Title: Somebody Special
Author: DreamsLuv
Rating: T
Pairing: Sakura Centric
Disclaimer: I own none of these characters!
Summary: High School AU | Sakura-centric with/plus Akatsuki | She never asked for much and she was always willing to give everything a thought, but this was the only thing she was ever truly proud of. Yet, was she willing to abandon her track team just to continue with her dream?
"Come on, you're almost there! Just a little faster! Come on!"
Dozens of comments continued to be shouted as the heads of people approached the white line. Although, two were clearly ahead of all the others; one with slick silver hair and another with chocolate twin buns.
"Tenten, come on girl, you can beat him!"
And as the crowd standing besides the track continued to shout, the silvered hair man passed the white line, quickly followed by the brunette girl.
"Ha, better off next time." Hidan, the man with the silver hair, taunted the shorter girl who came after him, Tenten. "You should know that you can't beat a fucking pro."
"Please, one of these days I will beat you," Tenten replied as she rolled her eyes, panting a bit as she rolled her shoulders. "You just got lucky this time."
Although both were immediately one-handedly hugged by a spiky hair blond. "You guys both did amazing! No need to make it a competition!" Naruto yelled out with a giant grin, keeping a positive attitude as he gave both a pat on the back.
"Says the dobe who always loses to me."
The cocky reply immediately gained a glare from the blond. "Oh shut up teme." Naruto continued to glare at the smirking boy, known as Sasuke, who still continued to be unfazed.
"Come on don't argue guys." Heads turned to the pink haired girl, who only rolled her eyes at them. With a hand on her hip, she pointed at the direction of the locker room with her thumb.
"Save that for after we change and head to the pizza place." She said.
"Well maybe I like being sweaty, un."
Sakura rolled her eyes at Deidara's comment. "Yeah, maybe I do too, but maybe I also like being clean when and while eating pizza."
The group continued to converse as they head to the locker room to change.
"Obviously I'm the faster one."
"Ha, as fucking if. If you were, then you would be doing the long distance!"
"Hello, my area is called sprint for a reason!"
"Naruto, come on, you're not the fastest one here. Everybody else just wanted a different position and you were left with this."
As Naruto, Hidan, and Tenten argued about who was the fastest, the other nine people just talked to each other while eating slices from the two pizzas. One was pepperoni while the other was combo.
In total there were twelve people on team; Ino, Itachi, Kiba, Lee, Naruto, Neji, Sakura, Sasuke, Tenten, Sasori, Hidan, and Deidara. Each competed in a different area, but all of them were ready to be substitutes for each other in case one was ever absent during an event.
"Man, it still sucks that Pein and Konan graduated, un." Deidara said with a frown as he sipped at his soda.
"They were hecka good runners!" he exclaimed as he threw his hands into the air.
"We could have invited them." Sasori calmly remarked as he casually ate a slice of pizza. Deidara rolled his eyes, taking a bit out of one of the combo pizzas before he replied. "But if we invite them, then we'd have to invite everybody else."
"Like Zetsu, Kisame, and Kazuka." Itachi added as he grabbed a slice of combination pizza.
Kiba quickly swallowed the food in his mouth before he spoke. "Don't forget Hinata, Choji-"
"And basically, just imagine our bill. It'd be horrible, especially since I have to pay this time." Ino cut Kiba off, leaning against back against the seat as she laughed a little.
The group continued to chatter about little things, quickly changing topics and switching between conversations with others. Everybody was obviously busy with their own businesses.
"Hey, Sakura," the pink-haired girl set the slice of pizza in her hand back onto her plate, turning her head to look at Sasuke, who sat right besides her.
"You have a little something," the darker haired male leaned in closer towards Sakura, raising his hand to wipe off a bit of tomato sauce at the corner of her lip with his thumb. "Right here."
With that, Sasuke leaned back to sit up correctly, wiping his hands on a napkin. "So, dobe, race again on Monday?" He asked casually with a smirk. Although he didn't speak too loud, he immediately gained the attention of Naruto.
"Oh, you're on teme!"
As the two now engaged in a small banter, Sakura had honestly felt a bit surprised. Her cheeks were slightly pink from embarrassment, and she didn't know how to exactly feel about the situation, especially due to their past history.
However, she didn't get much time to think to herself before somebody called out her name.
"-kura, Sakura! Saku-chan!"
"Huh?"
Snapping out of her thought, she turned her head to look at Deidara, who sat across the table from her and was reaching his hand out towards her, waving at her in an attempt to get her attention.
"Finally, un." Deidara gave a wide grin when he noticed that he finally got her attention. "Who do you think is a better artist; me or Sasori-danna, un?"
The question was definitely not one that took her by surprise, since he did occasionally ask her this question every here and there, so she only smiled and giggled a little. "Can I choose Sai?"
Her comment only received a childish pout from the blond, but the red-head remained calm as usual. Although, it took a moment, but Sakura noticed the mouths drawn on the blond's hand.
"You redrew the mouths?" she questioned, gesturing to his still held out hands.
Deidara immediately cheered up, smiling as he nodded. "Yep! It's not like it takes long to draw them anyways, un." He said with a laugh as he held open his hand, pointing to the mouth that stuck its tongue out on his hand.
"But it is a bit gross when I'm sweating a lot and the paint starts to smear all over my hand." He complained with a small pout again, but a second later, he regained his mood and went back to eating his slice of pizza.
"I still remember that one time when your hand was sweating so badly and the paint smeared all over the shot put ball!" Kiba shouted, laughing along with a few others at the memory. "The coach was pissed!"
The long haired blond rolled his eyes at the memory, swallowing the piece of food in his mouth before he spoke. "Man, he made me stay after practice to wash it off."
"And while you were doing that, we were here chilling eating pizza until you came back." Kiba quickly added in with a snicker. Although his comment resulted in laughs and nods from the group.
The rest of the day continued smoothly as the group stayed at the pizza place for another hour before they all began to part.
Only a couple of people were left, all standing outside in front of the pizza place doors. Some walked home together, others carpooled, and others were having a quick conversation before they left. Sakura and Neji were one of those people.
"Hey Neji, can I get a ride to your place?"
Neji turned to look at Sakura, prepared to ask why until she suddenly interrupted him before he could speak. "Hinata invited me over for a sleep-over this weekend and Ino was going to come later because she had to go home and finish some stuff first. I figured that it'd be easier coming with you now, so…"
Sakura trailed off a bit before sheepishly smiling. Although, Neji nodded, slightly smiling as he gestured her to his silver sports car.
"Thanks," she happily said as she hurried to the passenger seat, waiting for him to unlock the car before she slipped in.
"It's no problem," he replied as soon as he sat down. "So, why are you guys having a sudden sleep over? Didn't you guys already have one last week?"
And, that's about it for now! First chapter is kind of short, but I'm feeling really inspired about this story.
