Good Boy Meets Bad Boy

Good Boy Meets Bad Boy



LOL wow everyone totally hates cliffhangers XD
“RAWR I HAET CLIFFIES UPDATE NAOZ”
…no seriously, I love all of you tho ;_; I’m sorry for the sudden cliffhanger~ I hope you enjoy this next chappie!

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Chapter 15

Drugs Are the Best Medicine [Part Two]

[Sasuke’s POV]

There’s a very bitter breeze matching that of Neji’s gaze as the wind picks up his long strands of dark hair and tosses it to the side carelessly. I feel my lips form a thin taut line against the harsh cold, trying not to shake.

After a few more seconds of uncanny silence building between us I lift my hand to reveal the note I had received second-handedly from him and ask, “What’s this about?”

“We need to talk,” Neji says and leaves it at that, pushing off the wall he was quite comfortably leaning against.

My eyes are narrowed still, but one brow was thinly arched at him in wonder, “About?”

Neji’s silent for a moment, staring off into the space behind him as though overlooking the school grounds beneath us. Shoving his hands into his pant pockets to keep warm he returns a depthless gray-colored gaze to me and rather calmly says, “Naruto.”

I’m shocked and at the same time I wasn’t. I had a feeling the blonde would at least be a part of the conversation, but I was unsure about him being the center topic. “What about Naruto?” I press for him to elaborate and he jerks his head slightly to the side against the wind, knocking his hair back over his shoulder irritably.

“You’re being too friendly with someone who could have killed you,” Neji coldly states point blank and I was by far confused at his statement.

I don’t say anything, but he gets my questioning look and continues.

“Naruto… is a dangerous person when provoked.”

Neji was beginning to seriously piss me off because he kept riddling his answers; dancing around my questions instead of just flat out telling me what was going on.

“I’m saying is you need to be careful.”

Why the friendly warning? Especially from Neji?

“Why are you telling me this?” I ask lowly, trying to figure out the Hyuuga’s ulterior motive.

Neji’s pale eyes very briefly drop the ground beneath his feet before closing them, tentatively lifting his hands around his blazer. He unbuttons the jacket and slides it off his shoulders, dropping it to the ground next to him. I’m still in my stature, curious to know what Hyuuga was up to as he pretty much stripped in the cold.

Crazyass… it’s freezing out here.

Nevertheless once the blazer’s off Neji un-tucks his white button-up shirt from the waistline of his pants, curling his fingers under it to pull said article up, revealing a huge, veining scar on the right side of his stomach like he had been punctured there by something as big as my fist.

Coal eyes widen in disbelief at such a wound, “N-Neji…”

Naruto did THAT?! Why? I thought he and Neji were friends?

I whip a very confused gaze from Neji’s gruesome scar to his gaze and blurt, “Why did he do that? Why are you still around him if he did something like that to you?!” It didn’t make sense. If someone were to hurt me like that I sure as in hell wouldn’t want to remain their friend!

Neji tugs his shirt back down, hiding the goose bumps that formed across his pale skin when the wind blew and drops his eyes to his feet, taking sudden interest there. “Because,” pause, “I love him.”

There’s a very fast blink of my eyes. What did he just say?

“I love Naruto,” he repeats as if to reassure me I wasn’t hearing things. “I’m not… sure myself if it’s romantic feelings, but I know there’s love there. Naruto pulled me out of my darkness a long time ago.”

I’m watching Hyuuga closely, trying to make sense of all this. These people I’ve met just have these endless crazy series of drama. “…what happened?” I feel the need to ask. If he’s going to go as far as exposing such a mark to me he’d better damn well explain.

Neji doesn’t look at me, but seems to be contemplating as he still watches the ground under him. Finally he stands straight, closing light gray eyes again and unfastens the band around his forehead. My eyes squint at him in anticipation. Next he reveals to me a thinly drawn, green tattoo in the shape of a reversed swastika. It almost looked like an “x” at first glance, but it wasn’t. There were intricate lines coming out of each tip on the main piece and two long lines accented the sides, dragging across his forehead, one opposite from the other. I had never seen that symbol before on anyone and I wondered how many people knew about this.

