A/N: BTW... I have to change their age! Sakura will be seventeen and Syaoran will be eighteen! Okay??? Hahahaha.... Sakura has to reach the age of eighteen before she gets married! To whom you may ask... You'll have to find out!

Childhood Memories

Chapter 1

Change

After that incident with Syaoran Li, they did not meet again for another four months, for he had disappeared to his own homeland. But the day she knew of his return, was the day he caught Sakura hiding from him again. And she swore she saw a pink glitter coming from his neck.

But Sakura sighed as she was caught once again by Syaoran Li. It wasn't a surprise though, he always caught her but for some reason he never told. It makes her realize that the bastard had a heart. But as the bell rang she took no more time to think but to run. Sakura entered the classroom before the teacher went in. She brought out her pen and started writing.

Sakura wasn't a very noisy person. She wasn't as cheerful as she was after her mother died. She did smile a lot and all but she let all her emotions locked up in the little box in her heart.

Slowly she let those emotions by her writing. Usually she'd write anonymous emotional columns, no one knew, not even her friends. What made Sakura like this was just the loss of her mother. It had been only a couple of months and she hadn't been over it yet. It was too hard for her, she felt disoriented and lost.

She buried herself in her notebook and kept on scribbling. She didn't stop; she was so absorbed in her writing that she didn't even notice Syaoran taking a glance at her.

Syaoran just arrived from Hong Kong yesterday and been gone for four months because of family issues. A big one so he felt a bit clueless when his object of 'affection' was out of life. Usually they'd spend so much time bickering and shouting at each other that they grew to have an audience but now she'd just stare at him blankly and looked at him as if she agreed with him.

He didn't know what made her act like this or why she was so quiet, it scared him, scared him so much that he cared.

After school, Sakura walked alone towards home since she kindly refused Tomoyo's company. She stopped at a bookstore and searched through the shelves of the kid's section for something. Losing hope she sat down on the kiddie tables and sighed in defeat.

Then across her she saw an ecstatic little girl. She had beautiful glowing amber eyes and a long light chocolate braided hair. She was browsing through a book that was very familiar.

"Hi, I'm Sakura. What's that book you're reading?" Sakura asked in a soft gentle and polite voice with a matching small smile. The girl looked up from the book and smiled.

"The Rose Princess." She replied smiling. Sakura's smile widened.

"So do you like it so far?" She asked trying not be so excited. The girl frowned.

"It's really pretty but...I can't read yet. I'm only three." She explained. Sakura smiled at her intelligence. She was young but a very smart kid.

"Do you want me to read it to you?" She offered. It was only two thirty and she didn't need to come back home till six. The little girl brightened her smile.

"Oh yes please." She said running to her carrying the book at her side. Sakura took a bean bag and sat on it with the girl in side the loop her arms made while holding the book.

"Once upon a time...."

Less than an hour later Sakura had finished the story and a male voice was calling out a name.

"Lin!" Syaoran called in a relieved tone running to her.

"Oniichan! Sakura told me this story and I wanna be a princess too and she's pretty and I want this book!!!!" She rambled on making Sakura laugh softly. Syaoran tried hard not to smile but a small grin wasn't prevented. It felt good to see her smile after a weird day of.... No reaction.

"A story huh?" He repeated to his sister.

"Mm-hmm and it was lovely." She said in a dreamy tone.

"And you told it to her?" He asked raising an eyebrow at her. After a slight shrugged Sakura timidly nodded more over hesitantly.

"Can I get this book Oniichan?" She pleaded making Syaoran laugh.

"Whatever you say princess." Sakura couldn't help but smile at this side of Syaoran. It was so... brotherly and nice.

"Well Lin, I hope you enjoy your book I hope to see you around." Sakura farewelled while bending to her height. She stood and almost left but someone held her back.

"Where do you think you're going? Are you crazy to walk all the way home?! I'll drive you home." Syaoran suggested. Sakura hesitantly replied but he insisted making her agree. So Syaoran took the book and saw the writer's name.

