Next Time

Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto.

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#31 – Sacred

Sure, his rosary was something sacred and meaningful and should never, ever be defiled, but he couldn't help it if he sometimes forgot to take it off during sex; he was lying, of course, because he loved the feel of it pressing into his chest, burning, branding, as she pressed into him.

#32 – Farewells

The only farewells Hidan ever had to make were to those he killed—and even then it was in a half-assed, delighted sentiment—and to Kakuzu; it had been hard enough to come up with one for his previous partner, no matter how much the man had gotten on his nerves, and he didn't plan on conjuring one up for Sakura anytime soon, either.

#33 – World

The harsh, well-known truth about the world was that it was very unfair and very unpredictable, throwing curves and angles that seem to lead to nowhere; if anybody knows this it's Hidan and Sakura, and they thank the heavens that it is.

#34 – Formal

Hidan was never formal, and this was something that everybody just accepted—it was a fact of life that was as set in stone as the sky being blue and the grass being green; even on his wedding day, Hidan had mumbled a grinning, "I fucking love you, seriously," to his less-than-blushing wife.

#35 – Fever

It confused Hidan when, in the beginning months of Sakura's pregnancy, she began to get sick—not sick as in a cold or a flu, but as in she would vomit in the morning and sleep the rest of the day without any signs of a fever; the only person in the complex who could offer an explanation was Kisame, who laughed himself half to death and patted Hidan hard on the back, saying, "I'd like to introduce you to something called paternal instincts, Hidan, because apparently you have none," in a sarcastic, mocking tone that actually made Sakura giggle.

#36 – Laugh

There were always pangs of jealousy here and there with Hidan, particularly when Sakura would completely ditch him and his newly-stitched limbs to visit with Deidara; the two of them grew close in a way that was utterly and completely different from the way she grew close to Hidan—she would laugh differently around Deidara than with him, and it wasn't a bad sort of different, just…unusual.

#37 – Lies

Lies, lies, nothing irked Hidan more than lies, but only when they were coming from Sakura's mouth; she could skirt around the subject and make up all the little fibs she wanted about why she cried at night, but Hidan could always see right through her, and she didn't have to keep it to herself that she felt unwanted, because for fuck's sake, she wasn't by any standards at fucking all.

#38 – Forever

There were little moments—random times throughout the day, like when she was working on a garden out back with Zetsu or when she was helping Deidara paint the day room or when she was accepting Tobi's frantic, sobbing apology with his masked face buried in her stomach, arms tight around her waist and gripping at the back of her shirt—when Hidan felt like forever was too long a time to wait to reunite with Sakura again when she inevitably passed away; it was sometime after he saw Sakura healing Kisame's half dead, malnourished fishes while he was away on a long mission (that, he might add, the shark man adamantly denied existed) that he knew he simply couldn't deal with forever.

#39 – Overwhelmed

He found himself overwhelmed with Sakura more and more often when they'd finally established that yes, touching was okay, but no, they probably should fuck just yet—something he was dearly, dearly regretting, especially when she rubbed her hands up and down his stomach like she was doing now and brushing over something particularly sensitive, and ohhhh— "Please, Sakura, please touch me there again."

#40 – Whisper

Hidan often had insomnia, because all joking aside, he didn't like to sleep; so when Sakura suffered from the same thing, they'd stay up until all hours of the morning until the sun came up over that hill in the back courtyard and drowned the kitchen where they sat in yellowish light; they'd keep their voices down to barely-audible whispers, their sleeplessness fueling them to laugh at stupid things and be deliriously joyful with sake in hand about their fucked up, hopelessly irreparable world.