Naruto looked around the bar awkwardly before perching on a bar stool. The bar was almost deserted; a couple drunkenly fell together in some semblance of dancing near a speaker that droned with melancholy love songs. Another couple engaged in rapt conversation at the bar, their foreheads nearly touching. Naruto would have felt even more out of place than he did had a single man not sat alone two seats away from him at the bar, his head bowed in contemplation over his drink.
He couldn't decide whether he liked the idea of a bar without a crowd or not. On one hand, it was nice not to worry that he might run into one of his or Hinata's friends; on the other, crowds sometimes offered anonymity that a less populous environment could not.
Can't decide. How very out of character.
He grit his teeth in annoyance at his inner voice.
He waved the bartender down and asked for a beer. He had a whole new life to get used to; some alcohol to lubricate the shifting cogs could not go amiss.
He took a swig from his glass and grimaced. It was the worst beer he had ever tasted in his life, weak, lifeless, with the aftertaste of watermelon rind. He peered into the glass, dismayed to see some cloudy particulate settling at the bottom of the foaming beverage.
The bartender, sadly, was now at the opposite end of the bar, engaged in intimate conversation with the chatting couple Naruto had seen earlier.
"Hey," he said, to the lone man sitting nearest him.
The man slowly turned his face towards Naruto, scowling as he did so. His facial expression gave Naruto pause, it was so forbidding and irritable. Not only that, Naruto realized that the man was actually shockingly… beautiful. His hair was so black that it was almost blue. Large, dark eyes peered from the most perfect skin Naruto had ever witnessed in person. His features were symmetrical and well-defined; he was the very definition of beauty.
"Did you have something to say?" the man asked him pointedly. Naruto blushed, aware that he'd been staring.
"Hey, are all their beers this miserable?" Naruto asked him, holding up the suspicious-looking beverage. "This is some grim shit."
"I wouldn't know," the stranger answered. "I don't drink beer."
Naruto looked at the man's glass—whiskey, neat.
"Looks like I'm not, tonight, either," Naruto mumbled.
The corner of the man's mouth quirked upwards.
"That's what you get for actually ordering beer in a craft beer bar," he said.
The joke took a moment to catch on, but when it did, Naruto laughed loudly.
"Too bad it's the only bar open on a Monday night in this town," he said.
The man smirked again. "Hn. Too bad."
Naruto turned dejectedly back to his disappointing beer. Soon, though, he was uncomfortably aware of being stared at. Glancing up, he noticed the dark haired man peering at him quizzically.
"Are you actually going to sit and drink that shit when you don't want it?" he asked.
"Looks like the bartender is otherwise engaged," Naruto replied, jerking his head towards the end of the bar where the bartender continued his discussion with the couple there.
The dark eyes narrowed. "You're a patron. It's his job to make sure his customers have what they need."
"Meh," Naruto murmured. "I don't want to cause any trouble."
The man rolled his eyes before swiveling around and clearing his throat loudly.
The bartender glanced towards the opposite end of the bar before continuing his conversation. To Naruto's horror, the dark-eyed man raised his glass before lowering it loudly to the surface of the bar. The bartender immediately jerked his head up, straightening his back and glaring at the man.
He sauntered back over towards the man.
"Did you need something?" he snapped.
"One of your patrons finds this swill from the tap undrinkable," the man answered smoothly. He swept Naruto's beverage up and held it in front of the bartender's face.
"That is an artisanal beer," the bartender bit back. The bartender's attitude hit Naruto the wrong way; his native temper flared up despite the reticence with which he'd come out. He would have snapped back, but the interplay between the handsome, dark-haired man and the pallid hipster behind the bar was riveting. The bartender glared at the man through narrowed eyes, or attempted to, anyway; the dark haired stranger held his gaze dispassionately. Naruto shuddered at the thought of those dark, intense eyes staring him down in defiance.
"Hn. Artisanal," the man snorted derisively. "This is why some arts, rightfully, die."
