A/N: Ugh, sorry for the slow update! I've just moved to NYC recently and witnessed snow for the first time of my life! It's not as impressive as I thought it'd be but still made my day!
New Year's 3 days away! Happy Holidays and look forward to a whole new year. (:

Chapter 5- The Disappearance of the Cat

"Sakura, I can't walk home with you today," Naruto enters Sakura's classroom with a saddened face. "Gah, stupid errands!"

Sakura shrugs in return, locking her briefcase. "No loss on my side."

Naruto pouts. "You do know it's the best part of my—,"

"Don't you need to run?" Sakura checks her wrist watch.

"Ah shit!" Naruto springs to the heel of his feet. "See you tomorrow then, Sakura!" He gives Sakura one of his brightest smiles before running out the room.

Sakura lets out a sigh of relief. She is not that dense. It's not like she doesn't know of how Naruto feels about her… She just doesn't want to admit to it. Not yet, at least. Her mother has always been strict about her dating. Her father's pretty chill about it. But Sakura herself agrees with her mother. She's not ready. I'm leaving dating for High School, she thinks to herself. Besides, she has always treated Naruto as a childhood friend—and nothing more.

Naruto doesn't make her heart pound like the way Sasuke, of class 3-C, does. Sasuke is Mister Popular. The All-too-perfect one.

Sakura blushes at the faint thought of Sasuke. His jetblack chin-length hair…. His onyx eyes. They're all too wonderful. Especially the way he walks… it's all too graceful and mysterious. But she can only let out sigh. Sasuke doesn't even know of her existence. Typical. Too many girls are swooning over him already. What are my chances?

With that, Sakura makes the final check of locking her briefcase and proceeds to walk to her shoe locker on the first floor.

And it's raining outside, Sakura just realizes. The rain is soft, splattering lightly against the school windows. Rain makes Sakura gloomy. She can't help it. She frowns. Well, I better hurry home then.

As she hurries down the staircase, her friend Ino Yamanaka sees her and waves.

"Sakura!" Ino screams, with her blonde pony-tail swaying gently behind her. Sakura has no choice but to stop right where she is on the step, as Ino makes her way to the staircase.

Sakura cannot help but smile. Ino, the brilliant friend that always radiates cheerfulness and determination. Sakura actually owes a lot to Ino. Without Ino, she won't be standing here today with confidence.

"Are you heading home?" Ino asks, looking deep into Sakura's eyes. Ino always makes eye contact with people. It's hard to lie to her, especially with her light blue eyes staring deep into your very soul.

Sakura nods. "I am. Is there anything important?"

Ino clasps her hands together. "Want to go to a club meeting with me? I'm pretty sure you still have to earn a little more club credits."

"I really need to head home," replies Sakura uneasily. It's true she still needs to earn more club credit, but she feels too overwhelmed right now. Blame the weather.

Ino puts her hands on her hip. "Fine, fine. Don't expect me to ask again." It hurts her ego. And so she walks away with a faint wave of good-bye.

Sakura continues on down the flights of stairs.

The rain turns out to be a huge downpour. And Sakura does not have an umbrella.

As she walks through the heavy rainfall, she cannot help but to cuss at herself repeatedly for her stupidity. "Ugh, I should have listened to mother and brought an umbrella!" she screams through her clenched teeth.

She picks up her pace and breaks into a run. But just as she turns at the corner, she finds a cat there. It's not kitten. It's a cat, a fat one. Its fur is white but tinted with black spots. It's actually normal to find a cat on the street. There are always cats roaming. But this particular one is like no other cat.

Sakura, feeling sympathy, kneels down. This cat is bleeding from its right leg. Sakura is afraid to touch it, afraid of the diseases the cat might possess. That is when she realizes the cat is pregnant.

"I really don't get you…" Sakura whispers. "You're a mother-to-be yet you fail to find a shelter from the rain. But who can blame you when you have a bad leg like that?"

The cat hisses in reply.

"Well, I guess this rain is enough to make anyone gloomy and not think logically."

As if being able to understand the human language, the cat's face seems to soften—just a bit.

Sakura is no vet—yet she has a feeling that this cat is not only suffering from a bleeding leg...but hunger too.

"Oh, what am I to do with you?" says Sakura. "I can't bring you home. Mother has always disapproved of pets… I wish she isn't such a typical, strict mother—pah, that reminds me. It's always either her way or the highway. That mother."

The cat only sits still with the rain beating down on her fur.

"You probably think I'm crazy! If only you can speak…hang on a sec." She goes through her briefcase in hope to find a clean cloth. No luck. She has no choice but to do what people in movies do—she rips a part of her white sailor uniform and wraps it around the cat's wound. It takes some struggle since the cat did not trust Sakura at first. But Sakura somehow manages. She's willing to touch the cat even though there are possible diseases.

"Okay, we managed that wound. Now if only…I have food on me," Sakura suddenly realizes how near she is from the supermarket. "Actually, if I were to turn left and run a few alleyways down, I'll be at the main street where the supermarket is."

She stands up. "Fear not, cat. Wait for me here. I have a few 100 yens. I can manage to buy bread for you." Sakura knows people will be staring at her as soon as step onto the main street. A middle school student without an umbrella, who is therefore disgustingly wet with her uniform partly ripped at the bottom. People will not take it too lightly. Worse, a neighbor might recognize Sakura and ruins her family's face. My family doesn't have a good reputation anyway,Sakura concludes. That's because her parents are both Europeans. Sakura has dyed her dirty blonde pink.

She takes her hand and gently wipes the area under her eyes. As expected, her eyeliner is smeared by the rain. Her black lipstick's probably pretty messed up too. That's what she gets for buying cheap make-ups.

But Sakura decides to go into the main street anyway—for the sake of this mother-to-be cat.

While Sakura is away, a peculiar limo pulls to a stop near the corner in which the cat rests. The passenger door opens and out comes a strange boy with red auburn hair. Yes he is the boy with the Ai tattoo and heavy, natural eyeliners. He does not care for the rain even though he has an umbrella inside the limo. As his hair is weighed down by the rain, he looks down at the cat. One minute… two minutes…five minutes. He just stares down at the cat—his face portraying no emotion of any kind. After six minutes, he reaches down for the cat. The cat tries fighting this stranger off but the boy somehow manages to put her into the limo—in a rather gentle manner.

"Where to go, master?" the personal driver asks once the boy shuts the door closed.

"The local animal shelter of this place," replies the boy plainly.

When Sakura returns with the nicely wrapped warm bread,

the cat is gone.