Naruto Fan Fiction ❯ End To Serenity ❯ First Impressions ( Chapter 2 )

[ Y - Young Adult: Not suitable for readers under 16 ]

Second chapter! Hopefully, you'll like this one and it'll encourage you to keep on reading!

“ “- talking

` `- thinking

------------------------------------------------------------- ---------------------------------

--Chapter 2--

--First Impressions --

The unrelenting noise that was the alarm clock struck into Naruto's dreams and pulled him out by the ear. He pushed the `snooze' button and yawned in all the glory of the sunlight shining in through his window. A foxy grin tugged at his lips and eyes snapped opened to reveal a deep, crystalline blue, as dazzling as a fresh Summer's day.

His blonde hair shined golden in the rays and he squinted at the brightness that stung at his eyes. Rubbing sleepily at them, he winced as he heard a voice carry from downstairs in the kitchen.

“Naruto!” yelled Tsunade. “Come down here NOW! You're not going to be late on your first day, got that?!”

“Be down in a minute!” he shouted back. He smiled as he peered down at the street from his window. 'Bring it, new town.'

Today was the day, his first day of school in this new town.

He finally bothered to check the alarm clock and his previously unfocused eyes widened as he saw the numbers. “Crap, stupid alarm clock, can't you pick another day to screw me over!?” he exclaimed loudly.

The clock said 8:10am. And school began at 8:30am.

“Not good, not good, not good!”

'I'm laaattee!'

He jumped out from beneath the covers and quickly stripped off his blue and orange pajamas. At record speeds he had pulled on the long, black pants, buttoned up the short sleeved white shirt and put on the ridiculous navy tie rather reluctantly. He didn't know why but he didn't like ties. Just something about them…

He grabbed his black sling bag from where it was on his seat and then ran out the room and down the stairs, making a direct beeline towards the front door.

He was just about to run straight out the door too, when a hand grabbed his shoulder. He froze with his hand on the door knob and turned slowly in dread to the woman keeping him back. Brown eyes looked into his own, and Naruto knew that he was not getting there on time.

“Come on,” he pleaded, “I'm going to be late! Weren't you the one who told me I needed to make a good first impression?”

Tsunade smiled at him, looking quite amused. “And since when were you such a good little boy? You are not missing breakfast, it's not healthy. And besides, you eat so fast that it wouldn't make much of a difference anyway.” Her tone of voice obviously scrutinized the fact that he ate like a person starved.

Naruto groaned. Sometimes, having a doctor for a guardian was not the best thing in the world. Yes, he loved her like a mom, but sometimes she could be so strict. And that was the beginning.

“Fine,” he grumbled. He was not tempted to be punched through a wall that early in the morning when he was already late to school.

He pulled his bag off and dumped it on the red couch, and then sat down hurriedly at the wide kitchen table. The table was already piled with some of his most favorite foods, including waffles and ramen. Taking a bowl in one hand and his chopsticks in the other, he rapidly worked his way through three bowls of ramen and an entire plate stacked full of waffles. He swallowed his last bite, leapt from the chair and grabbed his bag again.

“I'm going now!” he called to the figure behind the kitchen counter. He opened the door and was halfway out when it was pulled shut in his face and he felt a cold hand running through the back of his hair.

“No you're not! At least not until your hair and uniform is fixed up!” She made him tuck his shirt into his pants and pull them up higher, as well as helping him do his tie up so tight that it was taking a lot of self restraint to not instinctively throw the darn thing from the house.

“You're making me a bully magnet!” he whined. He tugged rebelliously at the tie on his neck.

“Oh, stop being such a drama queen,” Tsunade scowled as she straightened his collar.

“Done yet?” he asked impatiently. He checked his watch. 8:20.

“Almost.” Tsunade began pulling her wet hands through Naruto's hair once more and he sighed, tapping his foot restlessly on the timber floor in the hallway and humming a tune.

Tsunade noticed this restlessness, and she remembered that it had not always done good for him in the past.

“Naruto…”

Naruto stopped tapping when he noticed her voice seemed suddenly a lot more quiet and serious.

“Huh?”

“Listen to me…be good ok? Don't get involved with anyone remotely suspicious, and make sure that you're always keeping your guard up.”

`Why does she sound so serious?'

Naruto turned around and hugged his step-mother affectionately. “It's a school, nothing is going to happen. The worse would be I can't make any friends. Stop worrying, you've been doing so much of that lately.” When Tsunade still didn't return his hug he joked, “If you keep on going like this, you can buy all the blonde hair dye there is and it still won't cover those hairs.”

