TT_TT I have such understanding readers! Thanks for getting why I couldn't post in a while! Finals are a bitch and giant 200 point projects are worse, so thank you so much for not turning into angsty homicidal maniacs! Now onto the homicidal maniac you all came here to read about…. :)

Kesu

Chapter 3:

The Healer

"A job?" the farmer asked as he brought up his straw hat with his thumb so he could look at the kid better.

"Aren't you a bit young to be traveling around in the first place?" his son spoke up.

The farmer scratched the back of his head, ignoring his son. "Well, you know, I actually hire ninja from Konoha if I ever need more help here." he said undecidedly. "Maybe the blacksmith in town needs some help."

Naruto nodded. "Sure thing old man!" he grinned before walking down the dirt path toward a small rural town in Fire Country, Ryuk, though invisible to the farmer and his son, followed behind him.

--

"No, sorry kid, I just got an apprentice." the burley blacksmith said apologetically. "Try the baker."

--

"Yodai, that bastard, he knows I only trust my bakery to my daughters! I have no need for a good-for-nothing pauper! Go try somewhere else!"

Naruto sighed as the door got slammed in his face and went on to see if he could get a job somewhere. Each time he'd get a similar response to the first or second. After going to every shop in town, Naruto sighed, plopping down on the rim of the fountain in the center of the small town while Ryuk laughed up a storm at his misfortune.

"Excuse me? Are you looking for a job?" a girl asked softly as she put her hand on his shoulder. He looked up at the girl around his age with long black hair in a low ponytail and warm dark brown eyes, wearing a plain light blue kimono and carrying a small basket full of herbs.

"Uh, yeah I was." he said in surprise as she smiled kindly.

"Oh, that's wonderful, I think I have something you can help me with." she said sweetly. "You see, I'm the village's healer and I need someone to help me gather herbs, carry sick patients, or carry my herbs when my patients can't come to me. I'm also very busy so I can't really keep my house as clean as Id' like to and sometimes that interferes with my work. I'll provide housing and you get paid as well, just for a little help here and there." she said humbly, making Naruto's mainly paranoid mind wondering if it was even humanly possible to be as innocent as this girl. Of course, his paranoid mind also told him that this could be a trick and she was going to stab him when he wasn't looking, but he decided to take his chances since this little town was almost on the border of Fire country. Plus he needed a job.

"You got yourself a helper!" he grinned obnoxiously.

"Wonderful!" she cheered warmly. "My name is Tamiko. What's yours?"

Naruto resisted to sweat drop as he told her his name. Even her name suggested she was a good person.

--

Naruto looked around a small hut outside the village curiously. It was a little far and in the surrounding forest, but she explained that it made it easier for her to be near the herbs she needed. The inside was simple, just one traditional style room that was a kitchen, living room, and bedroom all combined in one cozily with the only other door leading to the bathroom. It was pretty empty. In one corner was a chest with two futons rolled up neatly next to it. In the opposite corner was an assortment of giant baskets that could be strapped to your backs filled with different kinds of dried herbs. Next to them was a large bookshelves full of jars that held different colored powders, liquids, and salves all organized and labeled neatly. Followed by a worktable with a herb book opened to a random page and different tools Naruto recognized could be used to grind the dried herbs into dust and mixed to form salves. Her kitchen was actually just a smaller table that could just be considered a cutting board next to a miniature traditional Japanese fireplace instead of a stove.

"She likes to keep things simple…" Ryuk noted as he looked around slightly impressed someone could actually live like this willingly when they didn't have to, thought he'd never admit it.

Naruto mentally agreed. Tamiko walked up to the table, set down her basket, and began to organized the different herbs she had. "It's not much, but please make yourself at home." she said, turning from her work and smiling at him.

Naruto stood awkwardly at the door for a moment, before setting down his bag on the floor. "So what do you want me to do?" he asked.

She chuckled. "I need to go to check up on the major's daughter and see how she's doing. She broke her leg the other day, and her mother told me earlier that little Keiko has gotten a fever from the pains. The perfect thing for that is meadowsweet. Can you find that for me? It's in one of jars up there." she said motioning up to the top shelf where she couldn't reach.

Naruto looked up and mentally curse the fact that he was almost a midget. Even Tamiko was taller than him. Meanwhile Tamiko was packing different supplies like bandages and splints into a straw woven box with straps on it so it worked like a backpack, but she turned to him when she noticed he was standing in front of the bookshelf contemplating if she was trying to make fun of him. She gasped when she noticed he couldn't reach the top.

