the great pretender

the form

•

"kakashi-sensei and naruto still aren't here..."
sakura said in a whine. team 7 had been waiting under a tree for 30 minutes and though it was normal for kakashi to be late, it was odd for naruto to be.

"i wonder why naruto's late..."
nami said under her breath as sasuke began to slowly move closer to her. he placed his hand near the namikaze's and sakura grew jealous, causing her to do the same.

"nami, why do you care so much about that dobe?"
sasuke asked nami out of pure curiosity and jealousy. though sasuke wasn't too bothered that nami had a close bond to naruto, he wanted to know why.

"i don't know. naruto and i both grew up without any parents, but i was welcomed into the village meanwhile he wasn't. i feel bad for him and want to make up for it in every way possible. and we both have a power we can't control that's extremely dangerous."

"tch"

"nami!"
the blonde near from far.
an orange dot came rushing in with a wide smile on his face, making nami's worries fade away.

"naruto, where were you?"
nami asked the boy who simply smiled.

"sorry i was late. i'm moving to a new place so i didn't get much sleep!"
naruto said in a more cheerful voice than usual. this time, his smile was true. it wasn't as any of his previous.

"oh really, where is that?"

nami asked. she turned to face naruto, completely ignoring sasuke and sakura and focused all of her attention on the other blonde.

"nami, thank you for letting me live in your apartment! it's so much bigger than my previous one and i have space to move around now! my old one might've been the size of your washroom!"
naruto drowned nami in a hug and smiled, causing nami to smile as well. maybe her running away did something good.

"you're welcome, naruto!"
nami said. she stood up and gave naruto a warm hug; he hugged back.
suddenly, she felt a hand on her shoulder.
behind her stood kakashi with 4 pieces of paper.

"kakashi-sensei, you're late!"
sakura yelled at her teacher, making sasuke roll his eyes.

"i think you're ready to become chunin."
kakashi said, placing his hand on nami's head. he began ruffling her hair, making nami slightly mad.

"really?! thank you, sensei!"
naruto ran to hug kakashi, but was held back.

"you're going to need to pass the chunin exam to do so."
kakashi handed out the pieces of paper which seemed to be registration forms for the exam.
"get your parent or guardian to sign this and meet in room 302 in 3 days. i expect you to be there."

"erm, sensei... some of us don't have parents or guardians."
nami said, pulling kakashi's sleeve.

the man sweat dropped and cleared his throat.
"ask the hokage to sign the form then."

"alright!"
naruto cheered on and ran off, heading straight to the hokage's office without a single care.

"nami, i'm your guardian for the next year; hokage's order. i'll sign it tonight, just leave it on the table."

"ok, kakashi!"

nami began walking towards sakura who seemed concerned about the exam. sakura felt weak.
"what's wrong, sakura?"

"it's nothing!"
sakura lied.

"are you worried your parents won't let you attend?"

"no, i'm just a bit scared..."

nami smiled and swung her arm over sakura's shoulders.
"there's nothing to worry about because i'll be with you! also, if the whole team doesn't go then no one can participate. we sort of need you. think it through."

the blonde left the pinkette.
surely, she knew that the changed haruno's mind.
all she needed to now was wait and hope that her whole team will participate this glorious event.

•

a/n:

y'all, i'm sorry for not updating.
i've been going through some stuff and i'm also getting bored of writing at night lmao.
updates will be less often, but they'll still happen.
btw, the book will most likely be around 50 chapters and then there will be a sequel for naruto shippuden.

:)