Summary: Haruno Sakura never imagined her Mr. Right would be unavailable. AU. OOC.

Main Pairings: Sakura/Itachi, Naruto/Sasuke

Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto.

Chapter 1: I have measured out my life with coffee spoons

"For I have known them all already, known them all -

Have known the evenings, morning, afternoons,

I have measured out my life with coffee spoons;

I know the voices dying with a dying fall

Beneath the music from a father room.

So how should I presume?"

- The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock, by T. S. Eliot

Sakura meets him on one cold November evening.

She's at this café that is nowhere near her apartment, courtesy of Ino. Being dead on her feet after a twelve-hour shift, Sakura wisely decided to choose her battle: explain to Ino that she's not in the mood or face a bunch of total strangers.

So here she is.

Sakura doesn't typically tag along to any of Ino's various social groups but Ino had insisted that she come this time. Apparently, she likes a boy and wants Sakura to meet him.

"Black hair, black eyes, tall pale dude," Ino had explained offhandedly.

The problem? Sakura is staring at the man with that description and he's absolutely gorgeous. She feels like a total tool. The man in question is in the middle of a conversation with another woman who has blue dyed streaks running the length of her short hair. They don't seem to be flirting exactly; there is a sense of familiarity in their exchange, a comfort that comes with knowing someone for far too long.

He's two seats down from her, though. Sakura can't really hear the conversation because on her other side, Ino is currently engaged in a screaming match with another blonde who could have been her brother if Sakura didn't know any better.

"I'm Karin," the redhead from her left introduces herself. "What do you do?"

"I'm a nurse."

Karin gives her a scathing look from the tip of her pink hair down to her sandals. "Sure you are. I'm a tattoo artist. You wanna get one done?"

Sakura's tone is flat when she responds. "No, thank you."

And that is that. Karin ignores her from that point. Sakura doesn't mind; she's met way too many patients like her in her line of work. Although, Karin technically doesn't speak with anyone else, either. She continues to slurp at her coke randomly and after a point, pulls out her phone and begins to scroll through it aimlessly.

Sakura drags her eyes over to Ino's boy. He appears bony on the shoulders or maybe that's just because of the threadbare grey hoodie he's wearing. It looks completely worn out and surprisingly good. Or maybe Sakura is just biased. Developing an instant crush on your friend's romantic interest is surely a fantastic way to spend a Friday evening.

The blonde boy waves at her eventually with a shit-eating grin. "You don't wanna order anything?"

Sakura picks up the menu and pretends to skim through it. She keeps it down and says, "Coffee."

He shrugs and gets up to place the order at the counter. Shit. She hadn't realised it's a self-service place. She quickly gets up to join him. Together, they make their way to the counter in the back.

"I'm Naruto, by the way. Uzumaki Naruto."

"Haruno Sakura."

"Nice to meet you, Sakura. You're rather pretty."

Sakura stares.

Naruto barks out a loud laughter at her expression. "Don't worry. I'm gay and taken. My boyfriend is stuck at work so I decided to annoy his brother, instead."

"Ah, I see."

"But you are," Naruto says easily. He pulls out his wallet to pay for their orders and Sakura hands him the change for her coffee. He thanks her and pockets it. "You seeing anyone?"

"Not that it's any of your business…"

Naruto looks at her hopefully. "But…?"

Sakura snorts despite herself. "But no. You looking to hook up your friend or something?"

"Nah," he says, leaning beside her as they wait for their orders. "Jus' curious. Okay, that's not entirely true. I don't want to be punched when I ask you if you're interested in posing for a nude."

Sakura's elbow slips off the counter. Naruto laughs again, hauling her back up.

"What the fuck?"

Naruto simply shrugs, grinning. His eyes are blue as hell under the white lights. "I told you you're pretty."

"I'm not that pretty."

"Sure, you're no super model or anything," he concedes. "But I'm not looking for one, either. I'm looking for a story and you seem to have one."

She scoffs. "There's no way you know that for sure."

"Really?" Naruto straightens up, pinning her under a challenging gaze. "Tell me about your parents."

