Author's Greetings: Hello everyone! For those of you who have read anything by me before you know the deal! This will be my third Naruto-series-centric Fanfic and this time it will highlight the coupling of Sasuke & Sakura. Now I know quite a few of you have read my Kakasaku & Naruhina fics and I hope that you enjoy this one as well! Just a little disclaimer: If you have an issue with this pairing or any of the other pairings that I write about, I kindly ask you to keep your comments to yourself. Also if you want the chapters to come out fast I'd just like to let you know that reviews go a long way with me and motivate me to shell out the chapters more. Anyways! I hope you enjoy reading this!
Summary: Chronicling the time between when Sakura left Konoha & returned with Sasuke and a surprise. What happened in that lost year?
Chapter 1
'For Starters'
"Something's gotta give." Sakura muttered to herself as she scribbled away in her planner. She was sitting in the broom closet that was masquerading as her office at the hospital. She had spent the better part of an hour trying to figure out just how she was going to fit all of her patients in the next day.
"If Sayuri hadn't taken the weekend off this wouldn't be a problem." She told the wall petulantly as she added Mrs. Aburashi to her list and tried to find a time in her day to check up on the woman.
With a little groan Sakura threw her pencil down and leaned back in her chair, rubbing her undoubtedly puffy eyes.
She wasn't mad at Sayuri for asking for the weekend off. Not really. The woman had just gotten married recently and had put off her honeymoon for almost two months in order to help out with the large influx of patients that the hospital had been experiencing.
It also didn't help that two of the doctors were out sick and Igurashi-sensei (Who was supposed to be in charge) was putting most of the responsibility of managing the hospital onto Sakura's shoulders.
"He always does this. Leaves me in charge so he can take off early." Sakura said to herself before making a mental note to stop talking to herself.
"Well let's hope the hospital can manage without me for eight-" She looked at her watch "No make that four hours." She continued, ignoring her earlier mental note.
She grabbed her coat and bag and left her office, shutting off the light and locking the door as she went. The trip downstairs took ten minutes longer than usual because she was stopped every few steps by someone needing to ask her a question or get her signature on something.
Leaving the hospital and inhaling the night air a quick look at her watch told her that it was nearly two in the morning. With a tired groan Sakura walked the two blocks to her apartment, looking forward to putting her feet up and falling fast asleep.
Upon her arrival she dropped all of her things in the doorway, kicked off her shoes and stumbled into the dark apartment. She undressed as she walked, letting the clothing fall where it may (and making a promise to pick it up in the morning).
She was already half asleep by the time made it to her dresser and pulled out a soft flannel nightgown, as she pulled it over her head she noticed something out of the corner of her eye: A little rolled up piece of paper was sitting on her pillow surrounded by a few brown feathers.
Her adrenaline spiked as she recognized the familiar paper and she tugged the nightgown down over her hips and jumped into bed, greedily grabbing the letter and turning on the lamp on her bedside table. Unrolling the paper her hunch about who the letter was from was confirmed by the narrow, spiked handwritting:
'It is raining in Amegakure. It's always raining. The refugee state that this land used to be is slowly beginning to change as stability is restored. Currently keeping an eye out for a group called the Lizards. There were some medical ninjas that you trained in the camp the other day. Thought of you. - S'
Sakura leaned back against the pillow, clutching the letter to her chest. As always Sasuke was bland and straight to the point-no doubt Kakashi also received a similar letter. But the last few words were different-they always were.
She usually received a letter once a month (or every two months) and the first part was always about the state of Amegakure.
The village hidden by rain had been a battleground for some of the most brutal wars ever fought by shinobi. The entire government was being rebuilt from the ground up with the help of the four shinobi nations in hopes that it would one day be stable enough to entire the union that they all shared.
Sakura didn't know exactly what Sasuke's purpose for being there was-only Kakashi knew that-but she figured he did a lot of watching and waiting.
But that wasn't what made her crave these letters from the absent Uchiha. Sakura opened the drawer on her bedside table and pulled out the stack of letters-there were fifteen in total-and flipped through them.
'Saw a little girl who cried while eating spicy ramen. Reminded me of you when Naruto snuck wasabi into your food when we were twelve.'
'It has been hailing for thirty minutes straight. Do you remember when we were visiting the land of waves and it rained so hard one night and it got so cold that it started hailing?'
