Title: Are You Ready?
Chapter: 46 – Still
Author: Killaurey
Rating: T
Word Count: 5,490
Summary: AU. Sakura gives up on Kakashi as a teacher after Team 7 falls apart. Too bad fate, enemy ninja, and sheer bad luck have other plans.
Disclaimer: Naruto doesn't belong to me. It's Kishimoto's and I just play with it. Part 46 of ? Unbeta'd.

"Why don't you come stay with me?"

And, in the silence that follows her question, the mere space of a heartbeat, Tenten wonders: Did I really just say that?

She had, though, and even as Ino crows with delight, Tenten shrugs a bit and allows herself to be tugged into the room.

"I mean it," she says, looking at Sakura's incredulous expression. It's easier to look at that than it is to look at her idol, Tsunade-sama. Tenten doesn't want to turn into a stammering mess. "We've got the room and someone's always around since the shop is on the first floor."

And mom and dad will be fine with it. It's not the first time we've housed strays for a little while. I'll still make sure to ask before she shows up though.

"Besides," she adds, "we're friends."

And, okay, maybe she hadn't meant it when the words slipped out of her, but the more she talks, the more she means it. They are friends, aren't they? Maybe they're not the best of them but, hey, that just means they can work on getting to know one another better.

Tenten doesn't have so many good friends that she'd turn down the chance to make another one.

Sakura's eyes fill with tears.

"Why are you crying about having friends?" Ino asks, sounding mildly exasperated as she hooks a plastic bag over the edge of Sakura's bed and puts her hands on her hips. "Honestly, Sakura, it's no big deal."

Tenten stifles a grin at the way Ino reminds her of her mom.

"I'm not crying!" Sakura snaps, swiping at her eyes.

"Didn't I send you away?" Tsunade-sama asks Ino, as Ino takes a seat on the end of Sakura's bed.

Tsunade-sama looks absolutely flawless and Tenten tries not to look at her too much. It's like looking into the sun. Instead, she occupies herself with dragging a chair closer and taking a seat. She thinks she can keep her cool if she sits with Sakura and her hospital bed between her and Tsunade-sama.

Ino doesn't seem to have any compunctions about talking to her, though, which Tenten finds absolutely—absolutely amazing, honestly, even though it's a positively garish display of confidence.

"I brought treats and Tenten," Ino says easily, and earnestly, as if that's really an explanation. "Also, more than an hour has passed."

Ino pauses considers that for a moment, while Sakura puts her head in hands.

Then, Ino adds: "Besides, you knew we were at the door anyway."

Tenten blinks.

Tsunade-sama laughs as Sakura shoots her a betrayed look.

"You knew?" Sakura asks. "Tsunade-shishou!"

Sakura talking casually to Tsunade-sama is less jarring. Everyone knows—very nearly literally everyone—that Sakura is being taught by the legendary Tsunade-sama. It's obvious to anyone with eyes that they've developed a good rapport.

"Anyway," Ino says, "that's settled then, right? Sakura will go home with Tenten? That's not going to be a problem, is it?"

"I—" Sakura hesitates.

"It's fine with me," Tenten says, striving for casual nonchalance. "I wouldn't have offered if I thought it would be a problem. I'm not from a clan, so I don't have any secrets to be worried about you finding out, and there's no chance of unsavoury things being said about my family, if you stay with us."

Sakura frowns a little, her eyebrows drawing in. "I don't want to impose on you or your family—it wouldn't be right of me."

"Besides," Tenten adds, "I've always wanted a younger sister. You'd be doing me a favour, really, by indulging me with that for a while."

"Well…," Sakura says, looking at her blanket. "If you're sure…"

"I'm sure," Tenten says brightly.

"And I'll sign off on it," Tsunade-sama says briskly. "Ino, make sure Hatake knows about it."

Ino looks vaguely offended at being told to do that. "Yes, Tsunade-shishou," she says, and pulls a pack of cards out of her bag. "Did you have time for a game?"

