Dark Side
Inspired by Kelly Clarkson's song, "Dark Side". I suggest listening to it while reading the story! (:
Summary: An irrevocably broken girl living in her dark world the only way she's ever known, and the six charming men foolishly caught under her wicked charm. They're ignorant and pure; and she won't taint them. She's not an angel, not by any chance. ─multisaku.
Will you?
It's time to be a university student again. Walking leisurely towards my second-year economics lecture room, I quietly observe the everyday lives milling around me. I see almost-adults, those fresh from high school, scurrying about the halls with excited demeanours and friends sticking about. Loitering one side of the stairs, pretty but nondescript second-year females are gossiping about potential boyfriends and romantic soap operas. Third-year male heartthrobs, armed with trendy clothes and charming smirks, head to the cafeteria with occasional winks here and there to lucky females. And then I see a few last-year students, with tired but satisfied smiles, passing by me with intent to meet with their lovers, attend overdue get-togethers, or reach their dorms and sleep.
It's sickening, this makeshift university life. These people around me, despite strict professors and heavy school work, have little worries compared to mine. Worries of handing their assignments on time, failing a course, earning money for new and popular electronics, getting drunk in parties, finding the perfect boyfriend or girlfriend... I hate it. I hate the pretty and ignorant world they call their life, but a part of me─the one that still hopes and dreams and believes─envies it.
As I round a corner, I hear a silky voice call out my name, "Sakura."
I halt and turn around, meeting eyes not quite the shade of mine accompanied by a beautiful face that many female students admire. "Hey, Gaara." After the greeting left my mouth, I start to walk away only to have my wrist captured in a soft hold.
Gaara, with a small but heartfelt smile only reserved for me, says, "Let me escort you to your class, Sakura. Let me have you by my side, even for a short little while." With his sincere face and gentle, gentle eyes, I almost forgot who I was, caving in to this man who cares for me like I am a cherry blossom needed to be protected and cherished. Almost. But then I remember─I can never, ever forget anyways─and closes my nonexistent heart to this man who will give me his all.
"I'm sorry." I break his hold with my free hand, turn around, and continue my way without looking back. I feel heavy, and the voice inside me whispers why, but I know this is right. As I walk away, he does not follow. With hardened eyes, I try to erase a blurred image of a heartbroken, captivating face swimming in my mind.
Love me?
Red. The all too familiar crimson breadth of life. Black. The caging blackness that comes with the order, the act, and the finish. Since birth, these two colors have surrounded me and shaped me to who I am today. They are the constants in my royally fucked up existence, which, as those in the shadows say, is important in the society. Huh.
With my job as a grim reaper done, the price delivered and the stains washed away, I start to leave this room─this room filled with tossed away regrets, broken hearts, bleeding spirits, and long lost innocence. As I reach the door, a grey-haired man with mismatched eyes sitting on the windowsill opposite me decided to speak. "You're young, beautiful, talented, and charming. You deserve a world much better than this, so why aren't you leaving?"
After a long silence, I open the door and step out. I pause, and with a smile that screams a caged, lonely girl who knows too much and has seen too many, I reply to him, "Because this is the only way I know how to live. You can never get back what you've sold to the devil, right?"
Can you promise me?
The cafeteria is almost-full today. As I traverse along the bustling students to find an empty table, I politely decline classmates who want me to eat with them or the few who want me in their table because, well, they like me. I'm not a bitch who thinks I'm the most gorgeous girl in the whole universe and I can get any guy I want, but I am exceptionally observant as it comes with who I really am and what I do. I noticed that many people see me as an admirable student with a unique, charming appearance and a brain that is hard to surpass. Although with my detached, reserved personality, I thought people would just leave me the heck alone. But seeing the way my classmates and some others try to make friends with me, I can't help but puff out an irritated sigh.
Depositing myself on a table beside a big window, I start to eat my food in peace. But then two males, each with a tray of food, decided to invade my built up serenity; one sat across from me while the other sat to my left. I look up and sunny blonde hair enters my vision. I don't need to look to my left to know who's sitting beside me. Persistent idiots, I would know them anywhere.
"Hi Sakura-chan! How was your cell biology class this morning?" Naruto cheerily asks while digging in on his bought food. From the corner of my eye, I see Sasuke drinking his soda and waiting for my reply. These two best friends-slash-rivals have been trying to pull me into their friendship bond since first year, and to be honest, it's getting harder to resist them.
