Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto, or any of its associated characters!
Summary: COMPLETE. The blizzard outside is in his head, but he knows fighting these thoughts will only make them build and burst, and then there would be no way they wouldn't make it to Naruto—and so Sasuke has to let them come. Meet the snow as it falls, find the footprints he's already placed. SNS, canonverse, one shot, written for SNStober 2021! Collaboration with monosrojo!
A/N: Happy SNS month! This is a collaboration with the amazing monosrojo (over on Tumblr!) that we've been working on for the past few months - you can see their art over on tumblr for this fic :') I have been so endlessly excited about it, you have no idea. This is written for SNStober 2021, day 20, prompt: snowed in!
I hope you like it!
Snowed In
It isn't the stupidest thing he's ever done.
In the grand scheme of Sasuke's life, he isn't even sure it makes the top ten. But his list is long and lengthening, and he lost track of the end long ago. He's sure this makes it, though—
This...standing. In the middle of a blizzard.
…
Not the smartest move he's made.
He breathes out, and the steam is nothing against the snow. It scatters away before he can see it, replaced by the harsh and angry, replaced by the cuts and the cold and the lashes and the wounds—bruises on his cheeks, cuts on his hand, numbness on his nose.
It's dangerous.
He should turn around.
He should find shelter.
…
He continues to wait.
And like a break in the clouds, Naruto comes barreling forwards with Sasuke's name on his lips. He's shouting and laughing, white and smiling—frosted from head to toe, snowflakes in his eyelashes bouncing off the blue like the sky and its clouds—Naruto is sturdy and unfazed. Cold but unfrozen—they've travelled in worse conditions. Found themselves in worse places. Stood in worse storms.
Sasuke still pulls him back.
The storm isn't easing. It hasn't even peaked. And Naruto's travel has been further than Sasuke's—but quicker, undistracted, single-minded and unstopping—
The chances of him knowing where to find shelter are...slim.
And that leaves something Sasuke hasn't planned for. Something he's thought about, but something he hasn't planned for. He has a small cabin somewhere in all this snow—rundown and shoddy and worth just enough nothing for Sasuke to be able to afford it. It isn't perfect, but it isn't this storm, and so—
Sasuke heaves Naruto in and slams the door shut with his back.
"Fuck!" Naruto laughs, iced and glimmering. "That was brutal! Is it always like that up here?!"
The heat hits them all at once. The shield from the wind, shelter from the ice—Sasuke wipes at his face and feels himself already start to melt—
"The hail was new," he says, and Naruto laughs. He's just the same as him—with puddles under their feet, clothes growing heavier by the minute. They're moving from stiff to wet at an alarming rate, and Sasuke tries to decide the least disastrous way to make it to where the towels were—
Naruto wipes at his face, but it only makes it worse.
"Ugh," he says, dripping. "Whose—where are we? Whose house is this?"
Well.
"Mine," he answers simply, and his head flares. Naruto's head snaps up with the feeling, like some sort of panic twisting deep in his stomach—
Sasuke snorts.
"It's a rental," he tells him, and Naruto calms. It's always the severe thoughts that break through their bond. The screaming thoughts. The nightmares, the fears, the hurt, the wounds. Sometimes, the joy.
Sometimes...the joy.
"Yeah," Naruto laughs, and Sasuke hears it as it chimes in his head. "I was gonna say you'd be fucking nuts. Not that that's any different from your usu—"
Sasuke grabs Naruto's stupid, stupid mouth.
"Moron," he says, and Naruto tries to bite through his glove, "you're getting my floor wet."
"Mmmph—nargh," Naruto replies, and Sasuke snorts.
He can feel Naruto's smile in his hand. In his head. It's so stupid and beautiful and ringing through his head like a bell—
Sasuke knows he's its echo. He knows the bond will give him no sympathy, that this feeling bounces between them loud and clear and every time they meet again. This quiet relief. This tension and release. The moment they meet is a breath held in and now they let it go. Let go. Sasuke—
Oh.
Sasuke has to let go.
He snaps his hand back.
"You're a mess," he mutters, and his glove is an excuse to look away. Just for a breath. Just for a second. He pulls it off with a noise that's sopping and wet, already at the mercy of the heat in this house—Sasuke feels it in his head, his neck, his cheeks—
"Yeah, sorry, the next time I bust my ass to get here I'll avoid the fuckin' snow. It's only everywhere—"
Naruto steps forward, and it makes Sasuke break. Not even the duck of his head can hide his smile from Naruto's gleaming, glittering eyes. He feels that pulse—that echo, that little hum through the bond that tells him Naruto sees it. He's seen it and he's pleased. Satisfied. Far too smug about it all, Sasuke huffs out a breath—
"Moron," he tells him, just to even it out. "Stay—don't move. Stay there."
Sasuke puts a hand in front of Naruto's chest, as if to pause him, and Naruto raises his hand in reply. He bounces in place, but he doesn't move forward—an obvious agreement, a teasing indulgence. Naruto obeys him as long as it pleases him, and no longer. Sasuke knows that full well.
He steps back, but his eyes linger.
Naruto's do the same, watching him as he goes.
Sasuke heaves out a breath and leaves.
Towels.
He needs his towels.
He swallows and focuses and brings himself back while he still can. Sasuke is hot and melting and Naruto is the latter if nothing else—and his bathroom has some towels, if not many. If just enough. They will have to be enough, Sasuke thinks, pulling them from the rack. They're all he has. And it's strange to have again—the number of things Sasuke has kept in his life has grown and lessened and been destroyed completely, and now he's in some sort of…
Transition.
Maybe.
Sasuke doesn't know.
He hangs his cloak in the shower and tucks the towels over his arm. He'll light the fire. Give them a tentative flame. Do something to dry them both, although Sasuke doesn't need the heat...
…
"What?" Naruto asks, sitting firmly in the puddle of his own making. "You said to stay!"
Sasuke rolls his eyes.
"Don't pretend you ever listen to me," he says. "Why are you on the ground?"
"I—well, I was gonna look through—my—uh," Naruto huffs and laughs and looks up at him. "My clothes are all in here."
Naruto lifts his bag up, and a steady stream of water drips onto the floor.
Sasuke really tries not to let his laugh break free.
"Wh—hey! They said it was waterproof!" Naruto protests, and Sasuke—
"How waterproof?"
"How wat—just—just waterproof! What d'you mean how—"
Sasuke tosses the towel into his face.
