AN: You know, I've been so good for so long, making Kon all pragmatic and traumatized... but guess what? It's Hormone Time. Stand by through the awkward teenaged encounter herein, I promise, something relevant happens.

These things I learned, in the months before Naruto went off to the Wave Country and came back a child with a prophecy to fulfill:

One: always ask someone to look at your hair before you waste two weeks trying to manipulate chakra…

And two: like that song says, living might mean taking chances, but they're worth taking; loving might be a mistake, but it's worth making.

Daily Schedule:

5 a.m: Get up to Gai and Lee pounding on my apartment's door, to find that they have walked on their hands to get me up for training.

5:30: Sit on Lee's back while he does 3,000 pushups, while wringing stones in order to strengthen my hands.

6:30: Walk on my hands to buy meat buns for breakfast; if I beat Lee there, he must do 400 jumping jacks. If I lose, I take his place and he does 400 low kicks. I always lose.

8:30: Neji and Tenten arrive from home. Tenten's hair is always perfect; so is Neji's, which I inevitably comment to Lee about.

9:00-12:00: Jutsu training (mostly chakra manipulation, which Gai has come up with to help up my speed)

12:01: Neji and Tenten pull out their lunch; Gai throws our rice balls on top of a rocky cliff and Lee and I must climb for sustenance.

2:00: Team spars. Neji is forbidden from using Gentle Fist on me, but he still zaps me when he can. I try not to let his snarky comments sting me. Tenten summons every weapon she has, for me to dodge; I have to learn fast, and it works. Finally I face Lee. He is unspeakably gentle, and will show me how to punch four hundred times if that's how many it takes. I love this part of the day just for the moments where he holds my waist and shows me the right stances, the magic steps.

3:00: Neji and Tenten head home, to study a while and loiter around doing teenager things. Even Gai is ready for a break. I go home and collapse, sweat-soaked and exhausted, into dreamless sleep.

5:00: But not for long. Then it's off to Gai's for 'special' training, which sounds perverted but is actually only weird beyond reason. While Gai does crunches (WHERE does he get the energy!), Lee inserts peanuts in between Gai's abs. Sensei shells them in this manner, which Lee throws to me. I am to 'read' a book of Shinobi physics aloud to them (mostly ad-libbing, because at this point I recognize about…ten hiragana), and catch the peanuts in a bowl without looking up; I am then made to eat the ones I drop. Gai and Lee then blindfold themselves, and try to catch the remaining peanuts which I am obliged to throw for their exercise. If Gai has a mission, we are obliged to torture ourselves in his absence, anyway; but we cheat and use candy.

6:00: Throw up peanuts/candy. Go down the street to the oden store and order a big, fat bowl of 5 ryou noodles. Nobody starves in Konoha. Crave latkes and sopapillas.

7:00: Collapse at home; occasionally fit in a shower if I smell so bad that I keep myself up.

Strangely, I preferred having Sensei around. When it was up to Lee to make up our training routine, bad things happened. Except for that one time…

Despite having the life drained from me by two spandex-clad lunatics and their seemingly endless reserves of energy, I still had some semblance of self. I became a girl again, instead of a quiet intruder who knew they didn't belong; I helped Naruto with his laundry, ran errands for Iruka-sensei, laughed for real again. My body was forgetting my old life, and my mind did- for a while. There were just too many good things happening.

I remember that day because it was the beginning of things I couldn't imagine.

It was one of those accursed days: Gai was off in the River Country on a prolonged mission, and Lee had come up with some new way to torture me. Without sensei's bouncy obsessiveness, Lee was notably quiet, as if a limb had fallen off…well, as quiet as Rock Lee can be.

Like I said: new 'training'. Lovely, I remember thinking. When it became clear that Lee was marching straight towards the river, this 'joy' only increased. Not only was Lee not going to take it easy on me, but he was going to drown me on top of it. I told him that, to which he responded, "Can you not swim well, Kon-chan?"

Stupid, stupid me...

"Just paddle your legs like- well, not like that!"

"WHAT THE FUCK DO YOU WANT ME TO DO!" I screamed, barely lifting my mouth from the gaping cold of the crystal water. At my insistence Lee had allowed me to knot a bit of rope around my waist, which was tied to a rock. I was to swim, against the significant current, back to the sandbar and to safety, and maybe I'd get some peanuts if I was good. As it stood, I had my feet buried in the river-bottom silt, trying to make Lee believe that I was buoyant and didn't need this lesson. My arms, however, were pin-wheeling in a distinctly unprofessional way, in the foreign world all around my neck.

"This is not quite so hard as you are making it!"

"IF I DIE, I'M GOING TO –blubbber- COME BACK FROM THE –blub- DEAD AND KILL YOU."

Lee seemed unconvinced; I hated him for sitting on that nice, dry rock with time-worn troughs carved into it's sides. It was still quite hot out, even as Fall approached; the cold water just reminded you of how miserably so. I'd had about enough of Green Beasts for the day.

