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Fiesta

Theme#36 of the 50 shinobi theme challenge

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"Ne Itachi," Sakura said to her childhood friend—well she considered him her friend, though she never knew if he thought of her the same way.

"Hn," he answered as they walked down the decidedly peaceful sidewalk to a less frequented breakfast café. They had made it a morning routine to grab a bite to eat before heading to the hospital or the Hokage building—whichever they needed to get to on that particular day. Shisui tagged along with them every now and then, but he had just returned from a mission last night and was in no condition to strolling leisurely.

"Anko-san asked me for a favour yesterday," the small medic started hesitantly, "And um…" she paused.

"What is it?" Itachi asked, now slightly curious what the cruel jounin could have asked his small friend.

"She asked me to ask you if you were taking anyone to the annual Christmas celebration at the Hokage tower and if you aren't she'd like to know if you'd go with her and also, she wants to go out for lunch," Sakura blurted in one breath, her cheeks a mild tint of pink. "I mean, I know it's really immature of her to have to ask you out through someone else, and I should have said no and told her to ask her yourself, but she's just so scary and—" she small girl continued, now flustered, her eyes glued to the ground before her.

"I am already going with someone," Itachi confirmed, effectively cutting off her mindless chatter.

"Oh," Sakura stopped mid-sentence, positively delighted and very curious. In all her years knowing Itachi, she'd never seen him take interest in women before and she was very interested in finding out what kind of a woman had managed to catch his attention. "Who is it?" she asked in a mildly teasing tone.

"You," he said easily, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. Sakura stopped in her tracks and stared at her friend's back, dumbfounded.

Itachi smirked at her reaction before turning around to address her, "We are going to be late, Sakura. Come."

"Um, okay," she managed weakly, positive that her face resembled a tomato but powerless to do anything about it. She quickened her steps to catch up to him lest he leave her behind.

Sakura had never thought of Itachi as anything more than a good friend. She wasn't blind to his sharp intellect, odd sense of humour that one could only appreciate if you understood him, and least of all, his unnaturally good looks. She wasn't surprised that Itachi was a very sought after bachelor in Konoha, but the thought had simply never crossed her mind.

'Maybe we're just going as friends,' she thought to herself. 'That's probably it; Itachi just doesn't want to spend the night with some squealing, obsessed girl.'

As if hearing her thoughts, Itachi stopped abruptly, causing Sakura, still deep in thought and not paying attention, to collide with his back.

"Ouch! Itachi what the hell are you doing, you could have at least—" Sakura started, but was abruptly interrupted yet again, this time by Itachi`s decidedly warm hand, tucking a loose strand of bubble gum hair behind her ear delicately. She froze in her spot, her jaw threatening to drop to the ground as she stared up at him.

The tall raven-haired genius tilted her chin up and sealed his lips to hers, effectively stopping all her thoughts previously storming in her mind. He simply pressed his lips to hers gently, to assure that she understood his intentions were not purely platonic, lingering for only a few seconds before pulling away. He turned around and started walking again, leaving a Sakura to stare after him rather unintelligently.

"Come, or we really will be late," was all he said.

So now Sakura knew. Itachi didn't think of her as a friend as she had hoped all these years. It seemed he thought of her as a little bit more. Apparently, the kind of woman that had managed to get Itachi's attention was small, fierce, and had pink hair.

Uchihas never were predictable.

-End-

A/N: I just had this random thought niggling in the back of my mind for a while and thought I'd get it down. I know I've stopped writing Beyond Words, but that doesn't mean I'm going to stop writing altogether. I still hope that my followers can forgive me for that decision. I know the feeling of finding one of the unfinished stories you've been following has been put on hiatus.

I hope you enjoyed this little piece of ItaSaku fluff. I haven't written in a while, and I must say, it's good to be back

I'm sure all authors will agree with me on this point: Reviews fuel my writing, so I'd love it if you could leave one. Thank you very much :D

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