Sakura returns to her room that night, her first night, her first night alone in a new city. But not really alone, because Ino's texting her and so is Kiba, and Naruto cheerily tells her good night before heading back to his own room, and she has new friends already and she likes them.
It's only after she shuts the door behind her and locks it for good measure that she remembers she doesn't like herself.
Nights are the worst.
Nights, when she's by herself, no homework to distract her, when her muscles are too tired to dance and the world is quiet and all there's left to do is think, she can't run from her anxiety. It chokes her like an iron hand around her throat. The stomachache she's learned to ignore rushes back with dizzying force and she regrets so much. She regrets the pizza she had for dinner at Ino's dorm now that it threatens to make a reappearance all over her plain blue carpet. She regrets thinking she could ever really run from what's behind her, when it's made itself a comfortable home in her heart.
She showers in her private bathroom and uses scented body wash that calms her. Lavender is soothing and helps you sleep, so she massages that into her skin. Hibiscus-scented shampoo and conditioner. Jasmine-scented facial scrub. Sometimes these things relax her, but now is not one of those times.
She steps out of the shower and avoids glancing at herself in the mirror until she's dressed in cotton shorts and an Aerosmith T-shirt. The racing in her heart signals the start of yet another panic attack so she makes sure the bathroom door is shut and locked before she collapses to the linoleum tiles with her fingers clenched through her damp pink hair hard enough to hurt.
Sakura knows her mantras, the things that calm her down when she's like this. You're safe. You're safe. He's gone. He can't find you anymore. It's all in the past. It's all in the past. The past can't hurt you. You're okay. You're fine. You're safe.
Her mantras work eventually, even if the message is somewhat diluted after so many (hundreds, thousands) times of repeating them to herself. Minutes pass before her breathing relaxes, before the room stops spinning and that icy grip of fear relinquishes hold around her heart, before the tears that stream unbidden from her eyes freeze midway down her cheeks. Then there is silence.
It was foolish of her to assume that a mere change in address would be enough to cure her of the anxiety borne of a night she barely remembers, and a childhood she longs to forget.
Hundreds of miles from the breeding ground of so many of her nightmares, Sakura knows that now, more than ever, she is alone.
And she still isn't safe.
Sasuke drives his fist once more into the punching bag and relishes the way his muscles burn.
Soccer practice will start next week and he looks forward to the thrill of competition, the physical outlet for so much of his pent-up aggression. But he will not wait for the team to begin training, because Sasuke trains himself. He is disciplined. He adheres to a strict regimen and pushes himself to do and be the best.
It is the Uchiha way. His family may be gone (deaddeadnevercomingback), but their legacy lives on in him. Uchihas do not fail. Uchihas do not quit. Uchihas are the best and he will not stain the honor of the family (that left him all alone) that he loves, so even when he doesn't need to, he pushes himself.
Three hours into the workout, he feels the familiar stitch in his side that signals he's gone too far this time. But he ignores it and wipes down the weight machine that's now soaked in his sweat and stalks towards the punching bag, the only thing in the entire Hokage gym that he hasn't yet tested out.
He pictures his enemies as he rains a volley of punches against the sandbag. He isn't sure who those enemies are anymore. Everyone he's ever wanted revenge against for his family's sake is long gone, but the throb of anger and hate still burns within him. Perhaps not as fiery hot and volatile as it was before, so close to the surface and guiding all of his actions, but simmering, he thinks, would be the right way to describe it. Dormant unless provoked, then unleashed like a tiger until he can't go anymore and exhaustion wins the fight and claims him.
Sasuke is competing for midfielder, and he trains like a mercenary.
Everyone else in the gym is gone, and it's just him now. It's the first night at college; everyone is preoccupied with the getting-to-know-you parties and making new friends and writing home. But Sasuke hates parties and he doesn't need anymore friends and no one is home to read the letters he won't write. The only sounds in the entire gym are his own ragged breaths and the creaking of the chain that holds the punching bag as it swings to and fro.
It's a good gym, he decides, content that his sweat and blood but never his tears are smeared across each piece of equipment in some measure. His muscles ache now. Rock hard and beneath alabaster skin like satin over steel, they are the product of his efforts, but Sasuke does not work out for the musculature. He does not care what he looks like.
He pushes himself forward. The goal is to never look back. The goal is to strain and strain and work and train and strive and try and do until all that's left is his future.
