Hello, hello! I'm happy to see that people are interested in and enjoying my story so far. I know Oc's aren't everyone's cup of tea, so I thank those who stick around and want to see this story unfold! I will be writing from multiple character's points of view where needed to give a lot of different perspective on the story. My main focus, of course, will be on Sasuke, Sakura, and Kokoro. Continue reading to find out how the drama builds as Sakura begins questioning Sasuke's feelings, Sasuke battles with himself on what to do, and Kokoro tries learning to let go. Their parents' jobs will be significant to the plot later on.

Thanks again to all my readers and I'm interested in hearing your thoughts and opinions so far!

Enjoy!

~Sweetsugarstand

Chapter 4

"Yah!" Whoosh. Whap. Bam. Bam. "Kyah!"

Sweat hid the tears that had earlier fell from long dark lashes. Kokoro hated crying; it made her feel so small and helpless. That was why she usually tried to keep an optimistic outlook no matter what situation she faced. There was always a solution! Always. A damn. Solution.

"Aaagh!"

Kokoro slammed her round house kick into the side of the heavy bag hanging from their small personal gym. Today, she had no solution, and she didn't feel very optimistic. She felt angry, and sad, and betrayed, and foolish… Breathing heavy, Kokoro felt tears weld in her eyes again. She threw one more punch at the bag before dropping to the ground, her knees pulled in close to her chest and her arms wrapped tightly around them.

She felt so stupid and somewhat humiliated. A small part of her wished she had decked him just once for leading her on all day and waiting until the last possible moment to tell her that he…that he already had a new girlfriend. That would have been nice to know earlier, before she…she… Kokoro pressed her hand to her lips. She wouldn't have been so forward if she knew.

It made her even more angry, but she also knew it wasn't Sasuke's fault either. He'd simply assumed what most people would after not hearing from someone for so long. It made her feel foolish for holding on for so long, but all the more heartbroken that he'd broken his promise and did just the opposite. Taking a deep breath, Kokoro wiped away her tears and picked herself up for a hot bath.

It was eight before Kokoro pulled herself from her bath. She'd calmed down significantly. Her eyes were puffy and her cheeks red, but her thoughts were clearer and after a good night rest, she hoped she'd be ready to face tomorrow.

A knock on her bedroom door came just when she finished pulling on her pajama's. "Come in," Kokoro called. Risa, Kokoro's mother, peaked her head in. It was obvious where Kokoro got her looks from. She shared the same almond shaped eyes, button nose, and heart shaped face. The dark purple hair ran in their family and Risa's was just as long, if not longer than her daughters. Her body had aged well with the years and she was surprisingly fit for having popped out three children, two of which were impressively large boys in comparison to her.

"Ko, hunny, is everything alright?" Risa asked. Kokoro could see the worry reflected in her eyes despite the kind smile on her lips. "You didn't come down for dinner."

Kokoro faked a smile and sat down on her bed. "Sorry, yeah. I'm alright, just not much of an appetite tonight."

Her mother didn't buy that for a moment. Risa arched a brow, leaning against the door frame. "What happened?" She asked.

Kokoro's smile fell into a grimace. There was no hiding things from her mother; she had that uncanny ability to know when any of them were lying or upset. "I met up with Sasuke today…" Kokoro tried to keep the quiver out of her lip. She cast her gaze down and to the side. Her fingers fiddled in her lap. "We talked…we broke up." She pressed her lips tight.

In three fast strides, Risa was beside her. She sat and tapped an arm around her shoulders, tugging her daughter close. "Oh, sweetie…" What could she possibly say? Surprise and sympathy was clear on her face. Kokoro placed her head against Risa's shoulder and let her mother run her fingers through her damp hair.

This was her first heartbreak and she didn't quite know how to deal with it. "He has a new girlfriend I guess…I haven't met her yet." She didn't know what else to say. That's exactly what the situation was and there was no way around it.

