The Arts
Ok, so I bet this update was probably the last thing you guys expected.
I sincerely apologize for my absence on fanfiction, and will not subject you to any lame excuses that you could probably care less about.
I plan on making weekly updates now, as difficult as that may be to imagine, depending on how things in my life are going xD I'm going to be facing important exams soon, and I need to be focused one hundred percent on those. And since I currently have a lack of a social life, all my spare time will probably will go to fanfiction. Yay ^^
I apologize once more for my delay in updating. I know you want to get reading, so I'll stop blabbering and let you guys (hopefully) enjoy the fic.
Oh, one more thing though. Bear with me, because my absence in writing has made the quality of it degrade drastically. So if ideas are scattered everywhere in this chapter, I apologize. I'm just warming up my skills again.
Oh, and I must bring your attention to another observation of mine xD Apparently, in the last chapter, I was not able to properly spell the word pineapple. Silly me.
Okay, enough of my incessant talking.
Enjoy !
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Chapter 2
The Hopeful, Arrogant, and Insensitive
Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto.
After the end of Kakashi-Sensei's lesson, which no one even bothered to pay attention to, all the girls went out into the hallway, huddled in a small group, and expressed their youthful opinions on the matter of project partners.
"That son of a bitch!" Tenten cried out, practically wailing at Kakashi-sensei's unfairness of pairing her up with a stoic looking person that probably would not give her the time of day.
"Tenten…" Hinata muttered, "He's my cousin."
Hinata did not understand why Tenten was so against being paired up with Neji. Neji was as gentlemen-like as any other male teenager could possibly be. But then she remembered that Tenten and Neji had never met before- Strange, considering the fact that they have been best friends for quite a long time, and decided that she wouldn't fully reprimand Tenten until she had a proper conversation with him.
"Eh, sorry Hinata," Tenten apologized, "But I mean, you actually like your partner…ugh! Unfair."
Hinata blushed a deep crimson red, and quickly stuttered a pathetic "I do not," after which Sakura, sensing Hinata's distress, changed the subject to Ino. Hinata thought that Sakura was a God-send.
"Oh, Tenten, but you are sadly mistaken." Sakura informed the confused bun-haired girl.
"Whaddya mean?" Tenten asked.
"Ino also seems to enjoy the presence of her partner," Sakura informed, snickering a bit.
Tenten waved her eyebrows suggestively. She had also noticed the fact that upon the mention of Shikamaru's name at the beginning of class, Ino fell into absolute silence. Silence, which was not normal at all for Ino.
"What are you guys talking about?" Ino exclaimed.
"Well…" Said a timid Hinata.
"Why on earth would I wanna be paired up with a lazy ass kid like Shikamaru?"
"I don't know," Sakura replied. "You tell us."
"I'm shy when I meet new people, okay? Chill." Ino scoffed.
Hinata, Tenten, and Sakura all exchanged knowing glances with each other. Ino was never shy with new people. In all the years of them knowing her, Ino was always labeled as the loudest, most attention seeking member of their group. These qualities were not necessarily bad, just not preferable.
Ino, sensing their scrutinizing glares, decided to be her own God-send, and craftily deviated the subject away from her.
"But all of us here know that Sakura is just loving being paired up with Sasuke." Ino teased, smirking.
"I do not!" Sakura stated, defending herself.
In all honesty, Sasuke was not her first choice for partners. Hell, he was probably at the bottom of the list. From the first moments of their encounter, Sakura felt a menacing aura radiating from him. She didn't want to be enveloped in his dark presence, even if it was only until Friday. Thus, a disbelieving stare was directed towards Ino from Sakura, and her facial expression spoke volumes. Everyone had gotten the message. Sakura Haruno did not want to be paired up with Sasuke Uchiha.
How did one go about doing a project regarding art? Kakashi-sensei had not been explicit in his expectations on the project, therefore giving Sakura nothing to go on. Should she paint her own painting, write an elaborate report on the foundations of art, research different brush techniques and somehow interact with the whole class by making them try some out for themselves?
