Just Friends

Disclaimer: Don't own Naruto. Don't own anything worth suing for, in fact.

(A version of this was posted on lj while aff was down...sorries if you've already seen it.)


Just Friends

“Damn,” Naruto sighed.

Too tired to swear with any real ferocity, he dropped to the ground in the shadow of the
monstrous tree Kakashi had assigned him. The effort of concentrating Chakra in his feet in order to scale the trunk had left him exhausted, and all he had to show for the whole wasted day was a series of kunai scars on the great tree’s trunk.

His only consolation was that Sasuke, stretched out on his stomach nearby, had fared no better. He might’ve succeeded, had Naruto given him Sakura’s advice when he’d asked for it. As it was, the two of them had labored all day for nothing.

Naruto looked over at his rival. Sasuke was sprawled, breathless on the turf, his face pressed into the bend of a folded arm. He looked as dead as Naruto felt. Naruto supposed if anyone else had been there, anyone who judgements mattered to Sasuke, the other boy would’ve tried to look cool, pretended he wasn’t as tired as his present posture suggested he was.

It was in times like these that Naruto felt he was the only person alive who knew Sasuke was a fake. The smugness and the arrogance were real – real enough to sting. But the invincibility, the indifference to everything, that was an act. Naruto had seen the other boy’s moments of weakness and he knew from experience that pretending you didn’t give a shit about anything was every bit as difficult as admitting that you did.

His pretension pissed Naruto off.

The fox boy swore again to himself, picked up his forgotten kunai and hacked absently at the roots of the tree. He didn’t try to get up yet. After all, Sasuke hadn’t moved to rise, and while they had rested long enough to catch their breath, his muscles still felt buttery and sore, much too sore for another attempt.

Besides, Naruto had an erection.

He got them now with frustrating frequency. And for no good reason! Exercise did it to him. Sometimes just the sun on his skin did it. His clothing was loose enough to hide it most of the time, but as release was never immediately possible, he went around a lot of the time with a dull ache in his groin.

Today, at least, there was no one around but stupid Sasuke.

Heaving himself to his feet, Naruto contemplated how far into the woods he would have to go to eliminate the chance of being seen. That Sasuke would not come looking for him, he was certain. Sasuke didn’t even glance up when he heard his comrade rise. Naruto knew, because he watched to see if he would.

“Ne, Sasuke. I’m gonna pee. If you’re going back soon anyway, wait for me.”

Sasuke didn’t answer, just continued to rest, face down on the forest floor.

“Sasuke!” Naruto frowned. He had been ignored for much of his life, but he never got used to it, and the effects of the heat and the weariness and the god damn release he needed so badly had combined to make him more than usually irritable.

“Acknowledge someone when they’re talking!”

After a lazy moment, Sasuke waved him away. “Stop yelling, Moron.”

Naruto growled. He was sweaty, exhausted. And he was hard. His teammate’s scorn was more that he could take. He hauled back and dealt Sasuke a stinging kick, a kick Sasuke answered by yanking him off his feet. In seconds, they were on the ground, an eight limbed ball of chaos, but without weapons or chakra or special techniques, in a simple fist fight Naruto was just stronger. He was bigger – not taller, but heavier, thicker. They shouted and kicked and pummeled each other senseless a bare handful of minutes before Sasuke wound up half on his side with Naruto on top of him. The fox boy cocked back to deliver a punch but the blow never connected.

Sasuke had noticed Naruto’s erection for the first time, pressed hard against his hip, and he’d frozen. As abruptly as their quarrel had started, it was over. They looked at each other in horror for a moment. Then, just to break the tension – and to make it clear that he had won – Naruto shoved Sasuke more fully onto his stomach, planted a knee in the middle of his back and pinned him in the dirt.

Sasuke raised up on his elbows, as far as his position allowed. He didn’t try to free himself, but his voice was soft, furious. “Get off.” He snarled, spitting blood. “I’ll kill you.”

Sasuke dissolved into a string of threats and insults, but Naruto found himself distracted by the sliver of pale skin he saw between the hem of Sasuke’s muddied tunic and the waist of his shorts. He traced it with a finger.

Sasuke stopped swearing, stopped talking at all and just looked at him as if he’d lost his mind until Naruto couldn’t stand the silence anymore.

