Title: watch the stars burn
Fandom: Naruto
Characters: Sasuke/Sakura
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 522
Warnings: AU. Surrealism and pretentiousness. Teenage love.
Summary: "We are sixteen, and it is summer, and we can last forever."
Notes: Inspiration for this story comes from the picture by NOIR, located at miwako2015. hacca. jp/ gallery/ galleryimg/0705190137491. jpg

The gate opens, long-rusted hinges creaking private sorrows in a language nobody understands

The gate opens, long-rusted hinges creaking private sorrows in a language nobody understands. Opening the way to a desolate desert of nothing, a mountain composed of the used and discarded, abused and unwanted.

And it is all mine, because nobody wants it.

I am the king of this castle with no court but silence. Pilgrim to this holy mountain, where none pay homage. This graveyard where nobody mourns, and the only flowers left are already long dead.

I climb to the top, steadily. Rust pipes bend at the waist, marking my passage, and oil drums slip under my feet. Discarded teddy-bears smile as I pass, and every broken television reflects my image carelessly, for my entire kingdom to see.

I reach the top, and recline in my sedan chair – plastic of the refrigerator door refreshingly cool in the heat of the summer night. I lay back with a sigh, and open my eyes.

The stars fly by above, gliding like chariots, trot-trotting through the sky. A hidden splendor, unmarked by all but me, incalculable to all but those who are privy to this place. This damaged stretch of land, home only to the broken.

It is my home. My castle. My church. My grave.

I smile as the stars wheel by above, balls of fire ready to crash to earth and destroy all of its insignificant life, and yet somehow they hang in the sky and refrain. I look at that sky, filled with brilliance, and I am free.

My hand stretches out above my face, as I try to reach that luminous universe above, only to learn that I am grounded.

A sigh.

I am no longer a child. I cannot touch the sky.

For hours, I watch the stars wheel above, leaving me behind.

A sound, a crash, and then a girl climbs my mountain.

She is all misplaced limbs, unbalanced and ungainly, all arms and legs – forehead too wide for her face, lips too thin for beauty, nose a button of a thing. And her hair-

"Absurd," I whisper.

- pink.

Still, she smiles at me.

With her bubblegum hair and rosetinted cottonweave dress, she is a spectacle to behold.

"Who are you?" she asks.

I tell her my name. "I'm Sasuke," I say, "and I'm king here."

"I'm just Sakura," she says, completing everything pink about her – lips, hair, dress, name.

I grimace, and her eyes catch mine – green like cool spring and reflecting the sky.

I am lost.

She dips me a curtsey. "Do you mind, Your Majesty?" No mocking in her voice.

This place all my own and no one to share it with.

I move over.

She sits.

She smiles in that annoying way she has.

"You're kind of cool, you know," she says, carefree to whisper, a dreamer with dreams too big for her.

Her eyes catch mine, green spring and carefree, filled with brilliance and suddenly I am free. My hand touches hers, and once more I can fly.

"Thank you."

We are sixteen, and it is summer, and we can last forever.

But for now we watch the stars burn.