disclaimer: i have nothing...absolutely nothing. It's a hard-knock life...

by: somebrokenhearts

summary: Just like a bomb, he was suddenly back in her life. Fantastic.

BAM!

Dream

--

--

Sakura Haruno's life so far had been a path of questions and insecurities. But she knew one thing, if she was in one more session with Uchiha Sasuke, it would surely be her last.

..

…..

--Bang bang—

Sakura pounded on the door to her mentor's office. In her dark green eyes, one could see only the fear that had threatened to envelop her. The hallway was eerily silent, and not one of the usually bustling staff was present.

"Tsunade-sama!"

--Bang bang—

Sakura kept pounding and pounding on Tsunade's door, but her mentor didn't come.

"Tsunade, please open the door! PLEASE!!"

And suddenly Sakura was exhausted. All the energy in her body seemed to have left with one big exhalation. She felt her legs buckle under her body, and her mind seemed to get fuzzier. A cloud of mist seemed to envelop her and her vision blurred. Where had the rush of adrenaline gone?

"No. Must. Stay. Awake. Must. Sasuke…."

--Click—

The door opened.

Sakura's half-away mind registered this, and after a few seconds, the blood started to pump through her veins more fervently than ever.

She rushed through the office door, but tripped over her own feet and landed sprawled out in the office. Her usually neat hair was strewn about the tiled floor, and she winced as the impact sent shockwaves through her ribs.

On reflex, she quickly felt at her ribcage, and winced again. A broken rib. Just what she needed at that moment.

Finally, she remembered why she was now in a spread eagle on the floor of one of the most prominent doctors in the world.

"Tsunade-sama. PLEASE! I can't work with Uchiha Sasuke for the next few months. Please, just let me be assigned another patient. I know I'm only a novice and I shouldn't be undermining my superiors, but you don't understand. PLEASE TSUNADE-SAMA!! Please."

Sakura looked up from the floor in shame, fearing that Tsunade would kick her out of her clinic all together.

Big mistake.

Her eyes didn't meet the amber-gold eyes of her teacher. They met a bleeding red. The fear escalated to inhuman levels in Sakura's body.

"You," she managed to choke, still frozen on the floor.

Sasuke remained silent with his gaze fixed on hers.

Sakura's instincts kicked in and she jerked herself up into sitting position and scooted quickly towards the door. The sudden movement sent the blood rushing out of her head, and the dizziness and nausea returned.

Her back didn't meet the grainy wood of the office door. Instead, she felt two legs pressed against her back. In her lightheaded state, it took her a few moments to realize that the legs belonged to Sasuke.

He had moved so quick.

She slowly looked up and found Sasuke gazing down at her. Eyes still a swirling circle of black, red, black, red. Sakura recoiled and tried to look away, anything to get away from the gaze that bore straight into her heart, mind, body, and soul.

"Stop," she whispered.

"Stop."

"STOP!! Mmmfahsfiowerue."

He clamped his hand over her mouth. It was rough and calloused, just like before.

Tears spilled out of her eyes as soon as she realized her hopeless situation.

No. I don't want him to hurt me again. No.

The scar on her neck throbbed along with the fluttery beating of her ever constricted heart. Throb. Throb. Throb.

Her tears splashed onto the hand clamped over her mouth. He knelt down behind her and whispered in her ear,

"I'm back, Sakura……chan."

And only then did she thrust away his hand and screamed.

..

…..

3AM.

"ahhhhhhhHHHHHHH!!"

Sakura sat up straight in her bed. The nightmares she had been having every night since Sasuke became her patient had only magnified to epic proportions.

But every night she dreamt of Sasuke, and every night she was trapped in his gaze. She shuddered when his blood-red eyes appeared in her head again.

She didn't love him anymore. No, she was scared of him. So scared.

And the hands of time turned love into hate.

"I don't love you Sasuke." And weariness took over her body again.

..

…..

She recognized this playground. It was right outside of the Leaf Academy, her middle school. The swings were the same ancient wooden planks connected to rusty metal chains. The slide was the same garish yellow color, and it all sat on top of the broken concrete.

She saw her reflection in a puddle forming on the sidewalk. She realized that she was thirteen again. Her hair, cropped short, was matted wetly on her face.

She noticed a thin, alabaster boy with dark hair sitting on one of the beat-up old swings. He had always intrigued her. His past was shady: a homicidal brother, a whole family dead, and strange clan lineage with links to the underground world.

She walked over to him carefully, like approaching a frightened animal.

