Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto or the songs used.

Chapter 3

iSave Your Life

-xxx-

"It's not here, Hinata! It's not here!"

For the rest of the biochemistry period, Sakura and Hinata had spent their entire time…searching for Sakura's poor, lost iPod. So far, progress wasn't moving. And Sakura, like a mother who had just lost a child, didn't want to believe it.

"It can't just disappear!" The rosette cried desparately, overturning rocks and leaves. "It's not like it could grow legs and run away!" That was when she sat up straight. "Unless…"

"U-Unless what, Sakura-san?" Hinata asked curiously.

"Unless I've been a bad mommy and my iPod's running away!" Sakura shouted, clearly showing that already in the first day that she had spent with her hot-headed, blond-haired professor, psychological trauma was getting to her head.

And Hinata, being ever so observant, noticed. "Eh, S-Sakura-san… I'm pretty s-sure that iPod's d-don't have legs…and you wouldn't b-be a b-b-bad mommy… You're a v-very responsible person."

Sakura smiled at her new friend. Hinata always knew what to say, she always saw the better part of people and never blamed them for anything. But that was what also worried Sakura. Hinata cared so much for others that she didn't even think about herself. It was sad and frightening, but that's what you get when you have a good trait…right?

"It has to be here somewhere!"

So far, Sakura had overturned trashcans, tables, and even other people that were late to their morning classes in a pure, full-hearted effort to find her precious baby of an iPod. The poor pink-haired girl kneeled on both knees and raised both of her hands dramatically in the air. "Baby, come back! You can blame it all on me!"

Hinata sweatdropped. 'Oh, boy…Tsunade-sensei's already gotten to her…'

Sakura was thinking the same thing. Sighing in reluctant acceptance, the pretty rosette stood up, jogging over to the table that held her knapsack and giant, bone-crushing textbooks. Oh, why did the college have to send out such large books? Did they want their students to break their limbs?

'Well, it's good exercise…' thought the pink-haired medical student, readjusting the gigantic textbooks she carried in her arms to find a more comfortable position. She turned to her pearly-eyed friend and smiled awkwardly, a sweatdrop visible on her face. "Eh, sorry, Hinata-chan… I'm so sorry for wasting your time. And I know that you wanted to become a pharmacist. I shouldn't have interrupted you in the middle of biochem class. Heh-heh. But thank you for helping me try and find my iPod. Even if I can't find it right now." Nervous laughter.

The black (almost blue) haired girl simply smiled amiably and then shyly replied, "D-Don't worry, about it, S-Sakura-san. I-I really enjoyed helping you try to find your iPod." She giggled. "I-It's so funny w-watching you." Hinata bowed politely at the pink-haired student before straightening up and grabbing her messenger bag off of a nearby table. "Good luck, S-Sakura-san. I hope you f-find it somewhere…." And with that, the pearly-eyed girl dashed off to wherever she was heading.

"Probably going to find someone with biochem notes…" Sakura muttered before adjusting her knapsack on her shoulder and pulling out her phone to check the time.

10:20, read the time. Sakura sighed. There was only ten minutes left of the biochem class…and Sakura was sure as hell in not wanting to go back to the devil professor's room.

The rosette laughed at her behavior in front of Hinata and shook her head. "Wow… she must have thought that I was so weird," she murmured before resuming her speech to herself. "I should be heading over campus to psychology now."

It was only logical. Psychology was all the way across campus. And Sakura was too lazy to find her damn car for such a short drive over. It would be wasting gas and polluting the air, and it wasn't exactly too much work to walk across campus. Besides, it would be great exercise for her. Especially with the monster books eating away at her arm muscles. Yum.

Sighing and readjusting her textbooks—what? You can't blame her. Those books are heavy—Sakura began her trek across campus grounds to her psych class, running her psych notes through her head. 'So let's see… we're supposed to be learning about classical conditioning. Classical conditioning was thought by Pavlov…' She ran all her memorized notes through her mind, irresponsibly not watching the road.

And up the road ahead were plotting, conniving, hateful bitches…waiting to strike.

And Sakura didn't know a thing about it.

-xxx-

Sasuke had gotten out of his math class early. He was already done with his worksheet, and, seeing how Kakashi-sensei was still drooling over his new edition of Icha Icha Paradise (trust him, Sasuke knew what kind of smut that his teacher was reading…not that he read it, of course…), Sasuke decided to leave before his fangirls could eat him alive.

