Authors Notes 1) I don't own Naruto or its characters.

2) Please review this story, as it is the first one I have written, feedback would greatly help me improve.

3) Constructive criticism is perfectly fine, compliments are also nice.

4) Thank you to my friend Alex for his help.

Chapter 7

Lee stood in the street, facing Sakura's home, gifts in hand. He had followed Tenten's advice. Wait for a few days. Use it to think about what happened, and give her some time to cool off. And then, go talk to her. Bring presents. Taking a deep, steadying breath, he took a step towards the house, and stopped.

One more deep breath, and his footsteps resumed. By the time he reached the door, he had stopped shaking. Shifting the packages in his hands he rang the bell. The door opened to reveal Sakura's mother.

"Greetings, Haruno-sama," a quick bow. "Is Sakura-chan in? That is, I wish to talk to her. I mean, I would, may I please speak to your daughter ma'am?"

The elder Haruno female looked Lee over before smiling. "Ino is trying to convince her to take up gardening. Just head around to the back."

"Arigato, Haruno-sama"

Another small smile, this one accompanied by a shrug. "Good luck, Lee."

Making his way to the back of the house, he could hear Ino criticizing. "No, no, no. You'll never get anything to grow if you plant it like that, honestly, Sakura, is it really all that difficult?"

"Ino, hobbies are supposed to be relaxing. This is taking way too much effort. I won't always have the time to do this."

Lee could see both of them now. They were crouched over a patch of dirt, presumably trying to plant flowers. Sakura looked pretty frustrated at the moment.

Oh well, he wasn't going to run off now. Biting his lip, he called out with a small amount of trepidition; "Wouldn't it just be easier to use these, Sakura-chan?"

The two females looked up at the unexpected voice. Lee stood holding up a bouquet of flowers, an unsure smile on his face. Sakura stared at him surprised. At least she wasn't looking angry, that was a start. She leaned over and whispered something to Ino. The two of them launched into a brief discussion, not a word of which made its way to Lee's ears. His arm slowly fell back to his side, the grin wearing off of his face.

Ino stood and approached him. The look she gave him sent chills down his spine. As she reached him, he prepared himself for whatever she had to say. Ino did not say a word, simply walking past him, and disappearing around the side of the house. Lee glanced over his shoulder, almost expecting an attack. When none came, he let out a sigh, only then realizing that he had been holding his breath. He looked back to Sakura. She was walking towards several chairs set up on the lawn, and motioned for Lee to follow.

They sat facing each other. Sakura was the first to speak. "So why are you here, Lee?"

"Sakura-chan." He handed her the flowers, which she placed in her lap. "I wanted to apologize for what I did."

"Oh?"

"I thought about what I did - or rather, what I said - and I realized I was wrong."

"You realized that you don't need to protect me, then?"

"No, I do need to be able to protect you."

Sakura glared at him, and stood up, the flowers in her lap falling to the ground. She made no move to catch them. "Sakura-chan, wait," He grabbed her arm, trying to keep her from leaving. "Just let me finish, please." Sakura looked down at him for a moment before sitting down. Lee released her arm and took a moment to choose his words carefully before continuing. "I love you, Sakura-chan, and I need to be able to protect you, and anyone else that I care about. But you need to be able to as well. It was wrong of me to say that you shouldn't be training.

Sakura smiled, "So you don't have a problem with me training with Naruto and Hinata, then?"

Lee handed her the other package that he had been carrying, an excited look on his face. "Open that one."

Sakura took the present from him. It was small, and wrapped in plain brown paper. Whatever it was, it certainly was heavy. She opened it carefully, resisting the urge to just tear the paper off. Whatever this was, Lee was pretty excited about it, and his enthusiasm was contagious. The paper once removed, revealed a box. Opening it, she removed the contents, a set of ankle weights. Judging from the look on her face she wasn't sure if she should be happy with the present or not.

Lee, accurately reading the look on her face, offered an explanation. "I thought that since we were fighting because I didn't want you to train, that these would make a good present to apologize with. I took the weights out of the first set that Gai-sensei gave me for these." Sakura sat staring at them; she did not say a word. "I'm sorry if it's a bad idea, Sakura-chan."

She shook her head, bringing her thoughts back to the here and now. "No Lee-kun. It's very nice. It may not be a normal gift, but it has a lot of meaning behind it. I love it. Thank you."

He flashed a thumbs-up sign for a second before speaking, his grin rivaling one of Naruto's. "I was sure I had a good idea. Does this mean that you can forgive me?"

"Hai, Lee-kun."

"Yosh! Sakura-chan, let me take you out to dinner tonight. I promise to make sure we have a better time than we did on our last date!"

Sakura's face fell. "I can't, Lee-kun. I just became a last minute replacement for a mission. I leave tomorrow."

"Oh. What kind of mission is it, Sakura-chan?"

"I can't discuss it, Lee-kun. The papers were classified."

"Is it dangerous?"

"Lee-kun, I can't…"

Lee nodded. "I understand, Sakura-chan. I won't stay any longer." He rose, as did his girlfriend. Pulling her close, he pressed his lips against hers before releasing her. "Just stay safe, Sakura-chan." At that, he turned and began to walk away.

