Lovestruck || borusara

XVII.

Sarada cringed as she slowly gained consciousness. Dark eyes fluttered open, only to immediately clench shut, the bright light from the window hurt her pounding head.

It was obviously morning, but how late she couldn't really be sure. Sarada blindly reached around, hoping her phone was somewhere near her. When she found the device, it was dead, but she probably should've guessed that after she clearly hadn't plugged it in.

She dropped her useless phone, in order to address her more pressing needs.

Water.

Her mouth was so dry, she desperately needed some water to curb this punishing hangover. Slowly Sarada lifted her head, and in her dizzy observation of her surroundings realized she had passed out on her couch with her glasses still on.

Her work laptop was open and askew on the coffee table, so she turned it her way to check the time. But when Sarada saw what else was up on her screen her stomach dropped and she suddenly feared she was going to throw up.

One unread email from her boss, Karin Uzumaki, that simply read "Call me."

Fuck.

Sarada grimaced as she read the two words over and over. She had really hoped emailing that outline was all a dream. When she opened the attachment, she sighed. Her only saving grace was that her drunken hands only typed out about a fourth of her internal rant from the night before.

Still, it wasn't pretty.

After chugging down two glasses of water and plugging in her phone, Sarada dialed her boss.

Maybe if she was lucky she wouldn't answer and they could postpone this conversation until Monday when she had more time to figure out how to walk back this mess.

"This is Karin," she answered after the third ring because Sarada was really anything but lucky.

"Good morning," she greeted, trying not to sound like a scared little girl in the principal's office. "You wanted to talk to me?"

"You were up late last night." Her tone was almost... teasing. Maybe Sarada wasn't dead.

"Oh, uhh, yeah, about that outline..." Sarada began but her hungover brain struggled to come up with a good excuse as to why she would say something so inflammatory about a well-beloved athlete.

"I'm intrigued by the concept, care to explain it a little more?"

What?!

She stood there silently for a moment, her phone pressed to her ear, mouth agape. "Um...well it was just a wild idea, still very much in its infancy. But it struck me so suddenly, hence the late email..."

Sarada nervously wet her lips. She could fix this. All she had to do is make up something reasonable and then just say she changed her mind.

She inhaled a deep breath as her feet began nervously pacing through her living room. "I was just thinking about how we, ya know as a society, allow famous athletes to believe themselves to be more valuable and important than others. And that belief can breed this behavior of treating women like disposable objects. But —"

Just when Sarada was about to say she didn't think it was an idea worth pursuing, Karin chimed in.

"I like this idea of Athletics Illustrated almost holding a mirror up to ourselves and examining our contributions to this problem through the way we glorify sports, and by extension the athletes themselves. It could even be argued that the greater sports media ecosystem that puts these men up on pedestals is the exact cause for this kind of behavior."