CHAPTER THREE
"Anybody can sympathise with the sufferings of a friend, but it requires a very fine nature to sympathise with a friend's success." - Oscar Wilde
Naruto Uzumaki knew that a morning person, he did not make. As the many episodes in which he was either late for training or missing it altogether had done well to prove, he was not the first person you would expect to be awake at the cock's morning cry. No one expected him to be on time or alert at the sixth hour.
That was to say, no one could begin to expect anything from Naruto Uzumaki. Any expectations held toward him could be disappointed just as easily as it could be surpassed.
The nightly ANBU patrols would know this, especially those assigned Naruto's neighbourhood. On most nights, the lights of the tiny, dilapidated apartment would be extinguished and heavy snoring could be heard from the next street, often keeping the boy's neighbours awake until the landlord found enough courage – and the whim to truly bother – to tromp up to the apartment and dump a bucket of cold water over the offender.
That usually muffled the thundering, but did not put an end to it completely.
On other nights – the rare occurrences – the Uzumaki boy could be seen hunched over whatever work he may have stayed up to complete, his silhouette dancing in the low candlelight, the electricity having once again been cut off from his particular apartment.
If those ANBU had known Naruto as well as Iruka Umino or Kakashi Hatake, they would know that the boy would never deprive himself of sleep for anything less of an extremely important matter.
Naruto truly did consider his task of tremendous importance. To make a friend smile was as vital as air, and to the blonde, it meant everything. A faint smile was evident on his face as he reached for the glue. It had been present since he had arrived home from his second visit to the hospital and had started his work. That was, until he spilled the sticky paste over the leg of his pants, joining the many other stains that had managed to creep past his attentiveness.
He glared at the ruined clothing, and then sighed. He knew at once that he should have asked Iruka-sensei to help him. As the teacher knew – and had offered his assistance for this cause – his former student could handle isolation, tough missions, betrayal – anything. Just not craftwork.
His eyes itched for rest, his body aching from having once again been pummelled the lessons of youth by Might Guy and his equally enthusiastic student. Naruto persisted. He had to finish it tonight. Otherwise it would become distraction for him, and he needed to train hard for the Jonin exams. He could not afford to be sidetracked. And, more importantly, he had promised to give it to her tomorrow and a friend was worth more than a sleepless night.
So Naruto Uzumaki nodded to no one in particular and reached again for the glue, prepared to do battle.
As it turned out, Naruto was the last of his friends to hear the news.
Even Konohamaru, who had taken it upon himself to risk Ebisu's berating to alert his respected 'older brother', had been among the first handful to catch wind of the latest development.
It took infinite patience and effort to rouse Naruto from his sleep, and another demand of self-control to free the blonde from his bedsheets. When, at last Konohamaru felt he had the older boy's attention, the young Sarutobi belted out the announcement.
Naruto's ears rang from the amount of abuse it had taken. However, he immediately snapped to attention upon the golden words. "Say that again," he croaked in a breathless whisper.
Konohamaru leaned in close and whispered into his ear. "Sakura. Is. Awake."
It would have taken Kakashi's skill to avoid the torpedo that had sudden snapped upward. Unfortunately, Konohamaru did not have such dexterity, and therefore copped a huge collision and a bleeding nose. But all pain and annoyance was instantly discarded when he saw Naruto leap up in pure joy. The blonde dug deep into his drawer, retrieved a scrapbook and leapt out the window.
It had been a long while since Konohamaru had seen his idol so worked up, and he realised that was the reason why he was grinning despite a bleeding nose.
Naruto was tempted to take off his weights to increase his speed as he bounced from roof to roof. The tiny ounce of responsibility still present in his system prevented him from doing so, knowing that it would result in quite a number of hours trying to recover where he had left the weighted anklets. That, however, did not stop him from literally colliding with familiar faces and pausing for a fraction of a second to shout the three blessed words to them in place of the standard apology.
Kiba Inuzuka, Choji Akimichi and Kurenai Yuhi decided to forgive him. Shikamaru Nara had not bothered to take his eyes off the trailing clouds in the sky. Good for you, Naruto, he thought lazily, before he finally registered the throbbing ache in his foot that he could have sworn had not been there when he had previously decided to hike to the roof for some cloud-watching.
It took Naruto a painstaking total of seven minutes to arrive in the familiar foyer of Konoha Hospital. The nurses on duty barely managed to recover from the destruction of the front doors before an orange and black hurricane swept up the staircase toward Room Eighty-Four.
By now, Naruto was panting with anticipation. He had a thick album tucked under his arm, securely clutched to his side. The Grin had returned, brighter than ever. She was awake. After months of waiting, of hoping, she was finally awake. Everything would return to normal – not like he would ever admit life to have been slightly depressing during the empty absence in it.
