"Is it harder than you thought, having a husband that's always gone?"
The question slips innocently from the mouth of a nurse, a civilian new to the village.
Sakura pauses a moment. She thinks of the door that is coming off the hinges that she can't fix, of the jars on the top shelves she can't reach, and of the difficulty she's found in cooking for only one person.
"No" she replies with a soft smile, thinking that door can wait to be fixed, the jars reached with a stepping stool, and the leftovers she always has for lunches. She's adapted to not having Sasuke around, to relying solely on herself.
"Do you miss him?"
The smile fades. How can she even begin to explain to this nurse that missing Sasuke has been so intertwined in her life that it's become a part of her. How can she explain that she keeps a fan on a night to replace the sound of him breathing, that some days she walks around with an aching throat and stinging eyes because she misses him so badly she aches.
Not having Sasuke around, she thinks, is like missing a limb. She's off balance and missing something that used to be there.
She can't, she thinks, even begin to explain her complicated need for independence while being so dependent on a person that's never there.
Huffing out a small laugh, she just nods her head and smiles again.
"Yes, I do."