A/N: If any of you are wondering... Monk is a show about this detective guy. The amusing part about it is that he has all these phobias. But, as usual, I'm bad at describing things, so watch it for yourself, if you get the chance. :P

Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto, or any of the characters, or Monk. The only thing I own is this plot. :D

Burn City

I grabbed Hinata's hand as she was leaving. "When can I get out of this place and start work again?" I asked. I had always been impatient, and hated staying in one place, especially a hospital, where you were cooped up in a bed all day long. Hinata frowned and looked at her notes.

"Ano… Y-your burns are h-healing steadily… b-but I'm not sure y-yet. Maybe Dr. Shikamaru w-would know. But, let's just w-wait and see." She murmured. I bit my lip and turned back to the TV. Monk was on, which was good, because he was far more entertaining then the usual soap operas.

"He's the guy." I said and tilted my head in the direction of the TV where it showed the husband of the victim.

"H-how do you k-know?" She asked, also staring at the TV. I smirked, pleased that, for once, I knew something that someone else did not.

"He's pretty obvious… And Monk thinks so too, which means he is." I answered and sat up a little more, leaning heavily against the soft pillows. Hinata nodded and I tugged on her sleeve.

"Get me some water?" I asked. My throat was feeling especially dry today. Hinata said that it was healing, and that might be why, but I hated the dry, scratchy feeling in the back of my throat.

"Okay." She began to walk towards the door, but I reached out and grabbed her sleeve again.

"Oh, and ask Shikamaru when he thinks I'll be able to leave." I reminded her, and she bit her lip in reluctance but nodded. I smiled and turned back to the TV.

"I…I'll pray for you." She whispered, so softly I wasn't able to hear her over the loud buzz of the TV.

--Some hours later--

Shikamaru stepped into my room and pulled up his usual chair from the side. He watched me as I continued to stare out the window, almost lulled to sleep by the soft music coming from my stereo.

"So, Sasuke, I hear you've been asking Hinata how soon your burns will be completely healed." He finally said and, having caught my drowsy attention, I turned.

"Yeah… When do you think?" I asked and reached for my, newly filled, glass of water. He sighed and looked down at his note pad.

"I don't know, Sasuke. Probably a while from now." He paused as he saw my brows furrow into a frown. "After all, you haven't been in here that long." I groaned and went back to looking out the window. Shikamaru proceeded with checking my burns. He tapped my shoulder and I winced and turned to him, a hand hovering over the shoulder.

"Don't tap my burns!" I snapped. He smiled and shrugged, annoying me more.

"Hinata wanted me to tell you that someone else will be bringing you lunch today." He said and went back to scribbling notes on his pad. I sighed.

"Why?"

"Because she has more patients then you." I nodded, it's not like there was anything I could do about it. In fact, I shouldn't really have minded, but, I suppose, it's because she was my regular nurse, and it bugged me to suddenly have a change in my schedule.

"Which nurse is it?" I asked. "Ami? Kana? Mai? Yui…?"

"His name is Naruto. He's a friend of hers from the cafeteria." Shikamaru's voice cut through my thoughts and I stopped mentally naming all the nurses I knew. I scowled.

"A cafeteria worker?" I asked sarcastically. "Come on, I'm not that bad a patient." He smiled down at the pad.

"No, it's a sign that you're a good patient, and we don't have to worry about you anymore. After all, we wouldn't let anyone other then a nurse help you, in any way, if it wasn't that you were healing steadily." I raised an eyebrow.

"So you mean that now I'm not going to die at any moment." He looked up at me with those half-lidded eyes.

"Well, you're full of humor today aren't you?" He said and I shrugged. "Well, it's always a good thing to be in a good mood." He continued. In all actuality, he was ruining my mood. He got up and walked to the door, pausing for his usual last comment.

"It won't be a permanent thing, but I don't know how soon we can get a nurse to you… We're kind of full lately." He said and then closed the door behind him. I looked at the clock. One more hour until lunch.

