Say It With A Straight Face

-

summary: "Okay, Sasuke, here's how you can prove you don't like Sakura. Say 'I don't like Sakura' five times with a straight face!" "I don't -twitch- like Sakura -smirk-" "HA! YOU DO!" "SHUT UP! I JUST... HAD TO SNEEZE!" Sure. Sequel to "Just Press 'Send' "

timeline: The characters are juniors in high school; I've also lumped Neji, Tenten, and Lee in with the juniors, to make it easier. I've made Temari and Kankuro seniors. A/U

Chapter Seven

"Hey, guys!" Sakura yelled, running towards Tenten, Ino, Shikamaru, Neji, and Kiba where they all stood just outside the front entrance of the high school on Monday morning, waiting for the bell to ring. The pink haired girl stopped in front of her friends, grinning, as she adjusted the strap of the messenger bag filled with books that was hanging off her shoulder.

"Hey, Sakura!" Ino smiled, looking up from her compact and eyeliner just long enough to examine her friend for a couple of seconds, "Where's Sasuke?" she asked, digging around in her purse for some mascara too. If Sakura didn't know better, she would have sworn that she could hear a sly tone to Ino's voice, but - wait a minute, this is Ino.

Sakura's face immediately went bright red, and she dropped her green eyes to the cracked, concrete sidewalk and its chewing guy smeared exterior. She picked at the strap of her bag, which she had a habit of doing when Ino grilled her like that, and said friend smirked. "Um... he's uh... with Naruto today. I think!" the pink haired girl blurted quickly.

"Why?" Tenten asked obliviously, not necessarily in on the drama yet, because her cell phone died that weekend. Tragic. "Doesn't he like always walk with you?" she went on unknowingly, as everyone else dead-panned at the brunette, slapping their foreheads, and Sakura looked about ready to pass out... or spontaneously combust. Or both.

"Male bonding or something. It's October 10 - Naruto's birthday," Sakura managed to say, before dumping her books out of her book bag and throwing it over her head.

"What's wrong with Sakura today? She's a little... jumpy," Tenten whispered to Neji. He arched an eyebrow at Tenten and gave her an incredulous look.

"What?? Am I missing something? Neji?!"

-sigh-

"Oh, here they come." The group turned around to see Naruto running towards them from the parking lot, dragging a very unhappy looking Sasuke behind him as they cut across the tree filled school grounds.

"Hi, guys!" the blonde shouted at the top of his lungs. He dragged Sasuke over to the others, grinning, with a sly glint in his blue eyes, "I AM BIRTHDAY KING!! YOU ALLMUST ADDRESS ME AS KING NARUTO McAWESOME PANTS FOR THE REST OF TODAY, PEASANTS!!" Everyone dead-panned and watched as he giggled excitedly and pulled a scepter and crown out of his back pack, "I. AM. KIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIING!!" he cried, jamming the crown on his blond head.

Rock Lee happened to pass them and witness the 'coronation' as he was doing his hourly laps. He stopped in front of Naruto and threw himself to the ground, "Congratulations, Your Majesty!! Consider me, Rock Lee, cool green beast, your loyal servant!!" he shouted, bowing to the ground, ignoring the gum stuck all over the concrete. Ew.

Everyone just sighed or hit their foreheads again. It is way too early in the morning for all this.

Naruto turned to his friends all staring bug-eyed at Lee on the ground, pointed, and grinned, "Now that's how you treat the birthday king!!" he turned to Lee, head held high in the air, "Nice!! Um... here... I knight you! Lord Bushy Brow, under my Ramen Armada!" he yelled, whacking Lee on the head with his scepter.

"Oh, thank you so much, Your Majesty! What an honor! I will be the best ramen knight ever!!" Lee shouted, his eyes brimming over. He raised a fist in the air, "I shall run these laps in your honor, my king! Then I must tell Gai-sensei of my knighthood! Oh, I am sure he will be so proud!!" He bowed again and ran off, screaming "LONG LIVE KING NARUTO McAWESOME PANTS!!"

