Disclaimer: Masashi Kishimoto owns the storyline of Naruto, and all affiliated characters.

The first time she smiled at him was when they were thirteen. They had just successfully pulled off a rather exceptional prank on Kakashi. It hadn't been the funniest, or the strangest, but it had certainly served its purpose. And it had brought along some rather unexpected revelations. Of course, Naruto mused, Kakashi had probably let them pull that prank. He wasn't an elite shinobi for nothing, if the number of unclassified missions he was assigned nowadays was any indication. But that hadn't mattered to them at the time.

Sakura and Naruto had been waiting for both Kakashi and Sasuke at Ichiraku's for the past hour now, and they had long since realized that Sasuke would probably not be coming. Knowing him, the grunt he had responded to their cheerful invitation with most likely meant that he didn't give a damn what they did and that he most certainly would not involve himself in anything fun and social.

"I guess it's just us today, Sakura-chan," Naruto half joked. "How 'bout we make this a date?"

She whacked him on the head. "In your dreams, baka."

"Aw, d'you have to hit me so hard?" Naruto whined dejectedly, "Aren't I your precious teammate?"

Sakura ignored him, and after a moment's pause, she spoke up again. "Kakashi-sensei should be here soon. He's way too cheap to pass up a free meal, especially since you actually offered to pay."

Naruto sighed, knowing a subject change when he heard one, and shrugged. "We haven't gotten together in a while. The whole team, I mean."

Sakura nodded absently, and looked over at the blonde. Oh boy, Inner-Sakura groaned internally, he has that expression on his face that means he's about to do something incredibly stupid. I can practically hear the gears turning.

Predictable to a fault at times like these, Konoha's beloved Number One Unpredictable Ninja smirked, a terrible idea materializing in his evil, adolescent mind. The evil glint in his eyes was impossible to miss. "Oh Sakura-chan, I've got this plan," he hinted rather obviously, "We're gonna punish him for being so late all the time."

Having long since learned that attempting to dissuade her teammate is futile when he gets that mischievous look in his eye, Sakura could only half-heartedly object, knowing that something awful (or awfully stupid) was bound to happen. The goody two-shoes in her strongly wants to protest, but her Inner cackles maniacally and tells her to stop being such a stick in the mud. Sensing weakness, Naruto honed in and attacked with a last "Pretty please, with five cherries on top?" She would relent, like she always did.

She finally smirked back, her apparently innate evilness winning out. "I suppose we should."

Naruto pulled her closer. "So here's what we do…"

Kakashi ambled leisurely towards Ichiraku, Icha Icha Paradise in hand. He looked up at the lovely blue sky. Judging by the sun's position, he was only about, oh, two hours and four minutes late. His head immediately dropped back down into his book. He was later than usual, but if they could normally wait for two hours, they could wait for another couple of minutes. Besides, this chapter was his favorite. Satisfied with his logic, he resumed his unhurried perusal of his little orange book, and continued towards the ramen bar.

"Kakashi-sensei!"

He looked up, squinting into the ridiculously bright sunlight.

"Ahh… Sakura-chan, Naruto-kun. Yo." He smiled amicably at them, and waved, as he entered the restaurant. "How nice to see you. How are my two favorite students on this fine day?"

"You're late," the two aforementioned students deadpanned, blatantly ignoring his attempts at cordiality and instead, glaring flatly at him.

He sighed. His students were just so hopeless.

"Yes, well, I was walking on my way here when I saw an adorable little black kitten perched on a perilously high tree branch that needed rescuing. When I climbed up, I happened to see a little old lady a few blocks away who looked like she needed help—"

"Liar," they interrupted, still glaring balefully at him.

He chuckled at how incredibly reliable his students were, the hand not holding the book ruffling their hair.

Naruto and Sakura frowned, annoyed, and shook off the offending appendage. They weren't little kids anymore!

Ah, the predictability. How cute.

Sakura suddenly smiled sweetly at her sensei. "Kakashi-sensei, we already ordered for you. I hope you don't mind eating cold ramen." She paused, "You did make us wait for so long, after all."

Kakashi stared blankly at her for a moment, unnerved, but wrote off her sudden change in attitude as a female thing. "Uh...sure. But you and Naruto are paying."

"Yeah, yeah, Kakashi-sensei. We already promised. Just eat. Sakura-chan and I already ate while we were waiting for you," Naruto piped in happily.