--An hour later--

The door to my hospital room opened and I turned to greet my new "lunch carrier." I have to say that out of all the people I was expecting it wasn't the blonde, baby-faced, smiling man that walked into my room. I supposed he was handsome in his own, strange, way but that stupid, annoying, dopey grin simply ruined his features. He placed the tray on my bedside table and grinned at me. Wrong way to start a relationship.

"Hey, I'm Naruto Uzumaki!" He greeted me, with an excited voice. I rubbed my temples; how did Hinata bear with this man? I already couldn't stand him.

"Sasuke Uchiha." I grunted. He gestured at the food.

"Hinata said you liked tomatoes." He said, a little less excited now. If the excitement was just a sign of nervousness when he was meeting people, and he calmed down afterwards, then I might be able to bear with him. I turned on the tomatoes, one of the few happy things in my life, and attacked one with my fork, plopped it into my mouth, and sighed with happiness. Tomatoes, the only heaven on earth. They were always delicious, even if they were from the cafeteria.

Naruto shuffled his feet and the awkward silence fell down heavily on us. "So…" he said, and glanced at me with those huge, blue eyes. "What do you work as… Err, I mean, before you got burnt." I rolled my eyes.

"I'm a model." I said quietly and then shoved another tomato into my mouth, it bulged against my cheek. He raised an eyebrow and tilted his head.

"A model?, " he chuckled, "When you say model all I can imagine is a really pretty girl in short-shorts and a belly-shirt or something." I stared at the man; was he retarded?

"Well now you can imagine me." I said and turned back to my tomatoes, choosing to ignore the obnoxious fellow.

"In a belly-shirt and short-shorts?" His question jolted me out of my ignore-Naruto-at-all-costs mood and I stared down at my tomatoes, the image of me in a belly-shirt and short-shorts coming to my mind so quickly that I couldn't stop it. To my surprise, I found myself chuckling, though those chuckles soon turned to coughs, but more surprising was the fact that I found myself enjoying the laughter erupting from my throat.

The laughter was short lived though, for it soon turned to grating coughs, and I leaned back against my pillows heavily. "Water, water!" I rasped and Naruto dashed out of the room, soon back with a glass of water, which I gulped down. I sighed and laid the glass of water down on the bedside table before grinning, another surprising thing, up at him. "You just failed as a nurse." I said, my voice still slightly raspy.

Naruto burst into laughter and held his stomach as he leaned back, throwing his joyous cries to the ceiling.

--A few days later--

Shikamaru opened the door and held it open, which was surprisingly gentlemanly of him, and Hinata walked in, rolling in a man on a wheel-chair.

"H-hello, Sasuke," She said quietly and rolled the red-haired man to my bed. The red-head, slouched in his wheel chair, looked up at me, his eyes a strange, pale blue-green. I took him on in a staring contest and he finally looked away, averting his eyes to the side. He was kind of weird, no eyebrows, and a single, red tattoo on his forehead which said love. "Ano… T-this is Gaara. Gaara m-meet Sasuke." Her voice stumbled out and she smiled hesitantly. I raised an eyebrow at her questionably.

"So… What, exactly, is this?" I asked. I didn't mean to be rude, I just wanted to know why Hinata had suddenly rolled a weirdo red-head into my room.

"Ah… It's a recovery group. There's a-actually supposed t-to be three members, but, um, t-the third member of y-your group will be here a-another day." She answered in her usual, unsteady voice.

"The point of this little exercise is that, for the rest of the year, you're three-man-cell will be meeting, once each day, and talking about your experiences. It can be anything, how you got burned, or who your girlfriend is, excuse me Sasuke." Shikamaru finished for her, answering my question more effectively. I frowned; why hadn't they told me about this? Then again, they never told me about anything. Gaara looked back up at me.

