Sakura's POV Ino's light feet carried her up over gently sloping stairs, made of mahogany wood, a deep red brown in color with a lovely finish. Its agreeable scent mixed with the chocolate cosmos's in a cool night breeze. The smell spread penetrating every molecule of air under the cottage's long porch, sheltered overhead by a low sweeping overhang. From the cottage's porch, its front door opened welcoming visitors into a cozy, dimly lit living room. To the left a fireplace beckoned, built and decorated in gray-tan colored brick. Inside it's charred interior, split alder wood stacked in a crosshatched pattern burned, giving off a sweet aroma. Firelight danced hypnotically in red-orange fingers, casting heavy shadows that flickered like phantoms off white painted walls. I warmed my feet by its flame, kicking off my sandals onto the woolen rug below. Heat crept up my legs and up my entire body to the tips of my fingers and the top of my head, as I reclined back on a comfortable sofa to the further to the right of the living room. I let my lids shut and relaxed to the sound of fire crackling in quick, frenzied snaps. A soft tapping on the hard floor was heard beneath the crackle, inaudible to the average human ear. It sounded more like the touch of a feather barely brushing the ground. That's how light she stepped, nimble and deft as the wind. Her arm faced up to the ceiling, balancing two teacups delicately atop a black lacquer tray. With her back held straight and head up high, she bowed with the graceful air of a courtesan, offering me tea. My thumb and forefinger closed in around one of the fine china cups lifting it from the tray. I supported its bottom of it with my other free hand, bringing it to my mouth. I sipped the tea in small, steady gulps and a pleasing steam filled my nostrils, the delightful scent of jasmine. "Thank you, Ino," I whispered, above the rim of my cup. Ino replied with a nod seating her self beside me. She crossed one leg over the other, setting the tray on a low lying table to the side of the couch, where I left my cosmos with the ribbon tied around it. "What were you thinking about, Sakura?" Ino asked, raising her cup to her chin. I swallowed and fixed my sight on the hypnotic dance of flames. "About what a great friend you've been," I admitted shyly, feeling myself crawl inside. "As kids I was never confidant and everyone...liked you." "Isn't it obvious, forehead girl?" Ino laughed proudly, cocking her head to the side. She set her teacup down on the table, next to the flower and tray, and teased me with a nudge in the arm. "Not only am I beautiful, but elegant as well." "Ino, you pig! Don't rub in it!" I put my cup down on the floor and dived swiftly at Ino. Like a predator thrashing its prey, the impact slammed her down flat against her back on the sofa, knocking out every ounce of wind. Pinned beneath me, I felt the rise and fall of her chest, lungs gasping desperately for air. Her hot breath hit my lower jaw, the air strong as a wind tunnel, slipping in under my dress collar and blowing across sensitive skin hidden by the base of my neck, just above the collarbone. Flesh shivered and tingles spiraled up and down my spine in pleasurable torment, throughout every limb, the tips of the nerve endings in each strained past the utmost limit, above and over the edge of oblivion. Consumed by my senses, abandoned by all defenses, my lips parted in helplessness unable to utter a sound. A playful smile broke over Ino's fair features as she tilted her head up towards me, face only a hair's breadth from mine. "Can't fight back?" Ino jested, with the tinge of mischief in her voice unmistakable as day. "Ino...I" Only a few raspy words spilled out from my throat, over the heated crackling of flames. "Oh, I get it now. You were thinking about this, weren't you, Sakura?" Ino's smile twisted into a wick grin. As Ino said that, a charred log in the fireplace coated with a thin layer of ash, tumbled down in a blaze of orange-yellow flame, and sparks flew out from the embers trapped beneath. They glowed like fireflies in the night, their glare reflected in her eyes, aflame with passion. She raised an arm, which was cast in fiery shades, up around my neck pulling me closer and our bodies pressed together. "A-about what?" I stammered, as the muscles in me tensed atop her weight, fighting the barrage of overwhelming sensations that left me breathless. A feverish battle lost as the last of the embers died down and she whispered in a low voice, "This," and her lips rose up to meet mine in a deep searing kiss that melded us together as one, for the souls