Whiskey Lullaby
DG32173
Sarah: I was listening to the radio the other day and heard one of my favorite songs (though I have over a hundred and fifty favorite songs, and no, don't ask my to name them all cause I won't). I was trying to think of an idea for a new song fic I wanted to write, and that song gave me the idea.
DISCLAIMER: No, I don't own the Naruto series. Nor do I own the song "Whiskey Lullaby", sung by Brad Paisley and Allison Krauss. And yes, I messed with the song a bit on purpose. The reason is simple, and will be easily found when you read the story around the song.
SUMMARY
Sakura finds Shikamaru cheating on her and this is what happens.
NOTES
'Thoughts'
"Talking"
Reading or writing something
'Inner person talking"
Lyrics
STORY
Nara Sakura smiles brightly as she smoothes out her brand new sexy red dress. She intends on surprising Shikamaru and taking her beloved husband out to a nice restaurant for dinner then coming home and showing him just how much she loves him. She opens the front door of their mansion that he inherited from his parents. Closing it quietly behind her, she slips silently up the stairs to their bedroom.
But about ten yards away, she hears moans and whispers coming from the bedroom. She furrows her brow, wondering what's going on. Then she hears a woman say her husbands name in a way that only she should say it. Her eyes widen in shock, not wanting to believe it. She slips up to their bedroom and opens the door, only to find her husband in bed… with her best friend. Both are naked, and are looking at her in surprise.
He put her out
like the burning end of a midnight cigarette
With a strangled cry, Sakura wrenches her eyes from the scene and runs down the hall and down the stairs, hearing him calling her and begging her to come back. She's outside and fumbling with the keys to her car by the time he catches up, in his boxers. "Sakura-koi, please, I'm sorry! I swear, it won't happen again!" he cries frantically, trying to catch her hand.
He broke her heart
She smacks his hand away from her, anger and betrayal evident in her eyes. "Don't touch me, bastard!" she yells frantically at him, finally unlocking her car. His eyes widen in shock and hurt. "I trusted you! I loved you! And this is how you repay me?! Sleeping with my best friend?! Go to fucking hell bastard!" she yells, tears flying from her eyes as she shakes her head.
She uses her almost inhuman strength to push him away. She gets in her car, turns around in the yard, and zooms down the driveway, not taking even a single glance back. If she had, she would have seen him sink to his knees, tears trailing in rivers from his eyes as he watches her drive away, knowing that he had gone too far this time and that she'll never be coming back.
She spent her whole life trying to forget
we watched her drink her pain away
A little at a time
Two months and God only knows how many bottles of whiskey later, Sakura still can't get rid of the sight of her ex-husband in their bed, having sex with her ex-best friend before they heard her cry and looked up to see her running away. Their friends watch as she sinks deeper and deeper into depression, slowly turning whiskey into the only thing she drinks. The pain and hurt of the betrayal are finally drunk away after three years.
But she never could get drunk enough
to get him off her mind
But even after five years, she still can't get the last scene she saw in the manor, the bastard who used to be her husband and the bitch who she once called her best friend having sex in the bed she had shared with her ex. She does the only thing she thinks she can do: find a gun dealer on the street and buys a rifle.
Until the night
Three weeks later, she finally gives up on getting rid of the memory. She pulls out a pad of paper and a pen, then starts writing her final letter. It read I'll love him till I die.
She put that bottle to her head
and pulled the trigger
and finally drank away his memory
With that, she pulls out the rifle she had bought, and puts it in her mouth, pointing the barrel towards her brain. If she shot herself in the heart, the healer-nin of Konoha will find a way to save her. But if she shoots towards her brain, the blast will blow out her brain, killing her instantly. She lets a single tear fall from her eyes, and it lands on the note clenched in the hand she will use to pull the trigger. She closes her eyes and pulls the trigger. The blast destroys her brain and sends the rifle dropping to the floor and skidding away from the hotel bed she killed her self on, her face falling forward onto the pillow.
Life is short, but this time it was bigger
than the strength she had to get up off her knees
we found her with her face down in the pillow
with a note that said
"I'll love him till I die."
Her body is found the next morning by her friends … and him. He had come to try and get her to forgive him for the terrible mistake he made all those years ago. To see her body with half her head blown off, he breaks down, sinking to his knees to start sobbing tears of regret, pain, and lost love.
"Shikamaru," Naruto whispers. "You should read this, it was in her hand…," he continues when he gains the brunette's attention.
The blonde passes him the crumpled bit of paper with a tear stain and drops of blood on it. Shikamaru carefully smoothes out the paper and reads the single sentence on the stained piece of paper: I'll love him till I die. At that, his eyes widen before his body is wracked with sobs again.