Naruto guffawed.
"Would you like anything else?" the bartender ground out.
"Ask him. He's the one who was served what looks like day-old piss," the man answered caustically, nodding his head at Naruto.
"Yes, sir?" the bartender asked irritably, turning his head towards Naruto.
The exchange had stirred something up inside of Naruto, pushing back his indecision and restoring his balance. "Gimme a scotch," he said, "Neat. Oldest one you have."
The bartender rolled his eyes before turning his back on Naruto and his companion to pour Naruto's drink. He set it in front of Naruto resentfully before returning to the other end of the bar.
"Day-old piss," Naruto chuckled as he downed the amber liquid hastily.
The man to his left raised one eyebrow and gave the ghost of a smirk. "Did you have a better description?"
Naruto laughed, feeling the liquor warm his belly. "That pretty well paints the picture."
He felt irrationally proud when he caught the ghost of a smile flit over his new acquaintance's features, then felt strangely bereft when the man turned his head away to focus on his own glass.
"Oi! Bartender!" Naruto barked. The bartender detached from his friends and sauntered lazily back towards Naruto.
"You ready for your tab?" he intoned.
"Tab? What the hell? No. I've had one drink, because that shit you put in front of me the first time didn't count and you won't be charging me for it. Bring me another scotch, and bring the gentleman to my left another of whatever he was having."
He slid from his seat and took the one immediately to the right of the dark gentleman.
The man gave no sign of having noticed Naruto's change in seating, continuing to stare down into his drink, his dark hair falling forward to obscure most of his face. Naruto studied him, noting how his hair naturally fell into spiky cowlicks despite looking incredibly silky. He could only see the man's jawline from this angle, but he scrutinized it, nonetheless; he looked as if he had been chiseled out of marble by an exceptional sculptor. Naruto felt a pang of sadness as he realized that the man's perfect lips were turned downward, which, paired with the man's dark hair and his similarly black attire, gave him a tragic, melancholic air.
Throughout his life, Naruto had found himself drawn in over and over again by the sadness he found within others. It grounded him, preventing him from feeling singled out by his own difficulties, but it also had given him a sense of purpose. He had always sought to bring happiness to those he met. He had also worked, in his own way, to try to rid the world of sadness.
Been a bang-up success at that. He winced as his inner critic exploited his Achilles' Heel.
The bartender returned with his whiskey, which he downed as quickly has he had before. He couldn't stand that voice, not tonight.
"I didn't order this," the man next to him spat, rousing Naruto from his mental self-flagellation.
"Your friend ordered it for you," the hipster bartender huffed. "Take it up with him."
Naruto felt the blood rise to his face as black eyes looked at him questioningly.
"Uh, thanks, you know, for sending that nasty beer back. I'm usually good at standing up for myself, but, I dunno, tonight's weird..."
He gulped as the onyx eyes roamed over his face.
"You…" said the man, "are very bright." The way he said it didn't sound like a compliment.
"Uh, wow, that's different," Naruto laughed nervously. "No one's ever accused me of being bright."
"Not mentally, obviously," the stranger drawled. "I mean, you are literally garish, from that preternatural shade of blond hair to that orange get-up you're wearing. Do you have to wear that for your job? I've never seen anyone over the age of five wear that shade of orange."
Naruto chuckled, feeling a bit tipsy. "Coming from Lord Bat the Goth Father, that's pretty funny," he jabbed, feeling proud of himself for the come-back. The black eyes continued to appraise him disinterestedly. "What's your name, anyway? I mean, I can call you Lord Bat Goth Father all night, but it's kind of a mouthful."
"You won't be calling me anything all night," the man retorted icily. "One of the benefits of frequenting a bar on a Monday night is avoiding the companionship of drunken jack-o-lanterns."
Naruto felt irritation building alongside fascination.
Without blinking, or shifting his gaze, he continued to stare into the obsidian eyes as he lifted his empty glass and shouted for the bartender once more.