Tsunade-sama hesitates. "What kind of game?"

"We've got four people here," Ino says thoughtfully. "So how about Daihinmin? I've got candy we can totally play to win."

Tenten isn't quite sure how this is her life right now. Is this really happening? "Point system, then?" she asks. "Otherwise only one person gets candy and that's no fun."

Ino grins at her. "You in, then?"

"I'm in," Tsunade-sama says, to Tenten's surprise. "And we're going to talk about what rules we're using. Make it a real game."

"What if I want to sleep?" Sakura protests.

"Forehead," Ino says, "you don't want to sleep. You in?"

"I could have wanted to sleep," Sakura says. "Pig. Yes, I'm in."

"Me too," Tenten says, not wanting to be left out while she's been welcomed without question.

"Excellent," Ino says. "So, Tsunade-shishou, what rules were you thinking of playing with?"

I like this man, Inoichi thinks to himself as he follows behind Hatake.

He could guard himself against that liking carefully and, in fact, he probably should. A man out of time. A mystery to unravel.

It's a dangerous gamble, betting on someone who isn't supposed to be here, who they're not sure how he's here, if he'll remain here, and there's the fact that the Hatake Kakashi who belongs in this timeline remains missing from it.

That Inoichi feels they've traded up is really beside the point.

I like this man and it would be irritating if he were to return to where he's supposed to be.

A conundrum, in truth, as several jutsu specialists are still investigating how to place each Hatake back where they were supposed to be. That problem is not for him to solve, however, and so Inoichi slides his pre-emptive irritation away into the depths of imagined starless waters, to be used, if necessary, later.

Most of his attention is on the problem of what it was that had attacked Ino's mind, of course, but he's much older and has gone further in his training than Ino has even begun to scrape the surface of, and so even while occupied, he has tendrils woven around Hatake's mind, a part of him examining it coolly.

The annoyance and exasperation at him, those Inoichi easily ignores. He's giving the man plenty of reason to be both of those things and those momentary, surface thoughts are passing things, like the clouds in the sky.

Inoichi is more interested in the caliber of the man he's entrusted Ino to and, in that, Hatake is all that he could have wanted.

A strong sense of loyalty, a stronger sense of integrity, a quick mind backed by a quick body. Practical and pragmatic but also knows when to allow frivolity.

And…

He pushes Ino and Sakura. He pushes them hard.

Inoichi dwells in the moment of the first run of the estate that Hatake had made them do. Every brutal, uncompromising moment of it, and then he watches as Hatake takes the time to tell them what they did wrong, what they did right, and handled the fallout of both.

He makes mistakes but he acknowledges and fixes them. He's considerate of their emotions and opinions without coddling them.

Hatake says something and Inoichi has the impression it's not the first time.

What? Ah–

"Yes," Inoichi says, paying more attention to the way the estate echoes with old silences, and, at the same time, to the lecture Hatake gave weeks in the past, on supplies and remaining nondescript. "I do want to see the Main House."

Hatake heaves a mental sigh and Inoichi drifts behind him, his mind tethered to his body by the thinnest of strings.

I haven't found anything here, Inoichi muses. But both Sakura and Hatake's thoughts agree on what happened. Ino…

He wishes she hadn't locked her mind down without consulting him.

It's not that he wishes to invade her privacy. He knows good and well the necessity of it, especially as there's little enough of that in the Clan—and as a whole, as needs must, they instead they prioritize discretion, control, and ethics over privacy.

That their ethics differ from what the civilian norm is and, even, from what many of the shinobi clans would follow is not the point. They hew to the lines in the sand that they have drawn.

But it's not about privacy, not in this case. It's about how he's plundered second-hand accounts of both Ino's pain and of her manifestation of another mind within her own from Hatake and Sakura.