He might have used too much force.
Naruto yelps and tumbles to the floor, laughing out an "asshole!" and following Sasuke as he steps. He latches to Sasuke's foot and yanks him back, and Sasuke stumbles and trips and fights down on his laugh, but loses to the smile. He kicks Naruto off his foot and makes it to his drawers—stiff, unused things that he's been filling...slowly. Uncertainly. A bit like himself.
He tosses the clothes back to Naruto, and Naruto snatches them out of the air with a "thanks" and a "dickhead". Sasuke rolls his eyes and fires back, but Naruto only grins—pleased and happy and in a spot that should have him well and truly miserable.
He's not, though.
Neither is Sasuke.
"Hey," he says, holding Sasuke's clothes in his hand, "actually, can you—can you hold them while I pull this off?"
He gestures at himself, and Sasuke quietly obliges. The floor is wet and there are only two arms between the two of them—Sasuke knows the struggle and knows the dance. He knows how wet fabrics stick and stay, the way they suction to the skin, the way Naruto has to fight to free himself—he tosses the cloak away easy, but the shirt is a slow, slow…
Torture.
Naruto is so—golden. So glowing. So only in the room, so incandescent and alive. Sasuke stares and knows he is staring, watching him pull his head from the shirt, watching it stay tied around his wrist. He watches Naruto bite his lip and laugh and shake his hair, scrub his face in the fabric, meet Sasuke's eyes and switch their blue from laughing to asking—
He tears his eyes away, but it is too late.
Sasuke feels the question.
"I'll—"
He cuts himself off in a vague wave, and he feels Naruto's eyes on him as he takes his own clothes and vanishes. Evaporates. Sasuke shuts the bathroom door and leans, clenching his clothes and feeling himself fall. Feeling himself slip. His emotions are a weight and Sasuke bends further every day. He can feel himself succumbing. Feel himself kneeling. He puts his hand to the floor and closes his eyes and breathes. Breathes. Breathes.
Breathes.
Anything to stop this from crossing the bond.
It might already be too late. Sasuke doesn't know. Sasuke likes to think he'd know, but he doesn't. Every part of Naruto is a map he's studied and memorized, but how he'd react to this—this—this—
Sasuke doesn't know.
But Naruto's ignorance is a familiar comfort, and Sasuke grabs it and grips it to him. Steps on it like a stair and asks it to hold him. Catches it and asks it to pull him up, pull him back, ground him again and remind him that Naruto couldn't know. Not without Sasuke hearing the reply.
He opens his eyes, and the bond is quiet. There, but quiet, and it lives as a reminder of all he's tried to deny. All he is still trying to deny. With all they've gone through and all he's done, Sasuke is still full of fear. Still on edge, still sure this is dangerous and waiting to be proven right. Sasuke has had before. Sasuke has lost before. He knows he has to feel, he's torn himself apart trying to stop it, but this—
This will hurt.
He knows this will hurt.
Sasuke swallows and breathes and knows he's already conceded. Their bond is enough proof of that. There is a fire that lives in him and Naruto is the one who started the spark. But Sasuke's life is like the storm outside, and the snow has only now begun to settle.
Sasuke's still only finding his feet.
He breathes in and lifts his shirt from his body in a quick, familiar motion. He still expects it to catch on an arm that isn't there. He wonders if Naruto thinks the same. He wonders if it sends him spiralling, too, diving down into thoughts and memories and what ifs and if onlys until he comes back to himself, breathing heavy and hurting and searching for the first piece of paper that reminds him that it's okay. It's alright. It's okay, it's okay. Naruto's letters are a breath and reading them lets it out. Sasuke can't describe it. It's their bond in words, it's their bond from afar, in little details and non sequiturs and distractions and nothings—the million things Naruto tells him about his day, like it's vital that Sasuke knows every one, lest they miss a single part of each other. No matter how small.
He's kept them. The letters. It's a bit obvious and a bit surprising, but Sasuke can't bring himself to lose a word. He can't bring himself to start, to know where he can, and one letter has turned to a hundred, a thousand golden words to keep safe and dry and unharmed and together—
Too many words to travel with.
He'd had to find a place to keep them.
Impermanent, maybe. As much for him as it was for them, most likely. Sasuke's found a part of himself that wants to settle, but the method as to how...he doesn't know. Well, he knows some things, but Naruto is in Konoha and Sasuke can't settle there, and so—
And so.
Sasuke hangs his clothes to dry and scrubs the towel over himself. Not two seconds into being by Naruto's side and he's already dizzy with thought. The blizzard outside is in his head, but he knows fighting these thoughts will only make them build and burst, and then there would be no way they wouldn't make it to Naruto—and so Sasuke has to let them come. Meet the snow as it falls, find the footprints he's already placed.
…
The wind howls.
Sasuke straightens his clothes and hears it. Feels it. Focuses himself and finds comfort in the way the bond is its opposite—if Naruto knew, it would be howling, too. But it's settled. Happy. Just a hum of ongoing contentment in the back of his head—
It changes.
Sasuke blinks, and Naruto is surprised by something. Made ecstatic by something. It spikes and ripples and reverberates through Sasuke's head, bursts that mix and separate and speed right past him—they filter through his fingers and Sasuke has to snap back to grab them, pull them back, look at them and realize—
It's as if Naruto has found something.
Oh, no.
He runs. He bursts into his other room as quick as he can, but the sight stops him dead—Naruto, in Sasuke's clothes, in Sasuke's bed, with Sasuke's blankets wrapped around him, holding—
"I didn't know you kept this."
—a letter.
Sasuke curses himself. He curses every ounce of his weakness. His stupidity. His impatience, his sentimentality, his yearning, he—
He'd fallen asleep reading that letter.
Damn it.
"I hadn't had time to throw it out yet," he mutters, and it only makes Naruto laugh. It's a soft, surprised laugh—something gentle and small and almost tentative, like a hint of the terrifying happiness Sasuke could feel in Naruto's heart—
"This is from at least three months ago," Naruto says, flipping it over in his hand.
"I have no way to be rid of them."
"...Fire?" Naruto asks, and Sasuke wants to curse himself again. "Right? Can't you just burn them?"
…
"Why are you in my bed, anyway? Get out of there."
"The—it's cold! Where am I supposed to—"
"Here," Sasuke says, flicking his hand to light the flame.
