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Title: Socially Happy
Author: redbrunja
Fandom: Naruto.
Rating: PG
Author’s Note: written for:![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
naruto_contest week 28 - happy. And YET ANOTHER last minute post. Also, one line of Sai's dialogue was written by ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
ryanitenebrae .
Characters: Sai, Sakura.
Summary: Sai tries to parse the meaning behind Sakura's smiles. He fails.
Sakura didn't smile when other people were around.
Sai wasn't sure whether to find this odd or not. If Sakura smiled before striking someone, it would logically follow that she wouldn't smile while alone, obviously. However, she had informed him that not all her smiles were false, that she smiled when she was happy. In which case, it seemed odd that she only smiled when other people are around. Sai deduced that Sakura was 'socially happy' like a 'social smoker': one who only inhales tobacco in the presence of others.
This line of reasoning leads Sai to conclude that on her own Sakura is unhappy.
Sai frowns. Usually there is a faint feeling of satisfaction upon successfully understanding some new facet of human interaction; however, that particular conclusion didn't produce that same feeling at all.
That may mean that he had not found the correct solution. Clearly his shinobi instincts were subliminally informing him that this question - Sakura's state of happiness or lack thereof while in the absence of her teammates - had not yet been answered.
Sai decided that more observation is in order.
Sai chose to study Sakura because, of all the shinobi of approximately his age, she was the one who most closely matched the baseline of behavior described in his books.
Naruto was obviously abnormal.
Kiba's behavior was even more illogical.
Chouji was blandly ignorable in the presence of his teammates and confident and effusive with his family. The roiling mess of expressed emotions that characterized the Akimichi household was even more terrifying than the rolls of fat on its Clan's members.
Shikamaru was listless: Sai was quite sure that proper shinobi boys did not spend hours on their backs.
Shino, Hinata, and Neji had a ritualized lifestyle that was even more impenetrable than "normal teen activities."
Ino was just confusing; around Shikamaru she displayed classic signs of sexual interest, yet she was actually having intercourse with a sandy-haired jounin who she treated utterly platonically when she wasn't copulating with him against alley walls.
Clearly, Sakura was the best person to use to navigate the unpredictable morass of human social bonds. Admittedly, her personality was a frustratingly impenetrable mix of politeness, kindness, anger and violence and she was prone to jagged bursts of emotion that prevented Sai from correctly predicting her actions. However, she organized her days in a predictable mix of work, training, and socialization, so some level of expected behavior was expressed.
Additionally, she didn't seem to mind explaining the actions of herself or others, as long as he asked politely and in a voice that didn't carry past her ears. Once, Sai had asked Ino why persisted in directing mating rituals of female sexuality towards someone who had no interest in her and possibly the feminine gender as whole. Ino had slapped him across the face and then attacked him with a kunai when he commented that she hit more more gently than Sakura did.
Sakura herself hovered on the brink of understandability. The puzzling aspects of her personality were more enticing than worrisome.
Sai perched on the telephone pole outside her apartment, watching her spoon rice into a bowl with a frown on her face.
The rice was fluffy, slightly sticky, the same shade as Sai's skin and he could see nothing displeasing about the foodstuff.
Sakura set the bowl on the counter, yanked open the window and yelled out, "Stop lurking outside like a damn vulture, Sai!"
She turned away without waiting for his response. His heart rate increased, and after a scant five beats he boosted some chakra to his feet and leaped to her windowsill, landing crouched and ready.
Sakura was smiling - now that she was in front of someone - as she filled another bowl. She handed the rice to Sai. The pottery was warm and he cradled it gently in his palm, steam rising to curl around his face, the warmth as fleeting as an embrace.
"I'm grateful for the food," Sai said, raising the bowl slightly towards her.
Sakura blushed. "It's nothing special." She fiddled with her chopsticks before picking up a bite, blowing carefully to cool it. There was a small table half-covered with scrolls and textbooks with a minute clear area just big enough for one person to partake of a meal, yet Sakura continued to stand in front of him while they both consumed their rice.
"May I ask you something, Sakura?" he questioned, voice modulated and inoffensive.
