Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto, or any characters from the anime/manga. Sometimes I wish that I did.

Chapter 2: Sakura's Story

Author Note: So, thanks for the comments that encouraged me to write some more! I know it's been a very LONG time, but I hope you can say it was worth the wait! Enjoy, and please leave some feedback soz I can live and make my writing better and crap like that! Also, I'd just like to remind everyone that I've only ever seen up to the episode when Haku made his ice mirrors and Zabuza died and such. So I guess this is more an AU fic than anything since (now that I have the info from my sis) Sasuke does not go evil in my world. He just gets to be a bigger jerk is all.


Maybe ramen wasn't such a good idea afterall... Sakura thought miserably, stirring the noodles in her bowl with her chopsticks in the heavy silence that had descended upon the two old classmates. The pink-haired Jonin risked a small glance up at the Hyuuga girl. She was still staring at Sakura with that quizzical look, like she was some sort of puzzle to be figured out.

"Hinata, please stop looking at me that way?" it was more a question than an order. All the same, Hinata turned pink and lowered her whole head to stare into her own ramen.

"I'm sorry, Sakura-San, I d-didn't mean to make you uncomfortable!" she apologized, in her lap her hands were twisting. It looked painful, "I just... Well you were attacked by that ninja and nobody knows why, or where he came from, and no one will tell me about how you're life has been these past few years..." She said all this without pause for breath.

Sakura sighed, putting both hands on the table, as if bracing herself, "I don't know who attacked me or why." she said calmly, "As to why no one has told you about my life? No one except Naruto knows what's really happened, and Sasuke if he even deems to remember it." she said this last part with bitterness, and gritted her teeth. She didn't want to remember the past, to go back to painful times, she wanted to move foreward and forget.

"Oh..." Hinata said, rather lamely. Sakura could see she really did want to know and really did care, not like everyone else would be- just asking to get the question out of the way and get to the great stuff they had done.

Sakura sighed again and her hands curled into fists and relaxed again, "Hinata, if I tell you, you understand that I don't want any of this getting around?" the Hyuuga girl nodded vigorously, lifting her head to look at Sakura again, "A few years ago when we all finally became Chunin, the three of us went on a mission, one of our last before we split up to do our separate things." here Sakura paused to take a deep breath, "We had all been up-tight and on edge, so Sasuke and I... relieved some tension..." Hinata's eyes got very big here and Sakura almost chuckled at how round they were, "Naruto said we had crossed a line and they got into a pretty bad fight. I jumped in the middle and got battered up quite a bit. Naruto never forgave himself for that, and Sasuke just stopped talking to either of us. And after that things just haven't... well they haven't exactly gone well for me." The next few moments were spent in more silence. Hinata knew Sakura wasn't telling the whole story, and Skura could see it in her face she was hurt that the pink-haired Jonin hadn't tusted her with any more.

"Th-thank you for trusting me with this, Sakura-San! I will never tell a soul!" Hinata promised, placing both hands over Sakura's in a moment of nerve. Despite having hinted at hard times, her hands felt soft and smooth. Both Jonin blushed and looked away.

"I-I'm not hungry anymore..." Sakura said, as they pulled their hands away from eachother, "Do you mind if I maybe step out for--"

"Oh, no!" Hinata hurried to reassure her, "I've lost my appitite as well, but I feel so bad that you bought me a whole bowl of ramen and I hardly touched any of it!" Sakura smiled and assured the Hyuuga that it was alright, and tried to make a excuse to leave, but Hinata proved to be stickier than glue and followed Sakura wherever she went, a smiling, silent companion, offering the occasional pleasantry- 'Isn't it beautiful out, Sakura?', or, 'Wow, that dress would look lovely on you!'- Sakura would have been annoyed, except for she did enjoy the girl's company, and it was different to be around someone so happy rather than what she was used to.

Oh, Hinata, I don't know why I never became better friends with you! You seem to make everything seem okay...

"Sakura, Hinata!" Someone called to them from down the road, The figure ran to catch up with them. It was Shikamaru, "You two... You don't know how much of a bother it was to come and find you! The ninja you found has dissappeared!" The two Jonins looked at one another in astonishment, each thinking the same thing, Hinata had killed him. How could he have dissappeared?

"When did it happen?" Hinata asked sharply, surprising the other two, who had always known her as shy and nice.

"Iruka had just stepped out to find a scroll and when he came back into the room the body was gone, just the clothes and some ashes were left." Shikamaru sighed scratching his head.

"Ash? Was the body burned?" asked Sakura, bitting her bottom lip.

"No, if the body was burned the clothes wouldn't be left behind and the bed would have caught fire too!" Hinata pointed out, and the two hastily made thier goodbyes to Shikamaru and rushed off to see the sight themselves.

--

"The ashes fell into a sort of pattern," Iruka explained to them as they sat by the bedside looking down at the ninja's clothes and the ashes, which did form a peculiar symbol on the front of the pillow case where the ninja's head had been, "it doesn't resemble any of the nations symbols, and it doesn't match the symbol of any known gangs and terrorists."

"It looks like a coffin..." Sakura murmured, fingers hovering inches above the ashes. She didn't see the puzzled look Iruka gave her, or the sad look Hinata had.

"Anyways, I thought we had better notify you, in case you knew anything about it, otherwise we'll keep studying!" Iruka saw the two girls out of the room and they both walked to their bedroom in silence.

"You've seen so much death, Sakura." it was an assumption, but the way that Sakura flinched assured Hinata that she had hit the mark, or close to it.

"Ninja usually do see alot of death." Sakura countered, becoming snappy in her attempt to defend herself.

"This is true,"Hinata agreed, "But I think that maybe you aren't telling me something, something Naruto and Sasuke don't know either. You jumped to 'coffin' right away, ninja don't bury the dead very often."