"Oh, thank fuck," Naruto says, and he's distracted and leaving. The letter flaps down after him, unfolded but forgotten, and Sasuke stares at it and tries to figure out how quickly he has to move for it to avoid Naruto's eye—
"It's freezing in here," Naruto huffs, fluffing himself into a firmly tucked bundle. "How d'you—do you need—uh."
He looks up, as if ready to offer Sasuke the heat. As if willing to unfold himself. Sasuke locks the letter in the back of his head and sits, but doesn't accept. He's already hot in this humiliation. Already feeling the flames on his face, in front of him. Beside him.
"I'm fine," he says, after Naruto's eyes continue their burn. "We're not all as pathetic as you."
"Oh, yeah, okay," Naruto laughs, sitting close and closer to Sasuke's side. "You're the dumb one here and you know it."
Sasuke snorts, but doesn't reply. The winds rattle their agreement, outside. They howl and whip and Sasuke feels the breeze even with all the doors and windows shut. Naruto shivers and hugs himself tighter, and Sasuke knows it's strange to have chosen here as a place to settle. And Sasuke wouldn't exactly call what he's done settling, but it does feel something close, and it does feel something strange. Like he's almost there. Like he's on his way. Like he could be there, if only he...
Sasuke swallows the thought.
"Fuck," Naruto shivers, nudging towards the flame again. "I dunno how I'd survive up here without this. I guess that's not really a problem for you, though..."
Sasuke breathes out, and holds himself steady.
"I'd imagine it helps," he says, soft and absent. He keeps his eyes low and controlled until Naruto stays quiet—dazed and drifting off into a thought, staring ahead into the flames in front of them. The fire dances across his face, shadows flickering across his nose, red reflecting in his eyes…
"How was the travel?" he asks, and it brings Naruto back to him.
"The—oh. Oh, yeah, it was fine. I dunno," Naruto laughs a little. "Long. Longer than I expected."
Ah.
Naruto's voice trails off, and his face flickers back with the shadows. Sasuke breathes his sigh in, instead of out.
"When do you have to be back?" Sasuke asks, and Naruto's gaze falls low.
"Tomorrow," he says, and Sasuke wonders why he always asks for the answers that will hurt. "Not first thing or anything, but I have to be back down for—a bunch of stuff, I told you the stuff with Hyuugas, plus Gaara's coming to visit. I mean Suna, it's Suna business, but—"
"But it's Gaara coming to visit."
Naruto looks up with a grin.
"Yeah," he says, blue and beautiful. "It kinda is."
Naruto's smile grows warm and sentimental, and Sasuke's eyes linger before he coaxes them away. Naruto has reasons away from Sasuke, and that's a good thing. It is. If they were together, he…
"What a Hokage you are," Sasuke says softly, meeting Naruto's eyes with his aching, tired own. "Using village affairs for your own personal agenda."
"I'm not the Hokage," Naruto shoots back, "and 'course I am. I have to. I spend all my free time visiting some other asshole."
Sasuke tucks his laugh away.
"I hope that asshole is appreciative," he mutters, and Naruto's grin shines on him again. "How are you not Hokage yet?"
"What d'you mean how—"
"You're doing the work without the pay," Sasuke says, and it makes Naruto laugh.
"I'm doing the work without the title," he corrects, as if he's smug and satisfied. And he is, Sasuke feels it, but Sasuke—
"...Do you not want the title?"
Naruto meets his eyes and then looks away, the small smile still on his face. Amused, gentle, true. If the flare of chakra wouldn't have broken it, Sasuke would have sent it straight to his eyes.
"Don't you want to travel?" Naruto asks, and Sasuke huffs out a breath.
He supposes he should have expected that.
"The house is temporary," Sasuke reminds him, and Naruto looks back.
"Uh-huh," Naruto says, leaning back to cross the path of Sasuke's breath. "You've got sheets and everything."
"...I needed them," Sasuke points out. "Have you looked outside?"
Naruto only laughs. He's pushing and challenging and Sasuke feels something in the back of his head, again, like Naruto has a question he wants Sasuke to answer. Like he as a nerve he wants him to settle—
"Yeah," he says. "It doesn't make them any less yours. What are you gonna do with them when you're travelling?"
"Leave them here," Sasuke tells him. "For whoever next needs it. This isn't permanent."
Naruto hugs his bundled knees back to himself.
"Yeah, okay," he says, resting his face on them. "How temporary is it, though?"
His face is squashed and lopsided, his eyes bright, but tiring. The room is warming around him and it shows.
"I don't know," Sasuke tells him, and it's honest. "I have to find somewhere to go."
Naruto lets out a soft laugh, but the bond settles, just a little more.
"I guess," he says, and his eyes are orange against the flame. "S'it nice or annoying to have no plans?"
Sasuke feels the smile on his face.
"You tell me," he says, leaning back. "You've lived your entire life that way."
"Go to hell," Naruto says, and he's up again in his offense. "I plan. I can so plan—I've planned way too fucking much recently."
"That was my point a minute ago," Sasuke tells him, and Naruto laughs and rolls his eyes and reels right back. It's warm enough for the blanket to fall and Naruto to leave it—Sasuke's shirt rests loose and messy across him, low on his chest and lopsided on his shoulder. It holds a light that fights against his skin and loses, and Sasuke, too, knows that fight—
"Ugh," Naruto says, and it's a sigh. "I'm so tired. I don't want to be this tired—s'it night already?"
He leans forward and then kneels, finding the window that's gone from day to night with no mention of twilight at all. The sky is dark and dreary, the outside promising nothing but fierce, cold night—
"It feels that way," he answers simply, and Naruto's weight sags heavier against his side.
"Fuck," he sighs, and Sasuke's gaze lowers. It's a long way to Konoha. Sasuke knows that. Not that it makes any difference to him, Naruto will always make the trip—he's run much farther for much less—but that doesn't make Sasuke's throat any less...thick.
"Oh," Naruto says, suddenly sitting up, "here."
He unravels himself and holds out the blanket, as if Sasuke's given him some sort of signal.
"I'm alright," Sasuke tells him, but Naruto shakes his head.
"You've got goosebumps."
And so he does. Chills, he thinks, from the way Naruto bites his lip as he smiles. Shivers from the way their knees bump to each other. Sasuke feels as if there's breath on his neck, something sending him hot and shuddering, he swallows and looks at the flame—
Naruto leans against his side, and there's no blanket between them anymore.
