Disclaimer: I don't work Naruto.
Happy birthday, Sasuke, Sakura stared at her phone screen before hitting send. It was a simple birthday message, nothing wrong with that. But why did she feel like she was adding so much unnecessary stress on herself?
If he replied, cool!
If he didn't, that's cool too!
Giving up, she started to delete the message – but not before Ino had caught a glimpse of the screen. The two girls had been on their break together at the Konoha Children Mental Health Clinic that they had worked so hard on establishing. They sat on one of the couches closely to one another since Ino had plopped down heavily on Sakura who got to the couches first.
"You have Sasuke's number, Forehead?" she inquired, more intrigued than she was just a second ago.
Sakura blankly looked up at her. "Oh." She looked back down at her screen. "Yeah, Naruto basically said it was mandatory for us to have each other's numbers so I didn't really have a say in that." She fake laughed.
Ino didn't buy it.
"Come on, don't act like you didn't beg Tsunade-sama for it." Ino snickered at the thought.
Sakura rolled her eyes at the assumption from the blonde. "Dude, that's so old now. I can't wait for the day that everyone stops teasing me about the guy. We're older now, I thought everyone would at least be smarter, but I guess not."
"Calm doooown, Forehead. Jesus. It was a joke. You know all of the girls were basically head over heels for the guy." Ino put her arm around Sakura's shoulders. "But you're the only one that's kept those same feelings, dude." She laughed. "Everyone else has moved on."
Sakura gaped at her. "What makes you think I haven't?"
Ino pointed down at her phone. "Because you're still dwelling on whether to say happy birthday to him or not! What's the hold up?"
"Nothing."
"Okay." Ino snatched Sakura's phone in an instant.
Sakura immediately reached forward for her phone but Ino turned her back to Sakura and hunched over the phone, mumbling incoherent words as she typed back the text that Sakura had typed out before backspacing. Except Ino added some. "And send! You're welcome, Forehead."
Sakura clumsily caught her phone as Ino had side-tossed it to her direction. Sakura deadpanned as soon as she realised what Ino had done.
Nothing bad.
"Bitch," Sakura finally breathed out.
Ino winked at her comically. "Chill. It's just a heart."
Yeah, it was just a heart. But Sakura could feel her own heart becoming heavier with each passing second. She stared at the message: Happy birthday, Sasuke-kun! 3
"Back to work we go!" Ino chirped before dashing out of the break room.
"Shikamaru and Chouji wanted to meet up later, are you doing anything?" Ino inquired, removing her white coat. The two were now heading out from their shift at work together. After not receiving a reply from Sakura, she turned around – only to find a Sakura who was staring at her locker blankly. "You're not still upset because of what I sent, are you?"
Still no reply.
Ino grabbed Sakura by the shoulders and rattled her. "Sakura." Still nothing. "I already apologized like 200 billion times, stop stressing over it! A heart means nothing! I swear, dude. You're so extra!"
Sakura finally snapped out of her trance and glared at her friend in front of her who was still in close proximity to her. "I'm extra?" She landed a finger at Ino's chest. "You're extra!" She sighed, feeling defeated, and ran her fingers through her short hair. "It's whatever at this point. I'll just agonize over this in the comfort of my own home."
Ino perked up. "Oh yeah!" Ino started packing her belongings faster. "Why be sad in your bed when you can enjoy quality bonding time with Ino—Shika—Cho!" Before Sakura could respond, Ino had already grabbed her arm and was pulling her out of the building.
"Are you sure it's fine with Shikamaru and Chouji?" Sakura quickly voiced while half-ass attempting to stop Ino.
"Shut up, you know we're all desperate to be around each other and catch up these days! It's so hard to make time when everyone's schedules are so fricking different,"
"Yeah, but this is your team – "
"I said shut up." Ino rolled her eyes at her. Sakura didn't catch it.
The two lightly chatted with each other as their feet carried them to their destination. Sakura had asked where they were even going, and Ino had just shrugged, muttering about how she didn't know the name of the place that they were grabbing sweets, but Chouji had been dying to visit since it was one of the newer establishments in Konoha – she didn't know the name of the place but she knew where it was at. It was a cute little bakery that Sakura had heard about but never seen. Sakura sighed at her friend and just accepted the situation.
