In Between Haruno's Memory

[4]

All Sakura could do was stare at the buildings in awe as her parents and herself walked past them. Her parents may have thought it was because this was the first time she'd ever seen them, but the truth was that she was awed by the fact that they were still standing. In her time they had been reconstructed since there demolishment. Also the people acted very different. By people she meant the ninja. The ninja here seemed more carefree than before and she could see a few gliding through the rooftops causally. An opposite to her time. Ninja were always rushing about with worry. She couldn't really remember any ninja out of the rookies that took it easy. Even Kakashi was swapped into missions like crazy after Naruto left.

'I think they were always like this outer.'Murmured Inner.'Everything began to change when we graduated. You know when Orochimaru fucked the village up and gave Sasuke a hickie.'

Sakura nodded at Inners words as her parents caught up to her and gently held her back as her mother lightly scolded her.

"Sakura you mustn't run off like that. You could get lost."Her mother finished gently as Sakura nodded. She couldn't stray away from her parents like that. She wasn't twenty-nine anymore after all and she most certainly did not know anything about how to get home or information on the village.

So for the rest of the day her parents gave her a mini tour of the district they lived in. She was rather surprised to see how many people and ninja alike knew her parents. For heaven sakes chunin Genma knew her parents! Thinking back on it maybe she had been too obsessed over Sasuke to even notice. That thought itself made her embarrassed.

Thinking about Sasuke she wondered how Naruto was doing. Her wonder turned to resentment. She'd bet her Charka he was still being abused by most of the villagers. The single thought made her want to crack her knuckles and pummel whoever was ever mean to him. Suddenly her train of thoughts was broken as she felt a very familiar charka source and angered yells come from near it.

'Naruto? Speak of the devil!'

Sakura hid a smile as she pushed away from her mother and ran to where she felt Naruto's charka to see a small circling crowd around a fruit vendor, and in the middle was a small blonde haired boy being yelled at harshly by the old woman as others jeered at Naruto. Before she could move closer to Naruto she was pulled back by her parents, but not before catching Naruto's broken expression that made her want to cry.

'Naruto.....what happened to you?'

.......

It had been a week since the incident with Naruto and Sakura was feeling glum. Her parents refused to let her outside unless they could hold her hand. She supposed they must be scared that she's run away from them and get lost. Still it was annoying since she was sure she wouldn't be able to find Naruto alone much less befriend him.

So Sakura spent her mornings expanding her charka sensing skills like she would normally do each morning, except this time she was allowed in the backyard. With an eye patch over her left eye of course. Her parents were still wary of allowing her to have any contact out the house, but figured it would be better to let her out in the morning for a while, rather then allowing her out in the afternoon.

Because of this Sakura spent her mornings playing with the fallen leaves and practicing her Charka control with the leaf exercise. After she got tired of doing that she'd just lay on the grass and stare at the sky. Shikamaru was right about cloud watching. It was the perfect hobby for anyone. Still Sakura was becoming restless. It wasn't until two weeks after incident that she finally burst while eating dinner one night.

"Mama, can we please go to the library? I promise I won't leave and I'll stay inside the building, but don't make me stay home another day. Please?"She added as she bowed her head down in question. It wasn't until she heard the clinking of money that she looked up to see her mom holding four thick golden coins in between her fingers and her fathers glum expression that she figured out what they had done.

"Hey, why'd you bet on me!"Sakura yelled as she looked back at her mom and dad with an accusing look that made them burst in laughter.

"Were sorry hon, but you see your dad and I betted four of Suna's rare collectable coins in how many days it would take you to burst."Mebuki explained while giggling happily.

"Humph. Well your mom bet less then three weeks and I said four."He shook his head before speaking in a childish whiney voice."Why weren't you more patient? I could've finished my collection."

Sakura cracked a smile before lecturing her parents mockingly about betting. The rest of the dinner was spent talking about their day and laughing at her dads bad luck. So it wasn't until after dinner Sakura received her answer.

"Sakura, I'll be leaving you at the library at ten tomorrow. I'll trust you'll be up early?"Mebuki asked as she patted Sakura's head and picked the dishes up.

With those words in mind Sakura leapt into bed happy for a change in schedule.

.....

"Now Sakura, you must stay in the library until I come to pick you up."

Sakura bowed her head slightly before telling her mom she'd be alright. With that reassurance in mind Mebuki left leaving Sakura alone.

"Alright. It's about time my plan started to unravel." She told herself softly while walking to the civilian section of the library. She had formulated a plan to fit just with all the knowledge in her head.

First she needed to have an alibi for wanting to become a ninja and knowing about ninja related things. Because this time around she wasn't going to befriend Ino like before. So in order to seem interested she would begin reading a bit of history on Konoha and even a few higher leveled books to show off her intelligence. After all she knew very well that chunnin patrol the library in order to keep an eye on under qualified ninja and civilians trying to get into the upper sections of the library. Luckily for her the historical part of the library was relatively close to the ninja section which happened to be section two of the library and was where most of the chunin hung out on during breaks.

Because of that Sakura decided it was a good spot for an alibi if needed. After all if she did this she'd be able to have a solid excuse for knowing information beyond her years. Plus chunnin love to gossip and any information was good enough for her.

So from then on Sakura started coming to the library on a daily bases. She didn't do much except grab a book or two and read it in the corner nearest to the chunin. At first they always seemed to look over at her and throw her weird looks when they saw what she was reading, but soon enough they got used to her presents. A few of them would even leave a piece of candy or a cookie. It continued on like that until about four weeks later she met someone she had not yet expected to meet.

Itachi Uchiha

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I'm sorry for being really really late. Its all good now cause like schools over and now I have loads of spare time.

So anyway thanks for reading and for waiting as well.

Playingbomboxs out-

1297-words