“My family did this to me,” Neji darkly explains to me, pure hatred filling his eyes to the brim. “My family is split into two, large divisions: there’s the main house and the branch house. My father was the head of the branch house and his brother in charge of the main house. Family members were separated into these two categories depending on their vitals.”

“Vitals?” I ask queerly.

“Such as birth weight and length, how strong we are when we were born. The most valuable members were placed in the main house and the rest of us were tossed into the branch house. Any member to the branch family had this,” he points resentfully to the angry green tattoo on his forehead, “tattooed on their forehead at birth.

Usually the stronger members were placed in the branch house to act as servants, bodyguards and sacrifices for those of that lived in the main house. Branch members are not allowed in the main house. Ever.”

Neji’s eyes drop, narrowing in hatred of horrible memories, fists clenching. “My uncle, Hiashi used my father as a sacrifice.”

My eyes widen in horror.

“And ever since then I had grown more and more hatred for the main house. I despised them and wished every one of them were dead. But then… I met Naruto. I was the type of person, who from growing up with the type of family I had was bound to the earth by shackles of destiny; that everyone was born with a fate that was inescapable.

But he… he proved me wrong. He opened my eyes to a completely different reality. Of course it took a serious ass-kicking to do so.”

Softly, I ask with a point at his torso in indication of the scar, “Is that how you ended up with that…?”

“No,” Neji admits quietly and finally tucks his shirttail back in. I’m still puzzled about that wound, but figured Neji would tell me its birthing sooner or later. There was obviously much more than that. “Because of Naruto my uncle and I were finally able to talk about what happened, albeit grudgingly on my half. But I as finally able to learn the truth about my father, and that was he willingly sacrificed himself for the family. My uncle tried to stop him, but my father wouldn’t have it any other way and forced him out of the picture in order to make sure that everyone was safe.”

Neji hadn’t quite explained what they were trying to be protected from, but if that had been truly important I’m sure he would say something or at least would have earlier.

“Though I’m still not on the best terms with my family, I at least don’t despise them any more.”

I step up to Neji until we were two or so feet apart and I retrieve his blazer, handing it up to him. Neji takes it from me silently and shrugs said cloth back on, trying to warm up again. “If Naruto helped you… then why are you telling me to be careful?”

Neji sullenly refastens his blazer and looks my in the eye carefully, “Naruto’s…” pause, “…He’s killed people, Uchiha.”

My eyes blink once fast, then twice and open wide in terror. What? Naruto’s… killed people? “Wh…what?”

“Despite all the grief Naruto has suffered… his biggest downfall in life is that he still, to this day, trusts people too easily though he tries not to show it. He tends to get attached… and when he gets hurt, it’s hard to break him out of himself again.”

Neji watches me closely as I battle inwardly with myself.

“Naruto’s not,” and he hesitates yet again as if he’s apprehensive in telling me all this information, “exactly normal.”

“What do mean, not exactly normal?” I stress, running a worried hand through my hair.

“I can’t explain it, but that abnormality, caused this,” and he runs a hand over his stomach where the scar lays beneath his uniform.

I stare through that spot and every muscle tenses in my body. “What about Kiba and Gaara?”

“Gaara I think has gotten hurt a few times, but I don’t think Kiba has,” is Neji’s quiet response, looking as though he was giving it a lot of thought.

We’re silent, still standing in front of one another, but not looking at each other. Finally I look up, but not into his gaze and run my fingers through my windy hair again and ask, “I still don’t understand why you’re telling me all this.”

Neji finally looks up at me and rather sternly says, “Like I said, Naruto gets attached. I can tell that he’s comfortable around you, strangely enough. Naruto in the beginning treated me like you until I got knee-deep in shit.” His eyes narrow then, “I don’t want you around Naruto if all you’re going to do is hurt him.”

