Naruto Fan Fiction ❯ Summers: Memorable Days and Unforgettable Nights ❯ First Impressions ( Chapter 1 )

Alright, alright. I know how insanely overdone this plot is, but I can't help it. It's almost 2 o'clock in the morning and I won't get any sleep unless I at least start writing this. And I'm making things OOC, just because it's easier to write.

 

Disclaimer: You don't own Naruto. I don't own Naruto. That's basically why fan-fiction was made. Dur.

 

 

Chapter One:

First Impressions

 

 

A sixteen-year-old girl sat in the passenger seat of a car. She twirled her pink hair with her fingers as she stared boredly out the window.

 

`Well I suppose things could be worse.' She thought to herself.

 

She brought her attention away from the window to momentarily look at the back seat. Three teenagers sat very uncomfortably in a space meant for two. On one side of the seat sat a blonde haired boy. He was in a black T-shirt, not wearing his usual fluorescent orange jacket over top due to the heat. Along with jean shorts that went just below the knee. His dramatically blue eyes were squinted in a glare aimed at the boy on the other side of the seat.

 

This boy had black hair that was styled much like a chickens behind. He wore a gray button down shirt with a blue tie. The button down had the top two and very bottom buttons undone and the sleeves were pushed up to just above his elbows. The tie was loose, and the entire ensemble looked very laid-back and yet stylish. He'd opted to wear girl- I mean skinny jeans. His intense black eyes were rimmed with a bit of eyeliner, and his gaze was also in a glare aimed at the blonde on the other side of the car.

 

Both boys were acting as if the girl in the middle of the seat wasn't even there. Her long blonde hair was pulled up into a tight ponytail. She was wearing a light blue tank top and light faded low-rider Levi's. Her face was scrunched up in anger as she was squished between the two. Her blue eyes noticed her pink-haired friend looking at her and looked pleading.

 

`Oh yes, It could've been a lot worse.' Sakura thought to herself as she turned back to gaze out the window. She had on a snug fitting green T-shirt. In white letters across the front it read `i bite'. The T-shirt was faded and had a vintage look and feel to it. She had chosen to wear dark Roxy shorts, exposing a lot of leg. Her green eyes were thickly rimmed with eyeliner. Her pink hair was worn down, and fell to her shoulder blades. She wore a hair-tie around her wrist at all times so that she could put her hair up at anytime.

 

She watched as the scenery started to go by more and more slowly, until the car came to a stop. She turned to look at the driver. He had short dark brown hair and black eyes. His facial features made him resemble an innocent puppy; much like the one that was lying in her lap. Akamaru had to be the cutest dog she'd ever met. A mix between a Jack Russell Terrier, Border Terrier, and Pomeranian. The driver, Kiba, had on a gray T-shirt and khaki shorts. He turned to Sakura and smiled, revealing slightly-larger-than-normal canines. She smiled back then opened the door. Akamaru perked up from his nap and hopped out of the car, yipping and running around.

 

Sakura laughed and stepped out of the car stretching.

 

“It's so good to be out of that seat. That had to be the longest I've ever been in a car.” Sakura said aloud.

 

“Well duh,” another voice rang out sounding deep and male with a bored tone “we were in it for, what, 14 hours?” It was the black haired boy, Sasuke.

 

“Shut up, asshole. You don't have to be so rude to Sakura.” The blonde boy spoke unnecessarily loud. That's Naruto for you though.

 

“No. Why don't you all shut up?! I didn't see any of you crammed between the two bitchiest hormone-crazed teenage boys ever for the entire ride!” This was shrieked out by the blonde girl, Ino. The statement was followed by two cries of `Hey!'

 

“Don't blame me. We all flipped a coin, fair's fair. I called heads and got the front seat.” Sakura said raising her hands defensively.

 

Ino sighed, knowing it was true, but still not liking the fact she had to be so uncomfortable.

 

“If you guys hadn't noticed, we're here.” Kiba declared. With that all the others turned to see they had stopped in front of a cozy looking two story house that sat right next to a boardwalk. The long dock was drizzled with light sand, so of course when Ino noticed this she squealed, “You got us a place next to the beach!”

 

“Well, when I was looking around I found this place; they're renting it out for the summer. It's not exactly huge, but if Sakura and Ino share a room then Naruto, Sasuke, and I can share another.” Kiba replied.

 

“I'm not sharing a room with the idiot.” Sasuke said and all but turned up his nose.

 

“Then you can take the couch.” Kiba said and Sasuke immediately retracted his statement. He may not like Naruto, but there's just no way he would ever sleep on a couch.

