Cheat

by Interrogated Pyjamas

Warning: Language, Yaoi, Shounen-Ai, Boy/Boy, M/M.

Disclaimers: I want Naruto for my birthday. Then I can gift wrap him and send him off to Sasuke. I own NOTHING, seriously peoples.

I'm not gonna live my life on one side of an ampersand
and even if I went with you
I'm not the girl you think I am
and I'm not gonna match you
cause I'll lose my voice completely yeah
I'm just gonna watch you
Cause I'm not the one that's crazy


Ampersand by Amanda Palmer

I love it.

It was an unfamiliar environment. It was orange for a start, my room wasn't orange. It was peach. Okay, so maybe that is a shade of orange, but this room was a real orange, bright orange. I shifted up, distantly feeling the duvet pool round my waist, as I wracked my brain for how or why I was here. The party, Sasuke and Gaara, it all rushed back to me, my eyes pooled with tears again, but I refused to let them fall. I'd never cry because of him, ever again. I sighed, Sasuke would be hard to get over, I'd loved him, I still did. But if he wanted Gaara instead of me, there was nothing I could do but let them live their lives. I couldn't force Sasuke into loving me, I couldn't force Gaara into being my friend. I couldn't, and I wouldn't, force them into anything. They had what they wanted now. I wasn't in the way.

The scent of burnt toast wafted up from downstairs. You may not know it but I'm one of those people that refuses to eat toast if it has even a slight hint of brown on it, it has to be golden. Yeah … I'm odd. I got up, making sure to make the bed before I smoothed my clothes out. I'd slept in them, so it was a bit uncomfortable, but I hadn't wanted to impose anymore than I already had.

I wandered downstairs, glancing at the mirror in the hallway and taking in my appearance. I was a wreck, my eyes were still puffy, my hair limp and messy. I looked crap. Obviously, Hinata had heard me coming down the stairs as she glanced up the stairs to give me a comforting smile. I joined her at the dining table and took the toast she offered me. She'd done it exactly the way I liked it; just crispy, not burnt with the butter put straight on so it melted and made the bread soggy. That made life a fraction better. I've said it time and time before, but toast has healing powers, toast can make everything well in the world. Instead of blowing up parliamentary buildings and tube stations, we should be offering each other toast. Well, I think we should be anyway. The butter sooths me and it helps to stop the pain a little. It works when you're feeling ill, sick or just plain tired, but this time it didn't work. Toast obviously isn't the cure for a broken heart. Eugh, that sounded so pansy and weird.

Oh, listen to me, I sound such a mess. Meh, that's most probably because I am, I can't stop blubbering and sobbing, and my heart feels like it's going to fall straight out of my butt. Err... on second thoughts, that's not the best way to put it, but in a nutshell I was depressed, exhausted and heart broken. Nothing short of time could ever fix it. Sasuke most certainly could not. He'd gone too far this time. Way too far.

Both Kiba and Hinata are looking at me with a concerned light in their eyes now, and I saw that I had, in fact, let tears leak down my already stained cheeks. I'm perfectly fine though. It obviously wasn't meant to be. Sure, it'll take a while to get over him, and sure, I may not move on for a while, but I'll be fine. All I want is for him to be happy, and if that means me being removed from his life completely, then so be it. I sent the brightest smile I could muster towards the general direction of Kiba and Hinata's concerned faces. They knew it was false, they knew I was hurting far more than I ever had before. They knew I was trying to hold in all of the overflowing emotions bubbling in the pit of my stomach. That's why they were such good friends, they could read me instantly, they knew when something was up, when to comfort me, when to avoid me. I loved them for it.

A clear knock on the door broke me out of my wistful reminiscing. By the swift and powerful knocks it was plainly obvious who it was. It was Sakura, a good friend of both mine and Hinata's. She'd obviously heard about what happened and wanted to 'offer her condolences', so to speak. She rushed in, gathering me up into her arms. Seriously, what's with people gathering me up into their arms lately? She pulled back, taking a long and hard motherly look at me, before finally letting me sit back down.

"He doesn't deserve you," she pointed out. More like I didn't deserve him, I was never good enough, never willing enough. It had all been a lie. A huge monstrous lie that I never uncovered until it was too late. I obvious wasn't the things he'd said I was; funny, clever, beautiful. Gaara was the only one that's funny. Gaara was the clever one. Gaara was Sasuke's definition of beautiful. I mean seriously, he's gorgeous, and in a way I don't blame Sasuke for wanting him. Fiery hair framing wonderful green orbs set into milky skin. He was beautiful. And me? I was just a nobody he'd used, probably to get a cheap fuck or something. What did it matter now? School was starting in two days time, I was a wreck, and I needed to look at least halfway confident or I'd look like a dweeb in school. And well, let's face it, I'm a teenager. That's not happening anytime soon.

