Title: Where'd you go. (Song fic)
Author: Kou (The Dirtwater Fox)
Summary: At the bottom of her sake cup, Tsunade reflects on her life a few years after leaving Konoha.
Notes: I'm writing this with several shots of bourbon, so if it doesn't end up flowing, sorry. The song, Where'd you go - by Fort Minor, featuring Holly Brook, is a great song to listen to when you're drunk enough to cry and thinking about those you miss. Weather they be alive, dead, just down the street or a million miles away, everyone misses someone. I once watched my mother hug her wedding picture to her chest to keep it dry under a torrent of tears. This occured shortly after my father died. Later that night, this song came on the radio and, although the lyrics are about losing touch with someone through distance and time - not death, it still made my throat tighten and my eyes overflow. I dedicate this fic to my mother, my father, the love they shared, and to all of you out there who have lost someone. (Some modification to the lyrics has been performed.)
Lyrics in bold.
"Oh Dan.."
Where'd you go...
"Why did you have to go and leave me?"
I miss you so...
"There are so many things I want to tell you.."
Seems like it's been forever...
"So many things I want you to see..."
Since you've been gone...
In later years, Tsunade had more than her fair share of regrets. Her brother had been lost to her as just a little boy, and she longed to see the man he would have become. At times like this though, it was not her brother she thought about. No, on cold lonely nights where she found herself commiserating in cheap hotel rooms, her thoughts would turn, not to a man that could have been, but to a man who had.
Times were hard now, but when Dan had been alive, trouble always seemed to turn out alright. If she didn't know what to do, he had always been able to set things right. Sure, maybe that hadn't always been the case. Her happy memories easily made him more, but that didn't change the fact that she still felt lost without him.
She said, Some days I feel like shit. Some days I wanna quit and go back to being normal for a bit. I don't want to accept that you have to be gone, I get along but the days always feel so long. I find myself trying to stay close to home, cause your presence still helps me not to feel so alone.
Her lover, although the term had remained un-consummated with such an honorable man as Dan, had died long before she had ever needed the illusion of beauty. One night, on the return home after a mission, they had stumbled upon an enemy encampment hidden beneath a clever Genjutsu. Dan, who had been the first Leaf sighted by the enemy took the full brunt of the initial assault. He had died in her arms less than ten miles from Konoha - She still remembered the pitiful moans that had persisted a while after his eyes closed.
So soon after the death of her little brother, she had nearly died right beside Dan. Her heart simply couldn't take it any more. Resigning her position, she'd left Konoha without much thought, taking only the few things left to herthat really mattered anymore: Her crystal necklace, Nuwaki's forehead protector, the sheets from her and Dan's bed - the last safe place they'd slept together, and Shizune. It was, after all, Konoha's fault that Dan and Nuwaki had died, so she sought to shelter the girl from a similar fate.
But I feel like an idiot - livin' life round your ghost. But when you're in my dreams, you never have much to say. Still, I want you to know that it's a little fucked up, That I'm stuck here waitin', at times debatin', Telling you how life sucks now you're gone but I'm here, Me and the rest of the family singin'...
"Shizune's growing into a fine young woman, Dan."
Where'd you go...
"I want you see her almost as bad as I want to see you."
I miss you so...
"What would you say to me, if you saw me now?"
Seems like it's been forever...
"What would you say to her, if you saw how I've raised her?"
Since you've been gone...
"Oh Dan..."
Please come back home.
(AN: I didn't write the whole song out obviously, but I simply can't. Hopefully, you won't understand why, but if you do, I'm sorry for your loss. It's been a few years since my father died and I still miss him, but I have learned a few things since then. If you have lost someone recently, allow me to say a few thigns that might help. As much as it hurts, and as hard to believe as it sounds, things will get better. Cry: When you're heart is in pain, there is no shame in letting go of the tears you shed on the inside, whether in private or public. You are not alone in your pain - You may not be lucky enough to have family and friends to share with, but the world is full of people who feel just like you do, to find them all you need do is look. When someone asks, 'So how are you doing,' if your not doing well, tell them that. Tell'm, "My -Insert deeply cared for person- just died, how the fuck do you think I feel?" Don't be afraid to seek help, and don't be afraid to seek faith if that is your wish. Anyway, I think I've said all I'm willing to say...)