 

The five all grabbed their things and headed into the house. It was cold inside, whether from lack of occupancy or just constant air-conditioning they didn't know.

 

The bedrooms were all upstairs so, one by one, they climbed up the narrow spiraling staircase. Everything about this house was tiny, but it was actually very big inside. The rooms were twice normal size.

 

Sakura and Ino chose to take the room that's above the garage, at the front of the house. There was a large closet, though it wasn't walk-in; and only one bed. But as the two girls stepped into the room they noticed another narrow staircase that lead upwards.

 

“There's a loft! That's so cool!” Ino whisper-shouted. She didn't want the boys to hear or they might come to claim the room as their own.

 

“You can take the loft; I'd rather be down here.” Sakura said.

 

`One less staircase I'd have to climb down after I wake up.' She thought. She hurled her bag onto her self proclaimed new bed. As she unpacked her things into an empty dresser she frowned. She needed new stuff, but she wouldn't go out shopping for a while.

 

When she finished unpacking, she called up to Ino who had unpacked in a dresser she'd found up there. They headed out of the room. When they stepped outside their room it opened up. There were two doors, one to the right of them and one to the left. The door to the right of them was cracked open and they could see it was a bathroom; the other door was closed though. In the room they were in now there was a couch and two recliners, all oversized and in bright childish colors. There were large windows on the right side of the room that made the room so bright, you wanted to dance.

 

Further into the room the space closed into a hall. The stairs lead to the hallway, and finally there was another door, at the end. It was open so Sakura and Ino knew it was the room the boys were sharing. They decided to check it out.

 

The room was very large it had four beds, something Sakura found strange.

 

“You know there was an extra bed up in the loft too. That's weird.” Ino said. The two girls left for downstairs.

 

“Kiba, are we expecting company this summer?” Sakura asked at the bottom of the stairs to the boys who were sitting on the couches talking and laughing. Kiba stopped laughing and froze then slowly smiled. He was so guilty.

 

“Well yeah, the owners of the house didn't want to leave for the summer, but I begged them to let us stay for the summer. The house is big enough, and they're nice.” Kiba answered.

 

“So where are they now?” Ino asked.

 

“Well Kankuro and Temari said they'd be on the beach and Gaara's probably out grocery shopping.” Kiba said.

 

After the group talked a bit they decided to head to the beach, but Sakura still felt disgusting from the car ride and wanted a shower before she went anywhere. So she grabbed her bathing suit and hopped into the upstairs bathroom.

She was in the shower for a while when she heard noise downstairs, so she figured that the group had come inside, bored with the beach and sick of waiting.

 

Still she put on her bathing suit, a white bikini with polka-dots all over in various shades of green. The strings on the bikini top were a pale pink along with the ties on the sides of the bikini bottoms.

 

She rang out the water from her hair then put it up in a messy ponytail that always looked great on her; though she had no idea why.

 

She grabbed a big fluffy white towel and went downstairs. The sight that greeted her was not the gang. It was an unfamiliar male. He was about four or five inches taller than her. He had shaggy red hair. Not the typical red hair, that is actually more orange than red, but actual red hair, like he just dumped Kool-Aid all over himself. He had on a Black T-shirt that was baggy on him, and baggy black jean shorts.

 

He turned away from the counter where he'd just finished putting away groceries, and was looking right at her. He had eyes intense like Sasuke's but they were green like her's. She smiled at him and waved.

 

“Hello, I'm Sakura Haruno. You must be Gaara. Nice to meet you. I'm headed to the beach did you want to come?”

 

“Hn.”

 

“I mean I could wait for you to change into your trunks?”

 

“Hn.”

 

“Is that a no?” She deadpanned, used to these answers from Sasuke.

 

An audible sigh escaped him and he answered, “One minute.”

 

Sure enough a minute later he came down with only black trunks on and a fluffy white towel over his shoulder. He nodded at her and they started out the door.

 

She started to explain her friends to him.

 

“Ino is a bit self-absorbed, but she's my best friend and I love her. Kiba is nice, he's very protective, but all my guy friends are like that. Sasuke is…a lot like you. He doesn't talk much and he has those intense eyes. I know it's because he's been through so much, but I still think it's amazing.” Sakura turned to look at Gaara, who was looking at her; he appeared to be actually listening to what she was saying.

 

“Did you have a difficult past?” She asked her eyes changing with her emotions.

 

“Hn.”

 

“Ah. How interesting. Thank you for confiding in me.” She said sarcastically. “Anyway, onto Naruto. He's very-”

 

She was interrupted. They had reached the end of the boardwalk and the aforementioned blonde was rushing at them full speed with sand billowing up behind him. While he hurtled like he was in the Olympics he screamed at the top of his lungs “Sakura!”

