"No, Sasuke, I am not letting you taint my children, I already told you!"
Night had fallen over Konoha, the warm, protective rays of the sun retreating over the horizon, the village now bathed in the silver light of the moon and the artificial energy of the lampposts. As nightlife began to sizzle in the city centre, the streets were still bustling with activity, but in the Uchiha Mansion, it was bedtime for its youngest occupants.
As Uchiha Sakura placed the last plate in the dishwasher, her husband scowled from his place near the sink, freezing in his action of bringing a glass of water to his lips.
"I am not tainting my children!" he defended himself against her ridiculous accusation, glaring hard in her direction.
Sakura remained unfazed, already used, after seven years of marriage, to his fiery temper and brash reactions.
"Of course you are!" she insisted, whipping around to face him. "My children are too young for you to taint their innocence with your gory stories!"
Sasuke's eyes narrowed. "Well, my children are too smart for you to paint their minds with sunshine and rainbows!"
With an annoyed huff, Sakura threw the rag in her hands on the counter. "What's your problem?"
"My problem?" he asked, almost surprised. "You know perfectly well that sunshine and rainbows don't exist in our lives, Sakura."
For a moment, the pink-haired woman was silent. She could see where he was coming from, but as usual and as with everything else, Sasuke was too cold and much too radical. "They're children, Sasuke," she said.
"They're shinobi, Sakura," he stressed. "They're Uchiha. The sooner they learn what a big responsibility that is, the better."
Her eyes softening, Sakura heaved a sigh. She could try all she wanted, but she could never stay mad at Sasuke, and whatever arguments she brought in such discussions—because they were quite frequent in their house—crumbled down within seconds when confronted to the place where his own came from: his dark, sordid past.
She knew what was running through his mind. She knew all the thoughts that crossed it, every minute of every day. She knew what he was feeling. He never showed it, but she had come to learn that he was scared—always so scared.
On the battlefield, he was fearless—a true warrior who had been through much more than his age should have allowed; he was calm and collected and knew exactly when to act and how to act.
The story changed when the décor did. He had been scared throughout their entire relationship, from the first time he held her hand, to the first time Tsunade placed their baby girl into his arms. And Sakura had always understood that perfectly and helped him along the way as best as she could. Sasuke had no idea how to deal with her love and cope with the feelings she awakened inside of him, because no one had cared about him in such a way in such a long time. Yet she was the most important person in his life—his family, this fragile family he had managed to build with her from the ground up, was what mattered most to him.
The Uchiha Clan had a tainted past. Konoha itself did. Sasuke had made mistakes and enemies at every corner and he had almost lost himself on the way. He didn't want to screw up again—not when he had everything he could possibly want. He was responsible for them and, everything he did, he did it with their best interests in his mind—everything down to the bedtime stories he wanted his children to hear. He didn't want a repeat of what had happened to his old family. He didn't want to lose someone dear to him ever again, and he placed all of his strength and energy and every single thought in making sure that wouldn't happen.
"Sasuke-kun…" she whispered, shaking her head. "Whether the children's bedtime stories have happy endings or not won't make a difference on their concept of responsibility."
"Sakura, you're painting a world for them that doesn't exist!" he hissed, placing his glass down on the counter. "What will happen when they realize that? Sakura, if I had known—if I had been more aware of the world around me… maybe—"
"Sasuke-kun! I've told you a million times before, there's no use torturing yourself with such thoughts," she chided, quickly closing the distance between them and standing on her tiptoes so that she could cup his face within her hands. "You were a child, Sasuke, what could you have done? And you know what?" She shook her head and dropped her hands to her hips. "It doesn't even matter, because you and I will make sure our children will never have to face anything like that. The past is the past—we've learned what we could from it. But we can't let it dictate our present, Sasuke—much less our future. You hear me?"
Looking away, Sasuke swallowed. "They will need to find out one day, either way," he stated in a much quieter voice. "About Itachi, about…" He shrugged. His wife knew perfectly well that he didn't have the strength to finish that sentence.
"They do and they will," she soothed. "And maybe you're right, maybe telling them a more realistic story will help them assimilate the truth better when they're told of it… but for Kami's sake, Sasuke, lay off the gore, will you? Mikoto's already interested enough—it scares me."
Sasuke smirked. "That's just because she hangs onto my every word," he teased.
Green eyes narrowed. "And that should be a responsibility you should treasure, not try to destroy her innocent mind with."
Huffing an amused breath, Sasuke shook his head.
Sakura stood on her tiptoes and wrapped her arms around his neck, catching his troubled, yet still somewhat smug, gaze with her warm, reassuring one. "Everything is going to be alright, I promise," she said. "We'll go through whatever comes our way together."