He would've asked Naruto and Shikamaru to join him over at the lunch area, but Shikamaru was too busy sleeping on his lazy ass and Naruto (the dobe) was still staring blankly at the problems.

Sasuke would have helped the poor blond boy with his math, but then, it would have taken him more than the whole period to have explained the use of derivatives and intergrals to him. And Sasuke wanted to get the hell out of the class that was crawling with scary, scary fangirls.

So he left, his backpack slung over his right shoulder and psych text book in hand. He was too lazy to fetch his car to drive over to where his psychology class was. It was all the way across campus, but the Uchiha didn't seem to mind. He liked walking. It cleared his mind and let him actually think while he walked.

'Hopefully the lesson in psych isn't going to be boring like math is…' Smirk. Psychology. Sasuke had always thought that psychology was a fun topic to do. Which was why he chose to major in both math (because it was painfully easy) and in psychology (because it was extremely fun).

Well, it'd be fun for him, that was.

Sasuke thought of all the things he could do to make himself seem repulsive to the fangirls. 'Then I'd be fangirl-free the rest of my life.' And oh, what he could do with a fangirl-free life. He could do everything and not live up to the expectation of the fangirls and be the dreamiest guy on planet Earth. He could probably take cooking class and actually make himself some food besides chomping on tomatoes all day long as a source of nutrition. Not that tomatoes weren't good. It was just…he wanted a bit of variety.

And the Uchiha would finally be able to have a girl in his life without the butting in of jealous, raging fangirls that would most likely try and murder whoever in the fucking world he was going out with.

Smirk. 'If they would try to murder the person I go out with, I wonder how they'll react if I actually get married someday…' The thought wasn't exactly pleasant, but it was something to think about while he walked through the lush mini-hills of Konoha University's campus.

"Speaking of which…" Sasuke muttered under his breath, "I wonder…" He let his sentence trail off, letting it be finished with an action of taking out a certain pink-haired girl's iPod.

Wrapping the ridiculously long pink ear-buds around his neck, Sasuke looked back at the black, classic iPod, running his thumb along the iPod's touch pad to resume where he left off of the Romeo and Juliet play that he and Sakura had both done in the seventh grade.

The raven-haired man scowled, remembering what had happened after the play was over and everyone was supposed to enjoy themselves at a Shakespearean banquet party. It was supposed to be based off of Romeo and Juliet's Act One, Scene Five where the two had first met in the middle of the masquerade ball that Juliet's father had set up.

It was a pleasant memory to start with…but with fangirls in the equation it became ugly. Very ugly.

(Flashback)

It was after the play, after Sasuke had played Romeo's death and received another kiss from Juliet before she had 'killed' herself. The whole play was pretty fun to play out. Not that Sasuke would admit it. Ever. It was after the play that Sasuke had set out to find Sakura in the midst of the crowd.

The twelve-year-old raven-haired boy sighed to himself as his feet still went on their own tangent, leading him to what he was trying to find. Correction: WHO he was trying to find. 'This is so cliché…' he thought to himself.

Not only that, but the same thing had happened in Romeo and Juliet. Sort of. What had really happened was that Romeo had spotted Juliet on the dance floor and had immediately fallen for her, head over heels in love. Juliet had seen him also while she was dancing with her fiancé that her father had chosen for her, and, being a naïve little girl, fell in love, too.

In the middle of the dance floor, Romeo and Juliet were dancing. And then kissing. Then finding out who the other was.

Sasuke had actually thought it was really pathetic. You don't exactly kiss someone you barely know just because they're good looking. 'Which is something that everyone wants to do these days…' the raven-haired boy thought as he went through the crowd, searching for a trace of pink hair.

That was the first difference. The first difference was that Sasuke was still looking for the pink-haired girl he had played his part with.

The second difference was that he was not madly in love with Sakura. He cared about her, that was true, since the day that he had first met her in the cherry blossom forests near his house, where he found her crying her eyes out. But nothing more than that seemed to spark. Until that kiss during the balcony scene onstage.

That kiss sparked something in Sasuke. Something that had been hidden within him since he had actually begun to notice the girl. Were they…feelings? The young boy nearly choked as he thought of that. No fucking way was he feeling any damn thing for Sakura. There was no way.

