Note: Yeah, about Chapter Seven when the red fox comes in; I just thought that up as I went (just like almost everything else I've written), the red fox will make sense later, and so will everything else. These sort of things is a technique I call the 'Swiss Cheese Effect', because the longer you leave it out, the better it gets at the end; it's the whole suspense thing. The technique sounds crazy I know, but it makes sense. I am now going to drop the chats, so I don't waste your guys' time, so enjoy the chapter. Chapter Eight! Yeah!
CHAPTER EIGHT: UNDER THE EVENING STARS
Sakura swam backwards, away from Kakashi and dove under, feeling a strange surge bubbling up inside. All those feelings brought Sakura back to when she and Naruto went swimming together. Of course this was only a one time thing. Sakura was deep in thought whilst holding her breath:
"Please Sakura-chan?" Naruto begged.
Sakura stared at the blonde and said it again, "no, I'm too busy today," she stacked clipboards and piled them in the filing room where all hospital records were kept.
Naruto followed the medic wherever she went. He still wouldn't give up, "but you're always so busy, it's not fair; I think you need to take a break from work for a change," he protested in hopes for Sakura to comply.
"I have too many things to do right now Naruto, I'm sorry," Sakura tried, but Naruto still wouldn't let it go.
He stifled, sighing deeply and finally giving up hope, "oh no, who will I invite to go swimming with me now," he said aloud, making sure Sakura would hear him.
"I was going to buy that special person ice cream right after, but noooo, she has to be little miss sunshine and finish her work," Naruto gloated, trying to make Sakura feel bad.
Sakura sighed, stopping what she was doing and facing Naruto, "fine then," she gave in, though not really interested for the swim.
"Yes, awesome," Naruto whooped in utter joy and jumped around in excitement.
"Naruto, I have nothing to swim in though," Sakura ended Naruto's leap of joy with a poke in the arm.
Naruto grinned, rubbing his poked arm tensely, "that's okay, I'll help you get one," he squinted his foxy smile widely at Sakura.
Sakura grinned lightly at her past before swimming back up for air.
Thinking again, Sakura drifted there on the water's surface, blankly going back through her memories:
"Hurry up Sakura-chan," Naruto wailed while splashing about in the water.
Sakura was hesitant at first and finally showed up, "does it look okay on me?" she asked, blushing intently as she skipped her way to the river.
"Are you serious, woman? You look good in that bikini," Naruto said, not caring how loud he sounded.
Sakura's blush reddened further as she dove into the water. She dipped her hair in the water, making it look more presentable and said, "well, thanks for buying it for me Naruto, I really appreciate it,"
Naruto shrugged, "don't worry, it's the least I can do for my best friend," he smiled happily before going under water again.
'Best friend…' Sakura thought as she had her face half in the water and deep in her thoughts.
After that swim with Naruto that day, Sakura actually enjoyed herself, although she didn't want to admit it to the blonde. The way she expressed it that afternoon was "a decent swim" along with a cheesy smile. Even that gave Naruto the great intention on giving the pink haired medic a bone-crushing hug and a 'thank you'.
"Sakura-chan?" the silence was finally broken.
Sakura felt a frown curving on her face as she thought about what she said to Naruto that day. It was more of a spur of the moment thing at that point, and now Sakura only wished she could've said something better than her previous words.
A hand grabbed her arm. Turning to see who it was, it was Kakashi, looking rather worried about his former student, "are you okay?" he enquired.
"Yeah, just thinking of something," Sakura replied.
Sakura felt like a broken CD player whenever Kakashi asked that question, she always replied with the same answer, and it was beginning to get annoying.
"We'd better get back, Kuro and Kitsune might be hungry," Kakashi recommended, still holding onto Sakura's arm without realising it himself.
Sakura stared at the hand that held her arm and held her breath for no apparent reason. She felt the hand move down slowly, making her skin crawl; though it felt strangely pleasant.
Sakura made her way past Kakashi and on the riverbank, sighing deeply as her thoughts slowly took over. She shakes the nasty images out of her head and gets out of the water, quickly finding her towel to avoid getting cold.
