Author's Note:

HELLO I AM SO SORRY FOR BREAKING MY PROMISES I GOT REALLY BUSY EVEN THOUGH IT WAS SUMMER HUHUHUHU. Plus, I WAS ALREADY FINISHED WITH CHAPTER 10 WEEKS BEFORE BUT THEN I NOTICED THAT THE FILE WAS DELETED AGH. But to make up for that, I'm finishing Chapter 11 already and I hope that makes things better. Also, I made a mistake about Itachi's and Shisui's ages. But let us settle with the two of them being 21 years old.

Disclaimer:

How can I own Naruto when I can't even own a heart?

Haruno Sakura had always regarded herself as that teammate who was desperately holding onto a thin ray of hope just so she wouldn't be swept beyond the outskirts.

Back when they were genins, she had no special techniques or moves to show off. She wasn't a jinchuuriki or an extremely ambitious person like Naruto, nor was she a naturally skilled shinobi like Sasuke. Moreover, she wasn't as talented as Sai.

Before, she used to blame everything on the fact that her clan was nothing out of the ordinary. Basically, her clan was among those families who lived simple lives despite having the ability to convert chakra into ninjutsu or genjutsu. In other words, her clan had no kekkei genkai, or an advanced bloodline limit.

In their early years, she was that helpless teammate who was always being rescued by the others. She wasn't fast enough to dodge attacks, nor did she contain enormous loads of chakra to fuel herself up. Back then, whenever an army of attacks was sent to their team by an opponent, the only reason why she managed to survive was that her sensei and even Naruto would carry her away from the danger zone.

However, all those years of being the weakest and most useless one were now left behind. After all, she had entered an area of expertise no man in her team could come close to. Because of her accuracy and precision in controlling chakra, she now saves countless lives, earning her well-deserved rank in the field. Because she has also unlocked the Byakugou Seal, she even surpasses her senpai, Shizune.

She was also commended for her skills in taijutsu, as she had improved over the past few years. She was a lot faster, careful, and of course, stronger. Renowned for her brute strength, she was feared and respected by many.

Kakashi would sometimes think that she could surpass her shishou, as she also had the potential in genjutsu.

Sakura had finally earned her well-deserved recognition.

And at the moment, the pinkette was standing in the middle of the huge and tall gates of Konoha. Her shishou, Tsunade, told her that they would return at this very hour.

Tapping her right foot, she alerted her senses for any signs of familiar chakra signatures that were heading towards the gates.

After a few minutes of keeping herself composed under the layer of heat brought by the glaring sun, Sakura was finally informed by her instincts that there were indeed some chakra signatures nearing the gates.

Narrowing her eyes, she bent down to eye the incoming people clearly. The first thing she saw was a bright yellow man in a black and orange jumpsuit waving at her. The first thing that greeted her was a loud and high-pitched voice, "Sakura-chan! It has been so long, dattebayo!"

"Agh! I'm so hungry! Hurry up, old man!" Naruto exclaimed while wrapping his hands around his belly that was covered by his dirty, tattered, and torn jumpsuit.

Sakura, who was standing at his right side, pinched his cheek irritably. "Naruto! Will you stop moving?!"

The blonde scratched his head as he grinned sheepishly before lowering his arms down so that his teammate could treat the wounds on his arms.

After healing his arms from all the scratches, Sakura moved onto Sasuke, who had a long and thin one on his left cheek.

"So, how was your mission?" she asked the three while applying green chakra on the Uchiha's face. Only Sasuke, Sai, and Naruto were present for their gathering at Ichiraku's Ramen stand. Their sensei was out on an urgent mission.

"You should have seen how I beat the crap out of those stupid brats!" the jinchuuriki yelled enthusiastically while clenching his right fists in the air.

"You almost got fully seduced by that girl, Dickless," Sai said with a face washed out of emotions.

Naruto attempted to strangle the pale ninja but it was easy enough for the Root nin to dodge his still recovering arms.

Sakura's green eyes gleamed at what Sai said, interested at the thought of Naruto, a prankster who typically seduces adult men, being the victim.

"Oh? What specifically happened, Sai?!" she said while smiling, careful not to disrupt the recovery of Sasuke's wound.

After letting her little secret slip out of her clumsiness to Shisui's knowledge, Sakura was now more careful than ever not to give Sasuke any idea of her feelings — hence, her composed behavior around him at the moment.

Presently, the Uchiha was wearing his usual stoic expression, listening to the threesome's conversation yet not showing the slightest interest in joining them.

Naruto's cheeks heated at the thought of what had happened to him during the mission. Pouting childishly, he said, "Never mind that! What about you, Sakura-chan? Did you miss us? You were lonely, right? Ehe."