He glowed when she finally hugged him back. “And if you keep on giving out hugs like that, I'll think that I need to drag you out to my social meetings more often,” she said. She was quite an important doctor, and earned enough to keep them pretty well off.

Naruto immediately let go of her and stepped back defiantly. “I'm not going to those!”

Tsunade laughed and returned to fixing up Naruto's hair. Naruto shrieked when he finally realized that the stuff she was pulling through his hair was sticky.

“What is this?!” He pulled back from Tsunade's hands and dragged his own through his locks. When he looked at them he saw thick, clear goo. “Uh uh. No way. I am not wearing gel!” he screeched.

“And who was the one who wanted to make a good first impression?” Tsunade chided him. Her hands were still covered with the stuff and Naruto shuddered.

“It stinks! And who thinks gel looks good anyway?” He gave up trying to get the stuff out and threw his hands up in exasperation. “Gah! Whatever! If I don't go now then their first impression will be I'm some tardy idiot who slept in late!” He finally managed to get out that door and onto the footpath, barely avoiding a stack over the doormat. Without another glance back he began running down the road towards the school.

“Which is entirely true!” Tsunade called cheerfully to him. Only when he was out of sight did she reveal the features of worry which reflected her feelings.

------------------------------------------------------------- ----------------------------------

At Homeroom Sasuke looked quite calm as he sat alone at his desk amidst the chaos around him. The girls were all chatting about their holidays and the guys were chucking around paper and trash. The stupid teacher was reading some colorful book which Sasuke more than suspected had no place in a high school.

Beyond his exterior though, he was screaming to get out of there or to otherwise beat every single person up into a pulp. Couldn't people stay quiet?! He could feel his adrenaline escalating, which if wasn't stopped would result in a serious rampage. He grit his teeth and looked out the window, hoping that something would happen to distract him from his epidemic.

`Damm this.'

He wasn't always in such a bad mood but who wouldn't be after spending so long alone with his devil of a brother in a beach-house in some unfamiliar town? The teachers had wanted him to spend more quality time with his last family member in the hopes of easing his fiery temper, and what they believed to be a serious problem with his mentality. They hadn't said it like that though, but he knew that was the reason - he'd put a kid in hospital in the last term the year previous.

`Quality time my ass.'

Hands wrapped themselves around his neck and this didn't help his temper at all.

“Sakura,” he said severely. His voice very clearly made it known that he was not going to put up with her on that morning. “Get off me.”

Disappointed, the pink haired girl pulled her arms back and sat down at the desk to the right of Sasuke's with Hinata, Tenten and Ino. Shikamaru, Neji and Kiba then sat down near Sasuke's desk, who braced himself in preparation for the annoying questions sure to come.

“Feeling any better?” Kiba asked for what must have been the hundredth time. Sasuke's withering glare was answer enough and Kiba shrank a little back into his chair.

Neji grinned at Sasuke, not being afraid of him at all. “We're not attacking you, chill.”

Shikamaru nodded agreement and closed his eyes as he spoke through a yawn. “If you keep on going like this, then everyone's going to think that Itachi raped you or something.”

The others froze, as did Shikamaru. He'd said the fatal name. Sasuke's eyes went colder than ever and the other three decided that it was a good time to give him some quiet time.

They cowardly scampered over to join the girls and Sasuke could hear Sakura and Ino asking infuriatingly whether he was alright. God…if it wasn't for the fact they were girls, his resolve would have gone long ago. Sakura was under the self-procclamation that she was his girlfriend and the only thing stopping Sasuke setting her straight was that Sakura managed to keep the rest of the female population away from him - an exchange which he could bear to take.

The sliding open of the classroom door distracted him from his thoughts and he and the rest of the class turned to the front to see a person walk rather nervously into the classroom. Averting his eyes from the class which was completely focused on him, he walked over to Kakashi and handed him a folded piece of paper.

The boy had blonde hair which had been swept shoddily back into some sort of mullet with gel. His tanned skin was quite flawless, with the exception of some strange markings across the skinny face. He was slightly shorter than average, which against the tall machos at Konoha was basically miniature. Not that Sasuke was macho. He was just more…intimidating.

The blonde's frame wasn't very big either. However…the cerulean blue eyes were what really caught Sasuke's attention. They seemed so big and innocent and bright that they could have been taken for a girl's eyes. But then again, the girl's here weren't so innocent.

