Sayuri

Tomorrow my parents are going to another one of those stupid retreats. I completely hate these things. I get that my dad wants to spend time with the rest of the Bojan, he doesn't get to see them half as much as he would like to and they are some of his most precious people, but I don't understand why I always have to go too. I always get stuck in a tent with my whiney ass cousin Naoko. She has to be the biggest loser ever, and she follows me around the whole damn time. I get no break from her whatsoever, its like the second we get there I've got the biggest pimple you've ever seen and no amount of Clearasil or Noxzema is going to get rid of it until we get home. Nobody else will put up with her for that long, not even her own brother and sister will volunteer to hang out with her. Hell, I wouldn't even put up with her, except that the last time I was mean to her I got caught.

It was at the summer retreat last year. Ryo and Ryuu, the best looking twins Suna or Konoha has to offer, had asked me to go out on the lake with them in their parents boat. I know what you're thinking, why would adult trust their 13 year old sons with anything as expensive at a boat, but it's totally not like that at all. Tenten and Kankouro's boat was in actuality little more than a glorified canoe. It was wider and had more seats then a canoe, and was far less likely to tip over, not that it would matter since we're all shinobi and can walk on water, but it certainly was nothing to write home about, we even had to row it, there wasn't even an engine, so there was very little we could do to damage this thing. Anyway, back to my story, the twins asked me to go out on the boat, and I of course said yes, since they are so totally cute. Side note-I am definitely kissing one of them on this years trip.

I start to leave with Ryuu and Ryo when I notice that Naoko is following us. I tried to pretend I didn't see her and hoped she would just catch a clue and realize I didn't want her to come, well it didn't happen. We kept walking and she kept following, eventually Ryuu pulled me over to the side, I'll admit that at first I thought he was going to try to kiss me because he was leaning in so close but he was really just getting close enough that I would hear him when he whispered, "Does she really have to come?"

"Yeah, sorry," I rolled my eyes and frowned so he'd know that it wasn't really what I wanted either.

When we got out onto the lake I started being a little flippant with her, well if I'm being honest maybe I was actually being a little mean. I started talking up all my accomplishments and bragging about how much control I was learning over the byakugan, and than I started asking her about her own. I know she doesn't do well in school and I know that her byakugan is one of the weakest in the whole clan, so I knew it would make her uncomfortable, maybe I was being more than just a little mean. Naoko is almost always at the bottom of our class, and it's a source of embarrassment for her but at the time I didn't care. It wasn't my fault she did poorly in school, and Ryo & Ryuu are her cousins, not mine, she should have felt more comfortable with them that I did, not less.

Unfortunately for me my dad had been watching us from the shore. One thing I can say about my dad with confidence is that he's completely overprotective of me. Seriously, sometimes its ridiculous. Anyway, he had been spying on us in the boat because he wanted to make sure I wasn't kissing either of the twins, apparently he's sure they are going to be "lecherous , just like their father was," whatever that means. Anyway, my damn father was watching us from the lake shore and just happened to be using his super sonic hearing to listen to our conversation. Why did it have to be my dad who has hearing like a dog?

When we got back to the camp he all pulls me aside to let me have it. "Sayuri I don't ever want to see you do that to your cousin again. How do you think your Aunt Hinata would feel if she knew you were doing your best to make Naoko feel stupid in front of her family? You better never do anything like that again. Inuzukas are known for their allegiance and you didn't show any. Loyalty to family and friends is the code of the Inuzuka, and today you went out of your way to break that code. I was ashamed to have you as my daughter today, and I never ever thought I would feel that way."

I love my dad so much, and hearing him say that to me was the most painful thing I've ever felt. I always want him to be proud of me and up until that moment he always had been. Having him be ashamed of me made me feel like crap. I'd never felt that low before and I haven't since. My dad has been at every thing I've ever done, cheering me on and supporting my every goal. Like when I was in the academy and I was in the spelling bee, it was down to the final two contestants, me and my cousin Hoshi. Everyone in the audience was quiet, until it was my turn, my dad started yelling, "Go Sayuri!! Kick her ass! Don't let Neji's kid beat you!!"

