One week, exactly seven days had pass since the incident and Sakura still has not confronted the guy, in fact, she still hasn't seen him in the campus that made Sakura question if what happened last week was actually real or not or maybe she's just simply seeing a hallucination of her future soulmate and the incident was simply a way of warning her.

But no matter how hard Sakura convinced herself, the fact that she's seeing colors proved that what happened last week was in no way just a hallucination. She thought about a lot of scenarios once she's seen the guy again, but none of those scenarios ever came to play since last week. Sakura was even called to recite twice today because her teacher thought she wasn't listening to the discussion.

Other than that, nothing out of the ordinary occured all week and now, it's Monday again. It seems all the unusual things that happened occured within one day on her first day at that and the following days, everything seem to go as usual.

Well, not as usual as Sakura thought it would be.

"You know, there are a lot of empty seats in the cafeteria. What are you doing here?" Sakura asked when she noticed him sitting in front. Who is this him?

Naruto, of course. And he's not alone, Sakura's eyes travelled from Naruto to the unfamiliar guy he is with.

"And you brought a friend?"

"Oh right!" Naruto said, putting his arm on the guy's shoulder. "This is Shikamaru. We were classmates in middle school."

Sakura looked less amused, in fact, she looked way more interested on the ramen than what Naruto is talking about.

"Hey Naruto, is that the girl who wacked you in the face last week?" Shikamaru asked, but he doesn't look like he cared at all. Sakura, on the other hand, felt her cheeks redden in embarrassment since someone saw how she slapped him. It wasn't really her fault, he was diving his head straight on her chest and Sakura thought he was going to do some lewd things but it turned out he was just bending down to pick up something on the floor.

"Yeah, her name's Sakura. Her slap really, really hurt you know," Naruto said, exaggerating his words as he held his cheek.

"I-I told you I'm sorry I slapped you!" Sakura said in defense but Naruto just laughed it off.

"Anyway, what are you even doing here Naruto?" Sakura asked, eyeing Naruto suspiciously. Sure they were classmates, but for him to suddenly show himself in front of Sakura during lunch and he even brought someone with him. What if he's going to do something like pulling a prank on the transfer student for everyone's amusement. It's not impossible, Sakura had read something like that from a manga.

"Naruto here said you looked lonely sitting on your own." Shikamaru was the one who answered, looking more languid as Naruto practically yelled in protest.

"I think he's hitting on you, so be careful."

"Shikamaru! You idiot! Traitor! What the hell are you telling Sakura-chan?"

Sakura feel down since last week but she didn't expect to actually laugh seeing Naruto and his antics. But when she realized she was laughing and that the two guys are looking at her, Sakura cleared her throat and straightened up, masking her face with a serious expression.

"Whatever, you can sit here all you want," Sakura said before she started eating her lunch.

"By the way, Shikamaru, where's Sasuke?" Naruto asked and Sakura looked up. So he's planning to bring more of his friends? Sakura is fine with having no friends but she doesn't know if she's fine with making a few and guys at that.

"The Captain saw us earlier, I told Sasuke I'm heading first so Captain told him something I had no idea about."

"Huh? Seriously? Why does it have to be him and not me?" Naruto whined but Shikamaru just ignored him.

"Wait, are you guys in the basketball club?" Sakura asked. If she remembers clearly, and she does, the guy was also in the basketball club. So there's a chance they know him? Sakura felt a sudden tug in her chest before her heartbeat race gradually.

Naruto pointed on himself and nodded. "Of course we are! And I'm pretty good at it! In fact we've gone to Nationals already!"

"Yeah, I don't need to know that," Sakura said as she averted her eyes. He's going to boast about his popularity again and Sakura doesn't want to hear any more of his self-proclaimed fame.

In the middle of eating, Sakura suddenly heard Naruto spoke. "Oh Shikamaru, look who's here?"

Sakura doesn't know why she felt a sudden tug in her chest again, for some odd reason she felt nervous and something was urging her to look up.

But when she does looked up, Sakura hope she never actually did. Because standing at the entrance of the cafeteria was the same guy Sakura bumped into last week. The same guy who gifted Sakura the greatest gift of seeing colors. And he's right there, just a few meters away.

"Hey Sasuke!" Naruto yelled, waving his hand to get the guy's attention.

When he looked ahead and towards the direction where Naruto and Shikamaru sat, Sakura could almost sworn their eyes met for a split second before Sakura stood up suddenly and made a mad dash out of the cafeteria.

She doesn't even know why she's running. Actually, she has an idea why. But she doesn't want to accept it. Being a scaredy cat, running away from problems when she should've been facing them like the strong independent girl that she is. But then there she was, literally running away. She doesn't even know where she's heading, she just let her feet carried her to a secluded part of the campus where there are no students.

She's created a lot of scenarios in her mind for when they finally meet again. But none of those scenarios came into play and Sakura did the most stupid, illogical and weak-ass thing she's ever did. She run away.

Stopping to catch her breath, Sakura found herself somewhere in the area near the gym. Not too far was the soccer field and the whole vicinity was deserted with students.

Sakura could feel her heart hammering on her chest, it was beating so fast she could practically hear her ears ring as she bent down, letting out a few breaths to calm her adrenaline.

She was almost calming down when she heard a voice called her name and Sakura gasped.

"Sakura-chan!" Naruto said, running towards her before stopping just behind her and putting his hands on his knees. "What the heck was that? Were you a marathoner or something?"

When Sakura made a mad dash earlier, Naruto wasted no time to run after her, he even ignored Sasuke who gave him a weird look as he run after Sakura. He almost lost her in the hallway, she was too fast and too small that she mingled with the crowd of students, making it hard for Naruto to run after her. But fortunately she stopped and Naruto managed to catch up to her.