"Oh, I'm sorry! I should have told you there was a stool." she apologies as she took out a simple wooden stool from under the table.

"It's ok," Naruto mumbled as he got the meadowsweet, but pause when he saw two jars labeled the same except they had different things inside. "Which jar is it?" he asked as he held the two jars to her.

"Wonderful! I need both!" she chirped happily as she gather the two jars, one filled with dried white little flower clusters while the other had a collection of clean roots. "I need to grind the plant for tea to help her fever. She'll need to chew the roots for the pain." she explained as she tucked a stray hair from her face behind her ear. She took some of the flowers from the jar and set them on the wedge of a stone and started to grind the dry plant with a strange wheel, making it a fine light green powder.

Naruto watched in awe as she meticulously worked with a smile on her face, putting the powder in a small clean jar before putting that and the roots in the straw box. She turned to him and smiled once she was done and handed him the box. "Come on now, we had to go help little Keiko to recover!" she said cheerfully. Naruto could only nod dumbly and Ryuk made sure to laugh at him for it.

"Hey kid." Ryuk said as he flew over to Naruto as sat taking a break after chopping enough firewood that could probably last Tamiko the whole upcoming winter.

Naruto took off the bandana he used to keep his growing blond hair from his face and used it to wipe some sweat from his face. "So you finally came back Ryuk?" he asked.

Ryuk merely cackled mysteriously. It'd been three months since he'd moved in and started working for Tamiko and Ryuk had gone away somewhere after a few days saying he was getting bored. Naruto really didn't mind, he'd learned a lot about healing, enough that he could be considered a mediocre healer, just slightly below Tamiko. He'd discovered not long after he'd met the strange cheerful girl that her mother had been a retired medical nin, so she could use medical justu too, she just preferred to keep that to herself unless the injury was serious or life threatening. Naruto couldn't use medical justu since his chakra control sucked, but Tamiko taught him about all the different herbs out there in the world even if she didn't always mean to. It seemed like she always felt the need to explain what a plant did and what she was going to do. She even did this when Naruto wasn't around, which he'd found out when he'd walked into her talking to herself after he'd come back from fishing in the nearby stream. He merely brushed it aside as habit though.

"So are you going to get going soon?" Ryuk asked suddenly, sounding impatient. Naruto thought about it for a second. He'd saved up his money over the past three months and he now had more than enough to travel farther than fire country which had been his original goal.

He nodded. "I'll probably leave soon."

"Good! I thought you'd be interesting, but so far the only thing you've done with your Death Note is kill Mizuki." Ryuk complained. "And if that isn't enough, you sealed up both that Scroll of Seals and the Death Note away!"

"I'm still in Fire Country. I can't risk taking the scroll out now." Naruto replied as he took out his chopsticks and a bento Tamiko had made him that morning from within the orange kimono top he wore now with black hakamas and began to eat.

Ryuk grumbled in annoyance, making Naruto give him a withered look. Sometimes Ryuk acted more like a child than he did, he thought idly. "I'd have to tell Tamiko first though."

"Tell me what?" Tamiko asked as she came up with a basket full of checkerberries and their leaves. Naruto immediately wondered where she got them since checkerberries didn't grow near here, though they did have a lot of uses especially in tea or when turned into an oil. Tamiko followed his gaze to the berries. "Oh, I almost forgot! I found some checkerberry bushes downstream! Isn't that wonderful?! I usually have to trade with merchants to ever get any! Come on! I need your help with gathering a seedling so I can grow one in my garden!" she said excitedly as she ran inside to put her basket away, while Naruto finished the rest of his lunch.

--

Naruto sat down tiredly once he got inside at dusk after planting the checkerberry seedling in Tamiko's garden behind the hut. Tamiko smiled at him and he returned it. After three months, he'd grown fond of the older girl. She really was naïve to how cruel people could be since she mostly spent her time gathering herbs and making medicine, mainly keeping to herself. She was also in good terms with everyone in the town, they practically adored her, even the grouchy baker. Even Naruto found himself counting her in his small list of precious people along with Iruka and the old man Hokage. He almost felt sorry he had to go, but he knew it wouldn't be safe for her if he stayed as long as he had the Scroll of Seals. He'd even thought of burning it, but quickly decided against it. He still planned to become a ninja and he might just learn something useful from it.

