Knitting Fate
Second installment in Canon Patchworking with Uchiha Ren series
Eleventh Thread
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This chapter has been beta'd for you by hestia8639. Thanks a lot!
Official beta'd version posted 04.08.2017
"People tend to complicate their own lives, as if living weren't already complicated enough."
― Carlos Ruiz Zafón, The Shadow of the Wind
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They're wary of her. Of them. Of course they are – what civilians in their right minds would not be wary of child killing machines-in-training? They perhaps think they hide it well, but that thinking only makes Ren feel like laughing like a hyena on a big dose of laughing gas.
Mebuki does that with the distance of a civilian woman, borderline hostile. She spares short glances in their direction – mainly Ren, Hana and Naruto's – when she thinks they won't notice. Naruto might not, the airhead he is, but everyone else? They do. Better yet, Ren and Hana practically feel it. Kizashi, on the other hand, does it with the grace of a man who never really made it past genin. Almost-chūnin, but not quite there. He's harder to notice, but they do fairly soon.
And Ren isn't exactly in the mood to be a victim of those weary, distrustful glances. Not with the way her muscles ache, dull and distant but present, stained from having to support additional weight. But she still sits, perfectly straight, and smiles, gently, politely and perfectly fake when Mebuki offers her a cup of tea.
(It's not much different, she concludes, from when Renee would visit her family home. It's, in fact, similar enough to cause barely-hidden annoyance and resentment. She's dead to that world, but Sakura is in a similar situation as Renee once was. And she's even more determined to help the girl now.)
"They don't like us here," Hana says to her quietly, when both parents leave them alone for a while in the living room, with the table full of sweets.
"No, Hana," Ren shakes her head. "They don't like the fact that Sakura isn't joking about becoming a ninja."
"This bad?" the Inuzuka heiress asks, glancing at the pinkette.
"I heard her mother say, few days ago, that she will have hard time finding a suitable husband if she's too muscled," Ren whispers back, so quiet that she barely hears herself, but she trusts Hana's doglike ears. She hears and nods.
Ren sighs heavily and looks at the pinkette. Sakura is in the process of eagerly explaining something to nearly all the children invited, but visibly focuses on Hinata. Shikamaru is pretending to be napping on the side, but it's easy to notice that he's actually paying attention. Naruto and Kiba, however, have literal sparkles in her eyes.
"Do they even realize that their daughter invited over the majority of the future clan heirs, and they actually came?" Hana asks, and Ren hums, because the other girl is right. Two Inuzuka, both children of the current Clan Head, two Uchiha, the only ones that are still alive and with Konoha, the Nara, Akimichi, Hyūga clan heirs, and an Uzumaki. Most of the people who would become important in ten to twenty years in the future.
"I don't think they do," Ren whispers back. "And even if they do, I don't think they care."
That is as painfully honest as it is true.
Ren is honestly very, very, very fucking angry right now. And why? Well, that is painfully simple – Mebuki has refused her third serving of (delicious!) cake because a lady should take care. And if it weren't for Hana and Sasuke holding her down, she would have already lashed out at the woman and told her just exactly how much of a lady there is in Ren, and will ever be. But the real icing on the cake (pun very much intended) is the fact that Mebuki refuses to let Sakura eat more than one serving – quite a bit smaller than that of anyone else.
"You see, Sakura, it's very easy to gain weight when you eat sweets like this," Mebuki says with a smile, taking the plate from her daughter, who looks quite a bit unhappy and, much to Ren's amusement and very little to anyone's surprise, it's Choji who speaks up.
"I'm sorry, miss, but I don't think she'll gain much weight from one piece," the boy says from above his plate, where he is right about to finish his second serving. "Especially with such good cake."
Mebuki presses her lips into a thin line, and looks at the boy. "I do believe that I am the one who knows what's best for my child," she says, and, actually, it's Hana who snorts and throws herself back on her chair.
"Starving your daughter like a civilian when she's training to become a ninja is knowing what's best for her?" the Inuzuka heiress asks, and doesn't miss how the Haruno matron sends her quite a judging look.
