"Perfection is achieved, not when there is nothing more to add, but when there is nothing left to take away." - Antione de Saint-Exupéry
It starts the night her father fails to come home. Sakura is small, a little too little to understand everything, but she sits in her bed clutching her sheets with wide green eyes, and listens to her mother pace in the kitchen with rapt attention. She doesn't know enough to comprehend why the men at the door made her mother upset, or what Iwagakure is; however, she does know her father is not going to come home. She knows enough to cry, and she is intelligent enough to learn what death is. (She remembers every second of the building tension, of Mebuki's sobbing, and even if she did not understand then she certainly does now.)
The funeral is on a bright and sunny day, and little Sakura stands next to her impassive mother in silence. In that moment, she doesn't understand the burning in her chest and eyes, but she thinks that this day should not be bright - it should be dark and rainy, the sky should cry with her mother, not smile on. (She hates the sky and sun, she cannot cry because Mebuki is holding her hand just tight enough to hurt, and that says everything.) Her mother's face is emotionless, a stark contrast to the small crowd of relatives surrounding them, and Sakura can barely remember who they are, but if her mother is not crying like them, then obviously she knows something they do not. Sakura will not cry either.
A month passes by quickly, and Sakura watches her mother pass through the stages of grief. She stares at nothing for hours, drinks a foul-smelling liquid at night, screams in her sleep, and ignores Sakura. Sakura's eyes sometimes burn in that unpleasant but familiar manner that besets crying, but she bites back the feeling. Her mother will not cry, so Sakura won't too. Thirty days flash by in a blur of dark days and darker still nights, and at the end mother sits Sakura down in the kitchen and speaks to her, voice bleached and face blank.
"Sakura, do you understand what's happened?" She begins, and Sakura wiggles in her seat slightly, before nodding rapidly. Her mother frowns, and Sakura freezes, afraid to upset the older woman again, because this is the first time Mother has noticed her in some time.
Sakura elaborates slowly, cautiously, observing her mother's expression the entire time. "Tou-san left on a mission... he's not coming home again because he's dead," The words are sour, the new concept of death makes Sakura's chest and eyes burn all over again, the sensation she knows better than anything else but cannot name.
Mother watches evenly, expression drained once more. "Kizashi died because he was not strong enough. Sakura, you enter the Academy next week, you will not fail like him. Do you understand, Sakura?" Sakura nods immediately, happy to follow her mother's commands, even if she isn't quite sure who Kizashi is. This isn't good enough for mother, because she lunges across the table with speed that makes Sakura freeze, gripping the child's wrists with strength that makes her wince. "I said 'do you understand'?! What is the proper response Sakura?!"
"Yes, kaa-chan!" Sakura squeaks, shutting her eyes firmly and leaning back into her chair, hands shaking. Mother is like this sometimes, when she is angry, but Sakura is not sure what she did to upset her this time.
"Yes, Okaa-sama," Mother corrects firmly, and when the grip on her wrists doesn't loosen, Sakura decides she is expected to speak.
"Y-yes, Okaa-sama," She stutters, her traitorous eyes welling up for the first time since the funeral as she awaits her mother's response.
Mother lets go of Sakura, wiping her cheeks clean. "Ladies do not stutter, Sakura, and ninja do not cry. You will be the best, Sakura; you mustn't fail like Kizashi," There is an order in these words, one that will shape the rest of Sakura's life. The child doesn't know that, so she lowers her head and forces her eyes dry.
"Yes, Okaa-sama," She repeats more forcefully, copying her mother's quiet steel. She will not fail like Kizashi, this person who upset her mother so. Her chest burns, but her eyes do not, and for Sakura, that is a relief. (Sakura hates, and that fire will burn brighter with every day she tries and fails to attain her mother's love.)
I have also posted this story on AO3 under the username "Bleunox." This will be multi-chapter, I don't know how long it will be yet though.