AN: New story. My second fic. please let me know what you think. Also, check out my other one.
Konohagakure no Sato
Sakura smiled softly as she got ready for the day. She hummed a tune to herself as she brushed her long pink hair. The bathroom mirror she was looking in showed off it's luxurious looking sheen and she smiled a little wider in appreciation. She closed her eyes and breathed in deeply to take in the pungent strawberry scent. 'Mmmmmm. I gotta admit, even if I regretted my choice, this shampoo would make it all worth it.' She opened her eyes and nodded to herself when she noticed she was done.
The teal eyed girl put away the brush and strolled out of the bathroom. She walked down the hall of her large, penthouse apartment and entered the living room. She looked at all the high quality furniture and all the expensive decorations she had acquired over the years and smiled once more. 'Regrets. Pfft, yeah right.' She picked up her keys from their place on the wall and made her way to the waiting elevator.
She pressed the ground button and waited as the familiar music started to play. She was still pondering how the three years had changed so much for her and whether or not she really regretted any of it. Thinking about her change, most would say it began just after their first C rank mission to the land of Waves, but she knew it had begun much earlier than that. Although the thoughts had been in her mind for much longer, the Wave mission had been the one to really push her into action.
When she believed Sasuke had died, she had obviously been grief stricken, but the thing that she hadn't expected was feeling lost. She had felt a sense of purposelessness that had shook her to her very core. She just didn't know what she would do now that her crush was dead. He had been her entire reason for being a ninja at the time, her entire reason for living even. She hadn't thought much about her future, other than the fact that she'd be by his side when it was time to revive the Uchiha clan. His 'death' had left her so broken and utterly confused that it had terrified her.
When he had rejoined the world of the living though, the soothing relief and calmness she had felt had also unsettled her. She regained her sense of purpose and her drive to go on, but the fact that his mere breathing had done so much to inspire such a reaction in her had kind of scared her. It showed her that her life pretty much revolved around him and his actions. These thoughts weren't really given much time to solidify, as they were overshadowed by the sheer joy she felt as she knelt by him, waiting for him to recover. It was short lived as soon as he awoke, because the joy she took in that fact was muddied by the fact that he didn't really seem to care about her. He was glad to be alive and quite affected when she told him that Naruto had defeated Haku, but he didn't even seem to notice the inner turmoil she'd just been through.
For the pink haired girl, this had been the straw that broke the camel's back. She had quietly endured rejection after rejection and dismissal after dismissal for many years now and though it had been painful, she had been confident that her efforts were being recognised, and soon he'd acknowledge her as the one he cherished above all else.
She had held onto that and kept believing that someday, and someday soon, he'd show her that he'd been paying attention all this time and that he would take her in his arms and choose her over Ino. Seeing him completely ignore the intense shattering she'd just experienced drove home the fact that he really didn't care about her. He really did find her to be unworthy of her time and beneath his notice. She was just one of the teammates that would slow him down in his ambition. More than Naruto even.
She had tried to ignore these thoughts and even tried to justify the actions behind them when they wouldn't go away, but she couldn't run from the truth any longer. Uchiha Sasuke held nothing but disdain for her in his heart. She had been more subdued during the rest of the trip. Naruto had noticed right away and he'd badgered her to tell him why, promising to beat the snot out of whoever had made her sad. That nice Tsunami woman had also noticed and had let her know that if she ever needed someone to talk to, that she'd make herself available. Even Kakashi-sensei and the rest of Tsunami's family had noticed, handling her much more carefully than usual and being even more nice to her. The 'love of her life' however, had barely given her a raised eyebrow, much less even enquired about her well being. He had spent every moment, as soon as he had recovered, training himself to exhaustion in an effort to be faster and to master his newly awoken sharingan.
Every minute he didn't need to be on duty at the bridge, he spent in the clearing where they had learn't how to tree walk. Kakashi sensei had given her a brief explanation on the water walking exercise to cheer her up or at least take her mind off of things and she'd been grateful. The time she spent away from her teammates, in the quiet embrace of nature, had really been helpful in that she had a lot of time to herself to really think things through.
She thought about her life, and all she had accomplished so far. She thought about all the things she wanted to do and noticed that most of it gravitated around the Uchiha. That fact had annoyed her more than she had expected. It made her then decide to take stock of her life, and eradicate everything that she was doing solely for his sake. The first thing she'd thought about was her career.
