Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto.

Family was a foreign concept for Sakura.

As a child, she had gone through life on her own, her parents rarely coming back from their trips to Kumo, Kiri and so on, and, by the time that she was six years old, she had been reduced to living alone with only her neighbors dropping by with groceries with no word. When Ino had found her, she was desperately trying to fill in the role of a loving figure in her life and she had ended up putting the girl on a pedestal, listening to whatever she said without question or sign of disobedience.

And then, Sakura had latched on to Sasuke Uchiha because he was strong. At first, she had wanted to marry him because he had a big family and she knew that no one in the Uchiha Clan would ever adopt her, a child of a small, barely existing civilian clan. She knew that if they married, they would be legally bound—family, if you wish—and if they liked her, that meant she could stay with them and eventually, maybe, they would learn to love her too.

The massacre came as a brutal, horrifying shock.

She had been too little to understand the repercussions of such a loss, because while she had distant parents who rarely came home, his family was gone. She cried for him the entire week, every night, hoping that somehow he would be able to live through this and know that people cared about him—even if they were not people he knew about.

Sakura had decided, then and there, that she would build herself a family.

But, she had been a neglected child and she did not know how to show familial affection. So, she copied Ino and the rest of the girls, nervously trying to figure out just where she went wrong when Uchiha Sasuke pushed her away—couldn't he see that she cared about him? That she wanted to have a bond, like family with him?

(He always snuck looks at her, the strange one with the pink hair and sad eyes after she walked away.)

Apparently not because Sakura could never remember a time where he looked upon her with fondness, nor a point in her life where he had even smiled at her, or what she said.

Only Naruto had ever had the pleasure of his pleased look.

(Sasuke could never look at her—she was too much. Too much goodness—potential. He never wanted his path for her so he pushed her away.)

When she was placed on Team Seven, she went home and sobbed happily into her pillow for the rest of the night. She was thrilled, overjoyed when she realized she could finally have something resembling a family.

But. But.

There had to be Naruto and Sasuke. The fated brothers, the bond that transcended centuries and worlds to form and bind them to each other, locked in an eternal struggle, only beatable by one of their withdrawals. Kakashi had not helped her either. He only ever had eyes for the Uchiha heir—a carbon copy of himself as a child—and his sensei's son.

And Sakura had been alone again.

She had thought, that maybe, maybe, if she spoke louder, was more frustrating, they would pay attention to her. Who she was, what she liked, why she liked it. Did they not want to know? Naruto, she found, for all his sweetness and adorable perseverance, only ever saw her as a conquest, some pretty little thing that looked shinier than the rest—it was a cruel, bitter thing to think, but it was true—and Sasuke barely even looked at her.

(Naruto adored her but not in the way she thought to be true—only with trust and patience and kindness—for all of his bond with Sasuke, it was her that he knew he could go home to.)

(Sasuke didn't look at her because he couldn't bear to see the happiness in her eyes—she looked too much like what could be home.)

She doubted that Sasuke would include anyone but who he needed in his life and she wondered, for a long, long time whether or not he would ever be able to break out of the habit of using and discarding people like tools when he was done with them.

But she had loved them.

For all of their faults—and there were many, also within herself—she had loved them. She had dedicated herself to them, to trying to cheer them up and make sure they had enough food—they were both orphans, you see and she, well she…wasn't—and she thought, maybe for just a little second, that it could have been enough.

It wasn't.

Still, Sakura tried. She pasted on smiles, went to every doctor's appointment and healing to make sure if they were alright—even if they did not see her—and she made them bentos for lunch every day. She knew Sasuke threw hers out. (He didn't—he put it by the tree and saved it for later, when only Sakura's meticulous signature onigiri could calm the rage in him.) Naruto ate them with vigor and gratitude shining in his eyes. (He always went home, happy tears in his eyes when he thought of how carefully she tucked the food in the box.) Kakashi just blinked when she offered him one and smiled, a plastic kind of smile, as if to say this is the only thing you will ever be able to do, won't it?

