1Scattered Light
By: WhisperedSilvers
Prompt: "Cookies? At twelve in the morning?"
Summary: Warmth into the early hours. —Sakura/Deidara
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At first Sakura hated her university. She hated the dull blood-colored bricks, the naked branches of oak, the gray of the clouds and the sharp wind during the fall. Iwa was something of a necessity, she preferred Konoha for one, mostly because she was born and raised there, coming here for a semester had been a mistake.
She thought, with the weather, and Iwa's reputation for the growing crime syndicate was anything but a warning, she still had went—she would stick through it and finish her semester here. She thought she hated the place, the weather, the food, the clothing, but it wasn't as terrible as Ino had droned on about.
Ino decided to take a semester full of botany classes in Suna – mostly because it was rumored that the Suna students were experimenting with hybrid plants for the pharmacology students there and Ino just loved to gossip – she had sent postcards and the occasional dried petal samples to her every Sunday of the week.
But Sakura had decided she wanted to learn about the chemical parts of herbs and medicine. Toxicology, biochem, and all that science-stuff really made her fingers itch to start dabbling. Iwa was known for their chemical experimenting, with a hundred different focuses from gasoline to earth to industrial to electrical to medical.
Sakura had bit her tongue and made her way to Iwa University.
It was for a semester—that was what she had told herself.
And it was for science.
Ino laughed and called her a nerd.
Now, midterm season was rolling around and she felt like there were too many things coming at her at once. She was smart, but she was only human and Iwa was known for being sadistic. She scowled and said, "Just six more weeks!"
Six more weeks and she could go home.
Sakura had made a few friends since she started her semester, it wasn't very Iwa-like to have a citizen sporting pink hair and green eyes in a country that was drab and dreary as the mountains it lay in. Sometimes she thought that people judged her for coming to this place, but once they saw that glint in her eyes as she looked at the lab—they knew she was one of them.
Because only Iwa students were just that insane.
Sakura sighed as she stared at her raw batter longingly, only a little bit longer before she got to stuff herself with sugar. After she tossed in her dry ingredients, she molded the dough into tiny little balls and positioned them on her cooking sheet. Nodding to herself, she placed her tray into the oven and set the timer for thirty minutes.
She grabbed her molecular biology textbook and began to highlight the entire page because apparently, everything was just that important. She had fifteen minutes of solitude before there was a knock on the door.
She blinked.
Glancing at the clock, jade-green eyes read the time.
12:15 am.
Surely, she wasn't being disruptive.
Sakura's sock-covered feet pattered over to her apartment door, unlocking the latch, she opened the door.
Deidara stood.
"What are you doing here?" she asked confusedly.
He pointed to her oven, the smell of chocolate wafting through the air, he indicated seriously, "I want, yeah."
Sakura sighed and opened the door for him to enter, "Seriously. It's twelve in the morning."
"I could smell the chocolate, Betty Crocker," he huffed. Deidara was one of the very few people she became friends with during her stay in Iwa, granted he lived two doors down from her, and he always managed to piss someone off because of his very loud experimentation—still, he was nice and interesting enough.
Moreover, he reminded her of Ino.
And she missed Ino terribly.
She rolled her eyes, "I need to stay up and study."
"And cookies are the way to do that?" Deidara hopped onto the bar stool, dipped his finger into the recently dumped batter bowl and tasted the last scraps of her uncooked cookie dough.
"It's cookies," she deadpanned.
"What about them, yeah?"
"I like sweets," Sakura crossed her arms underneath her chest, "Besides, it's the holiday season. I think I'm justified for baking."
"Most people would make coffee, yeah," Deidara snorted, then scowled when she picked up the bowl and tossed it into the sink. Water already soaking into the hardened dough.
"I'm not most people," she scowled, "Coffee this late would give me nightmares."
He stared at her, "Nightmares?"
"Coffee has caffeine, caffeine makes me stay awake, me staying awake means that I'll overthink, overthinking will give me nightmares, nightmares will make me not sleep and then when I have to take the exam, all I'll be thinking about is the nightmares," Sakura explained logically, she scrubbed the bowl clean and rinsed the measuring spoons.
Deidara sputtered.
