Naruto Fan Fiction / Naruto Shippuden Fan Fiction ❯ With You I Will Journey Life's Path ❯ We're Not Lost, We're On An Adventure! ( Chapter 3 )

Disclaimer: The characters, items, places etc of Naruto are property of Masashi Kishimoto. These objects are used without permission for entertainment only, not for making money. No infringement is intended.

Chapter 3: We're Not Lost, We're On An Adventure!

Following a few mishaps regarding clothes shopping for the wedding, Itachi was rather pleased that the day they were due to leave had finally arrived. It had taken quite a lot of convincing to get Deidara to wear a suit- when left to his own devices, the artist had tried two different styles before Itachi had stepped in to explain neither were suitable.

While Deidara was perfectly happy to attend a wedding dressed like (in Itachi's words) 'a 1980's disco reject with an idolisation of David Bowie', Itachi wasn't going to let him. Nor was he going to allow him to turn up dressed in full Victorian era clothing, complete with top hat and cravat.

Standing on the pavement outside of his home, Itachi had to wonder why he didn't just buy them all train tickets instead. Sasuke had packed his one single holdall into the boot ten minutes prior, as had Itachi, while Deidara stood with his suitcase in his hands muttering to himself about items he might have forgotten.

"Blondie, we're only gone for a couple of days," Sasuke finally snapped. "Put your suitcase in the boot and get in the car so we can finally get going, would you?"

"I'm thinking!" Deidara snapped.

"Well think faster!"

"What a wonderful journey we're going to have," Itachi sighed. "He has a point, Deidara. You have your suit and some spare changes of clothes- you're fine."

Deidara finally put the suitcase in the boot, turning to Itachi with a curious look on his face. "Why aren't we using the sat nav again?"

"Because it's broken," Itachi replied with an offhanded shrug. "We'll have to do it the old fashioned way with a map."

"Can't we just try without it?"

"Without the map? How do you expect me to find my way to somewhere I've never been without a map?"

"Road signs, yeah."

"A map would be easier, Deidara."

"This map?" Deidara asked as he opened the passenger door, swiping a folded map from his seat where Itachi had put it moments earlier for safe keeping.

"That's the one. Give it to Sasuke, please."

Sasuke held his hand out in anticipation of receiving it, but Deidara grinned and shook his head before ripping the map into tiny pieces. He threw them up into the air, letting them rain down on them all like confetti.

"Let's have an adventure," he laughed.

Itachi stared at him for a few long moments in disbelief before glaring at him and losing his temper immediately. "Deidara, you idiot! What did you do that for?!"

"I told you, yeah. This is the best time for an adventure! You'd be boring and follow that map the whole way."

"So we don't get lost!"

"Shush shush. Anyway, you'd follow it and it would be the most boring road trip ever. I'm just livening things up! Don't you think it would be more fun to try and read the signs and explore places along the way?"

"Not when the wedding is tomorrow and I was planning on getting us to the hotel tonight! I can't believe you just did that! Oh wait, no, I can, because you're a moron with no common sense-"

"Guys," Sasuke interrupted, glancing between the two of them as they glared at each other angrily. "Can you stop having a domestic at the side of the road? We haven't even left yet and I don't want you sniping at each other the whole way."

"Get fucked, Uchiha."

"Don't speak to my brother like that, Deidara!"

"He gives as good as he gets, yeah."

"He gave a perfectly reasonable request-"

"Both of you!" Sasuke cut in again. "Deidara, get in the passenger seat. Itachi, get in the driver's seat. I'm sure we'll be just fine without the map. The idiot has a point about road signs."

Deidara looked positively smug as he slipped into the passenger seat. Itachi glared at him once more for good measure before getting into the driver's side, taking a deep breath to calm himself before he started the car.

"I'm sorry I yelled at you," he muttered to Deidara. "It takes a lot to have me lose my temper and you managed it in one simple movement."

"I'm just that awesome," Deidara mock-preened, leaning across to kiss Itachi on the cheek lightly. "Now come on, let's go adventuring."