Sasuke lets himself breathe.
They always sit this way. Stand this way. If they are side by side, it would make so much more sense to have their remaining hands free—sit Sasuke's right shoulder to Naruto's left, leave their arms untangled and unhindered, but—
Naruto's fingers slip a little more to the left, and Sasuke's leg falls a little more to the right. Naruto's knee bumps to Sasuke's thigh and Sasuke's hand is only left to fall its way down Naruto's waist—there's nowhere else to place it, nowhere else to touch—
"Mm," Naruto sighs. "You're so warm..."
He has no idea.
"S'bad," Naruto mutters, ripping his head away. "That's bad—I'm gonna fall asleep if I stay there. Fuck."
The air cools between them, slow and unsympathetic, like a crack spreading through a stone. Sasuke breathes in and stifles a shudder.
"You won't allow yourself to sleep?"
Naruto blinks and breathes, waking himself with something deep and harsh and forceful. Sasuke knows the feeling.
He knows it very well.
"Nope," Naruto says, and his back sits straight with determination. "Not yet. You want me to get here just to pass out on you?"
Naruto teases his grin at Sasuke, and Sasuke feels the spark in response—
"It is you at your most tolerable."
Naruto's immediately awake again. Immediately awake and offended and laughing, shoving Sasuke to the floor and keeping him there—Naruto looks at Sasuke with eyes like the sky, blue and over his head—
"You're an asshole," Naruto tells him, and Sasuke doesn't move.
"You're an idiot," he replies. It makes Naruto laugh, in that breathless, short sort of way—that quiet sound that makes his smile grow, but only on one side—
He pulls back, and Sasuke feels weak. He lingers on the floor, even when his blanket leaves him—Naruto's taken it as he's sat back up, and he's looking over at Sasuke now. Looking, and laughing.
"What?" he asks. "You tired, too?"
Sasuke lets his head roll.
"We're a pair of old men," Sasuke tells him, and Naruto laughs.
"Speak for yourself," he says, but he's reaching out for Sasuke, and Sasuke feels something ancient and aching as he reaches back. "C'mon, grandpa."
Naruto takes him by the hand and pulls him back to his side. Sasuke's head roars with the familiarity.
"Okay," he says, leaning against him. "Tell me about your temporary house. How d'you—is there like a town nearby or something?"
Sasuke feels that spark again.
"No, I'm renting this from the trees."
"I'm gonna kick your fucking ass."
The spark breaks free, and Naruto laughs with him, rocking into his shoulder with a hot, lingering nudge.
"Yes, there's a town," Sasuke says, and this is the warmest this cabin has ever been. "If you can call it that. A collection of houses that have managed to survive the snow."
Naruto's smile widens.
"Bet they all have fireplaces," he teases, looking over at him. "Bet that's why you like it here so much."
Sasuke snorts and rolls his eyes, but Naruto is blue and yellow and flickering all over, and Sasuke feels his gaze settle and stay. He...
"Why didn't you tell me?" Naruto asks, and he's quieter than he was a moment ago. "We send like fifty letters a day."
"You send like fifty letters a day," Sasuke retorts, but the protest is quiet and warm, and Naruto is still looking at him. "It's not something I was going to say in a letter. You'd go berserk."
"I wouldn't go—"
"I felt you panic," Sasuke tells him, and Naruto is caught. He breathes out and ducks his head away, running a hand through his hair—
"Yeah, yeah, yeah," he says, slouching in place. "Stupid bond."
Sasuke watches as he pouts.
"Shut up," Naruto tells him, and Sasuke laughs.
"As you wish," Sasuke says, turning back to their flame. Naruto huffs again, shuffling and shifting and Sasuke feels the waves of discontent over the bond. The hot discomfort, the sheepish resignation...good. He owes Naruto one.
"...Shut up," Naruto groans, and Sasuke's smile widens. "You're such a dick."
"I haven't said a word."
"Oh, you're saying fucking plenty," Naruto snaps, but he's smiling. "Smug prick."
Well. He can't deny that.
Naruto takes one look at him and laughs, ducking away. He's obvious and embarrassed, and Sasuke gives himself another moment to study the nuances of Naruto's face. The differences in his smile, the furrow of his brow, the strands of Naruto's hair that were dry and those that still stayed wet…
Naruto catches his eye, and Sasuke jerks his head away. It's a panicked instinct—maladaptive and obvious, a movement he regrets immediately but always, always does. He bites down on the sigh and readies a response—
But Naruto doesn't comment on it.
Sasuke looks back, and Naruto is still staring. Unsmiling and lingering, as if he's been caught by something—he blinks back to himself as Sasuke turns, but he's looking down and away, and Sasuke searches the familiar waves of contentment and affection for...
Naruto laughs at something, and Sasuke can't pick out what it is.
"Um," he said, his tongue darting out between his lips, "so you...you're renting this from someone in town?"
He looks up, and the blue in his eyes asks Sasuke to take the distraction.
Sasuke tucks this into the back of his mind, and obliges.
"The trees," Sasuke says. "I told you."
Naruto laughs and punches him in the arm, and Sasuke holds his pleasure to himself as the tension in Naruto's shoulders disappears.
"Somewhat," he says, answering Naruto's original question, "I don't pay money. This was an abandoned house, ready to be torn down. In exchange for attempting to repair it, I can stay."
It's a strange house to invest himself into, old and abandoned and likely rightly so, but something in Sasuke seems to want to hold onto a lost cause. He's sure Naruto knows the feeling.
"Since when can you repair stuff?" Naruto teases, and Sasuke quirks an eyebrow.
"Think you know everything about me, do you?"
Naruto's smile widens and then softens, in quick succession. His mouth opens but his breath hitches, and he turns away to reply—
"Yeah," he says, and Sasuke thinks he could have seen the lie in Naruto's eyes. "I can read you like a book."
"You can read?"
Naruto slaps his hand into Sasuke's face. Sasuke laughs and lets Naruto knock him back again—the loud, obnoxious proximity Sasuke always asks for. He's not on his back, just backwards, with Naruto halfway into his lap—
"I'm gonna kick your ass," Naruto tells him, twisting his fist in Sasuke's shirt. He's laughing and bright and beautiful and Sasuke only just stops himself before asking him to pull—
"Go on then," Sasuke says instead, "usuratonkachi."
