Sakura bit her lip indecisively. She had 40 minutes left to her shift, but she really didn't feel like shelving another truck. She stared down aimlessly at the log she and the other library assistants used to record their daily tasks. She was terribly behind on her missing books reports, but those always seemed to take forever. Usually working was one of the highlights of Sakura's day. She loved her job. But... It had been a long day...and she was so tired. She was just ready to get home, have a glass of wine, and drift to sleep spooning one of her anatomy textbooks.
Sakura took a deep sigh and made a decision. She would kill time working in her sections.
Each library assistant had two assigned sections they were responsible for. As important as it was to shelve trucks of books, It was also their job to sight read (keep the books in their proper order), straighten (Books needed to be bookended and neat), and make sure each shelve had about 7 inches of space for new books. It was the most tedious part of her job, and she had been avoiding checking her section for a while.
However with finals finished and her internship completed, there was really no more excuses she could tell herself to avoid it. And today, at least, it seemed a better option than those dumb reports.
She picked up a blue pen and jotted down the time and her decided destination, and headed for the stacks. Leaving their workroom, she climbed the stairs to the 2nd floor and pushed through the door. The sound of whispering chatter hit her ears, her eyes catching on the reference desk. It was a slow day at the library and only one reference librarian was seated at said desk.
She walked past the desk headed for the non-fiction stacks. These took up half of the second floor of the library, and were always the most troublesome books.
She made her way to the 000's. As she rounded the corner her eyes landed on her first bookcase and she instantly deflated. Almost every shelved had been pushed back and held wide gaps of pulled books. From a glance she could see many books on their side, as well as a number of odd-balls, likely far from their Home.
She took a deep breath, pushed her sleeves up, pulled her hair into a pony tail and set to work.
Siding books into their place, puffs of dust floated up at her, attacking her nose. She coughed a few times but kept going. It was tedious work and she had learned over the months the best way to get through was just to do and not think to hard.
As much as she had been complaining, she realized it could be worse. There were, periodically, days that were so slow, she would pull out her hair looking for something to do to pass the time. At least that wasn't the case tonight.
Sakura was about half-way through when something grabbed her attention. She heard a load ruckus coming from the 900's (a few stacks over from where she was working). Peering discreetly over the shelf in front of her, she noticed a blonde man (a library regular actually) arguing cheerfully with someone.
She couldn't see who he was talking to and refocused her attention on her work.
'Okay let's see... 071.234...071.245...071.249...k...t...'
"HEY! Can you help us?!...Hello?" Realizing the voice was addressing her, Sakura blinked and looked to her right. Suddenly the blonde was in front of her, and she wondered how long she had been counting.
"Sorry! How can I help you?" She said happily.
"Okay so my friend and I were looking for the cookbooks and we found some in the 600's but they are all fitness and weight loss books. I was looking for something else. Do you have other cookbooks somewhere or is it that it?" He said this with a toothy grin that Sakura couldn't help but smile back at. Thinking about what he said, she paused, her brow wrinkling in thought.
"Well we have a large variety of cookbooks, and I know they aren't just fitness related...Cookbooks... Could you show me where you were looking?"
"Of course!" He responded almost shouting and leading her to the start of the six hundreds.
"Right here!" He stopped in front of the 613 section- Health and Fitness.
"Oh!" Sakura giggled. "That makes sense. Okay so this is the health and fitness section, that's 613. Because it is health and fitness, we shelve the cookbooks that focus on diet plans here. The Cookbook section is 641. This way..." She led them down the aisle two stacks over and around the corner.
"Here..." She said placing her hand on a few books. "…is where it starts. They go almost 3 stacks back, and are further divided into smaller catagories... Like... Country classics, ethnic foods, sweets, chocolate... Like I said, a large variety." As she spoke she noticed the blonde guy practically start to drool.
"See teme! I told you! We just had to ask!" He turned, yelling at his friend. Sakura realized she had been so focused helping the blonde she hadn't really noticed there was someone with him. She looked at him now and almost started drooling herself.
Quietly taking the verbal abuse of the blonde man was . Jet Black hair and smoldering dark eyes, he stared back at the load blonde nonchalantly. He had a nice build, muscular, but not like a body builder, and ivory pale skin. He was a few inches taller than she, and she like the way his face was slightly angular. He had very aristocratic features, she decided.
"...miss? I'm sorry what was your name?" Sakura was pulled back to earth when she realized they were both staring at her waiting for her to speak.
"Sakura." She said still looking at the brunette, who –she noticed- was looking back at her. He had an unreadable expression on her face, and she blushed ever so slightly, wondering if he had caught her staring.
"I know I've seen you in here before too." She said turning her attention back to Blondie. "You're one of our regulars right? I'm sorry but I don't know if I've actually met you yet. I've only been here a few months. What was your name?"
"Naruto! See teme! I thought you were new! He said you'd been here for a while."
At that she looked back at the brunette, who grunted in response and looked away. Sakura frowned slightly, not sure what that reaction meant.
"Oh don't mind him. That's just how he is." Naruto practically shouted, again. Sakura winced slightly. 'Was he always this loud?"
"Okay...and you are...?" She prompted, directing her question to mystery boy this time. She was guessing 'teme' wasn't his actual name.
"Sasuke." The brunette answered her. He looked at her for a few seconds, only a few but to Sakura it felt much longer before turning to Naruto.
"Let's go." And with that, Sasuke turned on his heel and sauntered off.
"W-wait!" Naruto called after him. He looked back at Sakura sheepishly. "Sorry he can be a little... Shy." He grabbed her hand quickly shaking it ferociously. "It was nice meeting you! See ya around! Hey! Sasuke! Wait up!" He yelled chasing after his friend. He was promptly shushed by the single working reference librarian and hurriedly apologized, not stopping for fear of getting left behind.
Sakura watched as the two disappeared and glanced down at her watch. She grinned and headed back down stairs.
'Well that's one way to kill time.'