title: scar tissue.
prompt: Triangle by LazyBaby
rating: M
summary: She's not sure whether it's the physical scars or the mental ones that are killing her. Maybe it's both. Because after all, some scars don't heal if you keep on picking at them.
warning: SasuSakuNaru/NaruSaku
scar tissue
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Sakura was confused by this answer.
"What do you mean? I thought he could have all the friends in the world."
Naruto shook his head, sadly, and looked at her with morose eyes. "He's one of the loneliest people I know, Sakura. I think he just uses girls because he wants to feel loved. He is loved, I guess, but he wants to love somebody back. I guess he's still waiting for that one special girl to come in and fill the hole in his heart."
Sakura was nearly tearing when he finished, because he could make a monster sound so innocent and fragile. Naruto was amazing with words, and she had to congratulate him on that, something that people didn't notice.
"Sakura-chan?"
She shook her head to wake herself up, and smiled at him sadly. "You speak beautifully," she whispered while she wiped her eyes with the back of her hand. "Naruto, you have such a way with words that it…I don't…"
The ramen came, and both of them thanked in their traditional style before eating. Naruto was eating slowly this time, as if he was going to miss something if he slurped it up all at once.
"Are you still friends with him?" she asked again, putting her chopsticks down and using her soup spoon to drink.
Naruto thought for a moment, freezing. "I…well, I don't know. I mean, he's still a brother to me, but the way he's been acting lately is…" he didn't finish, and instead looked down at his bowl, picking up the chopsticks with hesitation.
Sakura could see that he was in pain telling the story, so she changed the topic.
"How long have you lived in Konoha?"
He answered back, and soon they began a rally of 20 Questions, expanded four times. Soon they forgot all about Sasuke, and Naruto was back to his cheery self, ramen bowls piled high while they shared laughs all through the evening.
They didn't even notice it was nearly night.
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The two walked to the park together, the sky illuminated by fireflies and streetlamps. They sat on a bench, Sakura on the far end of one side and Naruto on the other.
Then, he began to scoot closer, without seeming suspicious, and glanced over to see what she was doing.
Her hands were in her lap, and she looked down, biting her lip nervously. He scooted even closer, halfway on the bench, when she looked up at him.
"What's wrong?" he asked, touching her shoulder gently. She flinched at the touch, and shrugged.
"Nothing…why?" she replied back, her eyes darting from side to side.
"You seem jumpy…" he muttered, before he was next to her, thigh to thigh. She was blushing heavily, and so was he. He found his hand on top of hers.
Sakura's eyes darted from their hands to his face, and she could feel her skin burning up. Naruto's normally tanned complexion was turning a nice pink, and before she knew it, he had tucked a stray lock of hair behind her ear.
He clutched her hand tighter and put the other behind her neck, slowly drawing her closer to him.
Before she could think, his lips were on hers, moving slowly, and she could tell that he was new to this, as was she. So she just sat there, holding his hand while her other was on his shoulder gently, and he did the work as his lips were slowly sucking hers. She closed her eyes and just let him do what he wanted.
They had both just gotten their first kiss.
It was beyond amazing.
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Naruto slowly pulled back. Sakura hadn't forced him off, which meant that she didn't hate it…but the way she didn't kiss him back didn't mean that she liked him…
He stared at her red face, the eyes refusing to meet his, and cupped her cheek.
"Sakura-chan?" he murmured. "Are you okay?"
She looked up at him, finally, and said, "Yes, I'm okay."
Sakura saw him lick his lips shyly again, so she allowed him to kiss her once more, her mouth moving against his in the dance.
It didn't mean that she was in love with him romantically. But she wanted to make him happy, the way that he had made her happy.
She knew that she meant the world to him.
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He offered to drop her off at her house, but she refused.
"I'm okay. I'm getting a ride home, anyway," she lied smoothly. Naruto frowned, seeing through the faux words. He held her wrist in his hand, felt her pulse beat wildly against his fingers, and squatted in front of her.
"Get on," he said, waiting to hook his arms through the crook of her leg.
Nervously, she climbed on her back while he bounced her up for more support, and she held onto his neck with both arms, clinging tight.
"Can you hold on?"
"Yes," she murmured in the nape of his neck, burying her head there and smelling his faint scent of ramen.
He walked with her on his back slowly, back to his house.
"Where are we going?" she asked, her voice edged with panic. "I…I have to go home."
"Just spend the night with me," he murmured. "I'll tell your parents that you're okay."
"No!" she shrieked, and he nearly dropped her from the shock. "I…I mean, no, it's okay. I'll just go home."
Instead, he held on tighter to her legs and looked over his shoulder at her face. "I'm not letting you go back to that hellhole, ever again. And if he wants to call the police, let him. He'll have to go through me first."
He knew that he had said too much, and he felt his heart sinking as she stopped breathing, her arms no longer around him.