As countless thoughts raced through her head, she wondered if Sasuke was even going to help her with the project at all. She had not talked to him about it, but it was more than obvious that she would end up contributing to the project a great deal more than he would. Sighing, thinking that there was no point in stressing herself over creating a magnificent project if there would be no one helping her, she contemplated doing a lame PowerPoint about a famous artist or painting, when a piercing sound of a screeching violin resonated throughout her whole being.
"Tenten!" Sakura shouted in frustration.
"Sorry," Tenten chirped, apologetically.
After the first day of school had ended, Tenten had made her way over to Sakura's house, violin in hand, to come up with some ideas for her project. She was actually pretty enthusiastic about the topic that Kakashi-sensei had graced her with, but less enthusiastic about her partner. Nonetheless, Tenten was determined to make the most of it. She had actually been toying around with the idea of producing her own song and had managed to come up with a few notes, but she had suddenly lost her inspiration, and in a frustrated gesture, carelessly slid the bow across one of the strings, eliciting a screech in protest from her violin-and Sakura.
"You know," Sakura began, "you're doing all of this for nothing. The project has to be a joint effort. What if Neji doesn't like this idea?"
"Yeah, well, I'd like to see him come up with any other idea of his own." Tenten countered.
Sakura sighed, running her delicate fingers through her short pink hair. She did not understand why they were becoming so frustrated over simple projects. These projects were to do with the beauty of art and music, as well as dance and theatre, and she could not help but feel that she should relish in these amazing things instead of stressing out about them. She could guarantee that their partners had not even thought of anything about their assignments, and she came to the decision that without speaking to them, neither Tenten or her were going to get anything properly done. She voiced her thoughts to Tenten.
"I see your point," Tenten said, while packing up her violin.
"You heading out?" Sakura asked, glancing at the clock.
"Yeah," Tenten replied, following her gaze to the digits that read 5:42 pm.
"See you tomorrow!" Sakura exclaimed to Tenten as she was heading out the door, who lifted up her hand in a goodbye gesture.
"I'm curious if you've made any progress on your projects," Kakashi-sensei said, while looking around his class.
Some fidgeted nervously, while others were sleeping on their desks without a care in the world, and others were chatting, completely ignoring their sensei.
"It's only been a day!" Naruto exclaimed.
"Ah yes, but every day counts. You only have four more days now." Kakshi informed, an evil twinkle in his eye at the thought of his students trying to complete their project the night before it was due.
Groans of protest spread out across the room, demanding that Kakashi granted them extra time for their projects. None of them had actually thought about how little the time until the project due was until now.
Kakashi could barely hold the chuckle that escaped his lips, wondering how on earth they had not thought of the time issue until now. In all honesty, he was expecting them to have complained yesterday about it. He had actually intended to give them two full weeks on the project, not just five days. He only said it was due Friday as some sick joke to witness his students embrace momentarily panic. But when he saw that they were more preoccupied with who they were paired up with instead of doing the actual project, he refrained from taking his initial due date back. In his professional opinion, the kids before him had to mature and worry about more pressing things, such as the time allotted for the project, instead of whose presence they would be in. They needed to grow up and learn to take responsibility for their lack of interest.
"I'm not changing my mind," Kakashi said in a tone that implied he was enjoying himself. "However, I'm not completely heartless. You may work on your projects during class until Friday."
After more protests and countless arguments from different head strong students in the class, most of which included the unfairness of being assigned such a demanding project only in their first week of school, the students finally realized that Kakashi-sensei would not be swayed in his decision. Accepting defeat as Kakashi-sensei pointed out they had spent almost half of their lesson arguing, they glanced around the room in search of their unwanted partners, moving seats so they could be closer to one another. Time was of the essence now, and not to be wasted.
