Authoress' Notes: Because after 309, you know you just have to make fics like this. Even though it's slightly NaruSaku or SasuNaru or SasuSaku at the same time. (Team 7 is OT3 love, period.) Fufufu. (And yet again I wrote this EONS ago but have yet only to post it 'til now. Slacker that I am, really. Kukuku.)

Disclaimer: It would've never been this depressing if I had owned it. Really now.

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Vinculum
By psychedelic aya

The pain is too unbearable, Sakura thinks. It hurts so much that even though she is a medic-nin and even though Naruto has the Kyuubi's chakra they cannot heal themselves. So unbearable.

"Again," Naruto pounds the ground with his fist and Sakura swears she can see tears of frustration in his eyes. And he hates being weak but he's crying right now because it is her in front of him, and he knows he can always be weak in front of her. Always. "The key to keeping my promise was right in front of us, and I let it slip away."

Sakura's been holding back tears because she doesn't want to cry like she did when they were twelve. But Naruto's crying now and his emotions are everywhere—scattered amongst his actions and his words and his crystal blue eyes. "Not again!" He hits the ground—hard and sharp from Sasuke's technique—over and over again until his skin tears and it bleeds and it hurts (but not as much as how their failure does. Nothing hurts more than that.) "We lost him, again…"

He turns to her. Sakura thinks she cannot bear the look of agony in his eyes, so she looks away. "Naruto…" And his name is all she can whisper, all she can muster—just like with Sasuke. How pathetic.

He doesn't care if she's staring at the ground instead of him. "I'm sorry, Sakura-chan." He looks pitiable with those tears in his eyes—so unlike the usual strong demeanor he shows to the world. Sakura wants to support him but finds that she can't—(why and why and why?) because he is Naruto and not Sasuke and the reason may sound so shallow but it isn't. It just isn't.

I can't give him false hope.

Inner Sakura thinks it's sickening. (You can love them both, you know.) And of course it won't be the same, but it'll hurt less. Maybe.

Hearing him say sorry (he doesn't deserve it) is making her do the same. "You idiot," she whimpers, and her voice becomes croaky without her permission. (He deserves better.) "You don't have to say sorry."

He still looks pitiful and it makes her want to break down on her knees and hold him and weep. But she is not twelve anymore and neither is he, and they both know they can handle the pain. This kind of pain is always duller the second time around, anyway.

Sasuke may always and forever think that he's not strong enough; but for Naruto and Sakura, he always had a knack for catching them off guard to ram knives through their hearts.

"I'll keep my promise next time, Sakura-chan," Naruto proudly declares, even though he is still on his knees and bits of water decorate his eyes. His determination is undaunted again, but Sakura thinks that he should give himself a break sometimes. "I promise."

The familiar words comfort her, because she knows that he never goes back on his word. Ever.

"Naruto…"

Sakura finally decides to look at Naruto because her heart is wrenching and because she thinks she has been ignoring him for such a long time. He is smiling and Sakura again feels the urge to hug him and weep.

"I'm sorry."

But she doesn't want to cry because she is not twelve anymore, and neither is he.

(She is no longer that girl who loved a boy and wasted tears for a purpose long forgotten, and Naruto is no longer that boy who loved a girl and wasted energry for dreams long made rotten.

If Sakura cries now, it will be for team, she likes to believe; and if Naruto bleeds now, it will be for the team, he likes to believe.

Gone are the selfish reasons of loving one person alone.

We are a team, they tell themselves now, and they like to pretend they know.)

But Sakura thinks she might slip—

"He still loves you, you know."

Naruto's statement catches her off guard.

He suddenly repeats, "He still loves us." (And the phrasing now is slightly different but it means the same—or does it?) And he is looking up at her with a shine in his eyes, as if he could've never been surer in his life. "That bastard. I could see it in his eyes."

Sakura wants to believe him. She's always wanted to believe in him, ever since they were twelve—but at that time he seemed so unbelievable that she dismissed him as a joke.

But now the joke's on you, isn't it—

(Sakura wishes her inner sardonic self would shut up for once.)

"Sasuke still loves you and me, Sakura-chan. And that's why we'll get him back. That's why I'll keep my promise."

But now, Naruto didn't seem like such a joke anymore.

Sakura looks at Naruto and nods. She looks at him and believes in him like how she should've belived in him earlier in her life.

"Naruto, tha—"

He cuts her off by shaking his head. "Don't; because it's fine." He says, as he begins to stand up straight. Looking to the sky, "I'll make everything right again."

His voice tells her everything and nothing at the same time—he still loves you, Inner Sakura concludes, and the thought makes Sakura weak because it isn't Sasuke they are talking about. Why can't I love you? She thinks, and notices how her throat suddenly hurts. Why couldn't I have chosen you? It is a random thought of the moment but she cannot deny that she has been wondering for such a long, long time.

Naruto seems to know what she is thinking because he looks back at her and gives her that optimistic smile. Because, he is trying to say, because.

"Its okay, Sakura-chan," He suddenly says, "I don't mind."

He says it out of the blue that Sakura just knows he knows what she is thinking.

(All it takes is a mantra of I love you I love you I love you—and how hard, she wonders, would they bleed and cry?

Because love is a painful thing. Naruto loves Sakura and Sakura loves Sasuke and Sasuke loves them both but still chose revenge, pitiful and angry and vengeful as his heart is. They sacrificed happiness because Naruto and Sakura could've loved each other and each other alonealonealone, and they could've been happyhappy oh so very happy; but still—though Sasuke isn't with them they still loved him and believed (knew) that he loved them back, and they like to think that it's what keeps them going. They knew how the three of them loved each other and in what way—the many aching ways (again and again and again) of how Naruto loves Sakura and how Sakura loves Sasuke and how Sasuke loves them both but left them with only each other to share the pain. Their love is a fresh yet corrupted cycle that goes over and over, and all of them wish it could stopstopstop but they've made it spin too many times that they've already lost count of what exactly they feel for each other—its not anymore something they can define. And even though one of them loves the other while the other loves another—it's all been jumbled in a mess they can't explain because who loves who doesn't matter anymore.

All that remains is that its love, no matter what kind of love it is.)

And the love is overwhelming. So overwhelming that everything is too much at once—and since Sakura is the girl of the group she can feel it at its best and at its worse. (Because there is no man-ego to bother her. No rivalry, no jealousy. No high goals to be reached; no revenge to be fulfilled; no wounded pride to be nursed. No, no, no. There was nothing.) So she feels the pain and the love because she can.

She's always been able to.

(It hurts after all to love them both at the same time, each one knows. But they try. They try.)

Sakura knows she is not twelve. She knows she cannot cry.

But Naruto doesn't seem to mind as she weeps on his shoulder and grasps his hands tight.

.//FINI – 060906

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Authoress' Notes: Sadly, Sasuke appears no where even though I wanted to imply their OT3-ness. Haha. Sasuke can be quite an idiot that way. Ho-hum.

Nevertheless, I hope you liked it. Smile and remember someone up there loves you.