"I'm sorry, sweetheart. These last couple years have been difficult. We've had to ask so much of you and your brothers...I wish you could have come home to better news." Risa glanced at the clock to see that it was only quarter past eight. She kissed her daughter one the forehead and headed toward the door. "I'll be right back."

About five minutes later Risa came back with a tray of crackers and cheese, apples and caramel, and two glasses with a bottle of sweet red wine. Kokoro looked at her mother, surprised as she poured them both a glass and handed her one.

"On a school night?" She asked.

Risa smiled. "I think the occasion calls for it. One glass isn't going to hurt."

Who could argue with that logic? Kokoro took a sip without hesitation. It wasn't her first time drinking, though she had never been drunk and only drank in small amounts on occasion with her parents. The wine was sweet and warm as it entered her belly. She bit into a cracker with cheese as her mother situated herself behind her and took hold of her hair.

Kokoro didn't think twice about the mark on her neck until her mother asked. "Kokoro. What's that on your neck?"

Her eyes widened and her cheeks flushed red. Risa had a fishtail braid started and must have revealed the mark when she pulled all her hair up. She had been hoping to hide and forget about that. "Oh... that..." her mouth suddenly felt like she'd been drinking dry wine instead of sweet. She begrudgingly told her mother about how Sasuke didn't exactly break up with her right away...

Risa was silent, her lips pulled into a line as she listened. She didn't say anything for a long moment until she finished braiding Kokoro's hair. "You know your father wasn't the first man I ever dated. I had a boyfriend or two before him and each one had their complications and heartbreak." She tucked a purple lock behind Kokoro's ear. "You've been very close to Sasuke since before you two could walk. It was almost expected that you two would start dating, but that doesn't mean everything is meant to be that way." Risa paused and added, "it also doesn't mean that things can't be that way again. We're home for good now, so you can start to rekindle your friendships. If Sasuke still has feelings for you, he may come back to you."

Kokoro started at her mother, curious as to what she was trying to imply. Something about her confusion must have been funny because Risa chuckled at her expression.

"What I'm saying is, don't sell yourself short. If Sasuke wants to be with you again, he'll come back to you, but it's also up to you if you want to take him back. Kokoro, you're a beautiful, smart, and talented young woman. Don't let heartbreak consume you - go out and make new friends. …And keep your options open." Risa took a long sip of her wine glass and ate a crisp apple slice.

She was right, Kokoro realized after a long moment. There was nothing she could do about the heavy ache in her chest except for accept it for what it is and try to move past it. Nodding, Kokoro cracked a small smile. "Thanks, mom."

For another hour the two sat and talked. Before she knew it, the bedside clock had changed to ten thirty and it was time for her to get ready for bed. Kokoro gave her mother a kiss on the cheek before she left with the empty glasses and tray.

Kokoro climbed into bed and grabbed her phone to see she had a message sent a little over an hour ago from… her heart skipped too fast in her chest and hurt all too strongly at the same time. She didn't know if she was happy or sad that he texted her. It was a simple message. He had just told her it was him and asked if she was doing okay. It was late, but she figured she could reply. If he was sleeping he'd get it in the morning.

Thanks ^o^! I'm fine, just finished getting ready for bed. Sorry, I just saw your message now.

Send.

Kokoro stared at her message for a long moment after she sent it. It felt…weird to be texting after so long. She skimmed through her phone, revisiting old apps. Most of them were just simple games. What was the new thing now a days? Was Facebook still a thing? She felt so out of the loop as she scrolled through the app store when a new message popped up on her phone. Kokoro clicked on it, surprised he responded this late.

Okay, I thought you might be mad at me for earlier since you didn't reply.

Well, she wasn't happy… but she wasn't mad at him. Kokoro rolled onto her side, typing her response.

I'm not mad at you. I understand, don't worry about it. We can still be friends, right?

It felt so silly asking, but she wanted to make sure 'friendship' wasn't going to be over stepping any new boundaries that may have developed while she was gone. Her return hadn't gone at all how she had been hoping. At least his response put a smile on her face.