"What's your name?" Naruto asked again.
The man rolled his eyes. "Sasuke," he answered after a long pause.
"Nice to meet you, Sasuke," Naruto said, finding the syllables pleasant on his tongue.
"You're drinking a lot, what's-your-name," Sasuke said, when Naruto's refill arrived. "And you're drinking fast. You should maybe ease up."
"I don't know what it is to you," Naruto muttered. "And the name's Naruto."
Another smile ghosted across Sasuke's beautiful face.
"Naruto? Are you serious? Are you named for the straits or for the fish cake?" he asked teasingly.
Naruto dispatched his third whiskey to the same swift fate as its predecessors.
"I don't know. I'd ask my mom, but she died before I could ask."
He winced as the words left his mouth. It didn't sound as funny as he'd intended.
Sasuke's eyes did not leave his face, but something in his eyes softened.
"What is a loud-mouth like you doing drinking alone on a Monday night, Na-ru-to?" he asked, drawing the syllables out in his deep, rich voice; the timbre seemed to tickle Naruto's spine. Mentally, Naruto thanked Sasuke for redirecting the conversation from his unseemly joke.
He sighed and turned his empty glass over in his hand. "Well, Sasuke, today is the day that my divorce was finalized. It seemed like something… not to celebrate… but… I dunno… to honor." Naruto swallowed, feeling reality begin to impinge on the borders of his pleasant buzz. "You know. There's not, like, a cemetery or anything I can take flowers to, just to say goodbye. There's no divorce cake, here's your half, there's your half, no dance done in reverse. Just seemed… right, I guess… to drink to it."
He felt stupid as he looked into Sasuke's eyes. He knew, he had always been told, that he talked too much, that he overshared. He knew alcohol only accelerated this tendency, and he knew that Sasuke was not likely the kind of person to suffer the overly-personal ramblings of strangers. But he couldn't help it. He owed it to Hinata to minimize the damage, and this meant sticking to the script about mutual decisions and amicability with the friends they had in common. But Naruto was not the sort of person who could process things as monumental as a divorce without talking about it, and no matter how foolish it made him look, he couldn't restrain himself tonight.
Sasuke didn't snap at him, though, nor did he turn away. "Hn. Welcome to the club," he murmured, and raised his glass to Naruto.
"You got divorced today, too?" Naruto asked.
"Hn." Sasuke grunted, his lips quirking upwards briefly. "Not today. But I did recently get divorced, yes."
Naruto felt a strange mixture of sympathy and excitement at Sasuke's words. All of his friends were still happily married. Somehow, the fact that someone as gorgeous as Sasuke could fuck up a marriage made him feel better.
"How long were you married?" Naruto asked.
"12 years."
"Same here," Naruto answered. Sasuke raised his glass again.
Naruto peered at Sasuke curiously. He knew that he was likely treading on a landmine, but he couldn't keep himself from prodding further.
"Why did you get a divorce, Sasuke?"
Sasuke rolled his eyes. "If you really must know, it's because I realized that I'm gay and that my very female wife deserved a chance at a real husband."
Naruto felt as if his throat would close up. His eyes watered.
"It seems I've hit a nerve," Sasuke muttered. "Your fourth shot's on me, as long as you agree to shut up-and get a cab when you're done drinking."
Naruto nodded dumbly as Sasuke called the bartender over again.
"I don't know how I was so stupid," Naruto murmured. "How does someone literally not know that they're attracted to men?"
Sasuke lowered his eyes.
"A person can convince himself of all sorts of things," he told Naruto flatly. "Especially things that fit with the expectations we've been raised with. In any event, you'll be fine. Humans are resilient."
Naruto felt as if the conversation had been effectively ended, although there was so much more he wanted to know. He welcomed the arrival of his fourth shot.
"Goddamn. Shit burns," he sputtered. "But it sure as hell does its job."
