Note: Yup, another Christmas gift! This one's dedicated to Anika. Enjoy!
Disclaimer: No one owns Naruto other than Kishimoto. Are you Kishimoto? No, I thought not. I'm not him, either! Surprise, surprise.
Christmas Party Havoc
Sakura stood in the kitchen, sighing to herself. Her mother had suggested, after seeing her daughter, Sakura, and Sakura's teammates striving so hard to complete a countless number of missions, that now they should hold a grand Christmas party. It had sounded like a fine idea at first—a Christmas party and feast with Sasuke-kun and all her other friends, a great big Christmas tree bedecked with gold and silver, all sorts of gifts and goodies—this was what Sakura had been expecting. But it turned out… who was to do the cooking and baking? Sakura. And, of course, any of her friends who volunteered to help her in the kitchen.
The pink-haired girl had her hair tied up in a bun at the back of her head, and wore a white apron over her pink Christmas dress. She had her sleeves rolled up to her elbows, and was mightily mixing the batter for butter crumpets.
The doorbell rang.
A young blonde kunoichi wearing a fine, rich purple gown laced with cream and silver embroidery stood on the doorstep of the Haruno house.
"Hi, Ino!" Mrs. Haruno warmly greeted the girl, not knowing a thing about the Yamanaka and Sakura's rivalry.
"Hello, Mrs. Haruno," Ino replied. She had been taken aback when she received the invitation to the Haruno Christmas party. But Mrs. Haruno had been the one writing the invitations and sending them out, not Sakura. And the mother had invited every one of the genin graduating with Sakura, and also, Team Gai!
"Ino, dear, you are looking so very charming today! Always the beautiful little lady, aren't you?"
Ino blushed, smiling. However much she hated Sakura, she loved Mrs. Haruno. Piling flattery upon compliments upon admiring remarks—yes, she loved Sakura's mother.
"Uhm…" she stammered, "Would you like me to help you out in the kitchen? I learned how to make toffee pudding and madeleines—little coconut and jam cakes!"
"Oh, yes, delighted to have your help!" Mrs. Haruno answered, and led the girl bustling off to the kitchen.
"Sakura!" she called, "Your friend is here to help you in the kitchen!"
Sakura turned, relieved that someone had come to help her make Christmas dinner. Seeing the blonde, she stiffened.
Mrs. Haruno beamed, and ushered Ino into the kitchen. Busily finding another apron and a bandana to keep hair from falling into the face, she dressed Ino up for kitchen work. Ino grimaced. She thought she'd be helping Mrs. Haruno, not Sakura in the kitchen!
Ten minutes later, Sakura twirled her tray of butter crumpets in one hand, opening the oven the other. She started sliding the tray in, but a hand roughly pushed her aside. Another tray smoothly went into the hot oven, bearing small round cakes.
Sakura glared at the other girl. "I preheated the oven, made my batter first, and got to the oven first, and now you're using it for your demented cakes?
"Well, the oven would be wasted if it were used for your muffins or whatever they are."
"Crumpets."
"Whatever."
"Whatever?" The oven door was once more, opened, and the tray inside was replaced by another.
"Get your muffins out of the oven!"
Replaced again.
"Crumpets."
Oven door opened and closed.
"Muffins, now get them out of there!"
"Crumpets!"
The doorbell rang again. More greetings could be heard from the kitchen.
"Hi, Sasuke-kun! You're looking more and more the dashing young gentleman, aren't you? Now, come help set the table, the ladies will be done with the food in a moment!"
The cooks froze. Ino shoved Sakura out of the way, forgetting completely about the oven, and ran out to the front door. Tackle hugging the dark boy, she slung an arm around him, simpering, "Sasuke-kun! Let's set the table together!"
Sakura glared at the tray of Ino's cakes, and put it into the bottom oven, her own on the top. Her mother wouldn't let her get away from kitchen work, and the feast depended on her. Sighing again, she got to work making casseroles, pies, bread, and an assortment of flavorful dishes.