"She will grow out of it!" Mebuki says, having visibly forgotten that there are many other people witnessing the exchange. "And she won't be able to marry well if she scares the boy away!"
Hana is already opening her mouth to say something, but then, out of the blue, Sakura cuts in: "but I like girls better!" and promptly clasps her hands on her mouth under the utterly shocked gaze of her mother. There's silence, as every other person looks at the pinkette, and then Mebuki growls.
"You'll grow out of it, too!" she yells, and Sakura whimpers, and Ren cuts in, because she will not listen to her bashing the girl, who's grown on her quite a bit. (And also because Mebuki had Sakura at age seventeen or something and is barely in her mid-twenties, and also, Ren is so very fucking done with hearing lectures from people younger than her who have seen absolutely nothing. Period.)
"When I look at this girl, do you know what I see?" she says, voice firm and allowing her chakra, hot and dangerous like the fire it can turn into on a whim, lined with anger, to bleed through her skin. The world sharpens, too, and she sees Mebuki's face grow a few shades paler, as she stares into the blood red orbs of the sharingan, arguably the creepiest Blood Limit there is. Ren raises from her seat, and crosses her hands. "I see a girl with passion. A girl with a cause. Not a child who wishes to be a ninja just because it's cool – I see a girl who wishes to become a ninja because she is inspired to do so. A girl who, frankly, can make it much farther than her father. I see raw talent, a rock – ragged and rough and tattered which, if polished in time, will reveal a gem that just might amaze everyone. I see a girl with a cause, who will have her name written down in history, perhaps even more than others!"
"This is not…" Mebuki starts, but Ren cuts her off with a motion of a hand. She is thirty-two with some experience in life (or so she likes to think) for crying out loud! She will not be interrupted by her grandmother an old-fashioned woman who only thinks about herself, about fulfilling her dreams through the child she's supposed to support through thick and thin!
"I don't care what you think!" she hisses. "Because you know what I also see? I see a woman, trapped in her own mind, in her own dreams, trying to force them on her child! On her child which she ought to support through thick and thin! On her child, from whose successes, no matter what they are, she's ought to praise!"
(Because I was the same!, she cries in her mind, and because I will not let you ruin Sakura's life like my grandmother almost did mine!
Because even if she succeeds, her grandmother did, too, in turning Ren into a selfish, arrogant, money-oriented sociopath.)
"That being said, wake. The. Fuck. UP!" Ren roars, slamming her fists on the table. "Grow up, like you are supposed to, and care for your daughter like a mother is supposed to!"
"And what can you know about raising a child?!" Mebuki shrieks then, still pale and frightened, but also angry.
"Nothing," Ren shakes her hand. "But I know exactly how it is to be raised like that. Like you raise her. And I know that all that awaits at the end of that road is resentment, grudges, and even hatred. All directed towards the parent who fails to see their child as their own person instead of a tool to fulfill their dreams."
"I… I don't…" Mebuki starts.
"You do," Kizashi counters, standing by the doorframe. She snaps at him, surprised and already opening her mouth, but he's faster; "I tried to tell you, dear, but you fail to understand. I… I made only genin because my mother got crippled on a mission and her resentment towards ninja grew, and her husband was a civilian. I… I always wanted to make it to at least chūnin, you know, but they held me down. Tried to talk me out of it, and succeeded – and I was so stupid to actually listen to them! I tried to talk to you about it, but you never listen. And, Ren is right, you know. I never once spoke to my parents since our wedding day, because I blame them for my failure. Because if only they supported me… If only they were there for me, instead of trying to convince me otherwise…!"
The man stops, only to prevent himself from choking on his tears. Sakura is crying, too- but then, the only ones who aren't crying are Shikamaru, Sasuke, Hana, and Ren.
"I forgot how it is, but Ren-san here… She reminded me, of all I felt as a child. I wanted to be a ninja so bad, maybe even become an ANBU one day!" he gasps. "But now, to think that Sakura could feel about me, about us, the same way that I think about my parents? It hurts, Mebuki."
"You hate your parents," Mebuki sniffs. "Even when they greet you on the street, you pretend you don't see them. And when they visit, you hide away and pretend you're not here… Dear, I-" she turns and looks at Ren. "Would Sakura, truly…?"
