Consolidated, nipped, and tucked to my heart's content. Now I just need to write new material and somehow finish this thing before I get irritated with it and go on another re-write rampage...

Rampant Imagination

The day wore on into evening, and Sakura eventually found herself on lunch break at a time far past noon. Gratefully taking a few moments to shut her eyes, she cleared her mind as best she could; it needed the rest.

More rest than she had gotten the previous night, that's for sure.

Freaking Kiba. Doesn't he have other people he can bother? I mean, we're friends and all, but I'm sure he has others closer to him that are far more used to his boyish antics and asshattery.

She was still angry about that morning, though the anger had simmered into an unpleasant essence of regret over time. By hospital policy, she had every right to yell at him, but he had actually helped as opposed to the people getting paid to work there who had done nothing but scurry around like so many cockroaches.

Unhelpful cockroaches.

So, being the kind-hearted soul she was at least half of the time, Sakura felt ever so slightly remorseful. She doubted he was all that hurt by her outburst, but one could never tell with men.

Though he's hardly a man… Could be if he tried, I'm sure, but right now, he's just a guy... Definitely not the same thing.

Not many people realized it, but Guys and Men were extremely different. Both hid their emotions from the fairer sex generally, but Men were the better choice if a lady wanted to have an actual relationship. Men had broad shoulders, and strong arms to hold you with when you cried; they didn't mind you crying either. They would tell you how beautiful you were even when you didn't feel like it. Parents loved Men, and usually felt pretty good about leaving their precious baby girl with them.

Guys, on the other hand, were more keen on making fart noises with their armpits, to be unbearably cliché. A Guy's smile was fun and full of hilarity, but rarely held anything serious behind it. 'Relationship' was the most taboo word to bring up with a Guy, followed closely by 'talk', 'kids' (probably worse than 'relationship', actually, but 'relationship' had a tendency of popping up first), and 'anniversary' (only because Hell would freeze over before they remembered one). Any chance flowers and chocolate were hand-picked and picked over when they were thought of at all.

Kiba is such a guy. It's really too bad that he needs to find a steady someone soon, because he just doesn't seem ready to have an actual girlfriend. If Naruto is any standard to go by, he may never be. Sakura let out a deep sigh, puffing her cheeks out contemplatively. Then again, Kiba's probably better off than Naruto is... Not that I'm really the best person to judge Naruto on his romantic capacity anymore.

Sakura thought back to even earlier that morning, when the dog ninja had been running his mouth off like the Guy he is; but he had at least noticed when he said something stupid, and felt bad about it... That was a start, right? He wasn't a bad guy or a dumb guy, just a… guy guy. Yeah.

Sakura shook her head and sunk further into the uncomfortable couch in the staff lounge, which was surprisingly empty. Definitely a plus, as it gave her time to think without distraction, an impossible task in every other place she could think to be. And she needed to be able to think, because for reasons she could not fathom at the moment, she felt slightly obligated to help Kiba out. Maybe it was because while she'd known forever that he was like this, she hadn't been exposed to a good dose of Kiba for some time; and since he'd presented his problems to her personally, perhaps the part of her that just wanted to help people, that just wanted to use the knowledge accumulated in that big brain of hers, was simply reaching out to a friend in need. She began considering lessons for the dog ninja, a series of skills for him to learn so that he could actually hook someone.

'Can I buy you a drink? What's your name? What's your sign? Do you like babies? Wanna have some soon?' Yeah, that'd go over like a stack of bricks.

She considered various approaches, but gave up after a few minutes. Thinking about dating was giving her a migraine. There was a reason she didn't do it very often.

Dating... What's even the point of it? Why waste time and money going out with someone if all you really want to do is boink 'em in the end? As far as she could tell, that was the only real main objective, unless of course someone's biological clock was ticking, and the few guys who had approached her had not been that far advanced in age.

Naruto was the only guy she would agree to go on dates with anymore, and that was only because they were practically siblings now.

And that was really a crying shame. Some truly magnificent relationships had been spawned out of lengthy friendships. It's almost like you can only really fall in love with someone if you already know them and know they can make you happy.