Kakashi just climbed onto the shore and walked past Sakura with a tired grin on his face. Yes, Kakashi was happy with how he ended the day. He quickly made the fire and warmed up in front of it, staring at the flames as they danced around through its burning colours.
Sakura collected her things and changed into her dry clothes. Before returning to hang up her wet clothes around the campfire, she spotted Kakashi's Icha Icha book just lying there under a tree.
She takes the orange book and stared at the cover, but before she went back to hand the book to Kakashi, a picture slipped out of the pages within. Sakura quickly picks up the photo, glancing at Kakashi, who was gazing at the fire.
Sakura examined the photo; it was of Kakashi when he was young, and he was with his old team. Sakura already knew that Kakashi was taught by the famous Fourth Hokage, she basically knew all the names of Kakashi's team.
When staring at the image with Kakashi smiling, it made Sakura warm inside because she knew Kakashi had friends in his life before becoming who he was now. Still, Sakura felt sorry for the Jounin that he lost all those friends in his life while on the road to becoming a great ninja.
'Kakashi…' Sakura slides the picture back in the orange book and made her way to Kakashi's side.
With all her wet clothes around one arm, Sakura noticed Kakashi was shivering. That fool; Kakashi was wearing nothing but his swimming shorts and his mask and the sun had already hidden itself away behind the horizon. He was shivering like a wet puppy.
Sakura sighed inwardly before taking her towel and draping it over Kakashi's shoulders, patting him on the back slightly.
Kakashi flinched. He looks over his shoulder to find Sakura smiling at him while holding out his orange novel, "oh, thanks; I thought I left something behind," Kakashi gladly took the book and tugged at the towel Sakura let him use.
"Thanks for the towel," he said with much gratitude.
"Don't worry, you looked a little cold and you were shivering, so I thought I'd do a favour since you always help me out," Sakura smiled.
Kakashi stared intently at the campfire before Sakura's words finally kicked in, "since when did I ever help you out," he wondered. Thought it sounded harsh at first, Sakura had to answer his question.
"When I was still a Genin, you always were the one to protect me, even if I tried to fend for myself; I was always the one behind everyone," Sakura's voice sounded hesitant; she didn't want Kakashi to take her words in a different way that would hurt him.
Kakashi sat there in silence for a while before facing the pink haired medic, "so basically, you felt yourself as a burden in the team because we always protected you," he stated, looking back out in front of him.
Sakura nodded, shaking her wet clothes to drain some of the water. Kakashi finally gets up and heads over to his bag. He grabs some clean clothes and pulls out a kunai and a string.
Kakashi ties the string on the branch not far from the camp and tossed the kunai at another tree. Kakashi pulled the string along and threaded it through the loop hole of the kunai, tying it down tightly.
"Sakura-chan, just be glad that you have someone who's by your side to protect you at any cost," he said with a hidden grin.
Kakashi went behind the trees to change and reappeared in a navy blue singlet and long black pants shortly after. He hung his wet shorts over the line to let it dry off. He stared at his clothes blankly before noticing that the mask he was still wearing was still wet.
He glanced at the medic while grabbing his spare mask from his backpack, keeping an eye on her so that she wouldn't spy on him, "do you want me to hang your clothes as well?" he asked suggestively. Sakura stared for a moment before saying, "umm, sure, thanks," she handed Kakashi her wet clothes and he hung them on the line next to his.
Kakashi had his back facing Sakura and pulled off his mask, hanging it next to his shorts. Sakura immediately witnessed the man's actions and ogled him, hoping to get some luck in seeing the Jounin's face.
Kakashi knew Sakura was staring, he could feel the medic's eyes bore into his back, making him feel slightly uncomfortable, but he knew he couldn't do anything about it. Kakashi purposely rubbed his face, trailing it to the back of his neck, making Sakura more tempted to run out in front of him to catch a glimpse of the Jounin's true identity.
"It was a good swim," Kakashi said out of the blue.
Sakura jerked her head up, knowing Kakashi was changing the subject, "yeah it was," she sighed, stretching out her arms. Kakashi put on his clean mask and faced Sakura, smirking a little.
The sun had long set and the campfire was burning brightly, heating the air around it and giving off its light. Sakura stared aimlessly at the fire as it danced on the collectives of wood. She stayed nicely tucked in her sleeping bag, while Kakashi was under the layers of his sleeping bag and reading his dirty book.
