Warning: this is quite AU, and I'm thinking that the Sasuke in here is non-massacre.

Another warning for character death. I wanted to explore how people deal with loss and death, and Sakura in here is a little... unhinged. This isn't a cute fluffy SasuSaku, if that's what you're looking for (although I love SS with a passion).

She doesn't slip. Instead, her boots crunch quietly against the snow, the sound white and pure. Her arms come around her knees and she stares. The blanket of ice doesn't perturb her.

It isn't long until a warm body seats itself next to her. "Sakura," Sasuke says, warm breath foggy in the unforgiving air.

She says nothing. He tries again. "Sakura." The name falls too heavy from his lips, he thinks.

"I know," she replies.

x

She's in the hospital now, walls pressing flush against her, unsullied and far too sterile. She can't stand it – the panic, the rush, the time, the death (dyingdyingdying) and it's suffocating her. Tsunade roars at her to get her ass off the floor and help, dammit, and the words slap harshly against Sakura's cheek. She wants to push open those glass doors (she feels like glass herself) and run, lungs burning and heaving until her legs fail her and she falls to the ground.

Instead she nods and assists her shishou in the operating room with trembling fingers.

x

When Sasuke sees her again, she looks like she's half-asleep but with glassy eyes wide open. Like a doll, he thinks. "Hey," he speaks gently, trying not to startle her. She jumps anyway. "It's closing time. How long have you been sitting here?"

Blinking, Sakura turns her head to peer at the clock. Five to midnight. She's been sitting at Ichiraku for over two hours, her bowl of ramen cold and untouched. She's vaguely surprised Teuchi-san hads't kicked her out, but she supposes he is mourning just like her.

"Sasuke," she murmurs. "I don't know how to do it anymore."

He nods once. He has no idea how he's supposed to comfort her but he'll try anyway – he'll be stable and he'll be there. "It's okay," he starts. "Tsunade will give you some time off. You've been working diligently." He pauses now, voice dropping several pitches. "It wasn't your fault, Sakura. You did your best."

She jumps again as if his words were a jolt of electricity.

He sighs. "Come on."

x

"Sakura-chan," he gasps. "Sakura-chan, please don't blame yourself, okay?" His breathing is far too loud.

His hand trembles against her cheek in a feather caress. She can't look at him. Blood is gushing out of the hole in his shredded chest.

And he's smiling that stupid smile again, the one that makes no sense to her, and it wasn't fair that she sat back and let him carry this burden all by himself and why did he have to be the hero-

He stops trembling and Sakura wants to die.

x

Sakura bolts upright. This is the thirteenth night in a row she has dreamt of him.

She turns to the clock. Four fifty-eight. Her hospital shift starts in half an hour but she can't bear to think about that place right now. She is no longer fit to hold anyone's life in her hands.

She sinks back into her mattress and her face is crumpled like her bedsheets.

x

Sasuke doesn't want to leave her, not when she's like this. He'd rather ditch the mission, ANBU be damned, than let Sakura's mind rot with guilt. She needs someone. He sighs again and tilts his head back, appraising the starless night. It seems like even nature understands Konoha's loss.

A lone gust of wind rushes past Sasuke and he stands up. He looks down at his feet, at where he stands on the Hokage Monument that, in his eyes, will forever be incomplete.

Trudging through the still village streets, Sasuke smirks bitterly. Team 7 was supposed to work out differently: Sakura, the talented medic, Sasuke, the ANBU assassin, and… Naruto. Naruto the Hokage.

Sasuke finds it funny how life is so, so good at turning the universe on its head.

x

He's in front of her door now. The lights are off, but he hazards a guess that Sakura is awake. Nowadays, she sleeps only when she wants to punish herself – she relives that day through her nightmares. "It's a small price to pay," she told him once, "for what I let happen to him."

Sasuke had stayed silent because he understood her need for atonement.

He knocks on her door now, his raps light but firm. She doesn't answer so he leans against the door.

"Sakura," he calls. "Are you awake?"

Nothing.

"Your shift starts soon." Sasuke had her timetable memorised. "You hate being late to work, remember?"

Her footsteps are like a ghost's. She opens the door and stares at him. His heart sinks a little as those eyes, once impossibly verdant, are now dull and ringed with purple bags. She is a mess.

He moves past her – gently – and into her house. Once upon a time it was littered with medical scrolls and textbooks, but after his death, Sakura threw most of her things out. Her home is now nearly barren. Sasuke supposes she wants it that way, to reflect her new state of being. It's poetic in the saddest of ways.

"Sakura, look at me," he commands, hands coming to rest on her shoulders. "I have to go to work. My squad's going to look for Madara." She flinches at the name.

Sasuke leans closer, coal gaze intense. He drops his voice to a whisper. "He'll suffer for what he did to Naruto."

Sakura just keeps staring. Sasuke shakes her a little. "Did you hear me, Sakura? We're going to kill Mada-"

"Stop."

Sasuke blinks. Stop?

"If you're leaving, just go. Try and find him, whatever. It doesn't matter." She closes glassy eyes. Sasuke can't fathom the hollowness in her voice. "Naruto's dead. Whatever you do now won't bring him back."

She's walking backwards now, away from Sasuke. "Doesn't matter what you do, because it was my fault," she mutters, voice shaking, "I let him die, so it's not your responsibility-"

Sasuke snaps. "Sakura!" He's livid, storming towards her, eyes ablaze. "No. No. It's not your fault. It was never your fault. Why do you do this, huh? Why do you-" he runs a hand through his hair "-insist on torturing yourself?"

Sakura looks at her feet, possibly in shame. Sasuke can't help but feel encouraged – she hasn't shown any sort of emotion in far too long.

He lowers his voice and sighs again. "Listen," he starts, talking to her lowered head, "you can't hide forever."

She sniffs.

He frowns. "Talk to me, Sakura."

And then he nearly falls over because she throws her body against his and buries her face in the crook of his neck, her arms holding him to her in a (crushing) hold. His collarbone is damp with her tears.

"Don't go," she cries. "Please, Sasuke, don't! It's not worth it." She coughs hard into his neck as if her sobs are choking her. "You'll come back only half-alive and I'll have to watch you die like he did." She begins shaking uncontrollably and Sasuke's throat closes up.

What can he say to that?

So he pulls her closer against him and presses his mouth against the top of her head. "Hey," he whispers into her hair, "we'll get through this." A pause. "You've got me."

It's a while before she stops shaking, and Sasuke sighs with relief. The sun begins to pour in through the sheer curtains, pale light forming geometric shapes on the floorboards.

It's a new start.

x

Months later she stands at the cenotaph. Her eyes are stuck on the last engraving: Uzumaki Naruto, the name a lighter grey than the others. In time, it'll fade, and more and more names will be added until Naruto will be drowned in a sea of loss. The thought makes Sakura want to vomit.

She must never forget him.

If Sasuke returns from his mission – once he returns, she amends – she'll buy some ramen and come back here. She'll place a bowl in front of the stone slab and rest another bowl in her lap, and she'll laugh and pretend that she and Naruto are at Ichiraku's again and that he's inhaling his food. It'll be like it always is.

Sakura turns away. No, no it won't.