Sometimes there's just no explanation for things.

Sometimes, the mind is like a sandbox, letting random thoughts bump around along the surface before certain ones trickle down and sneak through, usually without enough weight to really be noticed.

But then, sometimes a passing thought will stick there like honey on bare skin, lingering with enticing sweetness, pulling at the fine hairs of the arm it spilled on accidentally—and, if not swiftly taken care of, nearly impossible to remove by simple means.

It happens to Sakura one day at work. She sits in the cafeteria with Ino, munching distractedly on a half-wilted salad and filling out some paperwork. There are a million other things on her mind—Tsunade, the new influx of interns, working on poisons with Shizune, the charts she still needs to sign off on, Naruto's disconcerting sodium intake, Kakashi's upcoming birthday, Sasuke's weird rash he asked her not to tell anyone about, to name a few—but one single observation manages to slip through the cracks.

When Ino stands to get back to her shift, her cornsilk hair flows outward as she stretches her lithe body, arms pushing above her head until her back audibly pops. Her plain shirt cradles her chest when her hands meet in the air. There's a carefree satisfaction in the way her mouth curves around a pleased exhale, and with her eyes closed, Sakura can see how her eyeliner flicks up at the edges of her lids, jet-black and flirtatious in the most minuscule way.

Ino is hot. Normally that line of thinking is never anything to get worked up over. Beauty is a universal thing, and aesthetically pleasing people come from all genders and walks of life. Sakura knows this well; she's been to more countries than she can count on two hands. Nothing new.

But the way this particular information hits her is different. It's not the kind of appreciation for good looks or a nice body or a stroke of intelligence that is gone as soon as its vessel leaves the room. It's not a casual observation of Ino's innate attractiveness and confidence that Sakura commonly finds herself envying.

It's the kind of idea that takes her breath hostage in her throat and makes her stomach lurch enough to signify that she's crossed some invisible line; dipped her toe into cold, uncharted water that she's not sure would feel better if she stepped in slowly or jumped in all at once. So she decides to walk away altogether, both literally and metaphorically.

But it's hard to ignore the oddly alluring unknown behind her. It's also about as hard to ignore Ino as it is an exploding tag on a shuriken headed straight toward her. After over a decade of frenemy-ship, Sakura also knows this well, and should have known it wouldn't be easy to get rid of the thought.

The more she dwells on it, the more she starts to feel disconcertingly similar to the shy, frantic kid she was when they met. And she hates it.

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Surprisingly, and much to her relief, it doesn't consume Sakura quite the way she expected it to. She's pretty notorious for her obsessions and is just grateful this doesn't seem to be going quite the same way.

She accepts that she has a crush and reasons that it's only natural given the amount of time she and Ino are together. They practically live together at this point—they work together, eat together, shop together, do all their favorite things together, just like best friends tend to do. Accepting her tiny epiphany makes it easier for things to immediately go back to normal without so much as a blip on anyone's radar but her own.

It's hard, too, because she positively craves Ino's presence in the most innocent, platonic ways. Sakura loves having someone to talk to, someone who knows the most intimate details of her life and inner thoughts and won't judge her for them. She loves that she and Ino have come close to full circle in their bitchy, turbulent forever-feud, that they've allowed themselves to be vulnerable and free with each other like the flower-gathering girls they used to be would've wanted.

That craving doesn't go away. Instead, it only grows stronger, and Sakura believes that if she can just push aside the attraction, the need, then she can come back down from her strange cotton-candy cloud of daydreaming and be the friend she's meant to be.

It's there, though. It's present enough at times that Sakura feels like she should include a third friend in whatever plans they make, and so heavy on her chest that she wonders if Ino can see it with those clear, sharp diamonds eyes of hers.

Sakura thinks she can hide it as long as no one acknowledges there's a problem or that something has changed. If it's kept safely inside, she can compress it into something small and light enough to cast away once the seasons turn and her feelings pass.

Of course, Ino notices.

"God, Forehead, what is up with you lately?" she brusquely scoffs at Sakura as they sort through discount racks at a kunoichi thrift store. "You're so fucking spacey. It's like watching Naruto write a mission report."

"Sorry," Sakura mumbles, suddenly wholly interested in the hideous purple turtleneck hanging near her.

"Don't buy that. It's ugly." Ino flicks her long, flowing hair over her shoulder, holding a charcoal gray minidress in front of herself and smoothing it over her figure with a slow, perfectly manicured hand. "Also, apologizing doesn't answer the question. You know I hate when people try to pull that crap."

When Sakura stays silent long enough to nearly burst, Ino looks up from where she's been assessing the length of the dress against her thigh. Thankfully she doesn't seem to register that Sakura's eyes have been following her hand throughout its journey.

"Ugh! You're doing it again!" Ino steps forward to flick Sakura on her forehead seal, quick enough not to give her time to flinch away. It smarts pretty damn badly, enough to snap her out of her stupor. "Spit it out or I'll do a mind jutsu on you."

