Sakura felt Sasuke freeze for a second. Then, he tilted his head slightly. The kiss was soft, chaste, innocent. But everything and more she had ever dreamed of. She slowly pulled away, eyes remaining shut for a moment longer. She drew her hand back from his cheek and held it against her chest. The drumming of her heart seemed to be echoed in every cell of her body.
Her eyes were still closed as she felt Sasuke press another kiss to the corner of her mouth before he pulled away completely. She opened her eyes. His cheeks were dusted red, so were the tips of his ears, and he was looking at her lips, gaze contemplating. He looked so handsome, Sakura felt her stomach flutter.
Sakura never wanted their time together to end. But she knew it had to.
"I have an early shift at the hospital tomorrow," she murmured.
Sasuke nodded. She led him to the front door where he put on his shoes.
"Sasuke-kun, I…" love you, she wanted to say. But what was the point? He was leaving in two days and she was sure he was well aware of her feelings. "Goodnight," she smiled.
"Goodnight," he let his gaze linger on her before slipping out the door.
–––
The dreaded day had come. In a few short hours, Sasuke would be leaving. For how long? Sasuke himself didn't even know. Sakura was happy for him, she was. She knew he needed to do this, for his own peace of mind. But she was going to miss him, terribly so. Secretly, she hoped he would miss her too.
The April weather was nice and warm, the sun was caressing her cheeks and she knew her freckles would be appearing soon. Sakura was walking toward the main gates, to see Sasuke off on his journey. Maybe attempt to pursue him to stay, or to take her with him again… She hadn't decided yet.
Kakashi joined her at the gates but Naruto was nowhere to be seen. Where was he? It's not like him to miss saying goodbye to his best friend. "Sensei? Have you seen Naruto? It's not like him not to show up, especially to something like this…"
"I'm sure he won't let Sasuke leave without saying goodbye," Kakashi gave her a reassuring look.
Sakura nodded and laced her hands behind her back, shifting from one nervous foot to the other. She saw a figure dressed in all black approaching at a leisurely pace. Her breath hitched. Even from a distance, Sasuke seemed magnificent. She would miss seeing his prideful gait and haughty looks, his nonchalant hns and private smiles.
They hadn't talked about the kiss. Sakura wasn't sure if she wanted to. She felt that they had an understanding, even before the kiss. Not a commitment per se, she had a feeling Sasuke was not ready for that. She also knew he would never directly ask her or expect her to wait for him but they both knew she would. They both would.
"Sasuke," Kakashi greeted him.
"Kakashi," he nodded at him. He shifted his gaze to Sakura, with an unreadable look in his eyes. "Sakura."
"Hey, Sasuke-kun," she smiled a small, weak smile. He really was leaving.
Kakashi talked to Sasuke for a bit, well more like lectured him. Not that Sasuke had ever cared much for lectures. "So try to keep yourself under control, huh? Because it'll be my ass on the line," Kakashi finished his little speech.
"Yeah… sorry," Sasuke said.
Sakura's heart was clenching in her chest. She had been preparing for the moment that he would leave her again, she thought she would be okay. However, seeing him now, in his full travel gear, at the gates, she didn't want him to go.
"You're really going, aren't you?" She asked. More of a realization than a question. She knew she was grasping at straws, but she decided it would be worth a try. "Tsunade-shishou is almost done with the prosthetics…"
"Right now, I need to see this ninja world for myself… I need to know what kind of state the world is in," he said. And Sakura knew that of course, she just wanted to keep him to herself. Just a little longer. "I feel like I'll be finally able to see all the things I've overlooked before… if I don't seize this opportunity… I might miss my chance to see with this kind of clarity again… On top of that, a few things have been on my mind…"
Sakura did not expect such an elaborate answer. Especially because they had discussed this in the previous weeks. Whenever she asked about his plans, where he would go, what he would do. She knew he wanted to make things right. To help people. To redeem himself most of all. So he would be worthy. He'd never say, but she had a feeling he didn't feel worthy of her, her love, of Team 7's acceptance and forgiveness. But he wanted to be and this would be the way.
