Naruto stared up at the intimidating stone facade of the Konoha Institutes's main offices in trepidation. He hadn't really wanted to come here. While Konoha was a reputable and well known prep school it also had a certain reputation as to what actually went on there. He didn't particularly want to hang out with spoiled rich kids with attitude problems, but Naruto did have his goals and he couldn't afford to let anything get in the way of achieving them.
He sighed, shifting the duffel he carried slung across his back, trying to work up the nerve to walk forwards and push open the big wooden doors, but just ended up fidgeting and arguing with himself. He could find some other way to accomplish what he needed to do, this was merely the best and quickest way.
He took a deep breath and pushed himself forwards, the doors squeaking lightly on their hinges, the wood floor making gentle noises under his feet. It was an equally impressive entrance inside, with marble on the walls and high vaulted ceilings. He looked at the sign inside the door, arrows pointing every which way, and scanned the list until he found the name he was looking for, Headmistress Tsunade.
He swallowed and turned down the hall the arrow pointed to, scanning each door before he reached the one at the end of the hall, where the plaque gleamed even in the low diffused light. He knocked twice, in a sharp and nervous succession before he heard a shout of "come in" from the other side of the door.
He pushed inside and walked up to the dark haired woman typing away behind a desk. She looked sweet and approachable and Naruto thought then that maybe this wouldn't be so bad after all. He smiled.
"Headmistress?" The girl just laughed, shaking her head, and it was an almost musical sound.
"No, I'm just her secretary, but I hope I can help you anyways, she's not in her office right now." Naruto sighed heavily before searching the outer pockets of his duffel for the letter of introduction his uncle Jiraya had written him. You see, when Naruto had been little, both of his parents had died and he had never really known how or why, he was too young then. He had lived in an orphanage in England, where his parents had been, for a few years, until he was finally tracked down by Jiraya, one of the only family members he had left. Their family had not been poor, and the man immediately took him out of the orphanage, bringing him to France where he had a small complex in the mountains.
Naruto had happily stayed there for a long time, or at least it had seemed like a long time to a carefree child, and that he most certainly was. When he had become old enough to go to High School, Jiraya had decided that only the best would do, and had had a small conversation with an old friend who worked at Konoha, who he later found out was the headmistress herself. She had agreed to grant him entrance, and to keep an eye on him while he was here. That second fact had made Naruto pout when he'd heard it, he really was old enough to look after himself, thank you very much, he didn't need some old hag breathing down his neck.
His fingers finally found the smooth paper of the envelope, familiar under his fingers now as he had read that letter every night on his way here. He had been born in Japan, but they had moved shortly afterwards, and he didn't really remember anything from his time there. The school was nestled in the mountains in the south of the island country, and it had been a long plane ride to get out to the island, then quite a drive to get up to the campus.
The whole time Naruto had been busy worrying about the school that would be his home for the next year at the very least. Now here he was, standing in the intimidatingly large marble offices of Konoha Institute, and he was somewhat glad that his journey was over for now, even if his stomach did do a little flip, squirming like a small restless woodland animal in his gut. He forced a smile as he handed the secretary the letter.
There was a moment of silence as she read, one that seemed to stretch and morph and grow around him until he was nervously shifting around on his feet. The sound of papers rustling on her desk brought him back to the moment. He forced himself to be still and look back up to the woman behind the desk. She smiled, clicking something on the computer screen in front of her and the printer on the table behind her whirred to life, spitting out three sheets of white paper, each one with the school logo on the top in a bold gold and green. She handed him the papers.
"Here you go then, Uzumaki-kun! This is your schedule, your room assignment, a map of the school and all of the basic rules and regulations for the Institute. We expect you'll fit right in." She beamed up at him for a second before he turned to leave. His hand was on the door when she called out to him again. "Oh, right, I almost forgot. Tsunade will call you back in when she gets back from her business in America, which shouldn't be very long now at all. Your uncle requested that you get a brief overview of everything from her as soon as possible. If you have any questions, you can ask them then, and I'm sure she'll be able to answer pretty much anything. Okay?"
He nodded at her beaming face, and turned to leave again, forcing a smile onto his face even as he nervously toyed with the ends of his sleeves.
X
After an hour of wandering through the campus, and several stops to ask sheepishly for directions Naruto arrived outside the room to which he was assigned. The polished brass plate on the door read West Building: Room 8C. He paused, unsure of whether to knock or not, while he searched his pockets for the key the woman at the desk had given him. He took a deep breath when his fingers caught around it and decided to just slide the key card in and go for it.