I’m by far confused and I’m not liking Neji’s words. Naruto was the one that tried to rob me, not the other way around.

“Too many people have backstabbed Naruto and I don’t want you to be one of them.”

“Why would I backstab someone I hardly know?” I ask Neji rather angrily with a clenching of my fists.

“You may not do it intentionally. This stupid school project of yours will cause you and Naruto to constantly be in contact with each other and if he gets close and you decide that once this assignment is done and over with…”

“I’ll drop Naruto like he doesn’t exist,” I finish Neji’s statement harshly and he nods against the bitter cold. I didn’t like the idea of that, but I wasn’t sure if Naruto and I would still keep in touch after the project. I mean Naruto seemed to keep giving me the impression he highly disliked me, maybe even as far as truly hating my existence so it would really be up to him if we became “friends.”

I wouldn’t do something like that myself, but if Naruto told me to butt the hell out of his life I probably would.

“I wouldn’t,” I speak out my internal thoughts aloud to Neji, attracting his gaze that had been momentarily closed in musing, “do that. If Naruto didn’t want anything else to do with me after the project I’d respect that and leave him to his life. But if he does,” and I make a rather funny face at my next train of thought, “reach out to me I won’t turn away.”

The brunette in front of me is staring me down curiously, but seems satisfied with my response and I smirk rather coolly.

“I mean, if you guys can put up with him, why can’t I?” I meant it jokingly of course and Neji smirked in return at that.

“That’s very true.”

Now he stares at me very inquisitively like he has some probing around to do in my head and he finally asks, “Why do you hang around him so freely, Uchiha?”

“You can call me Sasuke,” I blurt out and he stares at me, murmuring my name in questioning in a form of correction to his previous question.

“It has to be more than just the project, other wise you wouldn't have hung around for lunch yesterday or follow after Naruto when he left.” He’s pinning me down with a deep, entrapping stare that actually makes my face heat up a bit and I find myself staring at my shoes.

I guess I had never really given it much thought. Naruto just didn’t portray himself to be as bad as he was from the first day I met him. So I tell him that, “Naruto’s not a bad guy. He looked--lonely. Like there was a deeper self that needed to be released. I could tell that even after your guy’s little hostage incident there was a different side to each and every one of you. I tried not to be quick to judge.”

Neji looks like he respected that because he was smiling, albeit faintly. But it was a real, genuine smile, not some cocky-ass smirk.

“You’re not so bad yourself, Uchi—Sasuke,” he pauses to correct himself.

My lips purse in a sort of pout and my eyes narrow, not sure I like the tone of voice he used that sounded more suggestive than sincere.

Neji shifts his hands around in his pockets and murmurs softly, “Well… I suppose that’s it then.” He never got around to explaining how he got the scar, but I realized then I’d find out sooner or later so long as I associated with these guys.

He strides forward, sidestepping past me and stops when he reached my side. The brunette leans ever so slightly in my direction until I can feel his hair tickle the side of my face, “I’ll talk to you later, Sasuke.” And I twitch slightly as his breath ghosts over my ear, sending chills shooting down my spine. As he walks off back to the stairwell he says, “Let’s get back to class.”

I turn to catch him looking at me minutely over my shoulder and I fight the blush back off my face, “Yea,” and follow suit of him.

I was by far confused. I was sure Neji hated my guts too, but I guess after that conversation he felt differently and I wasn’t sure if I should feel glad about that. But at least I found out a little more about Naruto and hell, even a shitload about Hyuuga himself. I was surprised that he even opened up to me as much as he did.

What next? Was Gaara going to invite me to his estate [in which Naruto was the only one lucky enough to go to] and tell me his life story too?

As absurd as that sounded it couldn’t be any crazier than everything else that’s happened in the past two days. And something told me it was just going to get weirder.

But at least now things made a bit more sense, or so I hoped. I’m not sure if I could handle any more surprises today.


