Hey, readers! Just to say this is my second Naruto oneshot. Rated T for a little language and angst. It's roughly around Shippuden time.

Disclaimer: Don't own Naruto, and I didn't own it at any other point.

Enjoy!

The Uchiha mansion had been abandoned for three years. What was once a large house among district of the Sharingan-using Clan was now simply a shell of a building, a painful reminder to everyone familiar with it's history of that fateful night Uchiha Itachi slaughtered his own family.

Everyone knew that. The Uchiha mansion was an abandoned building. Nobody ever went there.

That is, until recently.

In one of the first-floor rooms of the house lay the only visitor the semi-dilapidated building had received in three years. Covered from head to foot in dust, the pink-haired kunoichi, apprentice to the fifth Hokage, Haruno Sakura.
From the angle she lay, it looked very strange. Despite the coating of dust, she looked remarkably out-of-place in the house. It looked almost like she had fallen there from a great height and now lay, unmoving.

She was not sure how long she had been lying there. Light seemed to intensify the amount of dust that had gathered in the house for the past three years. It coats everything, muffling the echo of memories.

Her breathing was pretty much the only movement in the house, except for the dust particles, which swirled and danced in the sunlight, which peered through the window, highlighting a slash of the nondescript room. It slowly crept, as time went by, toward her arm that was stretched out in front of her, and if you were looking at her from the front, you'd think she was reaching for something.

It was empty, cold and silent.

But she didn't care.

Haruno Sakura had been coming to this mansion for a few weeks now. She couldn't seem to help herself.

Sakura had not told anybody else. Who else would understand?

She stirred very slightly. Even now, she was dusty. She couldn't have been here for very long, surely?

Propping herself up by an elbow, she looked at herself, disinterestedly. Her red garment was lightly coated with the minute particles. Her feet were slightly red from the cold. Her shoes lay discarded at the threshold of the room.
Her eyes travelled down her body, taking in the particles of dust. She didn't brush them away. She simply looked at them, and then let her head back down again. Vaguely, Sakura wondered if she lay there long enough, would she eventually be so covered by the stuff that you couldn't see her? Would you just see right through her?

She saw through things, sometimes.

Sakura saw through the insincere, awkward smiles people offered her as she passed her in the street. Previously, she had offered them politely back. Now, she simply glanced coldly at them before pressing on.
She saw through the true intent of the tentative questions people would ask her.
The truth was, through the smiles and the concern; it was all a lie. A fake. Just to ease their own consciousness. Sakura hated them for that. Hated being expected to pretend.

Liars. All of them are FAKE! Fucking pathetic FAKES!

A tap was dripping somewhere. Her finger twitched at the sound. Outside, she could vaguely see a patch of blue sky through a grimy window, grey clouds dotting the sky.
Dust rose up into the air, hovering in the light, which by now was beginning to grow deeper as dusk approached.
Sakura did not know what room she was in. For all she knew, it could be the very room where the parents of Uchiha Itachi had perished. There was no trace of anything now, of course. The bodies and blood had been removed a long time ago.

The house has no identity anymore. She knows that. It is not a home. It's a huge waste of space.

How long did it take to wipe away every trace of what happened here? She thought, How long does it take to wipe away memories?

The only thing that even hints at the past of this dusty, neglected building are the fans. The symbols that still stay on the fences, but even they look insignificant, blistered in the sun and the colour faded by the rain.
One kunai still remains embedded in the wood, but it is so rusty that it has begun to stain even the wood, the once shiny metal cracked and useless.
The wind quickened a little. Small droplets of rain flecked the window, smattering the patch of floor where they land, blown in by the wind.

Sakura's eyes are too dry to shed tears.

But as the wind lets out a howl, and the rain increases, she feels an odd, hollow feeling in her stomach that has nothing to do with the fact she hasn't eaten anything for two days. Eating seems impossible. All she wants to do is lie here. But even as she thinks this, she hunches slightly against the wind.

This is loneliness...this is what true loneliness is...

Her stomach grows, the sound making her eyes flick shut for a second or two. Shut up. She tells it Shut up. Just be quiet for a little longer... Just a little bit...

Sakura cannot stay here forever, and she knows it.

But the thought, every time it rises up in her mind, is pushed quickly away.
Because she doesn't want to admit to herself that lying here, is this forgotten place, is accomplishing nothing. She doesn't want to admit that nothing is changing.

But most of all…she doesn't want to admit he's not coming back.

Yes. She can't admit that, even to herself.

But she won't lie to herself, either. The truth, even if she won't listen to it, is written all over her face. Being in this house is the only way she can feel close to him, if only for a little while before she has to return to reality again. But what little memory the place possesses, it's still becoming harder and harder to cling to it.

How could anybody live here for 4 years after what happened? She asks herself why?

Of course, she already knows the answer to this herself. It's because he had nowhere else to go.

And maybe he didn't want to forget. He needed all this, to remind himself exactly what Itachi did to him.

For revenge.