Of course, he had replied almost immediately.

—-

Great! Well, I need to get to sleep now. I'll see you tomorrow. Good night, Sasuke!

Good night, Ko. See you later

Sasuke stared at his phone. He felt...relieved. When she didn't respond he'd assumed she must have been pissed at him for leading her on. She had every right to be, but he was glad she wasn't. How was he going to face her tomorrow? His phone buzzed again, but it was Sakura this time. How was he going to face her, too, when she still didn't know anything? He stared at her flustered message, wondering if he should tell her or if it wasn't necessary.

He decided not to. If he already ended things with Ko, what did she need to know for? He didn't need to make her worry or insecure about anything unnecessarily. Sasuke looked back at his phone to reread her message.

Well - enough about that. Sorry for ranting! Ino's party is Saturday. Do you want to go out, just me and you on Friday after school?

He didn't have anything going on that he knew of. Knowing it would make her happy to spend time together, Sasuke responded yes and asked her where she wanted to go. They made plans to meet after school at Le Chat Noir, which was a French tea cafe that Sakura liked, and a walk through Central Park and the market square.

Sasuke bid her a good night after they finished making plans. It took longer than he would have liked, but after tossing and turning for a while he finally fell into a restless sleep.

—-

Sakura bit into the end of her pencil. Her forest green eyes focused on the problem their calculus teacher, Mitsuki, was writing on the whiteboard: Use implicit differentiation to find an equation of the tangent line to the curve sin x + cos y = 1 at the point (π/2, π/2). Mitsuki stepped aside and Sakura began sketching out the answer in her notebook. It took less than a minute before her hand was the first stretched high in the air. Mitsuki smiled and pointed to her.

"Sakura, have you worked it out already?"

Sakura lowered her hand. "Yes, Mitsuki-sensei." He nodded for her to continue. "The answer is y=π/2."

"Correct," Mitsuki praised. He continued to give them practice problems to review what they learned in class yesterday and warm up for the harder materials they'd be covering for the rest of the year.

Calculus, English, History, Japanese… Their classes continued throughout the day. Sakura's eyes wandered over to Sasuke's back from across the room. Their seats were usually on opposite sides since their last names were so far apart, but it always gave her a good view of him. She was glad to see that he seemed more focused today than yesterday. He must have resolved whatever had been clouding his mind. Which reminded her…

"Sasuke-kun!" Sakura called to Sasuke after class. She waited for him by the door as he tucked his notebook into his bag and caught up with her. It was finally time for break, which meant… "Did you invite your friend to have lunch with us?"

Her smile never faltered, but she noticed the way Sasuke seemed to stiffen unexpectedly at her question. His eyes avoided hers and focused on the hardwood floors.

"No," Sasuke replied cooly. He allowed her to lock arms with him and start walking toward their lockers. "I guess it slipped my mind. I had a busy night."

She supposed that couldn't be avoided. "Well, what class is she in? Maybe we can still catch her."

"No."

Sakura blinked, surprised by his fast answer. Why not? Her expression must have been pretty clear because Sasuke quickly amended his statement. "I just mean, you don't need to go out of your way. She'll be fine. I'll invite her another time."

Oh. Okay. Sakura felt her smile dropping a little. An uneasy feeling settled in her gut. Why did it feel like he was hiding something from her? Sasuke wasn't an incredibly open person in the first place, but she still wanted to meet this mystery friend and it felt like - maybe it was her imagination - he didn't want them to. Sakura dropped it for now and met with Naruto and Ino by the lockers. They switched their shoes and grabbed their lunches before heading out to their normal spot by the cherry blossom tree.

On their way across the courtyard, Sakura caught sight of long, dark hair that shined with a purple tint in the sunlight. It looked soft as silk and belonged to an unfamiliar girl. Her head was down in a book, so Sakura couldn't make out her features well, but Naruto seemed to recognize her from somewhere. His exclamation surprised Sakura, causing her to jump nearly a foot in the air.

