Disclaimer: when Free Willy sprouts wings...

Don't say i never give you all longish chapters... ^^

The kitchen was silent for several minutes as they prepared the food, with Mikoto occasionally giving wild instructions here and there. Sakura followed them carefully even as she held in the urge to snort several times. Her blackberry filling was beginning to resemble black bean soup more than anything.

As Itachi's mother attempted to flatten her dough, she added flour or splatters of water to correct its inadequacies. Sakura was fairly sure the stuff was going to taste like chalk more than pie dough. But nonetheless, the woman appeared to be having a great deal of fun if her resumed humming were any indication, and Sakura didn't have the heart to say anything.

After smoothing the dough with a rolling pin proved unproductive, Mikoto switched to pressing it down with her fingertips. "So, tell me a little about yourself."

Sakura paused in adding some weird spice or other to her blackberry soup. "I, uh, what would you like to know?"

"Anything," the other woman said with a shrug.

"Well, I'm in my senior year of school, ready to graduate in a few months."

"What are your post-graduation plans?"

Again Sakura stilled in her movements, before placing the lid back on her spice container. It was a question she'd been trying desperately not to think about. A year ago she would have easily answered college for pre-med, but now her grades were barely good enough to avoid flunking. Her heart just wasn't in it anymore. "I…" she licked her lips, "I suppose I will find an admin job. Perhaps secretarial or receptionist."

"You have no plans for college?" Mikoto asked in an light voice tone.

Sakura flinched. She nudged around the blackberry concoction with the spatula for a moment. "I did," she said quietly, "before the accident."

Itachi's mother was silent for a while as she picked up the rolling pin for another attempt. The dough cracked and split. Mikoto sighed and worked at trying to press the edges back together. "Lost a bit of your motivation?"

Sakura shrugged. "You could say that."

"Your father's condition…it is stable?"

"I suppose."

Mikoto nodded. "Itachi updates me occasionally but I'm afraid it's a sore subject for me as well. I'm a coward for it but I try to avoid the subject."

Sakura glanced up at her, not sure whether to be surprised or offended. "Really?"

Mikoto returned her glance with a steady one of her own. "You must understand, the day of your father's accident was a painful one for me as well. Any reminder of my husband's infidelity is a hard pill for me to swallow."

Sakura looked back down at the counter. "I see."

A flour-covered hand covered her hand on the counter. "Sakura, look at me, child."

After a minute of staring hard at the granite countertop, Sakura raised her eyes.

Mikoto looked back at her with a heavy expression. "As hard as this has been for me, I can't imagine what you are feeling. To go from an honor's student and happy daughter to your father's accident and coma, to trying to hold a job to help your family, to finding out your mother cheated on your father, to watching your academic dreams slip out of your fingers. You are too young to carry such burdens."

Sakura said nothing. Her gaze dropped back to the counter.

Itachi's mother squeezed her hand. "How are you taking the news of what your mother did?"

Sakura's back, legs, arm, and neck stiffened. Her fingers grew rigid. "I hate her," she hissed. "I abhor her for what she's done. She had no right. She had no right at all. It's her fault. It's all her fault that Daddy is…Daddy is…if he…" she took a shuddering breath against the onslaught of sudden emotion that Mikoto's words triggered. "I will never forgive her. Ever."

The other woman held her hand a little longer and slowly released it. She returned to flattening her pie dough. "You sound much like my son."

"Your son?"

"Sasuke. He said much the same thing when he learned about what Fugaku had done. He still doesn't speak with his father."

Just Sasuke? Sakura wondered. "What about Itachi?"

Mikoto tried to lift the edges of the pie crust to raise it from the counter but the dough stubbornly stuck to. "My eldest is not one for such words. He will speak to his father about business but that's it. He released his pain in other…ways."

"I don't understand."

The woman began scraping the dough from the counter and wadding the scraps back into a ball. "After the accident, Sasuke became a simmering pot of anger. But Itachi, Itachi went looking for distractions. And he found it. In women."

Sakura stared at Mikoto as her mind remembered the words Hinata had spoken to her before; 'That was only his way of dealing with…' Sakura had wondered what Naruto's wife had been about to say in his office but the woman never clarified. But now she knew. Sleeping with women had been Itachi's way of dealing with his father's betrayal.

She felt the heat drain from her skin and cheeks. In all her anger and resentment towards her mother, she never once stopped to think about how much Itachi had been affected by everything. She always just…from the moment she met him, all she did was argue with him, accuse him, and lash out at him. She rejected the one who understood her pain the most.

As she watched Mikoto throw another heap of flour on the counter and drop her dough on top of it, she felt shame take the place of all her anger. "And…Itachi, he has forgiven his father?"

"He doesn't talk about it. I don't know."

Sakura went back to nudging around her blackberry mush. "And you? Have you…" She didn't know if it was right to finish her sentence.

Mikoto smiled at her. Genuinely. "Forgiven him? Absolutely not. He received a five year prison sentence for his stupidity. A light punishment if you ask me. I think he should rot in there till he's old and wrinkled and bedridden. Then he should be eaten by rats and buried with snails. But I have made the decision to forgive him. I just haven't managed it yet."

"Oh," Sakura whispered.

She felt an arm wrap around her and pull her tight against the woman's chest. "Go easy on yourself, child. Wounds such as ours take time to heal. And as healing comes, so can forgiveness." The arm tightened then released her. "Until then, rant, rave, and cry. Get it out of your system. It does you no good to fester."

As Sakura thought over her words, Mikoto picked up her dough and frowned at it. "And you know what else? Does you no good to fuss over something far beyond your ability to redeem. Sakura, child, do you know what to do when you have been trying to make pie for the last six hours and not a single batch comes out decent?"

Sakura slowly shook her head.

Mikoto dusted off her hands and pulled out a cell phone from her apron pocket. "Utilize modern technology." She punched in a number and held the cell up to her ear. After a moment, she spoke; "Kimiko, I…" she paused, "yes, I know I kicked you out of the kitchen but…the first batch burned, the second…yes…and the third batch of dough won't even flatten properly. I need you to hurry in and bake two blackberry pies for me. Don't let the boys see you. Sasuke is supposed to think I baked them…yes, I know this happened last year…will you just…I'll let you off early tomorrow. Deal. Thank you."

Mikoto tucked away the phone and grinned. "Problem solved."

apologies to those who wanted sakura tormented with the pies ;P