I met Naruto by the usual tree in front of the academy. This time he was awake when I found him, but that was probably because it was only 9:30pm.
“I talked to Old Man Hokage,” He told me. I listened. I wanted to know about going to school with Naruto, “He said he can’t just stick you in the academy. You need to get your parents involved.” I frowned.
“What if they don’t let me?” I asked him. He shrugged.
“I don’t see why they won’t let you. I mean, what’s wrong with going to the Ninja Academy?” I shrugged. We are just full of unknown answers today.
“I guess I could ask tomorrow.” He nodded in agreement, “I think I’m going to go home and go to bed. We’ve been staying up quite a bit the last few nights,” He nodded; probably tired.
“Yeah, me too. I should head home for a change,” Naruto said.
“If you have somewhere to stay, why do you sleep outside by the school?” I asked him.
“No one cares if I go home or not. I just find myself under this tree time to time and fall asleep.” I nodded, there appears to be a lot of nodding in our conversations.
“Okay. See you tomorrow sometime. I’ll ask my mom in the morning about the Ninja Academy,” I told him.
I ran straight home and hopped in bed like usual.
~~~
“Hey mother?” It was about 9:00am and I was standing in the dining house with mother while she was cooking some sort of meal.
“Yes?” She responded. She stirred the pot and I moved away as it seemed to splash a little.
“I was thinking about going to the Ninja Academy,” I said calmly. She turning off the burner and shifted to look at me.
“How did you learn about that?” Oops.
“I, uh, the school is not too far from our house and I wanted to attend there. It sounds like something I might want to do.” I said meekly.
“I’ll talk to your father about it,” She said while I threw my fist into the air and hoorayed, “That doesn’t mean he’ll like the idea. He might not want you to become a Shinobi,” She said. ‘Destroying my hope are we???’ I thought to myself.
“How come?” I asked her.
“It’s very dangerous. Shinobi die every day, but it is very honorable. So we’ll see.” I still hoorayed and left the dining house. Little did I know that our conversation caused our breakfast to be burned.
~~~
Naruto wasn’t at the tree, which made me a bit sad. I sat against the tree waiting for something to happen.
“Hello,” A voice sounded. I looked up to see a man, much older than myself standing over me. He had a slash across the bridge of his nose and his brown hair was pulled back into a pony tail.
“Um… Hi,” I didn’t know how to reply to the man.
“What are you doing here? Do you know what this school is?” He asked me.
“Sort of. A boy told me a little about it. He just said this is where you go if you want to become a Shinobi,” I told him.
“Are you interested in attending this school? I’m a teacher here.”
“Really?” I asked. He nodded. “Well only if Naruto can be in the same class as me,” I exclaimed.
“Naruto? When did you meet Naruto?” He asked me, a curious expression on his face.
“A few days ago, why?” I told him.
“I’ve known him for a long time; I think I can get you two in the same class. My name is Iruka,” He introduced himself.
“Mallow Uchiha,”
“Well, Mallow, I’ll be glad to welcome you to my class. Have you gotten permission from your parents yet?” He asked.
“My mother is okay with it, but I still have to get my dad’s opinion,” He nodded his head understanding.
“Hopefully he will be okay with it as well,” Iruka murmured.
“Yeah, hopefully.”
~~~
Naruto randomly showed up around noon and smiled at me sheepishly scratching the back of his neck.
“So…What did your parents say?” He asked me.
“One out of two. Mother said yes; father is still unknown.” Short and Simple. I didn’t want to explain the situation in depth so I said enough.
“Alright! School starts soon and maybe we can get into the same class!” He exclaimed.
“I already took care of it. I met a person named Iruka. He said he can get us in the same class,” I told him, “Besides, my father might not even say yes. I don’t know him. I can’t even predict what he might say.”
“Well, we’ll hope for the best,” I told him.
A young feminine voice was calling out. “Mallow?” she yelled. From around a building, Kyoku came looking for me. When she saw me, she ran towards Naruto and I, “Mom sent me to find you, you need to come home now. Daddy wants to talk to you about something,” I looked to Naruto and he grinned. I nodded to Kyoku and went with her, following her home after waving good bye to Naruto.