"Sasuke has a rash!" Sakura panics, squeaking loudly enough to alert every other patron in the shop of what is sure to become the latest drop in Konoha's endless gossip pool. "I—I have to go take care of it. I'll see you at work tomorrow."

And then she dashes out, leaving a giggling gaggle of women and a prayerfully convinced Ino in the store.

Sakura immediately wants to drown herself under the bridge in embarrassment, or maybe transfer to a lifetime of cactus breeding in Suna. Maybe she'll get lucky and Sasuke will kill her first for sharing his current darkest secret with the village's biggest chatterbox—though she can't help but feel that he owes her one anyway.

When in the midst of her nearly crippling mortification she finds herself hoping that Ino bought that minidress, Sakura prays for the swiftest way out imaginable, because she knows she's slipping out of control deep and fast. And she is not someone who takes that lightly, nor does she handle it well.

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She is grateful to whatever powers be that her position as Tsunade's apprentice grants her a private office. Ino doesn't have one, which is always a bit of bragging point on Sakura's part, and it's a good thing because it affords her the privacy she needs during working hours.

Everything is fine at work, during lunch break, while gossiping and drinking tea from the vending machine, until Ino catches her by surprise. It's all normal until her friend taps her from behind to give her an assignment or a juicy tidbit from the nurses' lounge, making Sakura spill her drink all over her freshly starched medic's coat, or when she tugs on her pink locks while passing by. This has always been their thing, but now Sakura has to restrain the mangled yelp of terror in her tight throat whenever it happens.

Always perceptive, Ino can practically smell whenever Sakura's behavior is diverging from the norm—she is either cool, sweet, and level-headed, or she's a furious, monstrously strong spitfire on a rampage. Her only in-betweens are cranky, grumpy, tired, overworked. It's never this skittish, dreamy jumble of nerves and extreme shyness she's hardly experienced since before training under Tsunade.

Sakura brings her knees to her chest and lets her feet dangle over the edge of her worn, squeaky office chair. She gnaws the part of her thumbnail that isn't covered with chipped green polish from her last girl's night with Ino.

She misses their closeness and comfort with each other, and is fully aware that it's her own fault for distancing herself, but she's also wary of the precarious edge on which she's tipping and the deeply-rooted desires she's exposing with each new day. The problem is that the attraction doesn't diminish the preexisting friendly love—no, it multiplies it into a far higher level, treading into unfamiliar territory that makes Sakura's heart beat in her ears whenever Ino is around.

All of this weirdness is purely because she is lost in the flurry of her mind. The dusty, cobwebbed corner she used to reserve for romance now cranks feverishly, trying to catch up after years out of practice, and it's driving her insane.

The door swings open with a crack, and in walks Ino. Her presence has always been commanding, but now it suffocatingly fills the tiny space of Sakura's office, making it seem like the claustrophobic closet it used to be.

Her breath catches in her lungs as Ino sinks into the foldout chair across from her desk, pulling a mirrored compact out of her uniform pocket and checking her flawless hair like it's any other day, like Sakura isn't sitting there with beads of sweat forming at the nape of her neck.

"Do you still have that hairbrush I left in your drawer? These flyaways are making me look like I stuck a fork in an outlet." Crystal blue eyes stare at her expectantly, and Sakura scrambles to grab the hairbrush that is indeed in the same drawer where Ino placed it however long ago. Her friend only grabs it and runs it over the silken white-blonde locks obscuring part of her face.

Sakura feels ridiculous, because it is like any other day, and she's just overthinking this entire thing. A sour streak of guilt runs through her system. Some friend she is, sitting here running herself into the ground over nothing.

"So. Apparently Sayuri is dating that male nurse over in the pediatric ward who I kept trying to set up with Hinata, and I think she knew I wanted to set them up, so she's totally sabotaging the whole thing…" Ino rants, but Sakura isn't listening.

It's not nothing. It can't be, the way it's clenching at her heart and making it pump like her blood is made of thick, stubborn molasses, refusing to budge until it figures out what the hell it's supposed to be doing.

She feels like a coward, a trait over which she has constantly prided herself on persevering. Sakura, too, needs to figure out what the hell she's supposed to be doing before she accidentally destroys a training field or civilian district out of mere stress relief.

"Are you even listening to me?" Ino snaps, pushing through the barrier of Sakura's mind.

"Sorry. I'm tired." She smooths a hand over her pink hair, pulling it into a loose ponytail. "Would you mind starting over?"

The question isn't lost on herself—Sakura sorely wishes she could do the same.

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The members of Team Seven are rather low-maintenance, even if Sasuke is enough of a diva for all four of them, or if Naruto and Kakashi prefer at-home medical treatment to a proper hospital setting.

Kakashi, the most relaxed of them all, never cares much about anything unless it's a life-or-death situation for him or his teammates. For this reason, he allows his former students to throw him birthday parties without putting up much of a fuss.

Sakura usually organizes the whole thing herself and this year is no different. Naruto's help is only given by way of his enthusiasm; Sasuke sometimes decides to grace them with his presence; only Yamato is the big contributor to the process. He's taking care of the food and venue, Genma is apparently supplying the alcohol, and Sakura is in charge of keeping everything under control.

