Chapter 30... holy hell how did I let this go on for this many chapters.... *sigh* Oh well, I've definitely been having a good time with this story and all your reviews have been amazing and very helpful. Wow... that kind of sounds like I'm announcing the last chapter doesn't it....

Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto or Concrete Angel

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Chapter Thirty:

"Sasuke?"

The sudden calling of his name woke the raven with a start, he had dosed off in the closet and someone was outside, in his room, looking for him.

The boy shook with fear. It could very well be Itachi, coming back before dawn to finish him off. Deciding that he didn't want his brother clinging to a pathetic life, wanting to kill him as brutally as he had their parents.

"Sasuke? Are you here?"

The raven curled up onto a tighter ball as far back into the corner of his dark closet. His knees were hugged closely to his chests and he was trembling excessively.

"Sasuke where are you?"

The voice was closer. Sasuke couldn't help but whimper as he cried as silently as he could in his frightened state. Please Itachi, don't kill me! Was all that was going through his mind.

Suddenly the door opened, flooding his dim enclosed space with horrifying light. Sasuke shut his eyes tightly against a brightness his eyes were extremely sensitive to from being in complete darkness for endless hours.

"Sasuke, are you okay?" A concerned voice called to him as he tried to distance himself from the world. Reluctantly he opened his eyes after he confirmed that the voice did not belong to his brother.

In his mind he saw two regular police officers who did not belong to the Uchiha clan's guard. They had come to investigate after no one had showed up at work or even exit the Uchiha district. After finding the place massacred they called in back-up and searched all the houses for any residents that may have survived. They'd found the young boy inside his closet late into the afternoon. However, he was shocked to find a blonde haired boy, his own age, leaning in from his closet door instead.

"Na... Naruto?" The raven asked, confused to see a person from the present day when he had been so caught up in the memory of his past. It was such a real dream... or daydream that he believed he was his younger seven-year old self again.

"Why are you in the closet, what happened?" Naruto was equally, if not more so, confused and obviously extremely concerned for his unofficial boyfriend.

"I... uh..." Sasuke tried to think of an excuse but in his present state nothing could make sense in his head. Instead he ended up shaking his head as the tears continued to fall from his eyes.

Naruto was quickly inside the closet with him, as close to him as he could get in the confined space. He rubbed the other's leg, trying to comfort him. Sasuke merely sobbed as he lay against the back of his closet, overwhelmed with his emotions. He hated himself for doing this, for showing his weakness to Naruto who was dealing with his own trauma but it felt good to finally let this go in front of someone he loved. It was better than when he had told Kiba the truth about his family, or most of it anyway. He remembered, though, that he hadn't cried in front of his best friend, even if he was tempted to.

Naruto slowly crawled closer, rubbing Sasuke's arm and the raven complied by sitting up and letting his head fall into Naruto's chest as he cried. Naruto pulled him tightly to himself using his left arm. He pressed his elbow against his back to hold him so he stroked the raven's hair as he felt the tears dampen his, or rather Sasuke's, t-shirt. He didn't know what Sasuke was crying over, but he suspected it was what he was so torn over before. Finally he was trusted to see the raven's weak side. Now all he wanted to do was hold the other and let him know that he was there for him, that he always would be and that he could be trusted to lean on.

They sat like this for a good half-hour before Sasuke started to calm down. He sniffed back the remaining tears and lifted his head from Naruto's chest. His eyes were set on the floor beneath them, not quite able to look the blonde in the eyes after being so open with his emotions before him.

However, he didn't move out of Naruto's embrace and certainly felt secure when the blonde kissed him gently on the forehead. It was reassuring to have the blonde with him, holding him, and he was glad he had come to his room in search of him.

They sat in silence for the longest time. Sasuke too embarrassed to speak first and explain himself, Naruto wanting to give Sasuke the time he needed and not pressure him into giving answers.

Sasuke knew, now, that he would have to inform Naruto about his past. He knew he could trust him, not that he hadn't before, he just hadn't wanted to trouble him with it. And he was far past that point by now.

"You probably never heard this..." Sasuke began in a thick voice that presumed he had no doubt been crying just before, "but, my whole family was murdered."

Naruto's eyes widened as he looked down upon the raven in his grip, whose own eyes were still refusing to meet his.

"I was seven... and I came home one day late from school. The Uchiha clan have their own district here on the outskirts of town, and everyone that evening was silent. No lights were on, no one was outside. I knew something as wrong and hurried home to find my parents... dead..."

Sasuke stopped and swallowed rising tears as the previously relived memories flashed through his mind. Naruto was silent but he didn't want to look up to see his reaction. "My older brother was there. Alive. He had a knife, and he confessed to killing every member of our family..."

"What?" Naruto gasped. He had never heard of this before. He had overheard old rumors about how Sasuke lived on his own with no family anymore, but he never knew that this was the cause of it. He figured that this was just a really deserted area because everyone was rich and worked or was away on business. He didn't know any of this, and it confused him that something as horrific as this could have been kept secret.

"The police who worked under the orders of most of my family, since we ran the police force, covered this up. Kept it a secret. I can't remember what they told people. It was either something about poisoned water or a gas leak... something strange like that. They never told the village that my clan had been murdered. Most didn't believe me, the soul survivor who was seven no less, when I told them that my brother had killed everyone. Itachi was a genius, he was well-respected by everyone, a real prodigy. So it was obvious they didn't want his image tainted, even though he was the only one whose body wasn't found.

