Chapter Three- Reality

"Hey, Sasuke," I greeted happily as I walked up to my boyfriend in the park.

"Hey, good, you're here." Sasuke greeted and pulled me in for a kiss.

"So what did you want to talk to me about?" I asked as Sasuke took my hand and we started to walk down the path.

"I wanted to talk about…what's going to happen when we go to college." Sasuke answered hesitantly.

I looked up at Sasuke with a wary expression.

"What do we need to talk about?" I asked. "I mean…didn't we already figure it all out? We go to different colleges…we see each other over the breaks…simple and we still get to be together."

"I wasn't talking about that part…exactly."

"What does 'exactly' mean?"

Sasuke's fingers fidgeted with mine, a gesture I was familiar with as when he was struggling with his next words.

"Sasuke…what's this all about?" I asked.

We had both stopped by now and we were standing in front of each other, our hands still connected.

"I'm…worried about Karin being at my school."

I couldn't help my next reaction. I burst out laughing, and continued to laugh for a minute. When I finally stopped, I looked at Sasuke and smiled.

"Oh, Sasuke, there's nothing to worry about." I giggled. "You've heard me tell Karin off before, why don't you just put some of my sayings to action? I bet she'd buzz off like the annoying bee she is if she ever heard you tell her off."

"Sakura…I'm not worried about that…" Sasuke's dead serious sounding voice cut through me. "I'm worried about something I've felt for a while coming through while I'm away from you."

I stared at Sasuke, speechless. I had a bad feeling about his next words. I had no brace for what he said next.

"I've always had some different thoughts about Karin…and if you were to leave me, even if it was for those short spans of months…I feel I'd be unable to keep myself…from losing my feelings for you…and falling in love with Karin, instead."

At that second, I dropped to my knees, unable to hold myself up.

"What…?" I whispered, shocked.

"I'm sorry, Sakura." Sasuke whispered as he turned and began to walk away.

I watched him as he slowly, painfully, left me. My voice bubbled up in my throat, and I finally became able to scream.

"Sasuke, don't go!"

My eyes snapped open and my body lurched forward.

"Please, no!" I cried and began to pant. I realized that I wasn't in a park. I was in my room, in bed, and it was three in the morning. Everything I saw was just a dream.

I buried my face in my hands and slowly took deep breaths. I had to mentally tell myself over and over to the point I was chanting it at a whisper out loud that it was just a dream.

Chak….

I turned my head to the side to see my mother peeking into my room.

"Are you alright?" She asked. "I thought I heard you scream."

"I-I'm fine." I answered. "I just…had a bad dream."

My mother gave me a worried look. "Well, try to go back to sleep. Everything's fine now."

"Yeah, thanks, good night, mom."

"Good night."

My mother closed the door and left me to sit for a little while longer before I finally fell back into a dreamless sleep.

'"'"'"'

"Woo, told you guys this would be great!" Ino cheered as she dashed in front of us.

"Oh, yeah, this looks awesome!" Naruto cheered alongside Ino and dragged Hinata down the road after their friend.

"We'll catch up!" I called to their backs, and then added to myself, "When we want to."

"They sure have a lot of energy today." Sasuke stated as he watched our friends run down the road of the carnival we had come to that day.

"You'd think they believe it's already summer vacation." I giggled.

"Knowing Ino and the Dobe, they probably already forgot what school is." Sasuke sighed.

I laughed at his comment and we continued down the road the others had bolted down at our own rate.

"Naruto's probably just trying to have a good time with Hinata." I huffed. "Neji was in control of her for days and she just got away from him thanks to me and Ino asking for her to come here with us. We just didn't mention Naruto would be here. Well, it's too late to stop them now."

"Yeah, I can only imagine the fit Naruto would throw if someone tried to take Hinata from him today." Sasuke responded. "He'll probably be wary just letting her leave for the bathroom."

"Poor Hinata." I sighed. "At least it means she's got a faithful boyfriend."

"You say that like you don't have one."

"Oh, no, never! I know you're faithful!" I beamed and hugged Sasuke across the torso.

Sasuke smirked. "Just glad you know."

I laughed a little, but my happy face faded when my mind strayed to the dream I had last night.

"Yeah, faithful…." I murmured under my breath. Sasuke didn't seem to notice.

"Hey, what's taking you two so long?" Naruto's voice yelled from down the road. We looked up to see the three of them in line for a ride. When I looked up at the ride, I saw it was a roller coaster with high points, twists, and turns. I gulped. I had never been a big roller coaster fan. Sasuke caught my look and wrapped a secure arm around me.

