HEY!! my first fanfic!! YEA!! I DIDN'T DIE! yea well my friend blacktpyro was bugging me all week about it so i just finished it today. lol xD i hope you guys enjoy it!! and review PLEASE!!! I REALLY NEED YOUR ADVICE! i need inspiration so if u guys have any ideas of how i should continue the story, im all ears. thanks so much! :D

disclaimer: I wished I owned Naruto, but unfortunately I can't T_T don't remind me.

WEAK?

Yeah, even though everyone noticed
They pretended not to
I thought I should just put an end to everything

Ah, when you silently reached out
In the pouring rain
I knew that hand took courage

We head breathlessly
Towards that endlessly distant tomorrow
It feels like we've been living for so long
But we still can't reach it

Hey, even if my heart
Is filled with pain
I wish I could still say that beautiful things are beautiful

~Life, Mika Nakashima (translated)

I stood at the edge of the river. The image that looked back at me was a stranger. I didn't know her. But I created her. And I didn't want to know her. Ironic. That's the way my life is.

Sakura stared at the page of her book. So if I transfer chakra there, I can do…THIS! She slowly repeated the process she had just read about. After a few tries, she perfected the jutsu. She smirked. Good. Next one.

She had been reading her textbook on jutsus since last night. At 7:00 pm she went to the library to borrow some books for her ninjutsu training. It wasn't unusual to see Haruno Sakura walking out of the library with a tower of books taller than she was.

Whenever Sakura walked down the streets of Konoha, she always managed to turn every head. She was the most beautiful kunoichi in Konoha, even more beautiful than her rival, Yamanaka Ino. Her hair was still short and shoulder-length but now she also had pink side-swept bangs on the left side of her face, giving her a young, teenager-ish look that all of the girls in the town envied. Her body, according to most of the male population in Konoha, was to DIE for. All of her curves were well developed and any guy was lucky to have her. Her facial features had grown a lot from since she was 12; they were delicate yet ferocious, innocent yet rebellious. She was known in the Fire Country as the Blossoming Beauty of Konoha. Even though Sakura was still seen as a weak kunoichi, she was smart and friendly enough to everyone. After Sasuke left, some of Sakura was lost too. Her eyes were now a dark green and the sparkle was gone from them. Now all she did was study, train, and train some more. Everyone, including Tsunade, could see that Sakura was slowly destroying herself. But nothing anyone said could change Sakura, not even Naruto. She never went on missions anymore. The most common place to find her was at the Konoha Hospital where she worked every day for fourteen hours.

But now, back to what's happening with Sakura.

It was now 8:46 in the morning. And she hadn't gotten a wink of sleep. After reading through the whole night, Sakura was sure that she had memorized and perfected about 200 techniques. Maybe she could be the next Hatake Kakashi. But after a while Sakura felt her eyesight become blurry and sighed. Great. This won't be the first time I pass out studying, she thought before she collapsed onto the floor. But right before she completely blacked out, Sakura performed one final complicated seal and felt herself completely drain out. Then she gave herself up to the darkness.

xxxxxx

"SAKURA-CHAN!! ARE YOU AWAKE?!" Waking up to the sound of Naruto's voice was probably the worst thing that could happen to a person after they had just passed out. And Sakura knew this from experience. Many experiences.

"Naruto?" Sakura said weakly, eyes still shut tightly. She knew that her chakra level was still dangerously low because of her training the day before. She could barely feel her finger tips. Tsunade was going to give her hell for this.

"AHH!!! SAKURA-CHAN'S AWAKE!!!" screamed Naruto at the top of his lungs. Sakura cringed. Great, now I'm going to need to repair my ears.

"Shut up Naruto. Don't. Scream. So. Loud. When. You. Are. Near. A. Patient," scolded Tsunade. This was also said slow enough so that someone with Naruto's brain size could understand. Sakura opened her eyes and met the disapproving look in her mentor's eyes. Oops.

"Sakura, please. This is the 45th time you've passed out while studying or training AND the 45th time Naruto broke down my office door trying to get you medical attention. You know, even if I am Hokage, it doesn't mean I get paid billions of dollars," Tsunade said in one breath. She was glaring at Sakura. All of a sudden, Sakura felt guilt build up inside of her. She knew that Tsunade was only trying to take care of her and make sure she doesn't get hurt. But she didn't know whether or not Tsunade really understood what she had gone through. Nor what she is going through. But Tsunade wasn't quite finished.

"Even if you are training, it doesn't seem like you're getting any stronger. What's wrong with you Sakura? Why aren't you improving if you're pushing yourself so much?" Ouch. Now that hurt.

