Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto. It is the property of Masashi Kishimoto; I merely borrow the characters for my own amusement.

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Nobody’s Sin

Her first man was her teacher.

This wasn’t a particularly moral thing, but then again, Anko Mitarashi wasn’t a particularly moral girl. Even at the age of twelve, she saw morals as things everyone knew, and could properly use as gasp-fuel for someone else’s atrocities. Morals were the bold letters on the chalkboard in class, and the many repetitive sheets of “I will not —”’s.

All completely useless, unless used to toast marshmallows on an illegal summer-day bonfire—one of many delinquent activities added to her rap list.

But back to her teacher.

Of course he was older – much older – than her (how would he teach her otherwise?), but he knew more – much more – and Mama always said to learn from those who had the experience.

And Mama always said that some girls mature faster than others. Anko was getting a head start, was all.

Pun entirely unintended, of course.

--

When she was young, many of her academy teachers looked at some of her classmates and grinned ruefully.

You’ve got the brains, kid. But you don’t have the heart, and sometimes, that’s what counts.

Those same teachers would look at her, and they would sigh – an exhalation of breath that seemed to come from somewhere deep inside them where air wasn’t supposed to go, or leave from – with something in their eyes like reluctance.

You’ve got some of the talent, Anko, and you’ve certainly got the heart. But you lack the brains, and in your case, you’re going to let a lot of talent and heart go to waste.

She’d never understood what the big deal was. Who in the world would want to be turned into mincemeat, and knew that they wanted to before their tenth birthday?

No one, that’s for sure, and Anko wasn’t no one.

There was more to life than school, and training, and this learning stuff. So what if she could tell you the projectile-whatsit of a one-pound kunai at a hundred paces towards a blah-blah-whatever—

Who cares?

Nobody, that’s for sure, and Anko wasn’t nobody.

--

The thing with her teacher didn’t last long. He didn’t need to teach for very long, and anyway, all that psycho talk about kidnapping little boys and living forever all young and pretty was a bit of a turn-off. Honestly, when he started talking about stuff like that, it was hard to stay interested.

And maybe he was getting tired too (because she couldn’t be a little boy?) because one day, Anko woke up and Konoha with her to find out her teacher had been officially declared rogue and insane.

(Nowadays, she wondered why they didn’t do it earlier. The signs were all there, in the breadcrumb trail of frightened little boys.)

Now Anko, jaded Anko, knows better. But right back then, when two years seemed like a short time to be in a relationship, she has to admit that his departure hurt a little, and that she cried too, maybe a little. He never even said goodbye, not unless you call slipping out in the night to work on God-knows-what a goodbye.

That was before Anko learned that men were expendable, temporary trinkets, maybe as a pendant on a fine silver chain, or one charm of many on a gaudy bracelet.

Now Anko, jaded Anko, knows better.

--

Anko knows she has a reputation around Konoha. She can talk down, drink down, and beat down any man in any given room, and she can look incredibly sexy while doing it too. Evidently, there were people who disapproved of her antics, and called her less than pleasant names – ones she could churn out right back at them thirty times worse, free of charge – but she merely tossed her crazily-dyed, messily cropped hair and blamed double-standards.

Honey, I believe the word you’re looking for is popular and the other one you want is jealousy. It’s an ugly thing, darling, and you’ll ruin your complexion. That is why you’re wearing that hideous face-mask right now, isn’t it?

She was simply the female version of a player. A femme fatale. Nothing wrong with that.

Damn double-standards.

--

Her first mentionable stake – excluding all the other nameless bastards – was Genma. Hardly surprising, considering his reputation today.

(It wasn’t like that, at one point. She really did create the male Anko that they all know so well, and if anyone says that she learned from him, she wants their names and sleeping habits.)

This arrangement lasted for a surprising six months and reflecting back, it was likely the excitement that kept them going – the shameless lack of morals, hah, those useless things – and also the slow, gargling death of that excitement that stopped them before they had figured out a heading.

He said it was unfair that he never got to be the overbearing boss, that playing the helpless employee was really “not his thing.”

She said that he should suck it up and deal with it like a man, because he was the worst doctor she had ever played with.

They were both happy to leave, and to see other people. Anko found a new boy-toy within the week, and two more within the month.

--

There came a time when she noticed that her flings were getting shorter and shorter. This was during the time of her second notable bid. Kakashi used to have a stick up his ass in the Academy, during what little time he had stayed, and if she hadn’t seen the man in battle, she wouldn’t have believed that there was a stick, or a bone left in his body.

He was complex, but a man, and a man has needs that Anko understands. Apparently, he had more, because when their conversations didn’t consist of heavy breathing and muttered expletives, he was at turns irritatingly cheerful and wordlessly glum. In other words, annoyingly, infuriatingly fake. It got old quickly, and they stopped having conversations at all. He’d seemed gloomy (they’d lasted about a week), but then he had a couple of other times when water had splashed on his precious porno.

She sees him with his little student a few weeks later, and he is not-glum, so Anko watches their body language and knows that they did it. It wasn’t particularly moral, and the girl probably was, but she looked at her colleague and once-bedmate and saw that he was okay with it.

They probably had a talk about feelings or something like that. It reminded her of herself, not much younger than that girl, except her teacher did not do things like feelings, and Kakashi evidently did. Anko wasn’t exactly a pessimist, so she kind of-sort of told herself that not everyone was her and her teacher, her and Genma, her and Kakashi, her and Mr. Nobody-I-Met-Last-Night-Whose-Name-I-Don’t-Remember—that she didn’t have to be either.

(Though she did understand that bit with the younger generation—she’s checked a few of them out before. What? It’s not like she would ever try to date them—they’re much too mature for her. Besides, she doesn’t come into contact with them enough, and who in their right mind would make Anko a teacher?)

--

Her most surprising catch was Iruka, a few days after the shortest fling of her turning-not-so-young life. This would mainly be because, compared to the men she’s had, Iruka was a prude. A stuffed shirt. Very nearly boring—

Except for the very fact that he was boring made him exciting (don’t ask—it didn’t make sense to her either). Corruption of the innocent, or something like that, something you could go to jail for. (Ibiki would probably be happy to see her anyway—not.)

Iruka the Schoolteacher turned out to be very thorough, dotting all the i’s, crossing all the t’s, but that wasn’t enough after a couple of days.

You’re boring, she’d said.

You’re too exciting, he’d said.

Neither of them parted happily, and for the first time since a breakup, Anko didn’t find someone new within the week—she’d said none of them were hot enough, and wouldn’t say why. (Perhaps because none of them knew how to even feign classroom etiquette.)

--

Today, Anko knows that she can go home and have all her i’s dotted and her t’s crossed, free of charge, whenever she wants. She’s surprised sometimes, that she has been happy for nearly three years now (beating her previous record) even though she looks in the mirror these days and starts to see wrinkles that aren’t supposed to be on a femme fatale.

(Iruka tells her that it’s okay, because she’s not allowed to be “female fatal” to anyone else but him, because he was the only one who wouldn’t turn her in for negligent homicide. She sticks her tongue out at him, because she is a mature, grown-up girl.)

People wonder how Anko of the Short Flings and Iruka of the Prudish Nature got together. Iruka says that he’s the Stability to her Insanity. Anko says that she’s the Black-lace Lingerie to his Stuffed Shirt.

There isn’t much bickering after that, or perhaps there is, behind locked rooms or in secluded areas.

Life has changed for her, and she thinks that there is nobody in the world who wouldn’t want to be her.

And Anko isn’t nobody.