"Are you sure I can't go with you?" Sakura knew the answer to that as well, of course.
"My sins have nothing to do with you," he responded curtly. Sakura cast her eyes upon the ground in defeat. She knew he would say no, but she'd never expected him to put it like that… Suddenly, she felt two fingers gently grazing her forehead. Heat rushed to her chest, her neck, her face. She looked up from the ground with wide eyes.
Sasuke looked at her softly. "Maybe next time." And then, in a voice even lower, meant just for her: "And thank you."
Sakura's cheeks grew impossibly warmer. And he was off. Figure growing smaller and smaller as the distance between them grew bigger and bigger.
"You might want to put some ice on your face," Kakashi spoke up helpfully.
"Don't you have some important Hokage business to attend to?" Sakura fisted her hands.
–––
After Sasuke's departure, the days were slow, but the weeks seemed to pass by quickly. Sakura busied herself with the development of the clinic, as well as pulling double shifts at the hospital. Naruto and Ino worried about her, but Sai helpfully told them that "Ugly is depressed because she lost her romantic interest again." Sakura punched him through two walls, which Kakashi made her pay for later. He gave her a serious scolding that she needed to control her anger better and that she couldn't just go around punching people, just because she could heal them immediately after.
She was especially moody on Sasuke's birthday. He had been traveling in the Land of Wind, and she had sent him a poncho, hoping it would offer him some extra warmth on cold nights. She sat in her bedroom window that night, looking at the crescent moon, wishing it could be her to provide him warmth.
By the end of summer, the walls of the first floor of the clinic were standing and Sakura was given the green light to start training medics. Both Ino and Hinata were interested in helping the children and an experienced doctor from the hospital, Kenta, also approached Sakura with interest in transferring there, once it was up and running. It was them that Sakura trained first.
The training was very intense because Sakura was eager to have them proficient enough so they could train new applicants as well. They were fast learners and Sakura was as excellent a teacher as she was rigorous and strict. They were trained within two months. Two months of ten-hour days and little breaks, of sweat and tears and cursing and success.
Sakura was looking over applications one day, sorting it onto three piles: yes, no, and maybe. She was looking over a young medic's file, carefully considering if she should put her in the yes pile or the maybe pile, when suddenly, a falcon knocked on her office window. Sakura quickly dropped the file in the maybe pile and jumped to the windowsill, to the roof, and raced to the Hokage Tower.
She was sent on a mission. There was a jailbreak suspected to happen, and an airship had been taken down, and there were many injured. She raced with a group of medics to the scene and collected those who had – one way or another – left the airship. She healed them, as well as any injured personnel she encountered. She recounted no casualties in her mission report. Another day had passed by without Sasuke.
She thought about how this was the first time she'd left the village gates since the war. She decided to send Sasuke a letter and detail her amazing skills and tell him about how strange it had felt to be outside of Konoha for the first time in such a long time.
Sasuke's reply came a few weeks later. He told her that he would expect no less, considering her expertise in medical jutsu. He wrote to her about a cave he'd encountered in the Land of Waves, hidden behind three grand waterfalls. There was some sort of rare crystals lining the cave's ceiling, which apparently reflected his torches light in a green hue similar to that of her eyes. He asked how the clinic was coming along.
Their somewhat sporadic letters had been, at times, sort of awkward. They had never corresponded before, and Sasuke wasn't a great conversationalist to begin with. Her letters were always much longer than she supposed was necessary, rambling on about one thing or the other, asking about how he was, if his arm was doing alright, about the places he's seen, always signed: love, Sakura.
