Standard disclaimer applies.
The first time Sakura and Itachi had a true fight, it was about his expensive gifts, but the second time was about her family.
Itachi had introduced her to his whole family not even two weeks after the first date. They were close nit, that much Sakura could tell. And they all looked creepily alike, her bubblegum pink hair sticking out like a needle in a haystack.
They loved her. Mikoto cooed over her while Fukagu clapped Itachi on the back and mumbled something about it being "about time you found yourself a woman." When Mikoto had pulled Sakura over to her room to look through family heirlooms that cost more than Sakura would make in five years, she got a little freaked out. Mikoto's eyes had gleamed a little too much when she'd forced Sakura to put on some of the Uchiha jewelry, mumbled something about "finally getting those grandchildren."
If Sakura had squeezed Itachi's hand a little too hard when it was time to leave and if she was practically pulling him out of the Uchiha estate, well, he never said anything about it.
She didn't have a problem with meeting Itachi's family. Maybe she thought it was a little soon to start introducing family members, but as far as things Itachi did that concerned her, this wasn't high on the list.
The problem, however, happened as she was moving her things into Itachi's home. She'd finally agreed to move in with him a few months after he'd first brought up the idea, after him teasing and probing her about how much easier it would be if he didn't have to drive across town to see her and how his home was actually closer to her workplace—that of which he was still dropping not-so-subtle hints about how she should quit because he had more than enough money to keep them both in luxury for the rest of their lives. Sakura studiously ignored him.
Itachi wanted to know when she was planning on introducing him to her family. He'd brought it up casually . . . or as casually as he could. For a ruthless CEO, Itachi was surprisingly awkward around her. Mostly he just looked down to her hands that he'd placed in his lap, fiddling with her fingers and inspecting her nails as he mumbled something about her family and introductions and how it was only proper now that they lived together.
Sakura hadn't told Itachi about her family. She didn't tell him about how she hadn't had so much as a phone call with them since she left for college. Sometimes Sakura didn't think Itachi fully grasped what it meant that she'd moved out with next to nothing in her bank account to pursue a degree in pre-med and then—hopefully—medical school afterwards, all the while working odd jobs to pay the bills.
It wasn't that her parents were bad people or ignored her or were in any way the kind of people you'd tell stories about as a what-not-to-do guide for new parents. They feed her, went to all her volleyball games, encouraged her to follower her dreams and so on and so forth.
The problem arose when she started to look at colleges. Her parents wanted her to stay close to home and Sakura wanted to go to her dream school, which just so happened to be a few hours away. Her parents questioned her decisions and—whether they realized they were doing it or not—belittled her. How would she support herself? How would she manage part-time jobs and schoolwork and manage to keep her grades? She had to work twice as hard as other students in her major, so how much extra stress would she have to deal with, and was she ready for it?
And all of those were good, understandable questions. But what got Sakura was that they never thought about how it could work, only how it wouldn't work. They never gave it a chance.
What ended up happening was a lot of boiled over emotions from her mother, crying from Sakura, and a one-foot-out-of-the-room father, who only sometimes agreed with her mother but mostly just wanted to stay out of it. Looking back, Sakura understands what was emotional manipulation and what was just the product of two emotional women with backbones of steel in such close proximately to each other.
She almost didn't go. She'd gotten a full ride to her town's community college, but it wasn't what she really wanted. A part of her just wanted to see if she could do it, if she could support herself all on her own.
Phone calls were sparse at first. But it got to the point where there was so much charged history between her and her parents that even hearing their voices sent her skin crawling and emotions frayed. Sparse phone calls turned into nonexistent phone calls, no trips home for holidays, and only the occasional card or gift and a voicemail on birthdays.
Sakura didn't really want to dreg up that story. It wasn't that she didn't want to tell it to Itachi, it was just that she didn't want to talk about it at all. She'd come to terms with what had happened, and while there were some days she missed her parents more than anything, she was also strong enough to see she was healthier—mentally, emotionally healthier—now than she'd ever been, even with the stress of school and work on her shoulders.
Bringing up the story now was only reopening old wounds. And how could she put into words everything that had happened between her and her parents in a way that would explain to him what she went through? That would get him to understand—would get anyone to understand?