She gave a permissive shrug.
"Do you make yourself unhappy?"
Sakura blinked at him, chopsticks paused on their way to her mouth. "What?"
Sai explained his reasoning. "...so are you unhappy when you're alone, or were you being disingenuous when you informed me that you smiled when you are happy?" He frowned. "I find the idea that you only smile to hide your unhappiness from others...." Sai ran through vocabulary lists in his head, trying to decide the best way to phrase it "...unexpectedly covert."
"You think I'm unhappy?" Sakura's voice sounded weak, like ink mixed with too much water.
Sai tilted his head to the side. "It would make sense," he said judiciously. "You have a very high-stress occupation, you spend little time with your family, your traitorous teammate continues to antagonize Konoha, your other teammate is frustratingly obtuse and lacks a penis, your former teacher is mostly-dead-"
"He is not mostly dead," Sakura snarled, "He's in a medically induced coma and will be fine."
"–your current teacher is too preoccupied with more important obligations to give you the instruction you deserve, you work longer hours than is recommended for peak mental health and you don't have a boyfriend." Sai took a bite of rice. "Also, you're not getting proper nutrition."
There was a faint crack.
Sai smiled at her. "Logically, you must be unhappy. You smile so that other people won't know." Sai felt satisfaction at that answer. He also felt faintly nauseous. He would suspect Sakura's cooking if he hadn't watched her prepare it.
Sakura was breathing hard. She was clutching broken shards of pottery in her hand and the floor was splattered with bloodstained grains of rice.
"Why did you cut yourself, Sakura?" Sai asked, watching the blood run between her fingers.
"Get out," she said in a low voice.
"Hm?" Sai was confused.
Sakura took two aggressive steps towards him and Sai pivoted on his toes, evading enough to refrain from giving insult yet not so far that she couldn't strike him if she really, really wanted to.
She didn't, because instead of lunging after him, her fist blazing with chakra, she reached up and slammed the window closed. The bottom pane of glass cracked.
Sai watched her face through the window. She was inches away, one single sheet of glass between them. Her eyes were bright, almost glassy, and that impossible green color that he had never managed to recreate to his satisfaction. Sai opened his mouth and Sakura wrenched the curtain closed, the rings at the top jangling together like manacles.
A pane of glass.
A length of fabric.
Sai knew exactly how little effort it would take to breech those barriers and yet the prospect was daunting in a way that S-class missions weren't.
Sai finished his rice.
Then he carried the bowl back to his apartment. Out of concern for the fragile bowl in his hands he chose an easy route, one where his jumps from rooftop to rooftop barely needed chakra.
Once there, he went to his sink, removed the brushes that were soaking and then scrubbed it until the porcelain was free of any lingering remnants of ink. Then he filled the sink with soap and water and carefully washed Sakura's pottery. He didn't have any dish towels that he hadn't used as a blotting rags at one point, so he dried it with one of his spare shirts.
After that he left his set of rooms and leaped across Konoha again, annoyed that Sakura had chosen to house herself in such an inconvenient location.
Balanced once more on her window ledge, Sai raised his hand, considered knocking. He could see light glowing around the edges of the curtain.
Sai carefully set the bowl on the bricks of the ledge. A few strokes of his brush, a couple of hand seals, and a mouse wrapped itself around Sakura's item of crockery, securing it.
Sai had taken a bit of artistic license with the mouse. Its body was sleek, streamlined, fur looking like velvet, cheeks unusually full. Sai wasn't the best judge of these kinds of things, but he thought it could be described as cute. Or deformed.
He lifted his hand, again considered informing Sakura of his presence, and then decided against it.
He twisted on the ball of his left foot, and leaped away.
Author: redbrunja
Fandom: Naruto.
Rating: PG
Author’s Note: written for:
naruto_contest week 28 - happy. And YET ANOTHER last minute post. Also, one line of Sai's dialogue was written by ryanitenebrae .Characters: Sai, Sakura.
Summary: Sai tries to parse the meaning behind Sakura's smiles. He fails.
Sakura didn't smile when other people were around.
