The days after their initial meeting, it was obvious the girls were becoming closer and closer. Ino was bubbly, starting the conversations. Sakura would respond, though more reserved. Though, slowly, she was starting to open up more.

One day, Ino invited Sakura over to visit their family flower shop.

As they approached the flower shop, Sakura was shocked by the size. She has been to her fair share of flower shops, relatives were always buying cherry blossoms for her, but there hasn't been one this large. Then again, those shops were usually just flower carts. Ino's flower shop was an actual building, it's walls were painted a bright yellow color. The window frames were red, and a wide assortment of flowers were showcased in front of them. There was a dark orange awning covering them, just enough so that they weren't getting too much sun. On top of the awning there was a bright sign that said "Yamanaka Flowers" in clear writing.

Sakura let out a 'wow' and Ino was very impressed with the reaction.

"See," Ino said, "I told you this wasn't just any flower shop."

"I don't know how I've never been here before."

"Well now you are, so let's go in." Ino said, leading her inside "there's no point in just standing outside."

The inside was even more amazing. Flowers seemed to be everywhere. There were aisles that showed various flowers, all differing in shape and size. Sakura only found a few that were really recognizable to her. The smell was also amazing. Her senses were bombarded with the sweet scent of flowers.

"This is so pretty." Sakura said in awe.

Ino just laughed, "Thanks!"

"Well who is this?"

Ino's eyes immediately moved towards the voice. Sakura's gaze trailed behind. When she found the source, she was intimidated. The man was very tall. He was wearing a dark coat, and his hair was tied up in a high ponytail. It was so long it seemed to trail behind him.

"Dad!" Ino said excitedly "this is Sakura!"

"H-hello." Sakura said. She was trying to keep eye contact as much as possible. Ino's dad was just a bit scary to her. As he walked closer he seemed to just get bigger and bigger. When he got close towards the two girls, he kneeled down and wrapped one arm around his daughter.

"Dad, stop, your embarrassing me." Ino said, trying to be as serious as she could. Though you couldn't take her very seriously with her pouting.

"What's wrong, I can't show my little girl I love her in front of her new friend." her dad said.

He released his grasp on Ino, and reached his hand out towards Sakura.

"I'm Inoichi," he said, "so you're the Sakura I've heard about."

Sakura shook his hand.

"Y-yes I am."

"Ino has told me a lot about you." Inoichi chuckled.

The laugh worried Sakura a little bit. "Like what?"

"Only good things don't worry."

As he stood up straight, Ino tugged on the hem of his shirt. Getting his attention, she asked "Dad, is it alright if Sakura arranges some flowers with me? I'm just going to show her some of my favorite flowers first."

"Of course you two can, just don't make a mess," Inoichi said "or you'll be cleaning it up Ino."

"Fiiine dad."

After this conversation, the two girls spent the first part of their afternoon looking at various flowers. Ino obviously knew what she was talking about. She went in depth on some of her favorites. Sakura soaked in all of the information. It was easy to follow along since Ino's commentary was interesting.

"This flower is called Amaryllis," Ino said enunciating the name carefully "it represents the word dramatic. I'd like to think it's because that's what it looks like, I mean isn't it so pretty how it fades in from white to a pink color."

"Do you know the actual reason?"

"Uh.." Ino said, "No, not really, but I'll let you know!"

Besides this Sakura ended up learning so much more about flower meanings. Like white carnations mean remembrance. If you give someone a pink tulip, it means that you care. On the other hand if you give someone a yellow tulip it means you're hopelessly in love. Even though it confused Sakura how people could come up with these meanings, it was still very interesting to learn. She had to give her parents some flowers now since she now knows that there is so much behind them.

"Okay Sakura, let's go arrange some flowers." Ino said.

Ino led Sakura into an area away from the main store. They walked through a doorway which led through a medium-sized green room in the back. The flowers were arranged in aisles again, though it wasn't as organized as the main store.

"This is where we grow a majority of our stuff, well, it's whatever can be grown locally." Ino brought Sakura to table towards the back of the room. On the table, there was a vase and some other objects strewn about. There was scissors, packets of seeds and something else she couldn't recognize. It was this foamy material that Sakura couldn't place a name on.