He missed her, missed her dearly even though he visited her whenever he could. It was just not the same. She would finally see the vases he had bought for her, the designs he had carved into them. She would finally hear of him making Chunin, and be subjected to a two hour recount of the event. She would finally be there to knock some sense into him when he felt he needed it.
She would finally seem solid, real.
"Granny Tsunade!" he yelled at the top of his voice when he saw the woman outside Room Eighty-Four. Had he been paying closer attention, he might have noticed the strange lack of positive emotion in the medic-nin's face.
Tsunade turned to see Naruto pelting up the hallway. She felt a groan escape her lips. It was the last thing she needed. She and Shizune did their best to barricade him. "Naruto, I don't think-" But he slipped right past him, ever-present grin on his face as he smashed through the door and into the room.
"Sakura! Man, I'm so glad you're done sleeping! Great timing too; the Jonin exams are next week – you might be able to take part! Oh yeah, I made Chunin! Let's-" It took Naruto a moment to register the strange silence, and when he did, he bit off whatever had been lined up to race out of his mouth to regard his teammate with curiosity. "Sakura?"
She was sitting on the bed, leaning against a mountain of pillows. Her hair, grown just past her shoulders in the passing months, hung limply around her pale face. She raised her head, and then lowered it just as quickly, one hand pressed to her eyes. Naruto blinked. Her eyes. Was it just him or was there something different about them? He couldn't pinpoint what it was. Maybe it's just me…
Before he could even begin to formulate his next words, a hand grabbed and pulled him out to the corridor. When he turned in protest, Tsunade gave him a shake of her head, and it was enough to silence him. Shizune took his place inside the room, closing the door, which now hung slightly off its hinges.
"What's the big deal, Granny?" Naruto demanded. He pointed a somewhat accusing finger at his superior, and then turned his arm so that he was jabbing at the closed door. "What's wrong with Sakura?"
"Shut up."
"What?"
Tsunade pinched the bridge of her nose. "Look, kid, I have a headache. Quit making it worse."
Naruto hesitated – but only for a moment. "So Sakura…"
"Is blind." That said, Tsunade turned her back to the blonde boy and let him deal with his own emotions as she fought to deal with hers.
Silence was often deafening in its own way. Naruto had never grasped the concept of the saying, but now he did. It shaped reality, let the seriousness of a situation sink in. And it sunk in deep. He stared at Tsunade's back, the kanji on the back of her robe blurring from his sight. He waited for the woman to turn, laugh and tell him exactly how gullible he could be sometimes. But she did not, and when he remembered the blankness in Sakura's face – in her eyes – he knew that she was not pulling his leg.
"What…do you mean?" he managed to choke out. He felt a horrible retake of Konohamaru's shouted words earlier; Sakura. Is. Awake - Sakura. Is. Blind.
Tsunade felt the boy's pain. She was drowning in her own misery, struggling to come to terms with the harsh reality. Her apprentice – her daughter – was blinded. Not only had Tsunade allowed her to lapse into a comatose state, she had also been unable to detect a slight trace of venom. Guilt overwhelmed her, but as Hokage, she knew that blame on oneself was no help to anyone.
"Granny?" Naruto persisted in a whispery tone. "How…why…" You're the best bloody medic-nin in history! he shouted mentally. Don't just stand there! Do something about it! But the pain he felt rolling off the old woman prevented him from letting the harmful words slip from his mouth in animosity. He knew that, in her own way, Tsunade was hurting. It would not be fair to accuse her – she had put in her best efforts, and if that was not enough, there was not much he could do.
Deep breaths heaved in, their shallow counterpart escaping her lips. Tsunade closed her eyes. The boy had the right to know. The Hokage knew from the hospital's weekly reports that he visited his comatose teammate as often as the Legendary Sucker did the gambling stops. She did not want to hurt him, but she knew that she was doing the most harm by keeping him in the dark.
"In Sakura's battle with Sasuke," she began in a soft tone, and heard Naruto's sharp intake of breath at the Uchiha's name. She pressed on, "she suffered various wounds. The one you would know best would be the Chidori that she suffered to her lower back, damaging her nervous system as well as spinal movement. As you know, we have repaired the damage, but the cost was a state of comatose, which was much more desirable than the alternative."
Naruto had unconsciously closed his hands into tight fists, his nails digging deep into his palm. It was always difficult to stand the mention of Sasuke. He didn't hate his runaway teammate. It was unmistakeable that it was the Uchiha's doing that had cost Sakura months of her life as well as her eyesight, but Naruto could not bring himself to hate him. Instead, he felt a spear of sympathy strike his heart. A person who did not understand the significance of friendship did not understand the way of life. The moment Sasuke had chosen to lay a harmful hand on Sakura, he had torn away a small portion of his conscience.