And when we buried her beneath the willow,
the angels sang a whiskey lullaby
The funeral took place three weeks later. They buried her beneath a willow that she had absolutely adored on the Nara land.
La, la, la, la, la, la, la
La, la, la, la, la, la, la
La, la, la, la, la, la, la
La, la, la, la, la, la, la
The rumors flew but nobody knew
how much he blamed himself
All her friends came, including her ex-best friend and her ex-husband. Rumors of how it all started ran rampant through the rest of the crowd, but Ino and Shikamaru felt so much worse than the others. They blamed themselves for her death; if they hadn't been sneaking around and having sex behind her back, she'd still be alive and happy, perhaps even having some kids to look after.
For years and years,
He tried to hide the whiskey on his breath
Shikamaru was found in a bar that night, bottles of whiskey on the table in front of him. At first, he can't stand the taste, but he drinks it anyways. Over the next six months, whiskey became his best friend.
He finally drank his pain away
A little at a time
It takes six years for the pain, self-blame, and self-hatred to be drunk away. But no amount of whiskey dims the image of that hotel room the day he found his beloved cherry blossom dead. She will never know just how much he regrets how he had betrayed her nor will she ever know just how much he still loves her or the self-hatred and self-blame that flared within him that day.
But he never could get drunk enough
to get her off his mind
Seven years after her death, he realizes that the image of her dead body, half her head blown off, will never leave until he dies. He pulls out an old picture of them on their wedding day so many years ago, tears falling onto the dusty glass. He finds an old, dusty album of pictures from their honeymoon and flips through it slowly. Finally, he finds a picture of her alone standing before a gorgeous triple waterfall, blowing a kiss at him as he took the picture. He pulls it out carefully, sliding it into a picture-frame of its own. He puts the album and wedding picture back in the drawer they had been in for just over two decades.
Until the night
Clutching to the waterfall picture, he goes down to an old armory room. On the wall are all sorts of weapons, ranging from shuriken and kunai, to swords and maces, even to several types of guns. He picks out a small, but powerful, handgun and loads it with one shot. One shot is all he'll need. He returns to their bedroom. He had never stopped calling it theirs, even after her suicide. To him, it will always be their bedroom. So many memories, good and bad, are ingrained in the very walls, furniture, and air of the room.
He sits on the bed and grabs a half-empty bottle of whiskey. One last drink before he does what he is planning. After finishing the bottle, he throws it like a kunai towards a wall, where it shatters into thousands of shards of glass, like all the other bottles of whiskey he has drank in here. He doesn't care that his feet get cut up every time he walks around the room. He doesn't feel it anymore. He doesn't feel any pain anymore.
He put that bottle to his head
and pulled the trigger
and finally drank away her memory
He picks up the handgun, clutching the picture of Sakura at the waterfall like his final lifeline. He raises the gun and puts it against his left ear. He takes one last look at the picture of his beloved cherry blossom before pulling the trigger. He falls face first into the pillow. As the crimson river of life rushes out of him like a raging river, he lets go of the gun and clutches her picture tightly to his chest, right above his heart. "I'm … sorry … Sakura-koi…," he whispers to the empty air before closing his eyes for the last time.
Life is short, but this time it was bigger
Then the strength he had to get up off his knees
We found him with his face down in the pillow
Clinging to her picture for dear life
He is found that evening when his friends come to check up on him. They've been doing that every evening since they found her body in the hotel room all those years ago. When they try to take the picture from his grasp, they find that it will never be able to be removed. They can barely see the face of the person in the picture through his tight grasp of it: Sakura.
We laid him next to her,
beneath the willow
while the angels sang a whiskey lullaby
They buried him next to her beneath the willow they shared their first kiss under, where he proposed to her all those years ago. And the Nara clan dies with him. He had no siblings, aunts, or uncles. She had been the one who was to help him make Nara heirs. But he betrayed her before they had the chance. And now the great shadow-wielding clan is gone from this world.
La, la, la, la, la, la, la
La, la, la, la, la, la, la
La, la, la, la, la, la, la
La, la, la, la, la, la, la
La, la, la, la, la, la, la
La, la, la, la, la, la, la
La, la, la, la, la, la, la
When the last of the burial attendees are leaving, they would swear on their lives they heard the sound of a young woman laughing happily, and a young man joining in. They'd also swear on their lives they saw a ghostly form of a young woman with long pink hair and brilliant green eyes step out from behind the willow to leap into the arms of a ghostly young man with dark brown hair in a spiky ponytail and even darker eyes as he swirls her around.
To this very day, if you were to go to the Old Nara Estate in the evenings, you might be lucky enough to see the two ghostly lovers in each others arms once again…
Sarah: well… that was … weird to write. Yeah, yeah, I know. I don't usually write angst/tragedies, and it most likely sucks. But review and give me your real opinion on this, please. It would be greatly appreciated.