All was silent between them and Sakura was nearly falling asleep; Kitsune and Kuro had already fallen asleep so why didn't she? Something about Sakura kept her awake, thinking constantly about her worries and other things she expected in life.
Half the time, Sakura was staring at Kakashi; having nothing better to do, Sakura just watched Kakashi read his book. Kakashi could feel Sakura glare at him; it made him feel slightly insecure about his personal space, but he chose to ignore them wisely.
Sakura stared at the man a while more before finally trying to do something else, but what? She lay down on her back, arms cushioning her head as she gazed at the stars. What a sight that was. Back in Konoha, Sakura never had time to look up at the night sky; it sure was amazing to see how many stars were up in the blanket of darkness.
Sakura grinned to herself, looking down at Kitsune, who was sleeping by her bag. Sakura gazed back up at the sky and connected the stars, making funny constellations with her imagination. She found one in the shape of a dog sitting on its hind legs, begging for a treat. She found another one in the shape of a love heart; making her smile softly. Of all things Sakura could've found up there, she spots a cluster of stars in the shape of the Leaf symbol.
Looking around, Sakura found many more shapes and silhouettes of animals and people and other objects, "beautiful isn't it?" Kakashi said in a sigh, eyes still on the book.
"Yeah, it sure is," Sakura replied, not making any eye contact with the other Jounin on the other side of the fire.
Kakashi peeled his eyes off the text of his book and glanced at Sakura, 'what is she thinking about?' he thought, his lazy eye getting heavy from the day's progress.
"Do you ever get time to look up at the stars at night?" Sakura wondered, tilting her head slightly.
"Whenever I get the chance I look up there and think about things," Kakashi sighed, looking up and closing his book.
Sakura thought about what Kakashi would think about at those moments and contemplated if they would be personal or not. She asked anyway, "what sort of things do you ponder over?"
Kakashi sighed, sitting up a bit to get a better view of the stars, and said, "mostly about all the close people who have passed away in my time, but other times I think about what lies ahead in the future," he looks at Sakura from across the fire, "what about you?" he asked.
Sakura looked puzzled at first, "I usually don't have the time to gaze up at the stars like this, but when I get the chance, I try and picture out funny constellations with my imagination," she smirked at the thought of something really stupid that it probably would be too embarrassing to tell.
Kakashi chuckled, "I do that on occasions, but I don't always see any good images, because of my one eye," he said before frowning, staring at the fire before getting out of the sleeping bag.
"Just going to get some more firewood," he mentioned, walking off into the forest.
Sakura hummed a little tune that caught up in her head, lingering around like a bad odour, as she hummed a bit louder, knowing that Kakashi was well out of earshot to hear her signing.
Meanwhile, Kakashi walked around past the trees, collecting fallen sticks and branches. He stopped in the middle of it and felt nasty images brewing up in his head. Kakashi's skin crawled at his thoughts and bonked his head on a tree, only softly enough to stop him from imagining rude thoughts.
'Come on Kakashi, pull it together, how could you possibly have thought that up within two minutes; it's even more intense than Icha Icha Paradise,' Kakashi argued to himself through thoughts as he traced himself back to the small camp.
Kakashi felt the need to speak to his devil and angel self; where the devil Kakashi would tell him to follow his judgments and the angel Kakashi would tell him to keep his opinions and uncouth ideas to himself. He could see it now; on one shoulder would be a miniature Kakashi dressed up in red tights and holding a pitch fork and have little red horns and a pointy tail. And on the other shoulder would be his mini self wearing a white dress with a halo and wings and holding a harp.
Each would argue amongst each other in order for the one who needed the advice to follow whose ideas. In the end, one guardian conscious would stand after a fight and the real person would have to give a beating to both little characters.
With all the thinking, Kakashi had almost forgotten what he went out for in the first place. Quickly, Kakashi carried the dead wood back to camp and lay it down next to the fire.
He prods the flames with a long stick and tosses a branch on to keep the fire going. He sighs, glancing over at Kuro, who was sleeping like a baby by his sleeping bag. Kakashi grins and pats the black fox gently.