Naruto's teeth run over his lip, and he lets go. Sasuke falls to the ground, wistful and sighing, knowing that the flicker of Naruto's eyes to his lips had just been an effect of the flames.
"Coward," Sasuke tells him, and his voice sounds quiet. But Naruto's laugh is worse, it breaks in the middle, and even clearing his throat doesn't wipe the suspicion from Sasuke's mind—he lets his head roll to study Naruto, study the bond, dig into them both to find...
Hm.
Nothing more than usual.
Sasuke scowls, and Naruto stares into the flame again.
Naruto is happy and hopeful and sentimental and sighing and he is always all of those things around Sasuke. This gives him nothing. And Naruto ought to know that, but he still isn't answering any of the questions in Sasuke's head—
Sasuke sits up, and Naruto looks back over at him.
"You're awake again," he points out, fishing for hints.
"Yeah," Naruto laughs. "Yeah, I got really hungry. Uh—I did bring—"
"You brought instant ramen again."
Naruto bursts into caught-out laughter, and Sasuke pinches the bridge of his nose.
"I have food here, you know—"
"How was I supposed to! I thought we were just meeting in—in—"
Naruto gestures wildly to the world around them. The blizzard roars in response to being forgotten, but Sasuke is not sorry.
"Alright," he sighs, getting to his long-suffering feet. "Where are they."
Naruto laughs and stands too, and Sasuke takes the chance to check what he has left. Naruto yelps as he opens the door, but Sasuke's used to the cold—he keeps the food out here, when he can. The box is nearly buried, though—in fact, Sasuke feels the burn in his hand as he digs it out, wondering how long it's been to have snowed so much. He's lucky the door opens inwards, because the sky shows no signs of mercy—
"Fuck, that's cold," Naruto says, and he gives his whole body a shake. "...Hate that."
"You hate the cold?" Sasuke asks, shutting the door. Naruto glances up at him, as if it was something he hadn't meant to say.
"I—uh. Sort of. Not really," Naruto says, and Sasuke shifts the box to his hip to give Naruto a look. "It just...reminds me of stuff. Sometimes."
He barely meets Sasuke's eye, transient and nervous. He's uncomfortable with every part of this, and Sasuke takes a moment to piece together exactly what—
Oh.
"Have you been there since then?" Sasuke asks, moving over to the small corner he calls his kitchen.
"To—to Waves?" Naruto asks. "No. No, I—I keep meaning to. Why? Have you?"
"Yes," Sasuke answers, scanning his supplies. Not very much… "The bridge is still standing."
Naruto lets out a delighted laugh, and he's immediately at Sasuke's side again.
"No way," he says, leaning against Sasuke's counters. "I mean—I guess of course it'd be, but—"
"Do you know what they named it?" Sasuke asks, checking his spices, his jars, his packages, his bottles…
"They—no. They named it?"
Sasuke looks back at him.
"The Great Naruto Bridge."
Naruto blinks.
Sasuke feels his smile widen.
"No," Naruto says—
"They did."
"They didn't—you're fucking with me—"
"I am not," Sasuke tells him. "They did."
"Wha—I—"
Sasuke laughs and grabs the ramen from Naruto's hand.
"How many of these am I making?" he asks, but Naruto is still stuttering.
"I—you—"
Sasuke readies a pot full of water, and lights his stove.
"Why did they name the bridge after me…?" Naruto asks himself, and Sasuke finds himself laughing.
"Still?" he asks, turning to the side. "Still unused to being called a hero?"
"I wasn't a hero to anyone then!"
Sasuke scoffs.
"Tell that to the bridge," he tells him, and Naruto huffs out his embarrassed, amazed delight.
Sasuke takes one of the ramen bowls from him, and Naruto absentmindedly passes him another. And another. And...alright. Four, then.
Sasuke wonders if any of them are for him.
Naruto smiles at the floor, and Sasuke lets him dwell on that for a minute as he scans his window. The snow is falling fast, and hard, and consistently. Sasuke knows storms like this. He breathes out and glances back, only to break Naruto out of his stupor—
"What?" Naruto asks.
"What time were you planning on leaving tomorrow?" Sasuke asks, and Naruto blinks again.
"Uh—late. Later. I don't—why?"
Sasuke glances back at his window.
"Because you might be losing your chance."
Naruto follows his gaze and stares past him, moving around to...stare...
"It—but this won't go all night," Naruto says, looking back at him, "will it?"
Sasuke doesn't reply. He doesn't need to.
"Uh," Naruto says, looking back, "well, uh. Whoops?"
He laughs and looks back again.
"Whoops?" Sasuke repeats. "Don't you have several important meetings to attend?"
"Well, I—yeah, but—" Naruto looks back out the window. "I'll have to—we'll do letters. Or something. Good thing I'm not actually the Hokage, huh?"
Naruto runs a hand through his hair with another laugh, and Sasuke latches onto that again. That again. It's so strange to him—that happiness, that relief in Naruto's voice, at a goal he hadn't achieved yet. A goal he'd chased for so long. As far as Sasuke was concerned, Naruto was the Hokage and it was only a matter of time before the truth was made official—
"I'll have to—I'll have to warn them though," Naruto says, settling back on his feet. "Or they'll think I've finally run off with you or something."
Sasuke's head snaps to him, and Naruto's grin isn't half as teasing as it ought to be.
"As if anyone would believe that," he replies, but Naruto's eyes have never relented, and so it's Sasuke who is forced to turn away— "Send a letter when the weather clears. They won't expect you for some time from tomorrow."
Naruto's eyes linger on his back, but Sasuke doesn't turn.
"Thanks," Naruto says, merciless as he moves closer. "Guess I'm staying for a while, huh?"
Sasuke breathes in and feels as if he's only then realized what he's done. What he's given himself. It couldn't have been this easy. It was never this easy. He—
"You could—" Sasuke says, no stranger to this sort of sabotage, "you might be able to make it through if you left...now."
He doesn't look up. He doesn't look up. He doesn't—
"I dunno," Naruto says, and Sasuke looks up. "Seems kinda dangerous out there."
Not anymore than they'd been through. Not anymore than they'd had to. But Naruto's eyes move from the window to Sasuke, and they're waiting. They're patient, and they're waiting, and they're ready to oblige Sasuke in whatever he—
"It is dangerous."