After a while, Ino finally voiced out, "I'm surprised your team's not doing anything tonight – considering it's Sasuke's birthday and all. I feel like Naruto definitely would have made plans for the occasion since he's so deeply in love with the birthday boy."
Sakura laughed. "You're not wrong there. But who knows, maybe adulthood's finally caught up to him and he's too busy now."
Ino shook her head. "He's probably just has another date with Hinata and forgot what day it was,"
The two laughed.
"That's also a possibility." Sakura reflected.
Ino smiled at her friend. It was nice to finally spend time with Sakura like this. Sure, seeing each other at the clinic was nice, but it wasn't bonding to her. Yeah, the time spent with each other at the clinic was nice and working with your best friend was definitely a bonus, but times like these really made her appreciate her time with Sakura. "Thanks for coming out with me, Sakura. I'm glad you're finally agreeing." Ino suddenly aired her thoughts.
"What?" Sakura verbalized her confusion form the off-topic comment.
Ino laughed lightly before elaborating. "Before, you'd be so quick to reject any plans that we had. I'd constantly ask you to get tea with me around the time the clinic was finished, and you'd tell me no each time."
"Oh." Sakura's heart slightly ached at the statement. She didn't know what to say. She didn't mean to reject Ino that many times in retrospect.
"It's fine," Ino reassured her with a playful smile. "I deadass just assumed you were bitter and depressed because Sasuke came home and then immediately left the village again so it's fine,"
"Ha-ha," Sakura lightly punched Ino on the shoulder, "You're so annoying."
Ino winked, "Was I wrong though?" Ino didn't wait for a reply before she realized something. "Isn't that what he used to say to you all the time? Wow, Sakura, you're developing his vocabulary! Is it safe to assume that you guys have been hanging around each other a lot then? Is that why you were ballsy enough to message him happy birthday? When did you guys hang out? Did you grab food? How come I didn't know about this? Rude, honestly, but it's fine, just tell me about it – "
Sakura stopped walking and let all of Ino's questions sink in, her hands placed in front of her as if they could stop the barrage of questions Ino had thrown at her. "No, what the heck Ino. No. The last time him and I talked to each other was like months ago when I bumped into him and Naruto, quit assuming –"
Once again, Ino abruptly interrupted Sakura as she realized another thing, "Has he replied to you yet? A thank you for the birthday message?" her eyes lit up and she clasped her hands together in front of her as they started walking again.
"No," Sakura said in a low whisper before adding on, "I don't know."
"You don't know?" Ino repeated. "What?"
"I turned my phone off. A reply from Sasuke or not, it's fine." Sakura lied.
"How are you not dying right now? I literally used to anticipate every waking second of my life whenever I messaged Sai,"
"It's different,"
"How?"
At this point, the two had reached their destination and had been standing outside.
"Okay, enough talk of this. Don't utter one word about Sasuke to Shikamaru and Chouji." Sakura warned.
"You know they wouldn't give a crap about stuff like this, but," Ino mimicked zipping up her mouth. "Sasuke who?"
And for the rest of the night, the two enjoyed the company of their two friends and nothing about the text was ever mentioned. The group mainly talked about life and how each of them were doing in these newer times.
Sakura went home that night with a smile on her face, feeling content with life for a change.
the next morning
Bzzt, bzzzt! Bzzt, bzzzt!
Sakura groaned from under her blanket and reached for her alarm clock on the bedside table, eyes still closed, and disabled her alarm. She threw the blanket off and half-sat up in bed, leaning on an elbow. She had never turned on her phone again last night. She grabbed it and turned it on. She unlocked her phone after seeing all her email notifications from work flood her lockscreen. Sakura was halfway through skimming the email reports that the closing staff at the clinic had sent her when she realized something.
She quickly left the emails and went on her iMessage, the last conversation popped up immediately and coincidentally enough, it was her conversation with Sasuke. Her heart sank a little.
Read 5:30 AM ✓.
A/N: hey yall, i'm sorry i couldn't think of a name for the bakery, that's why i left it out :D
Anyway pls review, thank you for reading, I will be updating soon