Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto.
Dedication: To everyone.
Rant: I'm sorry. I've been kinda lazy lately. Anyway, five reviews last chapter, I'm so happy! The highest amount yet yeah ;D
utada3love: hihi, I'm glad to hear it... and you'll probably get it next chapter ;)
Lista: Well, she knows he's a sign to something that's going to happen, but she's not sure what yet... He's like the foreshawdowing to the climax of my story, something that vill involve Ino and of course our dear Naruto.
SasuIno: thanks! and I didn't really update that soon, sorry :/
I picked one of the newspapers and lay the other ones in my bag, and quickly flipped to the page about Gaara's disappearance. There it was, the picture of him, glaring holes through my head. I started to read, desperate to find something about him that would make me understand why I felt like he had a large impact on my life. Maybe I'd even find something that made my obsession logical, reasonable and understandable.
I read through the first newspaper, and it bothered me.
Gaara is believed to have been kidnapped by the organisation Akatsuki, a group known for threatening several politicians and sometimes even kidnapping people close to them to blackmail them. The group also is believed to be a terrorist group, though this yet to be confirmed.
The Akatsuki was a terrible group that most feared. And I wondered how Gaara still could be alive after being gone for so long and being with them… because he couldn't have died. He wouldn't go and die on me… would he?
I slipped out my cell phone out of my pocket and stared down at the display. I had several unanswered text messages, and I immediately started typing.
Hey, where are you? Shikamaru said he lost you in the crowd and he in the end went after us, since he thought you'd do that too. The match starts any minute now, so get you ass over here.
Don't make me worry, Ino Yamanka.
Sakura
I laughed out loud, and checked the rest of my messages. I knew I had to stop reading and start walking, because otherwise they'd wonder what my problem was. With a sigh I stood up and brushed of the dirt and started to drag myself to the arena, worrying about Gaara on the whole way there and when I would be lonely enough to read all my newspapers. Sadly, it was a long walk and my newspapers were abnormally heavy. But I figured they were worth it.
After all, it wasn't like I was wrong often. He meant something.
"We have a problem," Sakura told me as I slid in to a seat beside her. She munched on a bag of chips, sharing with Chouji who sat on the other side of her.
"We do?" I asked.
"Yes, we do have a big, big problem," she said. But even though she was talking to me, her eyes were set on the pitch, following the ball.
I had no idea how to act. Was I supposed to watch the ball like her? No way, she looked stupid.
I sighed. "So, what's the big problem?"
"Look on the right side of you, three rows beneath us."
I casually glanced down, causing me to choke. "Isn't that-"
"It is."
"With him?"
"Yes."
"Social suicide," I muttered. "And hand me the chips."
I looked down again, and I knew it was true. Karin and Suigetsu were attending the soccer game, standing up and cheering madly. They also laughed in between, glancing at each other. Yet, the day before Karin had sworn they were enemies. But they were together. Laughing, even, just like friends. I hardly could believe it.
"What's up?" Naruto asked, as the judge held another yellow card high up in the air.
I leaned forward to whisper in his ear, "Look to your right, three rows beneath us." He choked. "Yes, it's them."
"Social suicide," he declared.
I looked at him, before handing him the chips. "We're more alike than I thought."
"Really?" he said, looking sceptical, but nonetheless, I ignored him.
"Really," I responded and smiled. "Give the chips back." And as an afterthought, I added, "I'm going to get fat if I keep this up…"
Sakura, I and Naruto shut up about the whole Karin-and-Suigetsu-the-enemies-are-here-and-they're-like-friends thing until the opposing team signalled they wanted a time-out. We sat there and whispered nonsense and stupid ideas that would never work. Yes, we wanted to expose them and their friendship, because it'd be quite fun to see their faces.
"I know, I'll just shout: Hey Karin and Suigetsu!" Naruto said and grinned evilly. "And then they'll see we know and the rest will see them and they'll be-"
"What are you blabbering about, Naruto?" Shikamaru muttered from the other side of Chouji.
I flinched. If he just could disappear and stop being so smart, life would be wonderful.
"Nothing," Naruto replied and smiled innocently.
Shikamaru scoffed, but didn't push the matter. I let out a breath I wasn't even aware I was holding, and before I started talking again, I caught his eye.
He was frowning, like he didn't understand – unusual, I had almost never seen that expression on his face before.
I quickly looked away, feeling even more uncomfortable than before.
Just as I was about to tell Naruto that maybe his idea wasn't the best, he stood up, and I knew it was already too late to stop him. Instead of jumping up too like Sakura had done, I leaned back in my seat and watched the show.
"HEY SUIGETSU AND KARIN! NEVER DID I THINK I'D SEE YOU TWO HERE!"
