Summary: Neji x Sakura Meet Haruno Sakura, a typical junior high school prankster. When her prank got out of hand, the school principal decides to assign Sakura a mentor. Sakura thinks it's going to be a hell but things might not be as bad as Sakura thinks. AU and hopefully not too much OOC
Genre: Drama/Romance
A/N - Author Note
Italic - thoughts
Bold – emphasis on the word
Troublemaker
Chapter 8: Archery
Five days later
Sakura was tipping her index finger on the desk rapidly. Her ears were heating up and it felt like it has burning red. She gulped when she saw Sakamoto-sensei turned to the row that which her desk was aligned. Sensei was getting closer and closer to Sakura's desk. Sakura could feel the sweat started to fall from her forehead and she wiped it off with her hand.
Sakamoto then arrived at Sakura's desk and on her hand was a bunch of papers that was faced down but then Sakura could see all the reds marks through the white sheets of paper. Sakamoto especially placed one sheet of paper on the desk and then continued to walk along the row. Sakura slowly turned over the piece of paper in front of her. Her eyes suddenly snapped shut and she could feel her heart beat was getting faster and faster.
"This is it, Sakura. The moment of truth. Come on now, you can do it. Turn it over. NOW!"Sakura then turned over the paper and scanned through it thoroughly. Sakura couldn't believe her eyes. On top of the paper was a number that has a circle around it. But what Sakura attention was the number itself that was circled. Sakura blinked a few times to clear her eyes and to make sure that her eyes were not deceiving her. Then she took another good look at it, blinked again, and then rubbed her eyes. It wasn't a dream. She really got the grade that she saw on the paper.
Sakura jumped out her desk and shouted, "YEAH!"
Everyone in the class converted their attention to Sakura. Even Sakamoto stopped passing the quiz back and took a look at Sakura.
"Miss Haruno, is there something that you would like to share with the class?" Sakamoto asked.
Sakura came back from her joyful world and then realized what she just did and blushed. "Uh...no…"
The class erupted into a fit of laughter and Sakura sank in her seat. Clearly, she was embarrassed of the situation. But inside she was grinning like crazy and decided to ignore the laughing that was surrounding her.
Class was over and Sakura was heading towards the door, when suddenly a voice called out her name. "Sakura-chan!"
Sakura turned around and saw Naruto was walking up to her. "What cha' got on your quiz?" he asked.
"Se-cr-et" Sakura said while waving her finger back and forth.
"Awww….why?"
"Because…!...uh…I'll tell you later. Bye!" Sakura then rushed out of the classroom door, leaving Naruto behind gawking.
Sakura was practically running through the hallway and it appeared that she was looking for somebody. A certain white-eyes teen, which happen to be right over THERE!
"Neji-senpai!" Sakura yelled while waving her hand to get his attention. Neji was lying under a tree and he has his hands under his head and his eyes were close.
Upon hearing his name, Neji opened his eyes to see who called him. He sat up straight and looked toward the direction where the voice was coming from. Then he saw pink-haired and knew exactly who it was. I mean how many people do you know that have pink hair?
Neji lay back down under the tree and closed his eyes again. Then Sakura had finally reached her mentor and she was panting but not very hard.
"Neji-senpai, didn't you hear me calling you?" Sakura asked.
"I did hear you. That's why I lay back down." he answered, still with his eyes closed. At this point, anyone could tell that Sakura was angry by that remark even if you were blind.
"What's that suppose to mean?" Sakura snapped.
"It means, if you don't have anything important to say then leave me alone."
Sakura frowned at his cold attitude. But then she won't let that get to her. "Look." She pulled out her quiz result and showed it to him. Neji opened his eyes in thinking that it was something important. Then he narrowed his eyes at what he saw.
"So? Does that suppose to mean something?" Neji said in a bored tone.
"Of course it means something! It's not everyday that I got a 50 out of 50 on my English quiz."
"Oh really? I'm not surprise. Didn't I help you study for it before?"
"Damn, he's back to being a jackass." Sakura thought.
"That was different. The one you helped me study for is an exam. This is a quiz, but then Sakamoto-sensei counted as half of a test grade. She said that it suppose to be good practice before the real exam." Sakura explained.
Neji stood up and walk toward Sakura, then he leaned forward to her ear, but not too close. "Good job." he said only loud enough for him and her to hear, and then walked away with a half smirk on his face. Sakura was left slightly blushed after Neji just complimented her. Then Sakura shook it off and giggled. "Ok, maybe he's not a jackass anymore."