 

When he got close enough he appeared to tackle her but really it was more of a hug. Sakura giggled at first but after a few seconds when Naruto had yet to let go she started beating him over the head shouting.

 

“Naruto! You saw me five minutes ago! Let me go! You can't possibly have missed me this much!”

 

Naruto let Sakura go and waggled his eyebrows “Or can I?”

 

Sakura sighed and walked onward towards the group who were laughing hysterically and -given the direction they were pointing- it was probably at her. She started jogging to her friends and realized they were in fact laughing at her. More at Naruto, though.

 

She didn't recognize two people in the group. A tall girl with dirty blonde hair pulled into a pony-tail. She was very tan, and had blue green eyes. She was wearing a purple bikini, with grey swim trunks.

 

The other was a boy, equally as tan. He had brown shaggy surfer hair, and black eyes. He was in black and purple swim trunks.

 

She realized this must be Temari and Kankuro, the other owners of the house. Both stopped laughing when they noticed the red-head that was standing behind Sakura. They glanced to Sakura and basically gaped at her like fish out of water.

 

“You got Gaara out of the house? You got Gaara out of the house and onto the beach?” Temari said flabbergasted.

 

Sakura gave her a weird look and nodded as if confronting a Kindergartener. “I said I was going to the beach. I asked if he wanted to come. He came. It's simple logic.” Sakura said.

 

She rolled her eyes and looked out to the beach, it was a hot day and the waves were great. She wasn't much of a surfer though. She turned to the group, “Does anyone have a Boogie-board I can use?”

 

Kankuro stepped up to her and put an arm around her waist and guided her toward the house. “Yes, we have a few. Let me show you where they are.”

 

“No Lecher, if you take her in the house you'll probably rape her. Just let me do it.” said a voice. Kankuro turned to find it was his brother. He was too shocked to stop Sakura from walking off with Gaara.

 

 

AGHK

 

 

Inside the house again Gaara walked off and came back with a small black boogie-board and a long white surf board with red, black and grey decorative patterns on it. It was scuffed up from what was probably repetitive use.

 

“So you surf?” Sakura asked as they stepped back outside.

 

“Used to.”

 

`Back to short speech. Awesome.' She thought to herself.

 

They were silent until they reached the beach. The others were spread out now. Ino and Temari had chosen to lie out and improve their tans. Kankuro, Naruto, Kiba, and Sasuke were chasing each other around and splashing in the water. It made them look…well not very masculine, but it looked like fun nonetheless.

 

Sakura looked over to Gaara, who was looking at the idiot boys. She smiled and proposed “Race you to the water?”

 

Gaara looked at her and his face showed what he thought of the idea. Very childish. But of course Sakura didn't care. She just giggled and darted off toward the water.

 

Sakura soon found it was much harder to run in the sand. Instead of using the force of your feet to propel you further like you would on solid ground, the sand squished under the pressure and just sucked the power. Almost exactly like a trampoline when someone has a perfectly timed jump, they can steal it. They fly high up into the air and you wind up either standing on the trampoline angry or loosing your footing. It was a lot like that, so needless to say it took a lot more energy.

 

She had overcome the heat of the day; she was creating her own wind. Her hair was swishing from side to side in her ponytail. Every breath was filled with the salty scent of the beach water and the earthy smell of the sand. As Sakura was racing forward with her board hooked under her arm, she felt a gust of wind as Gaara went buzzing past her.

 

She smiled, always loving a challenge. Sakura always ran better when someone was in front of her. She focused in on him and set the goal to pass him, she let that be the only thing running through her. She could feel new surges of adrenaline and she pumped further, faster, stronger.

 

She was gaining, but he was fast. She got close, she was only two or three inches behind him, when he reached water.

 

She stopped pumping forward, but the momentum carried her a few more steps until she stopped, the water gliding across her feet. Cool and refreshing.

 

She turned back to Gaara, both of them were panting and there bodies glistening with sweat. She smiled and walked over to him.

 

“You're pretty damn fast. I give you props.” She said to him using a hand to wipe away a bead of sweat rolling down her forehead.

 

“Hn. You weren't that far behind me, you could have beaten me.” He answered beginning to walk into the water.

 

“Oh, but I had a head start. So don't be so modest, I'm trying to compliment you here.” She smiled walking past him into the water and as it began splashing against her thighs, she dived in.

 

The water was cool and it cleansed her of all her sweat and grime, but that wasn't all that she seemed to have been cleansed of since she'd arrived at this house. That boy, Gaara, something about him made her feel different.