"Revenge." Sakura snorts, her voice bitter, dust flying up as her breath moves it. "That's all you cared about, isn't it?"

A lock of hair flops in front of her eyes at the movement. She brushes it impatiently away. She thinks back to two days earlier in the evening...

"Sakura, is that you?"

"..."

Stupid question. Who else would it be? She tightens her lips as she reaches the bottom step, heading toward the door.
"Where are you going?"
"Out."

It is a simple answer, and one that doesn't require much effort to say. But it's an answer that won't satisfy her mother, and she knew that.

"You can't keep sneaking off like this! Where you keep going? Sakura? Sakura, answer me!"

The answer Sakura gave her mother was slamming the door. It didn't matter if she was upset. It would upset her more if she knew where Sakura was going. Let her wonder.

Then she hears something, and it's enough to finally make her look up.

She wasn't lying to herself. She was too smart to fall for it. Her inner voice was not crowing, saying this must be a sign. She knows how unlikely- No- How impossible it is, for Sasuke to be here, now.

But she won't admit it, either. Will not let her other voice stamp out any leftover hope.

Then she hears it again. A creak. And then...
Footsteps.

Then the handle of the door gradually begins to turn.
Sakura holds her breath, waiting.
The door opens.
"Sakura-chan...?"

It is Naruto.
Sakura has to fight for a moment to stop herself sighing from sheer disappointment. But she also has to fight to not gasp from relief.

"Sakura-chan...Why are you..."
He trails off, the word 'Here' left hanging in the air.

Even to somebody like Naruto, the reason why she's here is obvious.

He licks his lips, nervous at her lack of response. From the way she's lying, she could have been dead. To prove she isn't, she pushes herself into a sitting position, looking at him with dull jade eyes. He looks even more out-of-place then she does. His orange jump suit seems to scream for attention in comparison to the drab surroundings.

"What do you want, Naruto?" she asks him. Her voice comes out cracked and hoarse.

"Sakura-chan, you can't go on like this." he tells her. He sounds sad. She looks away, biting down on her lip. The pain surprises her a little.

"I know."

"Then why-?"

"Don't you understand?" she asks him, her voice both harsh and desperate. "I thought you out of all people..."

"Then why don't you make me understand?" he asks her, sounding angry, but the anger is not directed at her. "Sakura-chan, why are you doing this?"

She stands up, shaking, the dust falling off her slender body, and she turns to look at him.

"Because...I don't want to forget." she said, in almost a whisper. He looks at her, and there is something in his expression, a kind of softness that makes her desperate to get him to understand.

"I don't want to forget him…but at the same time…I can't bring myself to remember him either."

Naruto stares at her.

"Sakura-chan, that makes no sense-"

"I KNOW that!" she cries, tears of frustration sparkling in her eyes. "I know that he's not coming back!"

Naruto reaches out for her, concerned.
"Sakura-chan…"

Sakura does not quite accept his embrace. She buries her head into his chest, fists hitting at his shoulders.
"I hate you!" she sobs, tears spurting down her face freely now, and it feels like something hard and cold has shattered inside her, leaving this flood of emotions to pour out of her.
"I hate you! I hate you! I…hate…. you."

Naruto's arms wrap around her, pulling her close to him, and she gradually stops, arms falling limply to her sides. For what feels like a long time, they simply stand there. Her head is lowered, her rose-coloured bangs hiding her face, tears sliding down her cheeks.

"It's not me you hate, Sakura-chan…" Naruto mumbles after a while, and Sakura wraps her arms around him, letting out a tiny gasp, fresh tears falling onto the floor.
"I know…I'm sorry…" she whispers, looking up at him now, her eyes sparkling with tears. Naruto shakes his head.
"It's okay…I know…"

Sakura breathes in, and Naruto's scent somehow comforts her. It is something warm and familiar in a place so cold and empty.

"I can't help it…coming here." She mutters into his jacket, clutching at it. "Because it's the only way I can remind myself about…everything."
Sakura lets out a soft laugh, but it is not out of mirth.
Is it possible to love someone and hate at the same time?

"Sakura-chan?"
She smiles at him, and though she is still crying, he can see it is genuine.
"I've been denying it for too long." She tells him. "Sasuke-kun…Sasuke-kun won't return. I know that, but I wanted to deny it because I was so scared that I would be alone."
Naruto puts his arms on Sakura's forearms and looks at her. She returns his gaze, somewhat surprised by this action.
"Sakura-chan…you can't think you're alone. 'Cause you're not."

Sakura smiles and grabs Naruto's hand.
"I know."

Well, there you have it. Fluff AND angst. Who would've thought? Sakura and Naruto really do look cute together. -

Note: For those of you who are curious, the meaning of Intellectual ambivalence is an inability or unwillingness to commit oneself to a definite answer, position, or conclusion in thought, normally either because a definite stance is deliberately avoided for some personal motive, or because sufficient grounds warranting a definite stance are lacking.

And there you have it. Review?