Hatake and Sakura's thoughts know it as a shell. Ino did an excellent job at walking the line between Clan confidentiality and making sure her team knew what was going on. I'll tell her so, tonight, since she'll be better rested than yesterday. But… but as Clan head, moreso than as her father, I need to know how she's created this so-called shell. How much personality has she imbued it with? Mimicking a chakra signature for a quick burst of action or a small decoy is one thing, like a snake shedding a skin, but this is not meant to be a momentary thing. She sparred while wearing it. She trained with it on her, feeling like Hatake to even his own senses.

That's dangerous.

A Genin, even one so talented and skilled as his daughter (he is, perhaps, biased—but a father is permitted to be) should not be tampering with their own mind, creating new entities, without guidance.

It's not that I'm not proud of her, he muses, as Hatake and he step inside of the Main House. I am. It's a high-level mind art she's stumbled upon but, as she's recreated the concept herself rather than being trained in it… there will be weaknesses and pitfalls she is unaware of. I need to know how she did this before it is used again.

And it would be easiest to get the truest breadth and weft of it, from within her mind, flowing there and showing her the strengths and weaknesses, teaching while correcting, a conversation more in insubstantial vibes and intentions than in words.

But… it is also true that any attempt to get through the mind lock could have serious consequences for Ino.

Damned if I do, damned if I don't.

He hates situations like that, always has. The rock and a hard place have no appeal to him, just as mornings hold nothing but grumpiness to Chouza, no matter how many times they are forced to face them.

I'll have to talk with her. Get her to walk me through the shell verbally, which will have to do until she undoes the mind lock.

He could undo it himself. He'd also be risking his daughter's sanity.

For now, that risk isn't worth it.

Inoichi, as a father, hates that it must be a consideration, that one day, the risk may be outweighed by necessity.

Inoichi, as Clan Head, accepts it with cold equanimity.

The Main House is fascinating for the remnants of whispers from long ago, thoughts and impressions that linger in the shadows of the house's memory. It's so empty. Part of it–most of it–is how quiet it is mentally. There's no press of background chatter, no flow and shift in tenor of the voice of the place.

He seeks and seeks and finds nothing substantial, nothing really, other than the grumpy Hatake he's walking behind. Everything else is soft and faded, little lacy whispers that, were he alone in this decaying place, he might have gone mad in the seeking of them.

Chasing shadows of half-formed words to rid himself of the hollow echoing that threatens to maroon him here, bereft of connections.

Probably for the best that I'm not here alone. True silence is… rarer than rare. And worse than uncomfortable.

He finds nothing here that would leave members of his Clan wounded in the mind, rather than the body. He finds nothing at all. There's fish in the ponds and birds and squirrels and other wildlife go about their lives.

Nothing is out of place.

That, in and of itself, is something Inoichi finds suspicious. It's a gut feeling.

Hatake picks up a few forgotten things in the Main House but, while they'd spent a great deal of time here, they did not stay in the house overnight, so the bulk of their things have already been packed away.

"I expect that there are kunai and the like scattered around the estate's grounds," Hatake says, glancing outside through one of the windows as they pass by.

Inoichi admires the way Hatake says, without saying, that they could be here for ages, should he wish to be that pedantic about gathering their supplies.

Since there's nothing going on that he can find, he slides a little more of himself back into his body, grounding himself in the realities of it and the weight of a tangible existence.

"I only cleared myself for a few hours away from the village," he says, a wry twist to the words. "Not until we hit the next solstice."

Hatake laughs, a short, sharp huff of breath as he shakes his head and tucks a few bits of thread the colour of Sakura's qipao into one of his pouches.

"Then we've gotten everything here," Hatake says, the amusement fading as he adds, "Aside from where Sakura was held against her will."

It's clear, from the way he says it, that he'd rather not re-visit that area.

"That," Inoichi murmurs, "I do want to see."

There is no apology in his voice for that and, while Hatake's thoughts turn dark, reminded of what had occurred, Hatake outwardly just nods his agreement.

After all, having come this far, going back now would be… a waste of time.