Sai wasn't sure whether to find this odd or not. If Sakura smiled before striking someone, it would logically follow that she wouldn't smile while alone, obviously. However, she had informed him that not all her smiles were false, that she smiled when she was happy. In which case, it seemed odd that she only smiled when other people are around. Sai deduced that Sakura was 'socially happy' like a 'social smoker': one who only inhales tobacco in the presence of others.
This line of reasoning leads Sai to conclude that on her own Sakura is unhappy.
Sai frowns. Usually there is a faint feeling of satisfaction upon successfully understanding some new facet of human interaction; however, that particular conclusion didn't produce that same feeling at all.
That may mean that he had not found the correct solution. Clearly his shinobi instincts were subliminally informing him that this question - Sakura's state of happiness or lack thereof while in the absence of her teammates - had not yet been answered.
Sai decided that more observation is in order.
Sai chose to study Sakura because, of all the shinobi of approximately his age, she was the one who most closely matched the baseline of behavior described in his books.
Naruto was obviously abnormal.
Kiba's behavior was even more illogical.
Chouji was blandly ignorable in the presence of his teammates and confident and effusive with his family. The roiling mess of expressed emotions that characterized the Akimichi household was even more terrifying than the rolls of fat on its Clan's members.
Shikamaru was listless: Sai was quite sure that proper shinobi boys did not spend hours on their backs.
Shino, Hinata, and Neji had a ritualized lifestyle that was even more impenetrable than "normal teen activities."
Ino was just confusing; around Shikamaru she displayed classic signs of sexual interest, yet she was actually having intercourse with a sandy-haired jounin who she treated utterly platonically when she wasn't copulating with him against alley walls.
Clearly, Sakura was the best person to use to navigate the unpredictable morass of human social bonds. Admittedly, her personality was a frustratingly impenetrable mix of politeness, kindness, anger and violence and she was prone to jagged bursts of emotion that prevented Sai from correctly predicting her actions. However, she organized her days in a predictable mix of work, training, and socialization, so some level of expected behavior was expressed.
Additionally, she didn't seem to mind explaining the actions of herself or others, as long as he asked politely and in a voice that didn't carry past her ears. Once, Sai had asked Ino why persisted in directing mating rituals of female sexuality towards someone who had no interest in her and possibly the feminine gender as whole. Ino had slapped him across the face and then attacked him with a kunai when he commented that she hit more more gently than Sakura did.
Sakura herself hovered on the brink of understandability. The puzzling aspects of her personality were more enticing than worrisome.
Sai perched on the telephone pole outside her apartment, watching her spoon rice into a bowl with a frown on her face.
The rice was fluffy, slightly sticky, the same shade as Sai's skin and he could see nothing displeasing about the foodstuff.
Sakura set the bowl on the counter, yanked open the window and yelled out, "Stop lurking outside like a damn vulture, Sai!"
She turned away without waiting for his response. His heart rate increased, and after a scant five beats he boosted some chakra to his feet and leaped to her windowsill, landing crouched and ready.
Sakura was smiling - now that she was in front of someone - as she filled another bowl. She handed the rice to Sai. The pottery was warm and he cradled it gently in his palm, steam rising to curl around his face, the warmth as fleeting as an embrace.
"I'm grateful for the food," Sai said, raising the bowl slightly towards her.
Sakura blushed. "It's nothing special." She fiddled with her chopsticks before picking up a bite, blowing carefully to cool it. There was a small table half-covered with scrolls and textbooks with a minute clear area just big enough for one person to partake of a meal, yet Sakura continued to stand in front of him while they both consumed their rice.
"May I ask you something, Sakura?" he questioned, voice modulated and inoffensive.
She gave a permissive shrug.
"Do you make yourself unhappy?"
Sakura blinked at him, chopsticks paused on their way to her mouth. "What?"
Sai explained his reasoning. "...so are you unhappy when you're alone, or were you being disingenuous when you informed me that you smiled when you are happy?" He frowned. "I find the idea that you only smile to hide your unhappiness from others...." Sai ran through vocabulary lists in his head, trying to decide the best way to phrase it "...unexpectedly covert."