"Hey, that's her isn't it? From yesterday morning?" Naruto's blue eyes fell on Sasuke curiously. Sasuke grunted in reply. That was all the confirmation the boisterous blonde needed. "Hey!" He called suddenly, bounding away from the group and toward the girl. He wasn't alone. Suddenly, Sakura found herself detached from an uncharacteristically surprised Sasuke and lead by Ino toward the mystery girl.

It took a moment for the girl to realize Naruto was yelling at her. She lifted her head from her book and gentle purple eyes observed them, curious and cautious. Tentatively, she waved at Naruto and her lips curved into a small smile seeing her and Ino close behind. "Hello," She greeted, far calmer than the two blondes set on discovering her identity. "Can I help you?"

Wow… Sakura couldn't help but stare. She couldn't tell from so far away before, but up close she noticed just how pretty this girl was. Her symmetrical, heart shaped face was smooth and pale as porcelain. It contrasted beautifully with her straight dark hair, which Sakura noticed was long enough to brush her hips when she stood to greet them. The way the light caught her eyes gave them a unique, amethyst tint she'd never seen before. She was short, maybe no more than five foot two, if Sakura guessed correctly, slim and athletic.

Naruto jabbed a thumb at his chest. "I'm Uzumaki Naruto. And my friends," He paused, glancing over his shoulder to see where they were. "Yamanaka Ino."

Ino grinned and waved. "Hi! Nice to meet you."

"And Haruno Sakura." Sakura waved and smiled, greeting her the same as Ino at Naruto's introduction.

Clasping her book between her hands in front of her, the young girl bowed. "I'm Kage Kokoro. It's a pleasure to meet you all."

When she stood, Sakura noticed Kokoro's eyes flicker toward her, but before she could discern what her expression meant, Ino had jumped in and stole her attention away. "Well, Kokoro-chan," Ino began, "we heard you just transferred back to the area and wanted to invite you to have lunch with us."

Kokoro looked surprised. "Oh, really?" Her eyes flickered past them. Sakura realized she had glanced at Sasuke, who remained waiting in the distance. There was a moment of hesitation before she grabbed her bag off the ground and nodded. "Sure, that sounds nice."

"Awesome!" Naruto pumped his fist in the air excitedly. "Come on!" He started running back toward Sasuke.

At the top of the hill Sasuke and Kokoro's eyes met. Sakura wondered if she had just imagined that the pause between them was as long and tense as it seemed before Kokoro smiled. "Hi, Sasuke-kun."

"Ko-chan." His greeting surprised Sakura. She had never heard Sasuke use a nickname with someone before, but she seemed to be the only one to notice.

The small group of friends took their usual seat beneath the cherry blossom tree in the school yard.

Sakura sat beside Sasuke, feeling unusually quiet as she pulled out her bento and handed Sasuke his. For once, she wasn't quite sure what to say. Ino sat beside her, and Naruto plopped down on Sasuke's other side leaving the spot between him and Ino open. Kokoro knelt there and opened a beautiful homemade bento.

Within seconds, Naruto was hovering over her shoulder with vulture eyes. "Did you make that?!" She had a colorful assortment of diced chicken over rice with a tangy looking sauce, rolled egg, and vegetables.

"No, my mother makes our lunches," Kokoro replied. She pushed the box toward him. "Want to try?"

"Eh?!" Naruto jumped, looking between her and the box. "I can?"

"Sure."

Never one to turn down a free sample, Naruto plucked a rolled egg from her lunch and popped it into his mouth. "It's good!"

No surprise there, Sakura thought. It looked delicious! A small part of her took pride in the fact that she cooked and made all of their lunches herself and they always came out good.

"You said 'our'?" Ino asked. She opened a container of salad and drizzled a light balsamic dressing on top. "Do you have siblings?"

"Two brothers," Kokoro nodded.

Oh boy. Sakura knew what was coming next when she saw the spark in Ino's eyes.