He turned the knob slowly, still nervous. He knew he was going to get a roommate, and it wasn't really that that bothered him so much per-say, in fact he thought it might be kind of fun, but he wanted to start out his first year at this new school on the right foot. He wanted his room mate to like him. He pushed the door open, scanning the space ready to say hello to the other boy but was somewhat disappointed to find the room empty.
He sighed and threw his duffel onto the floor by the unoccupied side of the room and flopped unceremoniously down onto the bed. It was soft, the linens were obviously expensive, smooth to the touch, with pillows stacked at the head board. He surveyed the other side of the room, and was a little disappointed.
The bed was unmade, a flurry of uprooted sheets and blankets, but the walls were left blank and white. The desk was piled with books and papers, with one lone picture of a scowling red headed boy with a facial tattoo standing with his arms crossed, with a blonde girl draped over one side beaming like an idiot and flashing the V-for-victory at the camera. Another, slightly taller, stockier boy stood on his other side, smiling weakly, almost ignoring them both.
Naruto let his gaze flit to the ceiling above him, tracing a small crack that started in the corner above his head, tracing it slowly with his eyes until it disappeared. He sighed heavily when he thought about the school. He knew this was going to be hard, being one of the best prep schools in Japan it promised to be a lot of work, but probably worth it in the end really. Still, the Institute had a strict dress code and other such things that were a world away from what the boy was used to. He wondered if it would work out, or if he'd find some way to mess up this chance without meaning to.
He was wrenched from his thoughts by the door slamming open rather violently, bouncing off the wall with a loud noise that made Naruto jump. Standing in the doorway was a small pale boy, one that Naruto recognized from the picture tacked to the wall behind the desk. He smiled, sitting up. The red haired boy walked in silently, trailed by a boy in very dark sunglasses, with a scarf wrapped around the bottom of his face. Neither one of them said anything, so Naruto cleared his throat.
"Hello, I'm Uzumaki Naruto, I'm your new roommate, what's your name?" He winced a little at the sound of his own voice, like a puppy, excited and eager to please. The red headed boy merely grunted before turning his back. Naruto blushed a little.
"My name is Gaara." his voice was thick and gravely, low but still cold as ice. Naruto flinched a little. The boy behind Gaara shook his head a little.
"Gaara be nice, he's new after all." He turned towards Naruto then, and inclined his head slightly, "My name's Shino by the way. I live down the hall a couple units." Gaara just glared.
"What are your classes?" Naruto pulled out his schedule to compare. Neither boy spoke then, and the silence stretched out in front of him before Gaara broke it with a snort.
"Listen Uzumaki. I'm not your best friend, I'm just your roommate. I was fine in here by myself, last semester, but now you're here, joy of all joys, and I get to share a room with you." Shino chuckled.
"He's just mad because he had a room mate at the beginning of first semester and the kid left so he thought he'd be alone in here." Gaara turned back to Naruto then, his face blank and serious.
"Do you know why your predecessor is gone Uzumaki? It was because I killed him for annoying me." His face remained flat through the whole statement, which he delivered in his slow drawl, before he turned back away from Naruto. Shino scoffed.
"He didn't really kill the poor kid, don't worry. And as long as you don't piss him off you'll be fine I'm sure." Somehow Naruto was not comforted.
X
Naruto had left the little room shortly after Gaara had arrived, because the other boy had made a production out of ignoring him and it made the blond uncomfortable. He was still a little nervous about wandering around the campus, but he figured it was a whole lot less awkward than sitting in that little room with a boy who seemed to hate him.
He didn't think that Gaara's cold indifference would have been as disappointing to him if the boy hadn't been so attractive. Naruto blushed at the thought, but it was entirely true: he thought his roommate was damn hot, and even if he was probably straight as a ruler Naruto's mind kept painting the two of them in certain compromising situations together. He supposed that was also a big part of wanting to get the hell out of that room as quick as possible. Naruto sighed.
The campus of the Konoha Institute was massive, the school itself was located on a large cleared plot, but the land around it for miles was their property, with wooded areas and a large lake, not to mention an onsen up the mountain from the dorms. The compound itself was surrounded by a high stone wall with a big wrought iron gate at the driveway. Naruto could still remember the small tendrils of unease that had curled around his internal organs when he had passed through them in the cab he had taken from the airport.
These gates had been a fitting first impression of the school though, all of the buildings were made of stone, tarnished and darkened with age, and they towered above him ominously, making his heart beat a little faster. He wasn't used to places like this, so old and prestigious. It made him shiver.
Naruto had been so caught up in his thoughts about the campus that he hadn't even noticed the boy running across the courtyard he was currently walking through until they were both flat on the ground. Naruto was stunned, but the other boy seemed fine, blushing a little bit and stammering out an apology, struggling to stand back up before offering the blond a hand. Naruto was taken aback slightly by the boy.