Tenten and Neji looked at Lee then each other and sighed.

"Well?" Naruto looked at the others expectantly.

"Not. On. Your. Life," Sasuke said flatly.

"Nice try," Sakura smirked.

"If you think I'm bowing for you then you can think again!" Ino said in a threatening tone as she looked for her nail file.

"If you think I'm going to do that..." Shikamaru and Kiba warned.

"Hee, hee," Naruto grinned, scratching the back of his head, "Had to try."

"Here are your tests back!" Kakashi said brightly, walking into the room with a huge stack of papers that he could barely see over about ten minutes after first period was supposed to have begun. Everyone groaned.

Their teacher started passing back papers, "Great job, Sasuke," Kakashi said, handing him his paper back with a perfect score on it. Sasuke gave Naruto, who was visibly fuming, an I-told-you-so look. Naruto scowled then looked up at Kakashi expectantly. The man dug through the stack of papers for a minute. He glanced at the blond.

"Naruto... uh... I know you didn't cheat," He handed him a paper. "What's with the crown?" Kakashi stage-whispered to Sasuke, glancing at Naruto a little worriedly.

"You don't want to know," Sasuke groaned back.

"How do you know I didn't cheat?" Naruto asked eagerly, "Because I'm so smart? Because I'm too noble to cheat? Because -

"Look at your test, you idiot, and maybe you'll get it," Sasuke smirked, handing him the paper. There were marks all over it and a big, red 'D'.

Naruto sweat-dropped and stared at the test blankly. For five minutes. Sasuke was beginning to think the blond had gone into shock or something. Then the Uzumaki's face lit up into one of those grins only Naruto can do. He pulled out his eraser. Sasuke rolled his eyes as his friend started trying to scrub out the answers and steal the right answers off Sasuke's test while the Uchiha wasn't looking.

Kakashi didn't even look up from his book, "That won't work, Naruto," he said in an amused tone as he heard Sasuke scoff and Naruto start cursing and rub harder, making the eraser squeak, "I wrote you a note on the back," he said, offhandedly pointing to the test.

Naruto glared suspiciously and flipped over the test.

'Naruto, I know you, so I sprayed your test with hairspray. That means you can't erase your answers, replace them with Sasuke's, and say I made a mistake.'

-Love, Kakashi

Naruto groaned and started sweating, Kakashi chuckled into his lovely, little orange book, and Sasuke smirked.

Naruto scowled, giving up on his poor paper and moodily played with his eraser. Sasuke raised an eyebrow and watched as he suddenly grinned and took out a pencil. Honestly, that guy's moods changed like a PMSing girl. The Uchiha watched as Naruto drew half a smiley face on his eraser, and the other half on the other side, as if it was a whole smiley face folded in half.

Naruto flipped the eraser to one side, "Hi, I'm Bob," he said in a squeaky voice, as the eraser.

He flipped it over again, and in a deeper voice, "And I'm Todd."

-flip-

"Bob!"

-flip-

"Todd!

-flip-

"Bob!

-flip-

"Todd!"

"Bob-Todd-Bob-Todd-Bob-Todd-Bob-Todd-Bob-Todd-Bob-Todd-Bob-Todd-Bob-Todd-Bob-Todd-Bob-Todd-Bob-Todd-Bob-Todd-Bob-Todd-Bob-Todd-Bob-Todd-

"What the hell?!" Sasuke muttered, then grabbed the eraser and chucked it off the desk.

Naruto jumped up, knocking his chair into the guy sitting behind him, and ran to his eraser on the ground. He threw himself to the floor and knelt in front of the eraser, "WHYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY?! Why must the good die young?! No!! Bob!! Todd!! Can you hear me, my sons?! Don't go into the light!!"Naruto sobbed, cupping his hands around his eraser.

