Wow, I feel like I haven't written or posted in such a long time. This has been stewing in my documents for a while now, and just today I discovered the urge to finish it. So here it is. =)
She's hard to read.
And he, who's always been the master at reading people—calculating their next move and reacting accordingly—is baffled.
"Ohayou, Sasuke-kun!" She smiles in oblivious sunshine. He offers nothing but a sweep of dark eyes and a straight line.
They stand for several minutes in this stilted world by the bridge; one-half dark and awkward, the other bright and beseeching. Right now, Naruto is not here to smooth out the lumps in this strange, painful relationship.
He can tell by her fidgeting that she wants to say something, but she bites her tongue and lets the words swell behind her pink lips. This annoys him, and he turns away from her. Why is it that she speaks her mind whenever Naruto is around, and yet, alone with him, she hesitates to utter a word?
Out of the corner of his eye, he can see her green gaze fixed on him.
Fortunately—or unfortunately, he can't decide which—Naruto arrives to break the silence that might have been beautiful. Naruto is all uncontained shapes and colors, erratic stitches coming undone.
"Sakura-chaaan!!" She turns at his boisterous voice, and the words burst from behind her lips, out into open air.
"Naruto, you're so noisy. You're ruining such a nice morning," she complains. Her face has come to life now, all agitated lines overflowing with hidden affection. (Right now, she's so easy to read.)
It's true; it's a nice morning. The sun is soft and the sky is blue and the birds are chirping. Kakashi is late; Naruto is loud; Sakura is here; all is as it should be. Sasuke closes his eyes to the comfortable sounds of Naruto and Sakura bickering in the background.
As if on cue, Kakashi arrives from his detour on the road of life. His presence perpetuates this insular world of Team 7 and the near-sighted dreams of these three children, one man.
"Well, Team, today we will embark on a very exciting mission…" Kakashi drawls in that comfortable, bored tone that assures them that this is going to be a very dull mission indeed.
Kakashi, he decides abruptly, would make a good uncle, or grandfather, or some sort of vague, male guiding figure. He's good at telling lies and making children believe them.
They're weeding today. Some plump lady watches sharply over them as they weed her precious herb garden. Naruto mutters curses under his breath after the lady hits him rather violently on the head with a ladle. Sasuke and Sakura roll their eyes at Naruto's behavior; Kakashi apologizes on Naruto's behalf.
The dirt is crumbly and small pebbles press indents into his knees. It's uncomfortable, but he won't complain like Naruto, who lets out a dramatized wail at every rock that happens to offend him. In his peripheral vision he sees Sakura, red dress drawn neatly over her pale knees, tugging at a particularly stubborn weed.
She looks out of place among the dirt, with faint smudges on her cheeks and an almost comically serious expression—and yet, within the context of their story, she is so perfectly in place. Among these two boys, one man, in this insular (safe) world.
This thought startles him slightly, because it means that she has a place in his world. His eyes focus resolutely on the weed before him, and he wrenches the root out of the ground with unnecessary force; but it isn't a clean pull, and there are still tendrils of roots slumbering in the ground.
-
"Sasuke-kun?" She's calling his name again. It's annoying, the way she says his name so naturally, like she was meant to say it all her life. "Um…"
There she goes again with the hesitating and the stuttering. His back is unyielding. Why face her?
Her appeal is in vain. She tries again. "Well…I was wondering if...maybe you wanted to walk home with me today?"
The question is old, but somehow she manages to make the situation as awkward as the first time. His scowl deepens as he turns to arrest her with sharp black eyes.
"No."
Today the word sounds particularly brusque, even to him. He wonders why; wonders why he notices how vividly the pain springs into her eyes today. It's like a whole new shade of green, the color of the ill-concealed hurt she tries to mask bravely (pathetically) with her faltering smile.
"Oh…okay." Her eyes flit to the ground, where the shadows are slowly lengthening. "I guess I'll see you tomorrow, then…"
He doesn't bother replying, and instead turns to walk away. This is what he does, always has done, always will do…
She should know this already. This is the routine, and to break it is taboo. This insular world of theirs allows no other way in the relationship that is Sasuke and Sakura.