Sakura didn't know what to say, so she just decided to say what she had said the past 45 times. "I'm very sorry Tsunade-shishou. It won't happen again." Talk about overused and cliché.

Tsunade looked like she was about to pop a blood vessel. Sakura thought, 5 4 3 2 1…

"DON'T GIVE ME THAT CRAP SAKURA! EVEN THOUGH I AM 52 YEARS OLD THAT DOESN'T MEAN I'M AS RETARDED AND SENILE AS THE PERVERTED FROG SAGE WHO CALLS HIMSELF JIRAIYA!" Tsunade screamed. Sakura was a bit scared and inched down under her covers a little. Naruto was already running and screaming out of the hospital room for his life. No one messed with Tsunade and got away in one piece. Of course, Sakura was an exception.

"Don't worry about me Tsunade-shishou," Sakura sighed. She'd lost count how many times she'd said that to her mentor. Oh well, it didn't really matter anymore.

Tsunade just glared at her stubborn pupil. "You can take a break from your hospital shift today," she said stiffly. Then she left the room with an angry humph. Sakura sweatdropped. It wasn't everyday you saw a 52 year old woman walk out of a room in a huff. A few minutes later, Naruto crawled into the room on all fours looking like he was scared shitless. Literally. Sakura forced a laugh because she knew it was a normal reaction, but it sounded fake, even to her own ears. Naruto's face fell too, indicating that he caught the false tone in his best friend's voice. It seemed as if Sakura had forgotten how to laugh.

Naruto had noticed the change in Sakura but hadn't done anything to stop it. He was the only one who knew what she was suffering and didn't want to take away her memories of Sasuke like Neji had suggested. Dumbass. Neji didn't wake up from his coma for 2 weeks. Courtesy of Sakura, of course. But gradually, Sakura stopped showing any emotions. Never cried, never smiled. And fake smiles didn't count.

Suddenly Naruto's stomach growled. He grinned sheepishly at Sakura who was already sitting up on the hospital bed. Sakura just looked at him and said, "Let's go get ramen." Naruto could've kissed her for that. But he thought of his girlfriend and disappeared to dreamland. When Hinata had finally had the courage to tell Naruto her true feelings, Naruto had been shocked. He hadn't thought that the shy girl had had feelings for him. But after a few minutes of processing what Hinata had told him (while she was blushing like crazy but refusing to back down and be weak) he finally broke into a breathtaking grin and said, "OK Hinata! I like you a lot too and I'm willing to try going out with you. I really think that I can learn to love you Hinata-chan!" Hinata, of course fainted dead away at that.

xxxxxx

"YOSH! LET'S GO!" Naruto screamed. But then he got punched through the wall by the infamous Legendary Sucker.

xxxxxx

A while later Sakura found herself surrounded by everyone from her genin days in a ramen shop that Naruto had dragged her to. Even Iruka-sensei was there. She wondered briefly who was paying for all of the food. Definitely not her, that was for sure.

"OI Sakura!" Ino called to Sakura over the loud noise in the ramen shop. Sakura turned to her and nodded her head to her former best friend slightly. She actually had no idea why Ino was talking to her. They rarely talked. After Sasuke had left, Sakura had become an exact replica of him: an ice cube. She rarely communicated with anyone and just became a bit hermit-like. The only people she really confided too were Kakahis-sensei and Naruto.

Ino seemed to notice Sakura's aloofness and her smile faltered. But her eyes looked determined. She had to do something about Sakura. She couldn't take it when her former best friend walked by her and just…ignored her.

"What's up Sakura? We haven't talked in a while, huh?" Ino asked softly.

Sakura raised an eyebrow. "What do you want Ino?" she asked flatly.

Ino gasped. This was DEFINITELY not the Sakura she used to know.

"What do you mean 'what do you want'? I can't ask my best friend what's up?" Ino asked fiercely.

"The last time I checked, you weren't my best friend. You were my former best friend." Sakura put an extra emphasis on the word 'former'. She still didn't trust Ino that much. Everything that Ino had done to her and everything that they had said to each other still hurt.

Ino was speechless. Sakura was right. They weren't best friends anymore. Just rivals. But Ino didn't want their relationship to be like that anymore. Losing Sakura had been tough.

"Please Sakura," Ino said. "I really don't want our relationship to be like this." Then Ino lost it.

"I really miss you, Sakura! I don't know why we split because of just one guy! I mean, he wasn't even worth it if you really think about it. And everything I said to you, I really didn't mean it." Ino said tearfully. She didn't know whether Sakura was still touchy about Sasuke. When she got no reaction from said girl, Ino continued.