within us touched one another. "Sakura...I..." Ino's mouth gaped wide open but no words came out as she lay there under me. I released all resistance, resting my weight atop her, my chin on her chest, listening to her beating heart. It raced in anticipation, holding in it years of deep-seated feelings. "Tell me, Ino," I said into her ear. Leaning her head back on the sofa, she turned it so we stared eye to eye. Her penetrating graze reached deep into my soul to its very depths, and from that place, she uttered, "Sakura, I...love you," in the most passionate soulful voice a mortal could live to hear. Tears brimmed in her eyes, turning her blue irises into watery depths I could drown in. It took all of the strength in her heart and soul to say that, a deed more brave than any act a shinobi warrior might hope to perform on the battlefield. "Somehow, I knew," I admitted at last, squeezing her hand in mine. She lifted my hand in hers up to her chest. "How?" Ino murmured, staring down at our hands. "You always bothered me about Sasuke-kun," I said, weaving my fingers between hers, clasping our hands in a knot of prayer. "I couldn't stand to see the two of you together." Ino sniffled, her grasp tightened and heartache churned in her expression, her eyebrows drawing together. "I'm sorry, Ino," I apologized, torn apart by her pain, gazing at her thoughtfully. "You felt left out." Ino inclined her head giving a wistful nod. With a slow cumbersome hand she reached for her cup on the low-lying table to the side of the couch, sipping her now lukewarm tea. "Even though you were with him, you two never got together," she managed to say "It wasn't meant to be," I sighed regretfully, feeling myself weighed down by heavy feelings, likened to a burden the soul must carry. "Sasuke-kun never cared about love. Only revenge. So much that Naruto couldn't stop him from going to Orochimaru." There mere mention of his name made me want to cry. The boy I loved plunged into the darkness of no return. Somehow, when he fell, my heart did too. Love is foolish and hardly rational. Maybe that's why people die from broken hearts. And Sasuke broke mine. It hurt like a knife that stabbed me, leaving a wound might never heal, even beyond death into the eternal future. "Don't blame yourself, Sakura," Ino implored me desperately, placing the teacup in her other hand on the tray nearby. She took my cup positioning it beside hers. "I can't help it, because I couldn't stop him!" I cried, suddenly seizing her from behind. I grabbed her the same way I did Sasuke before he left, reliving that agonizing moment. The scene of Sasuke departing that fateful night played itself in my memory, showing itself to Ino as sorrow sown across my face. In a pain-choked voice, I struggled to speak, "Ino, when Sasuke left he told me, 'Sakura, my path is different from yours and Naruto's. Thank you for everything you've done.' After those words, he knocked me out, and I awoke on that lone, cold bench the next morning." Abandoned and alone, what else could make a person suffer so much? "See, Sakura? It wasn't your fault," Ino replied sympathetically, running a hand across my arms that embraced her, her fingertips light like a feather ghosting over. From her touch warmth spread throughout my body, as a feeling of genuine love and tenderness. It healed some of the anguish, leaving me calmer. In a low quiet tone I said, "Do you really...think so?" She nodded, turning in my hold to face me. "Sasuke-kun made his own decision, Sakura." "You're right, Ino. I did what I could." I clung to Ino, breathing in her very presence. "What if he never comes back?" Ino smelled my sweetly scented hair, running her fingers through with the softest of caresses. "I don't know if..." I buried my face in the crook of her neck, with both arms tight around her, our bodies pushing against the back of the couch. "If I could live without him." "Me too. But we're got to be strong." Ino summoned an inner will that strengthened her words, firm and resolute. "I...I know. I'll do my best." My head slipped out from between of her neck and collarbone, my cheek brushing against her bare shoulder, my lips traveling lazily over her silken flesh that quivered. Ino's fingers uncurled in my hair, her lapis colored eyes widened reflecting my image, and a low whimper escaped chasing away all worries. "I can do my best because of you, Ino." I cupped her face in my hands and blew a thin wisp of hair from her eyes. Ino's visage brightened and her gaze penetrated the darkness like a shaft of light through the clouds.
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