Kakashi stared suspiciously at the strangely cheerful pair. They were getting kind of creepy… He shrugged it off. How could he possibly pass up a free meal, especially since for once, he didn't have to sneak out of paying for it?

The older male absentmindedly lifted his spoon to take a sip of soup, ignoring the two pairs of eyes fixated upon his face. They probably thought that they would be able to see his face if they watched closely enough. Ha, he thought vindictively as he brought his spoon to his masked lips, his attention shifting back to the seductive text in his book, that won't be happening—

"Croak."

"Aghh," the elite shinobi spluttered indignantly. "What the hell did you do to my food? Why the hell is there a TOAD sitting on my spoon?"

His two students, unable to restrain themselves any longer, burst out into loud peals of laughter.

"Oh, sensei," Sakura gasped out in between fits of laughter, "That's what you get for being so damn late all the time!"

"Yeah," Naruto agreed cheerfully, "we had to teach you your lesson sometime, and since Sasuke-teme didn't bother to come today—"

"—He'd have spoiled all the fun—"

"We decided to—" Naruto stopped abruptly, and slowly looked up at Kakashi. Kakashi looked back, his eyes widening fractionally. She hadn't defended Sasuke like she usually would. Had something happened?

"Sakura-chan," Naruto whispered, "Did you just insult Sasuke-teme?"

Kakashi turned toward her curiously, wanting to know her response as well.

"Yeah, I did." She looked away, discomfited by their reactions. "But it's true."

"…Yeah," Naruto consented, after taking a moment to mask his surprise and regain his composure. "Yeah, it is."

An awkward silence reigned over the three.

"Well," Kakashi interrupted hastily, "I should get going now. I ought to buy myself some real food."

Sakura nodded stiffly.

"Okay," said Naruto, still shell-shocked, not noticing the veiled insult to his beloved ramen, "We'll see you later."

"..And I'll try not to be late next time," Kakashi added as an afterthought, semi-contritely, but strictly for effect. Hopefully they didn't notice he'd said that because of course he didn't mean it. But maybe he'd only be late by an hour and a half next time. He was not looking forward to having to "accidentally" eat another nasty amphibian.

The two genins exchanged a satisfied smirk, all previous awkwardness completely forgotten. Success!

As Kakashi left, Naruto turned to Sakura at the same moment that she turned to him, and upon catching the other's eye, both burst into a fresh bout of unrestrained laughter.

"We did it, Naruto! It actually worked!" exclaimed Sakura. She smiled brilliantly at Naruto.

Naruto grinned back, nodding vigorously. Then, it hit him. Sakura-chan—beautiful, amazing Sakura-chan—was actually smiling at him. Not teme, or Kakashi-sensei, or Ino-chan, but him. Stupid, annoying, idiotic Naruto. He stared at her, awed. She was smiling a genuine, honest-to-goodness smile at him, not one of those oh-you're-so-stupid-Naruto-how-embarassing-Sasuke-kun's-so-much-smarter-than-you smiles. This was infinitely better. It was like the sun, he decided, gazing transfixed at her face—dazzling and bright and cheerful and amazing and just, well, perfect.

Sakura's smile faltered. Why was he staring at her like that? Was it because of that Sasuke thing? Well a girl did have her limits, she thought defiantly. He treated her like trash, no matter what she did, and that arrogant jerk had been ruining her friendship with Ino-pig, of all things. It was just a silly crush. She was so over him and was moving on to better prospects. Like that Neji, leers her Inner. Don't deny it girl, I saw you checking out his yummy abs yesterday during training. He is oh-so- fiiiine. STOP IT, she fumes, her ears burning from embarrassment and anger.

"Naruto? Is something wrong?"

He snapped out of his thoughts. "Oh. Um. No? " He mumbled uncertainly, still stunned and awestruck. He wondered if that smile meant she was over Sasuke. Even Naruto had been able to see that Sasuke was nothing but a conceited prick and would never be good enough for her. "Nothing's wrong," he murmured, unsure of the truth of that statement.

Sakura shrugged his momentary lapse off as one of his dumber moments. "Whatever. Let's go, Naruto."

"Okay," he murmured absently, still lost in his thoughts.

Yep, Naruto grinned as he looked over at his rosette girlfriend, remembering this moment five years ago. Life was pretty good.

END

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Thanks, PG