TWO YEARS AGO

A/n: everyone is about 13/14 ish years old.

"I'll make Sakura-chan notice me for sure," Naruto thought. He saw the beautiful cherry blossom sitting pensively under a tree. Naruto appeared with a poof of smoke and yelled in his usual cheery voice, "HI SAKURA-CHAN!" As soon as he finished talking, he immediately regretted it. "NA-RU-TO!" With mad fury burning in her eyes, Sakura punched him in the face with all her might. After the pain subsided, Naruto thought to himself, "Why is it that I always make her mad? I was just trying to say hello…"

Soon afterward, Sasuke trudged into the clearing. Sakura's previously crummy mood instantly dissipated as she saw her dream guy. "Ohayo, Sasuke-kun," Sakura blushed. She received a short grunt in reply. "Sasuke-kun, would you like to—"

"No."

"But you don't even know what I was going to—"

"No, no, and no. I came here to train, not to make friends with you."

Sakura froze. "not…friends with you." She couldn't believe the coldness of his voice. Just thinking about it gave her chills. Naruto saw the drastic change in her mood and yelled, "SASUKE NO BAKA! Apologize RIGHT NOW!"

"hmph.."

"grr… Sakura-chan, I'd like to have—"

"Naruto! Stop yelling at Sasuke-kun! Why do you always have to bother people? Why can't you just leave us alone? Why are you always so annoying and mean?"

Naruto didn't know how to respond. His heart broke yet again, for what seemed like the millionth time in his life. He quickly covered his pain with a toothy grin while rubbing the back of his head.

"Heh, sorry Sakura-chan. glares at Sasuke baka…" Naruto muttered the last part.

Suddenly, with a poof the ever-late Kakashi showed up with his Icha Icha Paradise book. "Sorry I'm late. I got lost on the path of li—"

"YOU'RE LATE!" Naruto and Sakura yelled together. Naruto inwardly smiled, for this was one of the few times that Sakura's anger wasn't directed at him and they were on the same side.

"heh.. well, I guess today we'll work on chakra training. Sasuke, you're going to work on your taijutsu with me."

With some hand seals, four large blocks with a kanji symbol on them appeared in front of Kakashi. "Naruto and Sakura, you'll be practicing by attaching them to the outsides of your legs using your chakra. Then I want you to walk around with them until I tell you you can take a break. Every time you get off the blocks you'll receive a slight shock. Have fun!"

After a few hours of this grueling work, Naruto was finally fed up. "KAKASHI-SENSEI! Why do you always teach Sasuke-baka new stuff while I have to do boring stuff!"

"sigh Naruto, I'm training all three of you where you need to be. Your chakra control is worse than an academy student, so you need to improve that. Since Sasuke has pretty good control I'm training him in taijutsu because I have a plan. And Sakura has especially good chakra control, so I want to nurture her uncanny ability."

"BUT I WANNA LEARN SOMETHING ELSE!"

"Naruto. You want to become hokage, right? And a hokage is very strong, right? You can never become truly strong if your chakra runs out quickly. Even though you have amazing stamina, you can be at least 20 times better if your chakra control was better. You can be very strong. Understand? So will you focus on your work?" Kakashi's patience was wearing thin. He tried to appeal to Naruto's desires as a last resort, hoping it would make the young blond stop bothering him.

"NANI! 20 TIMES! YOSH! I'll be the greatest hokage ever! KAKE BUNSHIN NO JUTSU!"

Suddenly the small clearing was filled with 25 Narutos. They all started to train and tried to knock each other off of the blocks.

"Gotta hand it to that kid. He's got some weird style. Not very bright, but effective nonetheless." Kakashi thought.

near evening

"Naruto, we're gonna go! You should go home too"

"No! I'll never give up till I have the best chakra control ever!"

"ugh! Naruto, why do you have to be so stupid! Jeez, don't you know when to stop?"

At Sakura's last comment, Naruto paused. He just wanted to be stronger so he could show his Sakura-chan that he wasn't worse than Sasuke. Why was it that he always failed to meet her expectations? But he mustn't let her get him down now.

Naruto turned with a toothy grin and said, "Don't worry, Sakura-chan! I always feel better in the morning!"

And with that, he turned back around and viewed the 2 remaining clones. Naruto charged at them and a big dustcloud was thrown up around the Narutos. He continued to train well through the night.

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Naruto woke up in a tired heap in the clearing in the early afternoon.

"Hmm? Weren't we supposed to meet her today? I wonder where Sakura-chan is?"

Naruto went back into Konoha and started to look for Sakura or any sign of Team 7. He did his best to ignore the spiteful glares he received from the villagers. He almost started to believe that he deserved this, but he knew in his heart that he didn't. He did his best to shrug it off and pretend it didn't happen or that it didn't matter to him.

Naruto soon passed the flower shop that Ino worked in. Naruto went in and asked Ino if she knew where Sakura was.

"Forehead girl? How should I know? Oh wait, I think I heard someone say she went on a three-day mission with someone… I don't remember. shrug sorry. Wanna buy some flowers?"

Naruto didn't know what to do. Without Sakura-chan near, he didn't really have anyone to socialize with. Sasuke was always a bust, and all the other teams seemed to be busy. "It's gonna be one looooooong weekend…" Naruto thought as he walked towards Ichiraku's Ramen Bar.

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How was it? Loved it? Hated it? R&R! Criticism and pointers are well taken, flames are not appreciated

Does it feel too randomish? I could mod it and make the story go faster if it seems too slow-moving. Seeeeeya