Here I am drowning in essays and a bunch of other crap and yet I present to you another chapter and a new summary. Enjoy!


It was only long hours that Soleil dedicated to etiquette and acting that stopped Hinata's jaw from dropping straight to the ground. The Uchiha clan was excellent with genjutsu, but she refused to believe that their heir would reduce himself to using his ability to amuse himself at her expense. Surely not.

An unusually bright smile appeared on Sasuke's face, not a hint of surprise or laughter in his eyes, and Hinata thought that perhaps it was her who was losing her mind. Was it normal? "Nii-san, I thought you wouldn't be back until next week!"

Itachi glanced back and gave Sasuke a small smile before returning to stirring a boiling pot. That was definitely a frilly apron he was wearing. Definitely a soft pastel green that looked absolutely ridiculous combined with the face of a shinobi who, at sixteen years of age, had a flee on sight warrant in most countries of the continent. That didn't happen just because. "No setbacks happened this time. Any requests?"

"Can you make onigiri?"

Itachi hummed his approval as he set down a wooden spoon in favor of pulling out rice. "How about you, Hinata-sama?"

She knew her face was already set aflame (she shouldn't stare) and her eyes were still wide as saucers. She opened and closed her mouth a couple of times as no sound came out. Hinata settled for a hushed, "I'm okay, thank you."

Sasuke took a seat and waved Hinata over. She silently joined him at the table and pulled out a book and a journal, ignoring the clear view of the Uchiha heir as he prepped the rice. He would not distract her from their project.

He would not.

But the face she saw in Bingo Books, stolen from enemy shinobi by her cousins, simply did not add up to the ruffled and ridiculously colored apron or the gentle expression on his face. It didn't match the ruthlessly efficient shinobi that the council and her father (don't think about it) wanted from her. In fact, he seemed so absurdly human, enjoying something as mundane as cooking that Hinata wanted to apologize for ever doubting it.

Hanging from a hook on the wall, another pastel apron caught her sight. Purple. It seemed like something the Uchiha clan's matriarch would wear and it made her think that the one Itachi was wearing was a gag gift of sorts. It was… endearing.

"We should try a full demonstration for our final project," Sasuke said, mindlessly scribbling notes on a journal. Hinata only offered a supportive nod as he continued his thought process. She needed to concentrate and best to let him work out a general idea before adding her input. "I don't think this is something our classmates could pull off at our level. We could show them real shurikenjutsu— no, we could choreograph a spar, loosely enough to fit in the demonstration but still keep our fighting styles intact."

"Knowing how to handle a kunai is fundamental, so we can both do that and then you could use shuriken and I'll use senbon."

"That could work… Nii-san, didn't you have a book about basic shurikenjutsu techniques?"

"There should be a couple of those in my bookshelf." Sasuke jumped to his feet, disappearing in a corridor and without skipping a beat Itachi set down a pair of glasses on the table and returned to chopping tomatoes.

Cubes of ice floated around her glass in a liquid that was somewhere between red and purple. Curiously, she took a sip and before she knew it half of it was gone. While she had partnered up with Sasuke on multiple occasions, it was never anything that required visits to each other's homes. The Academy was weeding out the weak links of the student population and it showed in the sudden difficulty of recent projects. She wouldn't mind more projects with Sasuke if she would be received with such a glorious drink every time.

"What is this?" Hinata absently murmured.

"Iced hibiscus tea." If she didn't know any better she would say he sounded proud. Almost as an afterthought he added, "mother grows them in her garden."

Hinata gave the liquid an appreciative glance. "Whoever came up with the recipe is brilliant."

A proud smirk tugged at his lips as he glanced back at her and twirled a kitchen knife with his fingers. "You'll find that I'm very good with all sorts of culinary tricks."

"Yeah." A voice huffed from the corridor. Moments later, Sasuke arrived with a stack of books and plopped them on the table. "But the aunts hate it when he one-ups their recipes after tasting them just once."

Itachi shrugged at this. "What's the point of working if not to enjoy the delights of life."

"That doesn't sound like a question."

"Of course not, it's a statement, Sasuke."

Hinata sniggered, hiding her smile behind a book. She truly wouldn't mind another project with Sasuke.