Naruto Hatake

Friends

For the next couple of weeks Naruto got used to his new life in school, he was learning some neat things although he was still bored at times. Sometimes Iruka would yell at him and Shikamaru because they fell asleep, plus the fact that he was getting a reputation. Well actually it was a couple, one was when after a week a string of mysterious pranks started to plague the school. Someone put dye in the teacher's tea and coffee in their teacher's lounge making all the teachers have black or green mouths and tongues for the day. Then there was the incident when had set up shaving cream bombs of some short, and then there was the day smoke bombs went off at random intervals throughout the day.

No one was sure who was the culprit and the teachers had decided to catch whoever it was in the act, that was how they caught Naruto after school planting clue on all the chairs of the teachers. Iruka had been disappointed in Naruto, and they had a talk with his father...who was two hours late for the meeting of course. Kakashi said he would punish Naruto although Iruka figured from the attitude that Kakashi actually thought it was kind of funny and would most likely just increase Naruto's training at home.

They also made Naruto apologize to the entire school, although Neji who was a year ahead had to admit the fact that Naruto managed to get all of that done and not get caught until now was surprising, but he never would admit it. He didn't even say that he knew Naruto since no one asked him which he was thankful for.

Naruto was also known for being the only one that could keep up with the Uchiha prodigy as well. The two of them competed all the time, races, sparing matches, and anything else they could do. Although they acted a bit hostile towards the other it was just their way, besides Naruto enjoyed having someone that made him push himself. He figured the harder he worked the faster he could make Hokage one day. But there was one fact that had escaped Naruto during that time and that was because he was the only one that rivaled Sasuke it made him more noticeable especially to certain members of the female class.

Although the Sasuke fan girls were numerous, Naruto had a smaller following as well. If he wasn't lazy in class or pulled pranks he would have gotten more, but there were other things that made certain girls like him. First was the fact that he always wore a mask making him kind of mysterious in a way, no one knew what he looked like and that curiosity was alluring to some of them. Another was the fact that Naruto once you got to know him was a very nice guy, Sasuke would always just blow the girls off and at times when he was really annoyed might say something hurtful just so he could get some peace and quiet.

Naruto on the other hand always would talk to the girls that went up to him, that made him much more approachable. The thing was he had no idea that the girls liked him in that way, he just thought they were being friendly and was just trying to make new friends. This of course was misread by the girls that he was interested in them and of course would lead to some trouble here and there, mainly young girls getting into fights over who was better Naruto or Sasuke, and who liked the boy more.

It also kind of made Hinata a bit awkward, although she would have gladly been placed in the 'Naruto fan girl' side of things she was also Naruto's best friend and she was always close to the boy. This led to some jealously with some other girls over how close Hinata was with him. Sakura was getting a little confused, she liked Sasuke but Naruto was so nice to her all the time as well so she had no idea which boy was better. Ino thankfully was only after Sasuke, and helped keep the three girls together in tougher times. She had no rivalry with Hinata and Sakura hadn't made her intentions clear so to Ino that meant that none of them were a threat to her and 'her' Sasuke-kun.

But there were a couple of people that Naruto was curious about, mainly was the Shino kid that always wore a heavy coat all the time, he always seemed to be alone and Naruto remembered how that was like. The other was Kiba who was a loud mouth show off, which meant Naruto was starting to like the guy. Plus when Naruto had been caught as the 'Academy Gremlin' as the mysterious prankster had been called, he had laughed so hard and gave Naruto a large smile.