By the time Neji and I finally got back to class it was just about halfway over and I nearly flipped out, but he reassured me we’d be okay.

Opening the classroom door, Neji’s sure to enter first with me following behind as he turned right for the teacher’s desk. A young man with dark brown hair pulled back into a tight ponytail, reminding me vaguely of Shikamaru, sat hunched over his desk grading paperwork. He had to have been in his early to mid twenties. So that was Umino Iruka. Looking up, dark brown eyes meet the two of us and states the obvious maturely, “You two are late.”

Neji straightens and says, “Sasuke misplaced his class schedule so he forgot where he was assigned to. He’s a new student and it’s only his third day, Umino-sensei,” and he pulls a slip of paper out of his blazer pocket and hands it to Iruka. “So Sasuke and I were at the office getting a printed copy made, but the machine was down so we had to wait for things to be fixed.”

How the hell Neji managed to get a signed pass of excuse from the office was WAY beyond me, but he obviously had underground connections with the school in order to pull strings like that.

But in all, I was at least thankful because Iruka looks up to him, then me and sighs, “All right, please take your seats and read pages 324 to 335 in your texts.”

“Yes, sensei,” Neji responds and nudges my arm in motioning to be seated. I move in accord with him and take my seat in the back of the classroom where I was newly assigned. I was surprised when I was sitting in front of Neji and suddenly felt myself shrink forward when said brunette bores holes in my head.

He doesn’t say or do anything for the next five minutes as we all read our texts in silence, but suddenly I hear rapid scribbling behind me and suppressed tearing of notepaper. A small folded slip is pushed up under my arm from behind. The sudden contact and Neji’s arm disappearing behind me again scared me, but I spotted the note and frowned at it.

Not this again…

Opening the note hesitantly, I read this: “Are you getting together tonight for the project?”

Picking up my pencil after glancing ahead of me to make sure Iruka-sensei was still deep in his paper grading I write back, “We’re supposed to be. Kiba’s going to call his mom and ask if it’s all right that we can all go over. If not, no, we won’t be doing anything tonight.” And I discreetly pass it backward.

Neji takes the note, reads over it and seems to nod to himself before writing this and handing it back, “I see. Let me know what’s going on. Maybe we can do something tonight.”

I jerk in my chair, eyebrows furrowing despite being widely open and my face is doing its best imitation of a tomato.

What the hell is wrong with Neji?! Is he making fun of me? I scowl at the note and crumple it up so he can see and drop it effectively on the floor under me and I can practically hear the brunette smirk behind me.

Asshole.


When the bell finally rings I was happy it was our lunch period because my stomach hadn’t stopped rumbling for the last ten minutes of class and that was embarrassing as hell. And once I could get my lunch and live through it I could find Kiba, Naruto, and Gaara and find out what our definite plans were for tonight.

No, I was NOT going to take Neji up on his offer.

Before I made it to the cafeteria I ended up running into a familiar pink-haired friend of mine, “Sakura?”

Said girl looks up from between the crowds of people and spots me, sporting a huge smile on her face on sight, “Sasuke-kun,” and happily waves at me while fighting through other students to get to me.

When we finally meet up she gives me this bouncy smile, “What’s up? How are ya?”

“All right, I was about to get lunch and then meet up with Naruto and them.”

Sakura blinks and then looks as if bitten by a rabid dog. She stares wide-eyed at me, “Oh?”

“What’s wrong?”

“N-nothing,” and she laughs slightly. “I guess,” she sheepishly scratches her cheek, “I was just surprised… Naruto and you didn’t seem like you were really getting along.”

I casually shrug, “Off and on, but we’re getting together to find out what were doing about tonight for the project.”

She looked a little relieved at that, “Oh, you mean you haven’t made plans yet?”

“No, they’re not definite yet. Kiba’s going to call his mom and find out. If not we won’t be getting together, but we’ll be more than likely getting together at my place tomorrow night since it’ll be Saturday.”