"Yes," Ren nods.
"No!" the pinkette disagrees.
"I thought the same when I was your age, too," Ren sighs. "And then I didn't anymore, because I grew up, matured, and opened my eyes. And all I saw was my family trying to force me into a role that I was neither willing nor meant to play."
She is Ren now, but she would never forget how it was and what it meant to be Renee. How it felt, being forced to run half a country, if only to escape clutches of the Archer Matron. How she doesn't even miss them at all.
Then, there were presents.
Naruto, it seems, feels like giving people plush toys would solve all the world's problems – the best part of this way of thinking is that he might not be entirely wrong. So, he gave Sakura a pink plush pudgy, one-piece cat. Kiba thought it a good idea apparently, and thus brought Sakura a matching, pudgy, blue dog that looks distinctly like a shiba-inu.
Shikamaru, apparently having thinking it oh so very clever, gives Sakura a small sakura bonsai. Or maybe he is just so lazy that he chose to give the girl the source of her name – or both, perhaps. Choji, because he and the Nara apparently do everything together, gifted her a thick book on bonsai and garden overall – with a great deal of herbology within it.
Hinata, still not entirely sure as to what she is doing there with all those children who aren't ignoring her as per usual, brought Sakura an empty album, with hopes that the pinkette would fill it with her favorite memories.
Hana, following Ren's subtle advice, decides to give Sakura her old scrolls on basic Chakra Control and even more basic Med-Jutsu. Not much, just pain soothers and ways to heal small bruises and papercuts, scrolls Hana has long since read, memorized and learned, but Sakura's eyes light up nonetheless, making Ren all too smug about subtly pushing the girl in the right direction.
Lastly, the gift from both Uchihas is a full ninja-suitable attire. Because, honestly, the girly and tight clothes the girl usually wore, all pastel pink, blue, and yellow, mixing rather oddly with her hair color, usually end up torn or dirtied beyond what normal materials could recover from. So a few days back, Ren took Sasuke to the ninja part of shopping district and had him try on various dresses, causing the owner and assistants to coo and fawn over the boy – his figure is very much like Sakura's, even if he is slightly shorter now, and in the end they manage to choose – a Qi-Pao, cherry-colored, sleeveless and trimmed with white, reaching just above the girl's knees, and white pants ending mid-calf and rather form fitting. Quite an odd mixture between Pre-Shippuuden dress and Boruto: The Movie pants, but the pinkette looks nice in it.
And, most importantly, it is made out of the special material most ninja clothes are made of – easily cleaned even from the worst, and absolutely immune to any accidental tears and holes.
But the best part is when Mebuki looks at her daughter after the girl changed – it is so very apparent that she had been absolutely convinced that there is no way for kunoichi to actually look pretty in ninja clothing.
They leave when it's already dark and Ren with Hana agreed to walk everyone home, one by one. However, just before they depart, Sakura latches onto Ren and locks her in a, maybe not bone-crushing, but already very strong embrace.
"Thank you," the pinkette whispers, "for telling mom."
"'s okay, kid," she sighs, patting the girl's head. "I know how awful it is when your own mother tells you that your dreams are dumb and you should focus on 'reality', just because she thinks she knows what matters."
"You do?"
"Yeah. And I really wouldn't want you to end up like me."
"But…" Sakura whispers. "But your mom is…"
"Dead?" Ren asks, and then snorts. "You see, grudges like these go past the grave. I will never see any of them again, and somehow… somehow I'm just happy they can't reach me here."
It's not like her mother is dead, not that she actually admits it. But the fact that there is little-to-no chance of her meeting her family ever again? Her 'real' family? That is true. She is just happy she is here without them. Without their venom.
"Ren, get a move on or we'll leave without you!" Hana calls, and the Uchiha just rolls her eyes, prying the pinkette off of her.
"Remember today, okay?" she says. "And if your mom starts being dumb again, talk to her, or to your dad, or to me. Okay?"
"Okay! Thanks, for today. Really."
"Ren!"
"Oh sweet Jashin, coming! Bye, kid."
Sakura just smiles widely, and waves.