Naruto Fan Fiction / Naruto Shippuden Fan Fiction ❯ With You I Will Journey Life's Path ❯ The Great Pancake Massacre ( Chapter 9 )

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 9: The Great Pancake Massacre

Itachi couldn't put his finger on why, but Deidara had been acting oddly. Well- more oddly than he usually did, considering his brand of normal wasn't the remotest bit sane. He'd been subdued and quiet, as well as a lot more helpful than usual.

Itachi usually did the grocery shopping but Deidara had jumped at the chance, ignoring the offer for a lift in the very least in favour of fighting with buses to the supermarket and back.

Itachi would have been able to ignore that, but he couldn't ignore the lack of art he'd been noticing. Deidara _was_ art- he lived, breathed, existed the subject yet he'd barely had his sketchbook out.

Any work he had done was outside in the garden, sitting up in the tree away from Itachi's eyes. His excuse that it was a nice change wasn't going over very well, considering the evenings especially were still icy cold.

Regardless, Deidara wasn't talking. He swore he was fine and always had a pleasant smile to give when Itachi admitted his worry. Unfortunately, Itachi wasn't able to contest it much anyway since he was still fatigued and sleeping like a cat.

Admittedly it wasn't as bad anymore, especially with the help of his old friend caffeine, but he still wasn't functional enough to try and suss out his suddenly secretive boyfriend.

With a cup of said caffeinated coffee at hand, he was still awake at ten pm. That in itself was a small miracle, and of course he'd put the time to good use by studying at the living room table.

Deidara had disappeared nearly two hours previously, taking his sketchbook with him into the garden. Itachi had learnt that he didn't like to be disturbed all of a sudden, so had given up attempting to check up on him.

Well, he wouldn't have checked up on him, but as the clock continued to tick around he found it harder and harder to keep himself awake. When he found himself moments from falling asleep over his textbook he finally relented, heading outside and looking up the tree.

"Deidara," he called softly. "Are you coming in?"

"Not right now," Deidara called back down without even looking up. "I have my key, yeah. I'll be in when I'm done."

Itachi took the gentle hint and headed back inside again, frowning in concern as he readied himself for bed. Considering how much of a lecture he had given Itachi for keeping secrets, Deidara was now doing the same thing.

He awoke to an empty bed in the morning, which wasn't all that unusual. Deidara often got up before he did, and could be found in the living room with art supplies spread across the table. For a fleeting moment he wondered whether his partner had even come inside, heading to the living room in the hope that he hadn't slept in a tree all night.

"Hey," he called out, thankful when Deidara poked his head around the kitchen doorway.

"Hi," Deidara called back, looking slightly troubled. He held an empty frying pan in his hand, which Itachi quickly stalked over and took before entering the kitchen to see the chaos he expected.

The kitchen looked as though a cluster bomb of pancakes had exploded in it. There was a pancake hanging lazily from the ceiling, which Deidara sheepishly knocked down with a broom. Three pancakes were on the floor. The bin looked as though it was housing about five pancake corpses.

"I was trying to make breakfast," Deidara said meekly as he took the frying pan back.

"How did you make the batter mix?"

"I borrowed your computer and went online," Deidara replied with a grin that showed he was proud of his initiative. "I measured everything out like you're supposed to and I didn't forget anything."

"In that case go ahead and sit down," Itachi offered with a kind smile. "I'll make-"

"No!"

Deidara's objection was so vehement Itachi was taken aback, narrowing his eyes in confusion.

"No," Deidara repeated, with less vigour. "Let me do it please. Go and sit down, yeah. I'll bring you a coffee."

Itachi did as instructed, accepting the coffee a couple of minutes later gratefully. He opened his mouth to speak but Deidara disappeared back into the kitchen, leaving Itachi to observe him slowly and carefully pouring batter mix into the frying pan once more.

"Why don't you use a utensil to flip it?" He called when that attempt ended up on the floor.

Deidara had flicked it high enough that it clipped the light on the ceiling before plummeting back to the ground so quickly he couldn't catch it.

"Because that's no fun," Deidara told him determinedly, pouring more mix into the frying pan.

It took a further three attempts before he successfully caught a pancake back in the frying pan. Deidara hollered with glee and Itachi smiled, feeling relieved- watching Deidara fail each flip was excruciating when he wasn't accepting help.

"Ta da," Deidara declared as he set the pancake down in front of Itachi. "With sugar and lemon, just how you like it."

"Thank you," Itachi smiled as he tried a bit. Deidara waited patiently for his opinion. "It tastes absolutely fine," Itachi praised after a moment. "I have no idea what I've done to deserve such pampering, though."

"I love you," Deidara countered, giving him a quick hug before scarpering back into the kitchen. "Why do I need a reason?" He called out in continuation. "Sometimes you do this kind of thing for me, and I thought it was my turn, yeah."

