turnaround
Sometimes, looking out at the huts and lean-to's, the dust and the squalor are rebirth, Sakura cannot breathe.
To one direction there is forest green, and vast open skies that stretch past the curve of the earth. No faces of stone glare back, and no bustling, living, thriving city sits behind her. A chasm in her chest clenches around the emptiness of a lost past, and the wind sounds like the slow, easy chuckle of Kakashi-sensei. Her eyes smart and her breathe trembles, rattles up her narrowing windpipe and exhales in a rush that could be a scream, given more volume.
But she shakes off the gloom, pushes it back with monster strength and hard-earned determination, before setting off down the worn dust trail.
He is sitting on a hill that overlooks nothing. When she settles down beside him, he does not move, does not give any indication that this is anything out of the ordinary. And it isn't. It is tradition – if tradition can come to be in so little time; habit, maybe, is the better term – that she come here at this time and sit beside him, close enough to reach out and touch but far enough to never consider doing so.
Tradition also dictates that she should not speak, because words are things of power, and there is no room for anything but emptiness between them. But Sakura is rubbed raw, today, and she is sick of rules she does not want to follow.
"I'm tired," she says, eyes not looking at him, but up, away, into the blue sky and all her tangled thoughts. Out of the corner of her eye, she sees the way his back stiffens in surprise, the miniscule repositioning of his head to look further away from her, a silent attempt to make her stop talking. She ignores him. "I'm really, really tired, Sasuke."
"I'm tired of being worried about everything all the time, and I'm tired of knowing that I should be worried about everything, all the time. I'm tired of being scared and I'm tired of being sad. I'm tired of being tired." She pauses, blinks once, hard. Scowling, she ignores Sasuke, who is still silent and tight, and concentrates on keeping her voice steady. "I'm tired of missing Kakashi-sensei and I'm tired of thinking, every single day, that today is the day they come for Naruto."
Suddenly, she sits up, fast and with no warning. The muscles in Sasuke's back start as she reaches over, across the space they never cross, and pokes him in the shoulder. He turns to a face that is still scowling, the expression not as angry as worn-down, sad rather than annoyed. Around her eyes, the skin if dark and puffy, and there is a gauntness to her cheeks he does not remember; the green stands out from the red veins crossing her eyes. He thinks that this is the first time he has really looked at Sakura in years. More than that, it is the first time since he left that he has felt this familiar pang that whispers words of protection and concern and anger, because Sakura is hurt.
"I'm tired of being mad at you, Sasuke."
Before he can react, she is standing again, back in the safety zone of no touch, and she is wiping her eyes and looking back at the stretch of nothing beneath the hill.
"I've lost too much, I guess, and seen too much, and I – I spent so long trying to get you back. Naruto, Kakashi and I, we – we tired so hard and now, now you're back. And I'm tired of ignoring you for all but the few minutes we come and sit out here, like strangers, and I'm tired of not having you even when you're here. So… So I forgive you."
For the tiniest second, she looks at him. Their eyes meet and she smiles, small and sad, before turning her back to walk down the path. He can tell by the rhythm of her steps that she is hurrying, probably out of embarrassment, but he is suddenly certain he cannot just let her walk away.
He stands too, but does not move.
"Sakura," he says, voice calm and low, not matching his inner self in the least.
Mid-step, she freezes.
When she half-turns to look over her shoulder, Sasuke nods, once, and smirks at her. It feels natural, remembered, right.
Sakura smiles back.