Full Circle

Full Circle

chapter 8

It was the end of Naruto's first week at the Uchiha manor. He was steadily becoming a part of the daily routines of the household. Sasuke could see his mother growing more and more attached to the blond boy.

He had never actually figured that possibility into his plan. And he himself found that he had to almost make a conscious effort to keep from regarding the boy as a sort of fixture in their lives.

"It's only been six days," he mused. "How did I..er.. we all get so used to him so quickly?"

He was sitting at the desk in his library, surrounded once again by his piles of books and notes. He should have been completely submersed in the fascinating information by now. After all, he'd had very little time this past week to bury himself in his work as he used to do constantly. He had been stuck with Naruto most of the time, aside from the times when someone else was keeping the bubbly blond busy.

Naruto had spent a little time with each member of the family, getting to know a little bit about everyone. He was most often found with either Sasuke or Mikoto though and then there was Sai of course.

Sai had been 'working' quite diligently. He mostly made a point of acting as though he were there to see Sasuke as much as Naruto, to keep from seeming suspicious, though there had been a couple of occasions where he had dragged Naruto off somewhere with him with some excuse or other.

It seemed that Naruto was becoming more comfortable with his fiance's 'best friend', his initial wariness melting away with time... and Sai's lies. Every time the blond did anything alone with the other boy, he would come back buzzing about things that Sai had told him which were probably all utter bull-shit.

There was nothing Sasuke could say about it though. Exposing Sai would ruin the plan and the plan was actually going fairly well, all things considered. Maybe Naruto hadn't shown any signs of being in love with Sai yet, but Sai assured Sasuke that the two of them were at least on par in the blond's regard. He seemed to think that it was just a matter of time before he would steal Naruto's attention entirely.

Unfortunately, Sasuke was finding that he couldn't help being annoyed by Sai's misrepresentation of himself. It was hard to sit there and listen to his accomplice blatantly lying to the blond whose big blue eyes shone innocently back at him. He itched to react to some of those ludicrous statements, but as Sai had pointed out the first time, Sasuke couldn't realistically expect him to achieve the result he'd been hired for, if he stuck to the truth.

Sasuke thumbed absently through the pages of notes he'd already taken as he thought back over that conversation.

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"A volunteer at the orphanage Sai?"

"What? Sure, a lot of people go for the bad boy, but this guy's one of those soft hearted idealists. I could tell right away that the whole good Samaritan bit would go over way better with him."

"You're not really an orphan either huh?" The question was spoken more as a statement.

"Hell no," he replied with a smile.

"What do you expect to do if he finds out?"

"Why would he find out? Come on now, don't give me that look. You can't be worried about your silly morals now. We're already lying to him," Sai protested.

Sasuke scowled at the insinuation that he might be feeling guilty or reconsidering his course of action.

"The more you lie, the more chance there is of him catching you in a lie."

"If you want me to get him to fall for me in the limited time that we have, I'm going to have to make him believe that I'm the perfect guy. As I am totally not the perfect guy, that is going to require an awful lot of lying, so you'd better get used to it." Sai looked at him almost sternly and he grudgingly nodded his agreement.

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He had been right of course. That was the way things were, and at this point, there was nothing to be done about it. Sasuke sometimes wondered though, how Sai managed to keep all of his stories straight.

He had made up an entire childhood for himself that didn't include his parents and contained just enough hardship to garner both Naruto's sympathy and admiration. Then he would chivalrously wave it off as no big deal and ask the blond about himself. He'd invented good deeds that he had done or wanted to do, saintly and/or talented people that he admired (whom he would modestly claim were beyond compare with his own humble self) and interests that just happened to coincide with whatever Naruto might think was cool or fun.

In Naruto's presence, he was unfailingly kind and polite to everyone. Understandably, Naruto was beginning to think of Sai as a really wonderful person, barring the tendency to flirt. (Though he made sure to only ever flirt with Naruto himself.)

Sasuke aught to have been happy with this kind of progress, but being a party to all this deception left a bad taste in his mouth. It certainly didn't help that Naruto had indeed made every effort to be a friend to him.

The guy was so annoyingly nice. And not the over-the-top 'Sai' kind of nice. It was just natural little gestures here and there that never remotely pushed the boundary of friendship. He always had a smile for him and he had a way of forcing an answering smile onto his lips. He was lively and funny and he seemed to think that Sasuke was funny too.

Sasuke had never been used to carrying on full conversations with people, much less enjoying them. Naruto drew him out somehow though, even if it was just to argue, and he caught himself actually looking forward to breakfast each morning when they had an hour to themselves to just talk to each other.