Cherry Blossom

A pen name instead of a real name, it kind of reminded him of someone. He opened the book and saw it was done by a eighteen year old and was published in Hong Kong. It struck a nerve. Snapping out of his daze he went to the cashier and bought the book and gave it to Lin.

They all went to his black lexus but Sakura reluctantly entered. She was quiet the whole ride since Lin did all the talking. But after a while she fell asleep leaving a dense tension for Syaoran and Sakura.

"So, what happened during the four months I was gone?" He asked uncertain. Sakura's attention was brought back and shrugged.

"Nothing much, you didn't miss anything except the school work."

"No, I meant to you. You've been sullen lately. And it's not like you. What happened?" He asked straight forward. Sakura was kind of shocked to hear this that he noticed so much. And the thought of what happened, almost brought tears to her eyes.

"My mom died. That's all." She casually stated but it came out as a scratchy sentence.

Syaoran felt stunned at the sentence. He expected bad grades but death? Whoa, it was too much even for him.

"I'm sorry."

"It wasn't your fault." She choked back tears. It was embarrassing as it is; she saw her house and stopped there. She said goodbye with out looking at him and left as quickly as she could after thanking him.

She didn't have the courage to face him tomorrow. Not even a bit.

The next couple of weeks, Sakura finally had enough of being cheery and finally gave up of hiding what she felt. She left the house earlier than anyone that day. She made a trip to her publisher's house and left her transcript of her story on her front door then left. She walked to school with her hair which was tied loosely with a thin crimson ribbon that made the wind play with it.

As she passed by the grills of the yellow peach house she let her hand slide by the bars. Her hand followed behind her while her feet continued walking to school. She saw the schools white walls and sighed.

Her mother's death hasn't been good for her at all. Her appearance was left uncared for, she was pale and her eyes seemed dull. Her words did not seem so expressive anymore, they just came out as if they were words from the business column in the newspaper. She seemed less mesmerizing but more nerdy. Her popularity seems to be slipping and she takes no action in regaining friends. She quit the student council just last week and spent more time in the music room than the glee club members.

She checked her watch and realized it was only 6:30 and she still had plenty of time. Her feet took her to the pale grey doors and her hands opened them for her. A great hall appeared behind these doors and a great grand piano stood on the leveled platform.

She took a few steps to reach it and sat on the black piano stool. The first note she played was at the high end of the piano and the rest followed. The song unraveled and revealed and finally a voice joined in.

"I'm crossing you in style someday." The female voice sang. Sakura was unaware of presence of the owner of the voice and therefore stopped her playing once she heard the familiar but surprising guest.

"What made you stop?" Tomoyo asked with her long deep violet hair following behind her. Sakura gave a small smile.

"That's the problem, I never did find a reasonable excuse to stop before. It's funny. I never liked playing the piano." She said playing a couple of keys. Tomoyo did not smile at this.

"thirteen years of pressing meaningless keys constantly, how much time did I spend on something so insignificant..." The amethyst eyes of Tomoyo gazed on her pale face as she continued to stare at the ivory piano keys. The steps she took to go nearer to Sakura weren't audible and so silence filled the room. Then Sakura continued.

"Now that I think of it, I've spent too much time doing things I'm not even up to doing... Do you think I've been living my life to its fullest?" She went on rambling about her doubts. Tomoyo felt all her annoyance for the girl's avoidance to her and an emotion of pity, sympathy and sadness filled her heart. She ran to the teary eyed girl and went to her aid.

"-What if I were to die tomorrow and-"She stopped for warmth enveloped her. Tears filled her eyes even more and they spilt on Tomoyo's clean uniform.

"I want to live Tomoyo. I want to feel something too." She mumbled.

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dramatic, I know but I needed a reason why she had to umm... to the next chapter right??? HEheehe... I know it took me more like a year to update but I felt like I needed to so.... Hope people read this fic... hahaha... I know I promised that it'll get funny but the next chapter maybe, in the next couple of chapters when she's in ............ and she's ....... For....... Yeah... that's great! ByeZ! -lizzy