It was like teaching WWII to high school students. You could explain about Hitler and the millions killed for no other crime than being born. You could show them gruesome pictures of concentration camps and bodies pilled upon bodies in mass grave, and they wouldn't really get it. You couldn't truly understand the pain of another person unless you lived through it.
But she'd tried. She tried to tell him how they didn't get along and they weren't involved enough in her life to warrant being introduced to her boyfriend. (Boyfriend—such an interesting term for what Itachi was. Better than sugar daddy and sugar baby, she supposed—)
Itachi hadn't gotten it. He'd nodded and said that he'd still like to meet them to properly introduce himself, to show them he cared about their daughter, even if Sakura didn't care about their opinion.
Sakura said no. She didn't want to hurt Itachi's feelings, but she wasn't about to call up her parents to schedule a visit with them for Itachi to introduce himself. She wasn't having that conversation—more importantly, she wasn't going to sit in her childhood home and listen to her mother's hidden hits at Sakura's life choices and watch as her father tried to disappear and not be a part of the conversation.
At first, Itachi had just pouted and tried to wheedle his way into getting an introduction. But when Sakura sank her heels into the ground and continued to say no, Itachi started to get hurt. Insulted. Why didn't she want her parents to know about him? Was it the age difference, the possibility they might come to the same conclusion as so many other people about the nature of their relationship? Was it because she lived with him?
Sakura had tried to explain it in more depth, but explaining it meant reliving it, and then her eyes started misting and, of course, Itachi noticed and immediately started to panic.
"Did they hurt you?" he asked, cradling her cheek.
Sakura barked out a laugh. "Haven't you been listening? They—"
"I know you've said you didn't get along and haven't spoken to them, but I mean did they hurt you?"
"Physically?" Sakura asked, raising her brows. "No. No no no. Of course not. But—I just—" Her voice got muffled by her tears again, two escaping against her attempts to blink them away and keep her eyes on the ceiling lights.
"Okay," Itachi breathed. He sucked in a breath through his nose and let it out slowly. "Okay. We don't have to meet them."
Sakura just nodded into his suit jacket. She'd come by during his lunch break to see if he wanted to go out with her. She didn't have any more classes that day and had a day off from work, and Sakura knew he'd been in endless meetings from the last two weeks, so neither had seen the other as much as they'd like.
They were still in his office. The first time Sakura had seen it, she'd teased Itachi about the leather chairs and how for one man, he sure seemed to need a lot of room. He'd just smirked and dropped an innuendo about breaking in his new suede coach with her.
Itachi had pulled her over to that same couch now. It was comfy, Sakura noted. She didn't want to know how much it must have cost.
After that day, they didn't talk about it. Itachi asked her if it would be okay if they had dinner over at the Uchiha estate sometimes, and Sakura said okay. She loved Mikoto, even with how she was a little overbearing at times. She found Fugaku amusing. She found Sasuke tiresome and more than a little bit of a brat. (And if she and Itachi were conspiring against him and oh-so subtly throwing bits of napkin at his hair to see how many they could get to stick with how much hair gel the boy had on, well, that was only between them and a grinning, sly Mikoto.)
It was only after a month of living together that Sakura wondered when their honeymoon phase would end. They'd been attached at the hip, but she didn't think it could last.
But two months came since they moved in together, then three, then five, and they'd been dating for almost a year and Itachi was still wheedling his way more thoroughly into her life than Sakura had thought possible. Somehow he still found ways to insert himself into every ounce of her being, in ways she hadn't thought possible.
When she got a break, just a minute of free time, her first thought was if she could call Itachi. When Itachi got out of a meeting that left him irritated and a little twitchy, he found her, no matter where she was. Sometimes this meant coming to her university and getting her out of class, her participation points intact, and cajoling her into sitting in his office for the rest of the day and long into the night as he worked. She'd study and watch him as he sat there, running his hands through his hair when no one else but she could see.
At some point, she'd say she was hungry, and his head would snap up to blink at her, then the clock, and curse quietly as he said, "Babygirl, I'm so sorry. I wasn't thinking about the time. What would you like? Chinese? Thai?"