"Kon-chan, you must try. Perhaps you need a bit of help-"

"NO, LEE, DON'T UNTIE THE ROPE, PLEASE-" Too late; the current finally prevailed against my spread stance, and knocked me beneath the roiling waters. I was never a swimmer in my other life, despite having grown up near the beach; I had nearly drowned in a pool when I was six, and had been wary of water ever since. Madre a dios!

I couldn't find up; my lungs felt bitten, bruised, tumbling in my chest as the current bounced me against the rounded rocks dotting it's silent bottom. The t-shirt someone had loaned me billowed, seeming to slow me even more, cloying a watery death. But what could you do? If I drowned here who knew where I'd end up: Narnia? Karakura Town? Who knew, and who controlled all this shit, anyway?

I heard the burst of my own body; my neck strained, searching for the land of Up- and there it was, bark-tasting breath and trash floating along the banks. I gasped hideously, choking on the water that was leaking painfully through my nose. Filled with air, I was lighter; I could float, I realized, if I would only relax. My head dipped back into the soundless world, and I loosened my muscles. Yes, I could survive in water, float to safety-

This reverie was interrupted by a Herculean splash and a wave of bubbles directly in front of me. My nose smashed into what felt like a ribbed wall of stone; I clung to the object instinctively, because it wasn't going anywhere, wrapping my legs around it and struggling to climb back up to the air. It was only when I was hacking directly in his face that I realized I was closer to Rock Lee than I could have ever dreamed: nosebleed close. All I could feel (besides my brain hemmoraging with hormonal impulses) was the tautness of the wet, suntanned skin I was gripping; his solid legs anchored in a torrent that had ripped me right off of my feet, and the even ripples of spine along his bunched, naked back. He had never been so heroic- or so shirtless. Spandexless.

"You really are not a very good swimmer, Kon-chan." Lee observed uselessly.

Letting go of him would mean being torn back into the water world, so I had no choice; I think I lost two quarts of blood, feeling him move bloody right up against me. All I could think was, do not move, do not move, he will get a hard-on and your mom will come here somehow and beat you to death for being so close to a boy-

"Are you alright, Kon-chan?"

"Gwaaaa…" was all I could mutter.

When his feet caught, he pitched forward, depositing me in a sitting position back on the original sands of comfort. Oh, bless dry land- bless oxygen, which had escaped me even after Lee had dragged me up to the surface. My heart was still throbbing. I wish I could say I was making up what happened next, but…alas. He'd pulled his jumpsuit down around his waist, knotting the sleeves around his waist (at least that lump wasn't what I'd thought it was…). Before reclothing himself, my eyebrow-endowed savior regarded the soggy bandages swelling, useless, from his arms, and shook them away. The appeal that those pitted, dark forearms and slim hands held for me practically turned my legs to jelly. Sunlight positively spangled off of a washboard set of abs and the most robust, solid chest that it had ever been my thrill to view; to dry that sopping bishounen hair, now in strands that revealed ears that begged to be nommed, required only a stiffening of his aqualine neck; I could even see the beads of water on his eyelashes. It was the most blatant appeal to every one of the fangirl preferences I'd forgotten that I had.

I put a hand over my mouth, two fingers between my eyes; I had to do something, or he would realize that I was burning a hole with my eyes in his unspeakably rigid stomach and every curvature of firm muscle that strained with his arms- lord, I knew girls who would have sold their souls to be sitting here.

Finally, the gaze of Olympus fell upon the poor mortal woman who he had saved; and with black eyes full of sweet care, he asked if I was alright, again.

"I'm fi-" I started to say; but as I drew the hand away from my face something wretched up in my throat, stunningly cool and silken. I threw myself down onto my hands and knees, choking- and with the movement of the hand I had held to my face, the water I had swallowed dashed itself against the shore.

I didn't believe what I had just seen; neither did Lee. He was so fascinated that he forgot to pull his shirt-part back up, which I pleasantly watched while I figured out what the hell I had just done.

Gai didn't have to come find me, the next morning. It was Lee (now sufficiently clothed) and I that tore up to his stodgy apartment door, down a hallway scraped an erstwhile butter-color from countless dings and shaded with grime. He must have been out cold, poor guy; we had to bang for a while before he appeared in the doorway. By this time we were beyond speech.

"SENSEI! SENSEI!" "SENSEI!" we shrieked, jumping up and down like toddlers.

"KON-CHAN-" "I DID-" "SHE MOVED THE-" "LEE BISHOUNEN-NO-JUTSU'ED!" "-THE WATER, SHE MOVED IT-"

"Whoa, you two!" he finally cried, a tired laugh rippling in a voice I had never heard from my zippy, blindingly-bright teacher. "Come inside and calm down! You're probably waking everyone in the building. And what'd you just say, Kon-chan?..."

"Do it, do it!" Lee whispered furiously once we were inside. He plopped a plastic cup of water onto the miniscule coffee table and practically sat me down in front of it; Gai was hovering in the semi-dark, while Lee's bright face circled like that of a hungry wolf. "Show him, show him!"