(He wasn't thinking it though. He thought she was the purest, kindest one of them all—the one that would succeed.)

Of course, that was ruined as well. Sasuke left with the megalomaniac Orochimaru and Naruto disappeared with his lecherous counterpart, Jiraiya.

Kakashi, of course, merely left her with a note—Make sure to train hard, Sakura-chan! I'm leaving on a mission for now.

And she had been left, standing there at the bridge, her face pale, her mouth drawn and her fingers clutching at a sheet of paper that was the only thing left of the people that she had invested in.

The people she had adored.

(Kakashi waited for her at the bridge, three weeks later, up until nine o'clock at night.)

Her parents died in an avalanche in stone the next month and she sat at the shrine she had built for them, facing strangers. Ino did not come to funeral and Sakura wondered, with a bitter twist to her lips, if she should just end it there and then, for she had nobody. She knew her body well enough to know that with the way she ate—small, supposedly tasteful, bites of food and no substance—and the fact that her ribs were visible and her hands trembled with every twitch of her arms, that she could bleed out in less than an hour.

Maybe even thirty minutes, if she was lucky.

But then—then, she had seen her.

Tsunade-sama.

She had been drinking. Her face was flushed and her eyes were red-rimmed and Sakura was sure that if she were to smell her breath she would be able to feel the burn of the sake on her tongue.

Nothing had ever looked more magnificent to Sakura than Tsunade-sama in that moment. Not the unification of Team Seven, not Kakashi's vague interest in her, not the idea of Sasuke's smile, nor Naruto's effortless cheer.

Tsunade-sama was beautiful and strong and she had no one. Her family had been killed, she was the last of her Clan, and she was still here.

Tsunade-sama was still here.

Sakura had gotten up, dusted her knees off and made her way towards the older woman, a brilliant fire in her eyes. Then she had gotten down on her knees and begged her to let her become her apprentice. She didn't care that her hair was smudging in the dirt, nor that her cheeks must have had mud on them when she lifted her brow—she only gave the woman a brilliant, teary smile after she hesitantly agreed.

Tsunade-sama became a fixture in her life. A…mother of sorts. But it was different. She was not loved, per se, more like appreciated to the highest value and full of fondness. But she knew Tsunade-sama would not allow herself to love her. She had lost too much, too fast and her heart was irreversibly broken.

She had wondered one day, if she would come out ending up like that—a bottle of sake in one hand, a snarl on her lips and fierce rage in her green eyes.

For all the love that she was willing to share, willing to give no one had ever reciprocated it. Not how she wanted it to be—not how she needed it, at least.

Family had always been a foreign concept for Sakura but as she lay in her crib, her eyes locked onto her dozing sister, she wondered if this was how it was supposed to be like. Mikoto was small, like her now she supposed, and her eyes, where Sakura's were gray and still lacking color, were a dark, dark brown, very nearly black. Her skin was pale and Sakura could see the veins under her eyes if she squinted close enough.

Her sister was staring back at her, a gummy smile on her face and Sakura couldn't help but smile back, joy shining in her face. Mikoto reached forward and grabbed at her cheeks and Sakura mewed at the painful pinch of her sister's fingers.

"Ah!" Mikoto cried, her smile spreading wider on her chubby face. "Ah!"

Sakura gurgled something back in response—the best she could do really, as most of her motor skills were reduced to barely functioning. She was just glad that she had retained her adult mind.

Mikoto beamed at her and inched forward, clutching at her cheeks even wider.

"Sa-Sa." Her sister garbled. "Sa-Sa"

Sakura's breath whooshed out of her lungs and when her parents came into the room to watch their little girls, they could not understand why their youngest daughter was quietly crying, a twisted, happy smile on her face.

She had found her family.

I've always thought that Team Seven was built on miscommunication. This is my take on that. I hope you all enjoyed it :) Tell me what you think!