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: Made it! I was worried I wouldn't, but here you go - an early update for you all. I hope you enjoy!
Two is a Crowd
Chapter 9: if not a part of you (day two)
Sasuke awoke with a headache. Naruto was already up—bustling around him, buzzing around him like the flies. The beetles. It was too cold for the cicadas, but Naruto reminded him of them too—a constant noise. A hum in the air. It wasn't the only thing; the spray from the falls had been relentless, sinking into his clothes and his skin. It warped Sasuke's flame—mixed and twisted with the heat until the humidity was all he was breathing in.
He wiped at his face, and his hand came away wet. It was wet to begin with.
Sasuke huffed out a breath and glared at the back of Naruto's head.
Naruto turned around and met it with a blink.
"What?" he said, still turning on the back of one heel. His other foot stayed stuck in the air—dodging the water, dodging the mud.
"You're loud," was all Sasuke gave him. It only made Naruto laugh.
"Oh, yeah, you've never met me before," he mocked, jumping back down to both feet. "I forgot."
He tossed the wood by the fire and sat down across from him. Naruto had been building a pile for them to burn even before Sasuke had awoken—they kept a constant flame to shield themselves from the cold, and the wet. One of those had been more successful than the other.
Naruto's ankles crossed somewhere past Sasuke's legs, and he gave him a grin. Uneven and orange—the flame and smoke and steam worked to hide his face, but Sasuke didn't need to see it to know what was there.
"You're grumpy this morning," Naruto told him, as if he didn't know why. He was pretending, again. Not as a lie, but as a kindness—Sasuke could see the knowledge tucked in the back of his blue eyes, but he wouldn't pull it out from the depths unless Sasuke did first. He had no plans to—it was safer here, on the surface. Above the water. Sasuke didn't particularly want to take that plunge.
"I'm wet," Sasuke muttered back, and Naruto's laugh breathed a break in the flames. He was still cautious. Still keeping an eye on Sasuke. But his worried hovering had taken the night to transform completely, and Sasuke knew the stubborn glint in his eye very well. Naruto'd set himself a challenge—and if Sasuke had to guess, it was to make him laugh.
What a stupid goal.
What a stupid thing to be working.
They had rations for breakfast. Naruto talked about nothing and everything, and Sasuke sat there and listened. Heated his food by the flame. It made it—better. More palatable. A strange, easy thing he'd never bothered with before. He wasn't sure if he would have noticed the difference.
…
He supposed he hadn't stopped for food when he'd been alone. With Taka…maybe. Rarely. Not by his choice. He certainly never bothered to create anything just for himself. He wondered if he would even know what to do, working over anything other than an open flame.
Sasuke grew quiet with his thoughts.
Naruto noticed.
"Whatcha thinking about?" he said, bothering him. Always bothering him. All the choices in the world, and this was the one that always won.
"Take a guess," Sasuke said, giving the water moment's glare. His gaze should have been directed within, he supposed. No news there.
"I mean," Naruto said, "you don't have to do it right away. Go in, I mean."
"Is that what you're telling yourself?" Sasuke asked, and Naruto huffed out a caught-out laugh.
"You—no! One of us should be—able to actually think," he insisted, and Sasuke's eyes narrowed. "So I thought—"
"Are you not entering today, too?"
Naruto visibly deflated.
"Well—y'know—not yet. We've—you've got some stuff to work through, so—"
"So I'm back to doing things alone again?"
It was a low blow.
Underhanded. Knowing. Sasuke knew Naruto's head would snap up before he even finished the thought—
But he was stubborn, and Naruto was smiling.
"Wow," Naruto said, leaning back, "asshole."
Sasuke certainly didn't deny the claim.
Naruto grumbled to himself until he ceded. Sasuke smiled to himself until he watched him do it. It faltered, of course, when he realized what he'd just talked them both into.
Damn his mouth.
Damn Naruto's, too.
Sasuke wasn't sure they both needed to fit under the waterfall—maybe they just needed to face it. The thunder of the water drowned out the thoughts in his head, though, and Naruto seemed comfortable enough.
Sasuke supposed he had done this before.
Cold, wet, and uncomfortable—Sasuke closed his eyes. It still took him longer than he would have liked. He felt the change this time, though. Saw the ripples under his feet, saw the rocks that drowned beneath them. It was the sounds that gave it away. The water still flowed, but the sounds…they were muffled. Distant. Like he'd gone somewhere far.
He supposed he had.
His other self stepped out of the falls, and there was no sound to his steps, either.
"Is that all, then?" Sasuke said, not bothering to greet him. "I set out to punish myself?"
