April 20th 996 — Konohagakure
"What'd you say about me?!"
"I said you're a dumbass, dead last. "
"Guys—" It sounds more akin to a weary sigh than the word she's going for, but Sakura's far too close to her limit to care. She's been trying—really, she has—to work on her hair-trigger temper, to try and be calm and patient with the boys and to stop exploding every time some little thing didn't go her way. (It's been doing more harm than good, like the four of them would take one step forward and then four steps back.) Sakura had thought she was making genuine progress, too, especially after having been elected the team student-teacher by their sensei… but sometimes the boys were just too much.
Her voice goes entirely ignored once again and Sakura sighs, not missing the tired groan from behind her as Kakashi-sensei buries his face into his little cursed book. His expression is hidden, both by his mask and by the orange cover, but Sakura knows without a doubt that he probably looks like someone's just gutted him and then asked him to clean up after himself. Really, his melodramatics are infuriating! He's just lying there on the grass, sprawled out like a gangly wet noodle. She'd feel bad for him, or at least sympathetic, if he'd tried at all today to be any kind of helpful with their training, but instead Kakashi-sensei had simply waved her off to teach while he sat to supervise.
Glaring daggers at their lazy excuse for a jōnin sensei, Sakura weighs the pros and cons of just dropkicking him right in the ribs for being so completely, inexcusably disinterested in helping the boys walk on water. The thin, tremulous thread of her patience is worn and fraying, but Sakura makes another valiant attempt of taking a calming breath before trying to speak up again. Naruto likes her well enough, right? Maybe if she tries with him…
"Naruto, come on—"
"You wanna go!?" Naruto bellows, completely missing Sakura's attempted intervention and sending her hopes flying to the ground with the force of a megaton punch, shattering all daydreams of a premature end to yet another shouting match.
"You're not even a threat," Sasuke-kun replies cooly, causing Sakura to experience a whole new kind of out-of-body experience as the fighting flares up to new heights.
This is it. This is the turning point. Naruto snaps at Sasuke-kun, Sasuke-kun belittles Naruto, Naruto flies off the handle and it turns into a full on scuffle—it's a song and dance that Sakura and Kakashi have memorised to the point that their jōnin sensei has a game of bingo featuring snippets of their most frequent insults, comebacks, and dismissals. She's pretty sure she can even see Kakashi-sensei's mask moving as he silently mouths the muddled mess of shouting between the two boys.
Pinching the bridge of her nose, Sakura closes her eyes and focuses on her breathing, counting backwards from ten. She doesn't want to snap. She shouldn't snap. Naruto always sulks and Sasuke-kun closes off and Kakashi-sensei seems unsurprised, which just hurts more… the distance comes back when she makes snappish comments. Sometimes she can get away with nagging them, or even raising her voice, but when she yells like she always had before Wave…
(A lot has changed since Wave, but obviously not enough—)
Her stomach clenches, churns, and that line of thought hits the surface of her mind like a pebble—innocent enough at first with far-reaching effects afterwards. Sucking her bottom lip between her teeth, Sakura wraps her arms around her middle and squeezes, a gesture that has become a sort of safety-blanket for her ever since that mission. The night after she'd seen Ino laughing and still so very happy, whole and with a team that loves her, Sakura had felt like she was crumbling apart inside; she'd stayed curled in bed, arms hugging herself so tightly that her ribs had protested, as if she could hold herself together physically with just her arms. It hadn't actually done anything, but the gesture still helped her pull herself together again.
Sakura knows she could let go and hang by the string again, drift off and away from this memory before it can spiral, but she's sworn to stop running away from it. She can't just let go and leave the boys alone, regardless of how tempting it may be to escape from her own self-loathing and paranoid thoughts—she swore to herself, to her new nindō, that she would be someone they could count on, Someone they could trust to watch their backs… and to stop them when they're being stupid.
"Enough!" It's not quite a snap, though her voice is raised enough that even Kakashi-sensei glances up at her, but all the same it leaves Sakura feeling vaguely guilty and quick to explain herself before anyone can feel annoyed with her. "Focusing chakra through your hands doesn't seem to be working for you guys, either—there's no need to fight, the two of you just need a different method to learn it from."
Despite how rational she'd sounded in contrast to how she'd really wanted to bite both of their heads off just minutes before, both boys glower at her as if she'd personally insulted them. Naruto's expression looks more like a pout while Sasuke-kun's is so dark that Sakura's sure that, if she hadn't accepted her own nindō and made it her sole goal, something she hyper-fixated on to the point of losing sleep, Sasuke-kun's stare would have left her a weeping mess begging for his forgiveness. She's actually surprised with all of her determination to look past her lingering, fluttery feelings towards him and Sakura actually has to take a second to marvel at herself for not immediately cooing and apologising—though a part of her, a tiny part that sounds an awful lot like the girl who'd been terrified of showing her forehead, cries out in guilt for angering her crush.
Sakura dutifully ignores that twinge and focuses her attention back to the still-soaked boys instead—and misses the approving eye-smile Kakashi-sensei throws her way.
Moving towards the waters' edge, where Sasuke-kun and Naruto are currently arguing in the knee-deep waves, Sakura presses her fingers to her chin and hums thoughtfully. She'd really thought she was onto something with the hands theory after seeing how hard the two boys had struggled with the trees before, but clearly even this isn't helping them learn how to regulate their chakra flow. It's been three days since they'd first started they hands-on approach, and yet neither of them has managed to actually get their feet onto the waters' surface. Surprisingly, Naruto's come closest, having managed to get his hands to stick long enough to attempt pulling himself out, though he'd fallen back in within seconds—but Sakura wonders if maybe Naruto just has that much chakra that he can keep pumping it without worrying he'll run out like Sakura and Sasuke-kun will.
As of right now, neither boy can stand up to their full height for more than a few seconds in the shallow edges of the water before the currents displace them and they fall back in, leaving them hissing like angry cats while Sakura asks the Gods what she did to deserve this.
(No right to complain, not after Wave—)
Before she can latch onto that promising beginning of a downward spiral, a breeze sends the loose locks of Sakura's hair dancing around her shoulders and knocks her from her musings. Glancing at the way the grass moves around her, the way her hair moves and dances on the wind, awakens a sort of epiphany that leaves Sakura outright laughing at herself.
"When in doubt, go back to the basics…" She murmurs to herself, shaking her head and stepping out onto the waves. At Naruto and Sasuke-kun's inquiring looks, Sakura takes note that Sasuke-kun's entire countenance hardens whenever she displays such chakra manipulation with ease. She'll have to show him some of the scrolls she'd read through and hope his pride won't cause him to shut her out. "I think I know where you're both tripping up here—the problem isn't how much chakra you're putting into it, it's how you'reregulating it. The currents are the issue here!"
Naruto, Sasuke-kun, and even Kakashi-sensei stare back at her with matching, equally blank expressions.
"The… currents, Sakura-chan?"
