Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto, or any of its associated characters!

Summary: Sasuke has spent three years trying to figure out how to live on his own. Maybe it's time to try something different. WIP. Future SNS, updates once a month. Canonverse. Rating may change!

A/N: another late update for you, friends. There are some prompts coming up that I don't quite know how to handle...we'll see!

Day 13 prompt - inseparable!

sunflowers for the skeptical

Chapter 13: letters and pebbles, distance and depth

The downside to Naruto's much more lenient schedule is that when he does finally have to leave—it's much longer than half a day. Unfortunately longer. And a few days apart ought to be nothing compared to what they've done before—Naruto's smile knows it, and Sasuke does too—

But they don't want to. Neither of them. Sasuke finds himself thinking they've done it already. They've tested their time apart. They've lived life like this enough—hasn't that been good enough? It's that over now? Naruto spends an extra hour pacing around the house after he's fully packed, and it's Sasuke who has to end up pushing him through the door.

With his lips, at least. Naruto isn't happy to be going either, and he kisses Sasuke goodbye about a hundred times about it.

That, at least, makes Sasuke smile. Little things. Stupid little things. He spends his day wandering about the village—answering the questions of all he passes by. They want to know where Naruto is. They want to know why he's gone, when he's coming back, when he's coming home.

"Konoha," Sasuke tells them. "He has some business to take care of."

Some of them nod. Some of them scoff. Sasuke personally prefers the latter—the ones who wave a hand and declare that he works too hard for someone so young. For someone who's done so much. What could Konoha want with him now? He's given them enough!

Sasuke smiles, and agrees.

He looks forward to telling Naruto their neighbours are turning on him.

And he gets his chance to, that night, with the arrival of Naruto's letter. It's babbling apologies at its unfinished end—he'd wanted to send something as soon as he'd gotten there. That was the start of the letter, it seems. It's disjointed and added to throughout the day, and Sasuke knows that Naruto had fallen into the trap of wanting to tell him everything. Wanting to ask everything. There was too much he was missing. Too much he missed.

Sasuke runs his thumb along Naruto's handwriting. He switches pillows for the night. Takes a towel to bed. Finds the clothes Naruto didn't take with him.

Such weakness. Such beautiful, indulgent weakness. Sasuke always thought it was wrong. Always awaited the punishment for his indulgence.

But the greatest punishment had been his restraint. His denial. His pushing away. His pushing down.

And Sasuke's learned that lesson, hasn't he? Even when Naruto is gone, he's with him. Even when Sasuke threw him away, he was with him. Naruto lives a relentless life in the depths of his heart. He's pumped through Sasuke's blood. To cut him out would kill them both. It almost had.

Sasuke finds himself deep in his obsession, again. Deep in this feeling. Naruto isn't home, but Sasuke plans for when he is. Knows where he would be. He does the dishes, cleans out Naruto's ramen pot, tends to the garden, checks for sunflowers. He paces through the town and the trees and the leaves and the breeze, and wonders if he should have made his own attempt at cooking for the market that morning. There's a spot saved on one of the tables—the same one they'd taken. Sasuke doesn't know the recipe, and tells them so, but he…

Wonders if he ought to learn.

He catches sight of small things—small, helpful things, like a portable stove to keep a pot warm. The types of signs that press up onto tables—that stay and stick above them, even in the wind. It's not a real idea. It's not anything yet. But Sasuke pictures the look on Naruto's face, standing there, and it…sticks, in his head.

He could bring that look back. He could bring that smile back.

"—Mako!" a woman calls, and Sasuke's instincts beckon him to step aside before he's barrelled over.

The boys stop—screeching to a halt—several steps past where he'd been.

"I'm sorry," the old woman says, and Sasuke recognizes her. Sasuke recognizes them. "I can't catch up to them anymore. Mako, give him space—"

"I don't have ramen," he tells them, but the boys—

"Can you do the fire thing again?"

Sasuke blinks.

The old lady gives him a resigned, apologetic smile.

…

Sasuke flicks a flame into his hand.