She couldn't really remember the reason she had initially wanted to be a ninja, probably so that she wouldn't be bullied now that she thought about it, but now, her reason for staying in the profession had been because Sasuke was a ninja and he would only want a kunoichi to restart the Uchiha clan with. She tried to ponder whether or not she had any real reason of her own to remain a ninja and she had come up short.
In all honesty, all the fighting, blood and potential loss of life scared her. This mission had shown her that as a ninja, she'd never be certain that she'd live to see the next day, let alone take the next breath. It showed her that all the things they were told in the academy about the dangers for kunoichi were real. It had highlighted the fact that she couldn't handle this for the rest of her life. She couldn't live with the fact that anyone she cared about could lose their life at any moment and there would be nothing she could do about it.
The thoughts refused to leave her for a whole day and by that evening, she was resolute in her decision. Haruno Sakura was going to quit the shinobi program. With those overly dramatic thoughts out of the way, she had felt lighter and more carefree than she ever had. She felt happy with her decision and knew her parents would also be ecstatic about her choosing to become a civilian. There was one thing she'd miss though, and that was Chakra.
Chakra made so many things so much easier for ninja than civilians. Travel was much less taxing on shinobi and much faster too. Chakra let them do things that even civilians would find useful, like walking on vertical or even upside-down surfaces, or being strong enough to lift things much more than any regular muscles could lift.
She had lamented the fact that chakra was pretty much an ninja only thing and no civilians made use of it, until she thought about the fact that few civilians had felt the added benefits of chakra and thus, had never really felt that they were missing anything. The ones that had seen shinobi in action had probably only seen them do massively destructive feats and those that had seen the useful techniques had probably assumed that they were horribly difficult to learn.
She had also decided then that she'd keep using chakra and find ways of making her life easier and more fun with the gift. That evening, when she had confessed her decision to her team, she had felt the need to tell Naruto beforehand and deal with his loud and annoying outbursts in private.
"Hey, Sakura-chan. What's up? Did you invite me to this clearing to tell me how much of a hero I was 'cause I beat Haku and the teme couldn't?" He asked, eyes lit up excitedly.
"No, Naruto, I didn't." She said somberly. Usually she'd have taken a deep pleasure in the way his expression fell at the admission, but the genuine concern in his expression and the fact that her feelings about Sasuke were still raw dulled the cheeriness in the moment. She forced herself to perk up a little and continued, "Naruto, I just wanted to tell you about a really important decision I've made, and it starts with how I felt when I was sure Sasuke was dead on that bridge."
His eyes seemed to narrow at the way she now said his name, but due to the overall confusion he felt, caused by the whole situation at large, he just decided to nod and listen, and hopefully he'd be able to make sense of it by the time she wanted a response.
She continued, You know how I always used to say I loved Sasuke?" She questioned, seeing the way his eyes continued to narrow as she kept talking. "Well, I really felt devastated when I thought he died." She noticed him blink a few times in genuine confusion when he realised that this was not the way he thought the conversation was going to go. "When he was laying there, and I couldn't feel a pulse, I felt like I was dying. I felt like someone had stabbed me through the heart, but above all that, I felt so confused." She saw his lips turn down in distaste.
Naruto felt the frown he was feeling show on his face at Sakura-chan's words show as she spoke. He was really hurt by the fact that it seemed like she came to him to vent her pain, and then let him know just how happy she was when she found out that her precious teme was alive. He felt a brief flicker of anger at the Uchiha who spurned the affections of the girl he himself heard in such high regard, but he couldn't deny the fact that she was here talking to him about it. He felt a little satisfaction at the fact that she came to him with her problems, but it withered and died at the thought that she only did it so she could rub in the fact that she doesn't love him, knowing that he loved her. He nodded and let her continue though, he'd been a part of enough misunderstandings and he really didn't want to ruin things with Sakura-chan over something that may be just in his thoughts.
"I really felt heartbroken. I had no idea what to do. I...I…felt like my whole life was falling apart, Naruto." She felt tears start to prickle her eyes as she remembered the pain. "I felt like… like there was nothing left for me here. I was almost ready to...to…" she trailed off and burst into tears when his eyes widened understanding what she was about to say.
Naruto didn't really know what came over him. He just saw the tears falling from her eyes and his body had frozen on instinct. "Sakura-chan." He breathed, lost for any other words. He really didn't know what to say, growing up as he had, he just knew that he really hated seeing the pain on her face. It tore at him in a way he couldn't even begin to explain... "Do...don't cry." he whispered,lost for anything else to say.