"I know," she laughed, "But it's how my brain works. Why are you awake anyway?"
"I was finishing my art project, yeah," he wrinkled his nose.
"Architecture?"
"I hate math."
Sakura hummed and dried her hands with a towel. "Yeah, me too. Which is why I'm glad I got it over with. No more triangles for chem."
"Nerd,"
"At least I make good cookies."
Deidara laughed at that, "Chocolate chip, yeah?"
"Mint chocolate chip," she corrected.
He sighed longingly, he was wearing thick gray sweats and a thin dark blue, long-sleeve knit top for pajamas, his hair messily unbound, he inquired curiously, "How's the studying going?"
"It's fine," Sakura's face dropped, "I have about three more chapters to go through. I'll be lucky if I get to bed by four."
"What time's your class?"
"Nine."
He winced, "Five-hour sleep?"
"Probably four or something close to it," she replied, picking up her notebook from her coffee table, she brought it to the table, "Class is on the east side of the University."
"Stonebridge building?"
She nodded.
Deidara frowned, "The labs are on the south side of the university."
"I know, but this class doesn't include a lab. It's a lecture hall," she wrinkled her nose, "So it's just more studying and concept-learning."
"Sounds boring, yeah."
"In theory," Sakura agreed and then shrugged, "Sometimes it's okay, Sasori-senpai visits the lecture occasionally. He brings me lollipops."
"The jackass is encouraging your sugar obsession," Deidara scowled, he crossed his arms, "And what do you mean he visits, yeah?"
"Professor Won likes him," she tilted her head and pointed to one of her chemical models in her textbook, "I think he wrote a dissertation on this, I swear the professor almost cried when he read it," she paused, "At least that's what everyone says."
"Who would've thought, a teacher's pet."
The oven dinged. Deidara's blue eyes widened with surprise and then switched to one of elation. Grabbing the oven mitts, Sakura took out her tray from the oven and sighed when the warm smell of chocolate wafted through the air.
Grabbing a spatula, she wiggled the flat part of the utensil underneath the cookie and pulled up. The cookie cracked down the middle, but it stayed in place as she allowed the treat to slide off the spatula and on to a nearby plate.
It wasn't there for long.
"Deidara!" Sakura snapped, her brows furrowing, "It's hot—"
Deidara's loud yelp wasn't worth her breath, she tried not to snicker at his shock and pain. He chewed slowly and swallowed the remaining chocolate sticking his teeth, "Worth it."
Sakura gave up plating her cookies, she ripped a piece of her hard-earned work and plopped it into her mouth. She groaned with pleasure, "It's so good. I should put butterscotch next time."
"I should just move in, yeah."
"I'll get Kankuro-senpai to kick you out."
Sakura grabbed another cookie and chewed while looking over her notes. The mint was slightly refreshing, but the creaminess of the chocolate made her want to nap, she cursed herself mentally. She should've put pepper or something inside these cookies.
Deidara shifted himself over and offered, "Here, I'll help you study."
She blinked, "Aren't you going to go to bed?"
"You have two trays of cookies left," he scoffed, "I'm not going anywhere."
Sakura glared at him, "Freeloader."
"I'm offering you my assistance," Deidara grinned and grabbed her textbook, "It's the least I can do after I ate half of your tray—in like five minutes."
"It's inhumane."
He shrugged, "I have like four mouths, yeah."
"Don't you mean four stomachs?"
Blue eyes twinkled, "No."
Sakura pursed her lips and she tried to press, "I really think you should go to bed, you can take some cookies if you want—don't you have classes tomorrow?"
Deidara shrugged, his cheeks lightly pink at the concern in her tone, "Noon actually. Now, quit trying to ward me off, if you didn't want me here, you could've made like, toast or something."
"Cookies are better."
"Make a cake next time," he paused, "Almonds are my favorite, yeah."
Sakura whacked him with her oven mitt.
Deidara lied.
He had a nine o'clock class and he skipped.
Sakura was too exasperated and exhausted from her exam to scold him. He made it up to her with a chocolate frappuccino from the really expensive coffee shop on third avenue. She pouted and he bought a cupcake too.
He sighed internally; he stomach wasn't the only thing getting soft.
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