AN: This started out as a one-shot and it sort of took off from there. I hope you enjoy this silly AU.

"This isn't even my cat," Sakura protested, holding the black feline in her arms. It nuzzled her neck and purred loudly. Her landlord looked unconvinced.

"I just want it out of here by tomorrow," he held up his hands, not listening to her explanation.

It wasn't Sakura's fault that animals liked her. She was just returning from a late shift at the hospital when she found the cat sitting in front of her door, mewling to get in. As soon as she came into view it ran to her, snaking around her ankles and rubbing itself happily on her legs. She picked it up, wanting to check it for a collar to see if there was a phone number. There wasn't one. It was obviously not from the apartment building, they had a pretty strict 'no pet' policy, so it must have wandered in by accident to escape the snow and cold. That was also the moment her landlord happened to walk by.

"It's not-" but he was already gone. She stood in the middle of the hall, cat still purring away, starting to overheat in her thick coat and woollen hat.

She looked down at the cat, it gazed back at her with large yellow eyes, blinking slowly. "What am I going to do with you?" She scratched it under the chin, the purring intensified. Sakura fished her keys out of her purse and opened her door, allowing the cat to jump down into her apartment. It instantly made its way onto the couch, curling up on the soft cushions to groom itself. She shrugged off her coat, hanging it on a hook next to the door and hung her damp hat on the one beside it.

She sat beside the cat on the couch, opened her laptop, and began her search for the nearest animal shelter. There wasn't much else she could do. It didn't look like a stray, but there was no way she could canvas the neighbourhood by the next day and she wasn't going to just throw it outside in the dead of winter. Hopefully it had a microchip so the shelter could find the owner but that was out of her hands. "Sorry, kitty, it's off to the shelter with you." It meowed at her. "Well, you can't stay here." She frowned. It was awfully cute... And she had always wanted a pet.

There was a sharp knock at the door.

'Great,' she huffed, 'it's probably the landlord again.'

She hurried to the door and opened it. And looked up. And up.

"Hey, have you seen a cat?" The huge man asked. He filled up almost the whole door frame and looked like he would be at home in a shady MMA gym. She could see tattoos peaking out from under his fitted black long sleeve shirt on his wrists and neck, and to her horror and fascination, on his cheeks were two matching pairs of gills that almost faded into his peculiar skin tone. She had a sneaking suspicion there were a lot more that she couldn't see. "A black cat, about yeh big, freaky yellow eyes?"

This was a new face. Did he live here? She would have definitely remember someone so... large.

"Who are you?" Sakura asked, ignoring his question.

"Kisame," Kisame, apparently, breezed, "Now, about that cat?" The aforementioned cat jumped off the couch and scampered towards him, greeting him in the same friendly manner as it did her. He picked it up. "There you are, you little shit. Thanks." And with that, he left. No explanation.

She watched him stalk away with the happily purring cat, and then it occurred to her that she didn't even really know that it was his cat. How did he even get in the building? Did he live here or not?

"Wait!" she called after him, stuffing her keys in her pocket and shut the door to go after the possible catnapper and apartment invader, feeling like it was her duty to look after the poor lost cat who was obviously quite happy to be taken in by anyone, owner or not. She fell into stride with him and he gave her a slightly annoyed look but didn't protest. "Is it your cat? Do you even live here?"

"No and yes."

"What? So it's not your cat but you're taking it anyway?"

"It's my roommates," he answered, exasperated. He obviously thought her questions were stupid. Was she supposed to just let this guy have the cat without making sure it was his? She continued to follow him in silence, unsure of what to do next. This actually solved her problem and would save her a lot of time and gas, but it troubled her and she was already too invested to back down now. They stopped in front of a vaguely familiar door.

"You... you can't have cats in this apartment." She stated finally, needing to say something. He ignored her completely now, not even sparing her a glance. Kisame opened the door and on the other side, to her great surprise, was Uchiha Itachi.

"Kuro!" Itachi said with a glimmer of happiness showing from behind his coke bottle glasses, taking the cat in his arms. The cat immediately stopped purring and tried to squirm out of his grasp, yoweling, until Itachi let it jump down. He watched sadly as it scurry into their small living room and through a bedroom door. Itachi frowned. Once the cat was safely inside, Kisame shrugged and brushed past Itachi through the door and into the apartments bathroom, leaving Sakura standing in the hall alone. She stared after him in confusion.

"I didn't know you had a cat, Itachi," Sakura stated with a hint of accusation, switching her attention to the Uchiha, "or a roommate."