Deidara eventually managed to make four pancakes, two each, within a reasonable time frame. Itachi had finished his when Deidara joined him at the table, but he stayed where he was cradling his empty coffee mug regardless for the company.

"What were you drawing last night?" Itachi asked conversationally, hoping to draw Deidara into a discussion. If art couldn't do it, then there was most definitely something wrong.

"You don't want to know," Deidara replied with a small grin.

"Now I definitely want to."

"I'll show you," Deidara offered, getting up and vanishing to fetch his sketchbook. He hesitated for a moment when he came back, earning a frown of confusion from Itachi, before he finally flipped the sketchbook to a page near the middle and handed it over.

The picture was different to any style Itachi had seen Deidara draw before. It was much softer, romantic almost, and coloured with pencils with equally gentle strokes that gave it an almost ethereal look.

Itachi recognised the drawing as that of the church Nagato and Konan had been married in, though Deidara had covered it in snow. Two small figures were standing on the path outside- Itachi realized with a start that one had blond hair and the other had black, and neither were wearing a dress.

"I didn't to bring this up because I was worried about frightening you," Deidara shrugged as he cut up his pancake into tiny pieces, not meeting Itachi's eye. Itachi realised with a start he was doing so because he was nervous, which was unnerving.

"But I realised that I want to wake up with you every morning and share pancakes and coffee, yeah. I want to be here, even through all the troubles you have with your complex. I want to go to bed every night in the same bed as you. I want to share my art with you, my life with you-" He paused, dropping his cutlery and reaching out to clasp Itachi's hands across the table tightly.

"Itachi- marry me? I was half serious at the wedding, but I'm completely serious now. Give it to me straight and if you say no, I won't ask again."

Itachi stared at their joined hands, eyes wide in shock. Deidara took this as a bad sign, and continued talking.

"My parents gave me a terrible example of married life," he explained quietly. "Dad was always out getting drunk and if he was home, one of us was probably going to get beaten. Do you know why I ended up in Europe for my gap year?"

"Go on," Itachi nodded, even though the question was probably rhetorical.

"Eg kjem frå Noreg," Deidara said, his voice taking on a completely different tone. Itachi stared at him for a moment before realising he had spoken in a completely foreign language. "I'm from Norway," Deidara clarified.

"I was born there. We moved here when I was about seven or so- I can't speak the language as well as I used to anymore, yeah. I wanted to go back there to enjoy my home country, instead of wanting to flee from it because of the life I led there."

"All this time you were bilingual and I didn't know?" Itachi remarked, still shocked at the revelation.

"Well it hardly came up in conversation, did it?" Deidara shrugged. "Besides like I said, I'm not really fluent anymore. I'm too out of practise. You've managed to avoid the subject, yeah."

"You gave me a suitable subject to move to," Itachi countered with a heavy sigh. "Look... Deidara, you know I love you? I really, really do. But..." He released his hands with a guilty look on his face.

"I don't think I can marry you. I'm struggling so hard right now to find myself- I don't know if I can change who I am again-"

"What would change?" Deidara interrupted. "Honestly? Nothing would change. We'd still wake up together, we'd still go to bed together, we'd still attend the same college, we'd still screw and kiss and all that other stuff."

"We would change," Itachi said definitely.

"No we wouldn't."

"I think I would. I... I'm not saying no forever, alright? I'm just saying that no, right now I don't think I can marry you. Forgive me, but you'd rather I was honest- you said so yourself."

"Alright," Deidara replied quietly as he gathered their plates together. "When you're ready, come to me. If that's tomorrow or a year or ten years or never, then fine. I'll still be here, yeah."

Even though he sounded alright, Itachi knew that he wouldn't be. However he stayed right where he was while Deidara headed out to the kitchen, sitting at the table as a sombre silence descended over the room. In reality, his main reason for saying no was fear. The idea of having a permanent attachment that wasn't his sibling or parents terrified him.

In reality he had already done so, but without a formal piece of paper to back it up he could remain blissfully ignorant, knowing either one of them could walk away at any time. They wouldn't but the option was there, and Uchiha Itachi liked options. He could control things with options, just like he controlled himself and his perfect exterior.

Deidara was a man who usually acted first and thought about the consequences later. He'd acted without thinking so many times before but now, he was sitting on the edge of he and Itachi's shared bed deep in thought.

Itachi was asleep in the bed, curled up with the cover and inky hair spread across the pillow. He looked peaceful, and all of Deidara's soul wanted nothing more than to just climb under the covers and join him.

He didn't. He couldn't. In the time that had passed since his confrontation with Sasuke, the youngest Uchiha hadn't visited again. His contact with Itachi had been short and not all that sweet, leading Itachi to believe he was having problems with Naruto again. Deidara suspected differently.