"I don't know what I prefer," Sasuke intoned from the back seat. "On one hand watching you fight is annoying, but on the other watching you get all sappy is just as bad."

"So why isn't Naruto attending, Sasuke?" Itachi asked quickly, cutting the line of conversation dead before it could escalate.

"He doesn't travel well. Plus do you really think introducing both of our boyfriends to the collective family and business people is a good idea at the same time?"

"I don't see why it would make a difference."

"It shouldn't, but it might."

"So what you're saying is you told him not to," Deidara observed. The glare Sasuke gave the back of his seat confirmed that line of thought.

"Sasuke, that wasn't very nice," Itachi admonished.

"He doesn't travel well!" Sasuke repeated. "Do you really want him to get sick all over your car?"

"It would be no worse than travelling with you as a child," Itachi quipped with a tiny grin, which widened when he noticed Sasuke turn red in the rear view mirror. "Have you even told our parents about him yet?"

"Why should I? It's none of their business."

"Right. You realise they're expecting grandkids from you, right?"

"Kids?" Sasuke repeated, looking mildly appalled. "Fuck that. I don't want kids."

"My sentiments exactly," Deidara muttered in agreement. "At least we can agree on something, right Uchiha?"

"You don't think it would be nice?" Itachi asked, glancing across to Deidara with one eyebrow raised.

"Itachi love, I don't really want to break this to you, but you realise that neither of us can have a baby, don't you?" Deidara pointed out.

Itachi glared at him for a quick moment before putting his focus back on the road. "I know that! I mean... It's just a nice idea."

"No it's a terrible idea, and you should never think about it ever again, yeah."

"Actually you have a point," Itachi mused. "It would probably choke on a paintbrush before its first birthday."

"Your biological clock is ticking already, eh?" Sasuke snickered in the back seat. "You're twenty two now, right? That's a bit early to want to settle down."

"Technically I am settled down," Itachi pointed out. "I'm in a stable relationship with a roof over our heads and a potential career in the works. What more could I ask for?"

"What are you planning on doing when you leave, anyway?" Sasuke asked curiously. "You never said why you were so interested in geography."

"I want to teach it," Itachi said simply.

"You, a teacher?"

"Why not? Do you disagree? I have the patience for it, at least. It just means I need to go to University to continue my qualifications, but that's fine."

"I suppose you're right," Sasuke finally shrugged. "I just didn't expect that."

"I didn't expect you to want to go into biochemistry," Itachi pointed out.

"Aim high," Sasuke smirked. "Unlike someone in this car, I actually have ambitions."

"Jog on, Uchiha. I have ambitions, yeah. They just include a canvas and colours instead of chemicals and drugs or whatever it is you want to do."

"Cure cancer. What do you want to do? Oh wait- you want to paint pretty pictures of cats and bunny rabbits. Have you ever looked into becoming a classroom assistant? For primary school classes, perhaps?"

"I do believe that picture of a Skyline Deidara painted for you hangs pride of place in your living room," Itachi pointed out lightly, earning a chuckle from Deidara and a glare from Sasuke.

Itachi took the moment to flick the radio on and hopefully drown out any further bickering with it. Of course, he should have known better.

"What station is that set on? Classic FM or something?" Sasuke asked, clearly not amused. "Could you be any more of a stereotype, Itachi?"

"What on earth is that supposed to mean?"

"It means you're boring, and your music tastes are boring to go with it."

"Actually Deidara set the radio," Itachi replied, glancing at Deidara with an amused grin. "Would you object to changing it?"

"You know as well as I do it's only set to that because your foot caught it a couple of days ago when we-"

"Enough," Itachi hissed quickly. "Just change it."

"Thanks for that," Sasuke muttered, suddenly looking very uncomfortable in his seat as he glanced around the car. "I need a shower now. Or some acid to burn my skin off, that would work fine too."

Itachi knew the journey was going to be problematic. He knew Deidara and Sasuke would most likely argue. He knew he'd probably want to tear his hair out before they were even halfway done. However, he hadn't factored in the possibility that he would be completing this journey essentially blind.