So why is today any different than all the thousand previous days? The million previous rejections?
But he doesn't want to ponder why, or the implications the answer to this question might pose. Instead he leaves her with her tender green eyes and his name still echoing on her lips.
-
He doesn't see her the next day.
At first he thinks nothing of her early absence from the bridge; although she usually arrives at the same time that he does, he assumes that she woke up late today, or that she is spending extra time on her hair.
But those few minutes drag on and he is left to share the could-have-been-beautiful silence with himself. The stilted world by the bridge is nearly toppling without the counterweight. When Naruto breaks onto the scene, and Sakura is still not here, he wonders where she is. But he does nothing, and waits.
Kakashi comes customarily. The silver-haired man raises an eyebrow at the absence of the sole female student; Naruto frets like a mother hen that has lost its chick. Both the boys are agitated. Naruto, because his beloved Sakura-chan is not here, and he himself because—
He's not sure why he's irritated. By all standards, it should be a fine morning. The sun is soft and the sky is blue and the birds are chirping, and Kakashi is late, and Naruto is loud—
Where is she?
He pushes the thought away, jams it under the turbulence that is dangerously rising. Sasuke blames the strange nature of his thoughts on Naruto's overwhelming obnoxiousness. Of course he's irritated. He's stuck with an absolute idiot and a premature grandpa.
-
By the third day of her absence, the entire male team has become a collection of incurably sour attitudes. Naruto and Sasuke communicate solely through glares, grunts, and threats. Although this isn't too far a departure from the norm…it is an edgier atmosphere without Sakura to mediate.
Even Kakashi is starting to look a little frayed around the edges.
So when Naruto loudly declares that he must see his Sakura-chan now, they are both only a little surprised when Kakashi agrees to the suggestion and sets off at a leisurely pace in the direction of the Haruno household.
Sakura's mother greets them at the door. "Sakura is sick," she explains, and immediately Naruto bursts into a renewed frenzy of worry. Sasuke feels his irritation deepen inexplicably.
"Kaka-sensei—?" Sakura blinks owlishly from under the covers of her bed, hair mussed and eyes wide. "Naruto? Sa—Sasuke-kun?"
He can hear the disbelief that lingers in the syllables of his name, and for some reason this annoys him. He merely glares at the spot above her shoulder.
To his surprise, her room lacks the girly accessories he had always expected. The walls are a practical white, and the furniture is simple, with few adornments. A single picture frame sits on her dresser, before the vanity mirror. The picture is painfully familiar.
She looks small, nearly swallowed by the expanse of blankets surrounding her. Fever flushes her face and makes her voice very soft and slightly hoarse.
Naruto hovers by her bedside, bombarding her with questions. Kakashi inquires about her well-being and smiles when she says she's feeling better, and that she'll probably come to training the next day. Sasuke stands awkwardly off to the side; out of place, but perfectly in context.
They all belong here, in this room.
Kakashi is the first to leave. After wishing her a quick recovery, he vanishes in his signature puff of smoke. Sasuke feels the itch to follow suit, but something glues his legs to the ground. His legs have lost their ability to move; his muscles struggle in vain. He does not understand, and this angers and scares him. It should be easy to walk away.
But he stands there a while longer, listening to Naruto chatter on and on about inconsequential things like ramen and Hokages, and watching Sakura roll her eyes yet laugh, smiling cherry-sweet despite her sickness. Naruto, like the sun, shining on a Sakura flower.
(Does that make him a cloud? Where does he fit in this picture?)
"Ne, Sakura-chan…" Naruto trails off abruptly from his rant on the increase of prices at Ichiraku. Sakura eyes him quizzically.
"What is it, Naruto?"
"Can I use your bathroom?" Naruto smiles sheepishly, rubbing the back of his head. Sakura lets out a soft snort.
"Down the hall, second door on the right."
"Thanks, Sakura-chan!"
