Chapter Three: Invitation

Author's Note: BAAAAAAH! Another chapter! Enjoy!

Thank you very much for the reviews! I love and appreciate them all!

And seriously, there is a first generation Xbox game called JAWS: Unleashed. Pretty damn awesome!

Lunch came and TenTen found me. "Dariru-chan," she gestured towards another table, "Come sit with us!" I complied and followed her.

The table was full of people. The only ones I recognized sitting there were Lee and Neji. I had to sit next to some girl with awesome pink hair and Lee, while TenTen found her way next to Neji.

I loved it when people dye their hair such vibrant colors. In Junior High, my hair had been a different color every month. First blonde, then purple, red, blue, and finally green. Now it was my natural brown color.

Anyway, the girl was the first one I struck a conversation with. "I really like your hair!"

She looks at me with green eyes and a smile. "Thanks!"

"Have you done any other colors besides pink?"

She shakes her head and holds out a hand. "I'm Sakura by the way."

I shake her hand, "Dariru."

A boy with spiky blonde hair snorts and looks at me. "Isn't that a guy's a name?" Well, I'll give him points for recognizing me as a girl.

Before I could tell him 'no', Sakura slapped him upside the head—very hard I might add—and snaps at him. "Idiot! Of course it's not a boy's name! Don't be so rude next time, Naruto!"

He rubbed the back of his head and I mouthed an apology to him. That slap had sounded painful.

"Sasuke-kun!" A blonde girl squealed. I thought she was Hidan's buddy at first, but remembered that the mobster's friend had been male, not female. She hugged an ebony-haired boy from behind.

The boy looked like he was about to shoot himself as the girl rubbed her pretty face against his head. To be honest, the girl was dressed like a hooker and it made me feel sorry for the boy she was hugging.

The blonde looked at him and asked a bit too huskily, "How's your day been Sasuke-kun?"

Good lord woman, you're in a high school! Not Hooters!

"Ino!" Sakura yelled, "Get your filthy pig-knuckles off of him!"

Oh good lord, that poor boy had two girls yelling over him. I was tempted to try to divert their attention away from him, but then I remembered Sakura slapping Naruto across the head.

Sorry raven-head, but you're on your own.

I glanced over at Lee while Sakura was having a bitch-fit with Ino, and noticed him glaring at Sasuke. It was a shocker, considering how happy he had been the day before. I whispered to him, "What's with the death glare Lee?"

He blinked and sighed like his heart had been broken. "I don't get it. I show Sakura my affection for her whenever I can, but she always turns me down. Sasuke-san just has to look at her and she's all over him!" He choked his plastic fork with clenched fists. "What does he have that I don't?"

An emo haircut and attitude for starters.

Personally, I wasn't into the emo guys. Or any guy whose legs were thinner than mine.

But in Sakura's case, it seemed to be the type of guy she got wet over. And Lee was definitely the opposite of all things emo.

"Don't get yourself too caught up with girls," I said to him kindly. "To be honest, girls don't know what kind of guy they want to spend the rest of their lives with in high school. So give her some time," I patted his back with a smile. "Maybe she'll realize you're the best thing that ever happened to her one day."

Lee looked like he was about to cry. Before I could get a word in, he gets me in a bone-crushing bear hug. "Thank you Dariru-san!" He exclaims in my ear. "I will continue to adore Sakura-san from afar! And continue to be a good friend for her!"

By now everyone at the table was giving us strange looks. You can guess that I wanted to be anywhere else but here right now.

Thankfully, TenTen comes to my rescue. "Hey Lee! Let her go, she'll suffocate!"

He lets me go and apologizes while I gasp for air. Hopefully, I'll get a warning next time.

Ino worms her way between Sasuke and Neji. Her sky-blue eyes giving the ebony-haired boy lustful glances every chance she got.

No, not lovestruck, lustful. Trust me, there's a big difference between the two. Sakura, on the other hand, seemed to give him a mixture of the two. A nice combination.

Naruto glared at Sasuke before turning to the pink-haired girl. "Hey Sakura. How about we go to a movie some time?"

"With you? No way!" As she squealed out in protest, I could hear Lee's sigh of relief.

"Aw, why not?" He sounded disappointed, but he didn't have a rejected look on his face. It was as if he had expected that answer from her. Maybe he had asked her out before?

"It's not like Sasuke'll go out with you," He added, "He never goes out with anybody!"

Her green eyes flared and her fists clenched. I thought for sure that she was going to pop him in the mouth. Thankfully, she realized that they were still school and slammed her palms on the table instead. "You're a total pervert! That's why I won't go out with you!"

Oh, and you aren't? That's what I wanted to say. Unless you're a child, or had been completely sheltered for your whole life, everyone has had perverted thoughts before. Some people just like to share their fantasies.

I took the less insulting approach.

"Everyone's a pervert," I said in the blonde boy's defense. "Some more than others."

Ino blinked in confusion before giving me a nervous smile. "You know, for guy you sound an awful lot like a girl."

I could hear TenTen holding back her laughter. Sakura was about to correct the blonde girl, but I stopped her. "Yeah, I get that a lot," I said, trying to make my voice a little deeper without sounding too ridiculous. "I'm told I get it from my grandpa."