His letters, in contrast, were much shorter. He answered all her questions curtly, but carefully. Every now and again he'd offer up additional information, sometimes he'd even include a flower or plant that was foreign to Konoha, and he'd always inquire about her well-being, about how the clinic was going, and sometimes if she'd eaten anything other than takeout.
The new year came and Sakura was told that the clinic could open as soon as the beginning of April. The news provided her with some much-needed positivity. The winter had been lonely and depressing without Sasuke there. Sakura divided her time between working and her friends, and some days went by so fast, filled with fun and laughter, that she barely noticed the empty space in her chest. But some other days, she'd sit on her bed, wrapped in blankets that could never warm up the cold that came from within. She would take the hairpiece Sasuke had gifted her and run her fingers over the pretty stones.
When she received the happy news, she went straight to her office, a new spring in her step. She went through the pile of applicants she had approved of and separated them into four groups. She took out scrolls and ink from a drawer and started writing to the lucky applicants that Ino, Hinata, Kenta and herself would start their training in a week and half.
Sakura turned nineteen. She went home from the celebration with her friends to find a hawk perched on her doorknob.
Sakura.
Happy birthday. Here's something you can use to either end a life or save one.
Sasuke.
He had sent her a plant she had never seen before. She spent hours in the library's botany section, before she finally found it. It was a rare plant, growing only on some mountainsides in the Land of Lightning.
The clinic opened and the transferring of the children from the children's ward was quite the task. But the rooms were bigger, with brighter light as they faced south-west, rather than east, and there was an outdoor space for activities with the children. They seemed to be happy, and in turn, Sakura felt very content as well.
A month after the clinic's opening, Sakura started going through the maybe pile. They most definitely needed more staff. The requests for treatment were piling up, and while there was room to house more children, medics that could treat them were running thin on time. Sakura appointed Ino to oversee the training of the new medics, with Mai and Sora – two of their most outstanding students – helping her.
"Alright, so these are the applicants that didn't make it to the first round, but I was considering," Sakura laid out the files in front of the others. "I was thinking we should narrow it down to twelve people, that way each of you get four people to mentor. I think that should be manageable, right?" They nodded in silent agreement. "Okay, let's divide the files into four and look through them. Put those that are a definite yes in the middle of the table."
Two hours went by in silence, only interrupted by the sound of paper turning, the leg of a chair squeaking here and there, and files being shuffled or dropped in their designated places. Another hour and a half went by before they decided on the final twelve people.
"Gosh, I'm starving!" Ino groaned. "I thought we'd never be done!"
"How about I buy you guys dinner?" Sakura offered. "It's only fair since I made you stay way past your shifts. Sorry about that, by the way."
"You know I love a free dinner," Ino grinned and stood up.
"Sora, Mai? Join us, please?" Sakura smiled at them.
"Are you sure, Sakura-san?" Sora asked. "I don't want to be any trouble." Sora was a very shy boy, Sakura had come to learn. He was excellent with children, and liked to spend even his free time at the clinic, reading to the children or teaching them how to do origami. He also had a huge crush on Ino, though Sakura doubted he'd ever muster up the courage to talk to the boisterous blonde about anything non-work-related.
"Oh, please," Sakura waved a hand. "It's no trouble at all. We all need to eat, after all. I insist," she looked at Mai.
"Alright, Sakura-san," Mai smiled.
They settled into a booth at a restaurant Ino had picked. A young server with black hair and black eyes came to take their orders and Sakura felt her heart pang. "Hey, Forehead, are you buying drinks as well?"
Sakura rolled her eyes. "Sure, why not? But you need to promise not to force anyone to drink against their will," Sakura pointed a finger at Ino. The blonde had been infamous for pursuing people into drinking game since her eighteenth birthday.
"Fine," Ino narrowed her eyes at her. She then turned to the server, smiling slyly. "We'll have a bottle of your finest sake."