Okay, this is all happening right at the front of the classroom, and everyone is just staring, a little scared.

"Class!!" Kurenai shouted, gripping the sides of her desk as she tried to earn back the attention of her once again sleeping physics class.

All that could be heard was the assorted snoring of her disinterested teenagers.

"-wham!- WAKE UP, PEOPLE!!" Kurenai shouted, whacking the desk of the closest student with a ruler as hard as she could. The ruler broke in half. Poor student.

"Aah!!" Everyone's awake now.

"Good," Kurenai smirked evilly, playing with the one half of ruler in her hands as she paced back and forth in front of her groggy class. Some kids shifted uneasily in their seats and glanced at each other with scared looks. The only time Kurenai paced and did the scary evil laughter thing was when something bad was going to happen, like a pop test.

"...Kiba," Kurenai grinned sweetly, pointing her half of the ruler at the poor boy, almost giving his nose a splinter as she advanced on him, "Tell me how far you and Choji have gotten with your open ended physics project."

Kiba squirmed under her intense stare and the rest of the class's gawking eyes. He glared darkly at Choji a minute, then muttered, "Er, we really... haven't gotten quite... started... yet. Sorry."

Kurenai's rosy colored eyes narrowed, "Kiba, Choji, you realize this is due on Friday, experiment, presentation, report, and rough copies, at the beginning of my class, right?" Kiba swore under his breath and Choji dropped the bag of potato chips hidden under his desk and paled. Kurenai smiled another sweet smile, "I recommend you get started, gentlemen. I give no extensions."

She walked back to the front of the class, tucking a stray strand of wavy, dark hair behind her ear as she scanned the class for a new victim. Nearly everyone flinched.

Kurenai smiled, "Sakura. Tell me, how are you and Sasuke doing?"

Sakura's head shot up from the Fanfiction notebook she'd been sneakily reading in her lap, a shocked look in her eyes, "W-what did you just say, Sensei?" 'Did I just hear what I thought I heard?'

"You and Sasuke's project. How are you doing on it?"

"Oh," Sakura flushed. (And that, girls and boys, is why you pay attention in class, so you don't mix up your crush and your science project with what your teacher is talking about.) The girl's eyes flashed to Sasuke, who was silently looking down at his lap, and went an even brighter red. She managed to smile back at her teacher though, "We've already picked out our topic, written an outline, planned out an experiment, written a rough draft to about that far and cross referenced it with text evidence cited from research books," Sakura replied, trying to replay only the right parts of her weekend that answered the question.

"Really?" Kurenai said, sounding impressed. She smirked and glanced at the rest of the class who were staring all slack-jawed, "You all should make such an effort in this class," she grinned at Sakura and Sasuke, "Excellent, you two. My two best students. I knew it - you make a great pair!"

Sasuke and Sakura both went red in the face. They glanced at each other and quickly looked away, not speaking.

Sakura slipped into an empty seat in social studies, nearly missing the bell from stalling on her way out of physics so she wouldn't bump into a certain someone at their lockers. Of course, with her luck, Sasuke'd had the same idea, and they ended up getting left alone in the classroom for a while, and Kurenai started gushing about what an excellent partnership they were again. That, in turn, caused them to both flee the classroom, and end up literally bumping into each other at their lockers and scattering books and literature homework all over the hallway. The point is, it was a mess, and Sakura felt like it had left her with an especially huge, unforgiving headache, as she sank into a free chair towards the back of the room.

She rested her chin on her arms, yawned, and settled in on a good, long, note-taking-only lecture on World War II and its impacts on the economy, or something like that - she couldn't really read the board from way back here.

'Note to self - Visit the optometrist... or offer Ibiki-sensei penmanship lessons.'

"REVIEW!! What finally convinced Great Britain to join the war?!" Ibiki threw at a red haired boy with glasses in the front row. He glared, pointing a scarred finger at him, "WELL?!" the teacher barked. The boy started shaking and sweat beaded up on his forehead so much that his glasses kept sliding almost right off his nose.