He stammered his teammate’s name as he pressed both his palms to the other boy’s back. It was a strange thing to do. He knew that. But Sasuke’s skin was so hot.

“Naruto...”

Naruto didn’t hear anything. He just ran his hands up to Sasuke’s shoulders, carried his shirt up around his chest as he eased off his spine and set his knee between the other boy’s thighs.

Sasuke tried to turn, and Naruto braced himself, half-expecting the other boy to blow a fireball at him. But Sasuke just looked away again, at the ground between his elbows.

Encouraged, Naruto pressed a hand between his shoulders. “Just lay like you were before.”

Sasuke surrendered to the pressure on his back, folded his arms beneath him and buried his head in the crook of one arm. Naruto’s hands slid back to his waist and worked his shorts down over narrow hips. Cooling night air made all the downy hairs on the small of his back stand up.

Naruto just stared at him for a moment, half wishing they’d kept fighting. Had all of this been fast and rough, it would have seemed normal. He did spend most of his life wanting to pound the hell out of Sasuke. But seeing his friend’s body all stretched out half-naked in the grass did funny things to his brain. It made him want to...well, to put his hands all over him, to touch him gently. That seemed more personal, somehow, than what he’d planned before. Besides, Naruto had so little experience with touch that wasn’t meant to hurt and he knew if he didn’t just do it soon, Sasuke was going to wake from whatever mad trance had made him receptive in the first place.

Pushing his trousers down, Naruto leaned forward and pressed his erection to the cleft of Sasuke’s ass. Sasuke tensed again, but he relaxed a little at a time as the other boy rubbed his length between his cheeks and didn’t try for more.

Then, it was over.

Naruto was unaccustomed to it, to how good it felt to have a warm body flush against him. He got so twitchy it was hard to hold himself up, and he had to plant his elbows on the ground, leaning more of his weight on the boy beneath him until Sasuke was straining a bit for air. Then, he came, shot all over Sasuke’s back and collapsed on top of his friend.

The feeling that followed his climax was so perfect and golden he’d have laughed out loud had he breath to spare. He was still panting heavily when, he raised up on his hands and poked the other boy’s shoulder. “Hey, Sasuke?”

Sasuke didn’t answer. He hadn’t even moved. He just lay face down, sweaty, sticky, muddy. His clothes askew, all bruised from their scuffle, he looked...pitiful. Naruto felt suddenly, strangely guilty. Sasuke hadn’t had as much fun as he had, but...but...he’d let him.

“You can do it to me now if you want. Unless you’re afraid I’ll tell everyone how big it is,” he grinned.

Sasuke said nothing. Not even a quip in response.

Naruto frowned at his friend’s naked back, cleaned away the wetness with his hand and wiped it in the grass. He could feel the tension in the other boy’s muscles when he touched him.

Was he really that weirded out?

“Sasuke?”

Still nothing.

Naruto shook his head, a strange mixture of embarrassment and hurt and concern floating around in his head. He didn’t know what to do with this, with the feelings, with what had happened and whenever he came to something he couldn’t handle, he cracked jokes or got mad.

“Sasuke!” he yelled, “Dammit, don’t ignore me when I–”

Sasuke responded, at last, by bucking Naruto off. His pants still half off, the fox boy landed hard on his rump in the dirt.

“Chikoso!” Naruto growled.

Sasuke had risen, secured his shorts, was well-prepared by the time Naruto righted himself and charged him. He just leapt back out of the way, landed in a crouch, black eyes narrowed to slits. He was finished. He didn’t even want to fight.

“Stop it!” There was an ugly color to his voice that froze Naruto dead.

“Sasuke...”

Sasuke turned for the home of Tazuna and his kin, paused for a second without looking around. “Go home, Moron.”

What the hell?! Naruto thought.

Sasuke left.

The fox boy stood, tingling with unspent anger, and watched until he was gone. Then he turned and slammed his fist as hard as he could into the trunk of the nearest tree. And again until he’d bloodied his knuckles and exhausted the last of his energy.

They fought that night about everything and nothing, about dinner, about which mat to was whose for the night. But when it came time to sleep, Naruto found himself alone in the room their hosts had provided for them.

