I was planning on making this a one-shot, but a certain someone asked to make this a two-shot instead.

So. Here we are. ~

Also, thank you very much for the story alerts / favorites / reviews. They make me happy.

That aside, I'd like to ask whoever's reading this to take a moment and pray for the earthquake / tsunami victims in Japan. God bless.

Fate

Konoha park, a year later. May 15, 2011.

Sasuke Uchiha sits on one of the abandoned swings. Nothing much has changed about him. Same black hair and dark onyx eyes. Same (if larger) posse of fangirls coming from the distance.

As he stands up leisurely and prepares to escape, the same pink-haired girl with emerald green eyes flashes through his mind — though, for some reason, he doesn't quite know why he remembers that certain person.

Nor does he remember her name.

Said pink-haired ninja stops at the Konoha gates, here on an annual visit to Konoha.

Konoha. Sasuke Uchiha. She smiles at the memory. Well, let him come looking for me if he wants — but I'm not going to go looking for him.

With that in mind, she salutes the guards and they let her in — they have, after all, seen her plenty of times in the years before.

Sasuke jogs away from the huge cloud of lipstick-and-perfume-smelling-dust, which are his fangirls, and ducks into a random coffee shop.

I should use new cologne. Or change my shampoo. That will throw the hellhounds off me for a little bit. Nodding to himself about his foolproof, genius plan, he almost fails to notice the flash of pink hair darting around a restaurant corner.

Almost.

Because, well, it's pink.

And pink is, to put it bluntly, certainly an odd hair color to have in Konoha.

Sasuke waits for his fangirls to clear away, then without realizing it, he is moving towards the restaurant corner. Because only one person he knows has pink hair, and that pink hair belongs to the face with emerald green eyes — the face that is flashing through his head right now — and he's hoping against hope that maybe, if he finds her, she can tell him why her face has imprinted itself in his head.

He rounds the corner and inwardly groans; the pink is lost in a sea of brown and black — and wait, was that silver?

Yes indeed. Sasuke spots a head of silver hair — Kakashi-sensei — and makes his way to the perverted jounin, lazily standing against a tree with a suspicious orange book.

Then he stops.

What are you doing, Uchiha? You are going to ask your perverted excuse of a sensei if he saw a pink-haired girl walk past?

For a moment, Curiosity argues with Uchiha Pride.

Curiosity wins. Curiosity sticks its tongue out at Uchiha Pride, leaving the latter to sulk at its emo corner.

"Sensei."

"Sasuke."

"Sensei."

"Sasuke."

Sasuke decides to cut to the chase.

"Have you seen a pink-haired girl around here?"

Kakashi flips a page. "Oh? Your new love interest, Sasuke? Good to see you are socializing."

Sasuke glares.

Kakashi crinkles his visible eye.

"Yes, I saw her."

Silence.

Sasuke waits. Kakashi flips another page, visible eye zoning in instantly on something in the book, no doubt an inappropriate picture.

Silence.

Sasuke is about to burst with pent-up frustration when Kakashi says, "Of course I saw her. That is the only thing you asked me. You never asked where she was going."

Sasuke exhales grumpily.

"Where did she go, Kakashi-sensei?"

"Now we're getting somewhere. Flower shop."

Sasuke grunts in reply and dashes off. Kakashi raises his arm in a lazy salute towards Sasuke's retreating figure, his visible eye never once leaving the page.

She is standing inside the flower shop. Her eyes are closed in a dreamy manner, and she is holding a white rose delicately.

Sasuke catches himself staring at her.

Her pink hair is short and goes a bit past her shoulders. She is wearing a dark red dress with black leggings, and she has black fingerless gloves on. Though the face in his head has longer pink hair that flows with the wind, there is no doubt — she is the girl that has been haunting him the whole year, the girl who keeps flashing through his mind every so often.

Then her eyes open, and her emerald green ones lock with Sasuke's dark onyx ones, and he remembers.

There is something about the figure, something about her — Sasuke knows the person is a girl — that attracts Sasuke's attention.

She steps up to him and the fangirls, and says, "I heard about your announcement. I would like to challenge you to a fight."

The signature Uchiha smirk appears.

"It seems like even strangers cannot resist the Uchiha charm."

"Oh, I didn't challenge you to be your girlfriend. I'm a ninja, believe it or not, and I only want to try my luck against the famous Uchiha."