He sighed and pulled himself up from the edge of the bed. Watching Itachi sleep, blissfully unaware of the whirlwind in his mind, wasn't going to help. Instead he snatched up his sketchbook and settled at the bedroom desk, setting pencil to paper and releasing some of his frustration in the only way he truly knew how.

He stayed there until daylight began to filter underneath the dark curtains. He hadn't sketched a single thing that would make sense to Itachi, but it all made sense to him. A crushed rose, a deer on a cliff-edge- symbolism that made him snap the sketchbook closed with a heavy sigh and wish he was actually tired. Despite the late hour the last thing on his mind was sleep.

"Deidara?" A tired voice behind him called. Deidara turned and gave Itachi a smile. He was looking up at him sleepily from the covers, eyes narrowed slightly in confusion.

"Morning," he greeted. "Go on, get some more sleep."

Itachi didn't protest, closing his eyes once more and curling the cover up around himself more. Deidara watched him for a few long moments before finally getting up and sliding into the bed with him, staring up at the ceiling as Itachi clasped tiredly onto his side lovingly.

Itachi knew something was amiss the moment he woke up at nine am. Such an act was unusual since if he didn't awaken at five, Deidara had him out of bed by half past. However Deidara was curled up next to him, fast asleep, despite Itachi being sure he'd seen him awake earlier.

He couldn't resist putting a hand to his partner's forehead to check if he had a fever though, seeing illness as the only reason he would still be asleep.

He felt fine, so Itachi slipped out of the bed with a frown on his face. It would give him a chance to fix breakfast by himself- Deidara had been snatching the job, even if it was a simple as buttering toast. He'd attempted dinner a few nights beforehand, which Itachi had attempted to rescue before relenting and calling for takeout.

Deidara had been trying to prove he could cook without recipes, but all he'd succeeded in doing was burning the pasta he'd been trying to cook. Itachi wasn't even aware you could burn pasta before then, but that's what happened when you set it to boil and left it to go work on some art- you came back to a dry pan with water-inflated, scalded pasta stuck to the bottom.

Before he had the chance to wake his slumbering boyfriend the phone rang. Itachi picked it up and greeted the person on the other end of the phone wearily.

"Nice to hear from you too," the person on the other end of the line sighed. "Did I wake you?"

"Kisame?" Itachi asked, eyes widening in surprise.

"Yeah it's me. Open your front door, would you?"

Itachi jogged down the hall and did just that, smiling at the sight of his old friend on the doorstep. He hung up the phone in his hand and allowed the crushing hug that came moments later, grinning as they pulled apart.

"It's unusual to hear from you any time except Christmas," Itachi mused. "What brings you here?"

"The Blue Reef aquarium in town," Kisame explained. "My unit have been acquired for some work there, so I took the opportunity to visit you while I was around."

"It's great to see you," Itachi enthused, which lasted approximately three seconds until one sleepy Deidara appeared at his side, rubbing his eyes and confused.

Of course, Deidara was still acting strangely, and was liable to be even worse with Kisame around. He wasn't exactly jealous, but he wasn't far off of it either.

"Deidara," Kisame greeted with a wave. "Have you been keeping Itachi in line while I've been away, eh?"

Deidara didn't reply, blinking a few times before walking straight past them down the hall to the bathroom to shower. Kisame narrowed his eyes in confusion at Itachi, who gave him a weak smile.

"Did I come at a bad time?"

"No," Itachi replied with a shake of his head. "Actually, I could do with someone to talk to."

Settled at the table with a cup of coffee each, Itachi sighed heavily and closed his eyes in frustration, shaking his head slowly. "I have no idea where to begin," he admitted.

"The beginning," Kisame suggested with a grin.

"You're the same as always I see," Itachi remarked with a tiny smile back.

"Charming? Wonderful?"

"Infuriating," Itachi filled in with a smirk before he frowned again. "Deidara's been acting strangely lately, Sasuke's been out of contact and reluctant to speak to me and my uncle Madara is trying to sabotage my college course in the hopes I'll want to inherit his business one day."

"It sounds like you've been busy."

"Unfortunately so. I think I know what's going on with Sasuke. I can ignore Madara unless he's on my doorstep, but Deidara... I have no idea. Or... I do, but I hope it isn't..."

He trailed off uncertainly, looking away from Kisame's gaze.

"You know I can't read minds, right?" Kisame prompted. "What's going on?"

"He asked me to marry him and I said no."

"Why?"

"Because I can't," Itachi replied when no other answer presented itself in his mind.

"Why not?"

"I just can't. Anyway- enough about me, let's talk about you."

"You said you wanted someone to talk to," Kisame hinted.