'But you had liked it,' smirked an evil voice inside of his head. 'You liked it and you wanted another one…'

Sasuke shook his head, trying to get rid of the evil thoughts that were plaguing his twelve-year-old mind. "Where the hell is Sakura?"

He turned around. And, as if out of the play that he had just performed, saw her dancing in the middle of dance floor, waltzing with Naruto, the blond haired best friend of both Sakura and Sasuke. And it seemed (to Sasuke's dismay) that they were actually enjoying themselves.

The raven-haired boy watched them, forgotten punch cup in hand, as he saw the rosette laugh heartily when Naruto had spoken to her.

'What the fuck are they talking about?'

Sakura caught the Uchiha staring after her. And smiled.

Sasuke's twelve-year-old eye twitched. He averted his gaze, looking somewhere—anywhere where there wasn't Sakura—muttering, "Tch. Annoying." And it was true. Her smile was annoying. Her laugh that she gave to Naruto was annoying him. Even her caring attitude towards him was beginning to annoy him.

The rant continuously danced through his head, a certain pink-haired girl in mind. Sasuke was so consumed in this thoughts that he didn't even notice the certain pink-haired girl that he had in his head had shown up in front of him.

"Sasuke-kun?"

He looked up, prepared to glare at a fangirl that was about to ask him to dance…only to have his voice die in his throat when he saw pink hair. Sasuke gulped silently. "What is it, Sakura?"

The young twelve-year-old rosette fidgeted, twirling a lock of her pink tresses around her index finger. While Sasuke was waiting for a reply, he took the time to admire her costume that she had worn for her part as Juliet.

It was a quaint sort of thing. The corset was there, widening her hips and subtracting inches away from her waist. It was worn over a forest green dress that complimented Sakura's pale skin and brought out her emerald orbs. The ruffles on the end of her dress's hand brushed lightly again the back of her hand, white against pale skin. Slowly, Sasuke's gaze made it from Sakura's costume to her face and hair.

And the two were just as—dare the stoic Uchiha say it—beautiful. Sakura's hair had been expertly braided and placed ornately on her head, a rose projecting from the large bun-like ensemble of hair. Her rosy cheeks clashed violently against her pale skin, her small nose just the right size… and her deep, shining, emerald eyes that stared back at the Uchiha himself.

Before he could stop himself, the raven-haired boy blurted out, "Would you like to dance with me?"

Sakura startled for a moment before smiling shyly and graciously accepting his extended hand that led her to the middle of the dance floor. For the rest of the night, they waltzed; Sakura laughed; and Sasuke had hints of a smile playing on his lips.

(End Flashback)

Sasuke's scowl deepened as he remembered further what else had happened that night. The fangirls were irate with the poor rosette, ripping off her precious hair ensemble, poking her wide forehead, and verbally abusing her.

All the while Sakura cried out for mercy and forgiveness.

Sasuke gritted his teeth, ignoring the guilt of not helping her when he had found her being picked on by a familiar red-headed girl with glasses and her followers. He had seen them pick on her, yet he did nothing about it.

Even though he did stand up for her when they were little five-year-olds, it was a little different when they were twelve. I mean, come on. Cut him some slack! Sasuke had a reputation to hold up. And if he had helped her, the fangirls would have more of a reason to hurt her.

"Not that I care…" he muttered, watching the end of the Romeo and Juliet play. His onyx orbs watched carefully as he gaze upon Sakura as Juliet, plunging the knife into her heart and falling of her lover's body, dead. "But it's not like I want her dead either."

Damn it! It was so confusing. Sasuke didn't know how to make of his feelings towards Sakura. Besides, he was still furious at her for nearly ruining his future with the whole graduation night thing, when the three of them (Naruto, Sasuke, and Sakura) had gone out past midnight for some fun, drunkly T. houses and egging the windows.

The whole incident had gone on his permanent record and followed him all the way through colleges, even while he studied abroad. And he didn't even fucking do anything! The last thing he remembered of that night was passing out on his ninth drink and waking up the next day in a small cell. His parents had pardoned him from getting a sentence, but the thing followed him everywhere.

That was the whole reason why he had decided to come back after studying abroad for four years for his bachelor's degree. No other universities would take him because of the incident. And he had wanted to major in both psychology and math. So Konoha University, with their large number of colleges, decided to retake him in and give him another chance.

He scoffed. 'Whatever… that's just a bunch of bull.'