She can't help but think her role a little ironic considering she's barely managing to hold herself together in the presence of her best friend, of all people.

To be fair, Sakura's justifies, Ino is over at her apartment helping her get ready for the party, and she's wearing that gray dress from the thrift store. It's the color of slate, making the silvery blonde of her hair shine against its dark, slinky fabric. It clings to her curves like it's hanging on for dear life, much like Sakura is on the laminate countertop of her bathroom.

It's odd. The envy that used to surge—and, honestly, still kind of does—over Ino's sexy and feminine figure has morphed into a warm, pleasured tug deep within her stomach. Sakura is rendered helpless at the sight, really, because she now feels…intrusive, almost, or something perilously similar, but also can't take her eyes off her.

Ino's patent leather pumps click against the tile floor as she walks toward the counter, unsuspecting of the rapid, hormonal pulse pumping in Sakura's fingertips, her feet, her neck as she comes closer. There is a cosmetic brush in her hand dusted with gold eyeshadow, elegantly poised to sweep over Sakura's eyelids, which flutter closed as Ino leans over her.

"You still have that dress Kurenai gave you, right?" Ino's breath is pleasantly hot against her face, whispering over the skin. She realizes that Ino is close, tantalizingly so, and has the fleeting fantasy of leaning forward to press their lips together and taste the sugared berry flavor of the lip gloss she can smell with each word and exhale.

"Mhmm. It's in the closet." The reply doesn't come out breathless, even though her lungs are quivering with the effort to work like they should. "You don't think that's a little much for a birthday party at Yamato's apartment?"

"Hell no," Ino says with a carefree laugh. "If you look hot, there's no such thing as overdressed."

"You think I look hot?" Sakura blurts stupidly, cracking open the eye not currently being attended to, but promptly closes it when she realizes the view is mainly directed down Ino's dress, cleavage pushing out of the scooped neckline.

"You will once I'm done with you." She can hear the assured smirk in Ino's voice, but her mind interprets the statement inappropriately and suddenly her face is on fire. She's glad it'll just be chalked up to being complimented out of a mild bout of insecurity.

As usual, Ino's right—Sakura looks good in her red blouson dress and gold sandals, makeup natural and pretty and shimmering subtly in the early evening light. But Ino looks infinitely better, the slim, toned muscles of her calves shaping with each step she takes. And God, those shoes.

Most everyone at the party is of the same mind as Sakura, if not exponentially more vulgar due to their status as mid-thirties bachelors. Genma sputters and chokes so hard on his beer that a disgruntled Shizune starts giving him the Heimlich. Yamato hasn't even brought out the food yet, and Ino's already working her magic over the gathering without trying.

The party is an ordinary one. The attendants are several jounin and chuunin, a good number of which are in the younger generation. As per usual at social gatherings, Ino takes it upon herself to try and get Sakura laid, dragging her along to talk to all the men she already knows and wants nothing to do with.

Sakura is in a shitty mood, because not only is she exasperated from planning this whole anticlimactic thing and being pimped out by the very girl she has a raging crush on, but now she has the audacity to get jealous.

Jealousy is a bad, bad sign. It means Sakura thinks she has some sort of monopoly on Ino that she doesn't, and still isn't entirely sure she wants to, mostly because she has no clue how Ino would react to her feelings. Sakura is past trying to suppress them—now she just wants them to fizzle out and evaporate instead of burning like lava inside her stomach, because getting pissed over Sai's poor, empty attempts to flirt with her best friend is about as petty and childish as their feud over Sasuke, and has the same explosive potential to ruin their friendship again.

She takes a breather by moving to sit in the corner with Kakashi, who's reading his porn book like it's a day at the park. He's calm and still and safe, always the voice of reason even if he doesn't feel like being one, and it's exactly what Sakura needs right then.

"Happy birthday, Kakashi-sensei." This is the first time she's approached him since they arrived; Gai, Anko, and Pakkun were playing cards with him until a few minutes ago.

"Thanks." He ruffles her hair, carefully because it's styled, and she understands that he's thanking her for the party too despite his lack of participation. She smiles and sinks further into the sofa next to him.

For once, she likes that her ex-teacher doesn't enjoy small talk, as it allows her to sit in comfortable silence. Sakura feels like a tea kettle, a volcano, a child on the verge of a temper tantrum. But when she rakes her bubblegum hair off her neck and slaps at it when it won't stay put, Kakashi notices.

"Something bothering you?" His sleepy eyes land on her face, which she can feel is flushed from anger and confusion and a glass or two of something alcoholic.

Sakura knows that Kakashi isn't truly interested in her problems; he's just giving her the opportunity to talk about the problem if she wants to, and she doesn't whatsoever. "Just wondering what to get you as a birthday present."

His eyebrow raises, perking intuitively like a dog's ear, but she's beyond relieved when he doesn't push the unspoken issue. "I thought the party was the present."