Naruto tried to care as little as Sasuke seemed to care, failed at it, and after three long hours of sleeplessness, he went to look for his friend.

*****************

Sasuke dangled his legs over the edge of the dock attached to Tazuna’s ocean-side house. With his sandals laid out beside him, he let his toes graze the surface of the sea and leaned over a bit to watch the ripples distort his reflection. When the water smoothed again, he faced a youth who looked, every year, more and more like the man who stalked his nightmares.

Sasuke splashed water until his reflection ripple into oblivion once more and stared off toward the line where sea met sky.

He liked this house, with its ocean view. He’d spent a lonely childhood, staring seaward from the dock on the outskirts of Konoha, ignoring anyone who found him there. Including Naruto. Especially Naruto.

Well, it was no longer possible to ignore the fox boy. Not now. Not since this afternoon. He stole into Sasuke’s mind in every quiet moment. No matter the direction in which he turned his thoughts, they came back around to Naruto and what they had done together. In the dirt. Like animals. And Sasuke had just let it happen. Just like before, with Itachi.

He’d heard that desperation in Naruto’s voice, the determination, recognized that strange tender insistence in his touch. His body had just shut down, his mind turned to mush. It was reflex, even after all this time, to simply give in. The legacy of his relationship with his brother was passivity in the face of advances like that.

Sasuke’s hands balled into fists. It wasn’t fair that his brother had so much power over how he behaved, over who he was, when he hadn’t seen the man in years. Itachi had made him a warm, responsive, unresisting thing. It wasn’t fair that from who-knew-how-far away, the mere memory of the man had been enough to occupy Sasuke’s brain so completely that he could barely recall the details of what had happened with Naruto.

He couldn’t even remember what the other boy had said to him. It had all been awkward and silly sounding, of that he was certain. But the Naruto’s voice when he’d said it, that stuck with him even now. He couldn’t get the sound of it out of his head – so soft, softer than Sasuke had ever heard it, apologetic, even a little reverent.

Itachi had always spoken softly to him, too, coaxing in that vaguely scornful way he had. Sasuke didn’t remember his brother’s words either. He didn’t want to remember. All the platitudes that poured out of Itachi, they were just tools, weapons he used to keep Sasuke quiet long enough to take what he wanted.

But Sasuke hadn’t known that then. He’d loved his aniki, hero-worshiped him. He’d never
resisted, even when it hurt him – it would have been futile anyway as young as he was, as strong as Itachi had already grown, but it shamed him to the point of nausea that he’d never tried to fight it.

‘Gently this time.’ That was all the more he’d asked, the only protest he’d ever offered.

Sasuke squeezed his eyes shut. He’d actually believed at the time that Itachi tried to be gentle and he’d never loved the older boy less for what he did to him. Now, though, now the memory of his foolishness fed his hatred.

Naruto wasn’t Itachi, of course. Sasuke knew that. But how could he explain anything to him – to anyone – why he was...the way he was.

Sasuke kicked at his reflection, at the ghost of the brother he looked so much like, at the killer he had made it his life to destroy. He would have justice one day, repay in blows the man who had left him the ruined, twisted-up thing he was. Until then, he had nothing to fight but his memories.

Sasuke made up his mind then. If he could not face Itachi yet, he could unmake his legacy, purge all the demons his nii-san had bequeathed him by years of abuse and betrayal. He would start with that dreadful, numbing fear of touch.

Sasuke rose, left his sandals where they lay and padded back along the narrow wrap-around deck. Still too lost in thought to be totally aware of his world, he rounded the corner and nearly fell into Naruto.

“Hey!” Naruto protested, his voice entirely too loud for the hour.

Sasuke stiffened, stared evenly into Naruto’s scowling face until the boy’s expression changed, softened. Blue eyes gazed off over the water, up at the sky.

“What are you doing?” Sasuke asked him.

“Etou....” Naruto fumbled for an answer. “I was going to train,” he lied. He punched the air for emphasis.

Sasuke looked his teammate up and down. Black-shirt, shorts, and that stupid hat he slept in. Training. Right.

“I’m going to sleep,” Sasuke sighed, edging by Naruto, passing so close on the narrow walk that his hair brushed the fox boy’s face. Naruto smelled his soap, and like a creature hypnotized, he turned and followed Sasuke back inside.

