Itachi was on his way to the training ground when he spotted Hinata perched on the dock at the large pond in the compound, its water lapping at her feet. She wore a blue knee-length dress and a thin white cardigan. Her hair was loose.

He tripped.

Hinata's head tilted to one side at the sound of it; she swung her head around to look. As he was in the middle of regaining his balance. She smiled and waved, beckoned. His legs carried him over automatically.

She shifted on the little wood platform to create a space for him, but the narrow space of wood required their bodies be pressed against each other; he had to tuck his left leg under himself with only the right dangling off. The ripples created by his foot broke the sky's reflection apart. He dry-swallowed. He opened his mouth.

His words surprised him:

"You...look nice."

Her posture tensed. "Oh. Um. Thank you." And relaxed again.

She leaned into him, a bare whisper of shifting weight. Her breathing was soft.

"Do you go cloud-watching?" she murmured, after a bit.

He looked up, at these silver shapes drifting through the blue. "Maybe I should."

She continued, "I think I understand Shikamaru now. He told me, once, that he wanted to become a cloud."

"That lazy Nara kid?" Itachi stifled a laugh. "Sasuke didn't like him very much in school."

Hinata nodded against his shoulder. "He didn't want any responsibilities…"

The ragged edges of one cloud suddenly became his parents' missive, torn apart and hurled into the bottom of a trash bin. Even as his face was angled up, he ripped his eyes away from it. His gaze landed upon her profile. She leaned forward so she could properly meet it.

"What is it?" There was a brittleness to the twist of her mouth, her timbre. "Please don't tell me it's - that it's nothing."

"Do you...do you remember when you asked what I would do? Given the choice?" He forced himself to not look away as he had before.

A silent nod.

"It was a lie." The confession tumbled out. "I don't...know what it would be. What I'd do."

A shaky inhale. He dragged his hands down his face. His palms cradled his forehead, fingers tangling in his bangs. The exhale, a great huff, felt like the draining of pus from an abscess - his shoulders sagged accordingly. He watched her from between his fingers.

"I thought it might have been a lot worse than that," she mumbled. Her cheeks pinkened.

His hands dropped into his lap. He raised an eyebrow. "It could still be." But a smile crept onto his face.

She laughed.


taking a break from working on my original stuff to bang more of this out! as a reminder once more my ao3 is valbino and i have the original fic as published in full on there, if you are wanting to reread that

hope you enjoyed and sorry about being insanely slow about this...

val