'Congratulate Naruto and Hinata on their marriage, I wish I could be there but I am sure that you will take care of congratulating them for me. You were always better at that than me.'
Sakura smiled at that one before putting it back on the pile and adding the new letter and putting them away. A sorrowful meow cut through her giddy phase and she peered into the kitchen to see her very angry and very fat cat glaring at her.
"Oh Miko I'm sorry. I forgot to ask Mrs. Emiko to come and feed you today." She apologized as she guiltily poured some kitty kibble into the cat's bowl before returning to bed and crawling under the covers.
Miko joined her a few minutes later, happily purring now that he'd been fed, and curled up behind Sakura's knees as she drifted off to sleep.
Sakura woke the next morning feeling better than she had in awhile, she stretched in the morning sunlight which shone on her bed and patted Miko's still sleeping form… and then she realized that she had woken up on her own with no alarm clock.
She jolted upwards and sent the cat flying from the bed and looked over at her alarm clock which read 9:15am.
"Oh crap!" She gasped as she jumped out of bed and hurried into the bathroom to hurry and get ready for work-which she was already an hour late for.
She slid into the hospital twenty minutes later looking disheveled and panicked and hurried upstairs to her office to try and figure out how she was going to fix her day.
"Miss Haruno." An angry voice greeted her as she stepped inside her office. Igurashi-sensei was sitting on her desk with one leg crossed over the other and he did not look happy.
"Igurashi-sensei, good morning." Sakura greeted him, a sheepish apology already forming on her tongue.
"You are over an hour late to work. That is unacceptable, there are patients that you have been tasked with taking care of.
"I agree and I apologize. I got out of work very early this morning and I must have forgotten to set my alarm clock."
"That is no excuse. I expect better of you, if this keeps up i'm going to have to rethink letting you shoulder some of the responsibility of helping to manage this hospital."
Sakura felt something almost audibly snap inside of her as the last year of stress and exhaustion overcame her: "Let me?" She asked quietly, gripping the shoulder strap of her bag.
"Yes. Let you, if you ever hope to be in my position one day you are going to have to learn how to-" Igurashi was cut off by the wall to the left of his head crumbling under Sakura's fist.
"I have been driving myself insane for the last year as you 'let me' shoulder your responsibilities while you wander off to god knows where. I have been the one that the doctors, nurses and other medical staff come to when they have a problem. I spent sixteen hours here yesterday and barely got home by two a.m. Not only that I don't need to be in your position Igurashi-sensei, and do you want to know why?"
"Why is that?" Igurashi-sensei asked, struggling to keep his voice from quavering.
"Because I am a better doctor and medical ninja than you ever will be. Don't forget who spent time in a war zone and who opted to stay in Konoha."
Sakura's smile dropped and she let the full intensity of her glare pierce through the man in front of her, "Now. I'm going to pack up my office. Because I quit. All of the information on hospital business that you have been neglecting is in the nurses station on this floor and if you even think about complaining to the board of directors remember I have an entire hospital of people who respect me to back me up. So, please, get the hell out of my office."
After the older man had scurried from the room Sakura sank down into her chair and put her face into her hands. What had she just done? It wasn't like her to lose her temper, not anymore. She used to be so good at speaking her mind from the get-go but this last year at the hospital had been brutal and she'd bottled too much inside.
Sakura began to pack up her office, putting her things in a large tote bag that she kept in her desk.
When she emerged from the small office that was no longer hers she was greeted with the concerned faces of the staff who she had worked with for the past year.
"Sorry you guys." She grinned sheepishly.
"Sorry? I would have decked him." Kotoko, one of the nurses said.
"Yeah you've been pulling more than your own weight for more than a year and you are never late." Said Nagakure-sensei, one of the older doctors who still worked at the hospital.
"What are you going to do?" one of them asked and Sakura found herself shrugging her shoulders.
"I don't know yet but it won't be here. At least not until Igurashi-sensei gets his head out of his ass." At least that got some laughs.
She said goodbye and excused herself, trying to get out of the hospital as fast as possible but couldn't help but stop and say goodbye to all of her patients before she left.
Once she was on the street, squinting in the early morning sunshine did she finally let a few frustrated tears escape.
-LittleMoonLover-