Sakura, Ino, Tenten, and Hinata were already situated smack in the middle of the class and were not planning on moving. Coincidentally, the four seats before them became vacant as their occupants emptied them in pursue of their own partners. The girls glanced at each other and smiled at their luck, as they settled comfortably in their seats.
All of Sakura's comfort was gone as she scowled; extremely unpleased of the current situation she was in. Sasuke sat in the desk in front of her, turning his chair so he could face her. However, he made no move to initiate any type of verbal interaction so they could actually begin doing the project. Instead, he settled for a dark gaze that most girls, and boys for that matter, would cower from.
Sakura mentally sighed as she eyed the girls next to her. Hinata and Naruto seemed to be communicating fairly well. That is, Naruto voiced his mundane and silly ideas in his loud and obnoxious voice to the blue haired lady, while she just blushed and added shy comments and her opinions in return.
Ino was yelling at a sleeping Shikamaru trying to wake him up, and Tenten was talking animatedly about her musical ideas as Neji sat opposite of her, arms crossed, a calculating gaze present in his pearl colored eyes.
Well, no matter how seemingly unproductive their discussions were, they were at least talking. Something Sakura and Sasuke had yet to do.
"So," Sakura finally began after a few minutes of awkward silence, "do you have any ideas?"
"No," Sasuke replied coldly.
Sakura sighed, but mentally noted that he had in fact answered her question, and that he was actually talking to her. That was a start, at least.
"Well," Sakura said, "what should our project be about?"
"Art," He said rather annoyed, as if talking to a three year old child.
Sakura's eye twitched at the bluntness of his answer. She bit back the haughty retort she was just going to snap at him with, thinking that she would be the bigger person. If she didn't play nice, she doubted that any type of work would take place. So she settled for rolling her eyes dramatically.
"More specifically? Like should we do it about paintings, painters, sculptures, etcetera?"
"Whatever," He replied with an indifferent tone.
Sakura furrowed her eyebrow at the arrogance of the male sitting in front of her. This project was a big part of their grade, after all, and she could not believe that he was not showing even a tad bit of interest. Didn't he realize that the final project, whether he chose to participate or not, would have his name on it as well as hers? Sakura was highly tempted to make their project a complete joke, just to mock him. A stray thought entered her head, and she wondered if she could do the project alone…
"Are you not capable of speaking more than one word as a reply?" Sakura asked, irritated.
"Hn," Was his only reply, as he leaned back against the chair and crossed his arms over his chest.
Sakura fixed him with one of her murderous glares, but Sasuke seemed completely unfazed. He just met her glare with one of his own. They stayed like that for a few moments, waiting to see who would be the first to succumb.
Sakura was raging right now at the complete hostility of the creature before her. How someone could possess such an amount of arrogance was beyond her comprehension. She was about to engage in a full on rant, when an idea crossed her brilliant mind, and she smiled a slow smile.
"I've got an idea," She said simply, with a tone of wickedness entering her voice.
Sasuke stared blankly at her, clearly waiting for her to continue.
"I was thinking," Sakura began, a bit too sweetly, "that our project should contain some interaction with the rest of the class. That way, it won't be tedious and boring as most of the other projects are bound to be."
"And?" Sasuke inquired with a disinterested manner.
"Well, how about we teach the class the basic anatomy of the human body. We can have a slide show, or something like that, outlining a few steps on how to draw one. Then we give them a real life model to practice drawing. And who would that model be but you? I mean, I can practically imagine you standing naked in front of the classroom, telling everyone to 'draw you like one of their French girls'."
Sakura never intended to be so mocking, and dare she say it, a bit mean. She never liked it when she was on the receiving end of harsh and cruel words, but she felt that Sasuke and his attitude, or lack of, righteously deserved it. She had to bite her tongue to keep her facial expression serious, as a look of annoyance and irritation crossed his usually uninterested features.
Just at that moment, the bell started ringing, and many rushed back to their seats to get the hell out of the classroom as fast as possible.