~~~
At home, Father and Mother were in the lounge room waiting for Kyoku and me.
“You want to become a Kunoichi, Mallow?” My father asked me. I assumed Kunoichi was Shinobi as anything else wouldn’t pertain to the situation.
“Yes father.” I told him.
“Why?”
The question stumped me. Why did I want to become a Shinobi? Because of Naruto? Because it seemed like fun? I couldn’t tell him that. What did mother say? Honorable? What’s another reason? To show that I can? Does that sound like a good reason? I could tell he was getting impatient with my answer.
“To bring honor to our family and to show that I am capable of doing so,” I told him, holding my straight face as well as I could. He nodded, seemingly approving of my response.
“Then you have my permission to join Konoha’s Ninja Academy.” I smiled and looked to my sister, Kyoku. She didn’t understand how wonderful this was! I was so excited! I wanted to run back to the academy and tell Naruto so bad! “But,” He continued. “I want you to take and support your sister,” Who cares! I’m happy!
“Okay!” I exclaimed.
“But dad,” Kyoku finally spoke, “I don’t want to become a Kunoichi,” She was upset, and she was visibly chewing on her bottom lip.
“And why is that?” he asked her.
“I wanted to become a flower shop owner,” she said in a low voice, “and I fear of losing my life on missions,” she told him. He sighed.
“Well I can’t force you, but if that is your goal in life, you must reach there on your own.” She nodded. Her face was still solemn. This family was confusing.
Father dismissed us and I was about to run to the academy, but as I sped out the door I collided into something.
“Ugh,” I sounded, “I don’t remember there being a wall in front of our door…” I groaned. The door grunted and I looked up. A young Uchiha boy, probably a bit older than me was on the ground rubbing the side of his forehead, “Oh.” I said. “Sorry about that,” The boy seemed to pout as he looked up at me. He had the usual raven black Uchiha hair color, and a few lockes fell in the front, and the back flailed out, much like
“Yeah…” he groaned. I jumped up onto my feet.
“Sorry, I’m sort of in a hurry, have to go to the Ninja Academy!” I yelled to him as I ran away to tell Naruto. The boy just laid there staring from afar at me, until an older Uchiha boy helped him up.
~~~
“Naruto!” I screamed as I got closer to him, he jumped at the sound of my voice, “I’m going to become a Ninja with you!!” I practically cried out. I was so happy. He smiled bigger than ever a hugged me for a split second.
“Yeah!” he joined into my cheering, “Let’s go tell Old Man Hokage!” He exclaimed and pulled me off to an unknown location. On the way there, people continued to glare, and I’m sure they were going to get used to me being with Naruto. We arrived at an abnormally tall round building. I distinctly remember the annoying stairs as we had to go up four stories of them. Finally we reached the door we had to go into and Naruto just burst right in.
“Old Man! Look! This is Mallow!” Naruto exclaimed excitedly, “She’s the one who’s going to join the academy with me, so can you enroll her?” He asked him.
“You need to go speak with a man named Iruka, he will enroll her, but I can tell you where he is.” The Hokage was a very old man, his face was wrinkled and his white hair stood straight up in an awkward spike.
“I’ve already spoken to a man named Iruka, he asked if I wanted to enroll but I didn’t have my dad’s consent yet, but now I do.” I told him. He nodded.
“Well, I can either send you to find Iruka, or have him sent here. Which is it you prefer?” He asked. Personally, I didn’t want to go find someone in this huge village. I’m new here, and would probably get lost in seconds.
“We can go find him Old Man, so see you later,” Naruto exclaimed and I mentally groaned. Naruto again pulled me out of the room and into the huge, mysterious village.
“You’re going to check the academy, right?” I yelled over to him as we ran.
“Nah, I’m going to check Ichiraku’s first.”
~~~
Naruto obviously knew exactly where to look, because sitting at that ramen bar was Iruka.
“Iruka-sensei!” Naruto exclaimed.
“Naruto?” He responded, “…and Mallow.” He added when looking to me.
“I’m enrolling,” I smiled at him.