"Uh... I, uh..."

"Come on, boy!" Ibiki roared, grabbing the boy's desk and leaning over to look him straight in the eye. The guy squeaked a little and scooted back in his chair, away from the crazy, bald, mutilated teacher. Well, wouldn't you too?

"WELL?!"

"I-I -gulp- d-don't know, s-s-s-sir."

"You don't know?! RUBBISH!!"

Sakura snickered and turned away from the sight of her teacher terrifying the first four rows of the classroom. As much as she loved seeing guys practically wet their pants in fear (okay, ew), she decided to scan the room for something more worthy of paying attention to. I mean seriously, Ibiki threw a desk out the window everyday before campus security ran in and dragged him out by his arms while he ranted about 'the Man' - nothing new there. Sakura's green eyes lit up and she sat up straighter as her sights happened to fall on Naruto and Hinata sitting where the three of them all normally sat together, when she wasn't late. She sat up straighter and grinned while she watched her two friends. Interesting.

As far as Sakura could tell, from that far away, Naruto was loud-whispering, for someone like Naruto simply can't whisper quietl, to Hinata about how he was birthday king. Sakura rolled her eyes.

'That idiot. He's never going to get a girlfriend if he keeps pulling stuff like that,' she thought irritably, tapping her fingers against the faux wood desk top. But wow, Hinata would probably get those little hearts for eyes even if he only spoke Dutch. I mean, he's bragging about a stupid crown made of plastic, gold paint, and... plastic, and the Hyuga's face was already about past a 7 on the 'How Red Can You Go?' scale. Tomatoes score a 6.5.

Sakura zoned out and rested her chin by propping it up with her elbow, idly running her fingers through her pink locks. She watched Naruto and Hinata talk all period, up to the point that Naruto smiled at her and leaned a little closer, and Hinata promptly fell over in her chair.

Sakura grinned to herself,' They're my new favorite couple!' she thought gleefully, 'Neji and Tenten are no fun - they've been together since 9th grade. Naruto and Hinata are so cute,' she sighed, 'I kind of wish Naruto would get a clue though. That's a little expected though, I guess. I mean, Kiba accidentally sent a him a carbon copy of the invites to the surprise party we're throwing Naruto tonight, and when he asked us about it we managed to convince him he was dreaming...'

"ATTENTION, MY YOUTHFUL STUDENTS!!" Gai shouted in gym class, "TODAY, MY WONDERFUL STUDENT BURSTING WITH YOUTHFULNESS, MY VERY SON THROUGH YOUTH, LEE, HAS INFORMED ME OF SOMETHING!!" Lee winked and gave a shiny thumbs up in the background, "IT IS NARUTO'S BIRTHDAY!! OH, NARUTO, THOUGH SOME SAY PASSING BIRTHDAYS ARE A SIGN OF LOSING YOUR YOUTHFULNESS TO AGE, I, GAI-SENSEI, GURU OF YOUTH, SAY NAY - IT IS ONLY THE BEGINNING OF OUR YOUTHFUL LIVES!! WHY, JUST LOOK AT ME!!" he struck the nice-guy pose, "MAY YOU CONTINUE TO GROW MORE BURSTING WITH YOUTH EVERY SECOND!!"

"NAY, MASTER, EVERY NANO SECOND!!" Lee cried, pumping his fist in the air as tears streamed out of his eyes. They finished grandly with identical flashing smiles and a thumps up.

Everyone sort of dead-panned at all the weirdness. Naruto grinned, "Soooo, does that mean I can pick what we do today?" he asked in his 'pretty please' voice.

"Yeah, sure, why not?" Gai agreed, flipping his hand nonchalantly. "NOW, I'M OFF TO CHALLENGE MY RIVAL!! KAKASHI!!" The kids in gym could swear they heard the sound of a door in the 11th grade math wing slam shut and footsteps running away.