She'd be lying if she said their skepticism didn't sting a bit, but at the same time it's not like she can necessarily blame them. Thus far, her various methods haven't really done them a lot of good—and while Sakura knows Naruto would never think to blame her, she'd caught more than her fair share of scowls from Sasuke-kun these past few days. Not to mention that, before their return to Konoha over two weeks ago, Sakura had never really offered much of anything in terms of bettering herself as a shinobi or as a teammate. She'd been so naïve, so childish, blinded by her self-proclaimed love for a boy that—as she's learned since the day he'd bled in her arms—she'd never really made the effort to truly get to know.
(Sasuke-kun deserved better than that. Naruto deserved to be treated better, too. They deserved better than that, than her—)
Sakura struggles against the ache in her chest, trying to banish the self-depreciating train of thought from the forefront of her mind long enough to explain herself, but no matter how valiantly she tries, it's still a losing battle. It's like the one thought opens a dam in her head, letting loose a torrent of thoughts she's tried and tried and tried to push to the back of her mind during their training. Breaking down when she's alone is one thing, but here in front of the boys…?
(She almost let them die, she didn't help, couldn't help, she was so weak, she let them all down, she—)
"Ah! Sakura-chan—!"
Concentration thoroughly interrupted, Sakura drops into the waves like a rock with a silent gasp of shock. The cold temperature of the water does wonders for figuratively slapping some sense back into her, and Sakura manages to re-center herself and focus on the task at hand instead of the lingering doubt and self-loathing plaguing her since Wave. She pulls herself back to the surface and sputters, wheezing and pushing her hair from her eyes, just in time to catch Naruto's expression of alarm as he dutifully wades in after her. What a good teammate , Sakura muses to herself, offering a timid but hopefully reassuring smile. He 's always watching out for me.
Sasuke-kun's expression catches her eye shortly after, though, and Sakura can actually feel her smile slip from her face in reaction. He looks amused, but the smirk on his lips doesn't make her stomach do somersaults like it would have not so long ago—the edges are as sharp like the kunai in her thigh holster and his eyes are gleaming with amusement at her for failing. It's not a friendly expression, and seeing it slaps her with a whole new set of conflicting emotions: Sasuke-kun finally noticed her with something other than annoyance, but instead of finding her annoying he just sees her as nothing but a joke.
(But she can't blame him. After all, as far as he's concerned, that's all she's been since graduating and being placed on his team.)
Instead of spiraling as expected from such a harsh mental commentary, though, Sakura is caught by surprise when she realises it isn't just guilt or shame tightening her chest—she feels indignant rage. How dare he laugh at her when he can't even manage standing on water? How dare he completely ignore all the hard work Sakura's put into herself, ignore the efforts she's gone to so that she never lets him down again? She may be the weakest link of Team Seven, but he even treats Naruto poorly! It just… it isn't fair!
"Well, it's pretty simple, Naruto!" Gritting her teeth, Sakura closes her eyes and directs an almost feral smile towards her dark haired teammate—a full show of teeth with edges just as sharp as his mocking smirk had been. Her chest burns and her fingers are curled into tiny, shivering, painful fists by her sides, but Sakura still stands straight instead of curling in on herself. She has plenty to be ashamed of, plenty she still has to work on, but the righteous anger at his treatment of herself and Naruto is enough to curb those negative thoughts for the moment. "The best way to learn how to walk on water is from the bottom up—you need to feel the movements of the currents first, figure out how the water is moving!"
"Once we know that, it will be easier to channel our chakra." The way Sasuke-kun murmurs this realisation, like he's missed something completely simple, fills Sakura with no small amount of vindictive glee. Take that, shannaro! She might feel bad for these thoughts later, but for now… for now, Sakura will take the warm surge of pride that flashes through her chest instead.
"Wow, you're a genius, Sakura-chan!" Naruto crows, all but hurling himself into the deeper end of the river with a peal of excited laughter. He grins at Sasuke as the raven-haired boy joins him, the two of them closing their eyes with expressions so serious that it's as if focusing on the currents of the river is the most important thing they've ever done in their lives.
Sakura can't help but smile after them, heart warm despite the chill of the water they're all in, before she returns to the river's edge to resume her meditation.
It's becoming easier and easier to turn her focus inward, Sakura's realising—it takes her nearly a third of the time it'd taken her just the day before to center herself, even with Sasuke and Naruto shooting insults back and forth in the river and the sound of Kakashi-sensei turning pages beside her. In fact, Sakura would even say that she has an easier time centering herself with the three of them nearby, even at their loudest. It's comforting, in a way. Familiar.
Watching the green glow of her chakra climbing up and down her arms, making it to her shoulders with relative ease, Sakura muses on her course of action tonight after the boys finally call it quits: she has two new sets of kata that she's spent the morning memorising, as well as a few exercises that would help improve her stamina. She needs more cardio, as well as building her upper arm strength, and she still needs to work on landing the bullseye more often with her senbon. After all, as excited as she is to fill her arsenal with plenty of jutsu to help out her team, the truth is that she has to have a solid baseline before she can do anything.
Her strength, stamina, and chakra reserves come first—then she can focus on everything else.
"Hey, hey—Sakura-chan! D'ya wanna get some dinner with me?"
Sakura pulls her awareness back to her surroundings at the sound of Naruto's voice, surprised at his offer when they still have plenty of time left to work on their training. The darkening sky overhead startles her, though, and Sakura's left wondering how long she'd sat there in meditation. Had they managed to walk on the waves yet? Sakura stands up and brushes off her legs, fully prepared to gently turn him down and continue on with her plans for the night, but looking up at his face makes her hesitate.
Maybe it's the hesitant but still hopeful expression that he's wearing, or maybe it's just her newfound self-awareness reminding her of how awful everyone's been to him since she's known of him. How awful she's been to him. Maybe it's because she remembers the way he'd looked at a simple homemade bento like it was the rarest of treasures he'd ever seen in his life. Maybe it's guilt. Maybe she really is actually hungry. Or maybe… maybe Sakura really does just want to be friends with Naruto.
Maybe she just really wants to be friends with her team.
"Oh, well…" Sakura hesitates on how to word her response, insecurity making itself known in the pit of her stomach as she considers the likelihood of a rejection, but she's quick to throw her hands up as Naruto's expression falls slightly. Waving her hands in front of her as if to ward off a blow, Sakura offers him a wide, in admittedly unsure, smile and nods her head. "Wh-why don't we all go? Team bonding, y'know?"
Sasuke-kun opens his mouth, his expression dismissive, and Sakura prepares for a biting remark aimed at either Naruto or herself… but it doesn't come.