Finding out that walking and thinking wasn't working out for him, Sasuke turned to look at his surroundings, taking in fresh air.

The raven-haired man admired his surroundings, watching the autumn leaves fall, red, gold, and orange raining from the towering trees. He wrapped his scarf around his neck a little tighter when he felt a biting breeze come by.

Autumn was so colorful in Konoha. Which wasn't exactly a surprise to the onyx-eyed man. It wasn't named the Leaf Village for nothing. There were so many colors: red, orange, gold, brown, pink—

Sasuke whipped his head around. 'Pink?'

Sure enough, there was pink. But this pink wasn't the color of a leaf. It was the color of the silky tresses of a certain rosette that he had on his mind.

Quickly, Sasuke dislodged the pink headphones from his ears and placed the iPod and the ear-buds into his leather jacket pocket.

'What the hell is she doing? She's supposed to be in class…'

Just as Sasuke was about to shout over to her (she was crossing the streets), he saw a girl bump into her, spilling the gargantuan textbooks and notebooks out in the middle of the street.

Sasuke was near enough to hear a sarcastic, "Oops. I'm sorry," from the brunette before she had run away.

'Wait a second…' the raven-haired man thought suspiciously, 'that girl seems familiar.'

That's when it hit him. The brunette was from his Math 150 class…and she was a fangirl. A fangirl, for Chrissake!

Sasuke began to dash across the mini-hills of the university, trying to reach Sakura as quickly as possible.

Sakura was still picking up her textbooks and papers in the street.

Ominously, a large truck came speeding down the lane. Heading straight toward the unknowing pink-haired student that was kneeling in the middle of the street, picking up her notebooks painfully, painfully slow.

Sasuke picked up his pace. 'C'mon…c'mon.' His legs screamed bloody murder as he began to continuously push himself to run faster. The truck seemed to be speeding up, almost a good distance away to run over someone. Which, at the moment, was not a good thing.

The Uchiha reached the curb of the pedestrian walk, close enough to Sakura to get her out of the oncoming car that didn't know when to stop. 'Why the hell won't the fucking car stop?' Sasuke thought desperately before a shout ripped from his throat:

"Sakura!"

He lunged for the rosette, ignoring the startled look she had on her face before tumbling her over to the other side to safety, getting her out of the truck's path. Sasuke looked up from where he and Sakura lay, looking at the driver's seat. In the seat was a now irate redhead with suspiciously familiar glasses. The truck drove away quickly.

Sasuke stirred from the pile of leaves that the two had landed in after tumbling over cement and surprisingly hard grass to look over at the remains of Sakura's notes. They were now scattered, dirtied over and ripped to shreds. Fortunately, the pink-haired girl's knapsack and the textbooks were safe, lying on the concrete next to the stop sign that the truck should have headed.

But, now knowing who the driver was, Sasuke wasn't surprised. He sighed in exasperation before pinching at his forehead. Why were fangirls so homicidal these days?

The girl by his side stirred, pushing herself up by her hands. Her pink hair drooped in front of her face before she pushed her hair back, exposing the face that Sasuke had known since the age of five. Same green eyes, same pink hair, same pale skin. The only thing different about Sakura was that she now had defined curves…and scratches on her face due to the rough tumbling.

Not only that, but the poor rosette was trembling. She looked helplessly at the raven-haired boy beside her who stared right back at her with an emotionless expression. Sakura gulped down some air before asking, "Wha—What just…happened?"

Sasuke gazed at her a little while before replying monotonously, "Someone was driving and they didn't see you." It was a lie, of course. They did see her. And they wanted to hurt her. Badly.

"It didn't seem like it…" Sakura murmured before sitting up correctly in the pile of leaves. She turned to look at Sasuke. "It was Karin. Wasn't it?"

Sasuke didn't answer.

But Sakura didn't need one. She already knew. She knew how much Karin had absolutely despised her since they were both five. She knew how much Karin's hate had built up during the years of growing up. And she was sure as fuck that Karin was the one who had tried to run her over.

"I'm sorry…"

Sakura blinked. She had forgotten all about Sasuke. And Sasuke was the one who saved her, for crying out loud. Sakura looked at him softly. "Don't be." She smiled at him. "You saved my life."

Sasuke gave her a guy-like snort before turning away. "You don't need to thank me. I was just doing it because it would make a mess of school grounds if they'd found you."