It's strange. Sasuke isn't used to this sort of reaction. This sort of awe. He learned about chakra as he learned to walk. It was never an unknown. It was a given. But this…

This is so foreign to them. It's foreign to him, too.

The children demand explanation, and Sasuke does his best to give it to him. Awkward as he is. Quiet as he is. He needs to read up on chakra, he thinks. He remembers the motions, the feeling–-Sasuke runs on muscle memory. The theory behind it all…it's been a long, long time since he's had to have that memorized.

He walks across a river, and the brothers yell at his back. Shout and hollar and nearly stumble in after him—

The older brother catches his younger brother, just before he tumbles in.

They never made it to this age, Sasuke thinks. Not like this. Sure, they were still alive. The both of them. But…

The old lady comes to stand beside him. Her small cane forces some pebbles into the water. Sasuke's learned her name is Ayaka.

"Thank you," she tells him, and Sasuke doesn't know what to make of any of this. "They're at that age now, I think. I am no longer worth listening to. I no longer know all. They think they do, now. They think they're so old. So wise."

She lets out a soft chuckle.

"The older I get, the more I struggle with it," she tells him. "Even you seem like a child to me."

She gives Sasuke a smile, and something seizes up in Sasuke's throat.

"With no disrespect," she says, at Sasuke's silence. "Of course. You're entirely capable. So are they—at some things. It's difficult not to see ourselves in the young ones. The people we once were. The mistakes we once made."

She sighs, and then she's laughing again.

"And here I go. That's another thing that comes with age," she says. "You begin to reminisce. Constantly. Talking everyone's ear off—would you believe they used to tell me I was too quiet?"

Sasuke's listening is too—solemn to be polite, he knows. He does his best to give a smile. Something in her seems to understand.

Perhaps she does know who he is, after all.

"At any rate, thank you," she says. "It's nice to see them this excited about something. And respecting someone, too—that's a miracle. Although I double either of them will harness any power of flame."

Sasuke's smile is a touch more genuine, that time.

"I can have Naruto pick up some chakra paper, if you'd like," he offers, and she laughs.

"Well. Now that's an idea," she breathes in, and breathes out. "A dangerous one, I think. I don't know if I want them having that kind of information."

She laughs, and there's a boom. A splash. The kids are yelling again—the older brother was pushed in.

Sasuke feels his lips twitch. Itachi would have never let him get away with that.

…

Or maybe he would have. Maybe he would have, and fooled Sasuke into thinking it was his own skill. In fact, if he eyed that anger that the older brother was yelling so loud with…

Hm.

"Do they remember their parents?" Sasuke finds himself asking, and Ayaka lets out a soft breath.

"Kota more than Mako, I think," she says. "With him being older. Not well, but they both remember bits and pieces. And I have photos around the house. Tell them stories. I do what I can to keep their memory alive. Of my husband, too. He passed a few years after my daughter and son-in-law. The boys do remember him."

Sasuke turns to her. Her smile is firm, wistful, and sad. She scans the sky with eyes that Sasuke recognizes. Understands.

"There is a lot of loss in lives like ours," she says, and Sasuke suddenly isn't sure who she's talking of at all—

"But our love stays with us," she says, and Sasuke doesn't breathe. "The ones we love always are. No matter how far our bodies may be. Our hearts lay side by side, don't they?"

…

A few more pebbles fall into the river.

"They do," Sasuke answers, and he wishes Naruto would just come home. His words even sound like a sigh. Ayaka is looking right at him, and her face is wrinkled again.

"Missing him, are you?" she asks, and that smile is a little too wry for Sasuke's liking.

"We've been apart for longer," Sasuke answers, sidestepping the question. She gives a small hum in answer.

…

…

…

"Yes," Sasuke finally bites out, and it makes her laugh.

"I don't blame you," she says. "I've noticed the silence, and I'm not even in love with him. Do you need more of a distraction? My grandchildren do wonders."

Sasuke bites down a laugh, but she has no such qualms.

"And I ought to find a way to repay you," she points out. "What would you like? I can pay you a tutor's rate."

Sasuke breathes in, but shakes his head. No, he…

He has a different idea.

A/N: that's it for now! lots of love, lots of wishing you all well,

- Kinomi