Sakura watched as Sasuke ungracefully got up from his chair, slamming it under the desk, a scowl prominent on his face. Only when the swarm of students separated these two, did Sakura let out her contained laughter.
As lunch time came around, the girls merrily sat down at a rather large circular table, and began eating, chatting of the day's events so far.
"So Ino," Sakura said, between bites of her apple, "did you manage to wake Shikamaru long enough to discuss project ideas or not?"
"Ugh," Ino replied, groaning as she stabbed a carrot on her plate, "he is so lazy I don't think we'd even finish half of the project if we had all year!"
Sakura chuckled at her friend's frustration, inwardly grinning with satisfaction that she was not the only one that had trouble with her partner. Maybe if all the projects were bad, Kakashi-sensei would have mercy on them, and cancel the projects. Sakura sighed as she knew her wishful thinking would not happen.
"Neji and I have actually come up with an idea on what to do!" Tenten exclaimed, surprise still evident in her voice over their somewhat mutual understanding.
"Really?" Ino yelled, incredulously.
"Yup," Tenten replied, taking another spoonful of spaghetti into her mouth. "Turns out that he plays piano. We're gonna compose a piece of classical music."
Sakura frowned, thinking how completely unfair it was for Tenten to get paired up with a decent partner, while she had such foul luck. Still, she couldn't help but feel happy for her bun-haired friend as she realized that she was going to do something she loved doing. As Sakura glanced at Ino, who was idly picking at pieces of her salad, she knew that the same thoughts crossed her blue eyed friend.
"Hinata!" a loud voice hollered.
The girls turned towards the raucous noise, only to find Naruto walking eagerly towards them with a huge grin plastered on his face, a tray with a two bowls of ramen in hand, and the rest of the gang reluctantly following after him.
Sakura noticed a layer of pink dust grace Hinata's cheeks as Naruto sat down beside her, as she said a quiet hello in turn.
"Boy am I starving!" Naruto exclaimed, as he lifted his eating utensils and dug into the ramen, as the rest of the boys placed their trays down on the same table.
Sakura tried not to notice the intense glare Sasuke pinned her down with, and proceeded to talk to her friends as if they were alone, completely ignoring the other males.
"So we're still going to check out Ichiraku tonight, right? Sakura asked her friends.
"You bet we are!" Tenten heartily agreed, "We've been waiting months for that place to open."
Sakura nodded in agreement, as she spotted Shikamaru give her a curious glance.
"You mean that new ramen place that is supposed to open tonight?" He inquired.
Sakura was about to respond her affirmative, but it was Ino who spoke for her. Sakura raised a delicately plucked eyebrow as Ino confirmed his question for him, and she certainly didn't miss the gaze her blonde haired friend was staring at an oblivious Shikamaru with. She made a mental note to ask Ino what her deal was with Shikamaru later.
"What!" Naruto exclaimed, "A new ramen place! Wohoo!"
Hinata giggled, as she fed Naruto's enthusiasm by saying, "In their advertising, i-it said t-that they had the widest r-range of different t-types of ramen in the state."
Naruto gaped at her, and fixed the members of his group with an intense stare, and proclaimed, "We're going!"
Sakura was genuinely surprised that Naruto had not yet heard of the new restaurant. However, as soon as those words left Naruto's mouth, Sakura instantly regretted bringing up the subject. Tonight was supposed to be a girls-night-out sort of night, and her plan instantly blew up in smoke as Naruto demanded he attended with his friends. She noticed the frowns on her friends faces, excluding Hinata's, at the prospect of the other guy's attendance. Sakura should have known better. She should have known Naruto's obsession with ramen was not something not to meddle with.
She was about to protest when, Shikamaru groaned, Sasuke muttered 'teme' under his breath, and Neji scoffed.
She found their reactions rather amusing, and was instantly relieved when she realized that they would certainly not want to go. Maybe they could convince Naruto to go another time, with the guys only, when all of them were up to it…
Again, Sakura's wishful thinking proved to be futile.