Instead, to Naruto's amusement and Sakura's astonishment, whatever Sasuke-kun was about to say is cut short by the solid thump of Kakashin-sensei's book on top of his head. Kakashi-sensei's expression is warm with good humour, his single eye curled in that smile of his, but even Sakura can see the underlying threat aimed at Sasuke-kun should he decide to finish whatever negative statement had been on the tip of his tongue. A beat passes and a dark look of annoyance crosses Sasuke-kun's face, but like a dark storm cloud passing through the otherwise clear sky, Sasuke-kun's expression lightens back to his usual neutral mask of indifference. Despite her own surprise, though, Sakura reasons that perhaps Sasuke is less willing to tell the man responsible for teaching and helping him reach that goal of 'killing a certain man' to kindly screw off.
"Why, Sakura-chan! That's a great idea!" Kakashi-sensei's voice is definitely an octave higher than is natural, and it's so sugary that Sakura's almost certain that she just felt several cavities form in her mouth. All three of his students stare at him with deadpan expressions as Kakashi-sensei shrugs off Sasuke's irritated attempt to slap his sensei's book from atop his head, bristling like an angry cat at the older man.
(Sakura will never be able to unsee the similarities between Sasuke and a cat again.)
Naruto cheers.
"—and then my cute little students can go straight home and get some proper rest."
Sakura sulks.
There's obviously no room for argument in his voice, and Sakura knows that it's a pointed command at her, his subordinate, from her superior. The boys may not catch the intent behind the statement, but Sakura realises without a doubt in her mind that Kakashi-sensei is telling her that she needs to slow down and take a day for herself instead of working herself ragged every single day to improve. The way his smile is directed at her, not Naruto or Sasuke-kun, tells Sakura that she will most likely meet some sensei-shaped resistance should she try to return to the training grounds after dinner.
"Maybe we can even make this a regular thing," Kakashi-sensei says with a light chuckle. Though the sentence is worded like a suggestion, Sakura can hear the intent behind his words loud and clear: Wednesdays will be focused entirely on team-building, and they will double as her mandatory break days. His smile tells her there's no negotiating this.
Naruto and Sasuke argue all the way down the street, locked in on one another and hurling insults at the speed of sound, completely missing the stares (some surprised, some disgusted) that they draw. Sakura finds herself gravitating to their jōnin sensei's side instead of trying to catch up with them—though she's adult enough to admit to herself that she wishes she could. The two of them are on a completely different level, though, and Sakura's not sure that she'll ever be able to feel fully like she belongs at their sides.
(Not like she deserves to—)
Which is fine. Sakura's completely fine walking with Kakashi-sensei in silence, her arms folded behind her back and Kakashi-sensei's attention fully turned to the novel in his hand. He doesn't look at her—not that she can tell, of course, standing on his left side as she is—but she doesn't really mind the lack of conversation. Sakura's found that, while she loves being social and loves having friends, right now she's been feeling more and more like she doesn't deserve it. It's harder to stay focused when she has to be around others all the time… so this small break is good for her.
Glancing up at the sound of laughter she knows as well as she knows herself, Sakura's eyes glance over to a familiar head of luscious blonde hair, situated between the two boys from their class that Sakura still can't recall the names of. Team Ten's facing with their backs to the street, and Sakura's eager for them to pass on by unnoticed as she turns her eyes back forward, ignoring the twinge of sadness that twists in her gut as she reaches up to run her fingers through her hair. Ino's hair had been gleaming, her nails painted in dark violet, and Sakura's sure if she'd been able to see her face that she'd be wearing her favourite strawberry lipgloss.
Sakura hasn't been doing any of her former hair-care routines, instead only settling for shampoo. She hasn't put on any makeup since she came home from Wave. The pale coat of nail polish she'd put on before their mission—shimmery but still transparent, so she still looked professional—has been steadily chipping off and she hasn't even considered taking the time to actually remove it. Nowadays she runs a brush through her hair and then throws it up in a bun on top of her head, or maybe just a quick ponytail… and since she's caught the concerned glances of her parents, two oblivious civilian merchants who she reads letters from more than she actually sees them, she's sure everyone else has noticed.
(Ino would notice.)
She doesn't feel self-conscious though, not any more; she'd sworn to herself that she'd give up her vanities and focus on becoming strong, strong enough to stand with her team, to be able to watch their backs and have them trust her to do so. She doesn't have time trying to doll herself and preen in front of Sasuke-kun and angle to become the next Uchiha matriarch—geez, she's embarrassed just thinking about how she and Ino had taken their idolisation of him and made him almost like an object in their own eyes.
He's a real person and he'd almost died, and she'd been completely useless to prevent that.
A swift thud against the top of her skull stops Sakura from heading down that particular thought process yet again today, and Sakura nearly jumps out of her skin as she snaps her head up to stare in confusion at her sensei's smiling eye. The spine of his little orange book is resting comfortably against her hair, and Sakura is confused as to how Kakashi-sensei had gotten ahead of her in the street—before she peeks around him and sees Sasuke-kun and Naruto turned in their stools at the counter of Ichiraku's, peering at herself and their sensei with matching expressions of confusion.
She looks back up at the understanding curve of Kakashi-sensei's eye, not for the first time wondering how he could be so expressive with so little of his face showing, before she offers him a grateful smile and moves to join her team for dinner.
April 21st 996 — Konohagakure
"I'm sorry."
Maybe it's because yesterday was the first time Sakura had ever really felt like they were on the same team. Maybe it's because of her realisation before dinner, that epiphany regarding her objectifying him instead of viewing him as another human being. Maybe it's just the result of constant, overflowing guilt constantly pressing down on her chest, crushing her rib cage, waving her from nightmares and constant reminders that she's nothing more than an annoyance instead of a reliable comrade in arms. Maybe it's the way that, when Sasuke-kun had arrived and seen Sakura on the bridge by herself, he'd almost turned and walked away instead of waiting on the bridge with her.
Or maybe it's just because it's time for her to own up and move forward.
Despite the apology being long overdue, Sakura's still horrified at herself for blurting it out now. She and Sasuke-kun are standing on Team Seven's bridge, the one they wait on together every morning. Naruto's not there to be a natural deterrent for this conversation to happen, and so the words had fallen from her lips as if a dam had broken. The air around them is so deathly silent that Sakura refuses to breath, afraid she'll shatter it with even the smallest intakes of breath.
He doesn't say anything from behind her, his back to hers on the opposite side of the bridge, but she can practically feel how tense he is following her words. His silence stretches on and on for what feels like an eternity, several long seconds in which Sakura is choking on all the words she wants to say, but she doesn't know how to word it, how to begin. She has so much to say, so many things to apologise for, but she's just so daunted and she feels so bad but it feels like the longer she keeps this in, the more she rots on the inside, decaying and falling apart and turning into the thick, black sludge that she sees her hands turn into in some of her nightmares.
"What for…?"
