Disclaimer: Does not own Naruto and other related .. Stuff.
Author's Notes: For all you NaruSaku lovers.. D-sama summarized everything I'm going to do with her and Naruto with one simple word. Fling. That's right a fling. Nothing more, nothing less. I don't really understand how you people could even ask that. In the summary its specifically says NaruTen or NaruTem. I even said I hated Sakura in the last chapter. Though, with that last scene, I probably threw you guys into a whack, huh? I hope I haven't deterred any readers because of that.. but a lot of the general populace of fan fiction just isn't realistic. I'm a teenager myself. And I certainly don't see anyone going out with just one person throughout high school. I'm so tired of these looser-like individual who can't see a character with another character because it's supposedly against "cannon". Just what the fuck is cannon? SasuSaku? SasuIno? And I figured out what I'm doing with Hinata. Nothing. That's right. Nothing. She probably won't even make an appearance in this story. Okay.. That's an exaggeration but you get the point.
And sorry if all the character interaction seems dry or boring. I just can't write those out all that good.
Warning:Um. What certain characters say does not necessarily portray my thoughts on said subject.
Last chapter
" Sakura was still laughing when Naruto kissed her. Oddly enough, instead of pulling back, she responded quite passionately. She wrapped an arm around his neck and let her free hand comb through his wild, golden hair.
And for the first time in years, Sakura and Naruto were relaxed."
Chapter 3
What attracts people towards one another can be a very fickle thing. Pre-teen girls normally drooled at the more mature males. Hell, most women do. They wanted them to be serious, intelligent, and of course, powerful. Well, except for the few exceptions that immediately falls for the underdog.
But those were some of the main reasons many growing kunoichi felt so drawn to mister dark and brooding Sasuke. Obviously. And the fact that Sasuke rose to the expectations, it made him appear even more attractive than he already was. It's a psychological thing, really.
Take Naruto for example. You couldn't exactly call him ugly. He would claim to be the most lovable and adorable shinobi around, but no one tends to listen to him anyhow. But many females would feel no attraction towards him because of his loud and brash behavior. The fact that he appeared to be weak because of his poor marks didn't help much either.
He was seen as immature. And once the female minds tags that to his description, their mind warps his appearance somewhat, making him seem ugly.
If you were to switch Naruto's and Sasuke's bodies, females would still be drawn to Sasuke, despite looking like Naruto. It's the character and first impressions that count. Naruto's character was childish, and his joy for pranks and jokes just wrote him off the list of the desirables.
These were the thoughts swimming in Haruno, Sakura's large brain. Though she chuckled at the thought of Sasuke attempting to do Naruto's Sexy no jutsu.
But, her life would have been happier if she had developed her puppy love with anyone else. Anyone. Shikamaru, or even that quiet cute kid who always sat in the back.
If she wasn't so stuck up on Sasuke, her friendship with Ino could have been deeper than what it was.
If she wasn't so stuck up on Sasuke, her Genin days would have been so much more enjoyable.
She could blame Sasuke, but that would do her no good. Even Sasuke had told her to take a nin's life more seriously. She hadn't.
She had no one to blame but herself. But alas, that is the first step to change. Admit the problem and take responsibility.
So here she was, flat on her back, in a very compromising position with Naruto.
It wasn't too uncomfortable, she supposed. She could have done worse; in fact, she didn't think she could do better.
His face finally grew up, leaving the entire amount of baby fat it held behind. Instead of round, it was hard and chiseled. He was definitely a little more than cute.
And he was powerful. Almost ridiculously powerful. Every little plan, every little trick she learned and used, it was nothing to Naruto.
Even if she'd known about his peculiar clones, there wasn't much she could have done anyway. And the fact that he was holding back so much pretty much shattered any amount of pride in her progress over the years.
Still, it didn't hurt her that much, considering it was Naruto and all. He wouldn't gloat about something and throw it in your face later. He's simply not the type to do that.
With all that said, Sakura nearly pulled her hair out.
What is fucking wrong with you!
Inner Sakura had been rather quiet as of late, but with today's turn of events, the Inner Sakura was annoyed as hell.
I stay quiet for two bloody years for you to get over yourself, and when finally someone perfect comes in your life, you're not fucking attracted!
"This coming from a person who just several hours earlier was trying to persuade me that he's a sick little man whore?" Sakura was more than annoyed with Saky's erratic behavior.
Inner Sakura continued to rant while Sakura practically poured her soul into the kiss.