Naruto might as well have glowed. He turns away to hide his smile, but it's turned to daylight in this room—it's daylight in Sasuke's head, and Sasuke basks in the rays of sun Naruto sends his way. He feels quiet and overwhelmed, turning to the water already-warmed, turning to the ramen he could just about ready. Naruto moves back to his side, leaning to it as if they're still huddled underneath a blanket, close to the flame—
"What else d'you have in here?" he's asking, pushing and prodding and in Sasuke's way. "Rice, more rice—"
"Food too healthy for your palate."
"—mushrooms, something green, ooh—sake!"
Naruto pulls out the bottle, and he laughs as Sasuke mutters a small, "...except for that.".
"Uh-huh," he says, sidling closer. "Since when do you drink sake?"
"It was a gift," Sasuke tells him, defensive. "You're welcome to it."
"I—a gift? From who?"
"From the farmers," Sasuke says, awkward and shrugging, "I normally buy from."
Normally. Usually. Often. Frequently enough to be noticed, frequently enough to be recognized—
Frequently enough to be thanked.
Sasuke hadn't known how to tell them it wasn't deserved.
"Aw," Naruto says. "That's really nice. They like you, huh?"
He says it so easily.
Sasuke can't respond.
"Okay, I'll—we'll put it somewhere safe, if you're saving it. Uh—where do you—"
"I'm not saving it," Sasuke says, but Naruto—
"Yeah, you are."
He puts it on the counter, and Sasuke huffs at the reminder of who he is talking to. But he eyes the bottle, and the way Naruto lingers. The way he smiles and settles beside him, away from the flame and the blanket and all warmths better than Sasuke—
"You're welcome to it," he repeats, quieter than before, and Naruto's head turns to him.
"...You sure?" he says. "You could share it with someone else."
Sasuke doesn't even deign that one with an answer.
Naruto's face breaks into a smile, and Sasuke knows that his head must have burst something across the bond. His emotions have always been a traitorous thing.
"Okay," Naruto says, picking up the bottle again. "Guess we could kinda celebrate, huh? When's the last time I could stay a night?"
Too long ago.
Sasuke doesn't answer.
"...Yeah," Naruto says, as if it's a reply. "How long does it take to, um, melt? The snow, I mean."
Sasuke breathes out.
"Out here?" he asks, checking the window as if it will answer him. "It can take some time."
Naruto lets out a small laugh, and Sasuke feels the rush of joy in his head.
"Well, shit," he says, close and happy and Sasuke feels the weakness in his knees, "guess you're stuck with me."
Sasuke breathes out, and knows he is smiling.
"Is that supposed to be a new development?" he asks, and Naruto slaps him with the back of his hand.
It stays, after the hit, for just a moment too long.
"Well, I'm gonna eat my food," he says, as if he hasn't been the one lingering. "Asshole. Uh. D'you need—"
"No. Go sit down."
Naruto's happiness sparks into his head, and Sasuke turns away before it overwhelms him completely. Naruto grabs the first bowl, but leaves the three, hissing at the heat in his hand—
"I'm gonna eat on your floor!" he announces, as if there's another place to choose.
"Better than my bed," Sasuke mutters, but Naruto's already left him. He's sitting on the floor, happily humming away as he holds the bowl in his hand. It's cheap and unhealthy and Naruto can afford better things, now, but Sasuke thinks he understands. Sasuke feels the same about sleeping under trees during the day—it was a comfort he'd had to work for, in his youth. Only in his absolute exhaustion. But when it was allowed, it was treasured, and that sort of feeling…
Lingers.
Sasuke relights his stove and brings his pot back to him—black and bruised and well-used, it's another one of those things he isn't sure whether to call his or not. Naruto's put his head in a flurry with all these thoughts—past and present and future and home and life and lo—
He glances to his side, and Naruto looks back with a smile filled with noodles.
Sasuke can't help but laugh.
Naruto flips him off with a full mouth, well-practiced in not missing a beat. Sasuke fights his smile and his nostalgia—the familiarity of this moment. These feelings. Sasuke's lived this laughter at Naruto's idiocity a thousand times.
He'd be blessed to live it a thousand more.
He breathes, and the water is warming. The heat is in his face again, ahead of him, all around him. It smells like salt, and Naruto, and home. He never eats ramen when he's on his own.
The taste just isn't the same.
The water boils, and Sasuke gently places the sake into its bath. He has to count the minutes, now…
"Aren't you gonna eat?" Naruto asks, back at his side. The empty bowl is in his hand, and he slides it onto Sasuke's counter like it belongs there.
"Were you expecting me to?" Sasuke asks. "Four bowls is a small meal for you."
Naruto laughs and concedes the point, turning around to rest his back to the counter. Sasuke stares and wonders if he'll ever find a way to bring the chakra to his eyes without Naruto noticing.
"True," he says, his smile easy and tranquil, "but at least two of those are for you."
"One," Sasuke tells him, and Naruto's smile widens.
"Deal."
Naruto holds out a hand to shake and Sasuke laughs at himself for reaching towards it. He's lost count of the sake, now—damn it all…
"You're a shitty negotiator," Naruto informs him, and Sasuke tells him to go fuck himself. Naruto laughs and nudges a bowl into the crook of his elbow so he can steal them both, and Sasuke scowls at the sake as if that will tell him how hot it is. He supposes he can just—check...and if it's too cold, he can put it back…
The steam flips and curls as he pours, and it breathes heat against his hand. If it's warm to his touch it will be warmer to Naruto's, and that means it's perfect—Naruto likes his heat scalding, and Sasuke is happy to oblige him.
He's built of flame, after all.
"Ooh, already?" Naruto asks, sitting up onto his knees. "Here, let me…"
He takes the cup with a gentleness Sasuke still isn't used to, and holds it to his chest as he sits back down. Sasuke brings the rest to the floor, and lifts the flame as he sits back down. It's grown colder, now.
Naruto hasn't seemed to notice.
"Thanks for letting me stay," Naruto says, leaning against him as if it's absent-minded and automatic. Sasuke feels the warmth and can't think of anything else—
"I suppose I could have blasted a path for you if you were willing to swim," he says, and he knows it sounds strained. Naruto takes pity on him and laughs, but all it does is move them together.
"Asshole," Naruto tells him. "S'it okay if I sit like this? You're warm."
Warm.
"It's fine."
Sasuke's burning.
Naruto looks at him and Sasuke doesn't look back. The sake is an excuse that he takes and savours, feeling the burn within him echo what he feels outside, feeling it spread and twist throughout him—
"This is good," Naruto says, his lips still kissing the edge of the cup. "S'nice."