"Older?!" Ino hoped. When Kokoro confirmed that one of her brothers was indeed older, Ino couldn't help but ask, "is he hot?" with a sly look, making Kokoro laugh.

"I guess." Kokoro pulled out her phone and started looking for something on it. She turned the screen so Ino could see it. Sakura peeked curiously over her shoulder and felt her cheeks turn a little pink. The man was clearly related. His face was flawlessly handsome, framed by the same dark hair and sharp almond eyes. His lips were curved in a devious smirk that could stop a woman's heart. She couldn't see the rest of his body past his shoulders and the muscular arm he was leaning against, but her imagination filled in the rest. "He looks nice, but he's got a crap personality."

Ino snatched her phone to get a closer look. Sakura could practically see the hearts bursting forth from her eyes. "On a man this fine he doesn't need to have good personality!" Ino mumbled a few incoherent words to herself before handing Kokoro her phone back. "How old is he and is he single?"

"Ino!" Sakura hissed, swatting at her friend. They barely even knew the girl they were supposed to be trying to make friends with and she was already trying to jump on her brother she never even met yet! Talk about embarrassing.

Kokoro didn't seem bothered. In fact she almost looked amused. "He's 27 and yes, he's single."

Ino hummed happily to herself. She muttered to Sakura, "nine years isn't that bad of a gap."

Once again, Sakura rolled her eyes and chose to ignore her best friend. Time to change the subject and get to know the girl sitting beside them, not her brother. "Ignore her, please," Sakura tried to apologize for her friend's behavior while ignoring Naruto muttering that 'looks aren't everything' rather bitterly under his breath.

The rest of lunch passed with them asking Kokoro some basic questions about herself and telling her a little about all of them. They learned that she had been traveling with her family around Europe the last couple of years, but didn't specify what they had been doing for three years. Sakura couldn't help but feel like she purposefully and tactfully avoided answering some of their questions directly. During that time she was home schooled since it was easier than constantly switching schools. Her other brother was almost ten years younger than them. Sakura found the large gap in their ages surprising since most siblings were usually around 2-5 years apart. They learned that she was athletic, which Sakura already guessed from the muscle tone in her arms and legs, and that she knew how to play piano and sing, though she refused to give them a sample of her voice when Naruto asked saying it was too embarrassing.

Overall, Sakura's impression of her was that she was a very sweet girl. Nice, good sense of humor, and polite. Lunch ended too soon. They invited her to have lunch with them again tomorrow before they all split to return to their class. Sakura walked between Naruto and Sasuke. Naruto was chipper as usual, but Sasuke seemed to fall back into his silent brooding. Sakura realized that Sasuke hadn't said a word all lunch. Since he was normally quiet, she didn't notice right away, but usually he would at least chip in a few times or throw an 'idiot' insult toward Naruto. Aside from greeting Kokoro, he said nothing to her. She was his childhood friend, right? Shouldn't they have more to talk about with her just having returned?

"You're awfully quiet today, Sasuke-kun," Sakura stated casually.

Sasuke glanced at her and shrugged. "Am I?"

"Yeah," Naruto piped up as if just realizing it too, "you didn't say a single thing all lunch. Isn't Kokoro-chan your childhood friend?"

"Yeah, so?" Sasuke didn't seem to see a problem with his behavior that they clearly found odd.

They both blinked at him. "Don't you have anything to say to her? You know, talk and catch up?" Naruto pressed.

Sasuke reached up and rubbed the back of his neck. "Not really." It was then that Sakura noticed the beads wrapped around his wrist for the first time. He never wore that before.

"Where did you get those?" She asked, curiously. She never knew him to wear anything other than maybe a watch on occasion.

Sakura noticed the way his back tensed and his eyes discretely avoided hers. "...Kokoro gave them to me."

A rock dropped in Sakura's stomach. She couldn't say why she suddenly felt her chest tighten or her stomach turn. What? "When?" Sakura found herself asking, uncertain if she really wanted to know the answer.

"Last night."

End Chapter 4