Sakura is so relieved to hear the sound of his voice that she leans forward, head in her hands and taking in a sharp breath of air that leaves her knees weak and her head spinning like a top, heels of her palms pressed to her eyes to try and keep an overly explosive show of emotions from showing on her face. She's terrified. Her fingers are trembling, her heart hammering in her chest, and she's so unsure of what to say next that for a moment the world spins and she's terrified she might pass out and fall off the bridge and drown and—
"Everything—like, actually everything, Sasuke. For being so pushy and insensitive about your feelings and always asking you out and treating you less like a teammate and more like some obligated boyfriend and being so weak and I couldn't do anything, I just stood there, and—"
"… Hn."
Sakura pauses to take in a huge gulp of air, feeling even more lightheaded that before, her mind whirling so fast that she can hardly keep up. Hn? Hn?! What does that even mean? Is he ignoring her apology? Is it not enough? Is he still mad at her? She's gonna be sick, here it is—she can hardly stand and she feels like trash, like worse than trash, and suddenly she kind of wants to throw herself into the water below and never come back up again. She's the worst teammate ever. She doesn't deserve him or Naruto or Kakashi-sensei, and she just—
"Stop it." Sasuke snaps, the sound of his voice abruptly pulling the world back into focus, everything falling so still and silent in her mind that she feels like she could hear a pin drop and it would echo for the next decade.
"Huh?" is her intelligent reply.
"I can practically hear you overthinking from here, Sakura. Enough." His voice sounds kind of rough, uneven, like she's caught him off guard. Sakura abruptly snaps her mouth shut and flicks her eyes down to the water below to look at her reflection. Dazed green eyes stare back at her and she sighs, apparently loud enough for her teammate to hear, because he sighs, too.
"You're being annoying."
Closing her eyes against the self-pitying tears, Sakura swallows thickly and wonders if she'll ever make it up to him, if she'll ever become more than just the dead weight of Team Seven. Maybe she should bow out of team training today, maybe she should request to move off of this team, maybe—
"But… thank you."
It's soft, so soft that Sakura almost thinks she's imagined it, but she finds a small smile pulling at the corner of her lips all the same. Turning her eyes towards the village, Sakura sees a distinct orange and yellow blob making its way toward the two of them and she subtly wipes away the tears gathering on her lashes before Naruto gets close enough to see them and misread the situation.
She doesn't say anything else, and neither does Sasuke.
April 23rd 996 — Konohagakure
Team Seven is back to D-ranks, and Sakura's pretty sure that all three of them can agree that it's freaking torture.
Naruto and Sasuke—she's getting better at not calling him Sasuke-kun in her head, it's progress—are at one another's throats even more than usual today, though Sakura's kind of surprised that they don't seem to turn that irritation to her whenever she snaps for them to pipe down. More surprising, though, is the fact that they do quiet down when she snaps at them, instead opting for silently glaring daggers at one another behind her back for a while before the cycle begins anew. She's pretty sure Kakashi-sensei is laughing at them from behind his book, but every time she looks he's as silent as the grave… not that she doesn't stick her tongue out at him anyway before turning back to their assigned fence for today.
A tired glance to the left shows Sasuke's slow, careful strokes drying unevenly while a glance to the right lets Sakura know Naruto has yet again drawn a face instead of trying to paint the fence. Sakura's pretty sure she might kill him before Sasuke does if this keeps up.
The mission itself is pretty uneventful, aside from Naruto and Sasuke annoying Kakashi-sensei enough that he pulls Sakura off of fence duty as a punishment for them. Amused at their misfortune, Sakura shares a sneaky smile with her sensei before demonstrating her progress with chakra-enhancement and manipulation. She shows off her enhanced strength by picking him up with relative ease, as well as her speed as she blurs through her katas, before finally she brags about how she's managed to enhance her eyesight with chakra exponentially.
At first he doesn't seem to believe her, but once Sakura shows him how she does it and manages to follow one of his blurred movements from one side of the fence to the other, he's quick to congratulate her on such a feat.
The two of them continue on like this for the next few hours, picking fun at the scowling boys who can't seem to evenly paint this fence to save their lives. Stretching her arms overhead, Sakura announces her intent to head back to the training ground, which Sasuke actually seems interested in joining her… until Naruto mentions that he's yet again going to Ichiraku's for ramen. Again. After having it for lunch, and for breakfast, and for dinner the previous night, and for lunch before that.
"Naruto," Sakura murmurs carefully, brow pinching in confusion that she can see mirrored on Sasuke's face. "Do you… only eat ramen? Why not make something at home?"
"Eheheh… Sakura-chan, I don't really have anything to eat at home. I mostly just eat takeout." The fact that Ichiraku's is the only place Naruto is served without qualms is not lost on her, and white hot anger surges through her veins—at Konoha, at herself, at the Hokage. At anyone who treats him this way. Especially herself.
She owes Naruto an apology, too.
"I mostly eat takeout, too," Kakashi-sensei's unapologetic admission rips Sakura right out of her musings. "Who has time to constantly make meals?"
Sasuke nodding along with them only serves to poke the bear more and pushes her temper right towards the edge—and, judging by the minute shift in their team's atmosphere, the boys can all sense the danger looming on the horizon. She actually loses her grasp on her offense at the sight of the collective shift they all make, Kakashi-sensei and Sasuke moving away from her and inward towards Naruto, all of them cringing away from their smaller, pink-haired teammates more rare but still just as explosive temper.
Sasuke and Naruto may fear she's one small snap away from murdering the three of them in their sleep, but Sakura's pretty sure Kakashi-sensei is just being dramatic.
"Change of plans, boys," Sakura declares imperiously, nose turned up and hands on her hips. "We're going on a grocery run."
Kakashi-sensei's huff sounds a lot less like annoyance and more like a laugh, Naruto whines like an injured dog, and Sasuke rolls his eyes so hard she's afraid they'll pop right out and rolls themselves back to his house… but they all trail after her when she turns on her heel, anyway, and not once do they actually complain as she leads them from stall to stall.
She'll count this as a win in her book.
April 24th 996 — Konohagakure
"You know, Sakura-chan," Kakashi-sensei begins conversationally during team training the next day, not even pretending to read his book as he watches Sasuke and Naruto exchange a flurry of blows. Sakura looks up at him from where she's been working through her newest set of kata, blinking owlishly when he turns to look at her. "With your chakra control and the way you've already mastered enhancing your eyesight, I think you could make use of a very helpful technique."
The offer of Kakashi-sensei teaching her a technique without her bringing one up herself after hours of research has her intrigued, and Sakura steadily slows the chakra flow she's been pouring through her limbs to a standstill. Flexing her fingers, she perks up from her stances and bounces to stand right in front of her sensei, eyes wide and a hopeful curl twisting at her lips.
(She can finally learn something useful, she can do better, be better—)
"Tell me, Sakura, have you ever heard of the shunshin technique?"
"It's a technique where one channels enough chakra through their entire body in order to move at such extreme speeds that it looks like teleportation to the naked eye." Sakura chirps off the definition she's memorised from the scroll packed away in her knapsack, her voice an excited chirp that mirrors the way she's practically vibrating with anticipation. Oh, when she'd read about this technique, Sakura had wanted nothing more than to try and learn it—in fact, the very reason she'd read up so extensively on eyesight manipulation was completely in preparation for high-speed movement and combat.
