note.

Happy Valentine's! I love this chapter and I hope you will too~

(P.S. I've just realized this, but I type really long chapters on my phone, does anyone else do this?)

track 12.

Valentine's.

It's the day that sends shivers down your spine, regardless of whether you have a partner.

The panicking of boys that forgot what February 14th stood for, the economy's desire to milk every last drop of profit out of the occasion, and the needless creation of a day where one is supposed to show love. He thanked the gods that the dreaded date landed on Sunday this year. Away from school and fangirls. Saving him from an overflowing locker filled with chocolates he wouldn't eat.

Uchiha Sasuke saw absolutely no pleasure in experiencing the buzz of the day, and no incentive for participating in the clown like behavior.

But the one girl whose opinions he happened to care for, a girl that was normally logical and level headed - for some unexplainable reason - happened to adore it.

He hated all things Valentine's. So he can't understand why stopping his eyes from searching for Sakura - on such a day, doing something that embodied everything he hated about the event - is so difficult. No matter how hard he tried focusing on the score directly in his line of vision, it was fruitless.

So he gave up and asked Neji to stop practice early because they should all get back before the girls found them (bless Neji and his own fangirl predicament), after all, it was -

Saint Valentine's Day.

Just the sound of it made giggles reverberate through her body.

To designate a day for love, to show even more love than you would on an everyday basis. To remind those around you that they were loved. That you cared for them. Valentine's was a day you could unabashedly show your love - without a care for the judgement of others. You could declare it to the world and others would only want to support you.

Sakura had walked to band practice with five yellow roses in her hand, wrapping them in red ribbon and finishing them with brown paper tags.

Yellow roses.

For friendship. For loyalty. For jealousy.

She thought that they were beautiful in their honesty and undiluted sentiments. These unofficial friend-zone flowers.

The blinding bright yellow washes over her in warm watercolour hues under the reflection of lights, and the black pinafore dress she wore highlights her natural colouring even more. Pink, green, yellow. Sasuke thinks that she may as well be a pastel walking traffic light. It should be a crime. But even then, she's stunning with the giddy smile on her face as she trims off thorns and ties a perfect bow.

Walking over to place his guitar back in its cover he scans over the scallop edged tags, contrasted by her blocky printed characters.

Kiba, Naruto, Neji, Shika, Sa-

Sakura

This girl is crazy.

"You brought yourself flowers?"

"A flower. Singular."

Establishing that she's going to be broken the whole day. Sasuke tries to figure out how smart people like Sakura are only smart in selective timeframes - how her knowledge failed her at certain times. Perhaps it was the lack of sleep.

But she only strolls pass him to hand the other addressees their yellow rose, neatly packaged and professionally identical barring the name tag.

Maybe the other members believed that the lack of a flower indicates that Sakura is still harbouring anger towards him, because they leave the scene as quickly as possible after thanking her; but Sakura doesn't seem to think that excluding Sasuke on her list of 'rose recipients' is anything strange as the two simply continue their normal routine of walking back. Close to each other, down the alleyway along the park and children's playground, past unlit lamp-posts.

"You're not gonna say anything?"

"No."

They exchange the same words they would say on any other day, and he sees her off at her place. There are no declarations of love accompanied by red blooms and no specially planned ambushes to leap into his arms.

The Valentine's day he dreaded has not arrived this year.

That annoyed Uchiha Sasuke.

The crumpled carpet as he removes his shoes, the empty house he arrives back to (his parents have gone out on a date for this stupid celebration), and the wintery draft that blows into his room all serve to bother him even more. Walking over to close the open window, he finds a small note behind the curtains, threatening to fly into the sky.

A familiar brown piece of almost nothing. Weighted down by a single dark chocolate truffle, partly covering blocky printed characters. Slipping the note into his notebook, it strikes him that maybe he can deal with this sad excuse of commercial ridiculousness as long as they were like this.

"Happy Valentine's, you idiot."