Now bored, Kakashi focuses his attention to Sakura in hopes of a good conversation, but to only find the medic sound asleep. He smiles softly with a humming chortle; just staring at Sakura for as long as he felt like without the medic knowing.
Sakura looked so peaceful as she slept; just lying there with such a calm face as if all her worries were lifted off her. Kakashi sat back down, still ogling the pink haired medic as he opened his orange book.
The night was so quiet and peaceful; the only thing disturbing the full silence were the crickets and the water trickling down the river. On occasion, the odd owl could be heard, hooting and calling for the others. Not only that, but the man made sound of a page flipping from the perverted series of Icha Icha Paradise.
This must've been the tenth time Kakashi had read that book. At this point, Kakashi could literally act out every scene and know every word off by heart. The book still didn't bore him to death; it was like reading a totally different book each time.
Another page flipped, Kakashi was almost half way through the book, 'What time is it now? God knows,' like it really mattered to Kakashi to know what time it was. It was the only good time he could catch up with his reading in peace and serenity.
'And when he finally reached the end of the street, the bus began to depart the station, seeing only love of his life on it, staring endlessly at him until she could no longer be seen…' Kakashi read out the lines in his head as he stared at the text, before he heard disturbed mumbling and moaning on the other side of the fire. Kakashi watched Sakura toss over to her back and squint her eyes like she was fighting from something.
When Sakura had finally calmed down and was sleeping normally again, Kakashi sighed, looking up at the sky, noting that it had moved over the many hours he was awake for.
After all that calmness and alone time, the silence was abruptly disturbed when Sakura woke up crying stridently and breathing heavily as she sat up staring at her covered feet in awe. Kakashi straight away put his book down and walked over to the sobbing medic, "Sakura-chan," he started steadily.
Kakashi placed his hand on the girl's back and rubbed it gently, reaching for his bag and pulling out his bottle of water, "here, drink something," he insisted, allowing the medic to take his bottle and sculling it down.
Sakura tiredly closed the bottle while still catching her breath and rested her head on her palm, "bloody nightmares," Sakura stammered, wiping the tears away. Kakashi still had his hand on Sakura's back, making sure Sakura wouldn't start to freak out and start crying again.
Staring blankly at the ground in front of her, Sakura felt the sleepiness kicking in and absentmindedly leaned against Kakashi's chest, still sobbing. Kakashi stared blankly at the tired medic, holding her with one arm and trying to keep her calm and still for as long as he could.
"Are you alright?" Kakashi asked, cocking his head to the side to not find Sakura's terrorised face, but her actually fallen back asleep; face calm and normal.
Kakashi sat there with Sakura in his arms, sleeping like a baby and actually looking like she wasn't harmed at all. The thoughts began to race around in his head again, slowly taking advantage of his actions. He stared deeply into Sakura's closed eyes and with one hand, Kakashi gently moved the medic's pink locks to side and gazed at her snoozing face.
He just wanted to kiss her.
Wait a minute. Did Kakashi just think that? Slap his hand as punishment. How could Kakashi think that about his former student and take advantage of such a moment and even a sweet innocent Kunoichi. Maybe perhaps not so sweet, but she did have the personality of a blossom.
But who could blame the man. Sakura was beautiful and even to many other male ninja, she was described as 'feisty' and 'gorgeous', which was exactly how Kakashi was thinking of her, just without the 'feisty' part.
Maybe Kakashi was starting to have feelings for the medic, even though he knew how long their age difference was. Kakashi shook his head vigorously to refrain thinking of said things before. He gently put Sakura down, making sure her sleeping bag covered the most of her body to allow her to sleep warmly.
Kakashi returned to his sleeping bag, patting Kuro once more before settling down and letting sleep take over his body for the rest of the night.
Author's note: All I have to say about the last part of the chapter was "Awwwww," seriously, this is where the fluffiness starts. It will continue, and there is still a long way to go for Sakura and Kakashi. What will happen next? Find out in the next chapter: Chapter Nine: Wandering Into Mysteries. Before I disappear to carry on with my other chapters, I'd like to thank ifItwasnt4KakashiIwouldLoveYou, CherryKittyKat and WhiteTiger1992 for sticking with me so far and reviewing all the time; love you guys heaps XD thanks