"Hey Sakura-chan, why did you suddenly run like th–" Naruto couldn't finish his sentence when Sakura turned around. It wasn't her face that took Naruto by surprise, it wasn't the tint on her cheeks or the small pant she is making after running so fast like that.

What took Naruto by surprise was the fact that there are big fat tears rolling down her cheeks. Naruto tried to recollect his memories if he said something wrong to her that made her cry. But he couldn't think of anything.

"Sakura-chan why are you...crying?"

Sakura blinked in surprise, she doesn't even know she was crying until Naruto asked her that. She felt the warm liquid down her cheeks as she search for something to hold on to. Whenever she cried before, Ino was always there to hold her. But now there was no Ino. There was only this obnoxious arrogant guy in front is Sakura.

But despite being so full of himself, so loud and noisy, Sakura still found her way towards him, burying her face in his chest.

"Hey, Sakura-chan, you're scaring me. Just tell me why you're crying."

Sakura felt a hand at the back of her head, brushing her hair soothingly and the kind gesture made Sakura burst into tears again. Until the floodgates finally closed and Sakura could only make small hiccups did she finally take a step back and wipe her eyes, yet Naruto doesn't want to let go yet.

Sakura walked towards the wall and slid down as she sat on the ground and Naruto followed, sitting beside her.

"Sorry, I shouldn't have done that. Your soulmate might get–"

"I don't," Naruto said, cutting Sakura mid-sentence. "I don't have a soulmate yet, so it's fine."

Sakura looked at him for a few seconds before Sakura looked ahead. "But I do," she said.

For some reason, Naruto felt like a brick fell down on him.

"I found my soulmate," she said, making it clear this time and Naruto felt another brick fell down. Another one and Naruto felt like he'll get crushed by it.

"But he didn't accept it."

When Sakura said that, Naruto feels as though the bricks weighing him down magically vanished. But he couldn't help but frown in confusion when he heard what she said.

"What do you mean?"

"It was a lot more complicated but..." Sakura trailed off, taking a deep breath as if readying herself. "But if you want to listen, I could tell you all about it."

Naruto turned to Sakura as she looked at him only to see the same smile that could make any girls fall, well any girls but Sakura.

"I'll listen, so tell me all about it," he said, smiling with his eyes closed and Sakura could see just how bright he is under the shade of leaves. His yellow hair resemble a bright sun and Sakura realized how the color suits him more than she thought it does.

Sakura took a deep breath as she readied herself to tell him everything that transpired a week ago, starting from the point when she bumped into the guy as Naruto listened intently, he seem like he's more interested in listening to Sakura than he is in listening to any of the lectures and discussions.

"And when I told him we were soulmates," Sakura said, trailing off for a second to allow herself another deep breath. "He said no, we're not."

Naruto's mind suddenly played back from when he asked Sasuke why he was late last week, during which Sasuke was cleaning the gym.

"The girl said we're soulmates. I said no, we're not."

A strong gust of wind suddenly blew by, some of the leaves fell down as it did so. Naruto's eyes were hooded, shadowed by his hair as Sakura looked up, the sky today is cloudless and so bright.

"Hey Sakura-chan," Naruto said, but his voice does not contain any of his cheerful attitude a while ago. "Can I just ask something?"

"Eh? Sure, what is it?" Sakura said, looking at Naruto.

"The reason why you ran earlier, was that because you saw the guy who said that to you last week?"

Sakura nodded.

"So he's also the same guy who made you cry?"

"Huh? No, I just, well, technically yes but no," Sakura said, fumbling with her words. "I didn't even know I was crying until you said I was. And I ran because I don't know how to talk to him after that."

"What else did you two talked about?"

Sakura tried to remember again, well, it's not like she could just forget all about her conversation with him.

"He said that I don't have anything to prove that we're soulmates, which was really odd since he should've seen colors when we bumped. And then I was so caught up in the strings of annoyance that I told him I was mistaken and that I must've bumped into someone else. I even told him there's no way a douche and arrogant guy like him would be my soulmate."

Now that Sakura recalled all of those, she felt so dumb as she put her hands on her head and screamed internally.

"Why did I even say that? I mean, I'm one hundred percent sure we're soulmates! And now I don't know if I could ever face him again. So that's why I ran."

Sakura heard a laugh and felt a hand rubbed her head, messing with her hair as Naruto continued to laugh. But the laugh sounded oddly forced but Sakura just ignored it.

"And it turns out, the guy you were talking about was Sasuke," Naruto said, still laughing. "What a coincidence."

Sakura slapped his hand and brushed her hair that he just messed and puffed her cheeks as she glared at Naruto.

"Are you seriously laughing? I shouldn't have told you about it!" Sakura said with a huff as she crossed her arms.

"Okay, I'll stop," Naruto said, wiping imaginary tears from the side of his eyes. "So if you're so sure that he's your soulmate, how about I tell you two things on how to make him believe that you guys are really soulmates."

"Huh? Two things?"

"First, I could knock some sense out of him by literally knocking him out of consciousness."

Sakura looked at Naruto, eyes half-lidded as she punched him on the shoulder.

"And what's the second thing?"

Sakura listened as Naruto told her the second thing he can do to have Sasuke believe that they're soulmates. At first, the statement sounded laughable but by the seconds Sakura realized that it is slowly making sense.

"We will have Sasuke regret his choice of not giving you a chance. We will make him regret not believing you."

Those were the first things he said and Sakura just listen intently.

"But how?"

"Simple," Naruto said, looking at Sakura with his face devoid of any hint of humor.

"He is a guy who rarely shows his true emotions. So if he showed this certain emotion when he sees us together, that means you guys are really soulmate."

"And that emotion is?"

"Jealousy,"