Her handwriting is like calligraphy, pressed into the page, kanji swerving this way and that like it is avoiding something, a wind. She writes quickly, the pen between her fingers flowing across the page along with her words. A few strands of hair fall away from the messily tucked bun and hide her face from the world, so intent on its writing.
She feels his approach as much as she hears the rain on the windows outside or smells the scent of incense and candles and scrolls and tea that scatters her desk. She ignores his entrance, even when he sinks into one of the chairs, instead reaching for a blank scroll, setting the other one out to dry.
They sit like that for a while, with her writing away the mindless nothings about missing nins and medical issues and food supplies, while he watches her, making no sound. She wants to scream, can feel it building up inside her. Why didn't he act like others would have in his situation? Angry, furious even? Sad, maybe?
She can barely dodge his hand as it reaches out for her wrist. She holds it to herself, almost as though she were scalded and barely manages to whisper "Please don't touch me."
The rest of her hair has fallen out of the messy bun, and she brushes it back nonchalantly, letting it fall down her back and pool over the seat of the chair. His eyes watch her, sharp as ever.
"You didn't tell me." He said it flatly, his voice breaking the silence like a hammer on glass.
"No." Her own voice is quieter, calmer; there is no hint of emotion behind hers, while his seems to be bordering on hysterical. "I didn't want you to know."
"Why not?" He stands and begins to pace. The sound of his footsteps beats into her brain, thumping along with her heartbeat.
"You wouldn't have let me go." The statement hangs in the air.
He turns, a whirling wind of fury and confusion. "Of course I wouldn't have! What part of suicide mission do you not get? You could have died!" He slams his hands onto her desk, almost knocking over her ink.
"I'm alive, aren't I?" She is tired; she doesn't want to have this fight.
"Why do you do this to me?" His voice changed; it now sounded wrenched, heartbroken.
"Do what?" She looks at him sharply, her emerald eyes appraising him. "Do what, Naruto?"
"Why don't you let me love you? Why do you go and try to throw your life away? It doesn't make sense? Do you want to die? Is that it? I'm not good enough? Well then, who is? The Hyuuga? Uchiha? Or maybe you like Naras better Or it could even be Gaara!"
She hisses when he says the Kazekage's name and one hand reaches up to her shoulder, where the word sand is tattooed into her flesh. Naruto's eyes widen.
"It is him! You're still in love with the Sandman." He sounds dead; his face has fallen. "I thought that it was over between you, but it wasn't. No one in this village was good enough for you, so you went to him, and now he's gone. Get over it, Sakura. There are some here that can still love you."
She is trembling even as he mentions Gaara, talks about him like this. She has never heard him this hurt, this betrayed. "You can't just give up love, Naruto," she whispers, her voice hoarse. "It's not that easy."
"If I died, would you love me?"
Her eyes flash. "Don't say that!"
"Then say you love me."
"Naruto, we both agreed that it was over—"
"You can't just give up love," he says, stealing her words and throwing them back at her. "I never stopped loving you, and I never will. Do you love me or not? Because no matter what you say, Sakura, I will still love you. Forever." He pounds the desk, as though to prove it.
She feels choked; she can't breathe. She feared this, feared this as much as she feared her love with Gaara. How could she tell him when she had no answer? Sakura feels tears, but refuses to let them fall. Instead she stares at her writing, the curving symbols written in her own ink, on thick smooth paper.
She hears the door slam and his footsteps fade away. She knows that now he will go and challenge Sasuke to training and waste away his anger and pain. She knows that he will smolder and probably come back, come back to try to make words come that she can't say, because once again her soul is locked to one man, only this man is dead and can't ever make her stop loving him.
Her writing swims in her own tears as she tries to numb the pain, to cry it all away.
Her life is like her calligraphy; spinning away gracefully, waiting to fall and break when it hits the last page.