 

As Sakura floated in the water, her upper torso resting on the board with the rest of her body hanging off, her hands gripped the board to maintain balance and help steer. She began to zone out thinking of random memories. Slowly, gingerly she was pulled backwards. By the time she came to she was already being brought to the top of a wave. It wasn't a huge wave, but it certainly wasn't small.

 

She paddled with her arms and then held on to her board. Soon she was being carried on top of the wave, almost flying. By the time the wave approached shore it had wound down quite a bit. Sakura realized that the wave could've toppled over her and the under current could've drowned her. For some reason she found this amusing, her mother had always said having her head in the clouds would kill her someday.

 

The water was severely shallow because the wave had dropped her off by the shore; she rolled off of the board and onto her back. She giggled at the odd humor she'd found in her near death experience, and the light frothy leftovers of waves glided across her skin then back out again.

 

When her giggles receded, she lifted her upper body and rested her weight on her elbows, looking out at the ocean.

 

There were many boys surfing out on the decent waves. Most of them more buff in the arms and upper torso. She could hear the squishing and sloshing of someone approaching. The wet sand and water, made it harder to sneak up on someone, she'd decided.

 

As the noises stopped near her she continued to stare out at the ocean.

 

“It's beautiful, the ocean. I've never seen water so clear and blue, like it's some kind of liquid glass.” She looked in the south-eastern direction (about 135 degrees to her right) from where she was facing. She looked up and saw that it was Gaara standing there, looking out at the ocean.

 

His hair was wet and strands were sticking to his forehead, while the rest pointed off in random directions. His body was damp but for the most part dry. He had been surfing for a while. Sakura inwardly wondered how long she was out of it.

 

She continued “But I guess, if you live out here, you get used to it. It looses its beauty; becomes something that's just there.”

 

“Just because something is always there,” he looked down at Sakura, who was now looking up at him, “doesn't mean that it's less special. Most people take the good things in their life for granted and focus on the bad. Complaining about what could be better. But if all you have is bad, then the good things are what you focus on. It never loses its beauty.”

 

Satisfied with his answer Sakura nodded then looked back out to the ocean. Gaara's gaze, however, remained on Sakura. Sakura was different. She was a gift and he was certainly not going to take her for granted.

 

 

AGHK

 

 

Later on, Sakura decided to go check on the others, while Gaara went to go shower.

 

She saw that the group had gathered together and were chatting openly. They had taken all of the towels and placed them around each other and made what looked like a picnic blanket. They were seated in a big circle, but they had separated into separate groups as well, discussing different things.

 

Sakura giggled at the sight of all of her friends.

 

“Hey guys. I'm heading in now ok?” Sakura said turning to leave.

 

“And Gaara?” it was an innocent enough question but Ino had said it in a teasing tone. The one you'd expect from a family member -maybe a close uncle or aunt- about your first boyfriend. Simple, playful teasing, but Sakura knew what it meant.

 

Ino had implied that Sakura had a crush on Gaara. Sakura herself didn't exactly know where her feelings stood with him. It seemed like they'd just met. The group had been outside for around five to six hours. Sakura and Gaara had spent the entirety of the time together. Talking and not talking all the same.

 

Gaara wasn't an ugly boy but he wasn't outstandingly gorgeous either. Yet, she felt so strongly attracted to him. He was comforting and disorienting at the same time. He was gentlemanly, which was rare in boys these days, but he was slightly cruel and teasing at times. They would have completely one-sided conversations in which she talked of anything that crossed her mind. One conversation's topics ranged from fruits to how she missed the classic television shows to how the environment was on a slow decline. There were logical sentences and topics that connected them, but still the range of the conversation was unbelievable.

 

It was unbelievable mostly because during the conversation Gaara said not one word and spent most of the time looking in odd directions; just looking. He would appear to not be paying any attention whatsoever, but if she even paused for a breath he would look at her. His gaze intense and pressing her to continue, his eyes filled with interest that hadn't been there seconds ago.

 

Other conversations were very logical and grounded; didn't float around so many topics. In these more debate like conversations Gaara would speak full paragraphs, detailed with an elaborate vocabulary. Then he would go back to monosyllabic answers.

 

He utterly confused her. She felt that she knew him so well, like they'd been talking for weeks now, but it was only several hours. She also knew very little about him, though he also knew nothing about her. By now they knew each others personality quirks just as well as their friends and family, but as far as pasts the two had silently agreed to silence; though that would change.

 

So honestly, Sakura didn't know if she had a crush on Gaara. She did know that he interested her. She knew that by the end of this summer she would crack him, she would know everything there was to know about him.

 

…Starting with his last name.