Then I heard my mother, "Kiba! Sit down, and stop yelling. You're embarrassing our little girl."

My dad slumped back into his seat looking forlorn. It had never crossed his mind that his cheering would embarrass me, in his head he thought I would want him there cheering for me, because when he was doing something he always wanted someone there to cheer for him. He looked so sorry that I felt bad for him, and at that moment I knew I had to win for him. If I won he would forget that he'd embarrassed me because he'd only be able to think about how happy he was that I'd won. I did win, and my uncle Neji congratulated me. My dad was grinning from ear to ear, and my mom had to restrain him from rubbing it in my uncle's face that Hoshi had not been the victor. That was one of the best moments in my life, having my dad so proud of me, it was almost as good as the day I graduated the academy and became a gennin.

In contrast that day at the lake was one of the worst moments in my life. So now I focus on never causing my father shame again. At every retreat I make sure I take Naoko with me everywhere I go and I make every effort I can to help her fit in. I don't know if its working but I know my dad is proud of me and that's all that matters. Just because I smile and parade around with Naoko during these retreats doesn't mean I like going to them. They still always suck, and I still spend most of the trips wishing I was back in the Hyuuga compound taking care of my Aunt Hinata's bird sanctuary, but at least now when I go I always see my dad smile at me.

The thing that bugs me the most about these trips though is not that they are usually extremely boring, or that I have to be nice to Naoko the whole time, or that there is no running water, no, the thing that bugs me the most about these trips is the questions I always have to answer when we get back. It never fails, every time we get back from a retreat I have to answer tons of stupid questions.

The Bojan is like the most famous group of shinobi ever. More people have heard of the Bojan than the legendary sennin or even the Yellow Flash. So every time we go on a retreat the shinobi at the academy want to know everything.

It's not that I mind talking about the trip, I would talk about the trip to anyone who wanted to know about it, but that's not what they want to know about. They really only want to hear about the Bojan. And I've found that they don't even really want to hear about the Bojan, what they want to hear about is fairy tales. I've found that when it comes to the Bojan, sometimes the myths are better than the facts. I've seen it over and over again. The person who asks the question is like completely obsessed with a particular member of the Bojan and they can't tell the difference between fact and fiction. Sometimes they are so invested in the fiction that the truth can devastate them. For example, after our winter retreat this guy Liu was waiting for me at my locker to ambush me with questions about my Uncle Gaara, this kid was a fanatic, he rattled off facts about the Kazekage like his birthday, his favorite color, the date Akatsuki removed Shukaku, and a whole bunch of other things, some that even I didn't know, the point is he was a fanatic, he had even made up his own trading cards of Gaara. I tried to just ignore him but he kept talking so I then tried to get away and brush him off, but then he said, "I heard the kazekage uses his sand to grind the fur and skin off live deer so he can have bloody really fresh meat for breakfast, did you eat it too?"

"What!?" I just about spit out the water I was drinking. I just stared at him, I didn't know what to say. That was absurd, just freaking ridiculous, my uncle Gaara was not a psycho, well anymore, according to my grandfather when he was my age Gaara had been a little psychotic, nobody in the family talks about it anymore, but apparently the rest of the village still did. I couldn't let people keep thinking horrible things like that about my uncle. "No, I had bacon and eggs, and my uncle doesn't do that anyway. He had Cocoa Puffs for breakfast every morning."

Liu looked distraught. His fantasies of a blood thirsty hero eating raw meat for breakfast to keep killer urges at bay had been drowned in the milky waves of my uncle's Cocoa Puffs. He almost couldn't believe it. His life long hero couldn't possibly eat normal cereal for breakfast. Sadly this reaction was incredibly common. I saw it all the time. People's fantasies are almost always more interesting than reality. This crap was another reason I was dreading this next retreat. I'd rather not go, than I could avoid the barrage of ridiculous questions that awaited my return.