I realized that I just ended the last two chapters with those two sleeping..maybe I'm just tired? Well, here's the chapter you've all been waiting for.

Pairing for this chap: SasuSaku, Team7

Disc: ...Yeah.

Chapter 11. October Tenth

It was early morning when the two woke up, shying away from each other as soon as they noticed each other's presence that close to themself.

It was the last day they were going to be in that village and Sakura was looking forward to it. For one, it would mean she was going to be away from her family and secondly, Naruto's birthday was today. Of course, she already had a present picked out from a few weeks ago.

Sakura quickly arrived to the clinic. She had done most of her job the day before so there weren't many visitors who needed medical attention.

"Huh...I wonder if Sasuke remembers Naruto's birthday," she muttered to herself.

"Naruto's what?" A voice called behind her and she turned around to find Sasuke and Neji at the counter.

"Birthday," the rosette repeated.

Neji stood there for a moment. Although he didn't have a present ready, he knew that Hinata would know what to get him in the last minute so he could just ask her. However, it was Sasuke he felt sorry for. All these years gone and he finally comes back only to forget his best friend's birthday.

Sakura gracefully stepped next to Sasuke, her face frowning. "Don't tell me you forgot?" She watched the Uchiha stiffen.

"I'll..think of something."

"Thank you for allowing us to stay here." Neji bowed down to the villagers and the others waved goodbye to them.

"No, no, thank you for helping all of us in our time of need," one of them had said.

Sakura let out a deep breath as they were out of sight from that town. No one could ever feel the satisfaction she was feeling to leave. The kunoichi had not even bothered to glance at the faces of those people. She merely kept her head down most of the time–away from her family, mostly.

Of course, she had tried to stay silent most of the trip–trying to avoid any comments from her teammates and especially their pitied looks (how she hated them). However, when she was supposed to speak, she obviously joined into the conversation but made sure she lead them so far away, there wasn't the slightest chance of it being remotely similar to anything about that mission.

"Sakura."

She adult girl froze at the sound of her name being called out by Tenten.

"What did you get for Naruto anyway?"

Inwardly, she melted. Her stiff self wasn't as stiff as before. She smiled back at the weapons mistress and answered, "There were some scrolls at the Hokage's office that Tsunade said she didn't need and I figured he would be the one who wants to learn new techniques the most."

The two females looked back at their teammates.

Sakura glared at Sasuke. "Do you know how depressed Naruto is going to be, knowing his closest," she emphasized the previous word, "friend did not–

Sasuke stared back at her with his frozen face. He hated it when people emphasized their words just to try to make him feel guilty

–buy him a present?"

He didn't reply.

"Happy Birthday Naruto!" Sakura's cheery voice surprised the blond who was eating at his favourite ramen stand.

"Awe, thanks Sakura!" Naruto chuckled, showing his bright grin. Soon afterwards, Sakura dragged Sasuke away.

"What are you going to do?" She hissed in his ear. "The party is in a few hours."

Sasuke looked at her. "Okay, first, where is the party? His apartment is freaking tiny. And secondly, I said I'll come up with something." The Uchiha walked off, leaving Sakura to turn around to go pick up her baby from Shizune.

Sasuke stared at the dirt road, kicking a small pebble– he always wondered why kicking pebbles was always fun to him– and glanced by at the stores he was passing by. The display windows didn't really help, they were mostly cheap items or things he knew Naruto wouldn't like (mostly stuff he wouldn't like).

'Dammit,' he cursed.

It was late and Sasuke headed home from training, planning to get ready to go to Naruto's house when he realized his house was broken in by someone–or, as he noticed the number of shoes at his doorway, some people.

"Sakura! What the hell is going on here?" he yelled as soon as he saw the strawberry head.

"Ohh, right! I was supposed to tell you that I told Naruto that you told me to tell him that you lent his apartment for him for his birthday..." Sakura watched Sasuke's expression. "Oh no, don't worry. Tsunade told me to tell you so you don't have to remind me to not get drunk...cause I'm not...yeah."

"Where's Sumi?" Sasuke asked.

Sakura looked around. "I dunno..." she said carelessly.

"What?"

Sakura laughed and stood up tall, stopping herself from swaying back and forth. "Geeze, I'm a responsible mother, Sasuke. Sumi is with Ino and I am for sure, not drunk. I didn't think you'd take it so seriously." She smiled at him and grabbed his arm towards Naruto. "Go tell him Happy Birthday."