"You didn't even know this was happening?" He asked, his voice strangely gruff. I scowled at him; the fool was mocking me! I opened my mouth, about to throw a retort back at him, but Shikamaru coughed. I glanced at Hinata, she was biting her lip and looking at the ground nervously, and leaned back against the pillows. Gaara smirked at me, his hairless eyes dancing. I growled softly. This was grand--I was stuck with the idiot for the rest of the year, which was then five months, and I already didn't like him. Maybe the third member would be better.

"For the first couple of days Hinata will accompany you, until she decides you're ready to go by yourself. You'll be going to each other's rooms for those days, but after that it'll be up to you to make the meetings, and to get along." Shikamaru continued and I muffled a chuckle; maybe I could skip, or not plan the meetings. Shikamaru, seeming as though he read my thoughts, answered that by continuing. "But, for a while, Hinata will make sure you're holding the appointments, and meeting each other. Getting along? Well… That'll be up to you."

I sighed but Gaara remained silent, his blank face impassive. It was slightly creepy. I was cold, and told that many times--mostly by disappointed fan girls--but this guy was different. I held emotion in me, and showed it, sometimes, though it was mostly frustration, but this man showed nothing. His face could change, as shown by him smirking at me before, but his eyes remained the same. There was no emotion in them. Just a cold blankness that reminded me so much of him.

I quickly averted my attention by glancing at Hinata. "So, should we start?" I asked.

"Good luck." Shikamaru said and patted Hinata's shoulder. "Behave." He continued, his gaze turning to us and transformed into a glare. Hinata waved goodbye to him and then pulled up the "Shikamaru's Session" chair, crossing her legs delicately underneath it, and folding her hands in her lap. An awkward silence hung over us and I reached for my magazine, but Hinata shook her head.

"Um, so I, um, think w-we should start off b-by, maybe, telling each other h-how we got burned?" She said and blushed at the effort. I shrugged, other than Sakura's death, there was nothing tragic for me in my story, and I didn't have to mention her to this jerk. Hopefully, Hinata wouldn't make me.

"I was in a plane crash." I said simply and shrugged again. Hinata glanced at me curiously but, to my relief, didn't mention Sakura. She looked over at Gaara and he returned her glance with a blank stare then looked at my picture of Sakura.

"Is she alive?" He asked and I pressed my lips into a thin line. No was the answer, but I didn't want to talk about her, not to him. Hinata coughed. Fine.

"No." I answered, taking pity on Hinata; it had to be so awkward for her. He smirked at me.

"Died in the plane crash? How tragic." He replied, sarcasm dripping on those two last words. Anger surged through me, but I remembered Hinata and stopped myself from yelling.

"Very." I said through my tightly clenched teeth. He smiled at me, but the smile was cruel, barely even a smile.

"What was she to you?" He asked and tapped the glass frame. I scowled, resisting the urge to grab his hand and make him stop touching her.

"My fiancé." I said, wishing he would drop it. He didn't.

"Oh? That's strange; you don't seem like the type who would want to be held down by one girl." He said, his white teeth showing as his smile widened. I smiled back, but the smile was as fake and stiff as his.

"I was… Until I met her. Do you know what it's like to be in love? It totally changes you." I retorted, keeping my voice low. Sakura would want me to tolerate him, even if he was a total idiot. He looked at the picture again, his calloused thumb brushing the pretty image of her face. Then he turned to me, his teeth and gums fully exposed.

"I doubt you would have stayed with her." He said.

"Why not?" I asked, my determination for staying calm quickly slipping out of my fingers.

"Well, I don't really think you were in love. I just think you wanted to try something new." He said and waved a large hand in the air. His eyes were narrowed and cruel, the same as his smile. "You can always get a girlfriend, but getting married? Plus, it feels different when you do things with your wife then when you do it with your girlfriend. After breaking her, I'm sure you would have left her, and she would have gone and caught another boy who would do the same thing. I mean, look at her. The pink hair? Looks like she was trying to catch some attention." He smiled. I stared at him.