(She'd seen how fast Kakashi-sensei was, how fast Sasuke was already becoming, and Naruto would catch up in no time—she can't be left behind—)
"Very good, my cute little walking dictionary." Sakura's scowl only serves to make Kakashi-sensei's grin turn more and more impish, and the way she swats at him when he ruffles his hair only makes him chuckle and muss her little bun up all the more. Just when Sakura's prepared to snap at him for teasing her, though, Kakashi-sensei steps back and folds his fingers very purposefully into a hand seal for her to see, waiting just long enough to catch the recognition in her eyes—Tiger, that's the one—before he vanishes in a puff of smoke and leaves.
Sakura flounders, prepared to look around, but then Kakashi-sensei is back again, pointing to where he's tied her hitai-ate to a branch all the way across the training ground. She touches the top of her head in awe—she hadn't even felt him take it from her hair!
Sakura doesn't have the Sharingan or the Byakugan, nor is she as blessed as to be a sensor type… but what she does have is an eidetic memory and a strength of will (or stubbornness, if one were to ask her mom) that puts any one of the famous kekkei genkai to shame. Sakura pictures the day she'd first read about the shunshin and its chakra usage, picturing the way she'd roved her eyes along the bold black ink in her mind's eye, and then dutifully folds her fingers into the tiger seal Kakashi-sensei had used. Slowly, precisely, Sakura stretches the cool, jade-coloured chakra at her core across her body, smiling as it coats her in a thin layer—in her head, Sakura pictures herself in a pool of water, covered from head to toe in moisture, and then she makes sure to focus a bit more of her chakra into the coils of her eyes.
Opening her eyes and reveling in the clarity of the world, the sharpness of the leaves on each tree and even the rough texture of Kakashi-sensei's flak jacket, Sakura lets her chakra roll and curl across her skin. Satisfaction thrums in her chest at the sensation and she smiles, pleased that just a few weeks ago she'd never have the chakra control or pools capable of doing this.
And then she moves.
One blink and Sakura has moved from Kakashi-sensei's side—and though she only makes it about a quarter of the way toward her hitai-ate, she's still so pleased with herself that she's practically glowing. Wide-eyed and a little winded, Sakura turns to where her teammates are staring and Kakashi-sensei is beaming with pride, and it's with this mental image in her mind that she closes her eyes and forms the tiger seal one more time.
The rest of training goes on much the same—Sakura trying to shunshin to the point of leaving herself lying exhausted on the ground only halfway towards her hitai-ate, Naruto cheering her on, Sasuke trying to sneak-attack Kakashi-sensei—for the rest of the day and far into the evening. The sun is actually setting by the time the boys leave her there, and though Naruto seemed hesitant to let Sakura stay after they'd all left, he eventually scuffed his sandals in the dirt and left with the others, waving somewhat glumly back when Sakura waved them all goodbye.
Her parents still aren't home from their latest trading expedition, so Sakura doesn't bother with trying to hurry home before it gets dark. She takes her time working on her katas, going and going until her muscles are screaming for the sweet release of death and her lungs have actually attempted to commit seppuku. Then her anxiety begins to bubble up over the smallest self doubt—Sasuke could do this faster, Naruto wouldn't stop now—and to clear her mind she winds up going for ten more minutes before she has the inclination to drag herself, panting and sweating like a dog in the worst of summer, from the training grounds to head back home.
She almost doesn't see him, but when she does she freezes where she's standing.
Naruto's back is to her, but there's no mistaking that shock of blonde hair and vivid orange jumpsuit. It looks like he's looking at the ground, his fists tucked into his pockets, but the way his shoulders are slumped forward is all kinds of wrong to her… but worse than that is the people around him. Their expressions make something cold twist in Sakura's gut—like they're not looking at a person, like they see Naruto as nothing more than a cockroach. Worthless.
Trash.
(They should look at her like that, not him—they don't know him—they don't know how strong he is—)
The emptiness of her depression, those seemingly endless waves that she's only managed to get glimpses of happiness and contentment from over the horizon, suddenly shifts as if by a storm, morphing into something else, something hot and heavy and burning. Her anxiety and self-doubt that would usually accompany those thoughts only seem fuel the fire raging in her chest and Sakura's entire expression twists into one she's never felt herself wearing before. This feeling is entirely alien… but not at all unwelcome, not in the face of these people treating Naruto the way she thinks she deserves to be treated.
How dare they? Don't they know how incredible he is? Haven't they ever seen his smile? Sakura bristles and rage is hot in her chest and she's practically snarling at every adult she passes, forgetting all about how much of a mess she must look with her hair spilling from her ponytail and sticking to her face and arms. She snatches Naruto's arm and bares her teeth like an animal at the man closest to him, the one she hears the word monster whispered scathingly from, and for a moment she's genuinely tempted to show him what a real monster looks like.
She stared Momochi Zabuza in the eyes—this man is dirt under her heel in comparison.
"Sa—Sakura-chan…?" Naruto's voice pulls Sakura from the depths of that unrealised anger, and it's with every ounce of her self-control that Sakura pivots on her heel and pulls him along with her. She struggles between two different trains of thought threatening to crash in her head: between the knowledge that Naruto deserves better and she should make them regret it, and the thought that she deserves to be in Naruto's place, that she doesn't deserve to be treated like some normal kid and not the useless excuse of a kunoichi she sees when she looks in the mirror.
Sakura doesn't speak the entire time they're walking, even when Naruto hesitantly calls her name out a second time a few moments later, and when she finally stops it's in embarrassment—in the heat of all that rage, she'd brought him back to her home. She feels bad about her reaction, sure, but she doesn't really regret it… not when she remembers the way his head had hung low, like he was ashamed. Like those people hurt him. Sakura grits her teeth all over again as she turns to face him, her hands reaching out to take his in them, and she has to ignore how Naruto's face turns pink at the attention.
"Stay with me tonight."
"Wh—wh—" If she weren't still so angry and protective and riding a sort of edge that would have her clawing the eyes out of the next person to look down on her blonde teammate, Sakura would probably laugh at his red face and the way he stumbles all over his reply. Either that or she'd punch him out for the slightly dreamy expression that glazes his eyes.
"Not like that, you dummy!" Sakura rolls her eyes and squeezes his wrists, taking a step toward her door and tugging him along. Once upon a time, Sakura had been in this exact position, only in the reverse: it had been Ino tugging her wrists, making her come to her first ever sleepover, trying to uplift a shy girl's self-esteem and make her smile again. Ino had protected Sakura, had taught her what it meant to be a good friend, and now Sakura herself ready to pass on that lesson, the best gift her very first friend had ever given her. "I mean just stay the night, come have dinner—we can camp out in the living room and everything! Y'know, like a sleepover."