"KAKASHI!!" Gai hollered, and took off running with Lee at his heels, giggling madly.

Naruto grinned, "Free day!!" he shouted, grabbing a basketball and chucking it at Sasuke's head, who scowled and barely managed to duck, "And you girls!" the blond shouted again over the din of kids starting to run around like the crazy, unsupervised idiots that they were, "Go put on some mini-skirts!!" he leered, spinning another basketball in his hands.

-SIZZLE-

"Uh... why are you all looking at me like that??"

-BLOOD LUST-

"Hey, w-what are you doing?! Don't come any closer!!

-GRRRR-

"Stay back!! I'M ARMED!!" -holds basketball in front of his face and shrieks like a girl-

-EVIL GRIN-

"OH, MY GOD! SASUKEEEEEEEEEEEE!! HELP!!"

"Huh? Did you just hear some - thing?" Sasuke asked Shikamaru and Neji in one of those halting, wooden, bad-acting voices, "Oh well, I guess I will just leave and walk to the bath - room. Way over here," he called out, dropping the basketball.

"DAMN YOU, SASUKE!!"

The sound of knuckles cracking drowned out his curse.

"U-UH... STAY BACK!! NOOO!! NOOOOOOOOOOO!!
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH!!"

Once Naruto was taken care of -cough- beat into bloody remains and left to fester under the bleachers and hanging upside down from the basketball rim by his shoe laces, Tenten grabbed Sakura by the wrist and dragged her to the volleyball net.

The brunette spun around and faced the pink haired girl who had a look that was somewhere between deep disapproval and 'You know I suck at sports; let me goof off, not play a freaking game of volleyball' on her face. Tenten grabbed a shiny, white volleyball out of a bin and held it in front of her face innocently as she made her best puppy dog face.

"No."

"Pwease, Sakura?"

"No."

"Pweeeeeeeeeease??" She batted her eyelashes ridiculously for good measure.

Said pink haired girl glared for a minute, then pouted. "Fine," she muttered darkly, snatching the ball out of a triumphantly smirking Tenten's hands, and accidentally let it slip off her fingers and fly halfway across the gym.

"But Hinata has to play too!" she yelled as she ran off to retrieve the ball.

Five minutes later, all three girls were setting the ball across the net, back and forth to each other.

"So, -thump of ball hitting Sakura in the head for the twentieth time- Hinata, what was Naruto telling you in Ibiki's?" Sakura asked innocently, giving the ball a dirty look before tossing it cautiously to Tenten, who hit it towards Hinata.

Hinata, who's A) pretty good at volleyball and B) aware of Sakura's brilliant lack of balance and coordination, went with the safe response... SPIKE THE BALL INTO SAKURA AND RUN.

As planned, Sakura dropped like a metal weight off the leaning tower of Pisa (seriously, Galileo should have been more careful - I mean, you could hit someone doing that) and Tenten started to help her up. Hinata ran for the locker rooms, so Tenten kind of... dropped Sakura (ow) and ran after the Hyuga.

Unfortunately for Hinata, her calculations didn't include Tenten's awesome sprinting skills, so she's caught.

"Okay, whatever happened, spill it," Tenten drawled calmly, walking Hinata back to their volleyball game and improvising her fingers as hand cuffs.

"HINATA!!" Sakura screamed angrily, towering above them with her face hidden in shadow, face red and temple vain throbbing as she cracked her knuckles ominously, "WHAT THE F-

"What'd he tell you?" Tenten cut Sakura off, totally ignoring the scary aura and whacking said pink-haired girl calmly on the head (and making her fall again) to shut her up.

"U-u-u-u-uh..." Hinata stuttered, her face going absolutely purple and her pale eyes darting around the room as she nervously twisted a lock of black hair from her pony tail around her finger. Tenten waited patiently and Sakura moaned and got up off the floor, rubbing her head.

"H-h-h-he j-just t-t-told me it w-was his b-birthday," Hinata stuttered out.

