To R.S. Salvatore: Thank you for the review. I have pretty much decided to do a spinoff, so I hope it will be enjoyable.

To Anata Kiyoshi: … I don't know if I trust Naruto bungee jumping … I don't think he would survive to finish the last two days. Lol Thanks for the review!

To Still Not Dead Yet: Yeah, the fox theme popped up. I usually don't like to do that too much because apart from the kyubi, there is no tie to Naruto and foxes. It doesn't make sense to tie Naruto to a fox when there is no Kyubi in an AU story, but honestly I could not think of something else. I knew I wanted to do a build-a-bear thing because of the message, so I looked at the build-a-bear website for a while and honestly I could not think of what other animal would make sense.

Anyway, thank you for your reviews as always. I always look forward to what you will think of each chapter.

Eleven Pipers Piping

~*G*O*L*D*E*N*~

*beep*beep*

It took a while for Sasuke to realize that it was her own alarm clock that was making the strange sound. Even though it had only been a few days since she had used her alarm clock, it felt like so long. The past few days felt like an eternity. She had changed so much; she had transformed into a very different person. Everything around her seemed a little different now that she had a boyfriend.

A boyfriend. It was such a strange concept to grasp. Although things felt different, better, between her and Naruto, it was not like they were different people now that they had a different label for each other, but, at the same time, Sasuke felt different.

Now, when she woke up, she wanted, expected to see Naruto for breakfast. She was so used to Naruto waking her up with his crazy stunts that she did not like having to wake up to some electronic hunk of metal.

Yesterday, after a great day at the mall where Naruto had only got them kicked out of one of the shops, they had agreed to hang out at Naruto's apartment above the café for Christmas Eve since it would be closed for the holiday. Naruto decided it would be fun to bring a bunch of their friends over as well, which meant they both had spent the rest of the night calling people to see who was available and inviting them.

She had set her alarm for 6am in order to be able to get everything done that she wanted to get done before the party tonight. Although, at this very moment, as she lay under the warm covers of her bed, she could not help thinking about just staying in bed all day; however, she had too much to do and was too much of a perfectionist to allow herself to take time sleeping that she could be using to make sure everything was done perfectly.

So, with one more deep relaxing breath in her warm cocoon, she rolled out of bed to start the day. The first thing on her list: coffee, lots and lots of coffee. She had to admit that Naruto probably would not have had the chance to get to know her if he had not made the best coffee she could find in the city. Of course, that was not the only reason she liked him, but it sure was a nice bonus.

Over the years, Naruto had taught her a lot of tricks for making coffee. In hindsight, all the times he had come over to her apartment to teach her were probably not just friendly visits on his part. Actually, a lot of the little things Naruto had done around her over the years made a lot more sense, like letting her study in the café after closing when he was cleaning.

Sasuke snorted at the memory. That was the first time she had discovered how much of a pervert he could be. She had been so busy studying that she did not notice when the café had closed. After some unknown amount of time, she felt Naruto's presence behind her. When she whirled around, she found him looking down the front of her shirt.

"What the hell are you staring at?" Sasuke asked with a scowl.

"Uh…" Naruto had trailed off with a dumb look on his face. "I … uh … was just wondering what you were reading so intently?"

"Of course," she shot back. "Did you see anything interesting?"

"Absolutely!" he said vehemently.

"Pervert!" Sasuke yelled, punching him in the gut. Then, she quickly gathered her things and stormed out, leaving Naruto curled up on the floor clutching his stomach.

The ding from the coffee machine tore her out of the memory. Sasuke smiled as she poured her coffee into a mug. Despite having caught him doing perverted things around her, Sasuke knew he was a respectable guy, otherwise, she would have strangled him with one of his perverted outfits.

With a contented sigh, she sat down on one of the barstools for her counter and sipped her coffee. It was good, but still no where near as good as Naruto's. He would have to have him make her some when she saw him later. She smiled. It was nice knowing she had someone to go to for things she could not do herself, not that she would ever admit it to anyone, especially Naruto.

For now, she would just sit here and let the caffeine do its job. Sometimes, she wished she could just sit down with a warm cup of coffee forever. And, for a while she did just that, until the sound of the doorbell startled her awake again.

With a groan, she looked at her clock to realize it was still fairly early. Who would be at her door this early on Christmas Eve? When the doorbell started ringing over and over and over and over, Sasuke decided only one person she knew could be this annoying this early in the morning. Curse Naruto for being a morning person. Hadn't they agreed to meet this evening?

She threw on a robe over her pajamas and then trudged groggily down to the front door.

"What?" she snapped as she opened to door to reveal … not Naruto.

"Do you always answer the door so aggressively?" the man at the door asked in amusement.

"What are you doing here, Kakashi?" Sasuke snapped.

"Can't an uncle visit his niece on Christmas Eve?" he teased her.

"Where's Aunt Obito?" Sasuke countered. Kakashi had married her father's sister Obito before Sasuke had even been born, so Kakashi had been her annoying old uncle for her whole life. However, usually, Aunt Obito had him relatively under control.

