"It wasn't your fault kid." Tsunade's voice echoed relentlessly over and over throughout Sakura's head as she tugged one foot up in front of the other, climbing the endless stairs to her single room apartment door. "You did everything you could to save them."
Had she? She wasn't sure. Sakura felt that if she had 'only', or she might have done 'this', to save them, then they might have made it, at least long enough to say goodbye to their loved ones that had arrived, just after, they had died.
It was never enough, she wasn't enough.
Sakura shoved her key into her lock and turned it to the right until she heard the click. Her head fell forward onto her door. She was so tired. It had been a long fight, for nothing. She exhaled deeply, expelling all of the air from her lungs. Just as she was about to inhale again, her door opened and she fell face first through her door into her apartment at the feet of…
"Sasuke? What the hell are you doing in my apartment?" Sakura rolled over onto her back and glared up into the eyes of her ex-boyfriend.
"It's Valentine's Day." He gave her blank stare for blank stare.
"...and?" What the hell, she growled to herself as she picked herself up off her floor. He was the one who broke their relationship off, what the hell was he here for spouting off about Valentine's Day, as if he had cared about Valentine's Day for the last three years of their relationship but noooo once he dumps her, then he cares? Asshole.
"I brought you dinner. Us dinner." Sasuke shuffled his feet and waved tot he table where she could see plates piled with her favorite food, wine and some sort of pink and fluffy desert.
"Uh." Sakura blinked. Seriously, what the hell…
"You always said you wished I would have dinner ready for you when you got home so…" Sasuke's normally confident voice trailed off, hesitant.
"Sasuke." Sakura dropped her handbag onto the table by her door and hung her key up on the hook by the mail slot to the right. "We're not a couple anymore, you dumped me remember?"
"I made a mistake. I thought maybe if I uh, look, I'm sorry." He shoved his hands in his pockets and backed up toward the table. "I got you your favorite wine."
Sakura looked past him to the bottle in the iced case and blinked. Was she dreaming? She didn't think he even knew what her favorite wine was, much less where to get it. There was only one place in Konoha that sold it.
Sakura slumped her shoulders forward. She was tired and hungry. It wasn't like she had any romantic plans for the evening anyway so…
KNOCK KNOCK
Two sets of eyes flicked to the door, one green the other black.
"Are you expecting someone?" Sasuke didn't wait for her to answer before walking quickly to her door and opening it before she could protest.
"Oh, hey. I didn't know you had company Sakura." Kakashi Hatake leaned up against the door frame casually, his one uncovered eye darting between Sasuke and Sakura curiously.
"What are you doing here?" Sasuke tried to step out of the apartment and shut the door behind him, but Sakura pushed him out of the way.
"Sasuke was just leaving." Sakura shoved Sasuke in the lower back trying to push him completely out the door without using chakra, but the damned prick wouldn't budge.
"Oh?" Kakashi stood up and pulled the bag he was holding into view from behind his back. "I thought since you wouldn't be doing anything tonight I would come by and keep you company. I brought your favorite, gyoza and that wiggly fruit stuff."
"Wiggly fruit stuff?" Sakura giggled. Their old sensei was always so funny.
"Anmitsu?" She looked at the back with interest.
"Mochi is wiggly." Kakashi eye crinkled at Sakura playfully ignoring the red stare of his other former student. "So?" He held his bag up and nodded to the inner sanctum of her apartment.
"Come in, come in." Sakura waved Kakashi into her apartment.
"Sakura." Sasuke followed the white haired jounin into his ex-girlfriend's apartment. "I wanted to talk to you, alone."
"I thought you were just leaving." Kakashi set his bag down next to one of the full dinner plates on the kitchen table and looked pointedly at Sakura.
"He was, I didn't ask him to come over, he was here when I got home and…"
"Broke into your ex-girlfriend's apartment huh? Getting desperate, Sasuke? Grass wasn't as green on the other side was it hum?" Kakashi baited the Uchiha. "Realized you never should have left her when you couldn't find that 'perfect' someone?" Kakashi dropped down onto the chair that sat opposite to Sakura's usual and picked up the set of chopsticks by Sasuke's plate.
"This looks great." Kakashi popped a piece of chicken into his mouth and chewed.
"I see Konoha has a problem with stray dogs, someone should report it before it gets out of hand. For the animal's protection." Sasuke turned to Sakura. "I'm gone for two months and you're already fucking someone else?"
"What?" Sakura blinked back her shock at his vulgar words. "What did you just say to me!" Chakra exploded from Sakura's fists as she lunged toward Sasuke reaching for his throat.
Sasuke ducked and stepped to the side, Sakura's fist struck through the wall where his head was just a second ago. She pulled her fist from her drywall, spun and kicked out the table sending food, wine and desert flying across the kitchen.
Sasuke grunted as the table made contact with his abdomen, then pushed it back across the room at his ex-girlfriend who kicked it to the side, cracking the glass of her kitchen divider, the glittering pieces falling to the floor to scatter like ice. Sakura, fists raised and chakra cracking leapt forward once more but was intercepted.
"Easy killer. Your chakra is already drained I can tell from the strain behind your eyes." Kakashi eye crinkled at the pinkette. "He isn't worth it."
"Yeah." Sakura looked over her shoulder at Sasuke as Kakashi led her to her living room, he wasn't."
"What the hell is going on here?" The loud booming voice of Tsunade the Fifth Hokage stopped Sasuke from throwing the four kunai he had lodged in between the fingers of his left hand at Kakashi.
Tsunade stepped into the small apartment, bag of food in her left hand, her right hand on her hip as she took in the damage. "Uchiha, you dumped her, the damage has been done, you can't expect her to fall all over herself just because you bring her dinner and wine. If she wants you back, she'll let you know. Get out."
Tsunade turned to Kakashi. "Hatake, it took you long enough. Now that she knows you're interested in her as a woman and not a student, I'm sure she'll be in touch, now leave."
The Hokage waited for Hatake to slink out of the room before setting the bag of food she brought on Sakura's kitchen counter.
"You, sure know how to attract the broken, beaten and awkward don't you kid. You can't fix everything or everyone. Don't make any decisions tonight. Let's eat." The buxom blonde pulled her apprentice into a back breaking hug.
"Thanks Shisou." Sakura smiled.