Title: let's begin under these stars
Summary: He couldn't stop looking at her, like this. She was so beautiful.
Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto.
Prompt: There Was No Warning
Rating: K
Warning(s): none.
Comments: I know nothing about constellations and astrology, so yeah forgive me if this is not accurate in some manner or another. Lmao.

She'd never seen the sky look this amazing, until tonight. It was so clear, so bright—so peaceful. Far better than any of the ones she'd seen in her life in Konoha. She wished she could stay here forever, commit this place to memory and be able to come back as often as she wanted.

But they were on a mission, several days away from home, lying in the middle of a nameless forest in some village she completely forgot the name of. This was likely to be a one night thing, much to her disappointment.

Which meant she'd have to make the best of this night, with Kakashi sleeping against a tree base, his book lying flat on his face, Naruto snoring loudly by the fire, his sleeping bag twisted and tangled around his body, and Sasuke… Sasuke at her side, looking as amazing as he'd ever dared to look in his life, one foot propped up on the ground with the other crossed beneath it, and his square shoulders touching hers.

She tried not to think too much about that last thing as she whispered her favorite constellations to the dark, handsome man, pointing them out shyly, quietly marveling at the sky she adored so much. She tried to ignore the way her cheeks evidently flushed every time she'd look at him to find him gazing where she'd wanted him to, as if genuinely interested in her passionate astrological talk.

"Ah—over there, that's Cassiopeia, I think," she murmured, pointing to the small gathering of five stars in the similar shape of a W. Sakura quickly glanced to see if Sasuke was looking, but was quick to turn away when he seemed to sense this and turned to look at her as well. Smiling brightly, she pretended nothing happened as she leaned back on her hands and admired the sheet of lights above them. A small gasp left her lips, before she exclaimed breathlessly, "And there! That's Orion!"

"How do you know so many of them?" she heard him ask, prompting her to look at him. The curiosity in those amazing, black eyes of his caused her cheeks to flush a little, for the umpteenth time that night.

"I don't know. From my time at the academy, maybe?" she replied shyly, smiling to herself. "I was a closet geek. I read so many astrology books in my father's study when I ran out of fiction ones." She laughed, a little nervously, as if she was telling him some embarrassing secret. "I guess it kinda stuck."

"…Hn."

Her stomach bubbled with warmth as a short, tranquil silence took place. She liked moments like these with Sasuke, although so few and rare due to their lack of time alone. She liked that they didn't really need to talk, instead relishing in each other's quiet company. They were so special to her, making her realize, all over again, how much she really loved him.

Nudging his arm gently, she said softly, "And you, Sasuke-kun? Do you know any?"

He looked at her for one long moment, before he shrugged. "Not really."

"Really? Not even the big dipper? And the small dipper?"

He shook his head.

That was surprising. She knew he'd lost his family when he was very young, but still—he had a big family. And his brother… from what she understood, they had been really close, hadn't they? Which meant he had been too busy for him. Was the rest of his family like that too?

Or worse, she thought, maybe his family thought this kind of thing was too silly for a clan like theirs.

Hesitantly, she murmured, "That's kind of sad, Sasuke-kun."

Sasuke astounded her once more as he merely rolled his eyes. "They're just stars, Sakura."

She smiled again, small and full of admiration. "Well, I think they're beautiful," she murmured, wrapping her arms around her knees and leaning her chin on top.

He looked at her then, and she could feel the back of her neck heating up again. Kami, she'd been childish, hadn't she?

When she turned to meet his gaze, however, her heart seemed to stop. He was looking at her strangely, in a way that made her want to squirm, in a manner that was not exactly intense, but not exactly gentle either. She didn't know what that look meant, or what he was thinking—or maybe she did know, but she couldn't quite believe.

(because he couldn't possibly look awed and amused, couldn't possibly look so tenderly fond of her, like he wanted to—)

It made her swallow tightly, her mouth suddenly turning dry, stomach flipping with nervous butterflies that instantly made her start rambling, "You know, you can find a lot of them when you spot Orion. Like Taurus the Bull, and Canis Major. And Scorpio is not too hard to find either! And now that I think about it, Hydra's pretty easy to spot after you see it the first time! If you want, and only if you want, I could show you how to see them, it's really, really easy, Sasuke-kun, you just—"

A sound of surprise escaped her, cutting off her own sentence, as Sasuke suddenly leaned forward and grabbed the back of her burning neck with his hand, the tip of his nose skimming her cheek as he oh so lightly brushed his lips across hers, capturing her mouth in an achingly gentle kiss. Shaking and breathless, Sakura couldn't do much more than stare at him—his features displaying some new, adorable sort of innocence that she never thought she could quite see with him—as he brushed his lips against hers a second time, kissing her with a slow, burning desire and profound, muted affection.

(—kiss her.)

"You're making this awkward," he mumbled when he pulled back a little, the tips of his ears turning red as he met her gaze almost timidly.

Feeling more flushed than she could ever remember, and still not recovered from what had just transpired between them, Sakura coyly grasped the back of his shirt with her two delicate hands and buried her face in his neck, before shyly grinning and whispering, "Sorry."

A/N: this was supposed to turn out in such a totally different way and I'm so disappointed tbh, to the point I'm kinda keeping this in my work in progress to someday rewrite how I really want to, but as a positive, I really liked the way I described the kiss. So, at least there's that.

I hope there's no confusion with what's going on with them, because to me it's crystal clear since I had the whole damn scene in my head, but idk if everything that's written down portrays all that I know to the others. If not, well, just go with what you feel, I guess. It's a post-canon drabble and they're pretty tender with one another, so… yeah. If you need some type of example, I guess take Perfect Porcelain as a kind of model for what kind of dynamics they're supposed to have. ^^

See you… after tomorrow! Since I'm skipping tomorrow's prompt (solely for the fact that last year, I pretty much did that prompt already ;P)