Thanks for all the reviews/favorites/follows! I don't own Naruto.

Advice, Chance Encounters, and Decisions

The incident with Kiba in the halls had been almost a week ago. Since then, Kiba had been almost a constant in Sakura's daytime activities. He even started sitting next to her during lunch. Before then, Sakura almost never saw him in the halls, but now it was like she couldn't get away from him. She tried to avoid him, but it seemed as though Kiba was hell-bent on staying as close to Sakura as possible. He would walk her to class, hold her hand, put his arm around her, and sit closer to her than he should. He had even taking a liking to showing up at her house, uninvited she might add, and just finding excuses to hang around like he owned the place!

Kiba was delivering in his promise to make it difficult for Sakura to resist. She was pretty sure that he was wearing tighter shirts to display his muscular chest. She was also pretty sure that he was sitting closer to her so that she would be forced to breath his scent as well as for him to better smell her. Damn, did he smell good. It was a sexy, masculine scent that made her cheeks heat up. Sakura also thought that it should be a crime for Kiba to wear his leather jacket. He was just too damn sexy in it. Inner Sakura would always turn into a pile of hormones at the sight.

A part of Sakura, especially Inner Sakura, liked all the attention that he was giving her. She had never been pursued with such persistence before. Even though she found it really creepy that he somehow found out where she lived, she actually liked spending time with him. He seemed to really want to know about her and that was a good feeling to Sakura. They got along really well for two people with short fuses.

Kiba was being a gentleman about all of this as well. He hadn't made another move toward her like the one in the hallway since then. Sure, he might hold her hand or something but if Sakura expressed her discomfort with it, he backed off. He had also asked her out to several dates over the past week but Sakura continued to make excuses for her refusal.

She was starting to really believe that Kiba was serious about her. That day in hall, she was sure that he just wanted to fuck her and then never talk to her again, like all the other girls before her. She didn't know how a playboy generally went about convincing girls to sleep with him, but she was quite certain that he didn't put a lot of effort into it; at least not as much as Kiba was showing her.

As luck would have it, she was able to talk to Shino about Kiba's behavior toward her. They were two of the smartest people in school; they were actually tied for second in their class, behind Shikamaru. So, they had a couple of classes together.

Shino and Sakura's Advanced Calculus teacher was out sick today so there was a substitute. 'This is the perfect opportunity to talk to Shino about Kiba,' Sakura thought. Turning to face him, Sakura said, "Hey, Shino."

Shino was surprised when Sakura turned to talk to him. People rarely talked to him outside of the pack because they thought he was weird. Turning to face her as well, Shino raised an eyebrow over his ever-present sunglasses, "Hello, Sakura." He already knew what this conversation was about. Of course, he had noticed the drastic change in Kiba's behavior. Kiba had told him a few days ago that Sakura was the girl he had been dreaming about but that she continually rejected his advances.

"Um… I don't mean to be rude, but I was hoping I could talk to you about Kiba. He's been acting rather… strange lately."

"Yes, I've noticed that. He seems to fancy you quite a lot these days, doesn't he?" Shino wouldn't dare tell her that Kiba had been dreaming about her for months. She might call the mental hospital.

"Yeah, it seems that way. I was just wondering if you could tell me how he would um… how he would get the other girls to sleep with him."

"Ever since Kiba moved back to Konoha, girls have been practically throwing themselves at him so it was never too hard for Kiba to get one of them to sleep with him." Shino thought for a minute. "Sakura, I may be making assumptions here but you're worried that you might be hurt by Kiba's womanizing ways, aren't you?"

Sakura nodded. She didn't think she was being that obvious.

"Relax, Sakura. It's only natural to try to guard your heart like that and I don't think anyone will blame you for it. Kiba might not have the best track record with women, but I know for a fact that he never spent more than five minutes trying to get them to do what he wanted. He has never pursued someone with such determination before. He never even asked any of those women out on a date and from what Kiba tells me, he has asked you out multiple times. I can assure you that, to Kiba, you're not someone whom he will sleep with and then never talk to again. He really likes you, Sakura; really, really likes you and I know that if you gave him a chance, you both could be very happy together. You might say that it's too sudden but, as some would say, the heart wants what the heart wants and if there is one thing I know about Kiba these days, it's that his heart, not just his dick, wants you."

"Oh. Thanks, Shino."

"Anytime, Sakura."

Sakura bit her lip. That conversation didn't end in her favor at all. She had hoped that Shino would tell her that she was being treated like all those other girls. At least that would make it easier for her to resist Kiba's many advances. With this information, she didn't know what to do anymore. She didn't even understand her own feelings. A growing part of Sakura wanted to say yes to Kiba but the other part was holding her back. She shouldn't be feeling like this so soon after what happened. She was still trying to piece her life back together. It hadn't even been a week since she had reunited with her friends. She wasn't ready for a boyfriend yet, was she?

Naruto didn't like it. He didn't like it one bit. Kiba's behavior toward Sakura was wildly inappropriate. Sakura was not ready for a relationship and even if she was, which she's not, she could do way better than Inuzuka Kiba. Even saying the name made him angry. Naruto would not stand for this. The only reason he has tolerated it this long is because he was certain that Sakura would turn him down and Kiba would move on to the next girl. Naruto might not have been in Konoha for very long, but even he had heard of Kiba's recent dealings with the women of Konoha High. Sakura did not need someone like that. Naruto was certain that Kiba would end up hurting her and then where would they be? Right back where they started, that's where.

