"What the hell are you doing?"
The question asked by the confused Uchiha caused her to choke on the stem, making her eyes water and her throat hurt.
However, as life-threatening as the situation may have been, the pinkette didn't fail to blush as red as the sun when he wrapped his arms around her midsection and heaved; a rather awkward form of the Heimlich maneuver.
Up the cherry stem came, scratching her trachea as it went, until it was spat out, tied in a perfect knot, onto the wood floor of Haruno Sakura's living room.
Flashback…
Sakura was very nervous. She'd just called Uchiha Sasuke and invited him over to her place for dinner, since her parents were out for the weekend. It was one of their very rare days off, and she planned to make the best of it.
At first, the stoic ninja had declined, but a few minutes later he called her back and said he'd be over in an hour.
Since then, the pink Kunoichi had been practicing one of her new obsessions: Cherry stem-tying.
In the mouth, of course.
She'd first heard of it while flipping through one of her old magazines and a picture of a huge cherry smacked her in the face. Underneath the picture was an article saying that if you could tie the stem of a cherry into a knot in your mouth, you were a good kisser.
At first it'd seemed ridiculous, nothing to pay any mind to, until a certain Uchiha crossed her mind. She thought of how he looked earlier that day after training. His raven hair stuck to his glistening forehead and his labored breathing seemed to chill her so much she got goose bumps, although she was a good few meters away.
He wiped his hair from his face, and his onyx eyes met hers for a millisecond. Her heart rate sputtered when she realized his perfect lips were turned upward…
Was he smiling? At her? Impossible!
But there he was, in all his Sasuke glory, his eyes locked with hers and his lips turned into a small smile.
She gave a smile back and turned away, cheeks red.
(Back in her bedroom)
Oh yes, she thought, sighing dreamily, I'd love to kiss Sasuke-kun…
She decided the cherry idea wasn't so bad. The next morning she rushed up to the market and bought herself a bag of cherries. Her parents would be out that weekend, so she was relieved not to have to explain what she was doing with them.
At first, tying the cherry stem had been difficult. It kept sliding too far down her throat or getting stuck between her teeth. She tried it once with Chakra, but decided it wouldn't be so wise to do that when actually kissing someone.
However, by noon, she was spitting out half-knotted stems, which was as good as she was going to get before the break ended. She threw all the cherry stems away and called Sasuke.
End flashback…
"Hey!" she squealed, excited. "The knot's perfect!"
"Huh?" Sasuke asked. This day was getting weirder and weirder.
"Oh nothing."
The raven-haired boy just shrugged. He was embarrassed to realize he was still holding her around the waist, and quickly stepped back. His arms felt empty, and her body felt cold. She turned to face him.
"What were you doing, anyway?" he asked, allowing a bit of curiosity seep into his usually-apathetic voice. He was amused to see her turn a little pink.
"Err… Stem tying…?"
It was all Sasuke could do to keep down the laugh bursting in his throat. Damn her for making him actually human.
"Well why the hell were you doing that? You would've died if I wasn't here."
Sakura blushed impossibly more, and, deciding to turn her embarrassment into anger, said,
"I wouldn't have choked if you hadn't surprised me like that!"
Sasuke's ever-intelligent, ever-infuriating response was: "Hn."
"Why'd you make me spit up the stem, anyway, huh? I know you think I'm annoying. You could've easily let me choke."
His first reaction was to take her by the shoulders and scream at her that he'd feel too goddamn guilty for the rest of his life if he had, but that would've been a little too passionate for Uchiha Sasuke. He just shrugged.
"Am I ever going to get a straight answer out of you?" Sakura knew she was getting close to nagging his head off. She wondered why he hadn't just told her to put a sock in it already and walked out. But really, he was embarrassing her, which was an interesting thing for the man of no emotions to do, but still didn't excuse his briefness.
"Not until you tell me what you were doing with that cherry stem." His deep, cool voice shook her out of her reverie. She scoffed and started to answer, then bit her lip and cursed as she felt the pink flood over her face again.
"Well…?"
Giving up on words, she just sighed, grabbed his hand, and led him up the stairs to her bedroom. She chuckled nervously when she saw his face blanch as he was immersed in pink.
Or maybe it was because he was in her bedroom.
She quickly shook the thought from her head. No way, Sasuke's not Kakashi-sensei…
She retrieved the magazine and flipped to the only page she'd dog-eared, the page with the giant cherry picture on it and the article about cherry stems and kissing. He took it warily when she offered it to him, and scoffed when he saw what it was.
"Not one of those stupid things."
"There are actually a few good ideas in there…" Sakura stated, trying to keep the trembling out of her voice. Dammit, if only she could stop being so nervous all the time!
"Hn." He sat on her bed and she sat on the other side, her eyes flickering between the page and his face, waiting to see any reaction.
He slammed (or slapped, I should say) the magazine closed and made a weird chuckling noise. It took her a second to realize he was laughing.
The great rock Uchiha Sasuke was laughing.
She wasn't sure whether this was good or bad. She scooted a little closer to him, and…
"You think tying a cherry stem in your mouth will test if you're a good…"
…As he turned to face her, they saw their lips weren't even an inch apart.
"Kisser," Sakura finished for him before leaning forward to touch her lips to his.
She was shocked at how easy it was. Compared to tying that cherry stem, lip-locking was the most natural thing in the world. Maybe that was why if you could do that you could kiss.
Either way, she didn't care. She was kissing Sasuke and he was nibbling on her lip and sliding his tongue into her mouth and it made her turn into molten lava…
After what seemed like blissful hours (although it was probably a little under a minute) they pulled back, breathing hard. He rested his forehead against hers.
"What the hell," he huffed, "was that?"
"I have no idea. But I liked it."
To her shock, he actually let out a laugh.
"Ditto," he murmured, before meeting her lips with his again.
In Sakura's side yard was the other half of Team Seven. Kakashi and Naruto had been hiding in the bushes originally, but when they moved up to Sakura's room, Kakashi forced him to climb up the tree outside her window and see what was going on.
"Well that went well," the masked Copy Nin chuckled, hunched over in the tree with ramen's number one fan, Uzumaki Naruto, and watching the new couple tongue-wrestle. Naruto bit his lip to keep his laughter down and said,
"I knew it was a good idea to pour sake in Sasuke's tea."
A/N: A cute li'l one shot I was planning on the bus this morning…
On my iTouch…
Damn straight, I'm groovy like that.
So. Happy Luke Skywalker Day. (May the Fourth be with you!)
If you're wondering about the title Cherry Pits, it was because when you choke on a cherry, it's usually the pit. :)
Review!