"No. No, you barely buried that thought." The other Sasuke shrugged. "It's a starting point."
Sasuke waited for him to elaborate.
…
He did not.
"I don't understand," he said, hard and tight. His annoyance didn't break into his voice, but the other Sasuke still seemed to smile. "What part of myself are you meant to be? The part that hates me?"
That Sasuke laughed.
"No," he answered, "no, you're well-acquainted with that part of yourself. I'm the part of you that's happy. I'm the part that's accepted what you are. What happened to you. I'm the part that wants to live. With Naruto, preferably."
Sasuke's head snapped to him.
The other Sasuke looked at him with an unsettling smile.
"I should be able to live alone," he said—careful. This was a trap. Every hair standing up on Sasuke's skin felt this was a trap.
"Sure," the other Sasuke said. "But that isn't what you want."
Sasuke's eyes narrowed.
The other Sasuke leaned against that fucking rock again.
"I'm happy," he said again. "I love this life. But that isn't allowed. So you pretend I don't exist. Unfortunately for you, that still doesn't kill me."
He tilted his head.
"You certainly have tried."
Sasuke didn't reply. Fine. Fine. If there was a part of him that was happy—that enjoyed this, that existed and was okay with existing—he didn't accept it, he didn't want to think about what that would mean, but he—understood why that part of him would be here, at least.
He would have crushed that part of him. He would have ground it down until it didn't exist.
To him, anyway.
"What does that have to do with Naruto?" he asked, and that Sasuke looked at him.
"Your happiness?" he said, and it was incredulous. "Everything."
Sasuke narrowed his eyes.
"You think I should be dependent."
"I think I don't care," that Sasuke replied. "I think fuck you. Fuck this. Fuck living like this."
"I—"
"Your dependence has nothing to do with Naruto," he snapped. "Your manipulation—your desire to live alone doesn't even come from yourself! You still obey the same voice in your head—live with your hatred and nothing else, no one else, whose voice is that? Whose voice?"
"That's enough."
"He put the thought into your head," that Sasuke said, and Sasuke's voice lowered into a growl.
"That's enough."
"You choose to be miserable," that Sasuke said, and Sasuke was intensely aware of the water around him—intensely aware of the way it would spark his lightning— "You think it's the only way to live. You won't even tell Naruto to stay. You can barely even touch him, you haven't even told him you—"
"I told him to stay."
"I told him!" the other Sasuke snapped. "You panicked and moved on instinct, and you refuse to even consider why the thought of him leaving made you sick. Why did it make you sick? Why did it make you scared? Why can't you stop thinking about that memory of Naruto begging for your life? Remember that? Remember it again."
"Fuck you."
"You're obsessed with it. Aren't you? You can't get it out of your head."
"It—"
"Why would he do that?" that Sasuke asked. "Tell me. Why would he do that? Seems like the kind of thing you'd only do for the person you loved."
"Oh," Sasuke said, sneering, sarcastic, pushing him away, pushing it all away— "and Naruto's never been known to feel for someone."
"What does he feel for you?" the other Sasuke asked, and he was stepping forward.
Sasuke didn't reply.
"I'm the part of yourself that's not afraid to know," he said. "I'm the part that knows already. Do you want me to tell you?"
"No."
"I could tell you."
"No—"
"You already know it. You already know, if you just think, if you just opened—"
"Stop."
"You say you're healing, but you won't even let yourself start," that Sasuke said, close, too close— "You're pathetic."
"I know! I know that! Leave me be!"
That Sasuke raised his chin.
"I want you to picture the look on Naruto's face," that Sasuke said, "when you tell him you love him."
Sasuke tore himself free. He woke with a gasp, with a tumble, stumbling out of the thundering, cold waterfall and grabbing the rocks before he fell in with the rest of the pebbles—Sasuke was drenched and sick and nauseous—
"Alright?" Naruto called, and Sasuke froze.
Naruto, sitting by their fire, waved a hand.
The sky was dark.
"I quit before you," he explained. "C'mon. Get warm."
Sasuke shook his way across the water. Flinched as he made it to the trees. Naruto looked up long enough to make sure Sasuke's made it over, but he was quick to look back down again. Too quick.
…
Sasuke took a moment to take in the shake to Naruto's knee, and felt something loosen in his chest. A selfish relief. Comfort in their mutual misery. There was an old nostalgia to the feeling.
Naruto stared down at the fire and wouldn't look up.
He barely even blinked.