“Ne, Sasuke?” he called, when the other had reached the entrance to their room.

Sasuke paused, still facing the door, waiting until Naruto caught up to him.

Naruto’s voice held a rare note of trepidation. “You’re not still mad, right?”

Sasuke shook his head that the other boy had to ask. “Usuratonkachi,” he sighed.

Naruto had never been so glad in his life to be told he was stupid. Any other day he would have bristled at the insult, flung back a few of his own. But when there was a note of fondness in it, when the words meant Sasuke was Sasuke again, he was more than willing to let them pass unmarked.

Sasuke let them both into their room, slid the door shut, leaned against it.

Naruto yawned mightily, newly relieved of his troubles and suddenly aware of his weariness. He stretched languidly, bent to toss back the blankets that covered his mat.

Sasuke watched him for a minute, hesitating, before he said anything.

Naruto turned to make sure he’d really heard his name, and he stilled at the sight of Sasuke, propped against the door in the dark. He had his head down, black hair all in his face. Something was definitely off. Naruto didn’t know what, but the way Sasuke hid his eyes, the way he hugged his chest as if he were freezing...it made the fox boy nervous.

When Sasuke spoke again, his words came slowly, with great effort, then all in a rush as if he couldn’t say them fast enough. “I...want...I want you to do it to me again.”

Now, Naruto knew he’d heard wrong.

He just stood there in silence so long that Sasuke began to worry. What if what they had done together in the woods was a fluke, the effect of opportunity and generalized desire?

He kept his eyes on the floor, but he could feel Naruto staring at him.

“Are you, um...I mean, do you like...” Naruto trailed off.

“No,” Sasuke answered quickly, catching his meaning. Then, trying to remember the last time he’d looked at a girl, he amended. “I-I don’t know. Are you? Do you?”

Naruto shook his head. He couldn’t even begin to conceive of it like that. Sasuke was too different from everyone else he cared about. “I don’t think so,” he whispered.

Stillness followed. Naruto hated quiet.

Crossing to Sasuke, he slipped a hand up between his thighs. He felt the other boy flinch at the unsubtle touch and he wondered for the hundredth time what was wrong with this guy. He wasn’t even hard.

For Naruto, his mind followed his body – had it been the other way around, he would not have pounced on Sasuke in the forest. Sasuke had it backwards, wanting with his brain, something that his body all too obviously didn’t.

“You’re must be joking.”

Sasuke’s voice was even, cold, perfectly him. “I asked you, didn’t I.”

Naruto shook his head. This was all so ridiculous and weird. Sasuke was weird. His reasons for doing things the way he did never made any kind of sense, but Naruto was hard again. And though he knew he ought to be cautious – he had been spurned once already – desire had made forgiveness seem like reason and refusal seem like absolute madness.

Yanking his shirt up over his head, he carried his cap with it. He hastily shed his shorts and pulled Sasuke up against him by the front of his tunic.

The Uchiha shrank away like he’d been scalded, shot Naruto an offended look and smoothed his wrinkled shirt. He set about removing his clothes in silence.

Naruto stood aside, grumbled, feeling checked and awkward for his roughness. Why, he
wondered, did Sasuke have to be so damn dignified about everything?

Sasuke left Naruto naught to do but watch as he stripped and the longer Naruto stared the faster his irritation drained away. He had nothing left but awe by the time Sasuke stood naked, long arms folded across his chest.

“Well,” he said, waiting. He wasn’t looking at Naruto at all.

They just stood there, faced off, neither moving or speaking until Sasuke took the initiative and glided a step closer, close enough to rub his cheek against Naruto’s.

Naruto turned liquid inside. He felt paralyzed, as if in a dream; he could only watch and wonder, as his body moved without him, as he pulled Sasuke into him and hugged him fast.

Sasuke flinched again – and he didn’t return the embrace – but he didn’t recoil as he had before. Instead, he slowly relaxed and finally pressed his lips against Naruto’s ear. “Do it gently this time.”

His voice was a little shaky.

Naruto noticed it, but he pretended he hadn’t. He wasn’t feeling all that steady himself. They must have over done it, trained too long and too hard. Yes, that was what it was.