"And...?"

"H-h-h-h-h-he... a-asked m-me if... today was a good day to go out to the movies together!" Hinata squeaked, rushing the last part and altogether breaking the 'How Red Can You Go?' scale with her super blushing skills. Aw, man - that thing had no insurance!

"..."

"G-g-guys?"

"EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEK!!" they quite literally exploded, then without hesitation, jumped on Hinata, practically smothering her in a hug.

"OH MY GOD!!"

"THAT IDIOT FINALLY WIZENED UP!!"

"IT'S A BIRTHDAY MIRACLE!!"

"OMG - WHEN'S YOUR DATE?! WE CAN DO YOUR MAKE-UP AND STEAL THAT MINI-SKIRT INO BOUGHT LAST WEEK!!"

"WHEN'S THE WEDDING?!"

"HINATA!! I CAN BE YOUR BRIDE'S MAID, RIGHT?!"

"AH!! I CAN TOTALLY SEE YOUR DRESS ALREADY!!"

"YES!! BUT FIRST - YOUR DATE!!"

"YEAH, WHAT'D YOU TELL HIM?!"

Hinata sighed and looked down at her bright, white running shoes, "T-there is no d-date. I-I-I... oh, I f-fainted!" she wailed, turning around and starting to bang her head against the locker room door, muttering about her stupidity.

Sakura and Tenten quickly grabbed her hands and pulled her away from the door, before she gave herself a concussion. The patted her on the back sympathetically as the dark haired girl hid her face in her hands.

"Aw, don't worry, sweetie."

"Yeah, just leave it to Auntie Sakura and Auntie Tenten. We'll get your lovestruck idiot to ask again," Sakura grinned, the shadow of one of her evil smiles on her face as Tenten smirked and cracked her knuckles in the background.

Hinata went pale, "No! R-really, d-don't push him, g-guys. Promise m-me y-y-you won't. Please? I-I'd r-really want h-him to a-ask o-o-on his own."

"Aw, just kill our fun why don't you?"

"Does this mean the wedding's off?"

"Man, does this mean no little brunette Uzumakis running around?"

-thud-

"Hey, she fainted again." Sakura gave Tenten a blank look. "What? What'd I say?!"

"Tennie, you're really bugging me today. You know that?"

A few periods later, Sasuke and Naruto were sitting in boys' health class, both talking to try drowning out Jiraya's very 'enthusiastic' lesson and keep their minds pure. Of course, Naruto was doing all the talking, and Sasuke was only paying attention to him because it was either that or Jiraya's lesson on... never mind.

"Guess what, teme?"

"Hn."

"Do you even care?"

"Hn."

"Whatever, you bastard. Anyway, I asked Hinata to go to the movies with me today! I think I like her. You know - thatway. I used to love Sakura, but Hinata's just so much better for me, and she doesn't even beat me up! Don't you think, teme?"

"Hn... wait, what about Sakura?!"

"Oh, you didn't know, teme? Before you even met her on FanFunction or whatever, she used to some over to my house and we'd make out... and sometimes do a little more-

"..."

"-struggling to breathe as he tries to pry Sasuke's hands off his throat- God, -huff- Sasuke -wheeze- can't you even -cough- take a joke?!"

Said dark haired boy glared, before slowly releasing the blond.

Naruto scowled and rubbed his neck, gasping in air. Once he was over it though, he leaned over and leered at Sasuke, "Aww! Is wittle Sasuke-kins all overprotective of his new wittle girlfwiend?" Naruto teased, drawing little hearts in the air with his index fingers.

"Shut up."

"So are your sons going to have pink hair?"

"Shut up! She's not even my girlfriend! We're hardly even just friends! Have you seen us fighting? She's annoying!"

"I wasn't under the impression that you two were 'just friends' when you called me all stupid and giddy at freaking eight in the morning to tell me you kissed her," Naruto said, grinning slyly.

"... I was not 'giddy'."