The pink haired girl sniffled and gathered herself, drying her tears with the back of her hand. She smiled sadly as she continued. "When he woke up though, I felt really happy." *sniffle. "I felt like the part of my heart that had just been ripped out was falling back into place again." She paused and took a shuddering breath. "Naruto, I...I felt whole again." She saw his face morph from distressed to melancholy at her words. "I...I felt...like all was right in the world...Like balance had been restored and I was so happy." She saw his face start to take on a sour tone and decided she'd been going on for long enough. "Naruto, that scared me." She said, bringing her arms to wrap around each other and noting the way his face scrunched up in confusion. "I was pretty much ready to die when I thought Sasuke was dead, and when I found out he wasn't, I felt like all was right in the world. I realised that my whole life was centered around Sasuke and that I don't want it to be." Here, his grin burst back to life in full force as the conversation returned to the direction he originally thought it was going to take.
'Ahh yes. Finally! Now that Sakura-chan has acknowledged that the teme is a prick with a whole barn up his rear, she's chosen to go out on a date with me. This'll be awesome. I can take her to Ichiraku's and we can have ramen, and then we can…' his thoughts trailed off when he realised that she was waiting for him with an expectant look on her face. "uh...I'm sorry, what?"
"Yes, I have fallen out of love with Sasuke, but I haven't come here to 'bask in your mighty awesomeness' and get you to take me on a date." She intoned dryly.
"Wha!" He face faulted at the spot on prediction. When he righted himself, he questioned her, "What are you talki-. How did you know?" He started to lie, then switched to the truth when she gave him a bored look.
"Outside of battle, you're really predictable. You don't think about anything other than ramen, me and the Hokage's chair. It really wasn't that hard to guess how you'd react at this point."
His mouth dropped open to loudly voice his disagreement, but then Sakura seemed to nod to herself and settle in to wait. He realised that she'd thought about it and anticipated his blowing up at her. His mouth clicked shut wordlessly and she nodded again, still one step ahead of him. He frowned when he thought about that and resolved to think about it...at some point.
"Right. Now, what I came to tell you is that I don't want to be a ninja anymore." She held up a finger to stall his protests and continued, "Don't speak. I want you to think about it and later tonight, when I tell everyone else about it, I want you to tell me all the reasons that I could possibly want to be a ninja." She continued on, answering his unasked question, "Why am I doing it this way? I want you to learn to think Naruto. If you don't, one day you'll come up against someone or something that can't be beaten by throwing clones and determination at it. When that happens, I want you to be able to think through the situation."
He closed his mouth and nodded his acquiescence. "Sakura-chan. I...I have some questions though." He paused to see her response and finished when she nodded. "Why did you tell me now. Why didn't you tell Kakashi-sensei first?"
"Oh." She blinked. "Well that's easy, I'm gonna tell everyone else tonight. Kakashi-sensei will understand. He'll probably just ask me to make sure I'm sure by the time we get back to the village. Sasuke will probably just make that weird noise he makes and say that at least I won't be slowing him down anymore. Tsunami and her family will probably encourage me and tell me it's for the best, that little girls shouldn't be learning how to kill this young anyway. I told you first because If you found out with everyone else, you'd think everyone else was trying to make me quit and you'd fight it all the way back to Konoha." She finished.
He gaped in slight confusion and was about to speak out at her, but he stopped short and thought about it. He found out that she was right. Running the situation through his head, he figured that exactly that would've happened if Sakura-chan hadn't decided to have this conversation with him. He swallowed when he realised that he couldn't afford to keep being so thoughtless. If he'd been up against enemy ninja and they were able to predict his every move like this, then they could make him do whatever they wanted. He could never be elected Hokage with such predictability. No one would trust him to lead when he could be controlled so easily. He resolved to actually think on it some more later and moved on to his last question. "Okay, So...what are you gonna do now? Are you gonna go to.." His face scrunched up, "...a regular high school?"
"I don't know about that yet. I'll talk to my mom and see if she can help me out with the future stuff. For now though, I just know I don't want to do this anymore. I'll still be friends with you guys though."
"Well, I can't say I agree with your choice, Sakura-chan, but if the ninja life isn't making you happy, then I'm glad you're getting out of it." He turned and threw his arms behind his head as he walked towards the path back to the small house. "Come on, I heard Tsunami say that dinner's almost ready." Sakura smiled softly and followed after him.
AN: So… for all those who saw that I had updated and were hoping that my other story had gotten a new chapter...sorry. I'm gonna get right on that and you should hopefully have another chapter by Tuesday. Hopefully.
Anyway, please leave a review and check out my other story. Also, I may add another couple thousand words to this chapter in case anything's unclear.
Later…