"Sakura, I haven't seen you in a while. Kisame moved in a few weeks ago," he half answered, evading the question about his contraband cat. He pushed his thick glassed further up the bridge of his nose. Now that she got a better look at him, she could see a multitude of red scratch marks decorating his forearms and a few thin fading scabs across his left cheek. "How's your job at the hospital?"

"So far, so good. I'm still getting used to coming home so late, I'm just happy I'm not getting as many overnight shifts," Sakura spit out her automatic answer. She was getting tired of people asking about it, the novelty of being a recent grad had worn off fairly quickly. "He's been here a few weeks already? I'm surprised I haven't seen him around before." Maybe he was unemployed and never left his room? Or perhaps a thug, only leaving to skulk around at night? She doubted he would live with Itachi, studious and responsible, if either scenarios were true.

"Well, he bartends at Ichiraku's down the street, so probably just miss him every night," he explained. Itachi glanced at his watch, and looked back at her. "Would you like to come in for a cup of coffee?" He was ever the gracious host. Sakura smiled, maybe she could get the latest gossip about her allusive friend Sasuke.

"That would be lovely." Itachi's younger brother, and her former highschool classmate, was currently at a far away university and unless he was visiting his brother or she was lucky enough that he picked up his phone, he was impossible to pin down. She had resigned herself to hearing second hand information from Itachi, who coincidently lived in her building.

She entered his apartment in which she has spent plenty of evenings when Sasuke was staying there, realizing this was probably the first time she had ever been there without her childhood friend acting as a buffer. Not that he was very talkative, but at least she had a reason to be there when he was down. She didn't know very much about her friends mysterious older brother, but she guessed this was a good opertunity to find out. She sat at in the tiny living room, making herself comfortable on an overstuffed armchair while the raven haired man brought over the coffee and a beautifully arranged plate of various cookies. It was almost annoying how good he was at entertaining guests.

"So how long have you had a cat?" She really, really wanted to know how he had managed to hide it from their nosy landlord. She took a cookie.

Itachi stayed silent for so long she thought that maybe he was just going to continue to avoid the question, but finally he answered. "I found him about a month ago, without a collar, so I brought him in."

"What did you name him? Kuro?" What she really wanted to know was how he smuggled him in.

"Yes." Out of all of his skills, creativity was not one of them. He had a happy glow about him when he talked about the cat, obviously quite pleased to have it.

"Fitting," she grinned, "He a very friendly cat; I've never met a cat that let me pick it up right away." Itachi laughed nervously and tucked a long strand of hair behind his ear and she remembered the collection of claw marks on his arms. However much he loved the cat, it didn't seem to share his feelings.

In the back of her mind, she wondered where Kisame had disappeared off to when the door to the bathroom opened and he appeared wearing only a fluffy white towel. Droplets of water glistened in his hair and rolled down his toned back. Her suspicions were right; he was covered in tattoos. Almost every square inch of exposed skin was inked with little space to spare, and from what little she could see, his lower body was probably just as decorated. The only places that weren't tattooed were his hands and around the front of his neck above his clavicles. She had to look away when she noticed both his nipples were pierced.

Kisame snorted, ignoring her stare and subsequent blush. "I don't know what cat you're talking about. That little shit is a monster." He walked into the kitchen, unabashed by his near nakedness in front of a stranger and poured himself a cup of coffee. "You should've named him Lucifer."

"He didn't seem to mind you," Sakura remarked, remembering how Kuro greeted him and purred in his arms, calmly letting him carry it all the way down the hall without incident.

"I'm the exception," he grinned, showing off his sharp teeth. He walked towards one of the bedrooms, grabbing a handful of cookies off the plate and shut the door behind himself, only to open it again to shoo the cat out. Kuro avoided Itachi and jumped up onto Sakura's lap. Itachi looked forlorn.

"Anyways, you should know that the landlord saw Kuro and thought he was mine. I can tell him I got ride of him, but please try to keep him out of view. I don't think he'd be too happy with me if he saw the cat again," Sakura warned him; she didn't think she could be evicted because of a cat, but she wouldn't put it past their landlord and she rather liked living there. She scratched the cat behind the ears.

"I'm sorry to involve you in this," Itachi apologized, watching sadly as the cat allowed her to pet it without injury. "He seems to like you a lot."

"Animals have always liked me, I have no idea why."

"You can come visit him sometime," he said, surprising Sakura, "if you want."

Sakura smiled. "I'd love that!"