And she seemed... different... somehow

"Naruto?" The pinkette spoke with disbelief. Naruto couldn't control the huge smile that was forming on his face.

"Hey Sakura-chan!" He went to hug her but stopped himself, as he recalled their last encounter. She couldn't still be mad at him, right? He guessed that it was best to be safe than sorry, stuffing his hands in his pockets and trying to play it casual.

"H-h-hi." She simply responded. Only then the blond stopped to properly study her figure. She'd always had that petite frame that made him just want to hold her close to him. Her chest, although not as volumous as Ino's, held a certain feminine beauty to it. He shook his head to disperse those nasty thought in his subconscious. All in all, she didn't seem to have changed much from what he remembered of her, only that she looked prettier. Yet there was something else about that that seemed different. Naruto couldn't quite tell what it was exactly, but it was something radically different from the Sakura he knew. The way she was carrying herself, he couldn't really put a word to it. Naruto became even more confused as he'd just noticed that she was blushing madly. Why? From the corner of his eye he saw Ino look at them both teasingly.

"So uhmm, you're looking pretty Sakura-chan." He innocently commented. If the Haruno was blushing before, now she looked like a tomato. Naruto couldn't help but get confused as he watched the girl's reaction. For some weird reason, she was reminding him of Hinata.

"R-really?!" She squeaked, bringing her arms close to her chest.

"Uhmm, yeah?" He replied.

Okay, what was up with her?

"T-t-thanks." She stuttered in response. "I-I have to go now!"

Before he could've said anything the girl was already gone, shunshining out of there. His look turned towards Ino and Shikamaru for some sort of answer, but they didn't seem to be of much help.

As a breeze blew past him, Naruto could only wonder what had gotten into his female teammate.

***

Sakura's heart raced as she jumped from rooftop to rooftop, not sure if she'd ever run so fast before in her life. Her mind was eleswhere though. Too focused to keep strange thoughts coming to her head. To think that he was back brought this weird sensation, like a sworm of butterflies inside her tummy. A strange feeling she hadn't experienced since her days of crushing on Sasuke.

As she concentrated her chakra under hr feet to boost herself onto another roof, a single phrase kept repeating inside her brain.

Naruto thinks I'm pretty!

Naruto thinks I'm pretty!

Naruto thinks I'm pretty!

The girl finally came back to her senses as she recognized the buildings around her.