"Hi Naruto, Sasuke. It was okay, nothing different." I give them a fake but convincing smile just to appease them, like all the other ones I gave before. Naruto smiles back, and then launches on a happy rant about the action movie he and Sasuke watched with some other guy friends during the weekend. With the usual brotherly ruckus that follows whenever these two are together, and coupled with Naruto's bright personality and Sasuke's small quirks of his lips, I feel so... normal.
"Sakura, you have rice in your hair," Sasuke breathes in my ear. I tilt my head towards him, and I feel a velvety tingle creep up my spine. His handsome face is dangerously close to mine, and his onyx eyes are staring straight at my emerald pools. He lifts his hand and slowly pulls out the grain of rice stuck in my carnation pink hair, his gaze never faltering. I want to look away, but his eyes are so inquisitive, so curious, and so... open. I suddenly understand; he wants to know me, see the real me, and for me to know and see the real him too. It's tempting, to say okay, to just let go and let him in, but I bite my tongue and the lock inside of me is safe again.
I quickly return to my food and pretend nothing happened, and I miss the fleeting look of hurt that passes Sasuke's eyes.
"Sakura-chan, I know you love sweets, so I bought you a cookie! Here, eat it okay?" Naruto gently takes my hand and curls my fingers around the cookie. With a boyish grin, he looks at me with twinkling eyes of beautiful blue that my breath almost got caught in my throat. His eyes, they're full of hope, happiness, optimism, compassion, and purity. I see through him, just like with Sasuke, but this time the voice inside me solemnly whispers, he's the embodiment of what you've long lost; he's the person you wish you could have been.
I swiftly stood up, the cookie falling down on the table and breaking into two. I can't stay with them. This normalcy around them and the feeling that I belong with them, I need to stop it. It's just a mini-world held up by delicate fairy wings and surrounded by a veil of magical dust; it can never be real. Our worlds are different and souls in opposite sides. I won't let myself taint them.
Taking my messenger bag, I walk two full steps away from the table before Sasuke's voice, tinted with anger and confusion, stops me. "Sakura, what are we doing wrong?"
I pause, my back facing them. Naruto, with an uncharacteristic sad voice, continues for Sasuke. "You might or might not know this already, but we really like you, Sakura-chan. We want to know you, and we try really, really hard, you know? It hurts, Sakura-chan. Why... why are you always running away? Why can't you let us in?" His achingly forlorn words feel like knives stabbing my back, and my heart cracks. But then I remind myself, my heart is gone, just like so many other things that I wished I still had. Taking a deep, world-weary breath, I force Naruto's heartbroken voice out of my head. With my mind flashing me images of red stained hands and pleas for life, I ready myself to answer his question.
"Why? Because if I let you in, I would just bring you down to hell with me."
Stay with me?
I remember, after my first successful job, a higher up said to me, "It feels good, right? That feeling of victory... and the assurance that you're a predator and not a prey."
Bullshit. All I feel is numbness. Nothing. Every time I finish an order and see crimson droplets tarnish the ground, the little part in me that still hopes and dreams and believes, becomes smaller and smaller. There is neither satisfaction nor triumph, only an invisible child crying invisible tears of emptiness and repentance.
Walking aimlessly, I find myself at the park near my university. I need fresh air; the red and black constants in my life are suffocating me too much. This is a pretty place, and I see children happily playing in the playground not far from me. They are running around merrily with no care for the world around them. I turn away, and head to a small bridge located over a middle-sized koi pond. I lean on the railing, and let myself absorb the tranquility surrounding this little place of simplicity.
"Ah, Sakura! What are you doing here, un?" A familiar male voice captures my attention and I gaze to my right, seeing two popular fourth-year students strolling towards me. Deidara, with his golden blonde hair swaying in the wind, is sporting a charming merry smile. Sasori, his red-haired roommate, is walking beside him in a lazy but confident disposition.
Since our first meeting, these two art major students have been asking me repeatedly to become their muse, using charismatic and enchanting tactics to persuade me. When they pester me in the halls with their undying artist passion, girls would swoon and try to catch their interest instead. Then, when they leave, I would feel several glares burning holes through my head. They're great people and I admire their works of art. But their fascination with me would do them no good.
Deciding that this place is really comforting, I would stay for a bit longer until these two men start to corner me and unravel the barriers I so carefully put around me. Leaning on the bridge railing across from me, I offer them an imitation of a fairy sweet smile and a soft "Deidara-san, Sasori-san. Good afternoon."