And sometimes they'd set up dinner right there in his office. Sometimes eating on the floor, since that was were Sakura would oftentimes have her notes and laptop spread out on, her weird preference of the floor over the comfy couch. The first time she'd done it, Itachi had blinked down at her and offered to buy to new couch she'd prefer.
Sometimes she would sit on one of the leather chairs and Itachi would push aside his work on his desk and they'd eat there, Sakura sitting on the very edge of the chair, forever in fear of getting a stain on his ultra-expensive upholstery. (Not that he'd care, of course.)
On the bad days, Itachi would get her to his office to only situate her on his lap and close the gap between them. His hands would cradle the back of her head and slip under her shirt, drawling circles on her skin. She'd slide her hands into his hair, careful of his neat ponytail, and listen to him breathe, his panting breaths sometimes, his soft whispers other times.
And sometimes, on the very, very rare occasions when a deal didn't go well or someone just said the wrong thing to him on an already bad day, he'd grip her waist a little too tight. Never enough to hurt her. Never enough for her to be uncomfortable. But Itachi was always, always so gentle with her, so careful around her, that the first time it happened, she'd gasped. Just a little bit, but enough for him to hear and for him to break the kiss.
He'd panicked. He'd looked at her sides were his nails had dug in and his hands had roamed, and panicked.
"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry, babygirl. Did I hurt you? Fuck, I'm so sorry." He'd buried his face in her hair, breathing in.
She'd told him it was fine—she was fine. He hadn't even left a mark, and Sakura knew that she'd left a few marks on him before.
But he'd still came home the next day with matching ruby earrings and a necklace. Her closet had found itself full of even more shoes and purses that she'd likely never use.
It took her a while to realize that the gifts weren't for her, but for him. And if buying her a ridiculous amount of gifts was what cleared his conscious of something that Sakura had already forgotten about, well, he could have at it.
The next time it happened, Sakura didn't gasp. She actually purred a little bit.
It wasn't that she wanted him to be rough with her. In fact, Sakura was pretty sure that if Itachi did ever change from the gentle man he was with her, who constantly asked her if what he was doing was okay, if he was pushing any boundaries, if she was comfortable, if she was hungry or wanted a coffee or the whole damn world on a platter, she'd be disappointed and upset.
But she liked knowing that he let loose around her from time to time. She liked hearing him groan into her mouth and hissing in pleasure when she dug her own nails into his scalp.
And when they'd finally part, lips cherry red and breath mingled, he'd pull her against him. Sakura would just listen to him breath as he talked about his day, about his failed meeting or business deal or how those effing Senjus were really starting to tick him off. She'd just play with the buttons of his jacket and hum in reply.
And later, when they finally went home, when Sakura would fall face first into her pillow, so utterly exhausted from the day and just about to fall asleep, she'd feel his hands on her back as he straddled her, massaging her muscles and lulling her to sleep even more quickly.
And when he'd hear her breaths even out, Itachi would shower and come back to throw one of his leg over hers as his breath hitched at how Sakura would instinctively shuffle closer to him in bed.
And sometimes, his hand would shake when he brushed her hair out of her face, letting her breathing lull him to sleep as well.
Author's Note: I would just like to say I was peer pressured into writing this by you guys. Like, oh my gosh. So many comments. Sooo many very nice comments.
Obviously, thank you for commenting on this story. I really wouldn't have written this if it wasn't for all those nice comments. But, goodness, I enjoyed it. ;p
Again, there is literally no direction for this story. There will be no concise timeline either. I'm probably going to jump around if more chapters happen. And if I do continue, its gonna be really, really short chapters. Maybe one chapter about Sakura being on her period and Itachi not knowing what to do to help or her birthday or out shopping or something like that. Maybe him buying her more lingerie when she's not paying attention because she looked at a piece for more than five seconds one time. IDK.
I kinda wanted to write about their relationship too. Because I sometimes stumble upon stories where the main female character wants everything intimate to be rough and the guy to be dominate, and while it's fine if a girl is into that, I get tired when there's not a whole lot of the opposite. Sometimes it's just nice to have someone else take care of you. Sometimes it's perfect to have a significant other to be gentle and not dominate, because not everyone likes the whole power play thing. Women don't always want a manly-man and all that crap. Gentle and sweet is good, guys.
Please REVIEW!