"Well, yeah. But it's kind of a tradition now, so the novelty might have worn off."

"Not really." His reply is punctuated by the sound of a glass breaking, followed by Naruto shrieking like a banshee, and he side-eyes Sakura long enough to make her snort.

"What else could you possibly want?" she jokes, though her voice doesn't hold much humor.

"I can think of a few things."

She walked right into that one. "Uh oh."

Kakashi puts on a show of thinking hard, tapping his masked chin with a finger. "You and Ino could have a pillow fight, or mud wrestle in bikinis, maybe get it on video…"

She knows he's kind of kidding, and on a regular day she would pinch him hard enough to bruise or yell at his pervy ways, but all she does is blanch before her face goes up in flames.

Kakashi doesn't even get the chance to sheepishly chuckle or crease his eyes into a smile, because she dashes off to the kitchen, jostling the entire sofa in her haste.

Sakura wonders how upset Yamato would be if she dove face first into birthday cake on the counter, shaped perfectly like a bone with paw print sprinkles on the icing, though she manages to refrain. It'd be so much more convenient if it were a gigantic bowl of ice water.

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She decides to consult Naruto. He's a pretty open-minded guy when it comes to things like this, and he's also not the one person she'd normally go to in this kind of situation. But he's the next best blond-haired, blue-eyed, bluntly-honest friend she has, so she revels in his invitation to talk over lunch.

It isn't until Naruto tucks into his steaming, fragrant bowl of miso ramen that Sakura decides to broach the subject.

"Naruto," she begins, laying her chopsticks across the wide mouth of her bowl. He turns to her, cheeks bloated with food enough to stretch his whiskers and deep tan freckles further across his face.

"Mmnph?" Noodles and bits of chashu pork dangle over his chin, dotting it with salty drops of broth. His cerulean eyes are bright and open, ready to accept whatever she has to say, but she knows she has to tread carefully. He hardly knows how to properly chew, for God's sake.

"What would you do if you had a crush on Sasuke?" It's an easy enough comparison—the two are close enough to be brothers, though there's a strange tension there that could say much otherwise. And it's a relationship where he'd have to consider someone of the same sex, something she is sure neither Naruto nor herself have given much thought to before now, mostly because there hadn't been many romantic opportunities for anyone since their genin days.

Naruto chokes a little, face scrunching into a laugh as he tries to keep food in his mouth. Teuchi chuckles behind the counter; he's seen this happen countless times and has no reason to worry.

"You think I have a crush on that asshole?" her friend asks as he finally manages to swallow. "Why does everyone always ask me that, huh? I mean, Sasuke is good-looking…like, really good-looking, and he's strong and a friggin' genius, and he's all, like, stoic or whatever, and he does look really cute in an apron, but—"

"That—no. That's not what I meant." Sakura sighs as she turns to face him, the bandages on his prosthetic scratching against her knees as she swivels. She tries to think of another approach, but his one-track mind is full steam ahead.

"Hold up, do you have a crush on him, then? Still? I thought you got over that after…you know." Naruto pouts just slightly, and she's sure he is recalling the whirlwind that was the Fourth War. This is so far from where she wanted to venture it's almost funny, but she's getting frustrated, so it's mostly not.

"Naruto, listen to me." He turns toward her, attentive with chopsticks pausing over the steam trailing upward from his ramen. "Think about it this way: if you suddenly woke up one day and realized you had…feelings for Sasuke. Romantic and kind of…sexual…and totally not friend feelings. What would you do?"

Sakura thinks she's going to jump out of her skin watching him mull over her words. Maybe it's a huge mistake asking someone so loud and impulsive, because it's likely that her meaning is exceptionally obvious, but she reasons while seeing him gnaw thoughtfully at the inside of his cheek that the only danger lies in acknowledging her own feelings. Making them public, known, something real and altogether terrifying. Her hands shake where they rest in her lap, the fabric of her skirt bunching around them.

"I dunno," Naruto says after a few agonizing moments, completely unaffected as he winds a large clump of noodles around his chopsticks and eats it with his usual vigor. "That's kind of hard. I'd probably tell him, but he'd just think I was kidding or something, so…"

The words are muffled by his food, and he glances up with a friendly smile at Teuchi as the man methodically slices negi and carrots.

"Jii-chan," he says as he leans an elbow against the bar, "if you liked your friend, what would you do?"

Teuchi spares a humored, sage glance at Sakura, who can feel her humiliation slowly brewing into a pink flush up her neck.

"I always say that if you never try, you'll never know." The man chuckles with an ease that clearly comes with years of giving his daughter the same advice. "Go for it. And bring them here on your first date. Ramen's on me."

"Say, Sakura-chan," Naruto whispers slyly, "is this all an attempt to confess to me? 'Cause that would work out really well right now. I haven't gotten paid for my last mission yet." His eyebrows wiggle conspiratorially. Sakura scoffs and stands up, kissing his cheek as she slaps enough cash for them both by her barely-touched food.