Actually, yes. That's exactly what it was like. Sure, dating was all about getting to know the other person, but the underlying sentiment of the evening still seemed, to Sakura, a constant elephant in the room, hiding badly beneath the playful banter and expensive food.

Ino-pig's romantic history is the perfect example of this. How many years did she spend roaming the male population of Konoha before she noticed Chouji? He's not hard to miss or anything, but the point is that he has been a presence in her life from the very beginning. I mean, their fathers were on a team together, weren't they? It was just a matter of time, really.

Sakura grumbled to herself and decided some coffee might be nice. It was the typical hospital brew (see: gross), but it was steaming and eased a bit of the tension out of her shoulders as she slumped against the counter.

Then Kiba's face loomed in her mind, grinning in a fashion annoyingly similar to Naruto on a mischievous day, though wilder. Sakura attempted to distract herself by taking larger sips of the terrible coffee, burning her mouth with bad flavor more than heat, but it was hardly effective; her physically weakened state made it easier to lose control of her mind as well, so when the dog nin's face refused to disappear back into the darkness from whence it came, she gave in to the thoughts that had been darting in and out of her mind all day when she wasn't paying attention, musing over the relative comfort she found in his presence.

There was comfort there, she conceded grudgingly, unexpected as it was. That didn't make it any less real.

Well, he is a mild clone of Naruto… And there's the shinobi kinship thing to consider… I mean, we've all laid down our lives for this village at one point or another, and we were both elements of the good old Rookie Nine. Those kinds of things connect people all the time. It's pretty cool, actually, that this can happen.

A voice of reason (maybe) broke through her consciousness: you know what else is cool? Rivers in Egypt.

Sakura's eyes flew open and she paused, reconsidering the rogue statement. I don't get it… Which is incredibly stupid. Am I thinking this or am I thinking this?

She got a flash of memory in response… she and Kiba were sitting at her table – his heathen consumption of the soup she had so caringly heated up in the microwave resulted in a comment from her, which sparked a challenge from him – animal eyes, infused with an emotion she could not place and was quite possibly making up – a curl of something in her stomach…

Obviously it's just comfort, right? Foolish, foolish...

Sakura shook her head violently. She really needed a nap. A tired imagination can take you dangerous places.

WHY, I will question again, WHY must I always be wrong about the irritating shit?

The cougar was hot on Kiba's tail. After fifteen minutes of ducking down alleys and trying to hide among the few people around (the crowds chose a great time to go home), he managed to lose her by taking a corner at breakneck speeds and rolling behind a dumpster. Her rapidly clicking heels faded into the distance, and Kiba allowed himself a moment to breathe. Then he hit the rooftops, scanning for a landmark that would lead him to Sakura's place.

I hope this isn't some kind of trend, me ending up at her place after being chased by the wrong kinds of women... She'll skin me for bothering her so much, provided that she hasn't already by that point. Kiba grimaced, giving up on his eyes (no use at all) and putting his nose to work to find her apartment. Or maybe I give her too little credit. I mean, she hasn't killed Naruto once in all these years, and he's so much worse than me.

Suddenly, the vile specimen he thought he had avoided popped up in front of him like a Jack-in-the-Box. And since he had never gotten over that one particular nightmare, he screamed like a small child and threw himself backwards. Unfortunately, backwards meant directly over the edge of the building he had just landed on. He fell, in slow motion…

…onto a comfortable-ish couch. He blinked up at a ceiling (not his) and wondered why he couldn't manage to dream up something more awesome to land in, such as a large vat of pudding, or a sparkling pool teeming with babes. Maybe a pool filled with pudding and babes.

Then he clued into the fact that he recognized this couch. And the ceiling. And that dead ficus, watching him pathetically from the windowsill.

"Wait... That was a dream. I was dreaming and I'm at Sakura's... Wait, I'm at Sakura's? Again?"

The couch did not respond. The ceiling was far too lofty a character to comment (HA). The ficus, had it been alive, would probably have been able to fill in the details if it grew a mouth. Alas, for it was not so.

Kiba listened carefully, scenting the air for any odd and/or dangerous female smells. All he smelled was Sakura. He stared at the ficus.

"Maybe it was all a dream. Did I even go to the hospital this morning?"