"You were so giddy."

"Was I?"

"Uh huh."

"-scoff- Well, not as giddy as you over your precious Hinata a minute ago."

"-sigh- Yeah, she's awesome."

"Hn."

"Talk like a normal person, will you? Ask me when my date is."

"Hn."

"Ask."

"Hn."

"Giddy. Giddy-giddy-giddy-giddy-

"Shut up already! Fine, when's your date, you idiot?"

"Well, she kind of fainted after I told her," Naruto smiled sheepishly. His eyebrows pulled together worriedly, "What am I supposed to do, Sasuke? You have experience with girls now, you know, like Sakura. So give me some of your wisdom, do I, like, ask her again?"

"Uh-

"AHAAAAAAAA!!" Jiraya shouted, coming up behind them and clamping a hand on each of their shoulders, making them flinch, "GOTCHA!!" he crossed his arms and glanced down at both boys through narrowed, black eyes, "You kids are lucky this isn't any other class but mine, or you'd be in trouble for talking and disrupting my perfectly wonderful lecture. But this is a relationship issue! And I, Jiraya, am the ultimate lady's man!" he shouted, grinning widely and throwing a hand in the air very dramatically.

Blank stares from the class.

"Uh, yeah, just, ask her out again, okay kid?" Jiraya muttered, rolling his eyes.

"Heh, thanks, Pervy S- , I mean, Jiraya-sensei," Naruto grinned.

"Yeah, yeah," their gray-haired teacher waved a hand through the air nonchalantly, "But I think I'll finish up my lesson back here, so I know you two guys are paying attention," Jiraya smirked evilly as they both turned green, their eyes wide. The man stood in the aisle right between Sasuke and Naruto's desks. He cleared his throat and continued loudly, "And then, you just-

"Whoa, Sasuke, you look like you're gonna faint!"

Said Uchiha's very red face falls to the desk, muttering about his innocence being destroyed and a few choice swear words.

"There's a test on this, kids, so start memorising this! Bwa ha ha!"

The entire class groaned.

After their eighth and final period, Sasuke and Naruto were walking out of the fine arts hall together from the band hall and theatre class stage, when Naruto happened to spot Hinata stumbling out of the choir practice room. Naruto's face perked up, and he grinned.

"Later, bastard! I'm getting me a date!" the blond yelled, running towards Hinata at top speed. Luckily, he stopped before he ran into her or did something stupid like that. Sasuke smirked as he watched his best friend sling an arm around Hinata's shoulders and take her book bag for her, smiling like a normal person for once. Let's just say it was a good thing he took her bag, because Hinata's knees already looked like they were going to buckle any second even without the extra weight. Sasuke watched them leave, miraculously, without any episodes and/or fainting spells.

'Wow, the idiot really might be growing up,' he thought to himself, 'Well, at least now we can set up that stupid surprise party for him without having to worry about him walking in on us.' Smirking a little, he repositioned the book bag on his shoulders and turned around to head for his locker... and bumping into none other than Sakura, coming out of the art classroom. Sasuke's face immediately flushed, as did Sakura's.

'W-what? Wh-when did she switch to art?!' his mind stuttered at him, feeling very flustered.

They both shyly looked the other way, then headed in opposite directions to their lockers, forgetting, again, that they would just meet there again anyway.

Ten o' clock at night and a group of seriously pissed, very irritable teens were lying around Naruto's apartment, waiting for him and Hinata to get back from the movies. They'd all worked their butts off, trying to decorate as fast as possible so they could surprise Naruto when he came home, but so far they'd been waiting for SIX HOURS. Everyone just sort of laid on the floor now, bored out of their skulls and really hungry for cake they couldn't eat yet. Some of the orange crepe paper streamers were tearing and falling pathetically to the floor on one side. Balloons that had lost their helium were starting to fall back to the floor, looking all flat. There was even a small puddle of liquid chocolate in the kitchen, because the ice cream had started melting until Neji had the common sense to stuff it back in the freezer. The candles on the cake and on the table had burned down and hardened into little blue and orange and white lakes of wax. Can you say atmosphere of utter boredom and pathetic-ness?

