Strawberries (A Naruto Fanfic)

Chapter 10: Later On

Author's Note

What's up guys? Been a while, I know. I get lazy too. I hope I've written up to your expectations...I just do this stuff to please you all! You also may be wondering who Riri Nagare is. She is another OC that I made and - wait I'm not supposed to tell you! Sorry, gonna have to tune in to find out. Review, Fav, Follow, I really don't care as long as you enjoy.

P.s.- I almost forgot. Please if you read and review, point out any mistakes or errors I've made with punctuation, grammar, vocab. or anything else you think I should address. Remember that I want to improve my writing not only for me, but for you all.

Disclaimer= I FORGOT TO DO THIS THE LAST, 2 TIMES SO LET ME JUST SAY THIS NOW: Fuck you...I don't own Naruto or its characters. Ciao!

After arriving home tonight, I think about what Furea said just before we parted ways at school. She doesn't know much about me either, and yet she keeps insisting that this friendship we have will last long enough for us to get really close.

I really don't know how to feel about that. I guess I'm being unfair, though; she hasn't pressed me once about my personal matters and here I am, trying to get all this information out of her when I've just met her. And this is all so new to me. Normally I don't talk to too many girls around the school, and if anyone else were to come up to me and declare we were friends all of a sudden, I would break it off right away and shatter whatever 'bond' that person thought we had.

But that hasn't happened...

So what makes her special? Is it because of her secrets she has yet to reveal? No. I'm not that insensitive. But how come I can't see her as just another girl around the school? How come I can't just tell her, "I'm not your friend"?

I have other friends. Sure, plenty, so why do I see her as different from the rest? I know if I didn't I wouldn't be spending so much time thinking about her this much.

And why me? I was just as invisible as her before we met and I don't really talk much. Why did she choose me, out of all people to choose around that school?

Does she see me the same way I see her? As an individual? As... different from the rest?

Maybe this is one of her paradoxes that she will reveal one day... maybe it's the same with me.

Only time will tell, I guess.

"Menma, come down for dinner, please!" calls out my mother, breaking me out of my contemplative thinking.

Getting up from my bed, I stretch and move towards the door. I reluctantly start to head downstairs to the kitchen from my room. When I get there, I'm a bit nervous to see both my parents sitting unusually quietly and staring at me, calculating expressions on their faces.

Scratching the back of my head, I quickly look at both of them and shuffle over to sit at the table. For a second I think we're having an intervention of sorts, but... as if on cue, when I sit down, I am bombarded with a bunch of questions:

"You have a girlfriend?!" asks my mother hysterically.

"You didn't tell us – me?" asks my father, a disapproving look glinting in his deep, sky-blue eyes.

"How could you bring her over without telling us?"

"What if we didn't come home that night? How were you expecting us to meet her?"

"How long have you known her?"

"How long did she stay?"

"Were you in your room together?"

"Did you even want us to meet her?"

"Did you... have...?"

"That's enough!" I cut them off before they can even get to say that cursed word. I guess I should have expected it, though: when I got home after dropping Furea off last night, they'd gone to bed, so they didn't get to ask all these questions then. Knowing how persistent my parents can be, they must've been really tired. Heck, even my dad, since he crashed as well.

Both fall silent. I take a deep breath to calm myself down while they stare, patiently waiting for answers from their son.

"She's just... a new friend I've made, okay? That's all."

Their eyes widen in astonishment. "A new friend other than Sasuke?" my mother gasps.

"And a girl, at that?" my father adds.

"Yeah, so?" I say, looking away from them, slightly embarrassed.

"Do you know how big this is, sweetie?" my mother exclaims suddenly. "My son isn't a social dropout! And he has a girl... that's a friend!"

"I was waiting for you to come home with a girl. Just knew it would happen." My dad smiles knowingly.

"Oh, like you could predict that easily," my mother scoffs. "Did you not notice his behavior before? With the way he was acting, I was worried that he wouldn't even be interest in girls. Rather... boys, or an asexual, and God knows I want grandkids..."

Well, thanks for the encouraging words, Mom and Dad.

"Agh, Mom, Dad, she's just a girl who is my friend. Whoever said anything about kids?" I groan loudly and run my hands through my black, frazzled hair.

"Well, you never know, son." My father closes his eyes in thought. "Love is a mysterious concept only the lucky get to experience."

I roll my eyes in annoyance and resume eating my food. Please shut up, I don't want to hear this.

"And the fact that after all this time, this girl, Furea, comes to you wanting to be your friend says something," adds my mother with a genuine smile.

"You know, your mother and I were just friends when we met," Dad says, laughing obnoxiously loudly to himself.

My mother coughs sarcastically. "More like I was the bully and you were the victim."

Here we go. They're just gonna sit and argue about their past lives, while I'm forced to listen, without a care in the world. I don't want to have to deal with this right now. Or ever.

So, not being able to take any more of this crap, I get up from the table and start walking over to the living room, my appetite long gone. As I walk out of the kitchen, I hear my mother call from behind:

"Don't do anything stupid with that girl! I like her!"

"Yeah, maybe you and her can end up like your mother and I," my father adds in.

It was then that I realized that at times, my father can be just as evil as my mother.

I mean c'mon, Furea and I marrried with a kid? I shake that thought out of my head in horror. I really needed to get out of that kitchen... fast.