"You think I'm unhappy?" Sakura's voice sounded weak, like ink mixed with too much water.
Sai tilted his head to the side. "It would make sense," he said judiciously. "You have a very high-stress occupation, you spend little time with your family, your traitorous teammate continues to antagonize Konoha, your other teammate is frustratingly obtuse and lacks a penis, your former teacher is mostly-dead-"
"He is not mostly dead," Sakura snarled, "He's in a medically induced coma and will be fine."
"–your current teacher is too preoccupied with more important obligations to give you the instruction you deserve, you work longer hours than is recommended for peak mental health and you don't have a boyfriend." Sai took a bite of rice. "Also, you're not getting proper nutrition."
There was a faint crack.
Sai smiled at her. "Logically, you must be unhappy. You smile so that other people won't know." Sai felt satisfaction at that answer. He also felt faintly nauseous. He would suspect Sakura's cooking if he hadn't watched her prepare it.
Sakura was breathing hard. She was clutching broken shards of pottery in her hand and the floor was splattered with bloodstained grains of rice.
"Why did you cut yourself, Sakura?" Sai asked, watching the blood run between her fingers.
"Get out," she said in a low voice.
"Hm?" Sai was confused.
Sakura took two aggressive steps towards him and Sai pivoted on his toes, evading enough to refrain from giving insult yet not so far that she couldn't strike him if she really, really wanted to.
She didn't, because instead of lunging after him, her fist blazing with chakra, she reached up and slammed the window closed. The bottom pane of glass cracked.
Sai watched her face through the window. She was inches away, one single sheet of glass between them. Her eyes were bright, almost glassy, and that impossible green color that he had never managed to recreate to his satisfaction. Sai opened his mouth and Sakura wrenched the curtain closed, the rings at the top jangling together like manacles.
A pane of glass.
A length of fabric.
Sai knew exactly how little effort it would take to breech those barriers and yet the prospect was daunting in a way that S-class missions weren't.
Sai finished his rice.
Then he carried the bowl back to his apartment. Out of concern for the fragile bowl in his hands he chose an easy route, one where his jumps from rooftop to rooftop barely needed chakra.
Once there, he went to his sink, removed the brushes that were soaking and then scrubbed it until the porcelain was free of any lingering remnants of ink. Then he filled the sink with soap and water and carefully washed Sakura's pottery. He didn't have any dish towels that he hadn't used as a blotting rags at one point, so he dried it with one of his spare shirts.
After that he left his set of rooms and leaped across Konoha again, annoyed that Sakura had chosen to house herself in such an inconvenient location.
Balanced once more on her window ledge, Sai raised his hand, considered knocking. He could see light glowing around the edges of the curtain.
Sai carefully set the bowl on the bricks of the ledge. A few strokes of his brush, a couple of hand seals, and a mouse wrapped itself around Sakura's item of crockery, securing it.
Sai had taken a bit of artistic license with the mouse. Its body was sleek, streamlined, fur looking like velvet, cheeks unusually full. Sai wasn't the best judge of these kinds of things, but he thought it could be described as cute. Or deformed.
He lifted his hand, again considered informing Sakura of his presence, and then decided against it.
He twisted on the ball of his left foot, and leaped away.
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Writing his comments on other people was the most enjoyable part of this fic.
I'm also glad you think I write Sai IC, because I hate how most people write him, and I'm glad that the Sai in my head (intractable bastard that he is) makes sense to other people.
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And I am SO tempted to write a commentary for this, because
1.) I want to be able to go, 'look, here, see - I changed that word five times. And do you know how many ways you can describe a bowl? I found all of them.'
and
2.) writing this, I was so concious of 'well, this would be what Sai would be aware of, this is what I can slip in via body reactions, and ALL OF THIS IS STUFF THAT'S HE'S TOTALLY UNAWARE OF.
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Thirded!!
Your stories are always fantastic, but I just love this. I have yet to write Sai (I know, what's wrong with me?) but I only hope I can do it half as well as you can. Of coarse, you do everyone amazingly.
I'm going to stop before I manage to sound even more like an annoying, gibbering fan-girl.
Re: Thirded!!