“Ne, Naruto?” Sasuke whispered.

The fox boy’s arms tightened around his friend.

Sasuke shook his head, pressed his face into Naruto’s neck.

“No. Hey. What?”

Sasuke drew back, gave Naruto the weakest of smiles and caught his wrist. “It’s nothing,” he assured him.

Before Naruto could protest, Sasuke pulled him toward the bed.

*********************



Sasuke sat down on the edge of the mat and inched back a little as Naruto crawled forward on top of him trapping their erections between their stomachs. Sasuke was hard now and Naruto warmed a little at the thought that the Uchiha was hard for him.

On impulse he bent and pressed his lips to Sasuke’s in a fast, clumsy kiss. He’d started to pull away again when Sasuke laced a hand into his hair and led him back. “Here, like this,” he said.

Their lips met again and this time Sasuke slid his tongue into Naruto’s mouth, just enough to taste him, to show him what to do.

Naruto dug his elbows into the mattress and thrust once against the boy beneath him.

Sasuke broke the kiss, then, but Naruto recaptured his mouth, gave Sasuke his tongue in turn as he ground their cocks between them. “Is this okay?” he asked breathlessly.

Sasuke’s hand slid down along Naruto’s ribs, palmed one round cheek and forced him to slow his pace. Naruto took the hint, rolled his hips more slowly, savoring the sensation instead of trying to burn it out so soon.

The corners of Sasuke's mouth had curved just slightly upward.

Naruto looked down at him, smiled back as he bent to kiss him. Sasuke turned his head away this time, let Naruto have his neck. Naruto licked at his skin, scrapped his teeth over it, delighted by the marks he left on the other boy’s pale throat, by the way Sasuke’s back arched when he bit a little harder.

Sasuke matched him, trailing wet kisses along his collar.

Naruto groaned and lifted himself off of Sasuke enough that he could look down at his friend. The other’s dark eyes had fluttered shut, his kiss-reddened lips parted just slightly. It was such a beautiful, painful picture to his brain, already on fire, but he had to stop. He had to. Sasuke was strong and his grip on Naruto’s arms was so tight it had numbed the fox boy’s hands.

“Hey. Sasuke,” Naruto whispered. “That’s hurts.”

Sasuke opened his eyes, looked at Naruto in confusion, then at his fingers, clenched so hard around the other boy’s biceps that his hands trembled. He relaxed at once, winced at the way his muscles spasmed at the sudden release. He rubbed sadly at the tiny stinging crescents he’d left on Naruto’s skin.

“Sasuke.”

Sasuke looked up at Naruto’s face, wide open as always and full of concern. “If this isn’t right, you can tell me what to do.” He blushed. “You know more than me, ne?”

Sasuke squeezed his eyes shut, bit his lip.

Naruto stared down at his friend, lost, wondering what it was Sasuke saw in the darkness of his mind when he closed his eyes like that.

“If you...don’t like it with me, we can stop.”

“Idiot,” Sasuke smiled despite himself at the hurt in Naruto’s voice. It shook him out of his memories. “You really think I’d want to stop, now?” he asked, rolling his hips up against his friend.

Naruto’s breath hitched as Sasuke thrust again. “Well, I... Nnn. Sasuke.”

Naruto forgot his apprehension, caught Sasuke’s lips and kissed him hard as he ground down on his body. Sasuke accepted his tongue, breathed into his mouth. He guided Naruto’s hands down along his sides, and Naruto took the hint, rubbing his palms over his stomach, his chest and legs, touching him all over as he’d wanted to all day.

His skin was as smooth as it looked, amazing, but so hard underneath. His body was nothing but sinew and bone.

“Will you turn over?” Naruto whispered, sitting back on his heels, still straddling his friend. He raised up enough to let Sasuke shift beneath him, watched as Sasuke tucked his arms up under his chest and hid his face in the mat.

Naruto ran a hand up his spine, up into his mussed hair, traced his shoulders with his palms until his muscles unknotted. He planted a kiss on the back of the other boy’s neck as he lay down against him, took a shaky breath as he pressed his shaft between his cheeks. It was so much better this way. Sasuke was so soft there. It was the only part of his whole body where his muscles gave at all it seemed. Even after just a few slow thrusts, Naruto’s legs were shaking and he knew he wasn’t going to be long.