He sighed. So now to break the news to her.

Before he could tell her, she brought out a strange dish Naruto hadn't seen her cook before. Another thing he liked about her, she was great cook. Sure she'd taught Naruto how to cook, but his wasn't nearly as good at hers. It looked like a folded leaf around steamed glutinous rice flour and millet with pinkish purple mugwort on top. He didn't know what it was, but it smelled sweet and made his mouth water.

"That looks good. What is it?" he asked as she served some for both of them.

Tamiko beamed. "My mother always used to make this for me when I was little. It's called Fumanju, they're my favorite kind too, they're filled with honey adzuki bean paste!" she said happily as she ushered him to eat some.

Naruto was more than happy to dig in and when he took his first bite he immediately wondered how he had ever lived without ever tasting something so good. It beat ramen- like most of Tamiko's cooking- by a long shot. "This is delicious!" he exclaimed.

"Oh, that's wonderful!" she said happily, but paused and turned to the side to wipe her eyes with her sleeve. Naruto frowned, wondering what he'd done wrong as he heard her sob.

"Tamiko-chan?" he asked uncertainly when she wouldn't turn.

"It's just…" she started as she wiped her tears with her kimono sleeve. "I've wanted to cook that meal for someone else for so long, ever since my mother died." she said as she smiled through her tears. She brought a hand up to silence Naruto's questions. "I'm dying Naruto-kun. Even my mother couldn't cure me of my disease, she died trying. I know I'll die soon, I can feel it. Don't look at me like that Naruto-kun, I've known I would have to die someday. I'm just glad you came along." she kept her smile even though Naruto felt the stinging burn in his eyes. He choked back a sob as she continued. "I had distanced myself from most people, never really becoming attached to anyone since I always felt like I would die anyway. When I saw you in town three months ago, I felt like maybe I should at least have one friend before I go. Then I'll have someone to tell my mother about when I meet her again." she wiped away her tears with her sleeve. "I've been bearing my pain for years now, the pain has been catching up with me, not even my medicine will help anymore. I don't know how, but I know I probably won't wake up tomorrow. I feel cold and the pain is slowly leaving me." she crawled over to where Naruto sat tears making their way down his whiskered cheeks as he stared at her in shock. He tried to imagine how she could even move and stay cheerful all the time, but he only felt saddened by it. He never expected her to pull him into a hug. He buried his head into the crook of her shoulder like a child and sobbed, his heart wrenching with the pain of losing a loved one. One of his precious people. One he had no way of protecting. He felt so helpless as she clung to her as if keeping her close would keep her father from death.

"Will you do my a favor Naruto-kun?" she asked softly after a moment of silence. Naruto nodded into her shoulder, not wanting to pull away. "When I die, will you please bury me beside my garden? Some of my fondest memories are in that garden. Right beside the checkerberry sapling, so that even in death I'll be close to you."

--

He stared out at the yellow harvest moon in the night sky. A cool breeze that promised winter blew through Naruto's spiky blond hair that had grown out to look a lot like the fourth hokage. He stared out sadly, not being able to sleep when he knew that one of his precious people was dying in the room below the ceiling he sat on and he couldn't do anything to stop it. She'd left him her hut and her herbs and scrolls on medical jutsu even though he couldn't perform any. She said she'd wait for him along with her mother.

He could no longer cry, it was like he'd been wrung dry from all the liquid in his body. Ryuk landed on the roof beside him. "You knew she was dying." he said, it wasn't a question. "That's why you came back today."

"It wouldn't have changed anything if you knew." Ryuk said almost cackling. "So what are you going to do now?"

"I'll move on. I'll visit her so her memory won't die away, but I won't stay here." he said as he jumped off the roof and started to walk toward the small town.

"Hey, where're you going?" Ryuk asked.

"No one should pass onto nirvana without the taste of good sake on their lips." he said, remembering something the old man hokage had once said.

Ryuk merely cackled as if what he said held great amusement.

Tamiko means "child of the people"- or at least the website I got it from said so :P

kinda ties in with how she helps everyone in the village and would rather not get attention to herself since she's so humble, plus if you didn't notice, her favorite word is wonderful

sorry for the end being so sad, but Tamiko is going to be really important later