"I knew why... I was the only one left to live. But no one wanted to believe me, so I kept it to myself all these years. A select few people know the truth of what really happened, others who do don't want to accept it. So eventually, since I couldn't confide in anyone, I learned to repress the memories, keep them locked away so I wouldn't have to be bothered by them.

"But recently... they've come back and started haunting me. I hate reliving them... they're terrifying... they make me so paranoid that he's going to come back and finish off the one he hadn't killed..." Sasuke was once again crying by this point.

Suddenly he felt himself pulled into a one arm embrace and he once again buried his face in Naruto's chest, crying onto the already damp t-shirt. He may not have been going into much detail, and he was purposely leaving out Itachi's recent phone call, but it was too much for him nonetheless. It was strange how he could always avoid some parts of the truth and still make it seem as though he was confessing the tragedies he's faced. Sure it was the truth, and he was confessing something that he'd only personally told two people now, but he was leaving out important details that could significantly affect Naruto.

"Sorry..." Sasuke's mumble was muffled and still thick with tears, "I'm not usually-"

"You don't have to apologize Sasuke," Naruto's voice, how soothing and reassuring it was, was unexpected for the teary raven who was normally the one comforting the blonde. "You can cry, it's alright."

Sasuke felt a lump rise in his throat as Naruto stroked his back and he couldn't help but let out a quiet sob as he continued to cry. He'd never cried so hard... not since that day. It was good to finally let all this out, after he'd held it in for so many years without ever touching upon it. It was probably not the best choice to ignore his looming past, but when it was so distant from him it was just easier for him to suppress it. For someone like Naruto, it was impossible to surppress his pain since the pain was renewed and relived everyday of his life.

He was thankful to have Naruto here, to watch and comfort him as he broke down in his arms. With his composure lost, Sasuke felt completely vulnerable but he also felt safe being in Naruto's arms, as weak and vulnerable as the blonde may have been himself.

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His knees were sore, but Naruto didn't complain as he sat there in Sasuke's closest with the raven pulled closely against his own body, crying full-heartily into his chest. He was so stunned that he couldn't think straight. His mind was going over old senarios, focusing on a day back when he was following Gaara.

"He understands me perfectly. We're the same. You could never understand the pain me and him have been through!" His words about Gaara and himself he'd chucked so forcefully at Sasuke were... horrible. Now that he knew the truth about why Sasuke always avoided his past in their previous discussions, before when everything seemed good between them as friends. Naruto never knew how much he must have insulted the raven at that time... how much he underestimated the pain Sasuke had been dealing with. He was such an insensitive jerk.

With a few more sniffs and sobs, he heard Sasuke clear his throat and lifted his face from Naruto's chest. Still the other seemed unable to look up at his own crystalline eyes. "Thanks..."

Naruto offered him a concerned smile, not sure if Sasuke would even be able to see it since he was avoiding eye contact. "Sasuke..." The blonde bit his lower lip and his pause caused Sasuke to glance up to finally look him in the face. "I... thanks for confiding in me... I don't know what... to say, but... I mean... I never realized..."

"You weren't supposed to... I wanted to make you think that you could depend on me without me sharing my past... I didn't want you to think that I was just confiding in you because I wanted to share my past with someone who was also in pain." Sasuke's voice was lacking confidence now and it was quiet.

It was strange for the blonde to see him in such a position and he found that Sasuke's words were true. He had envisioned Sasuke as such a strong, confident person who never had to bear the burdens of the world. He could face everything and stand so strong because he'd never been brought down by anything or restrained by a constant pain.

Obviously he was wrong... Sasuke was still very courageous, but this was because he'd endured so much pain and didn't allow it to weaken him. Not like Naruto had... Naruto was so useless compared to Sasuke. He couldn't stand on his own or defend himself... but here the tenacious raven sat, just as weak as Naruto had been everyday.

"I did... I let myself depend on you selfishly and never thought to myself that you might have gone through something worse than me..."

Sasuke sighed, "Don't think that way... I don't want you to think that what you're going through doesn't compare. What's happening to you is real and it hurts, and it doesn't mean anything less compared to what happened to me. You have every right to be in as much pain as I do. If anything... I'm weaker than you."

Naruto's eyes, which had previously fell to the side, jumped quickly to look the raven in his dark eyes.

"You're stronger than I could ever be... I was able to repress my pain and not deal with it. I couldn't handle it and I wasn't strong enough to face my fears. You... you live with your pain everyday. There was no escaping it and yet you managed to attend school and get good grades and live as normally as you could even with all the abuse.

"For me... I just locked all my pain up inside me and left it behind to not think about. It was as though nothing was holding me back from having a normal life, but now that the dreams are coming back... now that I'm being haunted by my past again... I'm reduced to a tearful wreck..." Sasuke gave a weak laugh as he looked up into Naruto's eyes, which stared down at him with astonishment.

Naruto could not believe Sasuke, someone he'd been reliant on, someone who'd been holding him up, was saying all this about him. He certainly had never considered himself to be anything more than a weak and cowardly individual. Never had he thought that someone, especially a person like Sasuke Uchiha, could view him otherwise.

"Hey," Sasuke drew his attention back to him, "thanks... I mean it. I'm really glad you're here."

Naruto's eyes warmed to the shy confession of the one still held by his arm. "I'm glad we're both here..."

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Thanks for reading! I hope you enjoyed this chapter. Sorry for taking so long with this update, been busy busy busy and traveling a lot. I doubt there will be another chapter for a while, finals are coming up soon and then it's home for christmas break, I'll most definitely have time over the holidays to write at least one chapter haha.

Oh and for those wondering about my comment at the very beginning... no this is not the last chapter, so much more to come hehe