"Maybe you'll see something we missed," Hatake says. "Things were—fraught. At the time. Do you know anything of ritual jutsu?"

Inoichi frowns a little. "Some," he says carefully, then steers the conversation away from what rituals he knows with another comment. "Though what you've described doesn't seem familiar to me."

And what I've seen through your memories is definitely unfamiliar.

"It's never been something I've studied," Hatake says, leading them from the kitchen through another hallway. "It's too slow for me and I've yet to see a ritual involving chakra that isn't tedious, dangerous, or both at the same time."

"Talk to Chouza," Inoichi suggests. "The Akimichi use ritual the most between the three of us. I'll sign off on it."

And it is a suggestion, not an order. Inoichi tries not to give orders when there's no need to. People are more inclined to listen to someone if they don't feel previously taken advantage of.

And I'm not Shikaku, who leads the Jounin in their entirety. I wield a different sort of power.

Hatake considers this. The questions he doesn't ask bubble there, right under his skin.

Inoichi doesn't answer them. Just like the memories that Hatake keeps pushing to the side, refusing to deal with, he gives Hatake that illusion of privacy.

And I do not know what to make of those memories, in any case. It's better to let him sort through them first, with how he's layered them, than my having to do that legwork for no reason. I don't have the time for that, dealing with his childhood memories. No matter how much they've unsettled him. Not when even he doubts their veracity.

"I'll think about it," Hatake says. "Getting Sakura back on her feet is the most important thing right now and I want to make sure Ino is alright too."

He doesn't add that last bit for Inoichi's sake, the way another shinobi might, when talking to the head of their student's clan, but, rather, he says it and means it entirely for Ino's sake.

He does not forget who I am but he will not play the game of politics either.

Hatake pauses, looking out over a courtyard. Inoichi follows both his gaze and his thoughts and frowns, again.

When Hatake moves on, his steps are quicker than before. Not a run, no need for that, but—hurried all the same.

Inoichi matches him, pace for pace, and they step out into the courtyard that had been engulfed in green flame, Sakura battered and toyed with, the enemy wearing Ino's face and—

The courtyard is pristine.

Hatake stares at it, eye wide, and Inoichi follows his gaze and his memories as Hatake looks at the door he'd torn off the hinges to play the role of a makeshift stretcher to get Sakura out of the estate as soon as possible. At the stretch of cobblestones that had been torn up by a fight.

At—

A few leaves, tossed free from their branches, come twirling down to land on the ground.

"Well," Inoichi murmurs, feeling fiercely glad he'd come along for this, "this is concerning."

After Hatake had left with Sakura and Ino. After that… someone has been here, through the Hatake blood wards, and cleaned away all traces of their existence.

Eventually, no matter how fun the game is (and it is a lot of fun, playing with Tsunade-shishou, Ino, and Tenten) the game has to come to an end. It ends when Shizune storms into her hospital room, takes one long look at the fact that they're clearly gambling with candy and cards, and loses her shit on Tsunade-shishou.

Tsunade-shishou makes it worse by laughing.

She hasn't even been drinking, so Sakura knows she's doing it just to get under Shizune's skin.

Tenten makes a noise like she's been stepped on and is despairing of it and, as soon as Tsunade-shishou is dragged out of the room by Shizune ("You have an actual job!") Tenten makes her escape. She does it politely, takes her share of the candy, and reiterates that Sakura can stay with her, no problem, but Sakura blinks with bemusement as Tenten, well. As Tenten flees.

Then it's just the two of them and Ino sorting through the candies left, taking all the ones she likes the best and leaving the rest.

"What was with Tenten?" she asks.

Ino looks at her, then at the door. "What?" she says. "The whole—"

"Running away thing," Sakura says. "She ran out of here like a scalded cat. And she's, you know, she's usually…"

Sakura trails off, not sure how to say it. She doesn't even know if she knows Tenten enough to know her 'usual' but, every time she's seen her, Sakura has always been immediately struck by how put together Tenten is. She's only a year older than them but she's always been so steady. Even in her training clothes, Tenten gives off the vibe of… not being dressed to the nines, but so flawlessly comfortable in her own skin that she might as well be.