"Naruto, what you have to understand, is Sasuke's a hormonal teenager, and I don't think he's ready for a commitment to one... person. He just needs someone to be with, a nice little girlfriend who will put up with his crap. Preferably petite, bright hair of course, green eyes..." She was describing herself, as per usual. Oh, I forgot to mention, didn't I? Sakura had the hugest crush on Sasuke ever, she'd tried breaking us up, turning us against each other, none of it had worked, but now she had her 'chance'. Well that's obviously how she saw it. Honest to God though, if she makes him happy, I'm happy. At least I hope I am.

"And," she blabbered on, utterly convinced that it was her Sasuke was after, "I didn't tell you before, since I didn't want to stir anything up, you know? But Sasuke, lately, he's been giving me these sort of … looks. As if to say 'I want you', I ignored him, of course, but to be honest even though he is your ex, I don't think I'd be able to turn him down if he asked," she left the rest of her sentence hanging in the air, when he asks. You see now? Sakura is completely and utterly fixated on the idea that my boyfriend, or should I say ex-boyfriend, loves her. He doesn't. He loves Gaara. That much was plainly obvious.

I only had to endure another half hour of her garbage before excusing myself to go home. I thanked Kiba and Hinata, ensured them I was alright, and walked towards home. Yet, I never got there. For some reason I had a gut feeling not to head home so I didn't. I'm the kind of person who always trusts their gut feeling, it usually proves right in the end to be frank. So I head to Joker's, it was a club down town, owned by my older cousin Kyuubi Namikaze. He's some sort of club connoisseur or something, I dunno to be honest, I never paid much attention, but it was the only place I could really go in town. I slipped out my phone, it's awesome, a gorgeous orange Motorola Razr. Swisho. Pressing one for speed dial , I held the phone to my ear.

"Hello, this is the office of Kyuubi Namikaze, Ino Yamanako speaking, how can I help you?"

"Hiya Ino," I forcefully chirped, attempting to sound happy. It didn't work. Ino was a good friend of the mine, she knew when something was up. It was a shame to be honest because I only saw her when I went to visit Kyuubi and even then it was only brief, we kept in touch with e-mails and letters from time to time, but we seemed to be as close as we ever were for some strange reason.

She seemed happy enough to hear from me though, as we chatted whilst waiting for Kyuubi to get out of his meeting. She asked how my life was going, whether I was doing well in school and all of that useless knowledge. I answered truthfully, obviously, until she asked how Sasuke was and she noticed the pause.

"Oh no, Naruto, what happened?"

"Nothing," I choked out, barely keeping in a sob.

"Naruto baby," she cooed, "what happened? What did he do?" I let out a sob, knowing I'd basically told her I was hurting, it was okay though, she was like an older sister.

"Ino," I sobbed, is it just me, or am I sobbing an awful lot lately? "He … he cheated on me." It was so hard to say, sure I'd thought it, but actually confessing it out loud was a whole other level. It did make me feel a little better, I suppose, knowing that it was him that cheated on me. I never did anything wrong, I was a good lover, I loved him just as much as I thought he had loved me. And, I never betrayed him. Never betrayed him like he did me.

It confused me. It confused me so much that if he so desperately wanted to be with Gaara, why did he stay with me? He could have broken up with me. Sure I would have been heartbroken, but it would have been far better than this. We could have stayed friends, and to be honest I really didn't want to see his face again after that. Or maybe he just wanted to get rid of me completely and utterly. Completely 'delete' me, so to speak, from his life.

Ino comforted me, she always did. She made me feel like a person again, a complete and utter wreck of a person, but a person nonetheless.

The whole toast thing is about me. It's how I like my toast lol.
I had to get some toast while I was writing this.

Mm. Toasty Goodness.

Crap ending ... Meh
Toast to reviewers xD

I'm taking this opportunity to thank everyone who's reviewed:

My original plan was to individually reply to each reviewer, but I have loads of reviews, plus the ones on other stories so it's not really do-able if you want a chapter out. All I'd like to say is thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you so much. I love you guys and you've all given me the drive to keep going with this fic and all my others xD

I've tried a different sort of style on this fic to my others, so I'm glad you all like it.

I don't think I've had a single flamer which is shocking.

I'm not begging you guys for reviews,
But they do help.

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