Sakura’s kinda quiet for a moment and finally pipes up, “I see. I had plans tonight, but I’m going to go find my friend Hinata to cancel them so I can work on the project tonight.”

Hinata? Neji’s cousin? Well at least she’s canceling. This’ll be good for Ino, I’m sure. I motion for her to assist me in getting lunch and she grins with a bubbly nod.


It took us nearly ten minutes, but we finally made it out alive with two packets of beef bread each. I decided to cut across the courtyard with her as a shortcut to the other side where I could get easier roof access. The air was horrible, biting my nose, ears and fingers, but it wasn’t much longer.

As we reach the center of the courtyard I catch a flash of yellow to my right and my eyes instinctively follow it. I spot Naruto moving quickly through the school grounds, hands shoved deep into his pockets, evidently cold from being outside for two periods. But what baffled me was he wasn’t heading back towards school, but instead out of it. He passes quickly through the school’s gate and disappears around the corner.

What the hell is that dobe doing?

“Did you see that?” I ask, stopping Sakura and tug on her arm.

The pink-haired girl halts and looks in the direction I am and asks, “See what?”

“Naruto, he just ran out of the school gate,” I say in narrowing confusion.

“What?” Sakura looks gravely puzzled, lips frowning in a pout and she asks, “Wasn’t he supposed to meet up with you guys?”

“Yea,” I say softly, “but now it looks like he’s trying to ditch. He skipped out on second and third period and tried to get me to come out with him during second.” I move forward in the direction of the gate and Sakura speedily follows.

“Where are we going?” She queerly asks, trying to figure out if I was honestly following him or not.

“I’m going to find out what that dobe’s up to.” He’s been weird ever since last night.

Sakura and I head for the school’s gate quickly, slipping past the half-open entrance while stuffing the food into my blazer pockets for safekeeping.

When we slip out I look the girl over and say, “You don’t have to come if you don’t want to.”

“It’s fine~ trust me, if anyone knows anything about what Naruto might be up to, I do.” And I smile at that; actually glad she was assisting me in our sleuthing. I really didn’t want to follow after Naruto alone in case he was up to no good.

It wasn’t like I didn’t trust him, but he looked bugged out all day, or for at least the time I saw him. I just had a nasty feeling in my gut, which told me with much fervency to follow Naruto.

Rounding the corner we make haste once we spot the blonde hurriedly walking down the street, doing our best to stay hidden in case he happened to look back. Turning the block, we quickly run up to not lose him and find him still speedily moving down the sidewalk.

Where the hell is he going?!

Finally the blonde stops on a corner at the end of the block and Sakura and I hastily halt in our tracks and duck into an alleyway, peeking around a large, green dumpster to keep an eye on our yellow-headed target.

“I feel like a stalker,” I mutter stupidly as a shiny, black car pulls up in front of Naruto from the opposite end of the street.

“Shh!” Sakura yells above me and pushes down on my head hard to get a better look. Well it was true despite following him was my idea in the first place, which in all made me suddenly feel incredibly stupid.

That aside I’m dragged out of my muse when I hear a car door open and shut and worry that I might’ve just missed Naruto, but the blonde was still standing there and instead someone had gotten out of the car.

We both jerk to attention as we watch a relatively tall man, probably about my father’s height, walk around the back of the car and to Naruto. A pale face grins rather malevolently down at him and he looks like he was wearing some sort of makeup – purple eyeliner? He dips his hand under Naruto’s chin and makes the blonde look up at him, but Naruto distastefully growls and swats his hand away with much force.

Getting his point across, the man’s arm retreats back to his side and instead opens the car door, still smiling a snaky kind of smile. Naruto angrily closes his eyes and steps towards the car and the man puts a hand to the small of his back in a leading gesture, welcoming him into the back seat of the vehicle.

I feel a bead of cold sweat run down the side of my head and disappear under my hair. Sakura and I were tensed so badly we may not be able to move for a while. My jaw was restrained tight and I ached to say something, but couldn’t because I wasn’t sure what would happen if I spoke out to the blonde being with that man.