He'd managed to get them out of the area with little difficulty, but they were now cruising along a motorway that he had absolutely no idea how to get off of.

He kept a steady eye on the road signs as they passed them, hoping he would spot the one he needed soon. It would be signposted- it had to be. Everywhere vital was- that was the point of sign posts, right?

Either way, he was going to kick Deidara out if he continued his endless flicking of radio stations. Apparently he'd become bored of the generic pop station they'd finally settled on, and was attempting to find something else to amuse them with.

"Leave it," he finally requested. "Just leave it on this channel."

Deidara sulked, folding his arms and leaning back in the chair with an irritated huff. "I'm bored, yeah."

"Then get your sketchbook out."

"I packed it away in my suitcase."

"Then take it out when we stop next."

"Can we stop then?" Deidara asked, his voice bordering whiny.

"I can't- we're on a motorway, and I doubt 'my boyfriend wanted his sketchbook' constitutes an emergency worth stopping on the hard shoulder for."

"Then stop at services. You said you'd stop if we asked, yeah."

"I meant for a legitimate reason."

"Okay... Then I'm hungry. Let's get food."

"Liar," Sasuke interjected from the back seat.

"I don't care," Itachi sighed. "If getting him his sketchbook stops him messing with the radio, then fine- I'll do it."

He kept his word and pulled in at the next services, parking the car and jumping out. He opened the boot for Deidara, who rummaged through his suitcase with glee.

"I'm going to get some bottled water," Itachi told him. "Are you coming in?"

"No."

"Alright. I won't be long- do you want anything?"

"No, no. I'm fine, yeah."

"I thought you were supposed to be hungry."

"Oh. Then get me a sandwich or something."

Itachi sighed heavily and tapped on the back window, gaining Sasuke's attention. The younger Uchiha decided to go inside with his brother, leaving Deidara alone with the car.

Of course, Deidara processed this piece of information with glee and quickly formulated a plan in his head at what he could do in their absence. He continued to look through his suitcase, pulling out a couple of artistic props he had never expected to have a need to use.

He hummed the theme to Mission Impossible as he opened the bonnet of the car. Smirking to himself, he quickly vandalised what he intended before slamming it back down again. The first step in place, he opened a tube of blue paint and squeezed the contents on the windscreen.

He was just putting the finishing touches to his masterpiece when he heard steadily increasing footsteps approaching behind him. He stopped attempting to make patterns with the paint and quickly emptied the rest of the tube carelessly across the glass.

"Deidara!" Itachi called, breaking into a full out run to reach the side of his car. Deidara attempted to look innocent despite the blue paint on his hands. Sasuke glanced between them and simply got into the back of the car, stifling laughter as he did so. "What are you doing?"

"Painting?" Deidara attempted to reason, giving his boyfriend his best smile and hiding his hands behind his back.

"Are you incapable of behaving like an adult?" Itachi sighed, eyeing his decorated windscreen.

He opened the car door, leaning in to flick the water spray switch to clean it off. Deidara attempted to smother his laughter when bubbles shot up instead, leaving Itachi to blink a few times in confusion and disbelief.

"Bubbles?" He remarked slowly, watching the soapy creations float through the air.

"Deidara- you- why?" He finally settled on saying, leaning against the car door with another frustrated sigh and running a hand through his hair.

"Don't you like it?" Deidara asked casually, pulling the empty children's bubble pot from his pocket. "It's creativity at its best, completely unprompted!"

"It's stupidity at its best," Itachi argued, glaring at him. "I'm not stopping again, hear me? You'd better make use of the time here. Get that paint off your hands before you touch my car!"

Deidara pulled his hand back from the handle he had been about to touch as if it was on fire. "Aren't we hours away?"

"Unfortunately. I don't care; I'm not risking leaving you alone again."

"Maybe you should handcuff me to you," Deidara replied coyly.

"I could handcuff you to the car," Itachi replied, looking contemplative. Deidara noted that he actually seemed serious, quickly fleeing and leaving Itachi to stare at his car in disbelief again.