"Went well, did it?" Sasuke prodded, demanding his attention. It worked—Naruto looked up just as Sasuke passed him by, humming out a small, disheveled laugh. Sasuke didn't sit beside him, but he did sit…under. At an angle. He was closer to the flame this way, leaning against the wood Naruto sat on.
At least his clothes could start to warm this way.
"Went fucking great, yeah," Naruto sighed. Sasuke looked back just as he ran a hand up his face, through his hair. He was still wet, too.
Naruto laughed again.
"It's so stupid," he said, grabbing a stick from their pile. "It's—that's the problem, right? It's still just—part of you. Doesn't really matter what the truth is, 'cause it's just what he thinks. And he doesn't know what the fuck he's talking about."
He cracked the stick over his thigh and threw it into the fire. It flared, and Sasuke surreptitiously made sure it kept contained.
Naruto let out two heavy breaths.
"…Sorry," he said, dropping the other piece. "Sorry. I'm—I'm just—"
"He's infuriating, isn't he?" Sasuke asked, and Naruto looked over at him. "Imagine talking to mine."
…
Naruto's lips twitched.
"Yeah," Naruto breathed out, the lopsided smile back to his lips. "Guess you have it worse, huh?"
Sasuke shoved his ankle off balance. Naruto laughed, and Sasuke pretended he didn't still feel the heat on his palm—
"Shut up," Sasuke told him, and Naruto's laugh was soft in his ears. "Does he have the eyes again?"
"What—the other me?"
"Mm," Sasuke hummed, "the weird eyes."
Naruto laughed and ducked his head. Sasuke took a moment to study the way his hands wrung together. The way the bandages on one of them had begun to fray. Sasuke could replace them, if he…
Sasuke looked away.
"No, but he—" Naruto laughed again. "He doesn't have this arm." Naruto lifted his bandaged fingers up, in a quick, absent motion. "And I think his eyes might be more blue than mine actually are. They really—"
Naruto sliced through the air with his hand and shook his head. Sasuke bit down the laugh at the thought that Naruto might be the one on the receiving end of that gaze, for once. The piercing of those eyes—
It had so little to do with the blue.
"What about yours?" Naruto asked, and Sasuke shrugged.
"Looks like me," Sasuke answered simply. "Without a sharingan. Or rinnegan. Just…"
"Just you, huh?"
…
Just him.
Sasuke swallowed, and quietly acknowledged the thought. Didn't accept it, but—
"Um," Naruto said, breathing out— "aren't you cold?"
"Wet," Sasuke replied, and it made Naruto laugh. "Do we still have drinking water?"
"We—yeah," Naruto said. "Why?"
"Put some over the fire."
"Like in a—in a pot?" Naruto asked, and Sasuke stumbled with the force of his laugh.
"Yes, Naruto," he said, "in a pot. Not over the open flame."
Naruto protested his excuses, but Sasuke only shook his head. His shirt was warm and damp, now—sticking to his skin, and he was itching to get out of it. His pants, too. He took the lead of Naruto's hanging clothes and took his own to join them.
He didn't have many clothes to go through. These would have to dry quick…
Sasuke felt Naruto's eyes on his back, but they were gone by the time he turned. Naruto's body was stiff, again. Tense, again. Something about Sasuke, then.
He supposed he ought to have guessed.
Sasuke changed and grabbed the tea leaves from his bag. They'd been collecting them as they went—drying them as they went. Tea was useful in the cold. Satiated hunger when nothing else was available, too.
But this wasn't about either of those.
Sasuke breathed out and in again, and wondered how easy it would be to accept all he was about to be told. He didn't even want to touch today's discussion. He was barely still dealing with last night's.
Naruto prodded the fire, and gave him two glances before the third stuck.
"It's—um," he said, "it's heating up."
Sasuke sat back down. Naruto up, on the log—Sasuke down, against it.
Naruto's leg didn't shake, but it didn't relax, either.
"Deal with it tomorrow," Sasuke said, flicking the leaves into their cups. Small things Naruto had brought—gifts from someone or something.
"Deal with—" Naruto said—
"Everything," Sasuke said, vague and breathing out. "Tomorrow. Let it be their problem."
Sasuke let his head tilt back, and Naruto met his gaze with something…insidious. Slow. A smile that started small and ended the same, but changed—changed and burrowed deep inside the corners of Sasuke's mind—
Where that part of him lived. Fuck.
"Okay," Naruto said. "Deal."
Sasuke passed him his cup and turned away. He pressed his lips to it tight, as if there was something there to comfort him. There wasn't.
He wasn't even going to be able to follow his own advice.
A/N: That's it for day two. More days to come - next month!
See you in December,
- Kinomi