Naruto barrels out the door and down the hall. Sakura rolls her eyes at his retreating figure.
"That Naruto," she mutters, half to herself. Then her eyes flicker to Sasuke, who is still standing to the side, and it is as if the air has suddenly expired. Naruto is gone, and the light has died down. She is quiet, uncertain. Her eyes rove the room nervously, avoiding his – and yet he sees the glances that she steals at him.
He is exasperated and confused. He wants to leave, but his legs are still mired in place. There is something tense in this atmosphere, like a string pulled taut into quivering silence. Restless but unmoving.
It is so quiet he can hear the ticking of the clock on her wall. She shifts in the bed and the blankets make a sound like paper brushing against a cheek. It is unbearably awkward. He doesn't know why he is enduring this – why is he even here in the first place? But he can't break this invisible box that is stretching around the both of them.
He wishes she would say something, anything. He doesn't even mind hearing her annoying voice if it means the end of this suffocating silence.
"I…" she begins. He looks up at her, and her eyes quickly flit away like nervous moths. "Um...thank you for coming," she says finally. Her voice is noticeably hoarse, but somehow it is not as unpleasant as he had predicted it would be. "It means a lot to me."
He can see the shape of her hands folded tightly together under her sheets; can imagine the whiteness of her knuckles strained white as bone.
He doesn't understand the deep roiling that suddenly overtakes his stomach. He looks away uncomfortably at the clock, its second hand ticking steadily. Somehow, her words have made the silence more toxic; it's hard to breathe, and he doesn't understand why. How can she be so quiet still? What happened to her chattiness?
Where is Naruto?
He prays that the idiot is not taking a dump. Sasuke only knows too well of Naruto's infamously long toilet sessions.
For once, it seems, God has heard his prayers. There are the faint thumping sounds of Naruto's approaching footsteps, and both of them look almost too eagerly to the door. Sakura's shoulders relax visibly as Naruto enters the room, her anxious hands peeking out from under the covers. The light is switched on again, and she can speak, laugh, be herself.
Naruto stares at Sasuke with a ridiculously suspicious expression, the whiskers on his face twitching. "Bastard, you didn't try to do anything funny to Sakura-chan while I was gone, right?"
Sasuke blinks, caught off guard by the sheer absurdity of this statement. It takes almost all of his self-control not to burst out laughing right then and there. Him? Try anything on Sakura?
Instead, with his stony face set in steely perfection, he says: "I'm going home."
And finally, finally his legs can move again, and he is doing what he was always meant to do. (Walk away.)
-
Yet she is there the next morning.
There are still traces of fever in her cheeks, and he can tell she is sick by the weakness of her stance. Her "Ohayou, Sasuke-kun" is softer than usual, and she says it without looking him in the eye; just a tired, passing breath.
All throughout training he hears her panting heavily. Every so often she pauses to lean gently against a tree, catching her breath. Her steps are woozy and her body sways dangerously. It's frustrating to watch her weakness. If she's so tired, why is she even here? She should be at home, still resting in that boxed room of hers beneath the covers, where she can be safe and sheltered all her life.
He is so utterly distracted by her weakness and his growing irritation that Naruto is able to land a solid punch across his jaw during sparring. He glowers up at the blonde, a trickle of blood dripping down his chin where his lip has split. He viciously wipes the blood off his face, then rises, spitting in the dirt.
Naruto is staring at him with a somewhat baffled expression, though it's clear that he is pleased with himself. "What's the matter, Sasuke-chan? You didn't like the taste of that?"
The smirk on Naruto's face is suddenly infuriating beyond words. The warning heat flares up in his stomach, washing over him and making his vision dizzy. Sakura is swaying anxiously in the background, her brows creased together in worry.
(What is she doing here? She doesn't belong here.)
Sasuke's hands clench together and before he knows it a raw cry has ripped out of his throat as he flies towards Naruto in a sudden burst of speed. Naruto is momentarily caught off guard by Sasuke's ferocity; his eyes take on a shade of bewildered blue before he hastily dodges the blow.