God! this whole friendship idea was really getting in the way of things. He needed to stay focussed. What had happened to that impassive attitude that he was so famous for. He was supposed to be getting rid of the guy or better yet, leaving it all up to Sai, not worrying over his feelings or... or... Hell, here he was right now, wasting time obsessing over the whole situation. He should have just stuck to ignoring him completely. Now he couldn't get him off his mind, even when he was off playing with Takara and finally giving Sasuke some time to do his research.

Shaking his head determinedly, Sasuke flipped his notes back to where he had left off, poised his pen over the paper and forced himself to begin reading from the open text to the left. He got through about a line and a half before Takara came bursting into the room, shrieking with laughter. Sasuke dropped the pen and threw up his hands with an exasperated huff.

"Uncle Sasu help me!" the little boy screamed excitedly. Sasuke raised an eyebrow as he took in the diving mask and snorkel the kid was wearing.

"Help you?"

"The octopus is gonna get me!" Suddenly they could both hear someone humming the theme-music from Jaws. Takara was bouncing in place in anticipation.

A hand shot through the door, slamming loudly against the wall and Takara screamed in a way that should have had the neighbors calling the cops. 'If the neighbors weren't half a mile away... No, maybe even then', Sasuke thought as he cringed.

Naruto jumped through the door making hideous growling noises and chased Takara around the desk. He was half-wearing two sweaters, his head pushed through but not his arms, leaving them dangling around his neck with the sleeves flinging about as he ran.

"Must you two do... whatever it is you're doing, 'here'?" Sasuke finally asked. Stopping them both short in their game.

"Ah, sorry Sasuke," said Naruto sheepishly. "I hadn't realized where exactly he was running to, and then we were kind of caught up in it."

"What kind of game is this anyway?"

"What?" the blond grinned. "It's educational. I am teaching heem about ze great mysteries of ze deep," he explained in an overblown French accent.

"Mm hmm," Sasuke nodded slowly. "I've got news for you. That music was from a shark movie and octopi have eight tentacles not six." Naruto scratched the back of his head, giving a little chuckle.

"Well there were only two sweaters." Sasuke started to nod again, then he stopped and narrowed his gaze at the blond's strange apparel.

"Wait a minute... Are those my sweaters?"

"Yeah well, it's summer. I didn't pack any sweaters," Naruto defended.

"You went through my room?!"

"No, we nicked them from the laundry basket that the maid was carrying up to your room." Sasuke was giving him the 'unimpressed' look and Naruto chuckled nervously as he pulled the sweaters off over his head and handed them to Takara.

"Hey buddy, you want to take these back to the maid? We can play another game after ok?"

"Ok," Takara agreed and zipped out of the room.

"Sorry for disturbing you like that. You look pretty busy in here." He gestured toward the piles of books and papers. "You always work like this?"

"I'm taking a double major. It's a big work-load so I like to use the summer to get a head start and save myself the extra stress later on."

"A double major huh? What are you majoring in?" Naruto asked. The question struck close to the issue of future goals that happened to be a sensitive subject for Sasuke right now and he looked at him carefully before deciding that there was no harm in answering.

"I'm taking the business major that my father wanted me to take and also a history major for my own interests."

"Oh, you like history?"

"I'm interested in history and archeology," he confirmed.

"Do you want to have a career in that area some day?"

"I would like to. My father wants me to work for the family business of course, but I would much rather pursue my own goals. Business bores me to tears but when I'm studying history, it doesn't really feel like work at all."

"That's great. Did you want to be a historian and sit around in dusty libraries like this or give lectures and things, or be like a history teacher? Or did you want to work out in the field?"

Naruto's blue eyes were shining with interest now and Sasuke wasn't quite sure what to make of that. He had been prepared for polite indifference at the most.

"To be perfectly honest, I hope to work in the field," he admitted. "I've always wanted to be more hands on, to be the one having the experiences and making the discoveries instead of contenting myself with just reading about it."

"Wow, so you want to be an archaeologist huh? That would be a really cool job! You'd get to do a lot of traveling, figuring out clues and be like a real life treasure hunter. It'd be a real adventure!"

"It's not all adventure," said Sasuke, smirking at the blond's enthusiasm.

"No job is a hundred percent fun, but doing something that really gets your endorphins moving is worth all the work that goes along with it right?"

"I guess so."

Naruto frowned a little, taking note of the slightly wistful tone of the Uchiha's response.

"You are actually going to do it right?"

"Well..."

"Aww man, you can't seriously be considering the family business. You just said it bored you to tears."

"Well I'm certainly hoping that my father decides to be content with just my brother following in his footsteps," said Sasuke casually.

"No!!" The outburst startled Sasuke out of his careful blankness. "No 'hoping'! This is your life you're talking about. You can't do something you hate just because your dad would prefer it. You're lucky enough to actually know what you want. You have to go for it!"