"Aw, that's adorable!" She cooed.

TenTen sounded like she was about to lose it and I couldn't help but bite the inside of my cheeks. I loved messing with people like this. Sometimes, they'd get so confused that they start to question their sexual orientation. It was so funny to watch the gears grind in their head. And Naruto looked even more confused.

Poor boy. Maybe he'll figure out it's just a joke.

"Good afternoon," A silky voice announced itself. I had to crane my neck to see the owner, and it made me wonder what else this school has in store for me.

To call him a "boy" did not seem like the proper term. This guy was closer to a man than most College students.

He looked like Sasuke but was older and had longer hair. Pale skin, onyx eyes, and a flawless face, jaw, and body it would seem. Unlike Sasuke, this man was dressed for business. A nice fitting white shirt and black slacks with matching belt. He was the type of guy that all girls would fantasize about at least once in their life time, no matter what their opinion of him was.

His companion did not seem like the "boy" type either. Then again, he didn't look like the human type.

I'm not joking when I say that this guy had blue skin. It was a light shade of blue, but it was still freakin' blue! Even his hair was a darker shade of the primary color! His face looked rough and his jaw tight. There were these little marks on his cheeks that looked like gills beneath his white, beady eyes. His nose was pretty big too. Just looking at him made me want to play JAWS: Unleashed.

"What do you want?" Sasuke grumbled. The sound of the boy's voice almost made me jump.

So the emo can speak. That's good to know.

"Just wanted to remind you and your friends about the party we're having this Friday," The pale man looked at everyone when he said this. "You're all welcome to come if you'd like."

I could barely hear him talk; only because I wasn't really paying attention to him. As rude as it might be, I was too busy staring at his blue partner, trying to figure out how all of that blue could have gotten on his skin. He wasn't even trying to hide it either. The man was wearing one of those gray wife-beater tank-tops and tan khaki shorts.

He caught me staring at him and I gave him a shy smile. To me, he looked pretty handsome. So when he gave me a confused look, I had to remind myself how much of a guy I looked like.

He even said, "No homo," to me as his buddy wrapped up the verbal invitation.

At this, I look at my tray of untouched food and began poking at a piece of broccoli. Maybe I should start rethinking my wardrobe?

The two left after the message was delivered. But as soon as they were out of ear-shot, I turned to TenTen and asked. "Who were those guys?"

Sakura heard my question and answered for the brunette. "You don't know?" She gasped. "That was Uchiha Itachi! He's one of the most popular guys in the school!"

At her words, Sasuke stabbed at his pizza with a spork. "Can we not talk about my brother?" He demanded more than asked. The pink haired girl gave him an apologetic look before looking down at a text book.

Well that would explain why the pale man had looked like Sasuke. "Okay, but what about the blue guy?" My curiosity was itching to know.

Again, TenTen was interrupted but by Ino this time. "That's Hoshigaki Kisame. He's basically Itachi's bodyguard to keep girls like Sakura off of him."

"I am not like one of those girls!" Sakura snapped back into her fury, but Ino ignored her.

"To be honest, I don't know why Itachi started hanging out with him in the first place. The guy's so weird lookin'. Not to mention he's a total nutcase."

Naruto nodded, "Yeah he is! This one time, I was over at Sasuke's house. And then that guy comes up to me and says 'Oh, I guess I'm gonna have to cut your hands off.'. And he was holding a huge butcher knife when he said it!"

I couldn't help but cringe at his words. Even though most of it must have been an exaggeration it was still kind of scary. Then again, the guy—Kisame right?- could have just been joking around with Naruto. Dark humor does exist after all. Though, it didn't help that the guy resembled a shark. And I could have sworn I had seen pointed teeth when he had said "no homo" to me.

That god damn blue bastard.

As soon as I had gotten home, I had gotten out my old Xbox and started playing JAWS: Unleashed. It's been four hours now and I was still playing the damn game. I wasn't even doing the main storyline either; I was just swimming around, killing swimmers, destroying boats, and killing dolphin pods.

Yeah, you heard me right. In this game, you get to play as Bruce. The most infamous shark in Hollywood.

Of course, the crappy camera angles made it difficult to maneuver, but I got over it...until the camera decided to give Bruce's almighty jaws a close-up.

I closed my eyes and reached blindly for the TV's remote. As soon as I found it I turned the screen off and opened my eyes. My heart was beating so fast in my chest and my hand was shaking like crazy.

I have a love/hate relationship with sharks. When they're on the TV, the computer, or in a book, I can deal with them (but even then I get a little frightened on occasion, as you have just seen. But that's rare). However, if you put me in one of those Shark Tunnels at the Aquarium, I become terrified. It's because of this shark-phobia that I can't go into the ocean or an empty swimming pool.

If you're confused, don't worry. It confuses me too. Hell, it's my phobia and even I don't understand why I can watch Shark Week without so much as a wince; but I can't even brave going through a secure glass tunnel.

And Hoshigaki Kisame was just making it worse. The guy looked like a shark but I wasn't afraid of him. In fact, I was more amazed than anything.

I turned off the Xbox before going to the kitchen table. I need to get started on my homework.