note.
I've been updating every weekend lately~ Hopefully I can keep this up =]
I know the chapters of PTL don't seem too connected and everything is in snippets, but next chapter will be the start of a new arc. I want to finish PTL before July if possible (hence, the rapid updates).
track 14.
Dropping his bag on her Sakura's desk, he leaned down to her eye level. "Come with me after you finish packing. We're going to celebrate."
It's a Friday, the class had just submitted their final essays for the semester, and the half term was hours away.
Most of the class were tagging on to the university students to head to the local club - The Valley of the End, the Valley for short, since they rarely carded. Naruto and the rest of the band were going with Neji, but neither Sakura and Sasuke were about to risk getting caught and had decided that the two of them would go somewhere else instead.
It had been a simple flip of a coin to see where they were going. The library was where Sakura was going to take the two, while 'a surprise' had been Sasuke's.
And settling both her feet on each step as they descended down the single bulb-lit staircase, Sakura was pleasantly surprised to find a small - but neat - underground karaoke. It had looked a little rugged and old fashioned on the outside, but that was exactly what she loved about it. Just as Sasuke expected.
Two high school students in their uniforms. Renting a room wouldn't normally be allowed by the other establishments, but Sasuke had made sure that owner wouldn't care much for them at this hour.
Sakura set out to turn on the microphones as soon as they entered the velvet walled room. Humming and hitting them to make sure they were working.
"Testing. Testing. One. Two. Three." Sasuke laughed at how immature she was being as he assessed her voice through the speakers.
"The mics are of scantily passable quality."
"I wish the others could hear you right now, you sound like some microphone connoisseur." Sakura spoke into the microphone, stepping on the sofa where the schoolbags hung as a makeshift stage. "I happen to like them." She flicked the head lightly to hear it static-laced echo. "It makes my voice husky, and I sound sexy."
In the limited space, the faux baroque coffee table occupied most of the room, and Sasuke was forced to sit in front of where Sakura stood on the L-shaped sofa. So as Sakura dipped low, crouching behind his back and hanging her arms around his neck for her last statement, he tries his best to not get dragged into her childish teasing, because he knows she only did it because she trusts him to not think too deeply into it. Brushing her hands off him, Sasuke let out an exasperated huff when he snatched a microphone out of her hand, parrying against the punch headed his way.
"Tch. You're not sexy at all."
After all, he was supposed to be the asshole that told Sakura he wasn't interested in her.
But the feeling of her hands on his shoulders, and arms around his neck, reaching for his chest while the fabric of her skirt raised ever so slightly when she bent down, enough for him to see the nude tights she wore under the black ones for extra warmth in the chilly weather...
Is there any normal guy that wouldn't feel something in this scenario?
Sasuke tried to cool his head, reminding himself that she doesn't deserve to be the subject of his lust. Not when she's done nothing but been a good friend.
But there was only the two of them in the dim room. They were already so close already, she's even visited his house. To reach out, wrap an arm around her, maybe slide it under her shirt slightly, and kiss her like he had wanted to under those streetlights every night it shone on her face when he walked her back...
It would be so easy to -
"Let's sing the whole Lion King soundtrack!" He laughed. Sakura was flipping through the song menu excitedly as she knotted her hair like in Pantene commercials just to feel it unfurl under her fingertips.
She was unconsciously picking out the songs she knew were within his key without trying. Shimmering in some of her own picks now-and-then. Her eyes weren't focused on him at the moment, so she couldn't have seen the way he had looked at her, but that only made him feel worse. As if he were guilty of asking to taste of some forbidden fruit he had already refused.
They were friends. And he was thinking of such things while she sat next to him.