Yes, I am that much of a writing Nazi. Coarse/ course is one of my few weaknesses. The other is a wooden stake, or something equally pointy.
Re: Thirded!!
Just be grateful you can't see my rough drafts.
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I laughed heartily at "mostly dead" because it referred to both Monty Python and The Princess Bride. Your comment about miracles has been a great comfort lately. Thanks.
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??
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Actually it makes me a little depressed, but it's still great.
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Thank you! I though long and hard about if there was a better animal to use, but I really like the image of a mouse around the bowl, and he's already used that animal before.
It's Sai if Sai were the star instead of Naruto.
Lol. I think I do that will all my fic - write it as if Naruto ISN'T the star.
I laughed heartily at "mostly dead" because it referred to both Monty Python and The Princess Bride. Your comment about miracles has been a great comfort lately. Thanks.
I refuse to believe anything else.
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Sakura was really Sakura too, you could sense her trying to swallow down the tactless observations that he kept spewing out, and her restraint by breaking the bowl instead of his face.
Really awesome job! <3
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Yes he does! Because it is Sakura's dish and you take care of Other People's Things because that's Just What You Do.
love how you spend time on the little, subtle things that make up Sai's character (like him not quite knowing the difference between cute and deformed), almost everyone misses that.
Thank you. The deformed like is in there because while I think Sai could draw cute on purpose, I don't think that he would be able to see it as cute, if that makes sense.
Sakura was really Sakura too, you could sense her trying to swallow down the tactless observations that he kept spewing out, and her restraint by breaking the bowl instead of his face.
I think she was also really thrown by the realization that, he's right, she's not happy.
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I love your Sai. He's so....Sai. I don't know how else to put it. If they ever do a light novel with Sai in it, they should hire you as a consultant to write him. Or just have you write the whole thing. I'd buy six copies.
I absolutely love that he carried the bowl home, washed it, and brought it back. And made sure it was protected.
"He is not mostly dead," Sakura snarled, "He's in a medically induced coma and will be fine."
YES. THAT. THAT'S IT. *rocks back and forth, hugging knees*
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I would kill for that job. I am so pleased that I got a good reaction to my Sai-characterization because honestly, writing him is SO. MUCH. WORK. It's worth it though.
Oh, man, I SO need to do a commentary on this.
I absolutely love that he carried the bowl home, washed it, and brought it back. And made sure it was protected.
IT'S A METAPHOR FOR THE LOVE AND CARING HE JUST FAILED TO OFFER SAKURA! SEE, HE TAKES CARE OF THE PHYSICAL BECAUSE HE CAN'T FIX HER EMOTIONALLY.
And Kakashi is only MOSTLY dead. We know how fixable that is in Naruto-verse. Hell, DEATH is fixable in Naruto-verse.
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I'd say more... but what's the point when that somes it up nicely?
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That may mean that he had not found the correct solution. Clearly his shinobi instincts were subliminally informing him that this question - Sakura's state of happiness or lack thereof while in the absence of her teammates - had not yet been answered.
I love this part most of all, since it shows Sai relying on his own emotions to understand emotions. I love all that inner logic stuff, it makes me squee.
And the line of cuteness vs. deformed: win. Because we all know that in order to draw or write the ultimate cuteness, we must deform it.
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Thank you! The great thing about Sai is that he HAS emotions. He WANTS to connect to people and he is shown to feel awkward and unsure, so it's fun to show him slowly coming out of his shell.
And the line of cuteness vs. deformed: win. Because we all know that in order to draw or write the ultimate cuteness, we must deform it.
That was a bit of a lightbulb moment. Because I was trying to think what the more literally version of clueless would be, and then I realized that it can also be seen as being deformed. And it just WORKED SO WELL FOR SAI.
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I really enjoyed this!
Thank you so much! ^^
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"Sai deduced that Sakura was 'socially happy'..." This is a genius concept, btw.
I am now a SaiSaku fan. Thank you. ^^
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I am now a SaiSaku fan. Thank you. ^^
This was %100 my intention from the word go. ^_^
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Ahh, you planned this. I must say that I appreciate it immensely. ^^
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