Tsunade turned and noticed the blonde's shoulders shaking under his jacket. "Should I go on?" she asked. Although she had complete confidence in Naruto's self-control, she could not say the same for his prisoner.
"Yes," he said, and gave her a small smile to assure her. "I'm fine. No point getting worked up over a jerk."
Respecting his need to hide his conflicting emotions, Tsunade nodded. "Among other wounds were bite marks – snakes."
Naruto flinched. Snakes. A painful reminder that Sasuke had run off with a certain slithery Sannin.
"Snakes," Tsunade said again, seeing the blonde's distraction. "When we were…operating, we found no apparent trace of poison – it seemed that Sakura had attempted to drain it herself. She hadn't completely erased all the poison from her system, but the amount was too small for us to detect." It was another blow to her conscience. "The months she spent in the comatose state gave the venom opportunity to spread. It damaged her optic nerves, and it was enough to reduce her…blind."
"There's nothing you can do?" It was a futile question. Of course there was nothing that could be done – or they would have done it.
Tsunade's answer was to turn away again. She could not bear to look at the boy anymore. There were many factors – many if onlys – that contributed to the situation. If only she had checked up on Sakura's condition herself more frequently than she had. If only Sakura had managed to drain all the poison out of her body. If only she had not been in a coma for the past few months. If only Sasuke had not turn against Konoha and his friends. If only Sakura had not insisted on pursuing him after the first sighting. If only damned Orochimaru had not handed the Uchiha the snake contract.
All if onlys. All irremediable.
Naruto felt his head drop. Crushing disappointment settled on him.
It took him a while to deduce how Sakura must be feeling.
"Can I go in and see her?" he asked in an uncharacteristically quiet voice.
Although it appeared to be further back than her appearance suggested, Tsunade had, at some point, been a child before. She understood that there were times when everything seemed to work out – and times when the opposite would occur. When that happened, the person did not want to talk. He or she simply wanted to be left alone to whatever they desired to do. Naruto Uzumaki had those symptoms. And, as a medic-nin, Tsunade prescribed only the best medicine.
She walked up to the door, knocked once, and then opened it. Shizune was sitting on the edge of Sakura's bed, talking softly to her. She looked up when her superior entered, shaking her head. "I tried," she mouthed. Tsunade nodded, and the two of them went outside, closing the door behind Naruto and Sakura.
The word 'awkward' was, most times, not present in Naruto's dictionary. He did not believe in anything less than 'confidence', and it surprised him to find himself in such a situation. He had nothing to say – there was nothing he could say. Sympathy often produced the opposite result with Sakura, and he was not the right person to offer such sentiments to begin with.
In the end, it was Sakura – surprisingly – who stepped up to an unseen opportunity. "Naruto?" she said in a tentatively soft voice. Naruto felt himself wince; she sounded so alone, so vulnerable. He was instantly ashamed. She needed his support, and here he was being weak.
"Yeah," he said, placing the scrapbook on a spare chair by the door. "It's me."
Her expression brightened, but only very slightly. He found himself staring at her eyes, knowing that the pale emeralds could not see him. They were milky jades, blinking but unseeing.
"Naruto…I…" Her voice wobbled as she gripped the bedsheets. "I'm…"
"I know." He could not bring himself to say it. It would hurt her, and it was the last thing he wanted to do at the moment. To tell her, to the face, that she was blind, was more than an insult. It was betrayal. Naruto Uzumaki would sooner give up ramen than betray a friend.
Sakura's world was filled with darkness. Where there had been colour, there was only endless black. She felt certain that, if anaesthetic were to be injected into her, she would have no idea if her eyes were opened or closed. Only others would be able to tell her.
But that was useless. They could not see for her.
The pink-haired kunoichi felt her breath choke. Even without Shizune sitting by her side, futilely assuring her that it did not matter and that she would, sooner or later, overcome this 'recent development', she knew that it was doing nobody any good by wishing that time could go back and she could rethink her actions. She also knew that, if given the chance to return to the past, she would still choose to go after Sasuke, still choose to be blinded if it meant she could see him one last time, to plead him to return. It was no use wallowing in self-pity.
That was not to say that she actually listened to the sensible side of herself.