"In your dreams, Nar." With a pat on his head and a wave at Teuchi, she makes her exit through the noren at the shopfront. She isn't quite sure what gave her the inkling of satisfaction that spreads over her now, but she can tell it's from something she needed to hear.

"Wait, then who do you like?!" Naruto practically screams from his stool, but by then Sakura is too far away to respond.

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She ruminates for days afterward, chewing on her nails and pencils like she's punishing them, and realizes that the only way to get past this is to face it head on once and for all. If it worked with getting over Sasuke, it would probably work with anyone, right?

Hopefully they won't have to try and kill each other in the process. Sakura reasons, though, that given her history with Ino it could very well come to that, if with slightly less drama than the Uchiha-Haruno showdown. The entire idea is laughable.

Unfortunately, there never seems to be a right time. There's never a moment that begs to be ruined with a half-crazed love confession. Sakura really, truly believes she could say something and put it all out there if only the opportunity presented itself.

But thought and action can be hard to overlap, and this is certainly no exception. Usually she's so good at going after what she wants. It shouldn't feel this dire or make her so vulnerable or hinder her from enjoying her daily life, but it does.

Sakura worries at her chapped lip, teeth scraping the raw skin to an almost painful degree. The nurses are going for their bimonthly night out—when most of their schedules coincide for a night off, they all decide to go grab drinks and bitch about work. It's always nice, but when Sakura remembers that plan always involves a drunken Ino crashing at her place after a watching a mediocre rom-com on her couch, she dreads what could possibly happen.

The routine plays out before her eyes: fruity neon cocktails are downed, tipsy gossip is passed around, a few nurses try to hook up with moderately handsome shinobi, and then they all part in good humor when the witching hour passes. A giggly, inebriated Ino trudges alongside Sakura, narrowing down their movie options and shouting about her cravings for junk food and something far more indecent.

The night is chilly, so they throw off their coats and boots by the door before going to change into cozy pajamas. Ino always borrows some of Sakura's clothes, and they change together in the bedroom before throwing their hair into messy buns and wiping off their makeup.

Tonight, of course, Ino is slower than ever, or maybe it's because Sakura hasn't had much to drink and is therefore more aware of her surroundings. She walks back into her bedroom to find Ino finally slipping her shirt over her head and discarding her bra haphazardly onto the floor.

Ino is only in her skimpy underwear and couldn't care less as she reaches to put her river of hair up in an elastic. Her naked breasts move with each turn of the band around her hair, firm and soft like fresh marshmallow residing over the smooth, flat plane of her stomach. The light in the bedroom is dim, and it creates long, shallow shadows in the dips of her abdomen.

Sakura turns away, shuddering uncontrollably. She can't catch her breath for a minute, and when she stops reeling enough to reorient herself, all she can feel beyond the potent spark of lust is pure, unadulterated shame.

Ino trusts her as a friend, and even by accident, Sakura is taking advantage of that. She understands now more than every why Tsunade practically murdered Jiraiya for peeking at the women's onsen—and what's worse, she can begin to understand the thrill of the legendary pervert's favorite hobby. Her legs lock into place; there's no way in hell she's going down that road.

"Sakuraaa," Ino moans around a frustrated pout, "I'm stuck."

Sakura doesn't dare move.

"I can't get this thing over my head," she continues to slur. "It's, like…caught in my hair or something."

After a few more moments of listening to the drunken whining, Sakura gives in against her better judgment, and finds that Ino has truly tangled the camisole above her head. She keeps her eyes trained on the raised elbows and not the sight of Ino's immaculate chest, yanking the shirt out of its predicament with unnecessary force.

"Usually at this time of night, someone's taking my clothes off, not putting them on," Ino drawls with a loose laugh. Sakura's fingers accidentally trace the inside of her elbow; the skin is unbearably warm. "God…I haven't kissed someone in forever. I miss making out."

This is what Ino typically dwells on when inebriated, and Sakura always laughs and pokes fun, but she can't right now. Not when this is all hitting far too close to home.

"You'll survive," Sakura mutters, trying and failing to shut the girl up. When she tugs the shirt down, the movement is extremely hasty, and Ino's elbows fall over Sakura's shoulders as she lurches forward.

"Ooh," Ino sings with a hiccup of a giggle, her eyes narrowing suggestively. "We should kiss. That was a sign."

The thought is apparently hilarious, and Sakura is pulled closer by the inadvertent embrace around her head. She is frozen in place as their clothed chests graze against each other. Neither of them is wearing a bra, and she can feel everything, and it's all she can do to close her eyes and swallow around the solid lump in her throat.

"No, Ino," she whispers shakily, trying to get the situation under control. She's just a little buzzed, but her friend is totally drunk, and this is going downhill at the speed of light.

"C'mon, you prude!" Ino snickers, voice stretching over long seconds. "I kiss people…like…all the time. Just gimme one and I'll leave you alone." The slow smile stretching across her pretty face doesn't make her flimsy bribe any more believable.