Sakura narrows her eyes. "Don't have 'em."

He looks like he's won. "See? There's a story right there. Who raised you?"

She sort of can't believe this conversation is taking place. "They did. But they died when I was in college."

"Convenient."

Sakura's mouth drops open and she waits for the punchline. It doesn't come; he's absolutely serious. "Excuse the fuck you."

He shrugs nonchalantly. "Mine died when I was a baby. I was in foster system until six when Iruka liked me enough to keep me."

She shakes her head, annoyed. "I hate you so much right now."

He barks out a surprised laugh. They're called to collect their orders, for which Sakura is immensely grateful. Naruto doesn't pick up the conversation once they're seated at the table but he does ask normal questions such as about her work, what's the hospital like, and does she enjoy it.

All the while, Sakura is trying her best not to notice Ino's boy, which is technically the opposite of what she's come to do. She doesn't know whether it's her imagination or not, but she thinks he might be giving her fleeting glances in return, too. She'll know only if she looks right at him.

Sakura sighs.

Naruto eventually directs his attention to Ino, who had been texting someone on the phone. It leaves Sakura, once more, with nothing to do but drink her coffee and avoid looking at the pretty man.

Of course, whoever said that was a solid plan? When the man leaves the table with the phone pressed to his ear, the blue haired woman suddenly wants to talk to Sakura so Sakura has to lean forward a bit on her elbows while Karin keeps sighing miserably from time to time in annoying puffs. Sakura thinks she can go fuck herself.

Her name is Konan. She says the man's name is Itachi. "I'm in Ino's dance class. How do you know her?"

"We were neighbours at one point before I moved."

Konan is in the middle of regaling a drowning incident during her work as lifeguard when Itachi returns. She pauses long enough to say, Sakura – Itachi, Itachi – Sakura, she's a nurse, and continues right on: the kid was barely six years old but they managed to get him out in time.

"Yeah, yeah," Karin mumbles, "you two can bond over saving lives but can you do it some other time? Some of us don't wanna hear the miserable reality of staying alive. Look at Itachi, he already seems bored."

Itachi doesn't. He quirks up an eyebrow, though, says, "I'm a swimmer, in case you forgot."

Sakura can't help blurting out, "Really?"

Itachi turns his attention to her and it feels – it feels like a zap of thunder on a cold, dark night. Her heart pounds, her palms sweat, and it's insane how much his mere gaze is affecting her. Fuck, he's really, really gorgeous.

Not in the super model way, as Naruto would say. Clinically, he doesn't exactly have the sought-after symmetrical face or unusual eye colour or shiny, beautiful hair. He has none of it but there's something, something, about him that, to Sakura, just feels right. She's going to have daydreams about his goddamn stare, for fuck's sake.

And it's not like Sakura is against it, against feeling such intense attraction towards a stranger she barely knows. Her mind is in the middle of being blown away, in fact, that it happened with her. All her past relationships have been severely unsatisfying, which is why this – this feels like it's making up for all the magical charm she's heard rumours about.

"Yes," Itachi says, gaze steady and innately warm. "You're a nurse? That's cool."

Sakura squints. "Thanks?"

Itachi chuckles; it's a light and heady sound. She feels a stirring in her chest, a fluttering inside her ribcage – she did that. She wants to keep doing it.

He smirks. "You're welcome."

Then it's her time to snicker in amusement. He sounds both sarcastic and sincere about it. His phone rings again, a constant buzzing on the glass surface of the table. He glances at it and quickly accepts the call. He leaves once more with the device pressed to his ear.

Sakura watches his retreating back for a few moments; he's lean, the broken-in jeans riding low on his slim waist. He's tall, taller than the average men, and Sakura never thought of herself of being into tall men, not that she ever had a type, but now tall seems rather appealing.

Jesus Christ, she's screwed.

As though to drive that point home, Ino speaks from beside her. "Like what you see?"

Her voice is low and quiet, right in Sakura's ear, but Sakura flushes anyway, throwing a discreet glance at Karin and Konan, hoping they didn't hear that. Before Sakura can say you've got great taste, Naruto is calling for her attention, waving his phone in the air.

