Chapter 43

The following weeks passed by slowly for her, but she was alright with that. After her first week of bedrest she had been permitted to walk around the hospital, supervised though. She often times needed a crutch for her walk around the hospital, and surprisingly that was usually her husband who would give her an arm to lean on for her little walks to the gardens. If it wasn't for the fact that her husband was usually glued to her side, she knew she'd be free to try to walked around without worrying about his wrath.

Sasuke was very… temperamental, right now.

And if he wasn't with her he had Naruto with her, Kakashi, or Sai, to make certain she didn't go too far or over exert herself. Tsunade was even siding with Sasuke right now; which was not helping her or her developing insanity from being forced to bedrest! However, Shiakamaru was teachind her to play Go and shogi; he felt they would pass her time here, and Shikadai would play with Sarada while they were here. It didn't help her pass the time, mostly because she did not have the patience for those games. Face it, she was a doer not a planner; after all, she was on a team with Naruto, Sai and Kakashi; all of whom were doers and not planners to the extreme. Well, Sasuke and Kakashi were planners to some extent, but not to the degree of Shikamaru.

Which brought her to today as she sat in the hospital gardens with Naruto, Boruto, Hinata, and Sarada. Naruto was filling her in on all the Hokage training Kakashi had been giving her since Kakashi had decided he was to be the Seventh Hokage. He was really happy about it too, she just smiled and listened, Hinata was smiling with pride, Boruto was getting his butt kicked by a very irritated Sarada as they ran around the garden.

"Is it time!?" Naruto shouted, she looked up towards where he was waving. Kakashi and Sasuke had appeared, Sarada darted right over to her father as she clambered up his cloak to her customary perch on his shoulder. Boruto whined, Sarada stuck her tongue out in retaliation as she got herself situationed on her Sasuke's shoulder and her grip on his head was firm.

"Hn," Sasuke nodded as he walked over to her. She took the offered hand as she pulled herself up to her feet to lean on Sasuke then. Sarada patted her head then. She smiled a bit as she leaned on him and weakly stumbled with him.

"Time for what?" she asked once they were in her hospital room.

"Surprise!" Sarada shouted with glee as remained perched on his shoulders.

"Get dressed," Sasuke ordered as he produced a bag from within his black cloak, she stared at the clothes from their home he had handed. She smiled then, her tears slipped from her eyes too as she carefully got dressed in her clothes; it was the first time in forever she felt semi-human. she burshed her longish hair and pulled it back in a low tail. Feeling good-ish again she looked at her husband who appeared with Kakashi then; Kakashi had Sarada then.

"We'll meet you there, take your time," Kakashi waved as he left. Sarada was waving with glee as she was carried off. Sakura smiled a bit, Sasuke knelt down and helped her with her sandals; bending in any fashion still hurt like a son of a bitch, so he carefully did up her shoes.

"Ready?" he asked when he stood then.

"Yeah, where are we going?" she asked, she tenderly stood, her entire abdomen, hips, and lower ribs still ached from her miscarriage but she was handling the pain. Walking though, that hurt like a bitch! Again, she was handling the pain of it as she took his offered arm and leaned heavily on him.

"Surprise," he murmured softly as they walked away from her hospital room.

"Is this the secret thing you guys have all be sneaking around for?" she asked.

"Aa," he answered. He pulled her close to him as they walked together. Walking out of the hospital they took a slow pace she could handle, she knew that if he had it his way he'd have just ran straight to wherever he wanted to go, but they walked. She knew he wasn't liking the looks the villagers were giving him, she just leaned on him and tried not to stumble to wherever she was going. Sasuke just held her up her as they walked.

"So… where are we going?" Sakura asked him after about two blocks then.

"You'll see," he assured her as they made it through the neighborhood. People were glaring at Sasuke and giving her worried looks. Sakura decided to ignore it all as she walked slowly, her head was held high and her body as straight as it could be in it's current state. She was not ashamed of being by Sasuke's side, she was very proud of it.

"You're here! Finally! We thought Sasuke stole you or something!" Ino announced when they reached a nice house.

"Huh?" she blinked to Sasuke who seemed to transfer her to Ino, and Ino walked her straight to the house. Sakura stumbled a bit after her friend when they entered.

"Welcome home!" everyone shouted when she stood in the entrance then, she blinked as she stepped back then in shock, stumbling into Sasuke, his arm slipped around her waist as he nodded to her.

"Hi mama!" Sarada shouted as she hopped off Kakashi's shoulders and leapt up into her arms.

"Hi Sarada," she gasped.

"This was all teme's doing, we just helped furnish the place, and here, my surprise to you two," Naruto smiled as he produced a small box.

"Teme said you lost all your wedding photos, and I know it's not a wedding photo…but, I hope you still like it!" Naruto grinned. Sakura's eyes were wet with unshed tears again as Sarada scrambled from her to Sasuke, Sasuke helped her out of her sandals then as she limped to the couch. Sitting she opened the box and her eyes widened.