A survey of the boy's uniform by the rest of the class resulted in an outbreak of snorts and giggles. His shirt was actually tucked in, something which only geeks would ever do. The folds at the waist gave him a lop-sided kind of figure which only ridiculed him more. The tie was done up like a vicar and it was beyond Sasuke's understanding why he wasn't lying unconscious on the floor from lack of air.

From the teacher's desk a throat was cleared and everyone looked in surprise to Kakashi. Interested as to what would cause the perverted teacher to put his book down, Sasuke gave him half of his attention.

“Quiet down now! Jeez, Year 11s can be so hard…” Sasuke twitched - Kakashi's drawling voice was really annoying.

When the room had quieted down to a fifth of it's normal decibels Kakashi waved a hand towards the blonde boy. “I would like you all to welcome a new student to our school- Naruto Uzumaki. He has come here from a town nearby, and I am hoping you will all accept him.”

Sasuke looked as the blonde boy smiled like a kid and then bowed. “Hajimemashite.” The voice was melodic, and seemed to hang in the air. He found it captivating.

“You're in the wrong classroom kid!” shouted Kiba. “This is Year 11!”

Kakashi frowned at Kiba and said “Naruto is a Year 11 student, and despite however young you may think he looks he is in fact turning 17 this year.”

The class looked in stunned disbelief at both Kakashi and Naruto, who was embarrassed by his presentation. `Oh man…I knew she overdid the hair and uniform.' He'd immediately grasped upon entering the room that no other guys had their shirts tucked in, or their ties done up so tight. And they most certainly didn't have such horrible stuff in their hair.

“But we never accept new students into the senior grades. The classes are suppose to stay fixed,” Shikamaru pointed out. “Why him?”

Sakura whispered something to her girlfriends and they all burst out in laughter. Naruto immediately decided that he didn't like her. She was dressed like a slut. The skirt was revealing more than a little of her flesh, and the shirt was much too tight to be acceptable. Her black bra could be seen easily, pressed against her skin by her shirt.

Kakashi pointed Naruto to a desk which he gladly scurried into and then said, “This is…a special case.”

“What special case?” Kiba whispered to Shikamaru. “A mental?”

Kakashi sat back down at his table and ignored the questions which were still being thrown at him by his raucous students.

Sasuke turned around to see that Naruto was sitting at the desk to his direct left and was casting his gaze around the room, trying to gather a clear understanding of his surroundings. He noticed Sasuke looking at him and smiled. Sasuke was already bothered by how much he seemed to do that. It was so…naïve.

“Hello. I'm Naruto Uzumaki. Nice to meet you.” Naruto said happily. The voice wasn't exactly what Sasuke would call high pitched, but like the kind that singers would have- fluid and ringing. Sasuke suspected that if the boy were to shout, his hearing would be at risk.

He raised his eyebrows at Naruto and said, “The teacher already told us that.” He turned around to rectify his earlier mistake of letting Naruto catch him staring at him. He didn't offer to give his name, he knew that sooner or later Naruto would find out for himself.

Naruto frowned slightly at the Uchiha and thought, `What's up with him?'

He faced the front and only then did he realize that five HUGE guys had appeared around his table. The biggest and ugliest of them all slammed a hand down on Naruto's desk and the whole classroom became quiet as everyone stopped what they were doing to watch.

“What?” Naruto asked in confusion.

The guy growled and then grabbed his collar. A bit uneasy, Naruto said, “Let go of me.” He didn't even know the guy yet here he was being none the friendlier.

The bully smirked and said, “No.”

“Well, what do you want then?” Naruto asked, none the wiser.

The guy laughed and the other four laughed with him. He then gave a little rap on Naruto's head with his knuckles. “Don't demand anything of me. I could squash you so easily," he sneered.

Kakashi had finally figured out that something wasn't right and was making his way towards the huddle. A girl whispered warningly to the guy threatening Naruto and he quickly let go and with his set of thugs began walking back to the right of the room. Naruto was left as confused as ever.

As the big one walked by him, Sasuke casually put a foot out and he tripped, going crashing to the floor. His weight shook the small room and he was up and blaring seconds later. Holding onto his bruised nose, he shouted, “What the fuck?!”

He was about to yell some more when he saw Sasuke. Naruto watched in wonder as his face paled to a ghostly shade. He became even more surprised when the guy began bowing profusely to Sasuke who for the whole while merely looked coldly at him from his seat.