"Come this side. I wanna show you something."

Sakura does. She plonks down beside Naruto on the other side of the table, the empty seat beside Itachi's right, and tries to focus on what Naruto is showing. He has his social media profile opened up.

"These are some of the paintings I've done until now," he explains, tilting the phone to show her better. Sakura leans in. "I mostly work with oil paints. You've got that lovely shade of hair and I have the perfect mixture in mind for your eyes. Apple green and parakeet. It'd be perfect. Do you have freckles anywhere other than your nose?"

She scrolls through his profile interestedly. He's not Van Gogh or anything, not that she understands art, but she likes whatever she sees. Naruto has a few nude models of men and women scattered through his artwork but majority of them are close up portraits of various people. She likes a particular one of an old woman: her age spots and wrinkled skin, the bright silver of her eyes, and the smile stuck between tentative and hopeful. When she scrolls further, she comes across a few done in charcoal of a man who looks disturbingly similar to Itachi.

And then Naruto is laughing embarrassingly. "Oh – um. That's Sasuke. My boyfriend. I told you, right? Itachi's brother. He's beautiful, isn't he? Sasuke, I mean. Itachi can go die in a ditch."

A startled giggle escapes her. She hands the phone back, half-convinced of letting him paint her nude. He might actually do a good job of it. Besides, it's rather flattering to be asked to pose as a model for an artist, no matter how young he is.

"You were serious about it?" she asks.

He nods vigorously. "Of course. Will you at least think about it? You don't have to say anything right away. Here, take my number."

They exchange phone numbers. Sakura goes one step ahead and hits the follow button for his profile. Naruto positively beams, sending her a follow request in return.

Itachi is back. He slides into his seat and turns to them. "Uh oh, I know that face. Is he bothering you to be a model?"

"Yeah," Sakura admits. "Does he do that with everyone?"

"I'm right here."

"No," Itachi says, ignoring Naruto. "Only the ones he finds fascinating. I think you caught his eye."

"I can see that, although I have no idea why."

Itachi chuckles but doesn't respond. He changes the topic entirely. "Where do you work, anyway?"

"Senju General Hospital. Have you always been a swimmer?"

"Since high school, yeah. I don't really see myself being anything else, except of course, packing up people's shopping items in brown paper bags and demanding money in exchange."

She blinks. "You work at a department store?"

"Believe it or not, people don't give a shit about competitive swimmers' livelihood unless you're internationally famous. I do need to buy food to sustain."

"And book the swimming pool," Konan chimes in. "He's literally on his thirtieth lap or something by the time I show up for work. Then I spend the next hour ogling him in his speedo."

"Gross," Naruto mutters.

"Only because it's not Sasuke," Konan fires back. "Naruto is Sasuke-sexual. Put him in Magic Mike and his dick wouldn't even twitch."

"Gross," Itachi wrinkles his nose.

"It's true," Karin says from across the table. "When he'd come to my parlour, there was this hot man on my table, getting his asscheek inked. This dumbass didn't even check him out. I swear, Sasuke could literally be on the other side of the world and Naruto would go celibate and wait for him like a jilted husband."

"What's wrong with that?" Naruto demands. "Besides, you've got it wrong. If Sasuke were on the other side of the world, I would be there with him."

"How long have you guys been together?" Sakura asks curiously.

"Since forever," Ino informs her, rolling her eyes. "I think they came out of their mother's vaginas holding hands."

Naruto gives a sugary sweet, sarcastic smile. "You're just jealous because your dude wouldn't look at you twice even if you dance naked in his face."

What. The. Fuck.

Sakura shoots a quick glance towards Itachi, horrified, even as Ino shrieks in protest and throws her bundle of paper napkins in Naruto's face. But Itachi is openly laughing, so is Konan, and Sakura thinks this is the strangest part of her evening, no doubt.

"I've had more people willing to be naked in front of me," Naruto is saying, "than your chance of being naked in front of him."

"At least when I see his dick, I'll get to suck it," Ino counters.

"You talk as if I want to suck anyone's dick other than Sasuke's!"