Her hands were roaming all over his body. And despite him having a firm body, along with a nice rump, she just couldn't, enjoy herself.
She suckled his lower lip and invaded his mouth. His mouth tasted familiar but she was too busy wrestling with his tongue to pin point it.
"Oh my God.." The actual Sakura began. Her voice was shaking so much Inner Sakura actually stopped cursing. "Do you think.. I could be.."
Inner Sakura's eyes widened and immediately strangled Sakura. There's a sight for you.
Don't you dare say it! You say it I swear I'll kill you! Inner Sakura raged.
"Don't- be so delusional!" She mentally sputtered for a moment, being strangled in real life and in her own mind was equally dangerous. She hardly noticed when her body moaned from Naruto's ministrations.
"It's obvious! Why else would I feel absolutely nothing towards a person like him?" What had started out as a loud retort, finished in a hoarse whisper.
Inner Sakura crawled off her counter part, crossing her arms and looking away, clearly miffed.
Fine. Be a bloody dyke. See if I care. That was the first time Inner Sakura had used a volume of voice that wouldn't break sound barriers. But with that tone like that, Sakura wished she had yelled instead.
With that, Inner Sakura promptly shoved Sakura out of her corner of the mind, throwing her back into reality without warning. From a dark room with hazy white lines, to flat on your back on the ground with Naruto right on top of you, it wasn't an ideal situation that one would be comfortable in. It wasn't that she was completely unaware when talking to her counterpart, but it was enough to surprise the hell out of her when Saky booted her into the real world.
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Naruto was more or less enjoying himself. One does not get into a position like that and not get his blood pumping to the nether regions. It was just a normal guy thing. And Sakura's hands were wild, pinching and groping whatever she could. And when she invaded his mouth it got even hotter.
Her mouth held the distinct flavor of gum. Some sort of mint, but all that didn't matter.
He broke the kiss before tracing kisses from her rear jaw line to her chin, then finally going down and licking gently around her throat. It was all instinct for him. He felt like he was doing something right. When she moaned it urged him even more.
Right at that particular moment, everything was put into prospective. Sort of.
So the majority of the village didn't like him, which resulted in such a rotten childhood that it's a wonder he wasn't insane. Big deal.
Who cares that his supposed closest friend finally said they were friends, but then proceeded to try and almost succeeded in killing him. It happens. Well, not really, but he always knew Sasuke had more than his share of screws loosed.
And what if there were a group of nine preposterously powerful idiots trying to get him for what was sleeping deep inside him. He could always warp his ass out of there.
But the moment was killed. That happens when said girl suddenly gasps and shrieks as if you're taking advantage of her, sputtering your name as if she's afraid you'll rape her.
Naruto immediately sprang off her and stood up, observing her wearily.
What was it? Is she still clinging to her childhood crush on Sasuke? Using him as a replacement? Fell into her own self-delusion of Naruto is Sasuke and finally broke out of it and is now more than a little disgruntled that its just him?
Naruto frowned. He just can't catch a break. His stress was growing and turned into a mind-numbing headache now.
Everything was rushing back to him.
The village.
Sasuke.
The threat of a bunch of powerful freaks after his hide.
There's no peace for me!
So much for putting your problems in perspective. He exhaled slowly. He didn't want to hurt her in his state of frustration..
But rejection, even in small ways, hurt.
He shifted his focus back to Sakura who was slowly getting up. She looked a little flush and looked very apologetic.
"Naruto.. I-" Whatever she was about to say, it was cut off by Naruto.
"It's fine, Sakura." He sighed. He had half a mind to just yell at her, but that wouldn't do either of them any good. "I was just caught up in the moment, yah know? I didn't really mean for it to go that far."
"It's not-" He cut her off again by raising his hand.
"It's fine. Don't worry about it." Naruto's voice was stern and left no room for opposition. Highly uncharacteristic of him. It unnerved Sakura enough that she couldn't get a thought in otherwise. He knew he was being stubborn by not listening, but at the moment, he just didn't give a damn.
He walked off disappearing into the woods, totally forgetting that he was supposed to stay and wait for Kakashi. He listened to the leaves crunching under his sandals only to hear another set behind him. He only passed a few more trees when he turned around and noticed Sakura tried to follow him. Her mouth was moving but he didn't hear anything.
Strange. He sighed again, but had an idea to keep him busy and warped straight into Tsunade's office.
Looking around, it was odd that Tsunade wasn't around. Hell, he couldn't even sense that many people in the building altogether.
