Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto.
Status: Incomplete.
Before:
The thing is, Sakura is good at being quiet. She's good at being quiet and pretending and sewing her mouth closed after someone looks at her a little too hard, squints at her a little too much.
The thing is, Sakura is good at being quiet, even though her words are loud, and her actions are even bolder. She's good at breathing in the rage and letting it settle, deep, deep inside of her, like silt on the bank of a muddied river. She's good at letting it churn and churn and churn until all she is feeling is that scratch of anger, and her eyes twitch and her throat works, and she wants to scream—
The chunnin exams are when it starts.
It's always the chunnin exams.
Sakura remembers stepping into the arena and listening. She listened to the hush of the crowd, and the interspersed whispering. She listened to the beat of her heart, and the way her blood rushed through her veins.
She listened to Hyuuga Neji who doesn't quite stifle his words when he scoffs, "Of course the Yamanaka will win. Haruno's nothing—only a civilian playing with knives."
Sakura listened, and the blood began to boil, and she felt the rage explode in her mind and for once, for once, for the first time since her father's death, the first time since she'd seen the smudge of red splayed across the ground, she wanted to kill someone.
Sakura remembers the tight grip on her kunai and the rage, and then looking at Ino. Ino who was supposed to be her best friend and why couldn't Sakura just have one thing just have this one terrible thing, why couldn't she take Sasuke when Ino had everything else—
She remembers the words she'd nearly spat, "This fight isn't for Sasuke-kun," she remembers the rage and brutality, "This is between us, Ino."
This is between a Kiri-born outsider, patch-skinned civilian and a Konoha-born, Konoha-native clan child.
And Ino had scoffed, and Sakura knew that she thought she would win but Ino never saw Sakura angry, no one had, and the rage she carried was deep and furious and she felt like burning everything to the ground and then—
The shot of the match sounded and Sakura pounced.
She barely remembers what she did, what she said; she could only feel the rage and the beat of war under her skin and the feeling of desperation clouding her mind until—
"GET OUT OF MY HEAD!" She screams and then she's vicious and desperate because Ino looks like she's seen something and Sakura can't have that, no, Sakura can't have that at all—
"The match ends in a tie!"
For the first time, Sakura wants to disregard every inch of civility and passivity that Konoha has ingrained in her. Every. Single. Inch. Of her body yearns to tear out the Clan Child's throat.
Why don't you? The voices whisper, Why don't you?
And then Sakura blinks, because people are looking at her strangely, and she can't have that. No, Sakura can't have that at all.
So, instead, she reigns in the trembling of her hands and the burn of the rage, and breathes, deep.
"Ino," Sakura opens her eyes, and pretends like she can't see the wariness in her friend's. "Let's put this behind us."
When Ino smiles, Sakura has to try and stop the twitch of the kunai still gripped tight in her hand.
After:
Naruto goes still when Tsunade calls them up to her office.
For a moment, a single, furious moment he wants to curse Haruno Sakura and the day she was born. For a single, debilitatingly wrathful second, he wants to wish that she wasn't so goddamn selfish all the time how could she do this to us god FUCKING DAMNIT—
And then, Shikamaru begins to speak, quickly, desperately, and Naruto goes white as a sheet.
Before:
Shikamaru didn't know much about Haruno Sakura, not at first.
She was loud, she was annoying, she was in love. Or she was supposed to be. He thinks that he should have seen it, back then, in the academy, when Ino had declared ever-lasting affection for the Uchiha and then the next day, Sakura came to class with blushing cheeks and a nervous voice.
She was always good at being quiet. Not with her words, but with her mind. She didn't speak about herself. Not once did he see someone pick her up from the academy. Not even on the first and last day of school did someone come to see her.
Ino brushed it away when he asked. "They're civilians, you know," and Shikamaru could see that spark of superiority, even when Ino tried to stifle it. "They don't understand."
"Sakura's different, though." Ino always said, as if this exonerated everything she'd just told him. "She's like us."
The curiosity began when he saw her wrists. When they were little, she used to wear long-sleeves, and long pants, with hair covering her forehead and her hands always stuck in her pockets. He never saw much of Sakura's skin until they turned seven and she came into class with blushing cheeks and a short-sleeved dress.
He'd never seen Sakura in a dress their whole lives. Moreover, he'd never seen her wear anything remotely revealing.
And then he saw her wrists.
Bony, thin, wrists, that looked like they could snap at any second.
And then, in the flash of light, something flickered, and her wrists were smudged-brown before they lightened again just as quickly.
Shikamaru didn't know much about Haruno Sakura, not at first, not until he saw her wrists.
And then something shifted.
And Shikamaru suddenly saw.
Super short, but I'm feeling it :) Hope you enjoy! Also, Naruto can be mad and rude too. In fact, he can be pretty obnoxious sometimes, and a little blind when he's not trying too hard. Sure he's a sunshine child but he's not Jesus.