Ino grunted and punched the pillow on the couch she was lying on, glaring irritably at everyone else. Stupid Shino, being all calm and... calm, and Kiba, with the dog. Man, they just pissed her off for some reason. And Lee, still standing at attention by the front door and occasionally throwing flower petals from only God knows where. He seriously believes he's a Ramen Knight? Idiot. And Shikamaru, man that guy pissed her off, sitting there playing chess by himself - looking all hott... and... hott. He can't at least play with Sakura? Show off. Jeez. And Sakura was like totally pissing her off the most. Sasuke too. They were still acting all retarded, blushing and being stiff and not talking to each other, and just being all awkward. It just burned Ino up. After Saturday, shouldn't they be like making out on the couch and actually having fun because they were together, or some romantic crap like that? Man, stupid, shy, annoying, weird people. And then Neji and Tenten, sitting there all balanced... and... couple-ish. Classic 'girl leans her head on guy's shoulder and guy wraps his arm around her and whispers to her' deal. It totally made her want to roll her eyes or kick them out of the rocking chair or SOMETHING. Why is this so freaking boring?!

Please excuse Ino - sounds like somebody's PMSing. But the point is that right now everyone feels more like lending a hand in Naruto's death than celebrating his birth.

Suddenly, the lock on the door clicked, and the front door swung open, revealing Naruto grinning and Hinata looking like she wanted nothing more than for the bag of popcorn currently being constricted by her arms to be big enough to hide behind.

"I-I-I h-had a r-r-r-really n-nice time tonight, N-naruto," Hinata smiled shyly, giving him a very cute, awkward, one-armed hug (popcorn being squeezed to death by the other arm, people), which Naruto returned enthusiastically.

"SURPRISE!!" Lee screamed, throwing a whole bucket of petals, again, no one knows where from, and taking off running out the front door, screaming.

"Yeah, happy birthday," a few people groaned weakly from the floor, lifting themselves up half-heartedly.

"God, I'm tired."

"Can we have cake now?"

Naruto looked up, seeing the surprise party for the first time, "Oh, hey, guys. Is this some sort of bingo party in my house? If so, it's just like this dream I had last night, where we were playing in the Atlantic Ocean and then this shark got my bingo card and started-

"It's a surprise party, idiot! And we just waited for you for SIX HOURS!!" everyone exploded.

"...oooooooooooooooooh..."

"HOW LONG DOES IT TAKE TO GO SEE A STUPID MOVIE?!"

"Oh, chill out, guys. Can't a guy go out with his girlfriend and watch Batman?" Naruto retorted, putting an arm around Hinata's waist and pulling her closer.

"G-g-g-g-girlfriend?" Hinata stuttered.

"Yeah," Naruto answered easily, a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth.

Surprisingly, Hinata didn't even faint.

"... so you saw Batman?"

Argh! -rips fingernails furiously into desk and through papers- This felt like such a filler! I wanted to give Naruto and Hinata their moment, but it wound up feeling random. Gah, I won't stray from the Sasuke and Sakura again. Although, I suppose I can argue that it really was alright, due to the emotional context, but whatever.

The eraser scene was for Michaelle, because we actually did that in our homeroom period last year (I was Sasuke and she was Naruto, of course.) I am soooo sad - she's moving away!! -cries-

Hapiness! This chapter is my longest yet! Over 6,000 words!

Next chapter we shall head back to Sasuke and Sakura, and see what's wrong with them. Bet you guys thought it was all peaches and cream from here on out. This chapter was a little Naruto and Hinata action for you all, and a salute to our favorite knucklehead's birthday. Like I said, next chapter is back to the SasuSaku, and please excuse my slow updating.

Thanks for your feedback. Much love.