Where is everyone?
He shrugged it off and lounged in her chair. It was pretty damn comfortable. He could understand why people sometimes complained on how often she slept at the desk.
Looking around at her desk he noticed two pictures.
One was Tsunade with two other guys. One of them looked very young, almost like when he was a young brat. It didn't occur to Naruto that his era of being a useless brat was merely two years ago.
The other was a rather handsome man with a lighter tone of sliver hair than Kakashi's. His hair was long and was allowed to hang freely.
They seemed to be standing at the railing of the Hokage monument, Tsunade and the man standing side by side, each holding the kids shoulder.
He suddenly remembered who they were. It was Dan and Tsunade's little brother. Naruto couldn't remember his name because she never gave him one. It peeved him a little, but couldn't exactly complain. If she didn't want to tell him her brother's name, then so be it.
It was like a happy little family. Her happy little family, till they were both killed in a stupid war.
Feeling a little depressed at the picture, he tore his eyes away from it to look at the other one. This one he was more than familiar with. He even had one in his bag somewhere at home.
It was he, Jiraiya, Tsunade, and Shizune during their excursion back to Konoha to have Tsunade as the new Hokage.
Shizune had an arm around his neck; both were smiling happily at the camera. Like normal people should.
But Tsunade and Jiraiya was a different story. At the time, Jiraiya was ogling at some girl and Tsunade told him to stop being an idiot and smile at the camera.
The cameraman ended up taking the picture while Tsunade was strangling the hermit.
Jiraiya asked to redo it, but the three of them agreed and said they liked it the way it was.
Naruto grinned fondly at the memory.
That one whole trip back was almost more endearing this his whole time with team seven.
With them he wasn't constantly trying to get attention. With them he wasn't ridiculed or ignored. Let alone getting killed.
It was like a long over due vacation for him.
Leaning back into the chair, he continued to reminisce all the good times he had. His experience with Iruka, and he made note to visit him sometime soon, the pleasant times with team seven, that small fraction of a month with Tsunade and the gang, and of course his little burst of adventure with the sand siblings.
Who could forget the time they made actual friends? The relationship between team seven was forced. If they were never on a team, Sakura would still be his distant crush. And he and Sasuke would have never really spoken to each other.
With the sand siblings it was so much different.
He didn't have to prove anything. Though, he did prove a lot by knocking some sense into Gaara. The base of the relationship might have been fueled a bit my awe and heroism, but with him younger than them and him not being a cocky little dick, getting along with them was easy.
Especially Temari. What can one expect? Spending months with a particularly lovely looking woman, you can't help but grow fond of her. Even if she was quick with a mouth and could literally knock up winds that'll blow your ass sky high.
She wasn't like many typical females. She didn't waste precious hours of the morning to look nice or try to appease anyone. She just did what was necessary.
Kankuro was.. Well.. Naruto didn't know how to explain him. He was a mean bastard and Naruto didn't like him much from that one experience with him before the Chuunin Exams. But they got used to each other, and despite Kankuro being older and supposedly more "mature", he was the one who advised Naruto in doing over half of the crap they pulled.
Childish, but that didn't bother him much.
Then there was Gaara. He wasn't as cold as before, but you wouldn't openly hug him without risking loosing a few limbs.
Somehow, Gaara even knew of the Kyuubi. Naruto questioned him on but responded rather vaguely.
"Its obvious, you blond fool."
He didn't mind Gaara knowing though. After all, he knew of Shukaku. But he just had to tell Temari. Naruto was worried about her avoiding him because of Kyubi, but his worries were cast to rest when she smiled and said there was nothing to worry about. Naruto continued to just sit there. Not exactly doing or even thinking about anything in particular.
But what he did with Sakura just minutes ago sprang up. Even though it felt like someone stabbed him when it seemed like she realized she didn't want to be kissing him, he felt a little better. He dreamed of her the first few months with Jiraiya. And now that his childhood fantasy has been made into reality, he felt that he could move on.
Move on and accept the fact that no one will ever be his.
Putting that extremely depressing thought aside, it just hit him that he was in the Hokage's office without supervision. An office that was full of files of answers to questions that were burning in his head ever since Sasuke first spoke of wanting to kill someone.
He began rummaging through the shelves with a new goal in mind.
The Uchiha massacre.
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Sakura should have expected him to be upset. With her reaction of being thrown out of her own mind, she would have been hurt too. But he wouldn't let her explain. He was being so stubborn. And oddly scary.