Sasuke chuckled. "I forgot you're used to beer. Scotch is much more efficient on nights like tonight. But it does burn."
"Hell fucking yeah," Naruto slurred.
Naruto looked around the bar. The drunken couple he had noticed earlier were now openly making out on the dance floor, not even bothering with the pretense at dancing. The other couple had left. He felt a surge of excitement when he recognized the song beginning to play over the speakers.
"Oh, man, I haven't heard this song in years!" he exclaimed. "It's so good. Sasuke, have you ever danced with a man before?" he asked, feeling emboldened by the booze and the music.
Sasuke glared at him. "I've never danced. And I don't intend to start tonight."
Naruto, though, had lost most of his inhibitions, and he could not understand how someone could never have danced.
"Come on, Sasuke, humor me. It's my divorce dance." He tugged at Sasuke's wrist.
"Idiot," Sasuke mumbled. His cheeks flushed, and Naruto thought that his skin looked even prettier when he was blushing—almost as if he were lit from within.
Naruto continued tugging until Sasuke complied, if for no other reason than to shut him up. He was used to doing things this way. It was messy, but it got him what he wanted.
"Please, please, please," he sang along with the music, as he pulled Sasuke to the center of the dance floor.
"For fuck's sake, Naruto, if you're going to drag me onto the dance floor, at least refrain from trying to sing," Sasuke hissed.
Naruto smirked, but he quit singing. He put one arm on Sasuke's shoulder, the other on his waist. Sasuke stood, his hands hanging by his side, as Naruto moved them around.
Naruto had never been consciously attracted to a man before—not in person. He'd found himself fascinated with one celebrity or athlete or another, but he'd never felt the rush of attraction to someone he'd met. He was suddenly very aware, though, that he was attracted to Sasuke; not just his looks, which were beyond compare, but also to the acerbic bite of his personality. He could tell that Sasuke was fit, although he was lithe in comparison to Naruto's own stockier build.
He looked up at Sasuke shyly. He expected to find his black eyes glaring at down at him in irritation, but instead, he found that Sasuke was just looking at him questioningly.
He reached up and touched Sasuke's face gingerly. The onyx eyes widened, and for a moment, Sasuke looked like a little child. Naruto thought of the sadness he'd seen in Sasuke earlier and his heart ached.
"You're really pretty," Naruto whispered clumsily. "Even though you're very sad."
Sasuke flushed again and looked away.
Haven't had a dream in a long time,
See the luck I've had,
Could make a good man turn bad,
So, for once in my life,
Let me get what I want,
Lord knows, it would be the first time.
The music combined with Naruto's grief and the sadness he'd felt coming off of Sasuke, and he suddenly felt mired in it. He put his head down on Sasuke's shoulder and wept.
"That's it. You're done for, Naruto," Sasuke grumbled. He pulled Naruto's hands off of his body and grabbed him by the wrist. "This is over. You're drunk, and you're going home."
Naruto sniffed and willed the tears away, but it seemed that nothing was real anymore except for his failure, and Sasuke's sadness, and he felt paralyzed by all of it. Sasuke would have none of it, though, and continued to maneuver him roughly through the bar, half dragging him.
He wasn't completely conscious of the next sequence of events. He vaguely remembered being shoved into Sasuke's car, with a sharp warning about being left on the sidewalk should he puke; he remembered trying to sit on the bottom step at an apartment complex, too amorphous to climb to the second floor, as Sasuke threatened him and cajoled him.
He didn't remember how he ended up sprawled over Sasuke's couch, or how he came to be covered snugly in a warm blanket. He wouldn't remember that Sasuke had made him take an analgesic and drink a large glass of water before he laid his head down for the night.
The last thing he remembered was Sasuke's face over his. "You're the prettiest person I've ever seen, 'Ske," he mumbled. "Wish you weren't so sad." The large, dark eyes flew open wide in shock as Naruto sunk into a deep and dreamless sleep.