Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto.

REVISED 5/30/2015

All posted chapters have been revised. This basically involved cleaned up typos, rewording a little dialogue, fixing a messed up name and correcting a continuity error. While there are very likely still errors because I'm not perfect, these should be a little cleaner. I have redone all that was already posted in order to get myself back in the game of writing. I know it's been getting close to a year now since I've last updated, but I am working on it. Life happened and I'm sorry but I'm back. And if it makes you feel better, my little sister is going to be badgering me to update and since I live with this person and I'll want her off my back, it is likely that you will get more frequent updates now.

No Thanks Necessary

Chapter 10

Shikamaru winced at the loud racket that had invaded the normally calm home of the Nara family.

Kiba, naturally boisterous as he was, would yell loudly and bang things around on the table and generally be a menace. Naruto, trying to compete, would be louder and even more boisterous, aided by his lack of proper socialization which had the blonde bellowing over the Inuzuka in no time flat.

Hollering above all of the din however was Hana Inuzuka, more than used to this type of behavior but knowing that it was utterly inappropriate in a setting outside of her own home and trying with mounting desperation to hush the two loudmouths down in the presence of a clan head and his family but all she actually did was add to the general ruckus that had taken over the kitchen.

Shikaku had to duck immediately upon entering the kitchen as a wad of rice sailed through the air, splatting onto the wall next to the open doorway. The patriarch arched an eyebrow which Shikamaru could only shrug in response to.

"Quiet!" Yoshino bellowed, bringing the chaos to a complete standstill. She had her hands planted firmly on her hips and glared down the children in her kitchen like they were an enemy on the battlefield. "What is going on in here?"

One sharply pointed finger was all it took to stop Kiba from speaking as the boy opened his mouth. "Nope. Hana?" She asked, eyes still locked on the boys.

"Um…Kiba said he could finish all of the food quicker than Naruto. Naruto challenged him back. Somehow it ended up all yelling and boasting and no actual eating."

Shikamaru saw his mother's knuckles whitening as she clenched tighter around the wooden spoon, thrust awkwardly from her side. He knew that usually this meant that someone was about to be hit – and for once it wasn't going to be him or dad…

"Kiba." She said sternly. "In your seat now." Kiba jumped down from his position standing on the chair and sat down, watching Yoshino wearily. "No talking. Eat your food, chew and swallow." Kiba jerked his head in a nod.

"Hana," she turned on the lone girl, "Thank you for trying, but screaming louder doesn't help."

Hana ducked her head, blushing lightly, and picked her chopsticks through her remaining breakfast. She smiled slightly though, when Yoshino rested her hand lightly on the girl's shoulder for a moment, nonverbally telling her that all was forgiven.

There was a slight sigh, "Naruto…" The blonde had sunk in to his chair, clutching his fingers around the seat. His face was screwed up in a grimace as he seemed to brace himself to whatever Yoshino was going to toss at him.

Shikamaru noted that his classmate actually looked like someone who was bracing for a beating. Normally he would have thought that odd. His mother wasn't going to mash Naruto's face in, at worst she would smack the back of your hand with the spoon. But Naruto was only a few days out of the hospital after being beaten by a classmate's parent – no wonder he was reacting badly to his mother.

A glance at his mother's face showed him that she had seen the reaction too. Her own expression curiously blank, she walked around the table and started to clear up the blonde's dishes – most of the food having flown to the floor or flopped on the table, or even into Naruto's hair. "Let's get you cleaned up and get you a little more to eat." She placed a hand softly on the child's shoulder, but Naruto flinched badly, making the chair creak with the force of his little body pushing back.

Yoshino Nara closed her eyes, breathing out through her nose. She pressed her lips together, the corners curling down in such a way that Shikamaru knew meant that she was sad or disappointed. Given the way that those corners were trembling ever so slightly, he would go with sad for this particular instance.

"Naruto." She said it quietly, not moving, hand still resting on his shoulder, but not squeezing or doing anything more than laying there. "How about you go wash up okay? Then meet me in the kitchen so that I can check how you're healing."

Naruto cracked one eye open and seemed to study the woman through the slit before nodding, quickly scuttling off of the chair and onto the other side, giving Shikaku a wide birth and darting down the hallway. A door slammed shut a second later.

There was a moment of silence in the room before Shikaku cleared his throat and walked over to the table, placing his hand gently on Shikamaru's back for a moment as he sat down next to the boy. Eyes kept shifting to the doorway that Naruto had just darted out of as everyone seemed to be trying to figure out what to say in the silence left in his wake.

Clearing his throat once again, Shikaku gave it a go. "Shikamaru, Kiba," the boys turned their attention to the Nara clan head, "Does Naruto always behave that way around grown-ups or is this something new?"

Kiba shrugged. "How should we know? The only adults who ever talk to Naruto are Iruka-sensei and that old ramen shop guy."

"What about your other instructors?" Yoshino inquired.

Here Shikamaru snorted, putting down his bowl of rice and looking at his mother with humorless eyes. "Naruto's never in class long enough to see him interact with anyone let alone the teachers."