"Shit." Sakura swore, kicking the end of her bed and immediatly regretting it as her toe started to throb, "It's not something I talk about." she was surly as she sat down at the end of her bed, refusing to look at Hinata or anthing else.

"Maybe you'll feel better if you tell me, or maybe I can help?" Hinata pressed, sitting next to the Pink-haired Jonin and placing an arm around her.

"You can't help, what is done is done, and was has past is undoable..." Sakura said, softer than before, "And if I told you, you would just look at me differently. You wouldn't want to share this room with me..." she still would not look at Hinata, and the Hyuuga girl took her former classmate's chin between thumb and fore finger and turned Sakura's head to look at her.

"Sakura, I would never think any less of you." she stated firmly, looking Sakura in the eyes with her own pale ones, "If you don't want to tell me, fine. But at least know that I will never, ever abandon you." She released Sakura's chin and the two stared into eachother's eyes for a while.

"Thank you..." Sakura murmured, before leaning in and planing a small kiss on Hinata's lips. This startled the poor Hyuuga so bad that she jumped back as if touched by an electric spark. Sakura placed her hands over her mouth, looking pained, "I'm so sorry!" she apologised through her hands, "I didn't mean... I wasn't thinking... I just..." Hinata was struck dumb by what had happened and she gently touched her lips, not saying a word. Sakura, mistaking this as a bad sign, fled from the room, unable to be stopped by Hinata.

--

A fist slammed into a nearby tree, shattering the trunk and felling the rest of it. "So stupid!" Sakura hissed in anger, her fists were clenched and eyes squeezed shut in frustration and anger. She absently rubbed the scrapes on her knuckles with the thumb of one hand, head tilted back to look at the sky, "She didn't want that, you shouldn't have done it!" with another fit of self hate, the pink-haired Jonin hurled her fist at another tree, only to have the wrist caught in mid swing.

"Stop," came a gentel voice, "you'll hurt yourself." It was so simply said and yet it made tears spring to Sakura's eyes and she shut them tighter still, "Why did you run away, Sakura?"

"Stop being..." Sakura sniffed, "Stop being so nice to me. Why are you being so nice to me?" She would not cry, damnnit, she promised... ever since...

"What's wrong? Why are you crying?" a small boy, darkhaired except for a pink streak that stood out vividly in his spikey hair, knelt next to her, prying the kunai from her hands and placing his own hands in hers, "Why are you bleeding? Are you sad? Why are you sad? Do I make you sad?" at this the boy started to cry, to wail the way small children do when they're upset, "Why do I make you sad? Why aren't you answering me? Mommy, why aren't you answering me?!"

"Sakura, why aren't you answering me?" Hinata asked, worry etched across her face clearly, she could feel Sakura's arm trembling where she still held it.

"Haruto..." was all Sakura could manage for a while as she crumpled to the ground, arm slipping from Hinata's grasp. The purple-haired Jonin hastened to put her arms around Sakura as she wept bitterly into her shoulder. "I had a son..." she gasped finally, jerking her head up to face Hinata, who listened with worry, "Haruto... and then he died... It was because I wasn't good enough... and I had to bury him... and I..." She didn't finish, but started to unwrap the arm bandages that covered her lower arms- something she hadn't worn before, but had been wearing since Hinata had first seen her return. She brandished her arms at Hinata, who backed away enough to keep from being hit and still see what Sakura was trying to show her. Scars.

"Sakura..." Hinata breathed as she realized what the scars were from and she hugged the sobbing Jonin to her again, "It wasn't because you weren't good enough, it was because you were upset and you didn't know what to do!" she insisted, it was shocking to see that Sakura- the girl who had been so sweet and so sought after by Naruto- would do herself harm, would be this miserable.

"It is my fault! All my fault, I didn't take care of him and he had to take care of me! And now... now I'm here and he's in the ground near a tree in some forrest!" Hinata grabbed Sakura by the shoulders, startling her into sudden silent tears. Sakura looked up at the Hyuuga girl, feeling as though she could trust her now to keep this information from others, especially Naruto and Sasuke.

"Sakura, it's not your fault. You were alone, you were scared, and you didn't know what to do. But you loved him, I can see that, and he loved you, so now all you can do is move on!" Hinata shook Sakura's shoulders gently to get her point across, "Move on, make new memories with the people around you, love again..."

Sakura looked down at the ground, biting her lip. What Hinata said made sense, it certainly made her feel better than she had in awhile. "Thank you, Hinata... I don't diserve a friend like you... Can we maybe... go back to our room... it's late..." The purple-haired Jonin nodded her head and helped Sakura to her feet. "And," Sakura added quickly, "You won't tell anyone, will you?" Hinata shook her head, a small, sad smile proving she wouldn't as she re-wrapped Sakura's arms and they walked back to the village.

Parting Notes: So, how was that for an angsty chapter? Yes, Sakura is a cutter. A reformed cutter, anyways. And yes Haruto IS a Japanese name, I looked it up. Well technically I found it while I was searching for a name online and here is the definition:

HARUTO 陽斗, 遥斗, 陽翔, 晴斗 m Japanese
From Japanese 陽 (haru) "sun, sunlight", 遥 (haru) "distant" or 晴 (haru) "clear up" combined with 斗 (to), which refers to the constellation Ursa Major, or 翔 (to) "soar, fly".

And I found this name on so if you don't believe me go check it out for yourself! I'm not some closeted NaruSaku fan. Although the idea had crossed my mind once. And I'm DEFINETLY not a SasuSaku fan! That idea NEVER crossed my mind at all. Although it knda needed a kint of that so I could get the plot moving. I just had all these fresh ideas pop into my head that would work that were WAY better than my old idea for this story. So yeah. Feedback would be nice. Laterz.