"I…" Naruto hesitates, and Sakura's afraid that he's going to turn her down, that he's going to walk back into town and she won't be there to threaten anyone who looks at him like he's anything less than amazing… but he speaks up again, softer this time, a whispered admission that makes her heart swell and break all at once:
"I've never been to a sleepover before…"
Of course he hasn't. Guilt nearly smothers her and suddenly Sakura is back in fight mode, ready to fist fight everyone who ever passed up the chance to befriend him, including herself. No, especially herself. Is this how Ino felt all those years ago? Sakura was only shy, but Naruto… the damage runs so deep with him, Sakura can already see it. His eyes are so bright in the daylight, but in the dim light of her porch light, she can see shadows that he tries to hide from her, she can see there's so much to unpack that she wouldn't know where to even begin.
Sakura really should go apologise to Ino, too.
"Well, there's a first time for everything!" She hopes her smile doesn't show how badly her heart is hurting, how much it pains her to take this role when she doesn't feel like she deserves to. She hopes he doesn't realise just how badly she's failed him not just as a teammate, but as a human being as well. She hopes he can't see the hatred aimed at herself on the edges of her smile, so sharp and brittle that if it shatters it will hurt all the more to pick up the pieces.
If he does, he doesn't show it.
"Okay, Sakura-chan."
The two of them go inside and Sakura drags down all her bedding from her room, brushing off Naruto's assurances that he can sleep on the floor or just go home, and then she empties all of the spare bedding from the closets and even pulls her parents' bedding for extra measure. She and Naruto spend several minutes making a large pallet in the middle of the living room, pushing everything to the side and laughing as they layer it, and Sakura makes a show of lying down and then getting up when it's not comfortable enough. It makes Naruto laugh, so she counts it as a victory.
Then she pelts Naruto with a pillow and he squeals. She lets him win his first ever pillow fight.
It's after they're lying in their giant pallet, staring up at the ceiling in a comfortable silence with all the lights off, that Sakura decides it's time. This is it. This is the next step to making amends for failing him, for failing Sasuke and Kakashi-sensei and their entire village. She hopes that this will help her stop rotting inside. She hopes that this will fix the ache that won't go away. Just a little.
"Hey, Naruto?"
"Yeah, Sakura-chan?"
If she reaches out with her right hand, she'll be able to touch his arm or even thread her fingers through his. She could close that distance between them with a single movement, just by overcoming her own cowardice and taking that step even if he were to reject her… she doesn't, though. Her hand lays rooted in the same spot on the blankets, trembling just slightly, anxiety curling in her gut and making her swallow convulsively. She's already close to tears, eyes burning and throat constricting and chest heaving and lips quivering—
"I'm so sorry," she finally manages, her hands coming up to rub at her eyes as the tears spill, and she feels so very miserable in that moment. Pitiful. Selfish. How could she cry when she's trying to apologise to him? This isn't about her—this is about apologising, swearing to make it up to him, trying to make Naruto see that she never wants to fail their team ever, ever again. "I'm so, so sorry! I've been so terrible to you and I was so mean and I just—"
"Sakura-chan…"
"I was cruel! Just cruel! You're so strong and you're a great ninja and I mocked your dream and I laughed in your face and I said so many mean things to you and I was so worthless back in Wave—"
"Sakura-chan."
"I wish I could take it all back, and I understand if you hate me, Naruto. I hate me, and—"
"Sakura-chan!"
He's holding her wrist like she'd done to him earlier tonight, and his grip is trembling just like hers was. Hiccuping, Sakura turns to look at him and can't help the new tears that sting her eyes as she realises that Naruto's crying, too… but he's smiling, and she finds herself smiling back despite the way the emptiness in her chest is stretching at the edges and threatening to swallow her whole.
"I don't hate you, Sakura-chan. It's okay."
He doesn't let go of her wrist for the rest of the night.
April 27th 996 — Konohagakure
It's Wednesday and Team Seven is at Ichiraku's yet again, the four of them having taken their usual corner seats while they laugh and talk over their dinner. Kakashi-sensei has already inhaled his food, much to their chagrin, and is perched on his stool beside Naruto, who is sitting on Sakura's left side with a smile—it's different now, a softer grin than usual, one that she's realised they've begun sharing since their sleepover—and Sasuke's made himself comfortable on her other side.
The upside of this arrangement: she's got one of her boys on either side and feels included in the team discussion.
The downside: they argue across her and her sanity nears the snapping point.
Kakashi-sensei is laughing at her predicament from beside Naruto and Sakura is considering the pros and cons of hurling her bowl of Ramen at his face when The Discussion starts. See, The Discussion is one that Sakura's been dreading since Wave, one she's tried to put off for a very long time now, and already she's wondering what kind of monumental distraction she can cause with a half-empty bowl, a napkin, and a single chopstick when Naruto and Sasuke both look her way with matching expectant looks on their faces. Sakura wants the ground to reach up and swallow her on the spot.
"So, Sakura-chan, what do you think?"
They want to discuss team specialisations... and they want her opinion.
(They want to know how to best carry your dead weight—you don't contribute anything—they're going to leave you behind—)
Swallowing heavily, Sakura drops her gaze to her ramen with a sick twist to her stomach, resisting the urge to shove the bowl away unfinished thanks to those nauseating thoughts. She knows it's true, knows it deep in her heart that for all the progress she's made lately, she's still the dead weight of Team Seven. No doubt any plans for their team would revolve around keeping her out of the fight for as long as possible, like they'd had to do in Wave.
(Couldn't even protect the client by yourself—you had one job—)
"Well…" They're still waiting on her to speak, so Sakura swallows and runs her tongue over her suddenly dry lips, navigating as carefully as she can without laying her heart and guts out on the counter and screaming I know I'm worthless, I'm sorry, I'm trying so hard. After a moment's hesitation, Sakura tries again: "As of right now, I'm not really any good with ninjutsu, and I'm still trying to improve my taijutsu…"
She looks up expecting matching deadpan expressions of well, duh on their faces—some kind of acknowledgement that of course they know she's gotten nowhere, that of course she's useless—but what she sees instead gives her pause: Sasuke is nodding thoughtfully on one side and Naruto beaming with encouragement on the other, neither one of them looking even the slightest contemptuous or annoyed. It takes her a few moments to get over the outright awe burning in her chest before she can swallow and finish her thought, pulse hammering in her ears and drowning out all the self-deprecating remarks and anxiety that had been clawing its way out of her stomach just moments before.
This is the first time she's felt like an actual member of this team before, and she has to take a moment to swallow thickly before she continues: "I'd probably be good for long-range support, and I want to learn more about traps and genjutsu, but…"
"No, that's a good idea." Sasuke cuts her off, and Sakura jerks in surprise, glancing at where Naruto is nodding approvingly at him instead of immediately jumping on anything the raven-haired genin says to pick a fight. Confused, Sakura glances at Kakashi-sensei and sees he's pretending to read his book, not even looking up at her soft, shocked noise. Sasuke continues despite her flabbergasted reaction, "We have an advantage other teams don't. Naruto isn't terrible, especially not with his clones, and I'm decent with taijutsu and my ninjutsu."