The ficus stared back disconcertingly. Kiba glared at it for a moment and then gave up. How could he win a staring contest with something that had no eyes? It would totally never blink.

He peeked around the apartment and briefly out the door, just to be safe, then locked himself in, confident that the denizen in his dream had stayed there. He must have dozed off after she gave him his clothes... She had been called into the hospital, something important, he followed her... No, that had to be when he'd fallen asleep. Why would he follow her? That didn't make any sense at all. But when did dreams ever do that? Confident with this analysis, he headed back over to the couch; it was a quiet thing, but friendly enough to butts.

And so the boy miraculously proceeded to forget everything that had happened that day, just like he did all his dreams...

Until Sakura got home, that is.

Finally, FINALLY, she was allowed to leave, if only because she was completely drained of chakra and therefore of little to no use anymore.

Also, Tsunade had personally dragged her outside and literally kicked her butt in the direction of home.

Though it was really more of a gentle nudge with the toe of her shoe, because even though she was the mother of tough, the Fifth still had a soft spot for her apprentice. Even when that stupid apprentice overworked herself on lower-than-normal chakra reserves and a too-obvious lack of sleep. Even when she kept trying to turn back, muttering incoherently about some kid with severe burns on his leg, though Tsunade knew for a fact that the last burn victim they'd received had come in last week.

"GO HOME, Sakura. Please. And call when you get there, would you? I can't take you myself and I'm not very confident in your basic capabilities right now, so don't make me worry."

"Okaaaaaaay, okaaaaaaaaaaay. Gotcha. Call, home, yes, sleep, hrmb." With this eloquent farewell, Sakura toddled off home. Tsunade stared after her for a moment, then rushed back into the hospital to try and find someone to help the girl get home safely (that guy with the broken spine wasn't going anywhere), confidence running completely out. She was met, however, with the same problem as Sakura: unhelpful cockroaches.

And then some actual cockroaches that were spewing from a fresh hole in the wall, created by a runaway gurney.

Sakura managed to make it all the way to her building and all the way up the stairs before her legs gave out. She crawled slowly to her door and unlocked it, falling halfway in.

Good enough. She yawned immensely and had just dozed off when… Kiba?

No, no. I'm dreaming. He wouldn't still be in my apartment… would he? But then he asked if any cougars had followed her home and that sealed it. She murmured a blissful negative and let the darkness take her.

Kiba's only warning this time had been a muffled thump out in the hall, and then the door was swinging open. He had just jumped behind the couch when his nose registered a wave of Sakura smell in the air, faint under a miasma of antiseptic and blood.

He immediately hopped over to help her up, as she seemed to have tripped, tactfully checking to see if she had any visitors he didn't know about (he knew it was all a dream, but better safe than sorry; luck had been treating him pretty nice lately, but maybe she was just putting him off his guard). When asked directly, however, Sakura merely mumbled at him, smiled like an angel, and conked out.

Kiba snorted. "You seem pretty cozy here. Is it a habit of yours to sleep in the hallway? Just because the Hokage does it sometimes doesn't mean you should follow her example."

I mean, she drinks all the time, doesn't she? Surely she's passed out in a hallway or some other conspicuous place before. He thought it was pretty clever.

In any event, he may as well have been talking to the ficus for all the response he got. So, with a sigh, Kiba hauled the surprisingly heavy girl to the couch, figuring that if she were awake, she probably wouldn't want to inconvenience anyone who might have to walk past her door. Also, she would probably not be lying there in the first place, though he couldn't say for sure. People were weird.

The Hokage probably drank herself into oblivion on a regular basis, but Sakura was clearly passed out from exhaustion instead of alcohol. Besides the fact that this only made sense, he would have smelled the liquor on her; also she didn't strike him as a very hard drinker. If she drank at all, it was probably just girly shit like wine coolers and that pink drink that smelled like vodka-soaked cranberries.

Last night's bar fiasco was more on his mind than he'd thought it would be... Rolling his eyes for a nonexistent audience, Kiba forced the unpleasant (albeit spotty) recall from his head and turned his attention to the pinkette once more, studying the hollows under her eyes and the droop of her mouth.

