Chapter 3:

The next morning comes as quickly as yesterday left. Naruto has had all this time to meditate on his feelings and really settle on them. He can feel his stomach churn and turn inside him. Butterflies, goosebumps, many sentiments go through his body. Most are new to him. He's a foreigner to most of these kinds of things.

Naruto never was the kind of guy to get emotional about a girl or, heck, even be attracted to one. This hasn't stopped most of the girls he's come across from throwing themselves onto him.

Both Naruto and his only real friend are standing next to each other while looking through their lockers and getting their belongings. Sasuke pats Naruto on the back vigorously. "Dude, I can't wait to see who the special girl is! This must be one kind of a girl if you like her, that's no easy feat." Says Sasuke to Naruto.

This makes Naruto more embarrassed than he was already.

"Is she hot?" Asks Sasuke.

"Define hot." replies Naruto.

"You know, cute face, stellar body, the works."

Naruto just shakes his head, "That's all superficial" he replies, "None of that is necessary. But I can see how you'd benefit from it!"

Sasuke gawks, "HA! You know what? That's..."

Right before he can finish his sentence a new face walks by with a piece of paper in her hand. Her face turns from one side to the other, looking for her locker, apparently.

"Hm..." Sasuke thinks aloud, "I've never seen that girl before! I guess she's a new student here. Too bad, she doesn't really have any outstanding features about her. What do you think Naruto?"

Naruto felt her presence, as soon as the girl passed by, he dug his face into his locker to hide from her. Or at least hide his red, flustered face.

"Whats wrong?" Asks Sasuke.

Naruto says from the inside of his locker, "That's her."

"Hm?"

"That's the girl."

Surprisingly, Sasuke turns to his friend, then looks at the girl. One plus one equals two.

"That girl?" Asks Sasuke repeatedly.

"Uh-huh." Naruto says shyly.

Sasuke still is doing the math in his head. How is it possible that the "hottest" guy in high school likes the most Plain Jane you've ever seen? It's hard to believe. Sasuke continues his gawking at Naruto, "Wow! No wonder you never liked any girls at school, you like average girls! Pale ones at that."

Naruto would let the ground swallow him up if possible. This is too much for him to handle. Get a grip, this isn't the worst thing ever. But alas, Naruto peaks his head out of his locker in sheer curiosity, or out of interest, to have a look at the new girl. Almost immediately, Hinatas head turns towards him and they make eye contact.

She gets all excited and walks up to Naruto. Rapidly he closes his locker door because Naruto knows that his locker probably has some things that Hinata should not be exposed to. He closes it so quickly that he squished some of Sasukes arm fat because he was leaning against his locker.

"Wow, look who's here! Not only do we live in the same apartment, but we also go to the same school! Crazy!" says Hinata cheerfully.

Naruto is still blushing furiously, but Hinata seems oblivious to all this. Naruto then says, "Guess so. That means high school just got better! Good to have you!"

"Likewise!" Hinata says, "Who knows? Maybe we'll even end up in the same home room!"

Hinata waves them goodbye and goes towards the other direction to find her homeroom. Naruto sighs a sigh of relief. That's over with, who knows? Maybe they wont be in the same classroom, or maybe even, they'll be in completely different ends of the school and never see each other.

Sasuke raises his eyebrow and pokes fun at Naruto, "What a surprise! Naruto actually being nice to a girl. This must be true love. True love I tell you! Straight from cupids arrow to your cold barely beating heart!"

Naruto grumbles and punches Sasukes arm. "Shut up!" Naruto says.

"Ok. I'll stop. I forgot how strong you are." Sasuke says caressing his arm and trying to relive his pain.

The two of them walk into the classroom ready to begin class. All the other students begin to follow behind them. Naruto doesn't delay, he takes his assigned seat immediately. Sasuke just stands next to him confusingly, "What? Why are you sitting? You and I usually stand and talk." Sasuke asks.

"Listen man. I… I can't talk right now. My heart… it's beating so fast… I think I'm going to have a heart attack." Naruto says while clenching his hands into a fist and grabbing his chest.

"Wait a sec..." says Sasuke flamboyantly, "Since when did you have a heart? Don't tell me, love is in the air! How romantic!"

Sasuke gets the ugliest look from Naruto, this scare him a bit and he backs off a step to give him a bit of space.

"Its true though." Sasuke says.

"Do you have any tums?" Naruto asks.

"What kind of man would I be if I carried tums around with me?"

"Ah, true, I guess you have a point."

Seemingly, out of nowhere, Sakura jumps into their conversation and hands Naruto a handful of pink tums.

"Here you go! I just happened to be in the area and I overheard you guys saying you needed this. So, here I come to the rescue!" Sakura says.

Naruto just grabs it from her hands begrudgingly and puts them into his mouth while he says, "Thank you I guess."

"Thank you? I think this is the first time you've ever said thank you to anyone in this god-forsaken school! This event must be saved for future reference." Sakura says as she pulls our a camera from her bra and hastily takes a picture of Naruto. She runs back to the other Naruto obsessed girls immediately after to show them her evidence.

All the crazed girls scramble around the picture like small mice with a piece or cheese, but this is stopped as soon as the teacher walks in.

"Alright class, take your seats, we have a long day ahead of us." The teacher says as the students in the classroom all sit down, "Good, now that everyone's seated, I'd like to introduce you to a new addition to our humble abode. Everybody, please welcome our new classmate. Hinata, come on in."