Until Then

Chapter 17 ~ Friends Like These

"What if you're making me all that I was meant to be?
What if our love had never went away?
What if it's lost behind words we could never find?"

••••

Friday came around faster than usual, and the pinkette found herself lugging around big cardboard boxes filled with items for the children's clinic along side Ino.

The week had gone from an extreme high one day, to barely anything for the rest. It was however ironic that she got to go to work for just two days, before she was off again for the weekend.

"Does this look straight?" The blonde friend asked, bringing her index figure up to her lip as she narrowly eyed the large frame she had hung.

"Little more to the left." Sakura said, taking a single glance at the wall before going back to sifting through the items they had brought.

The second floor of the building had just been constructed, and the girls could argue it needed a little welcoming touch, especially when it would be used to facilitate the younger bunch of the lot.

"I wanted to do some painting with them. Sai had been teaching me, and I really think it could help some of the kids with the colours and stuff."

One of the aspects they were dealing with when it came to the children was getting them to overcome their fears of certain colours.

It seemed ridiculous, but specific colours seemed to trigger the children, inducing images of bad memories linked to it. One of the most common was red, just like a bull when flagged, except of one of the girls who had begun to furiously wipe her hands across her clothing as if to get rid of something.

They had found out she had been witness to her father dying during one of the attacks, and the colour red reminded her of the bloodshed.

"That's a good idea."

Ino hummed in agreement, standing back to admire the progress they were making.

"Painting lessons on your dates, I must say you guys really are adorable."

Her face showed surprise before laughing guiltily. "You got me!"

"Have you ever even been on a date, Billboard brow?"

Sakuras expression contorted at Ino's insinuation.

Technically she had been on alot if you counted all the times it was just her and Naruto, most likely eating at Ichiraku. Or when she politely accepted Lee's invitation to get a dango or ice cream. Or even that time Kiba and her were on a mission together, and they ended up at a fancy restaurant at the chief of the villages behest.

But, she was not counting those times.

She wondered if Sasuke had ever been on a date. 'Ha! Nahhh.'

'Unlesssssss. Nope, no.'

Sasuke was more too focused on killing his brother to worry about indulging in courting a girl.

"Uh..."

"That's what I figured. Sooo any ideas on what you want for your birthday?" The blonde asked, bringing her back to reality from her thoughts.

"Huh, my birthday is only at the end of March." Sakura said confused at the mention of her birthday so early in the month.

"Which is next week." Ino raised her eyebrow. Sometimes her friend could be so oblivious to the things regarding herself.

Ask her to memorize an entire encyclopedia, or recite a Shinobi rule from when they genin, that all she could remember. But her birthday seemed to fly way over her head.