"Hn." He said as Sakura walked off to get her baby.

Sasuke made his way through the huge crowd (was everybody here?) and tapped Naruto on the shoulder. "Happy Birthday, dobe."

"Hey Sasuke-teme! Thanks...Oh and thank you for lending me your mansion. You don't know how hard it was last year to try to fit everybody in my apartment..." he chuckled.

"PRESENT TIME!" Someone in the back yelled and Naruto cheered, rushing over to the crowd and started opening gifts.

Sakura, noticing this, stepped over to the Uchiha with the infant in her arms. "Please tell me you got him a gift of some sort."

He frowned. "Well, I did lend him my house for the night, which by the way, you're helping me clean again."

This time, it was Sakura who had the upside down smile plastered on her face.

"–THANKS HINATA!" They could hear Naruto hurriedly opening his presents. Everybody watched as he planted a kiss on the shy girl and laughed when she turned a bright ruby.

Soon, Naruto had opened all the presents and was happy as ever. Sakura noticed everybody turning towards her. Actually, they weren't facing at her, really, they were looking at the man next to her, all wondering if Sasuke was going to give anything to the birthday boy–adult considering he turned eighteen that day.

Naruto, sensing the problem smiled. "Nah, Sasuke being here is enough, right teme?"

"Uh...Actually I got you a present...I just didn't have time to wrap it."

Sakura quickly turned to Sasuke who went over to his desk and grabbed something out of the drawer. She was excited, wondering what he could've gotten Naruto in such a short notice.

"Uh...teme, there's no picture in this frame," Naruto muttered when Sasuke handed him the picture frame.

"That's because you have the photo. It's a new frame for Team 7's photo that you still have."

Naruto's cerulean eyes widened and he placed a hand on Sasuke's shoulder.

"Teme..." Naruto had his head down, thinking of something to say. Suddenly, his head perked up and his eyes were watery. "This...is the best gift ever..." And then he pulled the Uchiha into an awkward hug, causing Sakura to tear up and their sensei to watch in awe.

"Alright, alright, just let go of me."

Naruto didn't. "NO, I mean it! I mean...you remembered my birthday, you lent me your mansion for the party and now this! You're the best!"

Sasuke eventually stopped trying to get out of Naruto's arms and stood there. Technically, he only did one out of the three things Naruto had said he did, but it's not like he's going to know.

"Bye, Naruto. Happy Birthday!" Sakura had yelled as she left early to put her baby to sleep– really glad that Tsunade and the other adults had not brought any alcohol to this party.

"I'll walk you home."

She turned around to find Sasuke putting his shoes on.

"Why not stay here and party with the others?"

Sasuke gave her a face. "Do you know how loud they've gotten since they had cake? My head hurts just thinking about it."

Sakura giggled and started walking home.

"Oh right, if Hinata's father happens to ask you where Hinata was tonight, tell him she was with me. He still doesn't know that those two are together yet."

Sasuke rose his eyebrow. "He doesn't know?"

Sakura shook her head. "Of course not. He's very strict with Hinata and who she dates and is against Naruto and her in every way. You should've seen the look on his face when he caught her at his last birthday party, it was not pretty."

Things were silent after that and the only thing that could be heard was the crickets chirping. Sasuke had his hands in his pocket and stopped when they arrived at her apartment.

The rosette stopped and looked into Sasuke's eyes. "I'm really happy today, Sasuke, seeing what you did and all."

"Aa."

Her cheeks flushed when Sasuke leaned in closer. Sakura's heartbeats were out of control, hands getting all sweaty as Sasuke leaned in closer and closer.

She closed her eyes and secretly trembled.

She opened them when she realized he just kissed his child's forehead before he turned around and left. Sakura quickly rushed into her apartment and put the baby down, crashing onto the couch and touching her cheeks.

Her heartbeats were still irregular and she wondered if her face was still blushing.

Yeah, I'm SO sorry for the late updates..but I'm pretty sure I did well on my exams :) and final assessments. Thank you so much for

1. The reviews, yes, I was like "Whoa, three months with no updates and they still read it!"

2. The encouragements from my loyal readers (LOVE you guys!)

3. Waiting.

I will try to update again..next week? I dunno, now that its summer, I'm trying to update more often and stop my habit of leaving it there.

Please review and thank you for reading.

To all my reviewers and readers, June 24th is my birthday and so I would like to dedicate a oneshot called "Cupcakes for the Strawberry Shortcake" to you all.