"Please Sakura. Please give me another chance."

xxxxxx

Sakura walked over to a table and sat down between Naruto and Neji and ordered a miso ramen. She had just repaired her relationship with Ino and her heart felt much lighter. She hadn't really thought about Ino lately but sometimes just seeing her brought back a familiar feeling of pain and loss. Being with Ino again might actually help Sakura socialize more and return to her old self again.

"Sakura." Neji's deep voice reached her ears. She turned to him with a questioning look. Hyuuga Neji hardly ever spoke to her unless they were training together. What happened? Did he catch Hinata and Naruto doing SOMETHING ALREADY?!

But she didn't have very long to ponder those disturbing thoughts because she was greeted with a bunch of rice noodles stuffed into her mouth. She glared at the white eyed prodigy through narrowed slits as Neji smirked.

"You really need to eat something, Haruno."

"I ordered a miso ramen, in case you didn't hear. And since when did you care, Hyuuga?"

"Since the time you passed out while training with me and I had to carry you all the way to the hospital. It was TOO easy because someone weighed only 99 pounds. I need a challenge."

"Are you saying I should be fat?" Sakura glared. This conversation was probably going to make the top ten weirdest conversations she's ever had. Talking to THE Hyuuga Neji about her weight and fatness. Imagine that.

"Think what you want. I'm just saying that you should eat." Neji said. And proceeded to stuff another mouthful of rice noodles into Sakura's still full mouth.

"I can feed myself perfectly fine, now back off." Sakura said through gritted teeth.

"Are you sure about that? You even need people to carry you everywhere since you always freakin' pass out. Now eat or else." Neji countered with a small smirk on his face.

At this, Sakura got pissed. No one told her what to do. She stood up and started to leave but then she saw Neji smirking. He. Pisses. Me. OFF, inner Sakura screamed. She grabbed the nearest bowl of ramen from the table and dumped its contents onto Neji's head. The look on his face was priceless. Sakura would've died laughing if she weren't so pissed off and tired. So she stalked out of the restaurant with a dozens of pairs of eyes staring after her. Woah…, everyone thought.

Poor Neji. But that wasn't the worst part. The nearest bowl of ramen happened to be Naruto's eighth bowl. When Sakura took his bowl away from him, Naruto looked like he was about to cry. But now, he followed the trail of soup that Sakura had made when she was tossing the bowl, and followed it to Neji. Then… Naruto started eating the ramen off of Neji's head. Neji, whose left eye was already twitching after what Sakura did, started jumping off of his face when he noticed that one blond idiot was sitting on his shoulders eating ramen off of his head.

Neji drew in a deep breath….and exploded.

"NARUTO, YOU FUCKING IDIOT!! GET OFF OF MY FUCKING HEAD NOW DAMMIT!"

Everyone that had gathered at the ramen place had started backing out of the restaurant before the Hyuga prodigy exploded…as in REALLY exploded. Which meant that Naruto would have his chakra points sealed shut and his neck, stomach, and limbs punctured hundreds of times. That's how scary Hyuuga Neji could be.

"Hey Neji, I didn't know you used strawberry scented Herbal Essences shampoo."

The next second Naruto was flying out of a window and all the way across town, shrieking an opera while on the way.

xxxxxx

"Geez Neji. You didn't have to kick him all the way to Gaara. Gaara's just probably gonna kick him back to you," Tenten said to the steaming Neji.

xxxxxx

Sakura dozed under a sakura tree after the little incident at the ramen shop. She grinned a bit at the image of Neji's face. That was something she would never forget. She opened her eyes and sighed. It was Saturday and recently, there hadn't been any missions for her to go on. At least not for her. Sakura scowled at the memory of having Naruto, Neji, Tenten, Ino and everyone else leaving Konoha for an A-rank or B-rank mission. Everyone was already a jounin or Anbu, like Neji and Lee. She was the only one out of the rookie 9 who was still a chuunin. With the exception of Uchiha Sasuke of course.

Sakura thought of Sasuke. Sasuke. Sasuke. It was amazing. His name or any thought of him didn't affect her anymore. She was absolutely positive that she had forgotten about her feelings for him and had moved on. Thinking of how she had acted around him when they were genin made her want to puke her guts out and feed them to pigs.

She opened her eyes and glared at a fluffy cloud at the sky. If the cloud could feel the intense of Sakura's glare, it would've started pouring ocean-full amounts of rain.

But then her gaze softened as a new thought entered her head. I think it's time to let Konoha and the entire Fire Country know who Haruno Sakura is.