"No! You guys are coming even if I have to drag you!" Naruto decreed, "Besides, it will be fun… and delicious, too!"
Sakura cursed herself for being such an optimist. It was better in her opinion, to hope for the least, so if you were disappointed it wouldn't hurt too much. However, it seemed that today she could not follow her own advice.
"I'm… busy later," Shikamaru lazily muttered.
"Bullshit!" Naruto retorted.
Shikamaru simply yawned, but said nothing in return, and Sakura figured that was because he was too untroubled to do so.
"It w-would also g-give us an opportunity to d-discuss about our projects." Hinata offered, meekly.
Sakura stared opened mouth at Hinata, wondering why on earth the shyest girl in history chose this particular situation to be brave and voice her opinions for a change. Sakura could practically see the wheels churning in each of the heads surrounding her, reasoning that tonight was as good of a time as any to get started on a rather lengthy project. It would also be more comfortable too, with everyone present, and it wouldn't seem like such a tedious task if they were to have some sort of fun at the opening of Ichiraku.
"I think she might be right," Ino offered, discreetly eying Shikamaru in search of his reaction.
"Yes," Tenten agreed, "We do have so much more to discuss, so much more planning to do."
"How troublesome," Shikamaru droned.
As soon as more of their conjoined groups were aware of the perfect solution that presented itself, Naruto became ecstatic, and fist pumped the air.
"You're the best Hinata! I can't believe you managed to convince them!"
Hinata blushed but said nothing, and Sakura could not help but find a double meaning to his words. The fact that he couldn't have believed that Hinata was capable of such a feat was probably picked up on by the shy lady. Sakura could practically see the tiny portion of Hinata's confidence take a devastating blow. Thus, Sakura could have done nothing less but bonk Naruto on his seemingly empty head.
"You baka!" She cried, while Naruto started rubbing the spot where she had hit him.
"Ow, Sakura! What was that for?"
Sakura refused to say anything, and crossed her arms over her chest. Insensitive bastard.
"So teme, Neji, you coming?" Naruto finally asked, aware that they hadn't said much since they had sat down at the table.
Neji and Sasuke glanced at each other, as if forming a silent agreement with one another. Apparently, the two must be on good terms. Or at least, Sakura thought, that they respect each other.
"If Hinata will be there, I see it only fit I accompany her as well." Neji stated, simply.
Leave it to Neji to make meeting with a girl outside his family something he must simply do just because his cousin was going. Sakura did not fail to notice how Tenten rolled her eyes.
"Yay!" Naruto exclaimed, "And how about you Sasuke? I'm sure they'll have some sort of ramen with tomatoes in it."
Sasuke ignored Naruto's comment to the full of his extent, and rationalized with himself that the project did indeed have to be completed. And the way Sakura and he handled talking today… Well, it was obvious that they needed all the possible time they could get.
"Hn,"
Sakura silently sulked at Sasuke's response, since he obviously agreed to go in his Sasuke like manner, but decided that she'd better play nice again. She would not let a silly boy come between her and her friend's night out, no matter if was going to be tainted by the torturous homework assigned by a perverted teacher. She would just have to make the most of it.
"Tonight at six then, we'll meet at the school gates! We'll set off together from there, okay?" Naruto more demanded than asked, excitement evident in his voice, anxiousness radiating throughout his whole being.
As the bell signaling the end of lunch rang, everyone nodded in consent.
From that moment on, Sakura knew something was going to happen. She did not know if it would be bad or good, but something would definitely change tonight. It was her intuition kicking in again, and in all the years of her life, Sakura's intuition was never wrong.
Okay, second chapter is finally done! You cannot imagine the satisfaction I'm feeling right now for having finished this.
And I know that there isn't a lot of Sasusaku at the moment, but bare with me! I plan on it being a long-ish fic, with lots of development taking place. Ever heard of the phrase that 'love comes softly'? xD
Anyways, thanks for reading. And I'd thank you even further if you took your time and reviewed ;)
-October Raspberry