"Why am I dating you?" He mused out loud to himself as he emptied the bottle of water he'd just bought over his windscreen, turning the wipers on and standing aside as they flicked watery blue paint to the floor. "Why?"

"Because you're masochistic," Sasuke called to him out of the window.

"Rather than laughing, perhaps you could help me?"

"Your boyfriend, your problem," Sasuke shrugged.

"And I could always leave you stranded here, little brother."

That prompted Sasuke to move pretty quickly, growling in annoyance about idiots and paint as he attempted to help clean the windscreen. Between them they managed it quickly, heading back inside to wash their hands free of paint.

Of all of the things either of them expected when they pushed open the bathroom door, Deidara standing on the sink counter attaching googly eyes carefully to the top of the long mirror on the wall was not it.

"Deidara!" Itachi called, causing the man in question to jump and nearly lose his footing. "Get down!"

"I'm decorating, yeah."

"I can see that. Remove them and get down."

"You're no fun at all," Deidara sulked as he begrudgingly got down, ignoring the part where he had been told to remove the eyes. "This is supposed to be an adventure!"

"No, it's a nightmare," Itachi argued as he rinsed his hands free of paint. "Get out to the car and behave like the adult you're supposed to be, before I lose my mind."

Once back in the car, they had only been back on the road for about twenty minutes before Deidara glanced up from his sketchbook sheepishly. "Itachi?"

"What is it?" Itachi asked. He'd been quite enjoying the ambience of the car, with only the radio on low and most importantly, no fighting.

"I kind of maybe forgot to go to the bathroom, yeah. Can we stop?"

"Are you serious? But you were right there!"

"I got distracted!"

"He said he wasn't stopping again," Sasuke smirked. "Bad luck, Blondie."

"What?!" Deidara cried. "That's not fair!"

"No, I'll stop," Itachi replied with a heavy sigh. "Promise me you won't vandalise anything or stick googly eyes to things, or anything else ridiculous?"

"I promise, Itachi," Deidara replied solemnly. "You can trust me, right?"

"I thought you told me I could trust you!"

"Hey, stop pulling me! I'm not done!"

"I don't care. You've been gone nearly fifteen minutes and I come in to find it's because you're vandalising things again! You promised me, Deidara!"

"It's not vandalism, yeah. It's redecorating."

"Drawing in posters with markers is vandalism. Come back to the car and we're going to get some distance behind us, hear me?"

"Are we there yet?"

"No, Deidara."

"When will we be there?"

"I don't know. Asking me won't make it any faster."

"So... You'll tell me when we're almost there?"

"Itachi, I swear if you don't shut him the fuck up now I'm going to jump out of this car even though we're on a motorway."

"...give me a sign... hit me baby one more time..."

"Stop singing, Blondie."

"Bite me, Uchiha. I'm so bored, yeah. Huh... Itachi, why do you look so annoyed?"

"I'm suppressing the overwhelming desire to crash the car headfirst into a wall."

"....Oh."

"Deidara, if I pull into the next services are you capable of behaving like an adult and staying out of mischief?"

"What are you implying?"

"I'm implying that the first time we stopped you filled my car's water supply with bubbles and painted my windscreen, then decorated the bathroom in googly eyes. The second time I had to come and stop you from vandalising-"

"I get it, yeah. So the answer is obviously no, if we stop then I'll do something destructive out of boredom. Is that a problem?"

"...You know what, I'm just going to skip the services. Let me know if either of you want me to stop in future because otherwise I'm not going to put myself through that again."

"We need to play a game, yeah. How about I Spy?"

"How about no?"

"I wasn't asking, Uchiha. I was saying we should. I spy with my little eye something beginning with... C."

"I guarantee the choice word I'm thinking of right now isn't what you were expecting."

"Oh? Try me!"

"No, Sasuke. Deidara, you don't want to know."

"Fine, fine. So do either of you know?"

"Of course you fucking idiot, it's a car! We're on a motorway- it's not going to be anything else!"