"I also said let's talk about you," Itachi hinted right back. Kisame shrugged, taking the change of topic gracefully.

"Nothing much. I'll be at the Blue Reef this weekend- you should come down with Deidara, and try and bring your brother along too. We can get something to eat, watch the fishes- you know, all that fun stuff. It would probably do you some good right now."

"Thank you," Itachi replied sincerely. "I appreciate the offer, and I'll definitely be there even if I have to come alone. I need a break."

"How's the therapy going?"

"It's a long story."

"And the medication?"

"It's an even longer story."

"I see. Do you want to catch me up now or at the weekend?"

"The weekend, please. I'm actually expecting a visitor."

"Oh?"

"Madara," Itachi muttered. "My father, too. I hate to kick you out but they'll be here shortly and I haven't told Deidara about them coming yet."

"I get the message," Kisame grinned as he stood. "Thanks for the coffee. And remember- I'm above land so my phone's on, alright? Give me a call if you want to talk before the weekend."

With those words he was gone, leaving Itachi alone at the living room table with his half-empty warm coffee cradled in his hands. Deidara emerged a few minutes later, wrapped in a towel with his hair loose and wet down his back.

"Kisame left already?" He asked.

"We're meeting up at the weekend," Itachi murmured without looking up from his coffee. "Deidara- sit down. I need to talk to you."

"I don't like the sound of that, yeah. What about?"

"Madara and my father are going to be coming here soon," Itachi explained.

"What? Why?"

"To discuss business. In order for my plan to work, I need a favour from you."

"Oh?" Deidara said wearily. "Do I want to know?"

"I need you to leave for an hour or so."

"Why? If you want me to keep my mouth shut, I can do that. I don't like your uncle but I can-"

"No," Itachi interrupted. "I need to pretend we've broken up. I need Madara to trust me."

Deidara stared at him before getting up and making his way to the bedroom. Itachi followed, standing in the doorway awkwardly while Deidara got dressed and tied his wet hair back without a single word.

"Deidara? Talk to me."

"I'm not happy about this," Deidara replied harshly. "Why should I have to go along with something like that for your uncle's benefit?"

"It's important," Itachi reassured him. "Please trust me."

"I do trust you, but sometimes it's hard when you say crazy things."

"It's not crazy. Madara clearly isn't happy about our relationship, so if I pretend it isn't happening anymore-"

"No."

The single word was spoken softly, but it made its impact. Itachi closed his mouth immediately, feeling subdued.

"I'll do anything you want," he whispered. "Please, Deidara. You want me to draw, right? I'll draw, and I'll paint too."

"Are you bribing me?"

"Bargaining," Itachi disagreed. "I need this. I need you to do this. I... I'll marry you. I know you want that, right? This is how important..."

He trailed off, realising from the look on Deidara's face that he'd said the wrong thing.

"You're bargaining with the promise of marriage?" Deidara hissed sharply, clenching his fists in anger.

"Itachi! You-! Marriage isn't something you do to get your own way, yeah! Marriage is something you do because you love the other person and you want them in your life until the day you die! Something you clearly didn't want before-"

"No, that isn't true!" Itachi cut in. "I have issues, Deidara. You know that. Marriage is a frightening prospect, which is why I disagreed now. I didn't say it was off the cards completely."

"Yet you can throw around propositions when it suits you?"

"That wasn't the right thing to offer," Itachi admitted.

"That's an understatement," Deidara pointed out as he pushed past his partner. "I'll leave, yeah. It's probably for the best that I don't come back, right?"

"What?" Itachi whispered, his blood running cold. "What are you talking about?"

"All I do is spread my art like a plague," Deidara responded, not turning around to face Itachi. "That's what Sasuke said, and he's right. You can go ahead and tell him he won, yeah."

With that he stalked to the front door and wrenched it open. Itachi took a single moment to process what Deidara had just said before flying after him, grabbing his arm with enough force to hurt.

"Sasuke said what?" He hissed. "What did he say to you?"

"He said enough, yeah."

"What did he say?" Itachi asked again, his tone more forceful. "Deidara! Talk to me!"

Deidara simply shook his arm free and carried on walking. Itachi chased him up the garden path until Deidara finally turned to face him, anger on his face and tears on his cheeks.

"Don't follow me," he practically pleaded. "Please, Itachi."

"Then don't leave!"

"You need me to," Deidara pointed out. "For your plan. It was so important you offered marriage for it, yeah. I'll go, and you can sell your soul to your uncle. Just let me know when you're done so I can decide if coming home is the best decision to make or not."

He opened the gate and headed down the path. Respect for his request to be left alone was the only thing that kept Itachi rooted to the spot, before he stalked back inside the house for his coat and keys. It was about time he paid Sasuke a visit, he felt. Madara and his father could wait.

Chapter End