Before Sakura could shut his big mouth, Ayame, the old man's daughter and helper, answered his question for him while serving the team their tray of hot and pleasantly smelling ramen, "Oh, Sakura-chan being lonely? Oh, no. Not at all."

Before Sakura could register what the lady was saying, Ayame continued, "She had a date here with her boyfriend a few nights ago. Agh!"

Sakura did not know what the hell she was blabbering about.

But even so, the brunette resumed, "You're lucky, Sakura-chan! Your man's a looker! Black hair, black eyes, and even black clothes!" She then sighed while cupping her cheeks dreamily.

Naruto's blue eyes widened in shock.

Sai's already parted lips parted even more.

Sasuke raised his eyebrows before closing his eyes.

In an instant, an image of an extremely obnoxious Uchiha was projected inside Sakura's mind. In the next second, the thought of what happened in their festival date last night burned into the walls of her mind.

She had kissed his cheek.

The pinkette's cheeks reddened at the memory.

Little did she know that her teammates had turned to her and witnessed a lady who was blushing over the thought of her so-called "boyfriend".

"Sakura-chan! Is this true?! Who is he?!" Naruto stood up, shocked and frustrated at the same time. It came to her as no surprise. After all, her team comprised of overprotective men.

"Eh? You must be mistaken, Ayame-san," she said while smiling awkwardly with closed eyes and shaking her right hand in the air quite violently.

Sakura decided to focus her attention on Sasuke's wound, finishing it in a matter of seconds.

Her eyes skidded to Sasuke's onyx ones.

And shannaro, she swore his eyes flashed a dangerous glint.

As beads of sweat rolled down the sides of the Haruno's face, she fished out a sum of money and placed the coins on the table. "Ah! I'm so sorry, guys, but I just remembered that I still have an errand to do in the hospital."

After giving a curt wave of her hand, she excused herself and left the stand, abandoning a shocked Naruto, a surprised Sai, and a... Sasuke.

She most definitely didn't want her team to know anything about her relationship with Shisui. Silently hoping that she could still trust her pig of a best friend, she pondered the label of the Uchiha and her relationship.

They were more than just acquaintances. And it was extremely weird to classify them as friends. Before her mind could even advance onto the next possible "base", she shook her head violently and continued walking briskly towards the village hospital.

"Sakura."

The rosette's legs slowed to a stop, as did her churning wheel of thoughts. The depth of the voice that pronounced every syllable of her name raised every hair on her body. A bead of sweat rolled down her face from her right temple. Ever so slowly, she turned around to see tha man who called her.

Uchiha Sasuke stood with both hands inside his pockets. His face wore its usual calm expression.

"I'll walk with you," he said.

Konoha rained its own peaceful atmosphere, bathing the village with fresh winds and pleasant sources of light.

At the moment, silences fell upon Sakura and Sasuke, who were walking towards the hospital. It seemed like neither of them had planned on disrupting the peaceful atmosphere anytime soon.

In all honesty, Sakura didn't expect him to ask her out for a walk. It was just very unlikely of him, especially after what had happened at the ramen stand. It was, to put it simply, awkward.

Her emerald eyes secretly glanced at the man who was walking at her right side. Sasuke was looking ahead in front of him, with onyx eyes unmoving — onyx eyes that reminded her of someone else.

Quit it!

Sakura shook her head violently, shutting out the sources that projected Shisui's image in her mind.

Noticing her odd behavior, Sasuke chose to be silent about it. That was, until, Sakura's shaking was much more violent than ever.

"Is it true?" he questioned her, wearing a mask of indifference.

Upon hearing his question, the pinkette composed herself, tucking a tress of hair beneath her left ear.

She then faced him with only a little amount of confidence. It was both a yes and no. While it's true that Shisui treated her ramen nights ago, they weren't dating at all. Oh, wait. They did date last night. But, does that even count as dating? It was a blackmail of some sort. Plus, she wasn't even his girlfriend.

Realizing that it had taken her a minute to contemplate, Sakura turned to him and answered, "No, it's not."

"Then who did you go out with?" he responded almost in an instant.

Even Inner Sakura was taken aback by the Uchiha's curiosity. Wait, was he actually curious? She wasn't so certain about the reason behind his unusual behavior nor was she happy about his efforts in getting to know more about her life. Or basically prying.

Well, of course, it was something she didn't want anyone to have knowledge about. Unfortunately, Ino had already known.

Sasuke was definitely expecting a name.

A name that matched Ayame's description: black hair, black eyes, and black clothes.

The first one that popped into her mind was her teammate from ANBU Root, Sai. But alas, it was not at all possible. Sai could not have shadow cloned his way to join their mission with Sasuke. Her pig of a best friend would kill her if she knew that they were dating.