She must've had a really hard day. Hopefully she yells at me again about waking her up. Seeing her like this just makes me feel like an ass all over again. It's not like she would ever take the rest of the day off just because she'd lost some sleep... That's just not how Sakura is. Even after that team was safe, I'm sure she wanted to check that those idiots working under her hadn't almost killed anyone else. Something was strange about this, though; Kiba usually never felt bad about idiotic things he'd done after the initial wave of shame had passed.

Maybe it's because she's scary when she's conscious... Anyway, what can I even do? I don't... You know, I'll bet she hardly ate anything today. Yeah, I should make her some food! If she won't rest when she's tired, she probably doesn't break when she's hungry either. He shook his head. Poor little hardass... I hope she has eggs.

He had just finished beating the eggs for an omelet to end all omelets (the only edible thing he could make) when the phone rang. He ignored it, remembering Sakura's less than pleasant response the last time he'd answered her phone (and yes, she was out cold, but he'd have to take a message and then she'd know, wouldn't she?). Then the answering machine clicked on and assailed his ears with a barrage of swearing inappropriate for that time of day. So he picked up the phone in order to give this idiot some insight into why 2:26 AM was far too early to be cussing like that into some stranger's answering machine.

And the Hokage's voice responded, "WHO THE HELL IS THIS? SAKURA! I'M SENDING SOMEONE!"

"INUZUKA KIBA, MA'AM! SAKURA'S FINE, JUST PASSED OUT ON THE COUCH AND I'M MAKING HER SOME DINNER, I'M SORRY, PLEASE DON'T SEND PEOPLE TO KILL ME, SHE'S ALREADY GOING TO KILL ME WHEN SHE FINDS OUT THAT I ANSWERED THE PHONE!"

The line was silent. Then: "Inuzuka? Is that so… Huh."

"Um, yeah? What's so? Am I still gonna be iced? I would rather eat fish than sleep with them, for the record."

Kiba listened in confusion as the Hokage laughed, her tone becoming surprisingly light considering she had almost just sicced some ANBU black ops all over his ass.

"Oh, no, you're fine! I just wouldn't have thought you to be her type, that's all. I would've bet on Naruto out of everyone, but… well, actually, that seals the deal, doesn't it. You're both so alike, that must be wh—"

Kiba spluttered into the receiver. "W-what are you on? We're not dating, I'm just making her dinner."

"…And she's sleeping on the couch. Funny how much she trusts you considering you two aren't involved…"

Kiba opened his mouth to retort that she hadn't quite made it through the door, so it's not like she was consciously giving him this trust, but then he thought about what that would imply.

And yes, while he had been in her apartment before she got there, it wasn't like he was waiting for her or anything…

Though he couldn't think of any other reason why he was there. There were more comfortable couches to sleep on around the village. And he had completely forgotten about the laundry, so no excuse there.

"...That's what I thought. Your hesitance is almost cute. Fine, take good care of her, then. If you ever hurt her, I'll tear your arms off, among other things." And the line went dead. Kiba took a long minute to put the phone back down.

WHAT?

His brain had barely started wrestling with the idea that the Hokage thought he and Sakura were an item when his consciousness sparked.

He was just a regular idiot.

He was just a regular idiot.

Kiba was a regular idiot, and Sakura had a history of being able to deal with regular idiots. And if Naruto could be one of her favorite people, why not Kiba too?

His mind clicked around slowly. If we could just get together, then I've got a girl and my clan will shut up. It's not like they'd have to know it was fake... And then I could relax a bit and focus calmer energies towards finding an actual mate! Sakura's been helpful towards that end anyway, I don't see why it would matter if we were pretending to be dating in the process. And maybe my involvement would spur some hidden suitors into action. She would appreciate that, right? Kiba couldn't tell if he was having a stroke of genius or just planning something else for Sakura to roll her eyes at. But friends helped friends, as Shino said, and surely he'd had worse ideas in the past...

This... This could fix everything. Temporarily, but temporary is all that's required. A temporary set-up until we both find somebody else, at which point we'll move on with our lives.

He hoped Sakura would be in a giving mood when she woke up... Unlikely.

...Better make a damn good omelet.