"Get off me. Let's go—let's go put in a movie, okay?" Sakura is the strongest kunoichi in Fire Country, but she cannot find the strength, physical or otherwise, to move out of the near headlock in which she's caught. Her muscles tremble from how stiffly she's standing; she doesn't want to do something horrible like send them both through the wall in her rush to escape.

Her eyes are closed, so she doesn't see when Ino leans in to kiss her, only feels the clumsy, pillowy pressure of lips against her own which press a few more times for good measure. She can tell Ino planned to keep it short and sweet, but when Sakura opens her mouth to gasp for much-needed oxygen, the kiss goes deeper, and her head swims when she tastes peach lip gloss and sugar-laced vodka on the tip of her tongue.

Ino's teeth click against hers, and Sakura instantly remembers just how plastered her friend really is, and knows it's time to stop for good. It would be so easy to let this go further, to let hands wander and sheets wrinkle and let herself reach the summit she's been dying to climb. Ino would do it, too—her curiosity is healthy, and her sexuality knows little bounds. But this has crossed a huge boundary already, and to go any longer would have irreversible effects.

She pushes Ino away, their mouths parting with a wet pop, and she can feel her entire body blushing. Her friend only laughs deeply, drowsily, and flicks her forehead seal.

"You should loosen up. That was terrible." Ino unceremoniously stumbles out of the room, and the sound of her sagging onto the couch echoes throughout the apartment. By the time Sakura moves again, she can hear quiet snores drifting in from the living room. The hot tears at the corners of her eyes finally spill out onto her cheeks.

She furiously wipes them off as she goes to cover Ino with a quilt, since the ridiculous girl decided to fall asleep in the smallest, tightest clothes possible. She doesn't even let her gaze linger over the sleeping form; her vision is blurred with tears anyway, which come even faster as she shuts the bedroom door and crawls weakly into bed.

She lets herself cry because she's miserable, and it's so much easier than admitting how hard she's falling.

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They're both late to wake the next day, obscenely so. A bleary-eyed Sakura could hardly sleep at all, finally succumbing to exhaustion during the hours usually reserved for breakfast. Ino just snoozes off her impending hang over, comatose from copious amounts of alcohol the night before. She has the day off, the bitch, but Sakura doesn't—and now she's over five hours late to her shift at the hospital. It's a wonder someone hasn't busted down her door yet.

She throws on her usual garb, nausea rising in her sore throat when she sees her friend's clothes scattered all over the room. With a halfhearted kick, she gathers them into a heap before grabbing her things, brushing her teeth, and getting a move on.

"Up and at 'em, Pig," she yells with another stronger kick, this time aimed at the couch. Ino groans and Sakura's stomach drops—there is no way she can face her while she's this discombobulated. The next time she sees her, she's going to have to say something, and she doesn't know exactly what that something is when her head is whirling.

Ino will lock the door behind her when she goes, so Sakura doesn't worry about leaving her alone at the apartment. What she is dreading, however, is whether Ino will be gone by the time she gets back.

After getting past a pissed-off Tsunade and an unhappy Shizune, Sakura is assigned the next two night shifts to make up for being so tardy. She's extremely grateful for the distraction and excuse to stay away from her apartment. Every time she has a problem she doesn't know how to surmount, throwing herself into work is always a good way for her to mentally sort things out. It gives her a sense of purpose, and it helps her feel like she has some semblance of authority over herself and clarity when nothing makes sense.

The two nights are grueling work—three separate teams come in with several members requiring immediate surgery, and quite a few genin are sent to the emergency room due to training accidents. By the end of it, Sakura is running below empty, ragged and aching to the bone but satisfied with a job well done.

She hasn't even thought about going home; she's so dead on her feet that all she wants is a nap in one of the sleep room's bunks. A nurse stops her just as she's changing out of her surgery scrubs, approaching her with slight trepidation. Most of Sakura's coworkers have learned not to try and agitate her when she's extremely tired or coming out of a long procedure.

"Haruno-sensei," the nurse says with a polite smile, "I'm sorry to bother you, but Ino-san was looking for you."

Sakura's hand halts midair on its path to close her locker. "When?"

"A little while ago, when you were in the O.R." The young woman shrinks in on herself with each word. "I don't—"

"What did she say? Where is she?" The threat of hysterics closes in on Sakura, and though she knows she's being irrational, she's terrified that Ino remembers the stupid kiss and knows everything about how she feels and is mad at her and that their friendship will never be the same and…yeah. She really needs a nap.

"Oh, um…she's in the maternity ward today. I think she was wondering when your lunch break was."

Sakura barely notices how the nurse has backed away from her; she shuts the locker and steps closer, lowering her voice. "Don't tell her where I am. Just…pretend you didn't see me. I can't talk to her right now. Not yet, anyway."

Confused, the nurse nods slowly and begins stepping toward the door. "Of course, Haruno-sensei."

"Actually, no." Sakura wrings her hands together, willing herself to relax a little. "Tell her I went home instead." This way, Ino won't snoop around the hospital searching for her.