But Sasuke is fueled by an unnamed fury and it makes his movements faster and more brutal. He has already landed three good punches and a kick for Naruto's one punch before Kakashi is able to wrench them apart.
He squirms against Kakahi's firm grip, chest heaving, the anger and adrenaline still pumping in his veins. Naruto is glaring at him in a hurt sort of manner, equally agitated.
"What the hell was that, Sasuke?" Naruto yells.
In response, Sasuke spits again. Sakura looks positively horrified, and for some reason, this makes him want to laugh. His breaths are slowing but his mind is still awhirl. He feels suddenly sick, like the whole world is spinning in the wrong direction and he is walking upside-down.
Kakashi is staring sternly down at him. "Sasuke, that was rather unnecessary."
Sasuke remains silent, refusing to admit to any fault on his part. His mind is still clouded with a dark irritation, seething just beneath the surface and ready to erupt. Right now, he just wants to be away from this place, away from these people who don't belong in his world.
Kakashi's hand remains on his shoulder until Sasuke's trembling has ceased. "I think that we've had enough training for today. We all need a bit of time to cool down. You guys are dismissed until tomorrow."
He says this with a reassuring, smiling eye cast towards Sakura; poor Sakura who is pale as a ghost.
Like he said before, Kakashi is great at telling lies and making children believe them.
-
"Sasuke-kun," her weak voice reaches his ears, carried on the evening breeze. The sun is setting in angry orange light. His hands curl into fists at his sides. He doesn't need this right now. He doesn't know if he can handle it.
He considers blatantly ignoring her call, but somehow, somehow his legs stop against his will, and he stands, back stiff towards her. He hears her come to a stop a few feet away.
He waits for her to speak. For a few moments, she seems at a loss, trying to find her voice, and he can feel his impatience quickly building. This seems to be their eternal function: standing a few arms' length apart; restless but unmoving.
He waits but still she does not speak. So finally, it is he who breaks the silence, callously:
"Sakura, if you don't have anything to say, I'm leaving."
And his legs (thank God) are able to move, move away, and he thinks he has left her behind until—
"Wait! Wait, Sasuke-kun!"
The cry is hoarse, and he can hear frantic footsteps as she runs, runs and plants herself squarely in his path, in front of him so that for once he must look into her eyes. He is startled by how strong and clear they are, even as her body is a jumble of trembling weakness.
"I—I'm sorry," she blurts, arms straight down at her sides, hands balled.
He stares at her in confusion. What is she apologizing for?
"I don't know—if maybe I've done something that irritated you, or if maybe Naruto did something to make you mad, but—it really scared me earlier when I saw you like that, and I thought there must be a reason that you were that way, and—I don't know for certain what it might be, but, Sasuke-kun, if it's my fault or Naruto's fault in any way, I apologize for the both of us, and—" she breaks off from her jabbering, suddenly sheepish. "I'm sorry."
She swallows, and he notices in the evening light the burning red of her cheeks, a color of fever and strength. She stands there awkwardly, air run out and not quite sure what to do—but she is before him now, in a place she has never been.
His mind is suddenly clear. The wind blows softly against their cheeks, and he inhales quietly, slowly. It isn't awkward anymore. It is just as it should be.
The peace that floods him is inexplicable, but he doesn't want to question it too much. Instead he begins to walk past her, towards home.
As he passes her, he says with the shadow of a smile that he doesn't quite understand, "I'll see you tomorrow."
"Y-yeah," she stutters, just before he is out of earshot.
-
And she is there the next morning, and the morning after that, and all the mornings to follow, at the stilted world by the bridge.
This is where he, she—they—belong.
X-x-x
Dang, this is actually pretty long according to my standards. Anyways, I wanted to try out Sasuke's point of view, since I almost always write from Sakura's...and it was fun to try something else. I guess I wanted to capture Sasuke's resistance to the comfortable world that Team 7 tries to draw him into (which distracts him from his goal). I also tried to make the interaction between Sasuke and Sakura more realistic--which, regrettably, means less romantic XD