It's a quarter after nine and Sakura has spent the last fifteen minutes nursing a flute of champagne and trying to decide how to gracefully excuse herself for the evening. There's something painfully lonesome about being in a big crowd like this, and she'd rather be in her own house where her loneliness isn't so public-facing. She doesn't like these galas, but the money they bring to the hospital annually means she always has to be in attendance.
The jazz quartet begins plinking out something slow and romantic and she watches Naruto pull Hinata close. He whispers something in her ear. Hinata playfully smacks his arm and giggles before resting her head on his shoulder. It's not just Naruto and Hinata who've paired up. Sakura is the only one, it seems, who wakes up alone these days. Well, almost the only one. Her eyes drift to the tall man in the corner. She hadn't expected him to come, despite being the one who sent his invitation.
She makes her way off the dance floor, not interested in getting asked to dance by some wealthy donor who will "accidentally" brush up against her breasts. On the balcony, she can barely hear the bittersweet notes drifting from the ballroom into the evening air. She leans against the railing, her eyes closed, her breath deep and steady. She doesn't mind the loneliness, really. More often than not, she greets it as a friend. She likes solitude. There is something performative and exhausting about being around all these people.
The music grows louder as someone opens the door. He walks toward Sakura, in no particular hurry, and leans against the railing a respectful distance away from her. She knows who it is, even with her eyes closed. She would know him anywhere. She could identify him in a crowd of thousands. She's always hyper-aware of him, and she resents him for it.
"Thank you for your generous donation, Sasuke," she says. She doesn't open her eyes, instead focusing her attention on reversing the involuntary reactions her body has to his presence. She doesn't know if it's love, or fear, or some mix of the two that makes the hair on her arms stand straight up, twists her stomach into uncomfortable knots, and makes her heart thump out unsteadily.
"You're welcome," he says.
Sakura hadn't seen Sasuke in months. Not since seeing him at Naruto's engagement party. She'd stayed far later than she'd planned to on the off-chance that he might approach her. It had been midnight when he'd approached her.
"Do you want to get out of here?" Sasuke had said. No ihello/i or ihow are you?/i.
They exchanged kisses over her threshold, the ones she led being sweet and quick, his long and oddly desperate. They only made it to the foyer. He had pinned her against the wall, dragged his lips to the hollow of her neck, and thrust into her. She swallows hard at the memory. There was something about him that night that reminded her of the way a man dying of thirst might lap up water. She gasped under the intensity of his stare, under the pressure of his thumb over her clitoris. He nearly bit into her shoulder as he came, shuddering into her. He brushed his teeth over her clavicle as he buckled his pants back up. He didn't say goodbye. She had stood against the wall for a few minutes after she heard her front door shut. The loneliness did not seem so friendly as she felt the slick between her thighs.
"So...we're okay?" Sasuke asks. There's a beat of silence, and Sakura finally opens her eyes.
"Is that why you made that donation? Because you thought I was mad at you?"
Sasuke had always gotten what he wanted. His methods to achieve his goals had always been rigid and unkind and when he tasted the fruits of his labor, they were always bitter in his mouth.
So when he set his sights on Sakura, deciding, pragmatically, that it was time to settle down and restore his clan, he had tried a question instead of a command. And it took him all night to work up the nerve. Do you want to get out of here?, he'd said. Every intention of walking her home, every intention of accepting if she invited him in for tea or a drink. But it had gotten away from him, as these things often do.
They had walked in silence, and Sasuke oscillated between finding it a relief that he didn't have to make conversation and finding it agonizing to think about what he might eventually say. And then, too soon, they were at her door.
She had looked up at him and before he'd been able to stop himself, he brushed his mouth against hers. It had been so fast that he'd barely tasted her, barely felt the electric shock against his skin. He turned to leave before she grasped his wrist. He looked at her, her cheeks as rosy as her hair, her eyes wide with surprise, and, because these things always get away from him, he kissed her again. And again. And again.
When he ran his hand up her skirt, her honeyed moans turned ragged. He ran a finger through her folds, and, when he was sure she wanted it, he unbuckled his pants and pushed himself into her. And she sucked him in, wet and warm and wanting. She'd squeezed around him, and the only thing he brain would allow him to do was drive into her. Her eyes were closed as he activated his Sharingan. She didn't see the tomoe spinning.
And after her walls clenched around him and her pants got shriller and he emptied himself into her, he snapped back to reality like a rubber band snapping against his wrist. His propriety returned to him, and he almost said he was sorry before the words got stuck in his throat.
He had let things get away from him.
When he left her home, he did not stop walking. He spent the next week walking through the forest outside Konoha, and when he finally returned, he couldn't bring himself to face her. And the feeling appeared to be mutual, because she didn't come looking for him, either.
The radio silence got the better of him eventually and he did the only thing he could think to do: donate a sizable portion of the Uchiha fortune to the hospital. He'd inherited more than he could ever spend, and Sakura would probably come to thank him in person. And he could apologize then. Beg forgiveness for his transgression, despite wanting to beg her for the opportunity to transgress a second time.
She did not come to thank him in person. He, instead, received an invitation to a gala for the hospital; something all major donors get. So he goes and watches Sakura sway alone on the dance floor, her lips pressed against the champagne glass like they should be pressed against his neck. When the band slows and people begin to partner up, he thinks to ask her. But she's already halfway out of the room, headed to fresh air.
He sees her, mercilessly beautiful in the moonlight, and steels himself. Her face remains placid as he settles beside her despite the uptick in her pulse he senses.
"Thank you for your generous donation, Sasuke."
"You're welcome," he responds. He's glad she came out here. He certainly prefers this to asking for absolution with a jazz ensemble accompanying him, a drunk Naruto grasping his wife's ass in the foreground.
"So...we're okay?"
Sakura's eyes fly open. "Is that why you made that donation? Because you thought I was mad at you?"
"Aren't you?"
She sighs. "I'm tired, Sasuke. I don't know what you want and I don't know what to expect."
He furrows his brow. "You didn't come see me, either."
"What am I, a twelve-year-old girl with an infatuation? Am I supposed to chase you for the rest of my life? Was it not enough the first time I tore the world apart to find you?"
He can't look at her, in part because she's right and in part because he can hear that she's crying and he hates himself for hurting her once more. And he remembers a promise he'd made years ago, at the gate of the village, when she's asked to come with him.
"Do you remember what I said when I left the village that second time?" Sasuke asks, keeping his eyes focused on the moon.
"That I could come with you next time?" Sakura responds.
"Well, do you want to get out of here?"