Ino laughs. "That, Forehead, is a bad case of hero worship being stomped on by reality. She'll get over it. Tenten's just… she dreamed a few impossible things, that's all."

"Hero worship?" Sakura asks, then frowns a little. "Hey, don't take all the apple ones! I like those! You're such a pig, Ino-Pig!"

They squabble about candy flavours (Sakura winds up with exactly sixty percent of the apple-flavoured candies after some hard bartering; Ino crows about getting all of the orange ones which, well, Sakura let her have because they are disgusting and she has no idea how Ino likes them so much; they split the lemon and lime ones right down the middle and Sakura gets all the grape-flavoured ones, which Ino gives up with a wrinkle of her nose) until they're done with that, and Sakura does recognize that she got more candy out of it than Ino but, also, that Ino bought the candies for her.

She resolves not to worry about it and, instead, unwraps one of the grape ones immediately to eat.

"Hero worship?" she repeats, into the comfortable silence as Ino idly flips through the deck of cards, shuffling them, and then deals out a game of solitaire.

"Tenten's been obsessed with Tsunade-shishou since she was small," Ino says, not looking up from her cards. "She really looks up to her. It's one thing to know the rumours about the gambling and another for her to see with her own eyes just how human Tsunade-shishou is."

Sakura mulls over that.

"I suppose so," she allows, though it's hard for her to picture hero worshipping Tsunade-shishou. She's beautiful and talented but she's also well known as the Legendary Loser so, like, that's always put kind of a damper on it. Even as an Academy student, maybe especially as an Academy student, Sakura had wanted nothing to do with anything associated with the word 'loser'. "Do you think she'll be okay?"

"Of course she'll be okay," Ino says, and that makes her look up. "Why wouldn't she be?"

At that, Sakura doesn't really have any answer, doesn't really have the words to explain why she asked. Instead, she seizes on a different topic.

"What about you?" Sakura asks, frowning at Ino. "You've been weird all day and maybe other people haven't noticed but I have."

An expression Sakura can't read flickers briefly across Ino's face before it is gone and Ino looks just…

Tired and grumpy, Sakura decides, even though Ino has been smiling the whole time. Something's… something's wrong.

"What's upset you?" she persists, when Ino doesn't immediately answer her. "You can tell me, can't you?"

A small part of her, smaller than it's ever been, hopes desperately that it's not her that Ino is upset with but—really, Sakura, really—how could it be her, anyway, when she's been in the hospital the whole time? She hasn't done anything.

Anxiety is a stupid, stupid thing, Sakura decides. She's tempted to forget that thought entirely, leave it for Inner to deal with, but that's not fair to Inner. She's trying to be better about that sort of thing.

Okay, so I really, really hope it's not about me. There. Thought acknowledged. Now move on, self, and get over it.

Inner doesn't say anything but Sakura has the impression that Inner is laughing.

"Ino," she says, as Ino studies the cards spread over her blanket with the single-minded focus that tells Sakura that Ino's not actually looking at the cards at all. "Please tell me what's wrong. I know you could deflect and I know, if you really wanted to, that lies after lies would come easily to you, but… if it's okay, you know you can tell me, right?"

Ino sighs.

"It's nothing to do with you," she says, and Sakura allows herself that stab of gladness, that confirmation that it isn't her fault, and then focuses on being whatever support Ino needs from her. "It's… a lot of it's just really stupid and I didn't want to stress you out while you're recovering."

"Well," Sakura says, "if I'm asking for it, then that's different. And Tsunade-shishou said I'd be able to leave in a few days anyway, so I'm clearly on the mend…"

A grin ghosts across Ino's face. "Yeah," she allows, "that's true."