Sasuke's eyes are betraying him again.
Naruto sighs and smiles and fills his head with affection and happiness. And relief, again, like waves and waves of relief, lapping at Sasuke's shore. Sasuke wants to say it's the heat, or maybe the food, or maybe just being able to sit, for once—
But he thinks that it might be that Naruto doesn't want to leave. It could be that he wanted to stay. Even with all that was waiting for him. Even with the everything that was waiting for him. Maybe, even with that all, Sasuke was…
Sasuke grabs the instant ramen and drowns these thoughts into them.
Naruto lets out a small laugh.
"Really good sake and instant fucking ramen," he says, pulling Sasuke's blanket back over them. "I really pull you down to my level, huh?"
"Down," Sasuke repeats, and it sounds like a snort. "I think there's an entire world that would disagree with you."
Naruto laughs and rocks into him, and Sasuke lets his knee fall to tuck under Naruto's legs.
"Yeah, 'cause I go around telling everybody everything about me," Naruto tells him, "you're the same silent prick you always were. Could've been the Great Sasuke Bridge."
That makes Sasuke laugh, and Naruto watches him for a second longer before he breaks, too—
"Fuck," he says, reeling back towards the flame, "I can't believe they did that."
Sasuke hums a laugh that sounds suspiciously like agreement, and it makes Naruto kick at his foot. His gaze is back to absent, though—he's quiet and thinking, back to staring at the flame as Sasuke stares at him…
"You do tend to leave your mark on people," Sasuke says, and it's soft. It pulls Naruto back to him, pulls him back to blue and piercing, something painful in his gaze—
"That's not unique to me," Naruto tells him, and the lump in Sasuke's throat worsens. He's bad today. He's particularly bad today. The part of him that tears when Naruto leaves and scrambles for his letters as they come has flooded the rest of him, and Sasuke has never known how to keep it contained. He knows what he has to do. He knows what he has to do. He has to circle these thoughts like water around a drain, but never let them enter, never let them form, he can look at Naruto and hurt, but if he thinks about why—
Naruto breathes in, and Sasuke looks away.
The fire crackles.
"Um," Naruto tells him, and Sasuke fiddles with the ramen bowl as if it isn't empty. "I was gonna—I wanted to say—I—I keep them too. Your letters."
Sasuke's head snaps back, but Naruto's ducked himself away.
"Just, uh," he says, rubbing the back of his neck, "thought you should know. That."
He shrugs and looks down, and Sasuke doesn't know why he's holding his breath, too. He feels as if he's waiting for something, searching for something, but he doesn't—
"Anyway," he says, sitting up and breathing in, "how d'you get anything done around here? D'you always get snowed in like this?"
Sasuke laughs.
"How much do you think I get up to nowadays?" he asks, and Naruto's smile is back.
"What? You telling me you've got soft?" he teases, and Sasuke—
"You're welcome to check."
—answers. He sees it in Naruto's eyes as he thinks about it. He thinks about tackling Sasuke to the floor. Sasuke's senses are old but honed, and Naruto is the instinct he's trained the most. And he knows exactly how to accept, with his raised chin and unwavering eyes, he meets Naruto and dares him—
Naruto laughs and relents, pulling himself away for the alcohol, instead.
Sasuke's disappointment is palpable.
"So lots of, uh," Naruto says, "sitting here."
Sasuke snorts and continues to pretend he hasn't noticed Naruto holding himself back. Again.
"Lots of working on this house," he tells him. "I've done plenty of travelling. I'll do more yet. I need a breather."
He tilts his head, and Naruto meets his eye with a small laugh.
"I could use a breather," he mutters, turning back to the flame.
Sasuke raises an eyebrow.
"That explains why you're taking being trapped so well," he says, gauging the reaction. "With me, no less."
Naruto laughs.
"You're not so bad," he says, glancing back at him. "Y'know, I could be out there—"
Naruto waves his arm, and Sasuke's lips twitch as the winds howl.
"The superior choice to a blizzard," he says. "I'll take what I can get."
Naruto laughs again, and Sasuke feels the warmth as he downs the rest of his sake.
"Yeah," he says, "I'd choose you over a blizzard any day."
Sasuke laughs and shoves Naruto's shoulder.
"Usuratonkachi."
Naruto bounces right back to him.
"Teme."
He feels it again, then. The soft relief, the happy affection. He wonders if the bond is stronger when they're together, or if they just feel so much more—it's potent and brutal, it rings with every reminder that Naruto loves his company and Sasuke is so weak to the sound, he can't help but ask for it over and over again—
"You're going to be trapped for several days," Sasuke warns him. "You'll want to tear down this house."
Naruto laughs.
"If we run out of food, maybe," he says. "Do we have enough food?"
Sasuke thinks for a moment.
"...For me," he says, and Naruto— "I'm kidding, moron."
"That—you—asshole!"
Naruto shoves at him and Sasuke catches the hand in something intimate and lingering and far too prolonged—he throws it back to Naruto and breathes, feeling the way they're both under the blanket, feeling the way Naruto's legs cross over Sasuke's and Sasuke's rest so comfortably underneath them—
When Naruto's hand finally falls, his fingers overlap with Sasuke's.
Sasuke breathes out.
He tries not to get lost. He really does. But the flames are on his face and the storm feels so far outside, Naruto is so warm and so here, like home and haven and everything he's ever wanted stuck in his throat, stuck in the burning in his eyes, the ache in his chest. He's walked so far and searched so much and nothing ever compares to this feeling. Just this fucking feeling. Sasuke doesn't need anything else in the world—damn it—
He holds his breath and he's frustrated. He's yearning and hurting and he shouldn't be thinking about any of this. Not until Naruto's asleep, or distracted, or somewhere far enough away that Sasuke's thoughts could be reasonably explained away as something else, but Sasuke is stuck. But he's warm and he's stuck, Naruto's hand is over his and he just wants to turn his palm over and pull—
He lets himself breathe.
The nerves are getting to be too much. Too strong. Naruto might have felt them by now, but Sasuke could hope he hadn't—he could feel them in the back of his...mind…
Oh.
Those aren't his.
Sasuke looks up, and Naruto's been staring at him. He can tell from the way he breathes in, from the way the nerves spike, from the way he—
"Um," Naruto starts, caught-out but unwavering— "can you—can you tell me what you were thinking about just—just there?"