'Does he owe him money maybe?' Naruto wondered.

The guy finally stopped bowing and when he dared to look up, Sasuke said tonelessly, “You, have no right to be demanding anything from anyone.”

'Yep. Definately owes money.'

The thug nodded in terror, and then the bell went.

Sasuke picked up his bag and was out the door first. As Naruto left after him he could hear the words of three of the other guys in the room, and from what he heard, he deduced the dark haired iceberg was called Sasuke Uchiha, and the terror of the school.

------------------------------------------------------------- --------------------------------------

In Maths and English Naruto managed to fare pretty well without anymore attacks, mainly because the teachers were insane asses who put people in detention for sneezing. The Maths teacher Mr Zabuza was downright scary in both appearance and conduct. The English teacher Anko, was even worse. Where she lost marks for causing fear in looks, she made up for big time in her attitude.

In both classes Naruto found himself sitting at the desk next to Sasuke's. The ice prince just kept to himself the whole time. `Is he always like that?' Naruto wondered. Either it was just coincidence, or did it seem that everyone else didn't seem to want to sit near the Uchiha? Well…he guessed that pink haired girl did, but she wasn't with them in Maths.

In double Technology he was with barely anyone from his Homeroom. He glumly thought that he probably wasn't going to be making any friends anytime soon.

'I jinxed myself this morning.'

However, he was soon corrected in thinking this. As he worked on his technical drawing two boys sat at the table with him. He looked up in the middle of drawing a perspective of the room and was greeted with a strange sight. One of them had the biggest eyebrows he had ever seen and a bowl cut worse than his gelled hair, and the other was…fat. End of that description.

“Emm…Hello,” Naruto tried.

The fat kid didn't say anything so bushy brows did the talking for both of them. The moment his voice issued, Naruto was nearly blown from his seat in the enthusiasm that followed. “WELCOME TO OUR MOST NOBLE HIGH SCHOOL NARUTO-SAN!”

His ears ringing, Naruto looked in shock while the bowl cut kid just kept on rambling about how wonderful it was. As students on the surrounding tables sniggered and Mr Asuma approached, Naruto asked, more to shut him up than anything, “What are your names?”

Lee gave a half-salute and said, “Rock Lee! And this is-“

“Akimichi Chouji,” the fat boy spoke for the first time.

“Nice to meet you,” Naruto smiled.

Lee began talking again, and Naruto listened in amusement for the rest of the lesson as Lee told tales of disappeared students, dodgy teachers and disastrous sports carnivals. 'Konoha High really does sound very interesting,' he thought.

As soon as the bell went for the end of 4th period, Naruto was in the boy's bathroom in front of the mirrors. He'd had enough of the tie. Through Maths, English and Technology it had done nothing but give him a choking. He grabbed onto the knot and pulled at it, satisfied when there was a good 20cm space between the knot and his neck.

`Sorry,' he thought guiltily to Tsunade. `But I'm pretty sure that wearing it like before would attract more attention than not anyway.'

He needed to do his business as well, so he went into one of the cubicles. When he went to wash his hands he had unknowingly left his shirt un-tucked out of habit.

Outside the bathroom he met Lee and Chouji who'd waited for him. He was finally starting to feel a bit comfortable in this place now that he had actually made his first friends. "Thanks," he said as he took his bag from Chouji.

“No problem.” Chouji's stomach rumbled loudly and Naruto sweat-dropped. “We're going to the cafeteria now,"Chouji said. "Coming?”

Naruto smiled and gave a little shrug. `Why not?”

`I wonder what the cafeteria is like here.'

They went down a hall filled with lockers and then up a flight of stairs. Naruto noted curiously that these were all deserted.

'Where is everyone?'

At the top of the stairs was a set of red double doors. Chouji pushed them open first and Naruto and Lee followed him into the vast room within.

Naruto was stunned. `Oh…wow.'

How to describe the cafeteria? In his old school the cafeteria had been a grimy, horrid place where people only went if they had to buy their lunch. Here…it seemed just about everyone in the school was there from Grade 7 to 12.

It was filled with dozens of long tables, and at each table sat a different clique of people. Next to the door was a group of Goths looking forebodingly at them three, and there was a table which contained the guy who had tried picking on Naruto in homeroom.

“Does everyone hang here?” Naruto asked nervously as he looked around.

“For the first half of lunch, just about. For second half most people go outside into the quads,” Chouji said. He looked to the huge line of people waiting to pay and groaned. “No point lining up with that huge lot. We'll go sit down first.”