"What's wrong?" Sakura asks. "You've been flinging airy confidence around all morning and, like, Tsunade-shishou likes your impudence but I know good and well you're usually better at being respectful than that."

What she doesn't say is that she also knows good and well that Ino uses her confidence as a weapon to hide behind when something has unsettled her. Sakura's not even sure when she picked up that bit of knowledge, just that now that she knows it, it's clear as day to her.

"It's so stupid," Ino gripes and something in Sakura relaxes as Ino capitulates. "Okay, so, you'll hear about it anyway because you're my teammate but I did really just want to give you a few days to recover without having to think about anything but doing so. But you asked."

"I asked," Sakura agrees. "What's so stupid? Who has been stupid?"

"It's Shikamaru," Ino says disgustedly. "When Hatake-sensei brought you to the hospital, he also brought me, not because I was injured or anything but because I had a mild case of chakra exhaustion going on and since he was carting you here it made no sense to make another stop to drop me off."

Sakura nods encouragingly and, well, curiously. "That makes sense," she says, wondering how Ino had wound up chakra exhausted and making a mental note to ask later, once they were clear to talk about the mission freely amongst themselves, but also knowing that it wasn't the point of this conversation. "How mild a case was it—like, sleeping overnight and then taking it easy for a day or two?"

"Pretty much exactly that," Ino says, wrinkling her nose. "I'm still not supposed to use much chakra today but Shizune-san said I'll be able to go back to training tomorrow, so long as I'm careful about not overdoing it."

"Which you don't tend to do, not with chakra, in normal training," Sakura notes. "You work hard but, at the end of the day, you always have more chakra left than I do."

Ino shrugs a little. "I've been using it longer. You'll get there."

"I'll get there," Sakura repeats. "But, aside from that, what did Shikamaru do?"

With a roll of her eyes, Ino sighs again. "He and Tenten found our room when we were both still unconscious. Pretty close to when we were first checked in, I guess, though I'm not sure of the exact timeline on that, but Shikamaru saw me unconscious."

"He's seen you sleep before," Sakura says, a little bewildered that this is even a problem. "Like, you were on his team for nearly a year and friends for even longer."

"Yeah, he has," Ino says, "but he's never seen me asleep in a hospital bed which, like, even though it was just a case of needing a serious nap, when my dad came by and dropped off clothes for me… apparently Shikamaru lost his temper and yelled at my dad."

Sakura's entire being cringes away from that. "He did what?" she yelps, then flinches because oh, oh that hurt.

Ino eyes her.

"It's fine," Sakura says, breathing through it. "Don't worry about me—he really did that? To your dad?"

And Yamanaka Inoichi's never been anything but kind to her but, also, he's kind of intimidating and she'd be lying if she said she wasn't a little bit scared of him and the way he always seems to look at her and see right through her.

Sakura can't imagine yelling at him.

What if he yelled back?

Ino's temper is ferocious when riled. She can only assume her dad's is the same way.

"He really did that," Ino says moodily. "To my dad. In public. Tenten heard it. The nurses heard it. Other patients on this floor would've heard it."

"Well, that's… that's…"

She falters, falling silent as she tells herself, stops herself from saying they'll fix it and everyone will forget about it. She can't promise that. It stinks of Clan politics and she's barely on the fringes of that.

That's a promise you can't make, Sakura, and you know it.

"Is there anything I can do to help?" she asks, instead.

"Dad took Shikamaru to his dad," Ino says, which isn't a real answer but Sakura doesn't point that out. Instead, she watches as Ino toys with a playing card, running her fingers over the edges of it. "I haven't heard what came of that, yet, since that happened just yesterday, but it's… I can't stop thinking about it either."

Sakura makes a face. "Oh, ew," she says, "I'd be thinking of that too. Are you in any trouble for this mess?"

"No, I—I have to have lunch with Aunt Yoshino and Uncle Shikaku soon," Ino says carefully. "But I'm not in any trouble for being chakra exhausted."

Sakura pauses.