Sakura wilts, just a little.
(It's true, you know—they're the real core of this team—you're just the cheerleader —)
"Stop that," Sasuke's harsh, quick words snap Sakura out of that particular train of thought, but when she looks back at him he's staring straight ahead, dark eyes focused anywhere but on her. She can practically feel the eyes of their teammates shifting to stare at him, too. "You may not have our raw strength, Sakura, but what you lack in power you make up for with intelligence. Use it."
"Yeah!" Naruto crows, slapping her back and grinning from ear to ear. It's like Naruto's boisterous cheer makes everything in the universe right again, shifting everything that had been upended by—dare she hope—encouraging words from Uchiha Sasuke back onto its proper axis, and the world slots right back into place. "Sakura-chan's a genius! With you coming up with strategies and watching our backs, there's nothing Team Seven can't do!"
They trust her to watch their backs.
"…Thanks, guys."
She's blushing all the way down the back of her neck, and Sasuke's ears are a little pink, but she's smiling just as widely as Naruto even hours after they all part ways.
April 28th 996 — Konohagakure
"A little birdie says you two had a sleepover," Kakashi-sensei says the next day with an unreadable edge to his tone. Sakura's so caught off guard by his words that she loses her footing and falls straight into the water for the first time in a long while, missing Naruto's scandalised blush and Sasuke's own disbelieving expression, dark eyes swinging between his two teammates.
"I—yeah, I asked if he wanted to come sleep over." Sakura admits at last, and she's sure her entire face is the same colour as the roots of her hair—but she doesn't look away from Kakashi-sensei's carefully blank expression no matter how badly she wants to curl up and hide under the waves of the little river they're practising by. She apologised to Naruto and she doesn't regret anything about that night… outside of not decking that old man that had called her friend a monster, maybe. "I wanted to apologise to him and we spent the time getting to know one another."
"I see."
Sakura wonders if they're going to get in trouble for a moment, if there's some sort of rule about male and female teammates having sleepovers or something, but she doesn't risk glancing over at Naruto—after all, she's learned Kakashi-sensei tends to mess with them just because he can, and if her standing up to him and challenging him to disapprove of their bonding is some sort of test, she doesn't want to fail. He's a strangely sadistic man with basically no social skills to speak of, but he's by no means cruel, and she's absolutely sure Kakashi-sensei knows how Naruto is treated and that he'd never scold her for reaching out and treating him better than before.
"Well," Kakashi-sensei drawls after another lengthy moment, finally creasing his eye shut in a smile and freeing Sakura from their staring contest. "Did you two have fun?"
"Yeah!" Naruto bellows without missing a beat, jumping up from where he'd been beside Sasuke and zipping up to Kakashi-sensei, practically vibrating with excited energy. Apparently that had opened the floodgate, and Sakura's left to stand there with her blush growing darker and darker as Naruto regales the other members of their team with her so-called daring rescue, making her out to be a brave heroine instead of the coward they should all know she really is.
She makes eye contact with Sasuke in hopes that maybe he'll make one of his snarky comments and derail Naruto's story, but before she can plead with her gaze, she finds herself caught staring at the particular expression he's wearing. Sakura wonders what it is, the strange light in his eyes just before he closes his eyes and turns back to his stretches. He almost looks like…
Like a child being left out of a game.
Tuning Naruto's excited chatter out, Sakura turns back to her katas with half-hearted determination; she's much too focused on that flicker of emotion in Sasuke's eyes all throughout their training, so much so that she actually doesn't even realise she's successfully shunshined across the clearing to the tree with her hitai-ate until Kakashi-sensei points it out. She moves mechanically through her stretches and quick spar with Naruto, wondering what it meant, what she should do… or if she should do anything at all.
Would Sasuke accept an invitation to sleepover with her and Naruto if she asked?
Maybe he was just bothered that he wasn't invited at all, or maybe he had very strict ideals on inter-team relationships and didn't like that they'd done something so intimate, become so close. Maybe she was reading way too much into a simple expression. Maybe he was just bothered that training hadn't already started. Maybe she was hyper-focusing again and training was already over.
"Hey, hey, Sakura-chan! Wanna go for ramen again tonight?" Naruto's voice rips her from her musing and she looks up, smiling at his bright expression—she's swiftly learning that the blonde boy's grin is becoming something she can't say no to, and Sakura wonders if that's a bad thing or not. If he ever finds out, mischief is bound to ensue.
"Sure, Naruto. Wanna stay the night again?" Sakura rolls her shoulders and smiles tiredly at him as he nods excitedly, giving Sakura a small anxious idea that he may just snap his own neck and send his head hurtling into the stratosphere. She pauses for one long, heavy moment before she glances over her shoulder and waves to catch Sasuke's attention, struggling to raise her voice and push down the raging blush that threatens to coat her face once again. "Do you want to come, too, Sasuke?"
He hesitates, clearly prepared to shoot her offer down with a polite self-esteem assassination that only an Uchiha is capable of, and Sakura's about ready to give it up… and then Naruto, bless his soul, swoops in like some sort of god-touched saviour to do something onlyhe can do when it comes to Uchiha Sasuke.
He baits him.
"Bah! Sasuke probably wouldn't wanna come—he probably thinks you have cooties, Sakura!"
It's like he's flipped a switch, and suddenly Sasuke's pivoting on his heel and glaring daggers at Naruto, spine straight and head held high. The transformation is so immediate that Sakura's shocked into silence, eyes flicking between the two boys as they shoot off potshot after potshot at one another at lightning speed. She's probably going to have whiplash.
"I do not, dobe."
"You so do, teme!"
This goes on for several minutes and, as their insults become simultaneously more creative and more idiotic, Sakura finds herself staring up at the heavens, hands help out with her palms up, as if shrugging at whatever god happens to be looking down at them. (This is why Kakashi-sensei is the way he is, it has to be.) She's completely prepared to just take back her offer altogether when Sasuke steps closer to them, hands fisted in his pockets, glaring at Naruto with every single muscle in his body tense enough that she's sure she could flick a stone at him and it'd crumble on impact.
"Well? Let's go."
Kakashi-sensei is laughing at her as they walk away. Bastard.
The two of them argue all the way to her house, argue as she unlocks her front door, and Sakura's torn between wanting to throttle the both of them and possibly only throttling Naruto. Poor Sasuke looks so tense that Sakura almost gives him an out. Almost. Instead, she smiles in what she hopes is a reassuring manner and hands him some blankets and pillows. Naruto remembers what to do after last time, and it doesn't take Sasuke any time at all to realise the intent and help them lay out a big enough pallet to give all three of them ample room on the floor.