"Right, Sasuke! Your turn, yeah."

"Alright. I spy with my little- oh wait no, I'm not playing this stupid game. How about a joke? How do you keep a blond busy? Write 'please turn over' on both sides of a piece of paper."

"You little jerk!"

"Now, now. Enough, Sasuke."

"Aw Itachi, don't spoil my fun!"

"Hey, Itachi?"

"Mm?" Itachi murmured, glancing to the side. Deidara was looking at him curiously as he flicked sweet wrappers onto the floor of the car. "Stop trashing my car."

"You have no idea where we are, do you?"

Itachi really wanted to answer that yes, he knew exactly where they were but that would be a lie. He'd managed to follow the motorway successfully for the vast majority of the journey, but the moment they'd switched to back roads and dual carriageways he'd begun to lose track.

One missed sign was enough- he'd spent the next three quarters of an hour driving around in the vague hope he would see another sign that was of use to him. So far, he had found nothing.

"You're right," he admitted. "If you hadn't torn my map up, I'd know exactly where we were."

"So what shall we do? We've been on the road for ages- you really should take a break, yeah."

"Probably, but I know we're close," Itachi reasoned. "I turned off the motorway in the right place. There's going to be a sign somewhere, and we can rest at the hotel."

"Sasuke's asleep already," Deidara pointed out. "It's gone ten at night now. You really should stop."

"Where? I have no idea where we are, remember?"

"At the side of the road," Deidara replied with a heavy sigh that indicated Itachi was an idiot for not thinking of something so obvious. "We're not on a motorway- we're on some quiet backstreet. I haven't seen another car in at least fifteen minutes."

"That does not bode well for us," Itachi reasoned, but he took the hint and pulled over anyway. He kept the headlights on and shifted the car as far as possible off the side of the road, shutting the engine off and tilting his head back with a soft sigh as he closed his eyes.

"Maybe we could sleep in the car," Deidara suggested. "Then we'll have the light tomorrow, and we could ask for directions from people."

"Sleep in the car?" Itachi echoed incredulously.

"You're telling me you've never slept in a car before?" Deidara asked, seemingly genuinely horrified at that thought.

"No."

"How about camping? You ever been camping?"

"No."

Deidara continued to stare at him in disbelief. "Never slept on a park bench because you were so drunk you couldn't walk home?"

"No, Deidara."

"That's how I spent my time in Europe," Deidara shrugged.

"Drunk on park benches?" Itachi asked, giving him a good natured smile that said he was joking.

"No, sleeping rough," Deidara sighed mock-irritably. "I used to take overnight trains a lot so I could sleep on them. If I ended up in an actual hotel it was a good night. I just didn't have the money to put a roof over my head all the time."

"I'm sorry you had to live like that."

"It was pretty fun," Deidara shrugged, giving him a grin. "Don't you think the idea is nice? Becoming part of the canvas of nature, being painted on by the sunrise and your surroundings when you awake?"

"Despite the fancy metaphor, it isn't as nice as waking up in bed."

"You have no sense of fun," Deidara chided, looking a touch sulky.

"Apparently not which is why we are here in the first place, is it not?"

"You have a good point, yeah. So, catch some sleep, continue in the morning?"

"I suppose," Itachi finally relented, glancing at Sasuke in the back seat. He was sitting with his head against the window, which Itachi just knew would lead to him aching in the morning if he stayed that way. "None of us are going to be very comfortable, though."

"We'll find the hotel early tomorrow and get some more rest there, yeah. Make sure you leave a window open half an inch. Sleep well, okay?"

"I probably won't," Itachi sighed, but he had to smile when Deidara leaned over and gave him a tender kiss goodnight.

He opened the window slightly as instructed, torn between waking Sasuke and telling him to lay across the back seat for comfort, or just letting him sleep. He eventually decided on the latter.

His brother would get the hint if he awoke, hopefully. Reclining the chair back slightly, he flicked the headlights off and resigned himself to the most uncomfortable night's sleep he might ever have.

Chapter End