Naruto thought fast, snatched his t-shirt up off the floor by the mat and heaped it on the small of Sasuke’s back as his cock pulsed and he came. In that instant he caught his breath and held it so his cry wouldn’t reach his teacher sleeping one thin wall away.

The force of his climax shocked him, stole all the strength from his body. He finished laying full on top of Sasuke, buried his face in the other boy’s neck and exhaled a low,
muted growl of satisfaction as the last shivers shot through him.

He swore softly in awe, amazed it could be like this, so much better than doing it alone.

Still breathless, he tossed his shirt to the floor and flopped down on his stomach beside his friend. As he looked across the mattress at Sasuke, the other boy turned his face away.


Not this time, Naruto thought. Oh no.

“Why don’t you want to?” he demanded, pushing himself up on his elbows.

Sasuke said nothing, but Naruto would not be ignored. He inched close enough to wrap an arm around Sasuke’s waist, under his stomach. He lifted him onto his hands and knees. “Come on, get up. I’ll do it for you then.”

Sasuke let himself be pulled up and back until he sat down on his heels. Naruto’s chest pressed against his naked back as the fox boy scooted around behind him. Lightly muscled thighs flanked his hips and calloused hands settled lightly on his shoulders. “You can lean against me.”

Sasuke thought about it and finally untucked one leg to sit down.

Naruto sneaked a light brown arm around his waist. Then, Sasuke stopped him. “You know you don’t have to do anything for me.”

“You don’t want me to?”

Sasuke shook his head slowly. “It’s not that.”

“You want something else?”

Sasuke just sighed. “No, it’s not that either.”

It felt suddenly strange to be touching Sasuke at all and Naruto sought somewhere else to rest his hands. He was at a loss. He didn’t know a lot about how these kinds of things were supposed to go, but he’d sneaked enough peeks at Kakashi’s dirty books to understand it was his turn to do something back.

Why was Sasuke being so weird about it?

“It’s difficult for me anyway. Now. With someone else,” Sasuke whispered.

Someone else, Naruto wondered. He’d certainly gathered that Sasuke was not quite as new to all this as he was. It didn’t even surprise him, the way everyone slobbered all over him.

What really shocked the hell out of Naruto was that the Uchiha’s partner had kept their trysts a secret. Surely, had it been Sakura or Ino who’d had him, the whole village would know by now – Sasuke’s preference for discretion be damned. Yet Naruto had never heard a whisper and it made him jealous – did Sasuke have to be first in everything?! – and more than a little curious. If not Sakura or one of the others, then who? Had he done it more than once? Had his lover left him, or the other way around?

But no, this wasn’t the time to ask about it. He knew that much from the way Sasuke was acting. The other boy was not, by any definition, unemotional, but there wasn’t much in his usual range of feelings but anger and scorn and occasional amusement. A day ago, Naruto would have given anything to see something more human in him, but it was less satisfying now than he had imagined it would be.

Naruto wrapped his arms around Sasuke’s waist, hugged him fast and then held him close against his chest. “Sasuke,” he whispered, his lips against his friends bare shoulder. “Let me try.”

Sasuke’s hand came up, closed over Naruto’s. White fingers interlaced with his own, and Naruto thought for a minute Sasuke was trying to pry himself free of his embrace. Instead, he just squeezed the fox boy’s hand.

Naruto read permission in that.

His free hand found Sasuke’s erection, but he kept his grip light at first, just barely teasing the shaft. He let the other boy show him, with a hand laid over his, when he needed it faster. He freed his other hand, petted Sasuke’s hair, ran the tips of his nails lightly over his arms. He did everything he could think of, everything he’d done before that Sasuke seemed to like, everything that had felt good to him, but the other boy really was difficult. It was plain the way his breathing grew ragged, the way his hips jerked forward that he was getting closer, but pleasure just wouldn’t come to him as easily as it did to Naruto.

Naruto stopped stoking him.

“I told you,” Sasuke whispered, frustration plain in his voice.

Naruto ignored him, moved around in front of him and pushed him gently onto his back. He flung himself down at Sasuke’s side, turned his friend’s face into a kiss, slid a hand down his stomach. Sasuke sucked breath through clenched teeth as Naruto’s hand closed around his cock. Naruto kept up the motion as he sucked at Sasuke’s neck. “I want to try something.”

