A/N: This story takes place recently after episode 55, when Ino and Sakura visited Lee in the hospital. In my story, he has been released from the hospital but is still recovering.Action.
Training
Sakura watched him from the shade of a tall oak. So this is what Lee's training is like? No wonder Gaara was afraid of him.
The guy just did not quit. Even with half his body in bandages and splints, he trained harder than most perfectly healthy ninjas would.
"Five hundred roundhouse kicks!" he shouted forcefully, his voice breaking slightly from exertion. "If I can't do that, then it's a thousand push-ups!"
Chips of wood flew as Lee mercilessly attacked the solid stump. It was almost laughable the way he resembled a dilapidated human chainsaw.
Almost.
The fury of his attacks surrounded the boy with a haze of sawdust-- sawdust which, a moment later, found its way into the ninja's eyes and throat. Lee flinched, missing the log entirely and landing comically -- and painfully -- on his tail.
From her hidden vantage point under the trees, Sakura didn't know whether to giggle or cry. She was glad that Naruto wasn't around -- he definitely would have been laughing derisively by now.
She wanted to stop him; he was obviously hurting himself, and to no avail, according to what the healers were saying. But then again, to stop him would be dangerous -- to her if she got in the way, and most definitely to Lee's pride.
It pained her to watch as the injured boy gave a few rasping coughs to dislodge the dust, and then flipped over to begin his penance of push-ups.
"One thousand push-ups! If I can't do that, then it's two thousand punches!"
Sakura felt a wrench in her gut, as she remembered how Lee had performed the same exercise on the day she and Ino had gone to visit him while he was still in the hospital. She wanted to stop him then, too, but the nurse hadn't, and she didn't think it was her place...
"Fourteen!"
"Fifteen!"
"Sixteen!"
Not her place? How stupid! Maybe Lee wouldn't stop for that woman, but...
"Twenty!"
She was a complete stranger to Lee, after all. Sakura was his friend, and, as Lee had already made quite clear, his crush. What if...
"Twenty-eight!"
"Twenty-nine!"
What if she had stopped him? She knew how proud Lee was, and how determined he was not to accept the healers' words. Sakura could understand his reactions. After all, being a shinobi was everything to Lee. He was not only a rarity; he was a taijutsu genius. Could all that have really been...
"Forty-five!"
Lost?
"Forty-seven!"
"Forty-eight!"
"Forty-nine!"
"Fifty!"
Sakura placed her fingers to her lips worriedly. Lost. It hurt to even think about it. How could something that required so much work, so much dedication, so much of Lee's own soul, suddenly vanish? It just didn't make sense.
"Sixty! GAAH!"
Lee paused, his face drawn into a grimace. Sakura gasped, but Lee didn't hear her. He was panting heavily and gripping his good arm with his bandaged one.
This had gone too far. Sakura was about to rush forward to help him, but then...
"Don't!"
She froze. Did he already know she was watching?
"Don't stop," he rasped, "Lee."
So he was talking to himself. Sakura breathed again, if a little shakily.
"If I can not do even this, I am not a ninja or a man!" With that said, he released his hold on his arm, preparing to continue.
"Because if I can not finish what I start, Sakura-chan will never--" he lurched slightly, nearly collapsing, "never be able to look at me..."
A tear fell, glistening, next to his straining, callused hand.
"...like I look at her."
Lee was not the only one who had tears in his eyes.
endchapter1
A/N: First fic finis!
I'm only up to episode 64 in the anime and chapter 149 in the manga, so I don't know what's going to happen to Lee and his ninja abilities. So—oneshot, or can it grow? I may lengthen it if there are enough reviews.