The second one, well, had black eyes and hair. However, his outfit was way too flashy for her type, let alone be all-black. After all, Rock Lee was a lover of tight green spandexes, something she had learnt to tolerate.

The third person matched the description pretty well, seeing as he had spiky black hair, dead black eyes, and the occasional black street clothes. Everything went well for the Haruno until it occurred to her that she could cause inconveniences for Shikamaru, and maybe even his girlfriend from Suna.

And so Sakura was left with the option to be stupid.

"Maybe Ayame-san thought it was me, but it really wasn't. It may seem like I'm the only girl with pink hair in this village, but that's not at all true," she explained with a convincing facade.

And while Sakura may have her own little stupid moments, Sasuke had none.

He squinted his eyes a little due to the sun's rays burning into his sable eyes. Sakura gulped, hoping that he was pretty convinced, even though it had taken her a few minutes to respond.

"Are your feelings still the same?" Sasuke asked.

Utterly, the question made the kunoichi inwardly choke on a nonexistent bowl of ramen. Really, what was he getting at?

As she pondered for the answer, streaks of crimson were drawn on her cheeks. She had no idea why he was so interested, especially about her love life.

It took a heavy load of guts for the pink-haired kunoichi's 13-year-old self to confess to him about her feelings. For some inexplicable reason, it was not as hard as before now. Nonetheless, all the weight was owned by her feelings of pure surprise.

She took a deep breath and turned to look him in the eyes before saying, "Yeah."

Sakura didn't need blood red eyes with circling commas to catch the split-second moment wherein the Uchiha's eyes widened a little over her response.

What was he so surprised about?

Looking down at the ground, Sasuke blinked a few times before lifting his chin up to eye her.

He parted his lips to reply, but before words could even leave his tongue, two tall shinobis appeared before them.

Onyx eyes and hair.

Sakura was startled to see Uchiha Itachi and Shisui, who had teleported their way to their spot. Her eyes laid glances on Sasuke's own to check up on him. And very much to her surprise, his eyes hinted a mild pinch of irritation.

Shifting from her position awkwardly, the pinkette licked her lips and bit the lower part. Instinctively, she peeked at Shisui from the corner of her eyes.

Their eyes met for a second.

In an instant, she averted her gaze and decided to make the three Uchihas think that her polished toenails were worth praising. She didn't want them to know just how flustered she was from last night's date.

But something was bugging her. She could not understand why the eyes she had met just now were dead and even in some ways... cold.

With the jitters in her mind, little did she know that to Itachi, she was as easy as an open book. The 21-year-old prodigy wondered what on earth could have happened between the two in his absence. The aura around them was odd, and he couldn't help but derive from the contemplation the possibility that a development was formed from their little hospital moment weeks ago.

Interrupting their train of thoughts, Sasuke questioned impatiently, "What do you want?"

Itachi effortlessly blinked his curiosity away. "Otou-san told me to call you."

Grunting under his breath, Sasuke shifted his gaze to Sakura expectantly, with a little amount of worry in his eyes over the abruptness of their conversation.

She gave him a look of reassurance, which cleared the very small bits that wrapped his existent conscience.

After a poof of smoke replaced his spot, everything became awfully quiet. While it was evident that silence had fallen upon the threesome, Sakura couldn't help but selfishly believe that Shisui was the reason for the awkwardness.

He was silent.

To the point of being cold.

For Kami's sake, she had been trying to get his attention that was nowhere near her unnoticeable efforts. However, it seemed that he was... ignoring her.

What did I do?

For the record, their last interaction was an exchange of farewells after Sakura had insisted on walking him to his house last night.

Was he that annoyed by the... other interaction?

That much?

A pang of pain groped her chest and the pinkette couldn't understand why. She decided that it did really hurt to be ignored by a... friend.

Who the hell does that guy think he is? Shannaro, I don't care.

Meanwhile, Itachi was carefully observing the two again. He could sense that Shisui was well aware of the fact that he could read other people's minds easily the way he can. However, Itachi was certain that his cousin was trying his best to conceal his irritation over whatever was bothering him. What with his dead expression and all.

"I need to go to the Hokage's tower. I'll be taking my leave, Itachi-kun and uh, Shisui-san," Sakura voiced out as she bowed in respect.

Itachi nodded, replying, "Take care, Sakura."

Sakura made a little effort to turn to the other Uchiha, expecting even a little grunt from him. Anything at all!

But Uchiha Shisui's onyx eyes were wandering off somewhere else.

Jealous Shisui is sexy. Yall agree? Yes? Yes?

Well then, more jealous Shisui in the next chapter.