Author's Note: Originally written as part of a self-created writing challenge I called the Robert Frost Challenge where I take lines out of poems by Robert Frost and write a fic around it.

A Matter of Trust

He isn't talking to her.

He hasn't spoken to anyone, really. It doesn't make sense to her, not at first. When they won the battle to bring him home – when they dragged everything out in the open, exposing emotions both raw and real and painful, tearing free scars that had refused to heal – she thought they had done the impossible. She thought when he finally surrendered to his inner light, the light so long believed extinguished, they had won him back from the darkness. She thought the little boy whose heart had been blackened and torn from his chest had returned to them.

Then when they came home, he shut himself away from the world, and she realized yet again, she hadn't understood anything, hadn't understood him. Naruto got it – Naruto always got it – it's why they were able to bring him home at all. Without his passionate unending devotion to a friend everyone had given up for gone a long time ago, Sasuke would still be out there drifting in the ether, lost, and most probably dead. Just thinking about him dying, alone, cold, angry and sad somewhere in a dark hole made something clench up inside of Sakura's chest. No. She would put up with a thousand burnt down villages before she'd ever let that happen.

Because, she realizes, he's lived long enough inside of a dark hole; he doesn't need to die in one too.

But this wall he's put himself behind… this shutting off of himself to the whole world after all of this… it's scaring her. Maybe it's natural, normal behavior: after all, coming back meant facing those he'd almost gotten killed for his sake. Coming back means he's admitted in some way to being wrong. To being the one who needs to say he's sorry.

Sakura doesn't think Sasuke has as much to apologize for as many might think he should. After all, just saying sorry in this case can't be considered enough. He has to do it through actions, and no one else is as good at speaking through his actions as Uchiha Sasuke.

If only he would talk to me. Sakura stood forlornly in front of the door to Sasuke's apartment, hand poised to knock. He knows better than anyone I'm the sort who needs to hear what he has to say. No never mind that I can understand what he says through the things he does. I need to hear it… and at this point… he owes me that. He knows he owes me that.

This is why this door is staying shut, why he's keeping himself from her. Sasuke knows Sakura needs him to communicate with her in the one way he doesn't know how and for that this door has become an obstacle… and it's about time this last figurative wall separating them needs to come down. And she has to be the one to destroy it.

So Sakura doesn't knock. She digs into her pocket, takes out a key, and she opens the door. Carefully she pokes her head in to the apartment, almost expecting a hail of kunai. When it's clear that no booby traps have been triggered by her entrance, Sakura enters with confidence and closes the door softly behind her. It doesn't take her long to find Sasuke, as he seems to have made pensively staring out of windows an acceptably illuminating past time. Sakura stops short when she sees the young man perched on the windowsill, knee raised, with one arm casually draped over the knee. As always, her heart aches when she sees him. She's loved him since they were children and years later and now, she's come to accept she will always love this creature of the darkness. For no woman can continue to love a man like him without the love being true. Perhaps this is why Sasuke has kept her at arm's length, and perhaps it's why he's even tried to slit her neck from pulse to pulse so many days ago. He knows what she is… what that thing inside of her that he owns is.

All he has to do is tell me no, Sakura thought, fighting traitorous tears. Tell me no and I'll leave him alone. Tell me no and I won't bother him anymore. It's all he has to do to be rid of me. Then I can get over him and then… then I can move on. I'll never regret loving him but at least I'll know where I stand with him, and being his friend will hurt a whole hell of a lot less than living the way I'm living now.

"Sasuke-kun." The name escapes her in a soft whisper. She knows he sees her standing there. She just needs to remind herself of where she is. That she's still here.

At the sound of her voice, Sasuke's head turns, following his black eyes as they shift and eventually rest upon her. Sakura has to hold her breath for a moment, swallowing, before she is able to resume breathing. He'll always do this to me, she thought with some despair. I don't think anything will be able to change that. At least now I know that I can stand before him and not act like some simpering little thing that would have done anything he said. I know what he is and I know what I am.

Sakura smiles, somehow it's still something she can do around him, as she approaches and sits on the opposite side of the windowsill. She notes as he automatically shifts his knee aside to give her room to sit. It means she is not unwelcome. Uninvited but not unwelcome.

"I haven't seen you around in a while," she begins cheerfully. "Naruto told me you'd been staying in a lot so I'd thought I'd come by." Smile, smile and the world will smile back, Sakura. "It's a shame you won't go out, because we've been having some wonderful weather these past several days. Granted, it tends to get a little hot around noon but generally…"

"Sakura."

Sakura closes her mouth.

Sasuke appears to be taking a deep breath. "You don't have to pretend."

Damn him! Sakura's fingers curled into her palms. "I've… already said everything I've needed to say to you," she spoke softly, averting her eyes from his. "I've said it all."

"No you haven't."

Sakura's jaw clenches and she whips on him, feeling a familiar, hated anger swell within. "All right, smart guy, you're right, I haven't! Since when has anything I've ever said made any difference to you? I would just be happy enough to get past it and move on. I wish you'd let me." She pushed off and stood, not sure where this rage is coming from so suddenly and just hurting too much now to care.

Sasuke frowns, just slightly. "Get past what?"

Sakura wants to tear out her hair. "Get past…" She exhales loudly, making herself calm down. "Never mind."

Sasuke drops his leg and stands, staring at her. "What do you want from me?" he asks simply.

Sakura is close to tears now. "You don't know?" she asks, trying not to cry, and realizes she's going to fail miserably.

He steps closer to her. She does not move away. He lifts his hand, lowers it and makes one of his "Hn" noises. For the first time, she notices that he appears frustrated. Sakura peers up at him, glancing momentarily at the hand, still raised partway, and then at him, curiously. Tentatively she reaches out and touches that hand, enfolding it with her own, and eventually, growing bold when he doesn't pull it away, entwining their fingers together. He stares at their connected hands in a mixture of soft surprise and speculation, a light frown furrowing his brow. Then he looks back up at her and, incredibly, there is a light pink dusting on his cheeks.

"I…" he begins hesitantly. "I… don't know anything about this."

Clarity slams into Sakura like a locomotive train. Suddenly her fear and her anger disappear. Suddenly she wants to curse and break things, not because of him, but because of her own stupidity. Smart as she is, she has never bothered to take on the full picture. Of course, of course, it makes sense, it makes sense. Sakura smiles now, for real, and knows she has her work cut out for her, and that this is probably going to be harder than she has dreamed possible. But now that she has this she has something to work with. This is something she can do for him. Maybe in the end he'll change his mind and maybe she will too but he'll be the better for it, and so will she.

"I don't know much either," she admits, tugging closer so their bodies are lightly touching. "If you trust me… I think we can make it work. We know more than we think we do. I'd really like to find that out."

Sasuke appears uncertain, and perhaps looks a little afraid, but he nods. "I trust you."

Sakura smiles.