a/n: ok. So this takes place after 699 and before Sarada was born. Tbh, I haven't watched the Last and haven't read Sakura Hiden (anyone knows where I can read an english trans? I haven't even tried google.) so yeah, the timeline may be a bit messed up but hey at least I tried!

dedicated to: Virtually Forgotten. Not sure if you're gonna be able to read this but your review for my ss angst story, Quench, made me really happy I actually cried. I'm a frustrated poet. :( Also, this is less angst-y (not even angst i think) coz writing that story drained my soul of artful words and flowery angst-y phrases and whatnot haha.

Oh, and i don't own naruto!

lost and sometimes, found

Sakura wasn't expecting much when she finally saw him after five years, strolling through the streets of Konoha, his eyes on the road ahead, not minding the curious looks and heated glares some villagers were throwing at him. Naruto appeared beside him before she could make a move herself, and she thought of delaying whatever word of greeting she would like to offer. She knew something had changed, and she found contentment in it. Sasuke had come back, slowly reinstating himself as a Konoha-nin, and from what she was seeing, tying up loose ends and severed bonds.

More than that, however, he had proved to her that a next time was possible. A silent promise was made years ago, and he did not break it.

But then next time gradually evolved into a tomorrow and the day after that, and she soon welcomed the thought of an always. She found herself spending time with Sasuke even hours after the team's ramen sessions. She didn't dare to read too much into the attention he was suddenly giving her because despite the constancy of her feelings for him, her desire for reciprocation had waned into a simple wish of seeing him every waking hour and calling him Sasuke-kun, hoping his nightmares had finally been tempered by time.

She had thought about asking him about his journey, but she would immediately catch herself, reminding herself that his friendly presence beside her whenever he would suddenly fall into steps with her after her shift at the hospital was enough, a finality that didn't beg for further questions. After all, his footsteps echoing with hers and his voice answering to hers already defined a promise fulfilled.

But when they walked together one night, swirls of clouds and hesitant glimmers silhouetted against the enduring expanse of blackness, he had stopped her, and she noted the careful distance he had placed between them before he started.

"I'm leaving again."

For a moment, she took in his face, moon-bleached; the light was falling through a canopy of leaves, pouring down onto his visage, effectively hiding nothing – she knew he was telling the truth even with his face angled away from her.

A righteous anger started to boil within her. She had been lulled into a false sense of permanence by the thought of an always that she had forgotten the feeling of abandonment. Yet here it was again, waving at her, taunting, reminding her how she would always stay rooted on the same spot every time he would walk away.

He turned to her, perhaps sensing her unusual silence, and she now saw his face clearly as he did hers. She wished she could easily slip a mask over her emotions written too evidently on her face the way he could.

"I don't deserve this sudden acceptance, Sakura. I almost destroyed this village, your village," he took a few steps towards her, "It's my turn to protect it."

She finally found her voice to answer. "Then why do you have to leave again?"

"Naruto will be a Hokage soon, so I also have to do something. But I'm not the one needed here; Naruto is. I'll request to be sent on missions outside Konoha, to look for and eliminate those who would dare to touch this village."

Then as if breaking the tension, she inquired in a new tone, "What was it like out there, Sasuke-kun?" Do you like it so much to be there?

He shrugged. "It was something I've always wanted to see, a life different from here, a life different from my life as the sole survivor of my clan."

"Then why did you come back?" she barked. Her shoulders quivered as a passing wind rustled through the fragile leaves, now snapped off their nodes, dislocated and hovering, slowly on their way to meet the ground.

"I don't belong there," she heard him mutter.

"Then just stay here, Sasuke," she said resolutely despite the impending cracks in her voice.

When he averted his eyes, she began again, words tumbling out of her mouth in a desperate tone. "You don't have to take the responsibility of protecting the village alone. Together, we can protect it just like before when we were genin. Do you remember? Our trainings with sensei? We can do that again for the village. You don't have to blame yourself. You don't have to go," she pushed her tears roughly off her cheeks, "Just stay, here, Sasuke, with us, with me, and...and you don't have to be alone again..."

When her vision cleared, she saw his unwavering gaze, the cold beauty of his eyes pulling her in until he turned away.

"I will see you again, Sakura."

She gave a sharp, watery laugh.

"Just stop making promises," she said before running away because she knew he wouldn't follow.

But then later that night, she heard a knock on her door, and expecting to see an ANBU sent by Tsunade to request her presence at the hospital, she absentmindedly pulled the door open, uncaring of her probably bedraggled appearance – eyes marked with tears and tousled hair. The rush of cold night air had swiftly stung her skin before she felt her cheeks swathed in warmth, and she was suddenly looking into his eyes, belatedly recognizing the feel of his lips moving against hers.

Her first instinct was to pull away, to stifle the need to respond, but she threw her arms around his neck instead, pulling him in: her wary gladness smothered, her grief and hesitation and fear of a future without him discarded along with every article of clothing now lying unperturbed on the floor.

What she wanted was an always, not a next time, not a maybe. She wanted permanence, not discontinuity. But when in a moment of passion, he dropped a kiss on her forehead, slid down her nose, and finally claimed her lips again, breathing "this is a promise" with each word punctuated by a kiss, she kissed him back with the same intensity, a promise of equal measure: she'd live through again the exquisite pain of waiting for him.

They had had numerous endings, she thought as she caressed his hair, his head nestled in the crook of her neck, his palm pressed against the flat of her stomach. But she now believed they could always begin and begin again until they ran out of endings.

...

Fin.

(ok that line about the flat of her stomach is me trying to allude to her impending pregnancy. I'm toying with this idea that sasuke actually doesn't know about his having a daughter with sakura? Let me hear your thoughts on that. Anyway, i'm trying to write a fic centered on that idea. Please keep an eye out for it!)