"I'm going to try but things aren't always that simple."

"Of course not. They're never simple. The people who get what they want have to just cut through all of that."

Naruto paused and took in Sasuke's bewildered expression. When he continued, his voice had softened and a small smile returned to his face.

"You're actually not in that bad of a position you know. What you want may be a little unusual, especially with the crowd our families happen to associate with, but all in all, it's a perfectly respectable job. You want to be a scientist of sorts. It's not one of the typical pipe-dreams that parents everywhere dread. Like music."

"You want to be a musician?" Sasuke fought to keep from rolling his eyes at the thought that Naruto wanted to be a rock star. He really shouldn't be (openly) judgmental when the blond was giving him this supportive speech.

"Oh no, not really," Naruto laughed. "I have no desire to be in the limelight. I just want to write."

"What? Write songs?" Well damn. The brat surprised him again.

"Yeah, I could just leave the performing to other people. That's not the part I like. The music itself is great but the frenzied schedule and screaming fans I could do without. I don't think I'd make a good performer anyway. My vocal and instrumental talents aren't really anything special and I think the stage-fright alone might actually kill me."

"You might be a bit more level headed than I gave you credit for."

"Hey," Naruto mock pouted, recognizing the subtle joke in the Uchiha's statement.

"So I assume that you plan on going for this 'pipe-dream', since you just gave me that rousing speech on how I should go for mine."

"Sure. I meant every word of it. You parents will understand in the long run, you know. They really do care about your happiness. Just look at how they accepted your sexuality."

"Yes well, the problem is that they have their own ideas on what will bring about my happiness. Then they try to force it on me. Your children don't just find joy on their own you know. You have to shove it down their throats."

Naruto burst out laughing and Sasuke's treacherous mouth began to stretch into a smile. There was something undeniably satisfying about causing that reaction in the blond.

"Then it's just going to take some time. When you've gone and done it already and they see that you really are happy, then they'll have no more problem with it.

Though I think your mother would be ok with anything that you took the initiative on. She seems to be afraid that you'll get lost in this room and never see the light of day again. As for your father... You can tell him I made you do it." Naruto said with a grin.

"Tell him what?"

"You can blame it on me. We're going to be married. I'll play the 'nagging husband' and you can say I pushed you into it."

Sasuke stared at the cheerful blond. This guy had to be nuts. He should have known this was just a joke.

"Very funny," he deadpanned.

"Ok so that part was comic relief, but I'm serious about everything else and I will definitely help you."

"Really?" Sasuke asked with a suspicious glare.

"Of course! You're my friend remember. That's what friends are for. I'm not spending the rest of our lives together letting you be miserable. How could I be happy, knowing that you're so depressed?"

Sasuke looked utterly flabbergasted and Naruto sighed, wondering what exactly the poor guy had been expecting. Obviously Naruto had gotten here just in time. This guy needed some straightening out in a bad way.

"Marriage is supposed to be a partnership above all else. We're supposed to look out for each other. Admittedly, there are some people who don't really get that concept but..."

"-Ah, here you are. I've been looking for you. Did you forget Naruto? We're supposed to be leaving now."

"Oh Sai! I'm sorry. The time sort of got away on me," said Naruto, turning to the young man who had suddenly appeared at the door.

"Of course it did," Sai answered good naturedly. "And here you are chattering away in Sasuke's library, which is precisely the reason that I was supposed to be taking you out this afternoon. So that Sasuke could have the time to get some work done."

Naruto blushed contritely at the gently teasing tone.

"Ah heheh, I kind of got carried away. I'm sorry for interrupting you like this Sasuke."

The Uchiha wiped the scowl off his face and nodded to the blond.

"I've got to go tell Takara that I'm leaving first, ok? Could you meet me in the foyer Sai?"

"Sure. I'll be right there," Sai answered with a smile, and with an answering smile, Naruto passed him in the door.

"I'll see you later Sasuke!"

"Yes, we'll see you later Sasuke," said Sai with a smirk. "Enjoy your peace and quiet."

Sasuke sneered at the retreating back of his accomplice before moving back to the desk and flopping into his seat. Five minutes later he did his best to tamp down the surge of both positive and negative emotions that were threatening to overwhelm him and leaned over the text before him, forcing himself to concentrate on reading.

Five minutes after that, he gave up and went for a nap.

(A/N; Ok. Now I'm getting back into the swing of it. Expect more very soon. Oh and for those of you who are concerned about Neji, don't worry. I promise everything will turn out alright. Hey, have I ever steered you wrong?: p I had someone ask if school would be involved in this fic. Actually I intend to wrap everything up within the summer.)