"Sure," she agrees with a smile and walks away quickly. A huge exhale forces its way out of Sakura's lungs once she's alone, and she trots off to the sleep room, trying to be invisible the whole way there. She knows she's being rude not acknowledging her coworker's greetings in the halls, but her nerves are frayed and she needs to hide again.

She's tired of doing this, tired of hiding, tired of feeling and wanting so much and having no fucking idea what to do about it. She's tired of who she is, because she got sick of this pitiful, timorous girl over a decade ago. She's too old now, too accomplished, too deserving of better to do this to herself, or to Ino for that matter.

This, Sakura decides, will be the last time she runs away from this dark, looming storm over her head, this turbulence in her mind and heart. The next time they meet, she'll tell Ino exactly what and who she wants, and will have to deal with the consequences just like she always has.

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It doesn't take as long as she thinks it will. On her way to the grocery store the very next day, she automatically takes the shortest route, which goes directly past Yamanaka Flowers. She hopes to pop in on her way back and have a chat with her friend, but doesn't see her through the shop window.

"Hey, Forehead!" Loud stomps get even louder as they approach, and Sakura turns to find Ino marching closer. Adrenaline seeps through her veins in an instant. "Where the hell have you been?"

"Nowhere," Sakura replies, voice small. Ino isn't pissed, but she's also not happy, and Sakura is rapidly losing the words she's been planning to say under her ice-blue glare. "Work, mostly, and home…"

"So you weren't ignoring me, then," Ino states, perfectly-shaped brows tilting with skepticism. "Because I could have sworn I heard you snoring from the nurse's beds all afternoon." Which is code for how she only found this out after the fact, or else she would have come to personally wake her up.

Sakura is about to tell her some version of this truth—that yes, she was ignoring her—but she's beaten to the punch.

"Look, did I throw up on you or something?" She snorts indelicately and tosses her bangs back with a sharp flick. "'Cause I can tell you right now, that would've been hilarious, and I would have remembered it."

"No, you didn't, but—"

Ino snaps her fingers, her face lighting up with a revelation. "Oh, shit, it's because I kissed you, isn't it?" A haughty laugh rings throughout the street where they stand. "I totally forgot about that. Are you mad because I stole baby's first kissypoo?"

Sakura's cheeks redden as Ino grabs them mockingly, pinching and pulling at them before her hands are swatted away. They both know it was definitely not her first kiss, not even between the two of them. However, they'd never kissed when Sakura had feelings like she has now.

"Okay, that's it. What is going on with you lately? You've been acting like you used to at the academy, except a thousand times weirder."

Face burning, Sakura looks helplessly at the ground. "I need to talk to you."

"Come into the shop. Chouji's filling in for my cousin right now but he'll leave us alone for a few minutes."

"Can we go somewhere with less people?" There are a lot of civilians and some shinobi milling around the store and its open doors and windows, most likely excited to stock up on some mums and mountain sage now that the weather is cooler.

Ino snorts. "What is this, a love confession?"

Sakura knows she's being teased, that Ino is trying to lighten the mood in case the subject matter is more serious than expected, but it still makes her freeze at the unexpected question.

Ino wasn't suspicious before, but the curious shock slowly slackening her jaw makes it clear that she gets something after seeing Sakura's deer-in-headlights expression.

"Oh my God, it's a love confession!" Her scandalized smile and volume can't be contained, so much so that several passing people look on with quizzical brows. Sakura panics and scuttles away, uncomfortable with the audience and how her plan is going down the toilet.

"What's wrong, Billboard Brow?" Ino calls, her tone almost sing-songy. "Do you like me or something?"

Sakura loathes the smugness failing at veiling itself in her taunting voice and immediately succumbs to the bitchy, insanely competitive twelve-year-old that always threatens to come out around Ino, even to this day. She snaps in all her nervousness, in her sudden and overwhelming refusal to let Ino win this battle she's been having with herself, and wheels around. Before she can stop herself, a surge of anger pulses through her arm, and she punches forward once, fist landing in the center of Ino's face with a sickening crack.

They both shriek in surprise, but Ino's is more violent and horrified.

"Oh God, Ino, I'm—"

"You fucking bitch!" she screeches, face flushing nearly as red as the blood dripping over her mouth. "You ruined my PERFECT NOSE!"

She launches with enough force to land a significant blow to Sakura's jaw, yanking her pink hair hard enough to make her see stars. Sakura can't even apologize or try to stop her at this point—like always, her instinct with Ino is to react and retaliate just as aggressively.

Her vision goes red, and she instantly goes into fighting mode, audience be damned.

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Tsunade taps red nails against the Hokage's desk, their rhythm slowing as she stares longer and harder at the two hot messes of kunoichi in front of her.

"What the hell is wrong with you two?"

Her commanding voice is frighteningly low and calm, and Sakura gulps, resisting the urge to tuck a short, blunt end of hair behind her ear. She wants to chance a sideward glance at Ino, but she won't be able to look at the girl's enormously swollen nose without laughing, and that will not go over well in front of her shishou.