With a heavy sigh, he wound his arms around her tiny waist, hugging her tight against him, breathing in her flavor as he buried his face into the crook of her neck. He didn't know what he would do without this woman, and that was something he hoped he would never have to find out.
"Mama," their daughter's voice snapped them both out of their thoughts, pulling them apart. Instantly, Sakura turned around, a worried look in her eyes as she watched their six-year-old daughter make her way into the kitchen, a frown on her small features and her favorite stuffed snake under her arm.
"What's wrong, sweetheart?" She crouched down to her level, opening her arms wide, while Sasuke watched with his own concerned expression from above. Mikoto had his dark hair and her mother's green eyes, with her personality a terrifying mix of both of their own, yet seeing her anything other than lively and cheerful was worrying.
"I'm not feeling very well," she muttered between pouty lips, burying her face into her mother's shoulder.
Sakura immediately reached out to feel her temperature with the back of her hand. "You have a bit of a fever, sweetie," she announced, before standing up, with her in her arms, and pressing a kiss to her temple. "I'll take care that you feel better in the morning," she promised. "Do you want to sleep with me tonight?"
Mikoto nodded from where she had moved her head to the crook of her neck, only looking up when Sasuke ran a soothing hand through her hair.
"Hey!" a small voice exclaimed, as the sound of tiny feet padding against the wooden floors came from the hallway, and not two seconds later, their youngest child appeared. At four years old, Itachi was the spitting image of his father, complete with his messy hair and onyx eyes. "I wanna sleep with Mommy, too!"
Sakura smiled down at him. "You do?" Bending down, she set her daughter on her feet and placed a kiss to her forehead. "Well, then, why don't you both go take over Mommy and Daddy's bedroom?"
Itachi cheered and immediately thundered out of the kitchen and up the stairs, while his sister followed in a more tempered fashion, still clutching onto her snake.
Watching her retreating back with softened eyes, Sakura turned around once she was out of sight, facing Sasuke. She hated it when her children were in discomfort and she, as the best medic Fire Country had ever seen, couldn't do anything to alleviate that.
"I'm sorry, Sasuke," she said, running a hand through his hair in an apologetic manner. "Sleep in the guestroom tonight? I know you're tired from your mission and you have to rest properly. Alright?"
The Uchiha almost wanted to narrow his eyes in annoyance, because he was sure his wife was perfectly aware of how much he hated sleeping anyplace other than his bed, but he decided that was not the time to be petulant. With a heavy, resigned sigh, he nodded in agreement.
"Mama!" their youngest child's voice rang down the stairs.
"What is it, sweetie?" Sakura called back.
"Will you tell us a bedtime story?"
The pinkette laughed, her green eyes sparkling as they gazed up at her husband. "Sure, baby."
Sasuke rolled his eyes.
To his credit, he did try to heed her advice and rest. He had, after all, only come back from a mission earlier that day. So, he made his bed in the guest room. He took a shower. He picked his most comfortable pair of sweats. He followed the exact same routine he did when he was about to go to sleep in his own bed.
Problem was, his wife was missing.
And Sasuke had become so used to having her there, beside him, warming his side up with her lithe body, tickling his chest with her pink tresses and his neck with her even breaths, had become so used to her dependable presence that chased the nightmares away that it was downright scary.
He made it to the middle of the night before he threw the covers off him and made his way out of the room and down the hallway, to the bedroom he shared with his wife. The room was shrouded in darkness when he stepped inside, and he found it ridiculous how much warmer and peaceful the atmosphere seemed to be due to her simple presence.
Clearly, Sakura had none of the problems he did, since she was sound asleep in the middle of their large bed, pink hair spread over the silk, navy-blue pillow, their children curled up on either side of her—a sight that always made his heart melt. Their son was nestled against her side, curled up in a little ball, while their daughter was lying on her other, with her head resting on her shoulder.
Sighing, Sasuke approached them, tugging the covers up to tuck them all in, before slipping under them himself. His bed felt much more comfortable than the one in the guest room did, even though the only difference between them was the size, and he sighed contently as he rested his head on his pillow and reached for his wife, hugging their son in between them. Burying his face into her pink hair, he inhaled her aroma, while gazing down at her and their children wrapped around her through half-lidded eyes.
He would do anything for his little family. It was a thought that never escaped him. He would do anything for them, go to any lengths for them, protect them with everything and anything he had in him.
Because they were everything to him, and that was the end of it.
A/N: Written for sasusaku-headcanons on Tumblr.
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