"W-What?" she whispered, as if she hadn't heard what he was saying. "H-How did you…why…"
Suddenly, she began to cry, and he felt the wave of tears on his neck. She demanded to be put down on her feet, but he wouldn't let her, until she started trying by herself to get off. Finally, he decided to let her down, and grabbed her wrist so she wouldn't escape. She tried to run, but knew she was helpless, and wiped the tears with the back of her hand.
"Stop it, stop it…I hate you, Naruto, I thought…" she began in choked sobs. The words hurt him, but he knew that he had to do what he needed to do.
"I'm sorry, Sakura-chan," he whispered. Then, knowing that she didn't hear through her sobs, he shouted out, "I love you, damnit!"
She looked up at him, knowing that the answer was different when he said the words rather than when he thought about it. Her eyes were filled with sadness and disappointment and betrayal, but he wanted to let it all out. Everything had been perfect, up until now…
"I love you so much, Sakura-chan," Naruto began, his voice shaking as his grip loosened. She felt that she could run away, but she would be hurting both of them even more. "I've always loved you ever since Sasuke tried to…tried to…" he couldn't finish his sentence, but wiped his eyes with his sleeve. "When you laugh, I laugh, and when you cry, I cry, and when you're hurt…I'm hurt, Sakura-chan," his tears were flowing down his cheeks freely then. "I love you to death!" he shouted.
She didn't know what was going on but began to cry with him. He held her tight in his arms and kissed her head repeatedly.
"I know that you don't love me, but you can always learn, Sakura-chan. If I could just teach you, then we'd never have any problems and I could make you the happiest person you could be.
"I know," she whispered in his chest. "But I'm not supposed to be the girl that deserves you."
"Sakura…"
He kissed her again, roughly this time, and held onto her as if she would drop through his fingers like sand.
Behind the dimmed streetlamps, their glows decreasing, Sasuke had taken out his earphones, standing there in his athletic shirt and sweatpants.
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She fell asleep on the way, and Naruto felt the itch of dried tears on skin. He was carrying her bridal style, home, because he didn't want to wake her.
Taking the key on his necklace and putting it through the knob, he was surprised to find an angry Kushina, with her red hair burning bright as if they were flames, and Minato, who just stood on the side with his arms folded.
Then, their eyes drifted off to Sakura, and their expressions immediately softened before they turned stern again.
"I'm putting her upstairs," Naruto said quickly as he carried her up and laid her on the bed. "I'll be down soon and you can yell at me all you want, but for now, I need to tuck her in."
They watched as he raced up the staircase with his love in his arms, and Kushina put her head on Minato's chest, remembering how he used to do that to her.
"Minato-kun…they're so cute together."
"Yeah…they are."
He turned her head and gently leaned in for a kiss.
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Naruto slumped back downstairs, feeling empty without Sakura with him. His parents stood over him, looming ominously, and they growled.
"Where were you? Did you have any idea how worried we were?" Kushina began raging. "I got a call from the school saying that you ditched class with Sakura-chan. You know better than that! And what about the dress she was wearing? That sure as hell isn't mine, and I know that you could not afford that, anyway! Besides, you were saving up for…whatever it is. Anyway, Naruto, you are in serious trouble and you better explain yourself right now!"
Minato interrupted her, tipping up Naruto's chin.
"Naruto…have you been crying?"
Naruto turned away from his parents while his mother leaned in closer to see. Naruto murmured, "I can explain."
"Then start."
He didn't want to tell them the whole story, knowing that it was only a secret between him and Sakura. So he only told parts of it.
"Sakura was having a bad day, and so was I. We didn't have any other important classes afterwards, so we decided to go to the mall, because…well, you know the clothes she wears are pretty bad…" he said. "She was looking at this dress, and it was really pretty, but it was all the money I had. I knew that she wanted it though, and I wanted to see her happy, so I bought it for her. I'm out of money now, but that doesn't matter because I saw her smile today, and I know what it's like to be in love, kaa-san. Like you and tou-san say, it's one of the best things in the world."
Naruto's voice was cracking again, and he put his head in his arms. Kushina looked at him with sad eyes and rubbed his back, kissing his forehead.
"Naruto-chan…I'm sorry, I didn't mean to yell at you," she apologized. "I just didn't know."
Minato didn't care about that.
"So you're broke?"
Kushina gave him the eye, but Naruto looked up and nodded solemnly. Then, Minato smiled, and he took his wallet out of his pocket and gave all the bills that were in there.
"When you learn to love someone, you'll give up anything for them. For you, it was your ramen money, which is very hard for you to save. Just seeing her smile in a red dress was enough. I know that you are my son."
He gave Naruto a bear hug, and rubbed his back. "I'm so proud of you."
He stared at the new bills in his hand, and put them in his froggy wallet.
"Thanks, tou-san."