The rest of the afternoon was the same as always. Sakura got to class and was bored out of her mind. Even though she had better grades than better, that didn't make any difference to her. All her classes were as boring as always.
When school was over, Sakura ran straight home and packed some mochi, then left her house, and then headed toward Neji's dojo. When Sakura arrived at the dojo, everything was quiet.
"Oh yeah…! Today is Wednesday. No one is here."
Sakura then walked to her usual training spot. But when she got there, she didn't see Neji anywhere. So she assumed that there was only one other place where he could be. The archery field.
When Sakura arrived at the archer field, she spotted Neji right away. But she didn't want to disrupt him because he was shooting arrows and seemed to be preoccupied. Sakura decided to sat down and wait for him to finish. She placed her lunchbox on the table and sat down.
After 20 minutes of waiting, Sakura couldn't take it anymore. Neji never practice this much better when he knew he suppose to be training with her. Sakura stood up from her seat and walked over to Neji, she didn't care if he yelled at her. Making her wait for 20 minutes was where she draws the line.
"Neji-senpai!" Sakura shouted to get his attention. When Neji heard his name being called, he turned to look for the person who called him. To his surprise it was Sakura.
"Sakura, what are you doing here?" Neji asked with a confused face.
Sakura stopped and looked at Neji with an equally confused face. "What are you talking about, Neji-senpai? I always come here after school."
Neji thought about it for a few seconds and then respond, "Starting today, you don't have to come here anymore."
Sakura was more confuse than before. "What do you mean by that?!"
Neji then took a deep breath. "I mean, your 4 weeks of training was over yesterday. So you don't have to come here everyday after school anymore."
Sakura was disappointed by the news. "So wait a minute, does that mean that you're not my mentor anymore?" Sakura asked.
"No, I'm still your mentor. It's just that you don't have to train anymore. Don't worry; I'll still help you with your homework." Neji replied.
"I see…" Sakura whispered that only she could hear. She was kind of relief that Neji was still her mentor. Neji went back to what he was doing. Sakura walked back to the table and sat down again. Seeing, that she might not come here anymore, Sakura took this time to reminisce all the time that she was here.
A few minutes later, Sakura was still sitting at the table. Then Neji decided to take a short break and walked over to the table and found Sakura was still there.
"I see you're still here." Neji said.
Sakura was snapped out of her thoughts and looked up at Neji. "Yeah well, I have nothing to do at home anyways."
"Suit yourself." Neji reached for a cup of tea with one hand because he was holding a bow with his other hand. Sakura looked at Neji while he was drinking tea, and then a thought came to Sakura.
"Um…Neji-senpai…" she started.
"What is it?" Neji asked as he put down the cup.
"I was wondering….c-can you teach me…." Sakura hesitated to finish the sentence.
Neji raised an eyebrow. "Teach you what?" he asked.
"Teach me….that."
Neji was confused by Sakura answer. "What do you mean that?"
Sakura started to blush at what she was about to ask. "….that." Sakura said as she point to it. Neji looked at what Sakura was pointing to and it was a bow that he was holding.
"This?" Neji asked while holding up the object. Sakura simply just nodded in response.
"So you want to learn how to archer?" Neji asked.
Sakura nodded again, "If it's okay with you."
"…" Neji didn't respond back after a few seconds so Sakura got worry that he wouldn't agree.
"Now that my training is over, I feel kind of bored if I don't do something. And besides, I was always curious to learn how to archer." Sakura tried to make it sound as convincing as possible.
Still, Neji did not respond. Sakura was starting to hold her breath out of nervousness.
"I guess it wouldn't hurt to teach you." Neji finally spoke up. Then a waved of relief swiped through Sakura's body and she finally let go of her breath.
"Thanks, Neji-senpai!"
"Yeah, whatever." Neji began to walk toward the boundary line of the field. Sakura followed him and stopped when he stopped.
"Put this on." Neji handed the girl some protective gears to put on so that she wouldn't get hurt. Sakura took her time to put them on one by one. Then when she was finish Neji handed her a bow and an arrow. Neji told her how to hold it and how to stand while holding the equipment.
Neji stepped back to give Sakura some room to shoot the arrow. Then when she shot the arrow, well let's just say it wasn't good. She missed by a mile, according to Neji. But Sakura thought differently, she only missed by a couple of feet.