Naruto nodded and then looked uncertainly around at all the people. “Ermm…where do you normally sit?”

Lee pointed enthusiastically to a table in the middle of the cafeteria and Naruto was shocked to see Sasuke and all the `populars' were there. Sasuke was calmly eating some sushi dish while his friends clamored around. “You hang around with them?” Naruto asked distractedly.

“Huh? Yeh, why?”

“Nothing, nothing,” Naruto said hurriedly. Truth was, he could not imagine a more weirder grouping. Lee and Chouji weren't exactly what he would picture as being popular. On the contrary, they were probably down on the other end. 'But they're nice people,' he thought firmly. 'That's plenty enough.'

As walked past the thugs table someone suddenly gave Naruto a hard push on the back and he fell to the floor. He managed to break his fall with his hands and turned over. Looking up, he gasped as a bucket of prepared water was showered onto him by the same big thug. The freezing cold water drenched him to the skin, sending spasms of iciness down his spine.

He spluttered and shouted up at them. "What the hell?!”

Chouji and Lee quickly took an arm each and helped him up, while the rest of the cafeteria exploded into laughter.

Sasuke had looked up from his food when Naruto had fallen and saw full well what had happened. `How dare that bastard mess around in my territory,' he thought as he looked at the laughing punk. He made a mental note to make him pay. Naruto was yelling at the idiot, and his melodic voice had been replaced by that of a normal guy. Sasuke smirked.

Extremely pissed, Naruto took advantage of the water in his hair to clear out all the stupid gel. He turned his head upside down and laced the dried stuff out with his fingers onto the tiled ground, flicking his head back up when he was done. Closing his eyes, he shook his head a few times to get more of the water out.

'I'm dripping wet and freezing cold in the middle of the cafeteria on my first day,' he thought furiously. Could anything more go wrong?

When he finally opened his eyes, he was extremely unnerved to realize that the entire cafeteria had become dead silent and all eyes were staring at him.

Everywhere, the jaws of guys and girls alike were hanging on the floor as they gaped intensely at him. Even Lee and Chouji.

Scared that he had something more on him, like paint or some ornament, he turned and asked Lee uneasily “What's wrong?” He really didn't like this...the faces they were giving him were positively terrifying - why was that guy over there blushing at him? And there were more than a few nosebleeds that were normal for a fine Summer's day.

It took awhile for him to reply, and Lee shook his head slowly in wonder and uttered “Naruto-san is so...”

More than a little freaked by now, Naruto looked wildly around in the hope of finding out from someone else why he had suddenly become the target of a staring competition.

And then a girl screamed it. “He is so godamm HOT!” The rest of the cafeteria erupted into chaos.

`WHAT THE FUCK?!”

Everyone else was exclaiming loudly now too, and not only that…some of the girls had a predator look in their eyes and several of the guys were licking their lips. 'Is this a prank?!' Naruto thought desperately.

`Oh my God…'

Sasuke's normally composed face was looking at Naruto in astounded silence. He took back everything he'd thought about his appearance before. Now that the shirt was no longer air filled, he could see that the rounded frame had been an illusion made by the folds. Wet and sticking to his skin, all could view that the body beneath was a bit thin, but at the same time well-toned and slender. The blonde hair was now matted and without the dulling effects of the gel it had become golden highlighted and was framing his face perfectly. In their startled state the blue eyes were wider than ever and with all these features added together, the boy was the painting of an angel. And he still looked so innocent...

“I don't believe it,” Sakura whispered. “He's on par with Sasuke-kun!” The pink haired girl was looking at Naruto with an expression of stunned disbelief on her face.

At a table in the very back corner of the room a lone Year 12 was jerked out of his sleep by the commotion. Deidara looked grumpily around him, running his hand through his long, blonde ponytail. “What's going on?” he complained loudly.

No one answered him and he sulked at this. Instead, everyone's attention seemed to be focused on something or someone near the doors. Deidara got up and stood on top of the table to get a better view.

His eyes popped as they laid their sights on the beauty that was Naruto. `Whooaa. Is he TRYING to look like a fuck toy, or is he just the most freaking hot thing on the planet?!'

Deidara gawked at Naruto, unable to tear his eyes away from him.

But as Naruto made a small face of anger, something stirred in Deidara's memories and he frowned. `He looks…familiar.'

He snapped out of his lapse and in disappointment saw that Naruto had taken enough and had stormed out of the cafeteria.