"It'll be fine." Sasuke comforted. "It's just a ride. It's not like you'll get killed while you're on it."

I calmed down a bit as we reached my friends, though that's as long as the comfort lasted.

"We'll be like, 'woo' and the roller coaster will make us go 'whoosh,'" Naruto beamed loudly as we waited in line, "and then we'll go way up into the air only to come flying back down into a spiral that'll be so sick we'll all be like 'waaaah,' and then we'll reach the loops and be like—"

"Dobe, will you shut up?" Sasuke growled at his friend.

"Awe, is Sasuke-Teme afraid of the roller coaster?" Naruto teased.

"No." Sasuke answered and glared at Naruto when he scoffed mockingly. "I'm talking about what you're doing to Sakura and Hinata's comfort levels."

Naruto glanced down at Hinata, who he had a grip on around the shoulders, and finally seemed to notice her frightened look at what he was describing.

"Oh, sorry, Hinata," Naruto apologized, "I didn't realize. Everything will be fine, though! You'll want more after this ride. It is so intense yet awesome at the same time! We'll all go like—"

"Naruto," Sasuke intervened, "you're doing it again. Don't make me tape your big mouth shut."

Naruto grinned sheepishly at us and turned around so he was facing the roller coaster and not us. He started to talk with Hinata and left the rest of us to wait silently in line.

I watched as the line got shorter and shorter for us until we were almost to the front. When we reached the front, Sasuke and I ended up separated from Naruto, Hinata, and Ino, who were able to get on the ride right in front of us. I saw their cart go way up into the air and as it came roaring down, I could pick out Naruto and Ino's screams of delight. Their ride ended and I could see them all come off with a bit of a wobble in their steps. I gulped once more before they allowed the next set of people in.

Sasuke and I sat in the front of the cart. I frowned when a couple of high school girls ended up in the row behind us and decided to flirt with Sasuke until I abruptly turned my head, glared at them, and told them I was his girlfriend and for them to shut up. They turned to each other and started to babble on about things until a certain conversation struck me.

"So, what college did you say you were going to?" One of them asked.

"I'm going to that Cadvan place in the next town." The second answered.

"Me too!" The first squealed.

I felt a pit form in my stomach. They were going to Sasuke's college. Now I had to deal with the worry of not only him having Karin there, but the fact that he was definitely already in store for two new members of his soon-to-be college fan club. I felt sick before the ride even began.

"Don't worry about it." Sasuke whispered to me. "You're the only girl for me. It doesn't matter how many crazed college girls run after me."

I smiled weakly at his statement just as the cart jerked to life and began to inch its way forward as it gained speed and finally propelled us down the track.

Sasuke and I got off the roller coaster with dizzying steps. Naruto and the group came over to us and immediately started talking about the ride.

"See, Hinata, I was right!" Naruto laughed. "You did like it! You want to go to that other one now that everyone's here?"

"S-sure," Hinata smiled coyly.

"You guys have fun with that." I groaned. "I think that last one had one too many twists. I think I'm going to be sick."

"I'll take you to go sit down for a while." Sasuke offered and turned to the group. "You guys go on ahead."

"Okay, Teme, we'll meet up at the Ferris wheel, okay?" Naruto suggested, and led the girls off to their next ride.

Sasuke and I sat down under some shade at a table. I felt much better after my break.

"Naruto's going to run me into the ground at this rate." I sighed.

"Well, may as well enjoy it while it lasts." Sasuke shrugged. "After these two weeks we'll just have summer vacation and then everyone's going to be separated."

"Yeah…did you guys solve that Hinata and Naruto college problem?" I asked.

"We're working on it." Sasuke answered. "If they get to go to the same college, they'll be the only ones together. You said Ino was going to that beauty college, right?"

"Yeah," I answered.

"Then I'm going to mine, you have that one in another state…this is practically the groups last solid two months and a half together before everything ends up all chopped up." Sasuke explained.

I sighed and looked down at the table. "Yeah…reality is really starting to set in…."

Chapter three completed! And it's quite a long one for pretty much a nonsense chapter. I just couldn't think of anything big, but it's better than nothing at all. Hmmm…maybe I'll have something else happen at this carnival…or maybe I'll just move it to Monday when they're all back in school…. I don't know, I'll think of something. Anyway, hope you people enjoyed this chapter. I'll try to have the next chapter of…anything up! Whatever I feel in the mood to write…it'll be something! Okay…till my next installment of whatever I decide!