The doorbell rang several more times, and soon the dining room was packed with people. Neji had silently come in with barely a word to Mrs. Haruno's compliments and hellos, Naruto had poked around the house with much clattering and oo-ing and aah-ing. Shino, Kiba, and Akamaru had arrived together, and made their way to the dining room, trying to help with decorations. Lee had come full of energy, and still dressed in his green spandex suit—much to the surprise and dismay of Mrs. Haruno. Tenten and Hinata, surprisingly, came together, the older kunoichi guiding the younger along a decent conversation. They came into the kitchen, and this time Sakura had nearly flown across the room and hugged them. She was tired out from cooking.
In the kitchen…
Hinata murmered, "Uhm… Sakura-chan, your baked duck has to be turned over every ten minutes, and your buttered crumpets are about to burn, the pie should be spread over lightly with cream, not globs here and there."
Under the quiet instruction of Hinata, Tenten skillfully corrected all of Sakura's dishes and made a few more Hyuuga recipes.
Sakura rolled her eyes, wondering how in the world Hinata was such a great cook. And no wonder every one of her dishes looked… strange!
Half an hour, and all the dishes were ready and looked over by Hinata. They started to bring them all into the dining room, after taking off aprons.
Meanwhile, in the dining room…
Back in the dining room, Naruto and Kiba were busy arguing about where to place knives and forks, and spoons, too.
"Forks and knives go on the left side, and spoons on the right of the plate!" Kiba shouted.
"No, forks and spoons go on the left, while knives are on the right!" Naruto answered at an equal sound volume, "I'm right, aren't I, Sasuke?"
Sasuke could be heard, muttering, "Idiots" under his breath. Calmly walking over to the table, he rearranged the messed up utensil order.
"Forks, napkin, and bread plate on the left of the main plate, " he instructed, moving the mentioned, "And on the right goes knives, spoons, cup, and saucer."
Meanwhile, Neji was calmly putting up the Christmas tree, while Lee bounded around the tree, draping decorations here and there. This resulted in the genius Hyuuga having much difficultly getting the tree to stand straight and with stability. When it was finally done, half the decorations were hanging at an awkward angle, and the gold star was about to fall off the bottommost branch.
"No, no, no!" Shino came over, and put the string of flashing lights properly around the tree, and placed the star carefully on the very tip of the treetop. Neji took off all of Lee's decorative balls and artfully put them on the tree branches.
Ino busied herself putting up pink and lavender streamers all over the room, and Sasuke eyed them warily. Pink and lavender did not go well with him. But he was soon saved, for Shino's bugs had come out and decided to eat the streamers. They had some sort of perfume on them, and the bugs loved the perfume. The banners soon turned into rags, with wisps of chewed paper hanging here and there.
At last, dinner time…
The twelve genin and Haruno parents crowded around the dining table. They found seats with much clamoring and shouting. Naruto gaped at the dishes, forgetting about his favorite food—ramen. Hinata had indeed done her job wonderfully, to make the ramen-obsessed Uzumaki drool over her food instead!
"Now we say a prayer for all that we are thankful for this Christmas!" Mr. Haruno announced, "Who wants to go first?"
Lee raised a hand, "Mr. Haruno, I will go first!" he said, looking at the pink-haired man with firm eyes. "I, Rock Lee, am thankful for Gai-sensei, and my life as a shinobi!"
Mr. Haruno applauded for the short thankful speech. "Who's next?" he called.
Silence.
"Alright, Mrs. Haruno can say the next thanks!"
"Thank you for the world so sweet.
Thank you for the food we eat.
Thank you for the birds that sing.
Thank you all for everything."
Applause rang out across the table. "But… why do we need to thank the birds for singing?" Naruto asked, confused.
"Because they sound beautiful!" Ino replied sternly.
"No, because they wake us up each morning with they're sweet music!" Sakura argued.
"But… it's wintertime right now, and all the birds have disappeared!"
"Migrated." Sasuke corrected him, "They haven't disappeared, they've migrated."
"Whatever." Naruto rolled his eyes, "Then how is the world sweet? Has anyone ever tasted the earth?"
Sakura glared at Naruto. "Just stop it with your fault-picking, Naruto!"
"But when you say 'Thank you all for everything', there are people in the world who we don't have to thank!"
Slap.
Owwww!"
Naruto went home that day with a swollen cheek.
…
But, of course… much else happened at the Haruno Christmas party. After all, since when is a Konoha genin feast calm and unexciting?
Never.