Chapter 2

I Didn't Ask You to Love Me

Naruto did not take too much time in finding Sakura, he had a faint idea where she was at the moment. It was the place where she spent most of her time after the village was assaulted by the Akatsuki leader, Pain, alongside with her senior in Medical Ninjutsu, Shizune. Flapping the opening to the tent where the Hokage was currently resting in the care of the two Medical Ninja, he found her resting at one side of the blonde woman and applying a cold towel on her forehead.

At the unexpected appearance of her best friend, the pink haired girl shifted her attention away from the Hokage and to her blonde best friend who was standing at the entrance to her tent. Shizune was also mildly surprised to see him, ever since Tsunade had been put to rest in this makeshift hospital; Naruto had never come to see her. Well, one could not blame him. With all the stuff that had happened regarding Sasuke and the Five Kage Summit, Naruto had spent most of his time in the Land of Iron looking for his best friend and trying to dissipate the news he had heard regarding Sasuke's dismissal. The matter had been resolved peacefully, so maybe he had finally created time in his schedule to come and see the woman who he looked up to as the Village Head.

"I need to talk to you for a while, Sakura-chan," Naruto addressed the pink haired girl, denoting his intentions why he came to that tent. Sakura batted an eyebrow in surprise, owing to the curt manner in which her blonde teammate had talked to her, but nonetheless, she extricated herself off the ground and followed suit after him. The two walked wordlessly for a while, then halted at the back of the tent where they were in solitude away from any prying eyes.

Sakura looked into the taller man's cerulean orbs, wondering whether what had brought him to that tent was to check up on the Hokage. If that was the case, then there was no need to bring her outside just to ask, right?

Naruto, however, was the first one to break the ice after staring likewise into Sakura's emerald orbs. "How's Granny Tsunade doing?" He asked, in as calm a voice as he could muster. If he needed to talk to Sakura about something as important as what he had a falling out with Sai over, then the first thing he needed to go was to get the trivialities out of the way.

"She's getting better and better. Lady Tsunade doesn't look as pale as she did when she first entered the coma, so I think she's making steady improvement," Sakura responded in an upbeat manner, glad that her teammate was as worried for the Hokage as she was. Still, there was a funny feeling in her gut that told her there was more to the situation than Naruto was letting on, something which slightly unnerved.

Naruto managed a small smile at the pink haired woman, closing his eyes momentarily. "I see, that's great, Sakura-chan," he responded in the same calm manner he had talked earlier, although Sakura could not help but notice that there was a small strain in his voice just then. When he opened his eyes once more to focus his gaze onto her, Sakura confirmed it. His eyes carried a nervous glare, and she wondered what had brought that on. Then again, perhaps he hadn't come to ask about Tsunade after all, she surmised, as she placed her hands on her waist and prepared to get to the bottom of things.

"But something tells me that's not the reason you're here, right?" She questioned the man, curiosity welling out of her voice. Luckily, Naruto did not take too long to respond, gracing her question with a quick nod. She then kept quiet, waiting for him to tell her what had him acting in a bit of a nervous manner, while hoping in her mind that it was something that she would be able to help him with.

"Sakura-chan, there's something I want to ask you," Naruto started, and Sakura could not help but notice how his voice sounded a tad more confident this time. That was the first time Naruto had that tone when asking her something, save for when they were kids. Still, she chose not to interrupt in whatever he was going to tell her, and Naruto took that as a queue to continue," Is it true that Sai told you about my feelings for you, and that's what caused you to initially come to the Land of Iron looking for me?"

Surprised was an understatement for what the pink haired girl was feeling at the moment. Her eyes widened as she regarded what her best friend had told her plus he, wondering what had brought that on. However, she realized that there was no need hiding it after all was said and done, so she decided to be frank with him, moving her hands to fold them on her chest. "Yeah, he did. It's kind of ironic. He told me in the same exact manner you're talking to me right now."

At this response, the blonde man proceeded to place his hand on his forehead, letting out a small sound of displeasure, which of course, did not go unnoticed by the Medic. She realized, with a small sinking feeling in her chest that was the same look that Naruto always had whenever he was displeased about something.

She decided to continue talking, since for some reason she couldn't place her finger on, she did not find his reaction just then to be pleasing. Had he taken what Sai had done to be a mistake of some sorts? "And I'm glad he told me, Naruto, otherwise I would have continued to hurt you without knowing," she concluded her earlier statement, but with a more defiant note to her voice this time. There was no way Sakura was going to let him think that her learning about his deep love for her was a mistake. Actually, if she were allowed to be more frank on the matter, ever since she learned the truth, things became clearer to her, allowing her to put some perspective on the romantic notion of her life.

