necrotic
if you pretend things aren't real, it doesn't mean they aren't.
His face is mask of calm as he walks into the bathroom of some nameless hotel room – he's not exactly rushing, just in a hurry to get away from his teammates and the public eye – because he's the destruction right behind an overcast, crackling sky – the pulse of raw energy, of tangible frustration, lives in his veins. Inside, he's a mess, like a hurricane over the open sea – trapped by space, with nowhere to go, nothing to desolate. And this – this thunder in his head – is the inevitable result every time he unthinkingly utters a simple, meaningless phrase. Except it's not so meaningless at all. He closes the door behind him, locks it, and letting his eyes slide shut, he sighs as memories surface, unbidden. Why is it that saying 'thank you' has become the catalyst for a reaction so strong? he wonders, except he doesn't have to wonder at all, he knows, knows it down to his bones. And it's at times like this that Sasuke wishes that he could just keep his eyes closed all the time – to deny everything, to block out the images of the disaster he leaves in his wake, the things that seem to scar his retinae far too easily these days. My eyes, he thinks, are a curse.
Finally, he opens them and crosses to the sink, turning the tap and splashing his face with water, ice-cold – as cold as he wishes his heart could be. And he's a good actor, as good as his brother, but when he looks in the mirror, he can no longer pretend: his face is raw, open, vulnerable. And he hates, hates, hates it.
Later, when there's blood speckled on the cheap linoleum floor and glass tinkling in the sink, he finds that the mirror is too honest – it shows him broken, and he knows it is the truth. He can actually see himself, each fractured piece of his psyche – the innocent boy, the brooding adolescent, the calloused man stuck inside his teenage body. A son, brother, teammate, student; used, abused, pitied, envied – and for once, Sasuke feels real.
It all feels a little too real – whoever said the truth hurt was more right than he'd like to admit – and he staunchly denies everything he sees as he cleans up the evidence of his momentary lack of control. He bandages the knuckles of his right hand awkwardly, and then gathers the shards of the mirror, unceremoniously dumping them into the trash. Finally, there is only one piece left, but he cannot bring himself to throw it away. Staring into that sliver of silver, he cannot see his reflection as it is now, only the image of how he appears to those who used to care, to those who still do – he was arrogant but inherently good, he was hard to deal with but unconditionally loved.
Defiantly, he crushes in it his still-aching hand – more blood seeps through the gauze, atonement for the sins he knows he will commit. He slips his hand into his pocket and leaves the shards to gather in its corner – to remind him of what he was once was, what some may wish for, and what he is sure he will never be again. The slight weight is heavy and uncomfortable in his mind, but he knows he can't leave them behind – later, after he destroys all he cares for, after he achieves that sense of finality he has been searching for, after he has nothing left to live for, he will let them speed his fall from some towering precipice into an abyss of darkness. But until then, he will keep them, feeling what little is left of his heart blacken and fracture.
He strides out of the bathroom, and he's a man with grim determination, a force to be reckoned with – back to being emotionless, shameless, brutal: everything he never used to be. Sasuke is once more a natural disaster – he is unpredictable and dangerous and not quite rational. But in that cancerous heart of his, he accepts this as who he must be and knows he cannot change anything – he can only hope to ignore what miniscule conscience still clings to his decisions.
After all this is over, then we'll be together again, he vows silently, and then maybe, in another world, in another life, just maybe – for you, I could learn how to smile again.