Baby Blue

She looked so much like a lady
But she was so much like a child
A devil when she held me close
An angel when she smiled
She always held it deep inside
But somehow I always knew
She'd go away when the grass turned green
And the sky turned baby blue

George Strait

Sakura loved hot springs. She loved the way the warmth worked its way through her skin, making her feel pleasantly heavy and relaxed. She love how, afterwards, she felt as though her skin was glowing. And most of all, after a week on the road, she loved how they were a chance to get clean.

Still, going to the hot springs with her team had always been a trial. Most of the time, it meant she was on her own, listening to Naruto's happy chatter through the wall that separated the men and women. It was nice to have Kasumi-san as company, although she could tell the young woman was not very comfortable in the hot springs, despite how being around water normally seemed to relax her. She'd come out of the bath house wrapped in a heavy bath coat, and had blushed very red when she eventually slipped into the water. She wouldn't meet Sakura's eyes when talking to her, either. Even Hinata isn't this shy! Sakura thought. You'd never think a little thing like bathing could embarrass someone like Kasumi-san so much.

Above the murmur of the other bathers on both sides of the fence, Sakura suddenly heard Naruto's voice ring out. "Eh, eh, Kakashi-sensei! Stop trying to peek at Kasumi-chan! Pervert!"

Sakura felt herself go red from fury. Naruto really was infuriating! And now he was embarrassing them all. She glanced over to where Kasumi-san was sitting. The woman had gone even redder than before, and her eyes were squeezed tightly shut. As though she felt Sakura's eyes on her, Kasumi opened her eyes and offered the younger girl a tentative smile. "I'm okay."

"Naruto won't be when I'm done with him," Sakura promised.

Kasumi's smile grew a little. "Thank. But it's okay, I'll take care of it." Her eyes fell closed, and it seemed to Sakura that the woman was at once not all there, and more there than she had been previously. A second later her smile grew again, this time taking on an element very like Sasuke-kun's characteristic smirk. "Got him," she whispered.

She made a pair of hand seals - strange ones that Sakura had never seen before - and suddenly screams started on the other side of the wooden fence.

"Aaiii! Onee-chan! You got me! You got the wrong person, onee-chan, let me down!" There was a pause, and then, "What are you looking at, pervert? Don't look at me!"

Then Sasuke-kun's voice. "I'm not looking at you, teme! But anyone would think you wanted me to, hanging up there like that!"

"Liar! You're a disgusting…"

Sasuke-kun's furious voice interrupted him. "I'm not in love with you!"

The silence, from both sides of the fence, which had been growing throughout the exchange, became absolute at this furious pronouncement. Sakura felt her mouth fall open in shock. Around her, she could see the other women exchanging surprised looks, then lean close together and start whispering furiously.

"What did you do?" Sakura asked quietly, her eyes wide.

Kasumi-san giggled a little, for a moment forgetting her own embarrassment as she reveled in that of the two genin. "I just made the water pick Naruto-kun up and turn him upside down. I had no idea..." she was giggling harder now, "that he and Sasuke would still be fighting about earlier." This is the terrifying kunoichi with a demon inside her? She giggles like a little kid who's just pulled off a prank.

Sakura sighed. "They'll keep fighting about it until one of them almost gets killed. Maybe even after that." She paused for a minute, wondering if she should mention the trick Kasumi-san had played on the three of them. "I was really mad about that, too," she said at last.

"I'm sorry about that. But it was an important lesson."

A lesson? "Oh?"

"You have to understand, as shinobi, sometimes our fondest dreams and our worst nightmares are almost the same. Sometimes they are the same. All it takes is a breath, a few words, and things can be completely turned around."

"But why did you have to teach it that way?" She wasn't really angry, not anymore, but it hurt to think that Kasumi-san, a woman she liked and respected, would manipulate her and her team that way, even for a lesson.

Kasumi-san closed her eyes, and Sakura thought she detected a faint blush on the woman's cheeks. "That was partly retribution. Sakura, that trick you played on Kakashi…" she sighed. "I can count the people I've ever been close to on one hand and still have fingers left over. Almost everyone Kakashi has ever been close to has been killed." She opened one eye, and fixed Sakura with a stare that seemed to drill through the young kunoichi's skin right to her soul. "For that reason, what you three did was very inappropriate."

Sakura returned the deep blue-gray stare as best as she could. "That was your dream, wasn't it?"

Kasumi-san didn't answer, but closed her eye and let herself sink farther under the water.

I'm in love with Sasuke-kun, but he doesn't care about me, Sakura thought sadly as she relaxed in the water, closing her eyes to fully enjoy the warmth. But Kasumi-san and Kakashi-sensei love each other, but refuse to admit it because they're afraid that if they do, something terrible will happen. That's so sad! Later, she couldn't have said if it was steam from the hot springs or tears that made her cheeks wet.