sleep in half the day, just for old times' sake / i won't ask you to wait if you don't ask me to stay / so i'll go back to LA to the so-called friends who write books about me if i ever make it / and wonder about the only soul who can tell which smiles i'm faking / and the heart i know i'm breaking is my own / to leave the warmest bed i've ever known

- 'tis the damn season, taylor swift (evermore)

perhaps this is a small price he has to pay for living this life; this emptiness inside him, that is. and what is it compared to the faded remnants of her broken heart every time he leaves?

"this is the last time, sasuke-kun... i can't do this anymore."

ah, that's right. this is the last time he's leaving her.

he's boarded on the plane now, drinking his expensive champagne on his expensive first-class seat as he feels numb and nothing, waiting to take him home. and where is home, anyway? that wretched land with the blinding lights of cameras outside his building? that cursed city with the million eyes watching his every move? that haunted apartment where a man like him lives in luxury with nothing but a hollow chest because he left his heart somewhere else?

that is not home. it's only a facade he created to not lose face— a stance that doesn't make it seem like he doesn't want to be there, a voice that doesn't sound too nonchalant or too tired of everyone's bullshit, a smile that doesn't look fake for the press and everyone else.

but not to her, though. never to her.

all the pretensions he's got under his sleeves fades away when he's with her because they're all useless anyway. she knows him inside and out; possibly better than he knows himself sometimes.

"we're not doing anything."

"..."

"i- look, i'm sorry sak-"

"you don't have to keep doing this for me, sasuke-kun... you don't have to stay."

"... but i want to."

"i know… you always leave in the end, though."

those little trips back home to her are what kept him sane for the past 5 years he's been working at the limelight. there are shackles holding him down back to where he lives but in his hometown, he's free. and within her arms, he's found liberation.

that's why he keeps on coming back even after that tearful goodbye when they were young and in love— the promise he's made that one day he will come back with success sitting on his shoulders and make her proud; hers with the declaration of her everlasting trust and love, and the sweet seal of her vow to wait for him and for them to finally be together.

he comes back to her for the first time after 2 years of being away. he leaves her for the first time after 2 weeks of being back with her.

he comes back for the second time, then leaves again. comes back, and then leaves.

on and on it goes, this seesaw game they've been playing for the longest time, none of them wanting to get off. they're still trying to get a grip of something to tether them to their love— sasuke begging for time, and sakura grasping for sasuke himself.

until in the end, someone breaks for holding on for too long.

"how long will it be this time? 3 days? a week?"

"..."

"i can only take so much, sasuke-kun… and i have already given you everything you can take for the past 3 years..."

"i know…"

"you know i love you, and i want to be with you…"

"i know..."

"but i can't ask you to stay when i know you won't."

it has been five years since his promise and today he's finally unbound to it. the beautiful girl from his hometown has freed him from her lasting embrace and now he's spiraling somewhere else. to where, he doesn't know. all he knows is the heavy feeling inside him where his heart used to lay, and the cold hard truth seeping through his pores—

he lost himself now that he lost her.

perhaps this is the cost of going after this dream. he sold his soul to the devil of greed and fame and paid the consequences by losing his angel of light. without her, there is no going back home to her worn-out couch where he first kissed her. there is no going back home to her tiny kitchen where he pictured himself being at every morning. there is no going back to her bed, the warmest place he's ever known next to being inside her, where he last made love to her.

"i love you… you know that, right?"

"...i- i know…"

"but i understand, sakura… you don't have to wait for me anymore…"

"..."

"don't cry, please…"

"i'm g-gonna miss you… so much…"

"...i miss you right now."

and as the plane closes and starts to take flight, sasuke looks back.

there is no going back home.

~fin~

a/n: WELCOME TO SSMONTH2021! I AM BACK WITH MY TS BRIDGES BS HAHAHAHA this is gonna be an angst fest, i can feel hmmm thanks for being here!