Sasuke’s moan was half a sigh.

Naruto had never been so glad in his life that his sensei was a pervert, as he kissed down Sasuke’s chest. He just hoped Sasuke liked this as much as Kakashi’s smut books suggested he would. He kept his hand wrapped around the other boy’s shaft, licked experimentally at the tip before he took the head in his mouth.

Sasuke gasped, bit back a cry as Naruto stroked him faster, his rhythm punctuated all the time with little licks around the head of Sasuke’s cock. It was unreal.

Sasuke came so suddenly that Naruto barely sealed his mouth around him before Sasuke filled his mouth with the taste of warm salt water. Sasuke was still panting, out of his mind, when Naruto eased off his cock and crawled up the bed to cover his face with childish kisses.

“How was that?” he grinned.

Sasuke snorted. It was so Naruto to ask that. He was always looking for approval.

But Sasuke wasn’t prepared yet to talk. He reached up instead, in a rare moment of tenderness, and cupped a hand to the other boy’s cheek. He traced the whisker marks, the round jaw. He ran his thumb over his friend’s soft lips, contemplating what the other boy had done for him. After a time, he’d come to think of *that* as something embarrassing, demeaning, something he’d done for Itachi as his inferior. That Naruto had wanted to do it for him was...unbelievable.

Naruto was watching Sasuke’s face. He saw the sadness creep back into his eyes. Even when he smiled it was there. “You’ve been hurt too much,” he said softly.

Sasuke looked away. So, the drop out wasn’t so stupid after all, he thought. He wondered how much the other boy had guessed.

“If I hurt you,” Naruto went on. “Earlier...”

Sasuke shook his head adamantly. Naruto had done so much to heal old hurts, without even knowing it, just being himself. He had a gift for that, Sasuke had noticed. Sasuke was bad with feelings, worse still at words, so he pulled the other boy close with a hand on the back of his neck and kissed him.

Naruto shot him a curious look at that, but he decided to let it go, gathered Sasuke into his arms as he settled in to rest. Elbows and arms and knees fit awkwardly together and in the warm night their bodies stuck together everywhere they touched, but they clung tightly to each other, fighting oblivion until sheer exhaustion overtook them both and they feel asleep wrapped up in each other.


*********************


Kakashi moved slowly through the dark halls of Tazuna’s house. Even mostly recovered, he still woke up a little stiff, but another day resting, training his team was be all the more time he could waste. Zabuza was going to come against them before he was fully healed. He expected that.

Best make today count if today’s what I’ve got, he thought, pausing at Sakura’s door to listen for the thrum of her hair dryer before he passed on, heading for the next room to hers.

He didn’t even bother to knock. Sasuke was always up long before the others and no mere knock was enough to wake Naruto. The fox boy slept most mornings until Kakashi dumped him off his mat.

Yanking back the door, Kakashi got a step into the room, saw one well-made empty bed and for the barest instant he thought perhaps Sasuke had not returned last night. He and Naruto had been snapping at each other with more ferocity than usual. The pale-haired jounin had no clue what had set them picnicking on each other, but a second look told him that whatever it was, the two of them had definitely worked it out.

In the second bed over against the wall, Naruto slept on his side half on top of Sasuke, with Sasuke’s arms locked around his neck, and not a scrap of clothing between them. Kakashi had always kind of figured about Sasuke – the boy was not remotely interested in girls, and at his age, that was starting to look suspicious – but Naruto too?

Just then, Sasuke stirred and Kakashi backed soundlessly out of the room and shut the door again. He had turned to leave, then, feeling mischievous, he hauled back and pounded raucously on the door panel.

Sasuke’s startled curse was followed by a distinct thump, and a howl of protest from Naruto.

“Moron. You overslept.”

“So did you! Don’t call me ‘moron,’ Moron!”

Then, the thunder of feet and thud.

“Uzumaki Naruto takedown no jutsu!” The crash was immense.

Sakura appeared in the corridor, hands over her ears, pink hair pinned messily on one side of her head and that murderous look on her face.

Kakashi grinned behind his mask and escaped down the hall.