The server looked at Sakura, an unsure expression clearly settling on his face. Sakura groaned internally. "I think we'll just start with one cup each," she smiled at him. "That is, if you guys want any," Sakura looked at Mai and Saro questioningly. Mai nodded, but Saro had an uncomfortable look in his eyes. "We'll have three cups, then," Sakura told the waiter.
"But–"
"Ino, I said no pressuring!"
"Fine," Ino crossed her arms over her chest, pouting.
During dinner, they talked about how they were finding work at the clinic, funny things the children had said, and some past missions. Mai was in the middle of telling the story of how, during her first chuunin exams, one of her teammates sat up booby traps around their campsite for the night. In the middle of the night, Mai really needed to pee, but she just couldn't go when she knew her teammates' heads were right on the other side of the bush, so she went to leave and got caught in one of the traps. Not only that, but by the time her teammates got her down from the trap, she had to go so badly that she just told them to turn around and went right then and there.
Ino had tears rolling down her face, she was laughing so hard at the story. Of course, she would have found anything funny with how much sake she'd consumed.
"Sakura! What a surprise!" Came a voice from beside their booth. "You're not seen out much these days, running a hospital and a clinic! It's good to see you out of that white lab coat for once," said the young man. Haru, was an old civilian patient of Sakura's. He was a construction worker who had fallen down from a roof and broke his collarbone, fractured a shoulder blade and some ribs.
"Haru," Sakura smiled politely. Ino narrowed her eyes at Haru in scrutiny. "How are you? I hope that shoulder is working just fine."
"Yeah, yeah, it's great. I've been considering falling off another building, though, just to see you," his lips tugged upward on one side. "Can I buy you a drink?"
"Actually," Ino interrupted. "Do you mind? We're in the middle of a serious work business discussion meeting," she tried to sound professional. Sakura sighed, she ought not to let Ino drink more than two or three cups of sake.
"Sorry, but I think I better take my very professional business discussion meeting partner home," Sakura declined his offer. Not that she would have accepted it anyway.
"Maybe another time, then?" Haru asked.
"Yeah, maybe." Haru walked to the bar and Sakura waved over their server.
"See you guys tomorrow," Sakura smiled at Mai and Saro, who were headed in the opposite direction. Ino was leaning against Sakura and looked about ready to pass out.
"Come on, Pig," Sakura adjusted her grip on her friend. "Wanna sleep at my place?" Ino grunted.
They walked in silence back to Sakura's apartment. Once they were there, Sakura took Ino to her bedroom and undressed her carefully, then put one of her own shirts on her. She tucked her into bed and went to wash up.
She returned to her bedroom with two glasses of water. She expected Ino to already by passed out, but as she sat the glass down on the nightstand, Ino spoke up.
"He was flirting with you, you know."
"What are you talking about?" Sakura settled into bed next to her.
"That guy at the restaurant. The one who wanted to buy you a drink," Ino mumbled. "He was flirting with you."
"No, he wasn't. He's just an old patient. Probably just wanted to thank me," Sakura pulled the covers over her, and turned toward Ino.
"Old patients don't offer to throw themselves off buildings just to see you," Ino pointed out and shifted to face Sakura as well.
"He was just exaggerating."
"Yeah, sure. But that's still an unusual thing to say," Ino yawned. "Are you really going to just wait for him?" She asked after a few minutes of silence.
Sakura opened one of her eyes, confused. "What do you mean? Wait for him to fall down a building?"
"Forehead, you can be so thick sometimes," Sakura opened both eyes, just so she could glare at Ino. "I meant Sasuke. Are you going to wait for him until he comes back? Whenever that is?"
"Yeah."
"Do you still love him that much?"
"Yes."
"Do you think he loves you?"
The silence hung heavy in the air. Sakura thought about the time spent with Sasuke before his departure. About making dinner with him, training with him, spending hours and hours in the Uchiha library, the presents he'd given her, the forehead pokes, the tender gazes, the small smiles and the private but not-so-rare laughs. The kiss. The promise of next time.
"Yeah…"