Tilting my head towards the cloudy blue sky, I close my eyes in content. We didn't speak for a while, but I know those two are observing me, feeling their adoring gazes on my person. I inwardly sigh. Why do I always capture unwanted affections? In another life, I would be elated, and probably blush, stutter and feel like any normal girl with two handsome boys vying for my love. I might even fall for one of them. But in this lifetime, I am not that normal girl. I'm just a pretty shell with mystery, danger and death as familiar companions.
With a faint flurry of movements, I hear footsteps approaching me. Stepping down on my fight or flight instincts, reminding myself that I'm not on a job, I feel an artistic hand caressing a wisp of my cherry hair. Fluttering my eyelids open, I tilt my head away from its upward angle to lock eyes with Sasori's. He is staring at me with such intensity, rousing dust butterflies in my belly.
"Beautiful," Sasori murmurs loud enough for me to hear, and this time I coudn't stop the weak blush from powdering my cheeks. This is bad, he's getting too close; I can feel the chains inside me rattling from the temptation to respond to him. However, before I could will my body to move, I feel my left hand being lifted up. I glance to my left, and see Deidara placing a sweet, chaste kiss on my knuckles. With fingers worn from sketching and long hours of sculpting clay masterpieces, he began learning the creases and calluses of my hand. Then, he kisses my palm and looks at me with passionate, glowing cerulean eyes. With another short lapse of control, I feel my face heating up considerably.
Both Sasori and Deidara chuckles at my rare display of emotion, and looking at them, I know that they will forever embed this moment in their memories. Sasori, with one of the most beautiful and breath-taking smiles I've ever seen, leans his forehead on mine like he's done it millions of times. "You're so adorable, Sakura. This is a part of you we've never seen before. I love it. Would you care to share more of you?"
The chains in me stopped rattling, and I'm in control again. Flashes of adrenaline in the darkness, flying silver, soulless beings, and voiceless screams echoes in my mind. After a second, I roughly push Sasori from my person and back away from the two shocked artists. I have to leave. They almost broke a carefully laid barrier. This is dangerous.
I turn around, but before I could make a mad dash out of here, Deidara's voice made me freeze. "Are we not enough for you, Sakura?"
The voice inside me protests, you're more than enough! You're just the right person who can give me my heart and soul back! But I harshly silence her and instead draw up the familiar lock inside of me, blanketing myself with the usual indifference and empty eyes. I reply to him, "Don't speak such nonsense, Deidara."
Sasori speaks, and the disheartened tone of his normally enthralling voice made me swallow thickly. "Sakura, you always withdraw back whenever you start to let us in. Tell me, what is it that you try so hard to keep hidden within you?"
A tense breath of air swirls around us as they wait for my answer. With a bitter, bitter smile baring an irreversibly broken girl, I let the wind carry my response to them.
"You will never understand. Besides, if I tell you, I would have to kill you."
Will you?
Cursing, I realize that these aggravating pests have led me to an alleyway just behind a lively street buzzing with spirited night life. Any further from here, I'll risk losing them in the crowd and people would be suspicious if I continue to pursue them. Like quicksilver, I let numerous silver bullets pierce the air, hitting the running targets with scary precision.
I stop running. Two men lay on the ground, a river of blood pooling around each from a shot straight through the chest. A younger woman, not much older than me, collapses against a wall filled with monochrome graffiti, drowning in her crimson liquid from a bullet lodged in her throat. Their last male accomplice is faced flat on the ground a little farther away, clutching his injured shoulder. I slowly make my way towards him, and he looks up so quickly he could have broken his own neck.
"Oh my god, please! D-d-don't kill me, miss! I'll be a g-good man and j-just disappear and you'll never have t-to deal with me!" The man croaks out, intense fear evident in his uncontrollable shaking and waterfall of dirty tears. "Please, spare me!"
I blankly gaze at the crying man begging me for mercy, not noticing the hurried footsteps getting closer and closer to where I am. I see a tiny bit of my grieving self in the man's eyes, but I am not an angel, not by any chance. I point my shiny, ink-black gun where his beating heart lies, and whispers loud enough for him to hear, "I'm sorry, but I'll make it quick, alright?"
My forefinger jerks, and some of the man's crimson breadth of life splatters on me. I lower the hand carrying the weapon, and turn around, intent on reporting back that the predator won and to finally reach home for a much-deserved warm bath and sleep. I hear a sudden gasp, and my gun instinctively points to the two men standing in front of me. I inwardly scold myself for letting my guard down and not noticing their arrival earlier. As I analyze them, my eyes widen.
Naruto and Sasuke are standing there shock-still, unable to take in the morbid sight around them and the sight of me, the real me, covered in blood and holding their lives in the click of my gun.