"H—Hi Sasuke-kun. What are you doing here?"

No answer then,

"Nothing."

This was hardly a sentence. She tried again.

"But you're sitting in the rain."

"Hn."

What?

"Fine. I guess…"

She had been so easy to give up.

As she sat down on the other swing, he got up and left.

..

…..

"Sakura. Sakura. SAKURA ARE YOU AWAKE?!"

"Huh? What? Yeah, I just spaced out for a moment—that's all. Why are you in my office Ino?"

"Because I have been trying to page you for at least 20 minutes to tell you that Sasuke Uchiha is here."

Fear flooded into Sakura's eyes. One week had passed by too soon.

"Sakura, are you okay? Did something happen to you?"

Shit.

Sakura tried to mask the emotions playing in her eyes.

"I'm fine Ino. I just haven't been getting a lot of sleep lately."

But Ino could see through her shallow lies easily. She was going to 'google' this Sasuke Uchiha person.

As Sakura left momentarily to grab a cup of coffee before her meeting, Ino took the chance to log onto Sakura's computer. She opened up the search engine and typed in 'Sasuke Uchiha'.

What she got were many fan sites with Sasuke-kun calendars, candid photographs, and the like. A wikipedia page explaining just how rich the millionaire was. Millionaire? How? As far as Ino knew, Sasuke worked as a club owner in New York. They surely did not make millions of dollars. So how had Sasuke gotten his money then?

After clicking past three pages of fan sites, Ino found what she was looking for. Hidden away in the archives of a little-known, independent newspaper, there was an article written five years ago by a man named Kakashi Hatake.

Teen Missing for Four Years

For four years the FBI has searched relentlessly for a boy, now age seventeen, by the name of Sasuke Uchiha. Uchiha was last seen leaving the Hidden Leaf Park in Upstate New York one evening in the spring of 2001. The witness, who shall remain anonymous, said that Uchiha said he was leaving because he was 'weak'. The witness was not able to do any more for they were knocked unconscious, presumably by Uchiha. When they awoke the next morning, Uchiha was gone and his home was deserted.

Sasuke Uchiha's family had had ties with large organized crime groups from all around the globe, and had amassed a large fortune from the inside trading of illegal goods. There was, however, never any evidence, for the Uchiha's had left their trail spotless. When Sasuke Uchiha reached the age of seven, his family was suddenly massacred in the middle of the night by one of there own: Sasuke's brother, Itachi. Itachi, who had a genius IQ and was the heir to the fortune, escaped immediately thereafter. There is no explanation for why Sasuke was the only one spared.

Over the past two years, there have been reports of seeing the Uchiha, but none have provided any hard evidence of his whereabouts. It is rumored that he is involved with the shady criminal Orochimaru who is the ring leader of a large criminal group in Manhattan and is referred to as the Mad Scientist by his followers, but none of this has been confirmed.

Although, there is one case that suggests Uchihas's involvement with Orochimaru. The aforementioned witness was discovered several days ago in the middle of Hidden Leaf Park with a myriad of bruises, welts, and cuts, and a severe knife wound on their neck. A passerby noticed the person's still figure while on a morning jog through the park. There was no evidence left, and the victim seemed to suffer from memory loss. Investigators could only find one plausible reason for this crime, either the Uchiha or Orochimaru had found out our witness had spoken to authorities and had delivered her consequence. But why did they come after this person when there were so many others who could have known? Was it a warning sign? Investigations are still trying to find the truth behind this now-seventeen-year-old's disappearance. Be warned city of New York, he is lethal.

--

Ino shuddered at the last line. Something about the witness's assault had triggered something in her mind, but she didn't know what.

Ino quickly hit the quit button on the computer just as Sakura walked back in to grab her equipment and papers.

"Hey Ino. Are you okay? You look a bit clammy."

"Yeah Sakura. Don't worry about me."

And as Sakura walked out of the office, Ino swore she saw a long, jagged scar running up Sakura's neck.

"Nah. Sakura's too cautious to be caught up in that kind of stuff. And that kind of stuff when you're seventeen, definitely not up Sakura's ally."

Outside the office, Sakura hesitantly made her way down the corridor to the patient room, tears threatening to spill out of her eyes.

"It's for my future. It's for Tsunade. I'm not scared."

..

…..

A/N: Forgive me for the really sketchy plot and the jumpiness. This chapter is a bit of background considering the ending to chapter one was slightly confusing. Jet lag is biting at me at the moment so I will end here. Reviews are the cheese to my macaroni…let it be known kids.