Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto or its characters.

A/N: A somewhat timely update here! Thank you to everyone who took the time to review, and to those who took interest in this and followed and favorited it! It really means a lot to me :')

I apologize if things are progressing kind of slowly, but I felt it necessary to address Sakura's state of mind of sorts. So I hope you don't get bored reading this chapter :(

Review if you'd like to, and enjoy!

At the End of the Corridor

Chapter 2

Disappointment wasn't quite what Sakura was feeling when an entire week went by and her pink note still sat on the board, fluttering in the wind.

She should've seen it coming to begin with, and she had. So no surprise there.

…Or at least, that was Sakura's reasoning in trying to comfort herself.

She'd been really looking forward to... messing around, but she didn't have that chance anymore.

"…Sakura, you okay?"

The pink-haired adolescent snapped out of her dazed state. She realised that her two friends—two out of the only three friends she had, in fact—were staring at her with concern. Okay, well, Sasuke's face conveyed more annoyance than concern.

"Sakura-chan, were you listening to what we were saying?" Uzumaki Naruto asked. The orange-loving blonde was a raucous child and the class clown. That made him the fun and cheerful friend that Sakura needed to brighten up her days.

Uchiha Sasuke rolled his eyes. "Don't ask the obvious, dobe. Of course she wasn't." Sasuke was one of the most obnoxious people she had met in her life, what with his stuck-up attitude and completely inflated ego. It didn't help that he was born into the Uchiha family, one of the most powerful and influential families in the world. Despite that, Sakura knew he could be a reliable person and was most definitely trustworthy.

…In short, the three of them were social outcasts (if you ignore Sasuke's squealing fangirls) who got along well together.

"Sorry, I kind'a spaced out," Sakura answered sheepishly, feeling her already-insignificant self fade further into the noisy background that was the cafeteria.

"Hn."

Naruto laughed heartily and continued, "That's okay, Sakura-chan! We were just talking about the board at the end of the corridor."

"Oh!" Sakura feigned total interest in the subject matter because she was too caught up thinking about her lonely note.

Then Sakura's breath got caught in her throat when realization struck.

"O…Oh yeah? What about it?"

In a few mere seconds, she felt her pulse speed up by at least fourfold which meant she was supposed to be dead but she wasn't.

If her friends found out about her little secret, her entire social life would be over. (Hah, what social life?)

"Just said how lame and stupid it was. And what on earth is Principal Tsunade thinking?" Sasuke hissed in his trademark pissed-off voice.

"Oh, and I saw a pink note there!" Naruto added excitedly.

His raven-haired friend scowled. "Huh, losers." He commented off-handedly.

Sakura choked on her fruit punch. That was a pretty harsh blow. Gee, Sasuke could be a completely insensitive and insulting pers—

She set her drink down, shaking her head slightly to clear her head. Why would she think that way? This was just a game, something to relieve her of her stress by messing with people… It wasn't like she was supposed to be taking it for real or anything.

A sour feeling of sorts built up in the back of her mouth as soon as these thoughts came to mind.

Don't go off playing for real, Sakura.

…Then why exactly was she feeling so perturbed by it?

Mid-years were approaching at such a rapidly suffocating pace that Sakura found it increasingly harder to not pay attention in class, even though it was Biology lesson, and to make matters worse, just after break time.

Orochimaru, Head of Biology in their school and also incidentally their Biology teacher, now roamed the classroom like a slippery snake in search of his victims. His pale skin and long hair—and was that a tint of purple eye shadow Sakura sighted?—made him look the part of a rockstar.

That is, if rockstars droned on and on about useless stuff like beta cells in the islands of Langerhans or whatever it was.

"That's 'islets of Langerhansss', Haruno."

Sakura was careful not to leap out of her seat like the frightened bunny she was around Orochimaru. It would seem that on top of being a snake-like creature, he was also telepathic. Just her luck.

She allowed just her eye to twitch almost unnoticeably in response, hurriedly taking down the correct version of the term before she started writing about islands in her mid-year papers.

From the corner of her eye Sakura managed to catch a glimpse of Orochimaru breathing down Sasuke's neck like the pedophile he was. She couldn't help but grin impishly when Sasuke appeared visibly disturbed by the man's somewhat lecherous advances. As much as Sasuke tried to maintain his cool exterior, Sakura knew he was squirming on the inside.

She permitted her mind to wander off and think about other frustrating stuff, tuning out on Orochimaru's hissing. Other frustrating stuff like Haruno Mebuki, her future career, her male love interest, which shade of pink she preferred, sticking notes on a board and no-one replying to it…

Well crap.

It made Sakura quite irate to realise she had just reminded herself of what she had been so desperately trying to forget, but it wasn't like she had a need to forget it or anything because it wasn't important at all and therefore reminding herself of it shouldn't be an issue at all and neither should any distraction be necessary.

Sakura found herself grimacing while she tried to sort out the paradoxical situation of sorts, which was, by right, not supposed to be paradoxical based on the situation itself, hence contradicting itself even further and becoming a greater paradox.

Ah, the mysteries of paradoxes.

"Are you having a headache, Sakura-chan?" Her best friend rushed to her side immediately after Biology was over, having noticed her scrunched-up features during the lesson.

Sakura ran her fingers through her unruly hair, "Not really. I'm just utterly discombobulated by myself."

"Uh." Naruto looked unsure, probably because he couldn't comprehend what his friend was saying. "Sure, Sakura-chan!" He flashed her one of his goofy grins.

She cracked a smile, the tension that had been built up within her now melting away like snow having their first taste of summer.

"I'll just grab my stuff and we can head over to Math," Sakura said, promptly leaping over a table that was in her way to get to the lockers outside class.

The blond only gave her a sheepish smile. "Uh, sorry Sakura-chan, I've got… uh… something to do first…"

He started to back away from a now surprised Sakura.

"…See you in Math!"

And with that, he sped off down the main hall's corridor.

The sixteen-year-old girl sighed heavily and slammed her locker shut.

Her social life was falling apart way too soon.

Before long dusk had approached and the school was bathed in a orange-red hue.

Sakura woke with a start. She blinked her bleary eyes, turning to look at her surroundings.

It was their homeroom. Nothing wrong there. She'd just fallen asleep while doing her Biology homework—again.

Sakura sighed for not the first time that day, and buried her face in her hands. She wanted to go home too, but not with Haruno Mebuki around. She'd probably get impaled by lots of false accusations and nagging and whatnot before she even made it halfway up the stairs.

Carrying the same heavy feeling she harbored everyday when she had to go home, Sakura swept her belongings into her bag with one swift movement.

As she trudged out of the classroom, she willed herself to wander. It didn't matter where her feet brought her, as long as she could spend more time here, instead of at home.

Yet her feet conveyed her unconscious emotions, the hope she kept within her heart from the very beginning, and Sakura realised she'd reached a wall; a dead end.

Scowling, Sakura turned to leave, but her heart skipped a beat the second she looked up.

She was standing before the board at the end of the corridor.

…More importantly, there was an orange note sitting there in place of her pink one.

"I'll be your listening ear."

Just maybe, things were starting to look up for her.