My light in the dark

Chapter 2

I stumbled into the door and looked at the clock with a sigh. It was already four in the morning. Because of the incident at the bar I had to stay back late and fill in an incident report and now I had my next job to go to in less than two hours. I moved through the small apartment, tossing my jacket on the hook by the door and heading into the bathroom.

"Naruto is that you?"

I stopped when a scruffy head poked out of the nearby room. My roommate Shikamaru must have just woken up as he didn't have time to put his abundance of black hair into its trademark spiky ponytail and flopped into his eyes.

"Yea work ran late."

He looked back into his room at his clock and back at me.

"Still going to the café to work though?"

I nodded and he stifled a yawn.

"It seems like such a bother, I would call in sick but I know that you won't. How about I give you a lift today and I will grab some breakfast on the way."

I thanked him and rushed into my room to have a quick shower and get changed. When I finished Shikamaru was just leaving his room, hair tied back and wearing a suit but without a tie and the top couple of buttons undone. I shook my head and wondered how he had managed to become one of the leaders at the gaming company he worked at when he had such a slack outlook on life and his appearance. I was wearing plain black trousers, pants and a black button up shirt with the sleeves rolled up and my mess of blonde hair attempting to sit flat. I followed him down the stairs outside of out apartment and into his car. As we drove I could feel his eyes on me.

"So you finally got his name huh? Sasuke."

"Goddammit Sakura I am gonna kill her!"

"She rang me to tell me about the incident and that you would be running late. Are you okay though?"

I bit my lip and rubbed my arm where the guy had grabbed me, there was a slight bruise on my pale skin and I shuddered at the memory.

"I'm okay, Sasuke stopped them before they could do anything but I just froze. I couldn't muster any strength or use what you taught me."

He reached over and grabbed my hand where it was clenched on my knee and smiled at me.

"Don't stress over it Naruto. We will just keep working at it."

I sighed and relaxed my hand as Shikamaru turned his attention back on the road. He had been my best friend since I was living on the streets as a teenager. He knew about my past but unlike others he didn't look at me like I was damaged and didn't judge me for what I had been through. He simply talked about it logically and was helping me learn self-defence. Even though he didn't look it he was a good fighter and knew all manner of martial arts. His family ran a dojo in town but he had decided to branch out and do his own thing until it was time for him to take over.

"So, are you gonna ask him out?"

I snapped out of my musings and looked up. We had pulled into the car park near the small café that I worked at and Shikamaru was looking at me expectantly. I felt my cheeks warm up and looked away.

"I don't know."

"From what Sakura tells me he seems pretty into you. It would be good for you to start dating again."

We got out of the car and walked towards the small shop that only had a few businessmen grabbing their coffees to go before work.

"He just seems so far out of my league though. Like he is part of a world I couldn't even dream of being a part of."