It would have been alright if he had just insulted me, but insulting Sakura? She wasn't around to punch his face out. She was gone, maybe listening to this conversation from wherever she was and feeling as shocked as I did. Hinata gasped, but I didn't look at her. My eyes were stinging and fogging up, and I felt my shoulders shake.

"You… You son of a…" I picked up my glass of water, Hinata got me one hourly now, and threw it at him. His eyes widened and he ducked his head to the side, but it still hit him, only because my aim was off, and the glass shattering, the water spilling down his chest and into his lap. Hinata leaped to her feet.

"Sasuke!" She shouted and grabbed the handles of the wheel chair, rolling him away from me and stood in front of me. "That's enough, Sasuke Uchiha!" She said, her arms spread and her eyes narrowed. She had never been mad at me before, I had never heard her not stutter like that. I stared at her, my eyes wide, and a million thoughts racing through my head, blurring so badly I couldn't understand a single one.

"I…" I mumbled, and I felt myself drawing into myself. My shoulders were shaking, but I wasn't crying. I was just shocked. No one had ever insulted Sakura before. She was loved by everyone. And he didn't even know her. Hinata's face softened and she quickly pushed Gaara out of the room, calling for a nurse to take him back to his room.

"S-Sasuke…" She said softly, the tips of her eyebrows raised in pity. I sat up straighter and shook my head.

"I'm alright." I said, softly but firmly. I didn't want her pity. I really didn't.

--A few days later--

Naruto walked into my room, placed the tray on the bed-side table, and sat at the end of my bed, flipping out his magazine. I reached over and pulled the tray into my lap, plopping the usual tomatoes into my mouth. I was relieved really, everything was normal. The sessions with Gaara had gone peacefully, though strained, and the third member of our "group" had managed to still not show up. Hinata said it was because he had an operation.

Naruto silently flipped through his magazine, glancing at me a few times, and then reached over and stole a tomato.

"Hey." I said, but I didn't really mind. If I wasn't satisfied with the amount of tomatoes I had eaten once I was finished I could always just send him for more. He smiled at me.

"So, how's your "recovery group" going?" He asked me. I had mentioned the group in one of our random small-talks but I hadn't given him any details, and apparently, Hinata hadn't either.

I shrugged, deciding to keep quiet about the first night. There was no need to raise the subject of how I felt about Sakura's death. In fact, he didn't even know about her. He had sent a few glances at the picture of her on my table, but hadn't really thought about it, after all many patients have pictures of their loved ones and I was no exception. Instead I decided to change the subject.

"By the way, I was wondering something." I said. He raised an eyebrow at me.

"Go ahead." He said and picked up another tomato. I frowned at him but continued.

"By looking at me, how soon do you think I'll be able to go back to work?" Naruto blinked at me, his blue eyes wide. He obviously hadn't been expecting that.

"Working as a model?" He asked and I nodded. I had decided I wanted to know exactly how bad I looked, and, from a unprofessional look, how soon one would expect me to get out. "I don't know Sasuke… I mean, I don't know anything so…" He said and nervously nibbled on his fingernail. I shrugged.

"How soon would you expect me to get out?" I asked, ignoring his reluctance.

"You won't like my answer." He said quietly. I didn't reply. "Fine, you win. Get out? A while. You were pretty badly burned, truth be told. And work? As a model? I don't know if you'll ever be able to do it again. Scarring, you know? Your face is worse then the rest of you, and you need a handsome face to be a model." I stared at him and then leaned back against the pillows.

"Seriously?" I asked. None of the doctors had been that candid with me. He nodded and averted his eyes, ashamed.

"I wasn't supposed to talk about it." He mumbled.

"A-about what?" Both of us started and we stared at Hinata, who stood in the doorway. One of her brows was raised, but a small blush was spread across her cheeks, obviously from forcing herself onto our conversation. Naruto jumped out of his seat.