Sakura Haruno might not belong to a clan, such as the Hyuga and Uchiha, that practiced their bloodline of dōjutsu, but her eyesight meant as much to her as it did to such clans. It was with the very same eyesight now foreign to her that she had blinked and stared her way into the world at birth. It had been her eyes that had taught her to admire boys such as Sasuke, to see the 'cute' significance in their features and the 'coolness' in their detached attitude. It was her eyes that surveyed the damage to her patients, that told her the distance between her fist and the soon-to-be-demolished object, giving her precise information as to where and when to release her chakra.
She needed to be able to see.
But she couldn't.
And it crushed her to realise so.
She slipped out of the bed to stand on shaky legs, limbs that had not been used for months and were unaccustomed to the weight they bore. They were, however, surprisingly supple compared to those of patients she had previously attended to. She knew instinctively that someone had, with painstaking patience and care, gently exercised her muscles on a regular basis, to keep them from solidifying permanently and decaying into grey mass.
Naruto was there somewhere, hidden in the darkness. He had to be there. She reached out to find him.
It pained him to see her in such a state. Her eyes had flashed from side to side, as if unbelieving that they had been shrouded in a word of pitch blackness. Then, very slowly, she had hauled herself out of the bed. He almost reached out to help her. Almost. But he knew she did not want his assistance. She might in the future, but not presently. Sakura was much too strong-willed to succumb easily. It was not until she saw the futileness in her efforts that she crumpled.
He waited for that moment.
She thought she could sense a hint of chakra ahead of her. Hesitantly, she lifted a heavy arm to grasp the air. She raised her other arm, and this time she brushed against fabric. She gripped it tightly, unwilling to release her prize.
"You got me," he said quietly.
She nodded. "I did," she whispered. Then she let her hand drop and she leaned against his sturdy frame, suddenly too tired to attempt anything at all. The game of hide and seek wore her out.
When she realised that it was the way she would have to live the rest of her life, she let out soft moan.
Naruto had not imagined it to be like this. He placed one hand against the trembling back, the other sweeping buckled knees from the linoleum tiles. She barely uttered a yelp of surprise as her feet left the floor. She just clung to him, face buried in the arm of his sleeve, as he carried her to the bed and gently deposited her onto the mattress. Then he went to the door and picked up the album he had left on the chair, taking the scrapbook to the bed.
"Naruto?" Sakura asked in a small voice, uncertainly.
"Right here, Sakura," he replied. He sat down beside her, and then drew the sheet over them, settling it over their heads like they were children and were huddling together in the middle of the night waiting for the creation of their nightmares to creep up on them.
He opened the album and laid it across her lap. "This was supposed to be your birthday present. I was going to give it to you today and wait until you woke up before we went through it together, but let's do it today. I made sure you didn't miss out on anything while you were busy catching up on your beauty sleep."
She choked. "Naruto, I…" I'm blind. I can't see whatever you want to show me.
It was the first time he ignored her. He gently lifted her hand and placed it over a photograph on the first page of the book. "This was two months ago. Kiba's sister got married and we were having a party."
Sakura's fingers brushed over the glossy surface. She thought she could recognise the texture of the photograph even if Naruto had not pointed it out to her. But she couldn't be sure. Without her eyes, she would never be sure of anything ever again.
Seeing her hand wander aimlessly, Naruto guided it back to the left side of the photo. "This is Kiba and Akamaru – the mutt got loads bigger." He quietly moved her hand to the next person, frozen in a smile. "That's Hinata; she's still having trouble talking to me, would you believe? And here's Bushy Brows – he got had a little bit to drink and ended up going into this crazy fit, even managing to knock Neji around for a bit. Guy-sensei says he's one of those guys who end up fighting better than they usually do when they're drunk – strange bloke."
This process continued over the next few pages, and Sakura found it harder to swallow with each event they went over.
"…and Granny Tsunade got sick of losing so she dragged me along to the gambling stop and I won her double what she lost. She made Shizune take a photo because she said it was bound to be the only time she was seen together with a big bunch of winnings. There were all these coins everywhere – she kept dropping them when we were walking back to the tower."
When they turned the page, a drop of fluid slid down Sakura's face and dripped onto the parchment, blurring one of the rare smiles Neji offered, especially for a photo. Naruto did not feel the least bit guilty for reducing his friend to tears; she needed to let it out. He did it often enough.
"It's okay to cry, Sakura," he murmured, and let her bury her face into his jacket. It was one of the only times he had seen her cry and he realised just how strong Sakura had been trying to be all this time. She had tried so hard to prove herself more than a pretty face; becoming Tsunade's apprentice and striving to hide her pain whenever Sasuke just managed to come up in a conversation. She had tried so hard to be strong.
And now they were back to square one. Naruto did not dare try to fantasize the dozen others that awaited Sakura's challenge. But he assured himself, and his broken friend, that she would not be alone throughout the whole process.