"Somehow you two managed to knock down an entire forest's worth of trees, collapse a row of food stands, level a whole training field, beat the living daylights out of each other, cut each other's hair—quite terribly, I might add—and for some reason I will never want to know, Sakura has Cum on My Chest Sasuke-kun~! written all over her in permanent marker."

From the corner of the room, Shizune suppresses a choked laugh and tries to disguise it as a cough, which only narrows Tsunade's terrifying glare. Ino and Sakura don't dare move, mostly because they're bruised all over and beyond exhausted.

"Fix it," the woman demands, "now."

"Yes, Hokage-sama," the girls drone in unison, rising to leave with a bow. They trudge out of the office, sneaking sullen glances at each other as they make their way toward the outside stairs.

"I don't care what order we fix that stuff in, or how long it takes us," Ino murmurs, trying to mask the nasal hoarseness of her voice as they descend the cement steps. "First things first, you're fixing my goddamn nose."

"Yeah, fine," Sakura softly replies, because she's impossibly confused and sore and knows that this is the least she owes her friend. This is one of many times they've fought, but there's a definite, palpable change that neither will have the energy to acknowledge until they're somewhat back in working order.

The academy lies near the base of the Hokage Tower, so they silently decide to sit at the swing set in the empty playground while they get their bearings. Sakura crouches in front of Ino, bringing a glowing hand to her still-purpling face.

They don't look at each other for a minute, but their eyes meet since Sakura is focusing on realigning her friend's nose back to its original delicate shape.

"Do you really like me?" Ino's question is uncommonly quiet, so the meaning behind it is somewhat ambiguous, and Sakura flushes across her cheeks, ears, down her neck and chest under the scrutiny.

"Yes." Saying the word is such a relief that Sakura can almost taste it, and it feels incredible to be able to be this direct again. "I do."

Ino keeps staring to a point of concern, but then a smile quirks at her lips, which are surrounded by smears of dried blood and partly hidden beneath the hovering chakra-coated hand at her nose. Her own hand, cool and soft, comes up to gently hold Sakura's wrist.

"You know," Ino starts, rubbing her thumb over the side of Sakura's, "for all that room behind that giant forehead of yours, you sure do have a tiny fucking brain."

She giggles, healed nose wrinkling amiably. Sakura stops her chakra flow, the work finished, but doesn't move her hand.

"You should have just said so earlier." Despite the subtle loftiness in her statement, there's a touch of tenderness and understanding in Ino's eyes that grips Sakura's heart in the sweetest way imaginable, spreading warmth through her.

"Yeah?" A light, bubbling laugh draws from her throat. "I guess I should've left your nose swollen to match your pig attitude."

"Shut up," Ino retorts, laughing more assuredly this time, before reaching down to brush Sakura's uneven, disheveled hair out of her face. "Are you gonna hit me again if I kiss you?"

Sakura's too happy and too suddenly shy to flirt back, so she only shakes her head. A happy sigh escapes her when Ino's lips brush against her own before capturing them fully.

Her head is filled with the scent of Ino's vanilla perfume, the raspberry of her lip balm masking the coppery tang of blood around her mouth. The kiss lasts for an infinite, heavenly stretch of a moment until they break for air.

"I think those repairs can wait until later, don't you?" Ino's fingertips graze the back of Sakura's neck, and she bites her lip at the sensation.

The repairs can't wait until later, honestly, but Sakura isn't about to pass up on the unspoken invitation. "I might need some help scrubbing off this marker you drew all over me."

"Seeing as how I literally possessed you to do that, it's the least I can do." They both laugh blithely, the sound echoing throughout the playground.

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That night, the two lay in Ino's bed together.

Their hair looks a little better thanks to at-home haircuts to even out the length. Both are in various states of undress since some healing jutsu to fix the rest of their injuries turned pretty frisky earlier in the evening. Their limbs are tangled together beneath the sheets, heads resting closely on pillows with soft silk cases. They're talking about everything and nothing like usual, but this time there is an intimacy and underlying excitement that sweetens the air, the light, the atmosphere settling around them, and Sakura is incomparably blissful.

If she'd known things would be this perfect and messy and beautiful, she would have urged herself to develop these feelings long before.

Her fingers trail down the inward arch of Ino's back; Ino's fingers trace the neckline of Sakura's collarbone. Suddenly she smirks widely, eyes on the exposed skin in front of her.

"What?" Sakura asks, voice clearer than it's been since her crush developed. Ino taps a nail against her sternum, and Sakura remembers with a scoff what's written there.

"Hey," Ino stage-whispers with intent drama, "do you think that instead of fighting over Sasuke now, we can have a threesome with him instead?"

Sakura slapping Ino's arm before pulling her closer. "I hate you," she laughs, and then they both pause with equally thoughtful looks at each other.

"Like he would ever," they say simultaneously, and then burst out laughing all over again.

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a/n: i had this sitting in my drafts forever and finally decided to finish it...shoutout to my two sakuino gurls for motivating me to finish with ur interest in this dumb fic.