Naruto moved his hand from his forehead slightly, giving the pink haired girl a view of his face. There was an unreadable expression on it at the moment. "That's not it, Sakura-chan," he told the Medic in what seemed to be still a displeased tone. In reality, being hurt by Sakura was far from his concerns. It was something that he had gotten used to ever since he was a child. Now that he pondered over it, it bothered him tremendously back then whenever he witnessed Sakura openly display her affections for Sasuke, but with time, he realized it was a trivial thing.

"It's just that, you weren't supposed to know that way," Naruto said, this time in a much more resigned voice. In his mind, he felt as if the conversation he was having with Sakura at the present was probably the one he should have had with her immediately she confessed to him in the Land of Iron. He wondered why it had taken him that long to realize it.

Sakura threw her hands in the air in a show of growing irritation herself. This again? It reminded her too much of the conversation she had had with the blonde man in the Land of Iron when she had confessed to him in the presence of a few other Konoha Shinobi, and she did not need to be reminded just how disastrous that conversation had turned out. She did not want a repeat of the same in the present. "Why?" She started, in a much higher tone. "Because of some stupid promise you made to me as a kid? Naruto, when will you stop thinking that the things you do on your own hurt others as well?" She said, realizing just how exasperated she was feeling at the moment with her teammate.

Realizing how agitated Sakura was sounding at the moment plus the response she had dished out to him, Naruto was shocked. He removed his hand completely from his forehead and allowed it to rest freely at his head, now regarding the girl before him. There was a sort of fiery look in her gaze at the moment towards him at the moment, which almost caused him to hesitate in whatever he had in mind. Steeling his nerves, however, he decided that if he did not do it now, then he would regret it for the rest of his life and the time he spent next to the girl of his dreams.

"Look, Sakura-chan," he started, in a stern voice, possibly the sternest voice he had ever talked to the girl with," the reason I didn't want you to know was because I knew that you would act in the same way you are acting right now. I didn't want things to ever change between us. I wanted to stay by your side forever, even if it meant my love was unrequited. And more than anything, I just want you to be happy."

If you knew how I really felt about you, it would put you in a position where you would have to constantly watch out for my feelings. There was no way I was going to ever do something so selfish to you. You're the kindest girl I know, and that would be taking advantage of your kindness in a sense.

He had hoped that these words would be enough to make the girl understand, and abate her ever growing anger, but unfortunately for him, they had the opposite effect. The girl was enraged at this point, owing to the way she had her fists clenched at her sides. It couldn't be helped, at least in Sakura's case. While she knew that Naruto only had the best intentions at heart for her when he explained his reasons to her, some part of her thought that he was treating her like a kid who couldn't handle the truth. All of a sudden, it felt as if the roles between the two had been switched and that, unlike in the Land of Iron where Naruto had told Sakura she was making painful excuses, it was Naruto who was now making painful excuses instead. Under any normal circumstances with her best friend, she would have laughed at the sheer irony of the situation, but the way they were at the moment, it was no time for laughs. Instead, a small fragment of her felt shattered, and she slowly felt tears welling up in her eyes.

Naruto had already hurt her in the snowy country when he had told her that she was lying to herself when she said she loved him. And now, it was as if he was denying himself the right to love her.

Her voice was shaky when she opened her mouth to respond to him," Well, you know what, if me being happy means that you have to sacrifice your feelings, then I don't want it. Any of it! I didn't ask you to do this! I didn't ask you to love me!" She said, and by the end of her statement, she was all too aware of the familiar wet feeling on the sides of her face. She realized that it would be too late to hide her crying face from the boy before her, so the only thing she could do was look upon him with her tear-glistened face so that he could know just how much he had hurt her.

Unsurprisingly to her, the blonde man had also reached the level of his patience with the girl before him. He had his teeth gritted in his open mouth and an angry look on his face, before saying in an equally irate voice to the Medic Ninja, "Is that so? Fine then, I'm sorry I even fell for you in the first place."

And with that, Uzumaki Naruto exited the premises, leaving in his wake a grief stricken Sakura, who made no attempts to hide the anguish that had just struck her. She cried freely, keeping her gaze focused on the ground, in a manner reminiscent of the way she had a while back when Sai had revealed to her the truth regarding Naruto's feelings. And similarly, just like back then, from the back of a nearby tree, a certain dark haired man was watching her with a solemn look etched upon his face.

A/N: Thanks everyone for the reviews, favorites and alerts! This is my first attempt at trying to write NS in an angsty manner, so I hope I managed to capture it perfectly. Still, I hoped you enjoyed the overall chapter! Read and review!