"Hinata! You… um… what happened to your patient?" He asked. She stared up at him, the blush becoming redder.

"Um… H-he d-didn't m-make i-it through t-the o-o-operation…" She managed, stuttering worse then she ever did before. I raised an eyebrow, she did stutter, but not like that. Naruto's eyes were wide and reached over, pulling her into a warm embrace. I stared at them as Hinata's face turned bright red, and she clutched at his pale-blue sleeves. He pulled away, holding her arms, and looking her over.

"You okay?" He asked and she gave a small nod, staring into his blue eyes as if they were hypnotizing her. Something bubbled up inside of me and I clenched the white hospital sheets. She shook her head and stepped back, ramming against the door.

"Ah… S-since y-you've got e-everything under c-control, I-I'll leave a-and g-go…" She rushed out and stepped out of the room, slamming the door behind her. My lips twisted into a frown, but Naruto turned around, a smile lighting his face.

"She's so cute." He said and sat down again. "Always blushing, I don't know why. I mean, I've known her since we were kids, and yet she's still embarrassed." I frowned. Were they…?

"Are you two a couple?" I felt dread rise up in my chest, and a faint sprinkle of sweat on my forehead. What was happening to me? Why did I care? Naruto laughed.

"A couple? No way, dude! What made you think that?" He asked and grabbed my chicken. I smiled, oblivious to the fact that what he was chomping on was my chicken.

"Okay." I said and picked up a tomato, putting it in my mouth and humming tunelessly.

"Why?"

"Oh."

--Authors Note!!--

Okay, guys, one thing to clear up: I love Gaara. The only reason he's such a jerk is because it added drama. Don't worry, though, he'll come around eventually.

Well, we got some fluff, yes? Sasuke thinks of Hinata how? I'm not sure yet, but I think he has a crush but doesn't realize it yet. Like he's in denial. But he is pretty protective of her, anyway.

I'm sorry if I'm making Sasuke OOC, especially during the scene with Gaara. -shrug- I just couldn't think of any other way to do it. I give you permission to kill me.

blue. christmas. -- Thank you! It's encouraging to know that I'm in character, since I try really hard.

-cHi-1000-SpRiNgS-- Thank you for your reviews!One thing, though. I should know what you're talking about, I know, but I'm stupid so tell me, what's a x-fan…? I'm soooo confused… Anyway, whatever it is, I probably will know what you're talking about when it's clarified, and like it so… Clarification please!

book-fanatic14-- Yeah, I know, I don't like IC Hinata's either… But I try to make her IC anyway, because I feel that if you're going to write about someone you should make them how they really are, and Hinata is an honorable character, stuttering and all. But it is so annoying to write. And read… I hope I did alright in this chapter. :D

To all my reviewers-- Thank you so much for reviewing! You don't know, or maybe you do but I'm going to say that anyway, how much it helps me write and keeps me motivated! Plus, when I read them (the reviews), I get a warm, fuzzy feeling. And you know you want me to have a fuzzy feeling, right? XD

Are there any Fruits Basket/Furuba fans out there reading this story? Not to get off the subject of Naruto, but have any of you read the new nineteenth novel? I did, just recently, and was so disappointed. I'm a major supporter of Kyo and Tohru, and the description made it sound like there would be a lot of it, but there wasn't. Also I think it just got to light and fluffy at the end of the novel. It started out really dark, and then suddenly changed to happiness. Plus, Machi and Yuki are getting nowhere! They're just sitting ducks at this moment. Well, now I'm having large cravings for the twentieth novel and it comes out in July… Ugh. But, hopefully, there will be more Kyo and Tohru scenes… After all, it says in the description that Tohru finally tells Kyo of her feelings. But then again, you can never trust the description, I learned that the hard way this time. Ah, sorry for getting your minds off Naruto, but I had to rant.