Shit.
Shit.
Sasuke breathes in—
"Nevermind," Naruto says quickly, and his panic smashes right into Sasuke's own, "forget it, forget—no, I'll just—I'll just say what I—"
He twists his hand through his hair.
Sasuke doesn't even breathe.
"You know when we were twelve," Naruto says, staring at the floor, "you know when he fought, and you left, you know—you know?"
"Yes," Sasuke whispers.
"I always regretted not—not asking to come with you. Not that I think you'd—I mean, back then, we—you wouldn't have—" Naruto shakes his head, breathing in, pausing and starting over again. "I don't think you would've let me. I don't know if I could've done it either, but I—but I never asked. I always—I always wished I did."
It's a tough thing for Naruto to do—to tell Sasuke something he's never known before. But Sasuke stares at him, and he's bewildered.
"So I'm asking now," Naruto says, and he's looking up. He's blue and insistent and Sasuke is frozen in place— "if—if I could leave Konoha. If I did. Would you take me with you?"
Sasuke blinks.
"But you—"
"I'm not the Hokage."
"But you're going to—"
"I'm not going to be the Hokage, Sasuke." Naruto shakes his head and breathes. "I really—that's a whole—you know that wasn't ever even about that. Right? You know it was the village, and the acknowledgement, and getting people to look at me and see me, and—it's not—that—I don't need Hokage for that. And I don't want it."
"Your friends," Sasuke offers, but Naruto—
"Yeah," he says, and it sounds like a laugh. "I'd actually be able to see them. All of them. But that's not—don't—ignore all of that. Ignore everything—if nothing else was happening. If it was just us, without the rest of the world and everything else—would you take me with you?"
Sasuke can't lie.
Not to Naruto.
"Yes," he whispers, and Naruto sends him reeling. He sends him staggering, stumbling back, blinded by the searing happiness in his head—when the light fades and Sasuke can see past the joy, all that's left is Naruto's smile, his eyes, his disbelieving stare at the floor and the happy laugh on his lips—
"Okay," he says, and it's a breath. "Okay. Okay. I—"
He laughs again, and Sasuke steadies himself against the bond—
"Is that what...is that all you wanted to know?"
Naruto laughs again.
"No," he says, running a hand through his hair, "but I'm not asking the other thing."
Sasuke stares at him. Naruto meets his eyes and laughs again, shaking his head—
"Can I tell you—I've been planning for this. This whole time. I've been—that's why I've been working so hard, to try to get everything where they wouldn't need me anymore. When I said people would think I ran off with you—that's real. I know you didn't believe me."
He laughs again, but Sasuke—
"What's the other thing?"
Sasuke is stuck. Sasuke is so, so stuck, Sasuke is glued to those words and Naruto shakes his head, but Sasuke—
"Sas—"
"Tell me."
Naruto's smile fades, ever so slightly. Sasuke sees the spark in his eyes, sees the challenge in their piercing, relentless blue—
"Tell me what you were thinking about."
Sasuke flinches. Naruto runs a hand through his hair and laughs.
"See?" he says, as if it's all fine. "Told you. This is—I—fuck. You sure it's okay? If I just stay? I mean I'll go back to say bye, but I—"
"I—" Sasuke says, still reeling, still stuck. "Naruto, you—"
"What?" he asks.
Sasuke stares at him.
"You have something else that you want to say."
Naruto huffs out a breath.
"Yeah, but it's not...I don't think you wanna hear it," he says, and it's quiet. "And I don't even know how to put it into words anyway. Um."
He shrugs and looks away, uncomfortable and caught-out. Sasuke's reminded of the sake they've forgotten on the floor by the way Naruto stares at it, stares past it, stares as if he can't see it at all—
Sasuke lets himself think about Naruto again.
About the hope in his heart. The happiness. The safety. The strange settling feeling when he wakes up in the middle of a nightmare and it's Naruto who's woken him, sending something soothing and understanding through the bond between them—the gratefulness that's sent back to him when he does the same, when he wakes Naruto from whatever painful something his mind is giving him—the breath he holds when Naruto is away and the way he lets it out when he's back—Sasuke is a man searching for peace, but he's already found it, he found it years ago—
Sasuke lets his thoughts fade, and Naruto's back is rigid straight. It's tight and tense, it's a feeling Sasuke knows, he knows it very well—
"I—" Naruto says, and Sasuke receives a flood. He receives a tsunami. Sasuke stands in the blizzard and Naruto is the snow, telling him everything at once, Sasuke feels the hope and the ache and the yearning and the—
Love.
Naruto turns and kisses him.
The moment is broken before Sasuke even catches up. Naruto is gone before Sasuke even realizes he's there. He breathes in as Naruto leaves, the memory of his lips pounding into him, sucking in the air where his warmth still stayed—
"Please tell me I didn't fuck up," Naruto whispers, and Sasuke shakes out a breath.
"You didn't."
Naruto's laugh is trembling and wet. Sasuke sees the tears in his eyes before they even fall. They're gone in the next moment, faded into the blur that is Naruto's pressed-close face, but Sasuke feels them on his face as they kiss, they mix with his own—
"Don't freak out," he whispers, pushing the chakra to his eyes. Naruto's lips laughs against his and Sasuke memorizes their curves, the press of his cheek and the pressure of his hand, the broken moments with his eyes open, the ecstasy as they close—
When they break for air, it's only to fall. Naruto hides in his shoulder, holding him the same way he did when they woke up in the hospital, tight and trembling—Sasuke holds him just the same—
"I love you," Naruto tells him, and Sasuke feels it. He feels it all at once. Every emotion he tried to push back, press down, hide away, bury underground—
He presses his forehead to Naruto's, and sets them free.
And for a moment, they're a blizzard. They're a snowstorm. They're stuck here, together, with the winds howling around them, feeling the ice around them, letting it swirl and twist and—
The snow settles, and Naruto laughs.
"Too," he finishes, and Sasuke smiles. "I love you too."
A/N: And there it is! If you haven't gone to see the work monosrojo did for this piece, please go look! I am obsessed! I can't link them on FFN, but they will be linked on the ao3 version of this story :)
I hope you liked it! And a special thanks to monosrojo for collaborating with me, it was SO much fun and I loved every bit of it :'D
I hope all of your Octobers are going well! All my love to you.
Until next time,
- Kinomi