"So, my student." Ino said, which made Sakura giggle. She brought up her pointer finger and let out a "sh."

"This is an important lesson Ms. Haruno it's important you pay attention." Sakura just laughed some more.

"Sakuraaa."

"Okay, okay" Sakura said, still holding in some laughs.

"Alright, so to begin with flower arranging, you always need to pick the bigger flowers first. If you place small flowers first, it's going to look like the big flowers are drowning them. Also you have to cut the stems before you place them in the vase because fresh cuts can take in more water."

Ino also held up the packets that were next to the scissors, "Also, beforehand your flowers should be in water and you should put this stuff in the water. It's like flower food."

"Flower food?"

"Yeah! Flowers need food too! If anything they need more care than people at times. Or so my dad says."

Then she held up the foamy material. "This is called flower foam, you use this when you're arranging the flowers. You stick the stem into the foam. It makes it so much easier to make the flowers stay where you want them to."

"Isn't that bad for the flowers though?"

"No actually, you can water this foam and the flower will still be able to take it in."

Ino was obviously impressed with herself. Sakura was actually very happy with how this day was going. She loved learning new things, and this has been one big learning experience with someone she could call a friend. Plus, she got to see Ino being so enthusiastic about something which felt very inspiring. She wished that she could find something she could be this passionate about.

"So do you want to start?" Ino asked expectantly.

"Yeah sure, I think I get the basics."

"Nice," Ino smiled "let's start picking out our flowers."

Ino picked flowers that ranged in blues, purples, and some greens. Sakura picked a lot of pink and reds, a few white flowers too. Since Ino had three colors she thought she needed three too. As they started to arrange everything it was obvious Ino did this often. Her arrangment was fleshing out nicely. The big purple flowers she picked were being accentuated by these medium dark-blue flowers. She then placed these tiny green flowers into some sections which just added even more life to it. Sakura tried to mimic what Ino was doing with her colors, but it showed that she wasn't as experienced. Sometimes she even struggled to get the stem into the foam.

Sakura was still impressed with her work. Her big flowers were pink, and she accentuated them with the smaller red and white flowers. The red and white flowers were so close in size though that it didn't add as much depth. It also wasn't smoothly shaped. Ino's seemed to make a perfect dome, while Sakura's had some flowers sticking out making an awkward kind of lump.

"Yours is so pretty Ino." Sakura said.

"Thanks," Ino responded "I actually got really lucky with this one, yesterday was an absolute disaster."

"I doubt it was as bad as mine."

"No! I actually really like yours!" Ino said, "it's really great for your first time. If we do this again you should just pick a different color besides white, since it makes it look like it's for Valentine's Day. Which would be good if it wasn't April."

This comment made Sakura burst with laughter. Which left Ino confused.

"Why are you laughing that wasn't even that funny." Ino said through a smile.

"Sorry, it's just that I'm really happy."

"Really Sakura?"

"Yeah, I haven't had this much fun in a long time."

Ino's smile just got larger.

"Well that makes me very happy then. I'm so glad we're friends, you're really cool Sakura."

Sakura was so happy she could cry, but she knew she couldn't do that in front of her. That would just be embarrassing. So instead she focused on how the sun made the sky look through the glass of the green room. The whole room seemed to turn into a beautiful red. It was a little sad though, because the setting sun meant she'd have to go soon.

"I'm really glad too," Sakura said " but I'm sad I have to leave soon."

"Well, we've got a lot of time to hang out some more anyway." Ino said. "I mean we are hanging out again, right?" she teased.

"Of course!"

"Good!" Ino said happily, "I'll walk you out, since I'm such a great host."

"I thought you were a teacher?"

"Why can't I be both?"

As they reached the entrance, Ino handed Sakura her arrangement and then gave her something extra. She stuck in a yellow rose into the center. The yellow actually looked nice with the red, Sakura thought it had a unique look. Maybe if she took out the white it would look even better.

"What's this?" Sakura asked.

"A pink daisy." Ino said, sarcasm lacing her voice

"Shut up." laughed the pink haired girl, "What does it mean?"

"It means friendship."

A/N: I have a big problem with writing too much, this was almost 5 pages and it was mostly filled with useless stuff. In the end I still don't know how I feel about this chapter. Also, sorry for no updates I was on vacation :]