"Lee-kun!"

He turned and waited. It was clear she desired to say something, but was unsure of whether or not to do so. He remained silent, not wanting to influence her into making a choice she did not want to.

"Just… just don't get worried if I don't come back right away. Okay?"

"Hai."

One day passed, then two, and then three. After a week, Lee was starting to become anxious about Sakura, but reminded himself of what she had said. After the second week, he was worried. Forget what she had said, he knew something was wrong. By the twentieth day, he was barely even training. He mostly sat in his apartment, praying she would return.

His prayers were interrupted by a pounding at the door. As he realized that someone was knocking, it slowly registered in his brain that the sound had been going on for some time now. "Just open the door already, Thick-brows." Oh good. Naruto. He didn't have the energy to deal with him today.

He opened the door to find the blond with his hand swinging down to knock. Fortunately Naruto managed to check his swing. "Took you long enough. Now, hurry up, I don't wanna be late."

"Late for what, Naruto?"

"For what? For Tsunade's big presentation at the stadium. She announced it yesterday. No one has to attend, but the entire village is invited. It's supposed to be really special. So come on, I don't feel like attending alone."

"I'm sorry, Naruto, I don't really feel like going out. Why don't you go with Hinata?"

"Your girlfriend isn't the only one who gets missions, Thick-brows. Now let's go." Grabbing onto Lee's arm he dragged him along towards the stadium.

They arrived to find that it was packed. It seemed that almost everyone had turned out to see the event. Lee, upon scanning the crowd, commented to Naruto it would be surprising if they found anywhere to sit. Naruto turned to him with a grin. "Hey, I am the number one ninja at surprising people, remember?" With that he proceeded to lead Lee to the front row of seats, stopping in front of two people, themselves.

"Pretty good plan ne? I've had 'em here since last night."

Lee arched an eyebrow. It was a pretty good plan. "Kage bunshin?"

"Yep." Naruto snapped his fingers, and in a two puffs of smoke, the latecomers claimed some of the best seats in the house. Lee promptly went back to worrying, until the Hokage, accompanied by two people wearing the robes of sand jounin, strode to a podium set up at the center of the arena floor.

Tsunade adjusted the microphone and stepped back, clearing her throat. Moving back to the microphone, she began to speak.

"Ladies and gentlemen, thank you all for attending. As some of you may already know, the Hidden Village of Sand appointed a new Kazekage just over a month ago. This assembly is to celebrate the ascension of the new leader of our allies." Polite clapping rang through the crowd, and the Hokage waited for it to die down before continuing.

"To show their continued commitment to our alliance, several jounin and I were invited to view their jounin exam this year." Her proclamation generated a gasp through the crowds. Chuunin exams were always held between all the villages, but jounin exams were secret. These tests showcased those hoping to become one of the elites of their village. It was not something that outsiders were meant to see.

Again, Tsunade held up her hands. "This was a one-time offer, designed to promote trust and show that we are still committed to one another. It shall not be a regular event. Now then, of the two hundred shinobi who take the exam, we were allowed to enter ten. And," she snapped her finger, and a table popped into view, along with three blue uniforms, "it is time to meet our new jounin." The cheer went on for close to five minutes before it finally died away.

Tsunade motioned to the sand-nin standing beside her. "These two gentlemen with me were examiners, and are here to officially present our new jounin with their robes. And so without any further delay, let us begin. Our first ninja came in third out of a graduating class of twenty with an astounding performance. Hyuuga Hinata!"

Lee winced at the noise. Sure, he was cheering, as was everyone else, but Naruto was managing to be louder than anyone. Hinata entered the arena through one of the fighters' gates, and made her way to the center. She accepted her uniform and looked out at the crowd. She wasn't used to having this much attention on her. She wanted to run and hide, but at the same time she wanted it to go on forever. The entire village was cheering. They were cheering for her. Raising a fist in acknowledgement, she closed her eyes for a moment and let the cheering wash over her before walking quickly back off the field.

"Second, finishing twelfth overall, with a performance most examiners agree was severely hindered by a lack of interest, Nara Shikamaru!" The crowd again went crazy, although this time the ninja just picked up his uniform and headed back to the gate, stifling a yawn along the way back.

"And finally, we have a ninja who was a last-minute addition when illness forced out one of our original choices." Lee's breath caught in his throat. "She may have finished eighteenth, but that's quite impressive when you realize she entered the last event against advice with a broken arm." Lee looked over to Naruto, who was yelling. "I knew she could do it! All I had to do to get her in was win a bet against O-baa-chan!"

Lee stood up. His hands clutched the railing and his mouth hung open in shock. He was too stunned to even register his actions. Somewhere in the back of his mind, he wondered how he was moving when he was too surprised to tell his body what to do. His lips formed the name along with Tsunade, although no sound escaped from him.

"Haruno Sakura!"

This chapter is really late due to a combination of a horrendous flu (don't live in Canada), and the World Junior Hockey championships. Go Canada Go!

Thank you to Nonengel and Xoni Newcomer you two are responsible for over half of my reviews. You guys are pretty much the reason I keep writing this story, and I thank the both of you greatly. If anyone else would like to post a review, that would be really appreciated.

As always, until next time: Delais Starlight