"She has already gone over to the Uchiha mansion to set up for Christmas," he explained. "So, I was tasked with bringing you home."

Sasuke froze. "I … was not planning to leave until tomorrow, so I could be home in time for the Christmas dinner," she said stiffly.

"Yeah, yeah, we all know you like to wait to come home until you absolutely have to, but your aunt and I were thinking that maybe we could actually spend the whole holiday together this year," he said in the tone that said he was no longer just joking around.

"Why don't we talk inside? It's getting cold out here in the hallway," he offered softly.

Sasuke moved aside and followed him mechanically into the living room. No. No. NO! She could not go home now. She had plans to be with Naruto tonight and tomorrow morning. It's not that she did not love her brother and aunt and uncle, but she enjoyed her life here as well. Even before Naruto had become her official boyfriend, she liked to hang around her apartment for a few days before heading home in order to do all the things around town with her friends, perhaps especially Naruto, that she did not have time to do during the school year.

"Why do I have to go home early?" Sasuke asked as she sat in the chair across from where her uncle was sitting on the couch.

"Is it such a horrible thought to spend Christmas Eve and Christmas morning with your family," he asked with an eerily neutral voice.

Sasuke was silent for a moment longer before saying, "I already have plans for tonight. As I said, I was not going to go home until tomorrow, so there was no reason not to make plans with my friends."

It was Kakashi's turn to be silent. Sasuke had to greatly resist the urge to flinch under his questioning gaze.

"You know I usually spend the first week after I get out of school with my friends," she continued to break the silence.

"Mmhmm," he grunted. Then he broke out in a disturbingly huge smile. "Why don't you invite your friends to come over to the mansion for tonight?" he suggested.

Sasuke snorted. "No," she said curtly.

"Aww … why can't you be my cute wittle neice who used to insist that the whole family stayed together in the mansion on Christmas eve?"

Sasuke froze. "You know why!" she snapped. "I'll see you tomorrow! Now, get out of my apartment!"

Kakashi sighed. He knew he was pushing it with his last remark, but he had hoped maybe they had finally reached a point where she would be able to handle it. "Maybe it's time to forget about the past," he chided softly. Without another word, he stood up to leave. As he passed Sasuke, he placed a hand softly on her shoulder, but she just moved her shoulder and turned away. "I love you, kiddo," he called from the hallway before leaving the apartment.

Sasuke threw a pillow as hard as she could towards the hallway. Why did this have to happen now? She was finally feeling somewhat happy with her life and now her uncle had to come and remind her of all the skeletons in her past.

Her heart was starting to crumble all over again, but now she had a choice. She could let everything fall apart and lock herself away in her grief like she had done until now or she could take a chance that things were different now with Naruto. Sasuke could never know it at the time, but this would be the defining moment of her life.

However, in the present, all Sasuke could think about was getting away from here. She ran into her room and threw on some jeans and a sweater. Then, she ran out of her apartment in her slippers without even locking the door behind her. Before she could really think about it, Sasuke was pounding on the front door of the café, which was closed for Christmas Eve.

After a minute, her mind cleared a bit and she remembered Naruto telling her about a hidden key somewhere around … ah there it was under the bush. She quickly unlocked the door and rand to the stairs at the back of the café that led to Naruto's apartment on the second floor.

She ran up the stairs and at the top of the stairs, froze. "WHAT DID YOU DO!" Sasuke yelled.

It would have taken a huge shock to break her out of the state she was in and sure enough, Naruto had done just that. Sasuke found Naruto surrounded by white suds that seemed to be covering every inch of the apartment.

"Sasuke!" Naruto gasped. He tried to stand up, but slipped and fell flat on his back with a wheeze.

Sasuke sighed and then carefully inched her way over to Naruto. The floor felt like ice under her feet. "Are you okay, idiot?" she asked as she finally reached him and knelt down next to him.

"Fi~ine," he chocked out. He looked up and gave a half smile with his face covered with bubbles.

Sasuke chuckled lightly and wiped some of the foam off of Naruto's face. "What is all this?" she asked much more quietly this time.

"Day Eleven gone very, very wrong," he said, then blew some bubbles off his mouth.

"*sigh* Explain."

"To my smokin' true love,

On the eleventh day of Christmas,

My true love gave to me

Eleven Pipers Piping."

"Oo~ookay," Sasuke said slowly.

Naruto sighed dramatically. "It was supposed to be eleven bubble pipes that would go off when you walked through the door creating a pretty snow effect, … bu~ut the tubes connecting them kept breaking, the bubbles kept going off on their own, the pipes kept falling, then the bubble stuff got into the vents and everything really started getting bad … ehhehe …"

"Stupid," she chided, but with no real strength to it. She stared at him for a moment and then collapsed on top of him, snuggling into his shoulder.

".," Naruto stuttered, alarmed. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing," she said breathily. "Nothing is wrong when I have you."

~*A*N*G*E*L*~

I hope all of you (who celebrate it) have a wonderful Christmas tomorrow!