That's the goal anyway.
Somehow no matter how hard he tries to look forward, he can't help but turn back.
Till then, though, he trains. He isn't sure what he's training for, but maybe someday he'll figure it out.
Sakura sleeps easily after the attack has passed.
There are a lot of people here at Konoha University and so it's always a little noisy. Not everyone's sleeping yet and that suits Sakura fine. Noise means people means she isn't as alone as she feels. That means no more silent nights spent wide awake dreading the sound of Daddy's shouts or Mommy's cries or worse. There is nothing like that here. Nothing but a bunch of young, stupid people just like her looking to make something of themselves. Sakura sleeps fine.
She wakes early. She is not a morning person but it's hard not to be excited by the prospect of her first day of classes. She showers again just to while away the time and is meticulous with her appearance. She blows her hair dry and pulls it straight with a ceramic flatiron. She dresses in a pair of white shorts with a sand-colored tank top and brown strappy gladiator sandals she found at half price. Her makeup is minimal and sophisticated, a dusting of pink eyeshadow to bring out the green of her eyes, a dark liner on the top lid and then the bottom before a smear of mascara that elongates her thick eyelashes.
Sakura checks her backpack. Inside she has empty notebooks and binders, pens and pencils and a calculator and everything except textbooks, which she hasn't bought yet from the bookstore, since her professors advised her to wait until the second day of class to make any purchases. She double checks her schedule and sees that her first class is a psychology lecture at 9:15 across campus, which gives her an hour to kill, so she decides to get breakfast beforehand.
She slides on her sunglasses and smiles at her reflection and sets out the door determined to try.
Sasuke sits in the very back row of the lecture hall.
He is the only one in the room so far because he is early which means he is on time. His father taught him that. Punctuality has been drilled into him until he is little more than an automaton, one devoid of personality and opinion, one that always shows up before everyone else and readier than everyone else.
The lecture hall is large and soon, he knows, it will be full of students. He does not like Psychology but it's a prerequisite for his major, which is annoying. He does not care about why criminals commit crimes or Daddy-never-hugged-me or any of that. Becoming a lawyer is not about the desire to rehabilitate, at least not for him.
But he still needs the credits.
They file in soon after that. One by one, skittish and alone on this first day of class, or huddled in loud, talkative groups. Sasuke ignores the frequent stares he receives by girls, the giggles and flirty sighs. He keeps his fingers laced on top of the swing-out desktop and peers over them at the front of the room, where the professor has not yet arrived.
He sees the girl there, by herself and weighed down by a backpack that looks bigger than she is. His eyes watch her as she looks to the left and right, trying to find a seat. Briefly she glimpses him and she spares him a small (fake) smile, but makes no attempt to approach him.
Apparently she recognizes that just because she is friends with Naruto doesn't mean she is friends with Sasuke. Smart of her.
He tries not to think of her, but fails. She picks a seat in the middle of the room where he has a view of the back of her head, and he stares at long, pin-straight pink hair that tumbles down the back of her chair. Silly color. Silly girl.
He is not alone in noticing the girl. Different guys around her notice her, too, and Sasuke knows they are not watching her to scorn her fanciful hair color. Eyes follow her every movement as she sets down her backpack and removes a notebook and a number 2 pencil. The old-fashioned wooden kind that requires sharpening.
So far, Sasuke has made several assumptions about the girl and all of them have been wrong. He took one look at her fairy tale princess appearance and decided she must have a fairy tale life, complete with the loving mother and father and all the spoils of a wealthy, privileged lifestyle. But no parents accompanied her to help settle her in. Everything she owns is secondhand or cheap. Everything she is is something Sasuke can't begin to understand.
Thinking about it is annoying.
The professor is late and his excuse is pathetic ("I got lost on the way to the lecture hall") and Sasuke thinks even less of Psychology than he had before.
His first day of classes is off to a lame start.
Business as usual.
note.. Couple PMs asking me why this is rated 'M' if it's got a tame beginning. Easy: because it's just the beginning. Hahaha give me a chance to set up a plot and some characters and a back story, why don'tcha. If you're looking for mindless porn you're not going to find it here, sorry. Thanks for the reviews and favorites and alerts and reading this in general, I appreciate it!
Have a good night, you guys! Phillies play Arizona tonight (hopefully they can stop sucking and go back to being my winningest team.) Love youuuu xoxo Daisy