"I know it's from the festival that year we went to the moon, and that's the intelligence photo of Sasuke, but I hope you like it," Naruto said as he sat beside her. Sakura found herself looking at a makeshift photo of her and Sasuke, and the few photos of Sarada Sasuke had always kept with him.

"Thank you, Naruto," she smiled as she hugged him.

Sasuke frowned; well, that explained where his family photos had gone… looking at Sakura though he couldn't be disappointed in where his photos had been put. She could keep the photos; he had the two photos he wanted most for when he left. Also, he had the cheat of his Sharingan…

"I'm glad you like it Sakura!" Naruto grinned with joy and triumph.

"Well, there's still the rest of the house, and the kids are in the back yard! Time to party!" Ino declared with joy and she herded everyone out of the house to leave her with Sasuke.

"The dobe didn't do bad this time," Sasuke admitted.

"It's not a replacement, I know, but I still like it," she admitted as he poked her brow, she set it to the side then as he helped her up again. He looked at the gift the dobe had given Sakura, then he looked to his wife as he led her to where all the kids were running around outside.

"It's fine, Sakura," he assured her as she worried her bottom lip. He hated it when she'd do that because then he wanted to kiss her to get her to stop. She did stop then and smiled a real smile for the first time since waking as she was lead to a chair to sit.

"Thank you," she murmured as he left her. Sarada screamed, he looked over his shoulder as she ran from Boruto who was holding a worm and chasing her. Sasuke sighed, the dobe's kid was definitely the dobe's kid, and Sarada leapt onto him as she scrambled up to his shoulders, he just endured the clambering toddler as Boruto pouted in defeat then grinned mischeiviously as he darted off for the other toddler girl here with the worm in hand.

"Annoying," Sarada declared and he stiffed.

"Never say that!" he snapped; annoying was never a good description from the lips of an Uchiha! Just look at what had happened at him! He had married the most annoying pinkette ever born! Annoying was not a good word, and he did not need his daughter declaring boys annoying at her age.

"No annoying then, stupid!" Sarada amended.

"Better," he sighed then. Thank Kami! She was too young for boys!

"Stupid Boruto," she stated and he smirked.

"What's this?" Kakashi chuckled.

"Boruto stupid!" Sarada informed her honorary grandfather as Kakashi lifted her from his shoulder and seemed to be smiling as Sarada squirmed in his grasp as she was smiling and laughing in delight.

"Careful Sarada, your father declared Sakura stupid once and you've seen how that worked out," Kakashi informed the laughing toddler who looked serious all of a sudden.

"Mama not stupid! She smarter than papa!" Sarada argued and then scowled at him.

"Hn," he shrugged and she giggled as she hopped off and then darted off with Shikadai and Inojin. He was still annoyed with her statement of Boruto being annoying, she was too young for boys. He was telling Sakura that while he was gone the dobe's kid was not coming allowed near his daughter! And when he returned he was going to scare the hell out of that boy so he'd stayed away from his daughter.

"Mama! Mama!" she shouted as she hopped up to her mama who was sitting on a chair.

"Yes baby?" she asked as she clambered up to her mama's lap. She was so happy, her mama was good, she was warm again, she was alive, and this was how mama was supposed to be.

"Papa said you were annoying!" she informed her mother promptly and her mama laughed then.

"Your papa calls me annoying a lot!" Mama informed her as she had her hair ruffled. Sarada beamed up to her mama and held her mama's arms around her. Sarada was really, really, really happy as she held onto her mama. Her papa was with Kakashi (she liked that name!) and they were watching her and mama, she smiled at them.

"Papa said I can't call Boruto annoying, but he is!" Sarada stated to her mother then, her mother was laughing, and Pig was laughing as well.

"I bet he wasn't happy to hear you say that," Pig laughed.

"No, he said I can't call Boruto annoying," Sarada grumbled.

"So what was your compromise with papa?" mama asked as she stroked her hair.

"Boruto's stupid!" she declared, even Boruto's mama laughed at the declaration, her mama was laughing with Pig too. Sarada grinned in triumph then.

"Sarada, go play," her mama laughed.

"Aa!" she declared and leapt off her mama's lap as she ran off to go play with the other kids. She turned and smiled at her mama then ran after Inojin who was running from Boruto.

"Oh boy," Sakura sighed as she leaned back in her seat, Hinata chuckled. So Sarada was a balance of Sakura and Sasuke, this could be interesting when the girl got older; she was definitely going to be a heart breaker, Hinata's only hope was her son wasn't the one with the busted heart from the young Uchiha.

"Well, I can't wait for the boys to get older with her in the mix, she's exactly like Sasuke," Ino laughed.

"Kami help us," Hinata sighed.

Sakura was laughing, a real laugh, for the first time since she had woken up and Hinata smiled then.

"Sasuke wasn't that bad!" Sakura final wheezed out. Hinata and Ino rolled their eyes and Hinata laughed as she watched Sarada whack Boruto over he head like her mother did Naruto.

"STUPID BORUTO!" Sarada screeched and they were laughing again.

Poor Boruto, he was going to have his hands full with the Uchiha girl; Hinata mused.