AN: I can't believe I betrayed SakuHina this way. This fic is dedicated to J, because Naruto and plants, and ph for reminding me to get my femslash count up.
Title and final lyrics from Imogen Heap's "Pocket Sun"; fic inspired by the picture which is now its cover art - credit to vacuumchan on tumblr! You can find the original post in her sakuino tag.
"OK, I think these are ready for the shop," Ino says, lifting a flowerpot to cradle it. Sakura watches the muscles in her arm work for a moment and can't resist a proprietary grin.
She kisses Ino on the cheek briefly, to watch her girlfriend smile and blush. "Got you," she says, and lifts two flowerpots herself. What's the use of chakra-enhanced strength if you can't use it to show off in front of a pretty girl? "Lead the way."
The plants Ino grows in their apartment do have a tendency to shed leaves all over Sakura's clothes, but she doesn't mind. Coming home to an apartment full of greenery is unexpectedly lovely after a harsh mission, almost as good as a bath or a drink for relief. She's even picked up Ino's awful habit of calling the plants their children.
You'd sell our children? Sakura had asked, laughing, when Ino had said it first. Hell yeah, Ino had said, they'll keep us in our old age, let's drop this ninja lark, and Sakura had laughed more and she'd had to roll Ino over on the sofa and kiss her, her mouth, her shoulder, her back.
Ino is so tall and elegant like this, her long hair in a tail down her back like wind turned into gold, her bare arms. Sakura follows her out to the Yamanaka flower shop. The air has a little bit of a bite to it: summer's not quite here yet, won't be for a while.
The sky is grey, and where the sunlight breaks through, uneven, it comes in bright floods and crashes, almost too bright to look at. Under the light, Ino's face – gilded, alive – is like a photograph. Sakura runs after her, flowerpots balanced in her arms.
Peel the skin of love and lay it on me
My window wide and open
Free fall from the moon
My earth, my friend will catch me