The tension in the room is almost painful, and while Sakura flounders for a way to break the ice, Naruto has his own plans—in true Naruto fashion, he decides to promptly induct Sasuke into the Pillow War Hall Of Fame, smacking the raven-haired boy right in the face with a pillow and grinning from ear to ear. Then, the two explode into motion and Sakura is torn between fending them off and trying to take care of damage control.
Two vases and a clock are lost to the cause. Sakura has to make a new rule for pillow fights and breakables.
The three of them stay up a while after Sakura finishes cleaning up, all of them settled comfortably into their places on the pallet, all of them staring up at the ceiling in silence. Sakura is in the middle, Sasuke on her left and Naruto on the right, but Sasuke is further away—he's more or less crammed into the corner, making it look like Naruto and Sakura are snuggling by comparison. It's bittersweet, but Sakura knows clear boundaries when she sees them, so she resolves to just close her eyes and tries to focus on sleeping instead.
"Hey, teme?" Naruto's voice is soft, a gruff whisper beside her, and Sakura furrows her brow for a moment. She'd honestly thought he was close to passing out.
"Yeah, dobe?" As where Naruto sounds honestly curious, Sasuke sounds cautious.
"Remember when Kakashi-sensei was talking about our goals?"
Ah. The forbidden topic. Sakura wonders if she should warn Naruto off of asking, but Sasuke replies before she can even fully open her mouth, making her jaw snap shut with an audible click.
"… what of it?" Defensive, now.
"Well…" Naruto trails off for a moment, and Sakura wonders if she should axe this conversation before it can spiral too badly, as discussions are wont to do with these two. "We're a team, so we all have to be strong enough to reach this guy, right?"
"I'm going to be the one to kill him." Sasuke's angry now. Aggressive. "Not either of you."
"Duh." Sakura can hear Naruto rolling his eyes and cringes back into her pillow, staring wide-eyed at the ceiling as this heavy discussion settles over her like a smothering blanket. "I get that—but we have to be able to watch your back, and we have to make sure no one else interferes, right? We're a team. So we all have to get strong together."
"… Aah."
"So how strong is he, then? How hard do we need to work?"
Sakura thinks this moment is very, very fragile beneath Naruto's usually clumsy hands, yet here he is handling it with more finesse than Sakura herself could ever hope to. She holds her breath, chin tilted just slightly toward Sasuke in the darkness, waiting for his reply with the feeling that this moment could easily make or break their team.
"He is… very strong. A genius." Sasuke says this like it pains him and she swallows thickly, her heart skipping a beat. "I don't even know if Kakashi could win against him."
"Can you tell us more about him?" Sakura's spoken up before she's even realised what she's said, and her entire body freezes in the aftermath of her words. She can hear them echoing off the walls of her home, slamming against the painted walls and hardwood floors, shattering picture frames and memories and this entire moment for her team—
"He…" He pauses, voice hitching, and Sakura feels guilt wash over her from head to toe, but Sasuke powers on regardless. The weight of every single word is too much for one boy to bear alone, she thinks, and each syllable is short and clipped, as if he's perusing his entire vocabulary and only picking the most precise words to describe him. "He is—was my older brother. He knows how to use his Sharingan to levels that I do not, not to mention countless of our family's jutsu… he was a prodigy."
"I see…" Sakura murmurs after he's gone silent. The only emotion awash in her little living room is his anger and a long-lingering grief that she's sure she could never understand. What he's just shared was obviously very difficult for him, something he still struggles with, and Sakura is both relieved and guilty all at once. She's sure he's shared all he feels comfortable with—probably more than he's comfortable with, honestly—and she doesn't want him to have to divulge anything more. "We'll have to train hard, then."
"Yeah." Naruto sounds oddly serious in this moment, and Sakura smiles with awe at the determination colouring his words. She reaches out to touch his wrist, and she can feel that his hand is curled into a fist at his side. "We'll be the strongest shinobi in the village, and then we'll find him and you'll kick his ass, teme."
"Then we'll all come back and you'll take the seat as Hokage." Sakura says it easily and with such conviction that she can't help the proud little smile that quirks her lips.
"Yep, and you two will be my most trusted guards, and we'll show the world how strong the three of us are! Sound good, teme?"
It's silent for a moment, and Sakura wonders if maybe he's not as entertained as the two of them by the idea, but the she feels his fingers on her wrist—just a whisper against her skin that's gone as soon as it comes—and she relaxes with a content smile.
"… Aah."
April 29th 996 — Konohagakure
"So, how was the sleepover?" Kakashi-sensei asks her, eyes on his book as he turns a page with his thumb.
"Oh, it was great—maybe you should come next time." Sakura replies easily, frowning as he waves off her genjutsu once again without even batting an eye. She was so certain she'd had him that time!
Sasuke and Naruto are entangled in their newest routine, sparring both with their fists and their words. It's a test in concentration, she supposes, like they're testing one another and making sure they can't be caught off guard by cutting remarks or bold insults. Sakura smiles as Sasuke ignores a comparison about his hair and the backside of a chicken, ducking to throw a punch at Naruto's face along with a retort about Naruto's face having a resemblance to a—well, that's just disgusting.
"Mm, better not."
Sakura rolls her eyes at his easy denial and tries again—snake, rat—and growls when Kakashi-sensei just levels her with a bored expression. She'd be getting better if he'd stop being so freaking cryptic and actually make an effort to help her get this!
"Mah, my cute little genin are becoming a proper team all on their own." Kakashi-sensei's eyes travel from her back to the boys and she frowns, not much caring for the faraway expression in his eyes. She's never seen him look like that before, and especially not at any of them. He looks so… sad. "It's like you're the brain, Sasuke is your sword, and Naruto your shield. I'm so proud."
His added fake sniffle just has her looking at the sky and mouthing why me? to the Gods watching her misfortune.
"Well, if that's true…" Sakura stretches her arms over her back and arches her back, spine popping audibly, and moves to stand up from her sitting position. Patting off the grass from the back of her dress, Sakura smiles down at him and folds her arms behind her back, cocking a hip and shrugging her shoulders in a carefree movement. "You're our heart, then—because it's thanks to you that we're all together, anyway, sensei."
The hesitant but completely sincere smile she gets in return will stay with Sakura for the rest of her life.
11/06/18: This chapter has been fully re-written. While there aren't all that many new scenes, I did make sure to better focus on how Sakura isn't just "bouncing right back," her self-esteem and doubts are all still very fresh... they're just not what she's focusing on, now. I also hope the addition of dates helps people with the flow of time in this fic, as some people thought she was making "leaps and bounds" in a matter of days. I extended the time between Wave and Chunin because, while it makes sense for a shounen series to go from One Big Event to the next, it's not very good story-telling and Team 7 had hardly any time to really, genuinely grow before it happened.
The original word count of this chapter was 8,105. This revision's word count is now 11,473.
Thank you for reading!