Naruto didn't know why Sakura didn't punch Kiba in the face. He was sure that Sakura didn't want him hanging around her all the time. What did Kiba have that Sakura wanted? 'She must be too nice to tell him 'no'. Yeah, that's got to be it.' Well, Sakura might not be willing to get Kiba to back off, but Naruto sure as hell wouldn't let anyone walk all over his best friend. Kiba might think he rules the school but things were about to change. 'The next time he makes a move on Sakura, I'll punch his lights out,' Naruto thought with a sadistic smile.

'Why the fuck can't I sleep?!' Here it was, at one o' clock in the morning, and Sakura couldn't sleep. It wasn't like the nights where she couldn't sleep because of the nightmares. In fact, she hadn't had a nightmare in weeks. No, it was just a regular sleepless night apparently.

'It's because you're too busy thinking about Mr. Sexy Pants.'

'Shut up.' Inner Sakura was right. Sakura couldn't get her conversation with Shino out of her head, no matter how hard she tried and damn, did she try hard. She tried everything from thinking about her classes to singing "99 Bottles of Beer on the Wall." Sighing, Sakura got up, put on some clothes and grabbed her journal. Then she opened her window and climbed down her house and walked into the forest.

Sakura would sometimes wander around in the forest after her nightmares. It sure beat sitting around waiting for another to happen. She would take her journal to write down her feelings. Writing her feelings would often help her sort through them and figure out what she really wanted. If Sakura ever need to sort through some feelings, it was now. She was so confused about what she was going to do about Kiba.

The forest behind Sakura's house was connected to the larger forest that surrounded Konoha but it was located in the middle of town. Sakura had a clearing that she loved to go to in, what she guessed was, the middle of the 'mini-forest,' as Sakura liked to call it. Approaching the clearing, Sakura began to feel uneasy. This was unusual because she had never felt apprehensive about the forest, even on her first trip into its depths. Shaking it off as nerves, Sakura continued onward.

She immediately noticed it when she arrived at her favorite clearing. How could she not? The thing was huge. She couldn't believe her eyes. She didn't even think that they had wolves in the forests of Konoha.

She was staring at a humongous, brown wolf that was lying down, seemingly asleep. One might think that she would be filled with fear at the sight of the obviously dangerous creature,, but she was filled with curiosity instead. She didn't feel as though this wolf might hurt her. Besides, Sakura couldn't imagine that humans were a very good snack anyway. They didn't have anywhere near as much meat as other animals, such as deer, had. She cautiously approached it. She might be curious, but she wasn't stupid. Sakura's heart stopped beating when she felt the snap of a twig under her feet. 'Of all the times to live a cliché!'

Nara Shikamaru was awoken by the sound of a twig snapping. Unfortunately for him, wolves were light sleepers. Shika knew that Kiba told him not to sleep while doing patrols, but they were just too troublesome. Besides, the other two wolves on duty could handle it. It's not like anything happened in Kiba's territory anyway. All nearby supernatural beings knew how strong Kiba and his pack were. Plus, he had an entire family of powerful vampires, the Hyugas, as allies. The only real threat to Kiba was the neighboring pack in Suna, but Kiba had a tentative alliance with their Alpha, Gaara. So Shika didn't think it was too big of a deal that he slept during his patrol.

Looking for the source of the disturbance that woke him up, Shika's eyes fell upon Sakura. 'Damn troublesome woman.' She looked scared shitless. Shika just sat there looking at her for a minute. After a while of neither of them moving, Shika closed his eyes again, intent on going back to sleep.

After the wolf closed its eyes again, she tentatively started to move toward the wolf again.

Ten minutes later, Sakura found herself propped up against the brown wolf, writing in her journal. The wolf had allowed her to pet it for a few minutes before Sakura sat down and leaned on the wolf's side. She couldn't believe the wolf was so apathetic towards her. The wolf hadn't even opened its eyes again. She guessed that it had fallen asleep again.

'This has got to be the laziest wolf on Earth. He didn't even move!' Sakura couldn't help but compare this wolf to Shikamaru.

After writing for about half an hour, Sakura looked over at what she had written. She hated it when Inner Sakura was right. Everything she had written over the past half hour had to do with Kiba. Reading over what she had written lead Sakura to an epiphany. 'I'm trying to get over all of my pain, am I not? Didn't I say that I was tired of my pain controlling my life? I didn't let it get in the way of reuniting with my friends so why am I letting it get in the way of my possible relationship with Kiba?'

'Finally! I've been trying to tell you that all week!'

'No, you haven't. You've been trying to tell me to let Kiba get in my pants or vice versa.'

'Same difference.'

Sakura had come to a decision. She would ask Kiba how he really felt about her. Depending on his answer, she would agree to go out on a date with him. She refused to let the past control her life for another second.

'Hallelujah! Mr. Sexy Pants, here I come!'

'Oh hush.'

A/N: Please Review.