The two looked up and immediately made some distance between them. I laughed.
Everyone in our group turned their heads to look down at the group, and only a few seemed unaffected.
"I thought they hated each other, Neji," Tenten said and poked the boy sitting next to her.
"Apparently not," he replied.
"Weird," Kiba commented, and shrugged. "Didn't see that one coming. Just yesterday he was shit talking her on practise."
"Yeah, he even called her unyouthful things," Lee agreed.
Sakura smirked down at Karin, and then cupped her hands around her mouth before she started shouting. "HEY, WHY DON'T YOU TWO JOIN US? THERE'S TWO EMPTY SEATS OVER HERE!"
They looked at each other, a look of defeat on both of their faces. Karin stood up and Suigetsu followed suit and climbed the stairs up to us. She glared fiercely and sat down next to Tenten, and like the talkative girl she was, the brunette tried to involve Karin in a conversation. Suigetsu just slumped down in his seat and tried to disappear.
"So, are you like-"
"No," Karin and Suigetsu replied in unison, both glowering. "We're not."
"O-kay," Tenten said in a sing-song voice, smiling deviously. "Weird, I thought I saw you two holding hands down there… I must have been mistaken."
The redhead turned even redder than her hair. "Definitely," she then murmured.
And I just giggled in my seat.
The game soon started again, and almost everyone was standing up and cheering. Sadly the opposing team won, but we had a great time. Sasuke stood up and leaded the way out of the arena, and the rest of us followed him, a few a bit more reluctantly than others. Especially Naruto wanted to stay a bit longer so he maybe could manage to get an autograph of the game's star player, but he was just dragged along to the outside. We parted with Karin and Suigetsu outside the arena, both waving back half-heartedly to my, Naruto's and Sakura's cheery waves. Laughing, we went down the road without a care in the world.
"Where are we going to eat?" Tenten asked, throwing a glance at Hinata. "What do you think, Hinata? You've been so quiet."
Hinata started to fiddle with her fingers, and when she spoke the stutter was back. "I-I don't k-know."
"Then its McDonald's," Tenten decided.
No one bothered to argue with her, but many of us wanted too. Arguing with Tenten was though unnecessary – she always won, so why bother?
After a five minute walk we arrived to a crowded McDonald's. In there we parted, Tenten and Lee went to find a table big enough for all of us, Neji ordering for them. The line was long and several people tried to go ahead of us. They all received glares.
"Yeah, such a bright idea to go to McDonald's, it's not like it's always much people here, nooo," Sakura muttered bitterly, frowning at life.
"But it's cheap," Kiba told her and shrugged when she glared at him. "It is. Why waste money?"
"At least it's a lot healthier food at more expensive restaurants," she argued.
Kiba laughed. "True, but since when did you care if it's healthy or not?"
She sighed and turned to look at me – I had been an innocent bystander, watching them carefully if I would have to interfere – and smiled, ignoring Kiba. "What are you having?"
"Not sure yet," I replied and frowned. "I haven't been here in ages…"
"M-Me neither," Hinata said, while pulling a hand through her short black hair, "We a-always eat at the r-restaurant across the s-street."
I glanced at Neji, and before I had a chance to ask him, he answered the question like he could read my mind.
"I usually come here with Hinata, so I eat at the same place."
I nodded in response, and then turned my eyes to Sasuke. Cold eyes met my own, and I nervously glanced away – he seemed rather pissed off. Trying to avoid making him hate me even more than he already did – Naruto had told me – I just skipped talking to him. A few minutes later when I was still talking animatedly with Chouji, I glanced at him. He looked surprised, and in that moment I smiled at him.
A smile couldn't hurt, could it?
An hour later and we all shuffled onto the bus, pretty exhausted. Being the sneaky girl I am, I managed to snag a seat beside Sakura, avoiding Shikamaru successfully. He didn't seem bothered with it at all, since he hadn't even looked at me since I snapped at him at McDonald's while we were eating. Maybe he'd finally gotten the point I was desperately trying to make.
Shaking away thoughts about Shikamaru – thinking about him made my head hurt – I turned to look at Sakura.
She was staring at the bag at my feet. "Why have you bought like ten newspapers?"
"I'm interested in reading different perspectives of the news," I replied easily, the trained excuse slipping out my mouth with elegance.
"Liar," she said and grinned. "You don't even read the newspaper. There is a reason why you're failing Social Studies."
"Not true, Sakura. I'm just failing the whole knowing-about-recent-events aspect. I've got respectable grades in the rest."
"Still doesn't explain why you bought so many," she pointed out and rolled her eyes. "Come on, what's the big secret?"