He had brown hair that was wild around his face, and he wore a hooded parka against the winter chill, but Naruto's eyes were immediately drawn to the red tattoos the boy had underneath his eyes, trailing down each cheek. He gawked silently for a minute before chastising himself, grabbing the hand and pulling himself up.
"Thanks, I'm Uzumaki Naruto by the way, I'm new this semester. And you are...?" The boy smiled, and for the first time Naruto saw the boy's teeth, decidedly sharper than normal, giving him an animalistic beauty.
"I'm Kiba, I think I might be in the same class as you, you're Gaara's new roommate eh?" Naruto blushed.
"He hates me. Are you guys friends or something, you found out so quickly." He blushed and shuffled his feet, but Kiba just threw his head back and laughed.
"No, its not that, although I'm sure Gaara doesn't hate you, thats just the way he is. This school is pretty selective, so the classes aren't big and a new student is big news."
Naruto breathed a sigh of relief, slumping slightly and this only served to amuse Kiba more.
"So, Uzumaki, I've never heard of you before, what do Uzumakis do?" Naruto looked puzzled, cocking his head slightly and Kiba sighed. "Everyone here comes from a good family, you have to be pretty wealthy to go here, though social prestige goes a long time too." Naruto just shook his head. He wasn't quite sure what to say to that.
"Both of my parents are dead actually, I live with an uncle, he's an author, and friends with the principle apparently." Kiba raised and eyebrow in question but Naruto just shrugged it off. Kiba couldn't really help but smile, the boy was too cute, and that little nervous look on his face suited him quite well.
X
Uchiha Sasuke scowled at the familiar halls of the academy. He'd convinced his brother that he needed to take a break, and so he had spent the last semester in Amsterdam with their cousins there, but now he was back here in this fucking hell hole, and no closer to graduating, and to top it all off now he had to see Itachi every day again. He scowled deeper, when he heard the familiar distant click of heels behind him, telling him someone was following him. He focused on the tone and spacing of the clicks and sighed. It was Sakura, he could tell. Each one of his teen stalkers wore different shoes, damn stupid fashion-plates that they were. Sakura's heels were higher, but thinner than the others, the click was always small but sharp each time she took a step. Her strides were longer due to the shortness of her stupid fucking uniform skirt, hemmed up to the point where the hall monitors could probably report her for dress code violations. But none of them would, none of them would dare. Besides, even he could see the way most of them looked at her, envious or pining, depending mostly on their orientation.
He hated the girls that followed him around this stupid school, and if he was given a choice he wouldn't come back. He would go live in Amsterdam, or their uncle's house in Paris, or their summer house on the French shore. But he wasn't given a choice, he was given an ultimatum: graduate from Konoha and you can have the rest of your life, as long as you don't do something embarrassing, don't graduate and be trapped in this families tangled strings for the rest of your life.
He didn't see how any of this was important really, he was the second son after all, his brother Itachi would be heir to the family dynasty barring anything horrible happening, his own involvement wasn't necessary. He knew his brother, who would be graduating from Konoha this year, would never let anything happen to let his seat at the head of the Uchiha table be usurped, so Sasuke wasn't worried about having to take the companies one day. He also knew though that his brother had worked him into the fabric of his life, and that he would never let Sasuke cut ties, he would always keep that little proverbial leash around the boy's neck to tug him back to his place at the older Uchiha's side. He was the one to give the ultimatum after all, the only one who really gave a shit what Sasuke did.
Their parents were never around much when Sasuke and Itachi were children, and now that they were more grown up their parents weren't around at all really. Even if the brothers did take the short trip up to the main house there was a good chance their parents would be off on some trip or taking care of urgent business. Most of their time was split between the school and Itachi's Tokyo apartment, his brother loved dragging him out there on weekends and vacations. Sometimes Sasuke would be allowed to bring friends, but often his brother would get that face, that evil grin that sent chills up the younger boy's spine, and he would command him to come alone and bring nothing. Those were the weekends that left him like this: irritated and sleep deprived, rather sore all over, and very, very short tempered.
X
Naruto stared at the white ceiling of the dorm room where he had returned early in an attempt to get some sleep, but sleep wouldn't come. Classes were starting on monday, only four days away, and he couldn't help but be a little nervous about it, really. He didn't know more than a couple people now, and Kiba had availed him with a little bit of the "How the Institute Works" talk, but what he heard he was sure he didn't really understand. Naruto pushed it all out of his mind for now though, and pressed his eyes closed, focusing on sleeping, just a little bit.
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Chapter notes: Highschool AU, Cliché, foolishness, *disclaimer: i don't own the characters, only the setting, and i don't stand to make any money off this thing*