Then she takes off her dark blue cloak, lays it on the ground a few feet away, and flips her shocking pink hair. She raises her head, and piercing emerald meets dark onyx.

Grinning, she puts her kunai away. "How does it feel to lose, Sasuke Uchiha?"

He is speechless.

She continues. "Either way, I win. I'm sorry, but I don't think we are meant to be."

She puts on her dark blue cloak (which has miraculously appeared unscathed by the fiery battle) and bounds away, leaving him shell-shocked, staring at her retreating form.

He remembers who she is at the same time she recognizes him, and she grins slowly.

As if in a trance, Sasuke makes his way towards her in the flower shop, barely aware that she is also walking towards him.

They stop in front of each other, and she is the first to break the silence. She smiles and says, "Sasuke Uchiha."

And although he now knows who she is and why her face is imprinted in his head, he can't quite place what her name is. So he contents himself by simply stating, "You."

She quirks an eyebrow.

"Have you forgotten my name, Uchiha? That's rude. Especially since I remember yours."

"I haven't forgotten. It just… slipped my mind." He says vaguely, which is half-true, because for the life of him, he can't put his finger on her name.

"Then I'm not telling you again. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have things to do in Konoha." She starts to walk away.

"My offer still stands, you know." Sasuke blurts, before he realizes what he said.

Oh dear Lord I'm going mad. Mad mad mad madmadmadmadmadmad. He mentally bangs his head against a wall.

"The offer to be your girlfriend?" She looks amused.

He does not move, but gives her a barely audible grunt of assent.

"Well then…" she smiles slyly, "I'll make you a deal."

He looks up.

"If you can remember my name, I will go out with you."

Guess her name. Okay. That will be easy.

"…And you may not ask anyone what my name is. I want you to remember it by yourself, and believe me when I say, if you ask anyone, I will know."

His hope is thrown out the window.

"You should have it at the end of today." With that, she strolls off.

Sasuke sighs in frustration. He's got a lot of thinking to do.

Two hours later, Sasuke slinks through the Konoha marketplace, still lost about a certain pink-haired girl's name. He considers asking the guards at the Konoha gates, because they let her pass, so of course they have her papers and know her name — but he refrains from doing so, partly because he wants to win her fair and square, partly because he is afraid of what she'll do if she finds out he is cheating.

With no option left, he trudges to the local library and buries himself in a book of Japanese girl names.

Hisako. Chizu. Kaminari. Suki.

No. They don't sound right.

Groaning, he thumps his head to the book repeatedly — earning him a worried glance from the librarian — but he ignores her.

He glances at the clock. Three hours left to sunset, and he scrutinizes the book frantically.

Three hours later, nearly sunset.

Sasuke sits at the base of a sakura tree.

Amaya. Hana. Mitsu. Michiko. Jin.

His head is a constant ramble of names, names, names.

He is so deep in thought, in fact, that he doesn't notice the pink-haired girl, watching him from her perch on a tree root.

She giggles when she sees what tree he's sitting on. Oh, the irony, she thinks.

At precisely sunset, Sasuke hears light footsteps approaching. He doesn't need to look up. He knows it's her. The girl whose name he can't recall to mind.

She sits beside him.

"So."

"Hn."

"Any luck?"

He turns to face her then, hoping for anything that can trigger his memory and make him remember her name.

He commits her face to his memory, knowing that if he can't guess her name by the end of today, all hopes of having her as his girlfriend are gone.

Her clear, emerald green eyes, sparkling with playfulness and wisdom at the same time. Her pink hair, cut short, that flutters with the wind. He wants to hold it in his hands, feel the softness, but no. He doesn't.

And as he watches, a sakura petal gently flutters down and lands in her pink hair.

His eyes widen.

Wait.

Sakura.

Pink.

"Very well then." He gives her a mock bow, "Uchiha Sasuke. As I'm sure you already know."

She curtsies, graceful and light. "Haruno Sakura."

He breathes in sharply.

"Haruno Sakura…"

Her lips tug upward in a slow smile.

"Indeed."

Their lips meet in the sunset, and all Sasuke can think of is that this girl is different, she is one in a million, she is special, and she is his.

Fin.

Hope you enjoyed.

- TheAliensDidIt