"Seriously, stop," Itachi winces. "That's my brother."

Ino doesn't. She narrows her eyes furiously. "I bet you a hundred that he'll be the one to ask me out."

Has Itachi become invisible to Ino? Sakura tries to catch Konan's eye in a question but Konan and Karin are giggling amongst themselves.

"You'll lose it faster than you lost your virginity," Naruto says. "I'll just tell him to hold out forever."

"You wouldn't dare, Naruto."

"I totally would."

Itachi can hear you, Sakura wants to remind her rather bizarrely. She glances at Itachi once more but Itachi is watching the exchange in open amusement. He doesn't seem surprised or embarrassed or even angry.

"Oh yeah?" Ino is now saying. "How about I bet you two hundred that he'll ask me out before New Year's Eve?"

"He's had six months and he never did," Naruto tells her smugly. "What are the chances that he'd do now? In fact, I don't even see him here. Where is he, Ino? I thought he always comes when you call."

Wait, what?

Sakura is missing something, she's sure of it now. Everything makes a hell lot better sense when Ino deflates and miserably grumbles.

"He got stuck with work," she sighs. "Apparently, their management is on a warpath to downsize their branch. He believes if he overworks himself, he might have a shot at keeping his job."

Sakura blurts out, "Who?"

"Sai," Ino replies. "You know the guy I wanted you to meet? I thought he'd be here today."

A staggering relief rushes through Sakura's whole body. She's not a tool, after all. Itachi is not Ino's romantic interest, and there is no reason for Sakura to feel like an utter asshole about her crush. And then another thought flits through her mind: she can do something about this. She can act on her crush and it would be completely fine.

Thank fuck.

"Hey, hey, hey, come on," Naruto complains. "It's no fun teasing you when you're sad."

Ino smiles, rolling her eyes. She gives Naruto a fond look. "You still wanna bet?"

"Nah," Naruto waves his hand dismissively. He returns her smile. "You're a total babe and so out of his league. Sai would be an idiot if he doesn't ask you out, like, right now."

Ino laughs warmly.

Naruto continues. "I swear, if I were into vaginas, I would totally bang you and then bring you flowers in bed. I'd make you the best breakfast of your life and we'd fall in love like they do in the movies. I'd ask you to marry me under the stars, we'd live happily ever after with two point five kids and a dog."

"Okay, stop, stop," Ino snorts. "I get it. Jeez, I'm not even jealous Sasuke has to deal with your crap."

"Sasuke likes my crap."

"I bet he does."

"He really does," Itachi shakes his head. "I have no idea why. I try not to puke but it's getting harder by the day."

"What?" Sakura challenges him, coming to Naruto's defence immediately. What can she say? The idiot is loveable. "You're not a romantic?"

For some reason, that makes everyone else crack up, including Karin. Sakura doesn't understand the joke. She raises her eyebrows expectantly and then Konan explains, "Itachi might pretend to be grossed out by them, but he's marrying his childhood sweetheart. I'd say that's some romantic shit right out of a movie."

The air empties out from Sakura's lungs. She struggles not to slump or show how absolutely crushed she feels by the revelation.

Instead, she dredges up a wide, fake, teasing grin. "Well, you can hardly talk, in that case. You're engaged?"

For the first time, Itachi looks bashful and shy. He bites his lip and nods. "Her name is Izumi. She works in a different city, so we've hit brakes on the wedding plans."

"Not to mention the fact that you have zero money," Karin quips in.

Itachi laughs. "That, too. But Izumi would be earning a big pay-check in no time, just you see. I can't wait to be coddled."

Sakura joins in on the light-hearted humour, feeling all her hopes die with every remark at Itachi's expense. Apparently, they got engaged two years ago: Itachi proposed to her on the stage while she received her college diploma, and it's all sickeningly sweet.

Sakura wants to hate it but she can't bring herself to. She doesn't even know the woman but Itachi seems rather smitten, adorably so, and it's so nice that by the end of the night, Sakura actually manages to feel happy for him.

Update cycle is shaky, but approximately one week. :)