Aunt Yoshino and Uncle Shikaku? She's never heard Ino refer to… from context, it's pretty easy to tell they're Shikamaru's parents.

I've definitely heard of Nara Shikaku, he's one of the most important Jounin in the village. But have I ever heard their names in the context of being Shikamaru's parents before?

If she has, she doesn't remember. She's pretty sure she's never heard Shikamaru's mother's name at all, though she vaguely recalls Shikamaru moaning about how strict she was back at the Academy.

More importantly, though, is that she's never heard Ino call them 'aunt' and 'uncle', even though their Clans are close. That's… that's super strange. She knows Ino and, through Ino, she has a tiny window into the Yamanaka Clan and how they operate.

And they're very, very insular for all that they tend to be social butterflies. Not very many people fall under their heading of 'family'. So, then…

Sakura studies the expectancy in Ino's expression and thinks about it a little harder.

I wish I knew more about Clans and their alliances…

Then it hits her and she feels like a fool for not having seen it before. She doesn't need to know more about the particulars of the alliances the Yamanaka Clan hold with other Clans in order to be able to follow this particular political play that's going on under the surface.

Damage control. By openly spending time with Shikamaru's parents and calling them so familiarly…

Honestly, it sounds like an awful lot of work to Sakura, to have to play games like that, to save face and keep an alliance strong. Always having to think of these things. Still, given that Ino's on her team, Sakura is pretty sure that whether she wants to or not… she's got a role to play here.

Even from a hospital bed.

After all, people heard Shikamaru yell at Yamanaka Inoichi from this room in the first place.

She takes a deep breath and says, "That's a good thing, though, isn't it? After all, you've just gotten back from a mission–why wouldn't they want to spend time with you?"

Ino's smile tells her she got it right.

"I guess so," Ino says, sounding dismissive but looking more relaxed. "We haven't settled on a time yet."

Sakura ponders that. "Remind me," she says, "but does your aunt have any eye for fashion? We both need new clothes after our mission and Hatake-sensei wanted us to pick up a few things too."

Like underwear that's suitably nondescript and doesn't tell the tale of where it came from. Sakura isn't going to talk about that, though, where anyone could hear them.

Underwear are still kind of embarrassing to talk about openly, she thinks ruefully. No matter that we all wear them. I'd rather a locked door and a promise of a little privacy.

Ino tilts her head slightly. "That's a possibility," she says slowly. "I'd have to see if they want me all to themselves, though, or if you'd be welcome. I wouldn't mind but, like, you know how family can be."

Sakura makes a face at her. "Yeah, I guess so," she says, not wanting to talk about her family right now. "Let me know if I can come, okay? Even if just for the shopping bit of it, if they want dinner with just you."

"I'll see what they say," Ino says easily and something in the breeziness of her words makes Sakura wonder what other questions she should be asking.

And if she thought of the right ones, would she get the answers?

"Hey, do you think between the two of us we could come up with a list of the things we're going to have to replace?" Sakura suggests. "It'll be useful even if I wind up going shopping alone."

"Puh-lease, Forehead," Ino says, gathering her cards up without a care for the fact that she was ruining her own half-finished game. "If we're shopping for mission gear, we're going together, don't even pretend otherwise. Self-pity doesn't suit you."

"I wasn't—" Sakura cuts herself off as Ino shoves the mess of cards into her lap. "Ino!"

"Organize them," Ino orders, already rummaging through her bag with what Sakura thinks is excessive enthusiasm. "I'm digging out a notebook and pens for us and then we're going to figure out what we need and, more importantly, what we can afford."

Sakura swallows hard, trying not to laugh because that would hurt.

"Fine, fine," she says, "but this doesn't mean you get to boss me around! I'm only listening to you because shopping."

"It's very important," Ino says, pointing a pen at her. "And if you need to rest, you tell me. Got it?"

"Yes, Mom," Sakura says, and while saying so makes her heart ache, she finds she's also happy, right here, in the moment.