I stared at her, and then shook my head. "Nothing, Dad wanted them. I've got no clue why, though."
Yes, I was a liar. But I couldn't tell her I was going crazy over someone I had never met. Honestly, she'd think I was stupid – I probably was.
"Weird," she said and shrugged. Soon she leaned her head to the window and fell asleep, looking rather cute.
Resting my head on her shoulder, I fell asleep, but not before I told Hinata she had to wake us up when we arrived.
Yawning, I climbed out of the bus. Beside me, Sakura was rubbing her eyes, and as the bus swished by us we both glanced at the other.
"You look like hell," I told her bluntly.
She laughed. "You don't look that good either, Yamanaka."
We parted with Sasuke, Shino and Rock Lee at the bus stop. The rest of us walked down the street, talking nonsense. Soon Shikamaru and Chouji left us, and just a few minutes later, Naruto and I parted from the crowd. We stumbled into the house, both shouting a hello to my Mum and Dad. While Naruto went to the living room to watch TV, I ran upstairs and hid my newspapers under my duvet, frantically glancing around me even though I knew no one was watching – my family was downstairs. I carefully sneaked down to the kitchen and grabbed a glass and filled it with water, gulping it down in an instance. After pouring water into my glass again, I went to my room and switched into my sleepwear, burying myself beneath the duvet. I started to read the first newspaper my hands managed to find.
Two hours later I was finished, quite disappointed and lonely, since the rest in the house was sleeping. In each newspaper stood the exact same thing, just worded differently, so I tore them all apart while yelling like crazy.
My parents were, to say the least, not pleased.
Monday morning again and the crowd was thick. Around the notice board people were screaming like hyenas and I just wanted to kill the girl closest to me who even had a louder voice than our headmaster. As Kiba pushed away the annoying sixth-graders, I, Naruto and Sakura went forward to see what the commotion was about. It was a about some stupid disco that no one above the age of twelve could attend.
Not that I wanted to.
Sighing loudly – just to make the little brats feel uncomfortable – and started to make my way through the crow. Sakura and Naruto were just behind me, laughing.
A few minutes later, we were at our classroom hanging out with the rest of our class. As I giggled at something Suigetsu just had said, I saw her.
Manami was back.
She looked terrible, like she hadn't slept in weeks, and she was holding her hands protectively on her belly – not that her pregnancy was noticeable yet – while glancing around. She seemed like she was trying to be invisible, but Aya didn't allow her to do as she wished.
"YOU'RE BACK!" she shouted and hugged her.
Manami tried to smile but only managed a stained grimace, and leaned at Aya to whisper something.
And I, s the eavesdropper I was, casually moved their way, listening carefully while somehow trying to ignore Naruto's loud voice as he talked to Sasuke.
"No… they're homeschooling me. I'm just here to pick up all my things," she whispered, her voice shaking slightly.
And in that moment, I was so glad I wasn't the one who was pregnant.
Thursday evening, a few weeks later, it was official. Manami had been exposed, but neither I, Sakura or Hinata was the idiot who did it. No one seemed to know the culprit, and this time I decided to not butt in. Wasn't my problem, and I already had enough troubles. In school we were supposed to paint a picture of our family, and telling the whole class about all family members. We had lots of upcoming tests too, so pretty much the whole class had complained to our teacher, but Shizune just shook her head and told us that even if we did think the assignment was stupid we had to do it, since she would be grading it.
My cell phone had also given up its life, and I was back to my old red Samsung from years back, a phone that only could handle taking messages and sending them, and if I was really lucky it didn't crash when I called someone.
On top of all that, another kid had disappeared. Her name was Fu, a green haired girl with a pair of lonely eyes. She'd lived quite close to my own little town, in a city called Takigakure. She was just as mesmerizing as Gaara, and her disappearance was discussed in all the newspapers, as she also was the kid of a mayor.
And finally, Gaara, the one I was the most worried about, was still reported to be alive.
Pictures of these two were everywhere, and now everyone knew about it. We discussed it frequently in class, and our Social Studies teacher was surprised I knew so much about it, since I almost never had a clue about what happened out in the world. But I just shrugged in response, still not daring to confess my obsession.
Naruto was also acting weird, like he was hiding something, so as the kind soul I was I decided to check up on him before going to bed.
I trudged over to his room, seeing it was dark inside. But instead of going back to my room again I peeked inside, and quietly sneaked in. He was sitting in front of his laptop, reading something I didn't see. I carefully walked closer, careful to not make a sound since he hadn't noticed me yet. Scaring him seemed like a good idea, so I grinned wickedly and reached out for his shoulders.
And then I saw what he was reading about.