Shikaku narrowed his eyes. "What do you mean son?"

Shikamaru sighed, this was so troublesome. "Iruka-sensei never kicks Naruto out, but Naruto is best behaved in Iruka-sensei's lectures. Everyone else just kicks him out of the classroom in the first five minutes to go stand in the hall."

Hana looked appalled, Shikaku resigned, but Yoshino had that same quivering lip, sad face that she had only just gotten rid of moments before.

Kiba chimed in, "Yeah! It's bul – um – bogus too! Totally bogus!"

Yoshino had quirked at eyebrow at Kiba's choice of language, whereas Hana entered with a question of her own. "What are you talking about Kiba?"

Kiba was on his feet, smirk on his lips as all attention focused on him. "They always says he is 'disrupting class' or 'causing a scene' or 'being disrespectful.' Even when he's not doing nothin'."

Shikaku glanced at Shikamaru, "Is this true?"

Shikamaru nodded and shrugged simultaneously. "Sometimes he is…but most of the time he's asking someone what page we're on, or to borrow a pencil, or telling someone who is picking on him to leave him alone. But sometimes his voice is too loud and it carries or the kid who is picking on Naruto claims that Naruto is picking on him instead."

Shikaku pushed his thumb and forefinger into the corners of his eyes. "Of course."

"And then they forget him out there." Kiba added.

"Forget him?" Yoshino asked.

Shikamaru sighed. "Yeah. They never go and get Naruto and tell him that he can come back in. Not once."

Hana looked scandalized, "But the Academy Handbook says that isolation punishment can never be more than 15 minutes."

Kiba snorted. "Right…they leave him out there until lunch, if it's morning, or the end of the day if it's afternoon."

"Or until Iruka-sensei comes back and pulls Naruto back into the room for his lectures." Shikamaru added. "Sometimes I think that's why he cuts school so often."

"What's the point if they don't let me go to class anyway?" Naruto's voice drifted from the doorway.

The group looked guilty at having been caught discussing the blonde without him there. He had changed his clothing into something equally garish as the last outfit and his hair was dripping a bit, having been rinsed out to remove wayward food particles. That Cheshire grin was yanked across his face but to Shikamaru it felt cold. This was the smile Naruto threw up whenever he wanted everyone to think that he was okay.

"Naruto!" Yoshino gave the boy a small smile, but it was the tone that caught Shikamaru's attention. It was the first time that someone who wasn't Iruka-sensei had sounded happy to see the blonde. A quick glance in that boy's direction told him that Naruto had noticed that as well. "Why don't you come with me into the other room and I can give you that check up!" She held out her hand in an open gesture but made no move towards the boy whose eyes darted between the offered appendage and her eyes which were nothing but gentle.

He slowly moved stepped forward and cautiously laid his small tanned palm within Yoshino's pale thin one. She ran her thumb once over his knuckles before gently pulling him towards the kitchen so she could do the exam without others watching. Naruto's eyes wouldn't leave the joined hands as they left the room.

Shikamaru's throat felt tight at the scene and he couldn't really explain why but Hana looked a little wispy eyed as well. Shikaku looked like he was deep in thought.

Kiba though was just deep into what was left of his breakfast.

Shikamaru scratched at his head and asked to be excused.

As he wandered back to his bedroom he shook his head. Things were different in the house now. Way more complicated – way more troublesome. A couple of kids who behave like pack animals, a kid who doesn't know how to behave like anything all shoved under the roof of a family who were used to rather calm interactions most of the time with an incredible detailed routine that was now going up in smoke.

Shikamaru just knew that the noisiness and the stress was going to increase.

But it is only temporary, he told himself. Once Mrs. Inuzuka clears through counseling, she'll have Kiba and Hana back. And once Naruto's apartment is rebuilt he'll be back there on his own.

Shikamaru shoved down the odd feeling in his gut at the thought of Naruto all alone in that apartment, in that run down building, in a part of town that had seen better days.

Shikamaru had walked in that part of town before, with his dad. People there had a pinched and desperate look about them. It wasn't just stray cats and dogs scrounging through the garbage there, people and even families did it. Desperate for something to use or eat or sell.

He couldn't imagine that Naruto's apartment was very home-like. More like a cell. Maybe that was why Naruto was so loud. It was his desperate plea against the silence. His scream into the void. Please notice me. Please acknowledge me. Please. Please. Please. Because he lived in a ghost house. An apartment devoid of life until he brought it in to rest at night. It was oppressive. It was terrifying. It was dismal. And so Naruto cried out to the world the only way he knew how, begging them to prove that he was there. That he existed. That he hadn't been absorbed by the lifelessness that was his "home" and to tell him that he was still someone. He was real. He was alive. Naruto needed that proved to him on a daily basis, because maybe sometimes, he honestly didn't know anymore.

Shikamaru shivered. He was overthinking things again. Curse of intellect, he'd heard his father say once, was to always look for the complicated when the simple was usually the answer.

Shikamaru promptly climbed out his window upon closing his door and headed off into the Nara woods. He needed peace and quiet and relaxation after that breakfast.

He was going to need it a lot.