So I did. I slipped my hand into the cool of the liquid, and flexed my fingers; I could feel the chakra traveling outwards, and the indescribably linking that had occurred on the shore. Concentrating, I watched the ring on my finger come closer to my periphery. Indescribably, the water in the glass snaked out to follow my fingers, turning into a floating mass that hung above the table.

I wasn't disappointed; Lee and Gai set to exclaiming so that surely nobody else in the building was getting sleep. They demanded that I repeat the trick at least five times, and with each repetition I could exert better control over the quivering blob. I even managed to make it travel the length of the little table, from Gai to Lee. The moment I broke the chakra concentration, though, the mass of water splashed messily down, most ending up on the floor.

"Ah," Gai finally exclaimed. Lee was laughing with joy, those keen eyes watching my fingers as if they had suddenly become holy sacraments. "I'm guessing that your elemental chakra nature has been awakened, Kon-chan."

"The what of the who?" I asked incredulously. Holy mother- maybe I wasn't a failure after all!

"Every Shinobi has an element that they naturally heed to; it determines the kind of jutsu one can use. You seem to be a Water-type, given how you took to that. The talent of the Water ninja is an ability to meld their energy with the hydrogen bonds in water molecules, you see- and their chakra flows in a way that is more controlled than, say, Fire-type or Lightning-type."

"What do you mean, sensei!" Lee piped in.

"Ah, my eager pupils… listen good," the man said good-humoredly. "Fire-types have difficulty managing how much power they produce because of the unstable bond they have with the constantly-moving flame. My Earth elemental chakra is the perfect hindrance to Kakashi's Lightning-type, which is powerful but difficult to direct; Earth-types are sure and bold, but they have a hard time getting the energy moving and formed, you know? Lee's a total Earth-type; he's got no talent for chakra manipulation whatsoever!" I know, it sounded hurtful, but Lee just grinned anyway.

"Wind-type can really shuffle some chakra around," he continued, "but they are worse than even Fire at controlling how much energy they let out- It's like trying to catch the wind, literally! And Water-type, well- Water-types are in very good control of their energy; they can almost seamlessly meld with things and flow. Their weakness is, though, that you need a lot of water to accomplish anything, and your control loosens the more water you gather. A huge amount of training is required to become a successful Water-type, and even then most of them prefer to abide by their own strength. Do you two know, perhaps, the Seven Swordsmen of the Mist?"

"Zabuza!" I shouted; luckily, Gai didn't wonder where I'd gotten my information. It was all starting to come back. Gai was too excited, totally in the teaching element. "Right! By flowing power through a large sword, Water-types can increase the strength of regular blows, and even move at high speeds by swirling chakra on the soles of their feet! It's like spiritual silicone spray!"

"Awesome!" Lee shouted; with this he snatched my open palm and began inspecting it. He was so excited that I hardly knew what to say. Did he have such a good heart than even watching me- the one person who Neji thought a bigger letdown than him, absurdly old and yet possessing the skills of an Academy student- could really make him so genuinely happy? This boy had shared his beloved teacher, his time and boundless endurance with me; motivated and included me. As his thin fingers, cold, encircled my own warm ones, my heart petered so audibly that I'm sure Gai understood the look that washed over my face.

"But I don't want you getting too excited, Kon-chan," he suddenly interrupted; I thought his eyes narrowed. "Water-types are known to awaken earlier than other chakra types; they need the extra practice time, rest assured. This doesn't mean you get to take a break. No way! Your stamina is still so low, and your body so weak that you could be easily toppled! You're still nowhere near the level of the other Genin, even that one little spazzo, Naruto… Imagine, you, already a young lady and no better than Lee was at seven!"

I had lowered my head as Gai buttered these truths heavily over my accomplishment. The smart was unbelievable; I still had so far to go. The path seemed overwhelming, the climb insufferable; I'd hardly made it to sea level, and still the mountain loomed. That's what was running through my mind when I felt a soft caress; the warmth of Gai-sensei drawing close, and the lag of a kiss on my forehead.

"That said," he continued, light low on his smooth cheekbones, "I am so proud of you, Kon-chan. You have fought this far by yourself, and I promise to do everything I can to help you do what you are meant to: excel. You are truly a student to brag about."

… Had a teacher ever told me that before? Had my mother's murmurs of love meant as much as those words, her assurances that I could press on despite difficulty and huge assignments, competition and uncertainty? Yes. The whole humanity of my person had carried over into this world, at last: people recognized my hard work, and I had made someone proud. That was all I had ever tried to do.

Even though I'd been speaking more, I was completely silent in the face of this twist of fate. I sat with my hands cupped over my knees, two pairs of sable eyes looming like bright baubles in the sable brown of morning peeking over the window ledges- and threw myself into Gai's arms, crying with content.

I never wanted to see those faces fall. I would never shame him. I would never let him doubt me: this would be my nindo, my ninja way.