Sakura felt an angry vein pop on her forehead. Just as she was about to make a snappy comeback at him, the pink-haired medical student spied something pink. Earbuds. Her voice died in her throat. "What do you have in your pocket, Sasuke-kun?"

Sasuke froze. 'Shit…'

"What are you talking about, Sakura?" Sasuke inquired, his back still facing her.

"Do my eyes deceive me?" Sakura spoke dramatically. "Are those pink head phones I see?"

Before Sasuke could stop her, Sakura had already grabbed hold of the iPod.

The pink-haired girl laughed musically. "That's funny," she said, running her index finger across the touch pad, "This iPod looks just like mine. Including the headphones…" Her sentence trailed off.

Sasuke didn't like how her voice trailed off. He swung around to look at her. And had wished he hadn't.

"This…" gaped the rosette, "this is my iPod…"

And it was. Right in the middle, in large dark letters, were the words:

iSakura's iPod

Sakura looked up and met her gaze with the man she had known her whole life. "Sasuke-kun…"

Sasuke raised an eyebrow.

"…why the fuck do you have my iPod?"

Guess the thank-you was going to come later. "I was holding it for you," Sasuke said smoothly. It was the half-truth. He really was holding it for her. But he was also snooping around in her music and her videos… if she knew that, he'd be really screwed.

"Right," Sakura said, her tone dripping with sarcasm, "and you're holding it for me because you wanted to look through my videos?"

Shit. Sasuke, while trying to save Sakura from the oncoming car that was driven by a homicidal teenager, had forgotten all about closing the video section. So, of course, Sakura could see that he had watched the whole Romeo and Juliet play that they had done in seventh grade. That Sakura had actually kept.

Sakura, knowing that Sasuke had dug into her iPod without permission, blushed furiously before screaming, "Why the hell were you using my iPod? All of these things are really personal!" And it was true. The songs came from memories. Sakura downloaded only the songs that had memories for her, songs that had meaning. She kept videos and pictures of the past in her iPod, which was why the iPod was like a baby to her. If she lost it, it would be like losing all of her memories. Precious memories that involved Naruto, herself…and Sasuke. Her heart twisted painfully.

But, apparently the bastard didn't know that. Which was why he had taken it in the first place. Right? Sasuke didn't even know why he took it. So if he didn't know, how could he tell Sakura why? So Sasuke used his defense mechanism: changing the subject.

"You haven't even thanked me for saving your life," Sasuke told her as-a-matter-of-factly.

Opening her mouth to give him a nice retort and a blow to his ego, Sakura was just about to say a witty remark—

"I'm heading over to my next class. First class is already over."

—before the bell rang and hundreds, thousands of other students all over the campus began walking, driving, biking to their next class. Wherever that was. Just before she could call Sasuke back over to thank him and then verbally kick his sorry ass, the raven-haired boy disappeared into the crowd.

Sakura stomped her foot. "Dammit!" she cursed as she picked up her knapsack and giant textbooks and brushed off the leaves that clung to her clothes and hair. Still holding her beloved iPod in her hand (thank God!), Sakura smiled happily before putting on the earbuds, selecting a song, and walking away toward her psych class. Then she mentally slapped herself before muttering to herself, "I forgot to thank Sasuke-kun for saving me…" She smiled. "Oh, well. If I see him again, then I'll make sure I do it."

And so, off she went on her way to psychology, singing along to the current song that was playing on her iSakura.

I fought it for a long time now

While drowning in a river of denial

I washed up, fixed up,

Picked up all my broken things

'Cause you left me, police scene, chalk line

Tequila shots in the dark scene of the crime

Suburban living with a feeling that I'm givin' up

Everything for you (for you)

-xxx-

Author's Note: WH00T WH00T! I'm updating these things pretty fast, eh? I have a feeling that I made Sasuke a little OOC…is he? O.O I don't know. Anyways, I've written another fic (SasuSaku—I know, I know I should be focusing on this one) that's going to be based on Titanic. It's called Herculean. Check it out if you like SasuSaku! But I warn you, in there, there is a character death (and we all know who dies in the end).

Anyway, update on the next chapter: probably not for a week or something… I don't know. Anyway, anyone notice something about the song I chose to end with? How'd you like this chapter? Remember, I don't update till I get some reviews! And once again, thank you so much for those who have reviewed. I greatly appreciate it. :)

Review, review, review.