When he started to walk into the forest, she followed yelling and hollering at him with the intent to smack some listening skills through that thick skull of his, but he didn't seem to hear and vanished somehow. Not a trace of him anywhere.
Was he really that fast?
No. But she doesn't know that. It suddenly dawned on her that they were supposed to waiting for Kakashi at the clearing. A burst of anger seeped through her emotions at the repeatedly tardy Jounin. This whole mess was rooted at him. If he had bothered to come on time for once, she wouldn't have sparred with Naruto. She wouldn't have ended up playing with Naruto's tongue. She wouldn't have..
She shook her head as she climbed the hill. Her conversation with her alter ego still rang through her mind.
Kakashi wasn't the problem. Okay that's going too far, he's still a big part of this.
"Yo." An aloof greeting rang before her.
Speak of the devil.
"Ka-ka-shi-sensei." Sakura uttered through clenched teeth.
Kakashi stepped back and blinked. Giving her a good look over, he noticed the clenching and un-clenching of the hands, there was a vain on the side of her forehead on the verge of popping, and her expression was a horrible scowl. He gave a small groan.
Dealing with ticked off females was not how he wanted to begin his day. Then again, the beginning of most of his day started by his "daily reading" so he couldn't exactly complain.
"What did I do now?" He asked tiredly. She had a weird yet acute way of pinning blame on him. She could probably convince a person that the reason humans can't breathe under water was solely his fault.
She started rambling at which Kakashi zoned out. He wasn't immune to her convincing powers. If he listened, he'll more than likely feel guilty and apologize for something that was not his fault.
Bloody teenagers with a brain.
He absently wondered where was Naruto. He glanced at his watch and it was on cue for him to start listening.
"- hadn't come so damn late, he wouldn't have asked me to fight and we would had definitely not kissed, which leaves us in this whole mess!" She finished, taking in large amounts of air for her deflated lungs.
Kakashi was a little more than confused. They fought and ended up kissing? Why couldn't he manage to do something like that? The luck of that blond sometimes. It was either so utterly horrible, or it was something that only old perverts daydream about.
"So I take it that Naruto's a horrible kisser?" He inquired smiling. Then again, you couldn't really tell if Kakashi really was smiling..
"Of course not! But-" She abruptly stopped at what she just said and immediately blushed.
"That was the only thing you heard, wasn't it?" She shrieked as she poked him in the chest with one finger.
"Of course I was listening. But where is Naruto?" It sounded a bit sarcastic at first, but the question was sincere enough.
Sakura huffed and crossed her arms.
"I don't know." Her head turned to the side.
Kakashi sighed.
"C'mon. Today's the day they pick teams for the Chunin Exams."
Sakura's eyes widened.
Kakashi frowned. "Don't tell me you forgot."
She smiled impishly.
"Eh.." Sakura blushed even more.
"Never mind. Hurry, we have to find Naruto quickly or we can't get you two in." He started to sprint and soon enough the pair was darting forward in the trees side by side.
"But sensei," She started.
"Hmm?" He responded, but kept his head facing forward. They were running in the forest at first, but Kakashi veered back to towards the village. Naruto probably wouldn't stay moping around the forest for long.
"I thought you needed a team of… three to participate?" It was odd. There were only two of them. She hoped they wouldn't just stick someone on her team, someone she wasn't comfortable with.
"In Konoha, yes. But this year's event is going to be a collaboration between the Sand and us at their village. So things are going to be a bit different. Not to mention more interesting."
"Interesting?" She asked.
"Yeah. Cause' I'm one of the examiners." Kakashi stifled a laugh as Sakura almost slipped off one the branches.
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Someone was worried about me writing about the breakdown of Naruto's psyche. Don't worry about that. That was the whole point of the scene with Jiraiya and Tsunade. I'm not good enough to depict the torment that Naruto no doubt went through. Which is weird since Kishimoto and his board just totally neglected.
Please Sakura lovers (if there is any) don't give me that bull of how she confessed her love for him. She was 12 or 13 for crying out loud. A teenager's mind is fickle. Most anyway.
If you read all of my author-notes, thanks for listening. Now flame me just simply because you're offended at my opinion. I know someone will be bound to do that.
And only one person who reviewed said something that really made me do a "Huh?".
Blazer-6, you are such a pervert. Hahahaha! Though, you have spurred me to write something that's going to be rated NC-17 with TenNaruTem. Kage Bunshins are going to be used evilly. (Snickers)
Much love to all who reviewed.