I jerk against Sakura and she jumps at my sudden movement. I didn’t have to say anything to Naruto.

Just as he begins to turn away from us he happens to glance over his shoulder and sapphire eyes meet black ones. Naruto had seen me and I never saw him look so terrified.

My heart swelled and turned to iron, dropping into the pit of my stomach hard.

Naruto tries not to leave my gaze, but another light nudge to the back forced him to turn and climb into the back. I shift rapidly and tug on Sakura, ducking farther around the dumpster to not be seen by the man he was accompanied by, who just happened to turn seconds after and look in our direction. The car door slams shut and a few seconds later so does another and the car pulls away, Sakura and I still hiding out of the alley’s mouth.

“That was close,” Sakura breathes by my head in ragged words.

“Y-yea.” Licking my suddenly dry lips I squeeze my eyes shut and let my head hit the back of the dumpster gently, “Naruto,” and Sakura looks up at me quizzically, “he saw me.”

Sakura blinks jade eyes at me unsurely, tipping her head slightly up in my direction, “What?”

“Naruto… saw me. Our eyes met. He looked scared.” Frightened, like a kid that got his hand caught in the liquor cabinet. I clench my jaw again, teeth grit as I ball my fists. Something wasn’t right. My eyes watch the car drive down the street and I feel the sudden need to follow it. “Sakura, go back to school.”

“Huh?” She looks baffled at my sudden lunacy. “Why?”

“I’m going to follow that car,” I answer without really thinking, taking off out of the alley. The girl is quick to follow at my heels, speeding up along side me and stares up at me in the face, trying to reason with my crazy logic.

“What for?” It wasn’t like Sakura acted or sounded as if she didn’t care. It was she was scared to follow herself and more so about me going by myself.

“Something just doesn’t feel right. That and I’m pissed that he’s going to ditch out on us.” Okay, so the latter point of that wasn’t really the reason, but it sounded good. It was even weird to me why I was so worked up on following this car, but I suddenly got a sick feeling in my stomach that told me Naruto was in trouble.

I turn my head in my rapid running and duck into another alley when the car pulls to a slow stop at a red light at the end of the street. Looking a slightly panting Sakura over, I frown at her and command, “Go back to the school. I don’t know what will happen to Naruto or myself if I get caught and I don’t want you there in the middle of it.

“No, I’m not letting you go by yourself!” Sakura yells in her defense, raising a stern fist at me and looking dead set on hitting me over the head with it.

As much as I appreciated Sakura wanting to help I didn’t want her to get hurt and I was listening to my gut feeling, which was telling me that this situation wasn’t going to be a pretty one especially if I’m caught.

I pivot my head slightly against the stone corner and catch the light turning green. The car turns right. I look back to Sakura quickly and say, “Look, go back to the school. Find Gaara, Neji and Kiba and tell them the situation. If want to go with me that bad then come back with them. You’ll be better… protected that way,” and I blush a little at that statement.

She stares at me and gives me this little smile as I fish around in my pocket. Pulling out a pen I grab Sakura’s hand and turn it over so I was looking into her palm. She jumps, startled at my brash reactions and I begin quickly, but carefully scribbling down my cell phone number onto her hand. “Give this to any of those three so they can call me and find me, okay?”

Sakura closes her hand when I’m done, reopens it and studies the now smudged ink printed there.

I tear quickly out of the alleyway, yelling back, “Just do it okay! And be careful on your way back!” And vanish around the corner, hoping that I hadn’t lost the car.

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FIN! Not TOO shabby of a cliffhanger this time XD LOL
Dundundunnnnnn Sasuke’s internal instinct is to follow Naruto because he could be *GASP* in danger?! Ooooh Orochimaru is such a touchy bastard D:
And has anyone else notice me making Sasuke into a chick/dude magnet lately? LOL [that’s really unintentional, I swear]

Please rate and review!!