Then Sakura tried again. She straightened her arm and back just like Neji said. But then somehow she still didn't feel confident that she would hit the target. Neji was standing not so far away and he couldn't take it anymore. And so, he stepped up next to Sakura.
"Not like that." Neji then lean over and took Sakura right hand, which was holding onto the string of the bow, and with his other hand, he held onto Sakura left hand. "Like this."
Neji face was right next to Sakura as he tried to focus on the aim. Sakura then tilted her head to look at his face, and she started to blush at their closeness and at his handsome face. "Wow, I never notice how cute Neji-senpai is." Sakura smiled at the thought.
"Ready?" Neji asked and broke Sakura train of thoughts.
"Huh? Uh…Ready!" Sakura said. Neji was holding Sakura left hand and he pulled the string harder.
"Ok, when I say now let go of the string. Got it?" Neji asked.
"Got it." replied Sakura.
Sakura forgot about what she was thinking earlier and focus on the task at hand.
"Now!"
Then she released the bow and the arrow was launch. This time the arrow did not slow down and it went straight to the red target. Although the arrow didn't hit exactly in the middle of the spot, it was ON the red mark nonetheless.
"Not bad Sa-" Neji was cut off when Sakura suddenly jumped and wrapped her arms around his neck while jumping up and down.
"YAY! I did it! I did it! I did it!" and it goes on.
Sakura was so happy that she hit the mark that she didn't notice that she was holding on to Neji and she was really close to his face. Neji in respond was caught off guard and didn't make a move nor told her to let go.
After a whole 2 minutes of celebrating, Sakura finally realized what she was doing. She was hugging Neji! Sakura quickly let go of him and started to blush really hard.
"I-I'm sorry, Neji-senpai." Sakura apologized while looking away.
"…it's ok…" Neji said in a low voice.
"…"
"…"
There was an awkward silence between them. Then Neji coughed to get rid of the stupid silent.
"Uh…y-you want to…uh…try it again?" Neji didn't expect he would shudder like that. Inside he was cursing himself for sounding like an idiot.
"Uh…s-sure." Sakura shuddered just as equally as Neji.
Then Neji took a few step aside from Sakura and she turned to look at Neji with a confuse face.
"This time try it by yourself."
"O-okay…" Sakura was a little disappointed but she didn't want to let Neji know that.
Sakura then got out another arrow and put it on the bow and took aim again. She then glanced over to Neji, who was watching her every movement.
"Ok, I have to show Neji-senpai what I'm made of. I have to make that shot. I will make that shot!" Sakura thought. "But then again, it's hard to concentrate when he's staring at me like that." Sakura then pulled on the string harder. "Come on, Sakura. You can do this. Just keep focus. Don't think about Neji-senpai is watching you. Concentrate on the target."
Sakura narrowed her eyes to get a better view of the target. Her aim was none other than the red mark in the middle of the board.
"Hm…her stance is good. She also has good focus." Neji thought as he continued to study Sakura's posture.
Sakura pulled the string even harder. "One, two….three!" Sakura let go of the bow string and the arrow flew straight to the target. The arrow landed close to the last arrow before, which meant that it was inside the red mark!
"YAY! I actually did it! And this time I did it by myself! Did you see that Neji-senpai?" Sakura looked at Neji for an answer while giving him her biggest smile.
Neji just simply nodded and smiled back at her.
For next several minutes, Sakura continued to practice shooting and Neji was sitting at a nearby table, drinking tea. Then Sakura felt tired so she put down the bow and walked over to where Neji sat. Sakura also felt hungry so she took out her lunchbox and started to unwrap it.
Then the lunchbox revealed a couple of pink mochi, and Sakura started to consume the pink stuff. Neji was sitting across from Sakura and when he saw the mochi that Sakura brought, he chuckled softly beneath his breath.
Sakura shifted her head to face Neji. "What's so funny?" she asked.
"Nothing." Neji answered and he quietly continued to drink his tea.
A/N: Congratulation!! You guys made it all the way here! This is the last of the filler chapters.
For those of you know who wanted some mushy scenes, I like to say one thing to you people. Be patient.
Aren't ya happy now? I included a little spark between Sakura and Neji in this chapter, so I hope you liked it. I couldn't stop smiling and laughing while I wrote it. hahaha XD!!
Next Chapter: Don't Forget March 28
sacredairbga7