After a long, dreary silence with no movement from the three of us, Naruto, with difficulty, opened his trembling mouth. "S-S-Sakura-chan, what? You... you killed them all! Y-you, who are you?!"
Closing my eyes, condemning my entire being for eternity from not being able to protect them from myself, I smile. A smile of both a devil in disguise and a ruined girl with nothing left to live for.
"This is the real me, Naruto. Since you finally know the true Sakura, I have just one small question for you." I open my eyes, and look directly at his terrified blue orbs.
"Do you still want me to let you in?"
Love─love me?
Me?
Entering a quaint-looking café that I know he visits frequently, I look around to find a seat. A small wave of a pale arm catches my attention, and I spot Itachi beckoning me to his table located at the corner of the shop. I sit across from him, and he offers me a small smile showing his delight for my unexpected but welcomed appearance. A boyish waiter takes my order, a slice of Red Velvet Cheesecake and a cup of Jasmine tea with two drops of honey, and leaves to retrieve my food.
"Sakura-san, what brings you to this place?" Itachi looks at me inquisitively, sipping a cup of slightly steaming coffee. "I frequent here often and have never seen you around before."
Giving him a smile that does not quite reach my eyes, I reply, "I was passing by and it caught my attention. I was a little hungry, too, so I decided to feed both my curiosity and my stomach."
Receiving my food, I started savouring my cake, with Itachi observing me amusedly. A calm, comfortable atmosphere settled around us. As I finish my food, Itachi speaks in his elegant voice, "Sakura-san, I will pay for the food."
I look at him, and politely decline, "That is not necessary, Itachi-san." He shakes his head slightly, and then stares at me with gleaming eyes. "I insist, Sakura-san. If you are so against me paying, then would you like to pay me back by watching the sunset with me?" His eyes portray a mesmerizing kind of hope, and I incline my head yes with a faint smile.
We reach a small, pretty beach hidden by a park filled with big trees and scattered basketball and tennis courts. I notice we are alone. Itachi leads me to a spot near the water and lays down a beach towel he told me he always keeps in his car. We sit down on the towel with our shoulders touching, my petite messenger bag never leaving my side. The sand is silky to the skin; the gentle crashing of the waves creating a serene, almost romantic setting.
I admire the picturesque view of the sunset, and a soft mutter of "Beautiful" leaves my mouth. Itachi moves his gaze from the sunset and on to me, and he repeats the same word that left my mouth with much more affection that I fisted my hand on my bag so hard it almost hurt. I move my head to lock gazes with him, my pulse getting quicker but heavier from the tenderness and gratefulness I can clearly see in his eyes.
He leans in, and suddenly cages me in an affectionate hug that I did not expect to ever receive from an Uchiha. I feel his breath on my ear, and he murmurs, "Thank you for spending time with me, Sakura. I will cherish this moment, and I hope to make more with you in the future." He leans back and gives me a full smile, with no boundaries and restrictions, just pure happiness.
I feel heavy, so, so heavy. The voice inside me thrashes about and shouts, stop, stop, stop! Don't pick them, pick him! Love him, love him, love him!
Itachi continues to smile genuinely at me, and I thought, maybe, I could love him, cherish him, and let him in. Maybe, he can find the scattered pieces of me and give me a purpose to live. But then, I remember, even though I don't want to; the first kill, the second, the third, the fourth... They all come to me so quickly that my head is spinning. I then remember who I really am, what I do, what I've lost, and what I can never be.
I launch myself on Itachi, surprising him. I hug him tightly, and with a wavering voice, I open my mouth. "I'm sorry, Itachi. I'm so, so sorry. You are such a great person. I'm so, so sorry."
Itachi hugs me back, but replies in a confused tone, "Why are you apologizing, Sakura?" And as I continue to spit out pathetic apologies, I press the cool metallic head of my ink-black weapon on the back of his neck.
I can feel his eyes widening, fear creeping his whole being as he became icy rigid, cocooned in my hug. "Why?" Itachi asks in a choked puff.
Closing my eyes, I kiss the side of his neck and whispers in his ear.
"You're my target, Itachi. My 100th prey in my fucked up, dark world."
With one less silver bullet, and crimson stains decorating my cheeks, hands, and shirt, I blankly gaze at the beautiful sunset and the warm splashes of colors displayed in the sky.
I realize then, that the small part of me─the one that still hopes, dreams, and believes─is completely dead, just like all of the other pieces of me I've long lost. This time around, I loosen the chains inside me, just for a little while, and allowed myself to cry.
Even with my dark side?
. . .
I know it's kind of confusing, but ohwell~
(:
. . .