"Why we should need to wallow in this reality, relive it again and again, poke and prod and examine it until our eyes are bleeding, our hearts crushed with the horror and inconceivable sadness of it, is beyond me." — Beautiful Malice.

...

"Sasuke." Sakura waves her hand in front of your face and you snap back to reality. She frowns at you and you notice she is closer to you then you remember her to be. You count the freckles on her nose and you remember her complaining about how much she hates them. You count thirty-three. You like the number. You've always liked odd numbers. "You're doing it again." She says and she sounds displeased.

"What?" You ask, confused.

"Spacing out on me while I'm talking." She taps her pen against her notebook and bites on her lower lip absently. "Do you.." She starts hesitantly and then stops herself. She stares at you quietly and you see the struggle in her. Suddenly, you know what she'll try to ask you and you turn your head away. This is enough to discourage her. There is gnawing feeling inside your chest and you realise that you feel guilty. You know it's for the best, though, and you squash down the traitorous feelings.

"Anyway." Sakura says and laughs a little. She's embarrassed and perhaps a little hurt but she does her best to hide it. '"Are you finished with your calc homework? We promised to eat dinner over at Naruto's tonight."

You close your notebook with a snap and gather the rest of the textbooks and notebooks thrown about. "I'm finished.'" You lie and stand up. You dump your stuff on your already messy desk and grab your car keys and phone. You haven't told Itachi you'll be at Naruto's but you know he'll call eventually, so you don't bother. You're still annoyed at him for letting your cousin come over tomorrow. You remember Shisui as a cheerful guy, a bit like Naruto and you know you don't want him in the house or anywhere near you.

When you turn around, you see Sakura's fingers flying across the screen of her phone. "It's my aunt." She says without looking up. "She says Uncle Jirayia's coming over tonight and I should unlock the gate for him."

You nod and wait for her to finish. When she finally does, she unfolds her legs from underneath her and starts collecting her stuff. She shoves them carelessly in her bag and stands up, struggling with the zip. "Let's go." She says, still preoccupied with the zipper, and you head out of your room.

"Do you have coffee?" She suddenly asks and you stop.

"Coffee?" You ask. You don't have to check the time to know it's not time for coffee.

"Yes." Sakura replies. "Coffee." She pushes her fringe away from her face irritably and you notice her hand is shaking. "I need some. Kushina won't let me drink any, you know her."

"I doubt there's any left." You say. "Usually Itachi drinks it all." Itachi's hands shake sometimes, too, you remember and frown slightly.

"Let's go check, okay?" She says and walks past you. When you walk in the kitchen, you find her pouring what little coffee left in the pot in her metallic travel cup and she takes a sip before closing it and turning to face you. "Well, let's go then." She says brightly.

...

"Finally!" Naruto exclaims when he opens the door and allows you to walk inside the brightly lit house. "I thought you guys have ditched me. Mum's getting restless." He turns to Sakura after he closes the door and starts to walk towards the dining room. "She's very excited for you to try this thing she's cooked for you. I'm not sure it's food, to be honest but she spent hours on it." He shrugs. "She's been buying more of those weird cook books. What happened to some good ol' ramen?"

"Everyone gets sick of ramen at some point, Naruto." Sakura says, sounding amused. "Except for you, obviously." She adds when she sees his scandalized expression.

"Sakura-chan!" You jump at the sudden voice behind you and you turn around, along with your friends. The red-haired woman rushes forward and embraces Sakura, as if she hasn't seen in her years and not just last week. She smooths Sakura's hair down and pushes her fringe away from her face and basically fusses over her like a mother. "You look so pretty!" She squeals and Sakura blushes. "You should cut that a little bit, though." She says sternly, fingering her long fringe. "It's getting in your eyes and you'll have to put on glasses before you know it."

"Oh, the horror." Sakura says, making a mock-terrified face.

Kushina chuckles and then turns to you. Her blue eyes are darker than Naruto's and in this particular light, they are almost dark. You can change the shape a little bit and you feel like you're looking in your mother's eyes. Kushina pulls you in a hug, a welcoming hug like Sakura's, and ruffles your already messy hair. "You really need to learn to use a comb, kid." She tells you after she pulls away. She winks at you and pats your arm. "Let's go in the dining room them. Minato's going crazy. You know him — can't stay in one place for prolonged periods of time." She sighs in exasperation but there is a smile on her face.

She reminds you of your mother again and you remember why you've avoided Kushina for the past few months.

You look away from her and you feel her stare burning the side of your face. She is — was — your mother's best friend and you know she feels personally responsible for you. You don't mind so much, as long as she doesn't overdo it. You know she's hurting still and somehow you take comfort in that. It makes you open up a little more to her, because you know she feels the pain almost as deeply as you do.

You walk in the dining room and you see Minato waiting for you, all bright clothing and smiles. You shake yourself — there is no way you can ever mistake Minata for your father. You feel relaxed as you look at Minata's peaceful, youthful face and you almost smile when he greets you with a smile nearly as bright as his son's.

"Sit, sit." He says, gesturing around him. He's sitting at the head of the table and he doesn't look nearly as imposing as your father had.

You take your seats, you and Sakura are next to each other on his left side, while Kushina and Naruto took the right and you catch the smell of Kushina's delicious cooking.

"I made this specially for you." Kushina says to Sakura, who looks down at her bowl. You glance over and what you see makes you understand Naruto's reaction. "It's soba and tofu in ginger broth."

"Thanks." Sakura says brightly and she grabs her fork.

You look down at your plate and nearly smile at the carefully arranged tomatoes cut in crescent pieces around your steak.

There is silence as everyone starts eating their food.

"It's delicious, Kushina." Sakura says. Kushina insists to be called Kushina. No formalities when talking to me, she always says. "You'd have to give me the recipe so Auntie can make it for me."

Kushina's face splits into a wide smile. "No problem." She says and it's clear she's extremely pleased that Sakura has liked her meal. She turns to look at the rest of you questioningly and Naruto and Minato hurry to assure her that their steaks are the height of culinary delight. (Those are Minato's words, Naruto only nods along and makes pleased noises that make you feel vaguely uncomfortable.)

Her dark blue eyes turn on you and you speak quickly. "It's delicious." You say. Her eyes get even brighter and you can feel the pleasure radiating off her as she returns her attention to her own food.

"Mine is also very delicious." She says with a grin. "In case anyone wanted to know."

"Do you guys have some plans about your senior year?" Minato asks. "I remember when I was your age and my friends and I always had something planned for the weekend. We used to scout a lot. I must have peed on all the trees on top of the Green Mountain."

"Seriously?" Naruto asks with a grin.

Minato nods. "I remember, one night we got out of our little cabin — we were sloshed, mind you — and decided to go cliff diving."

Sakura gaps at him. "You didn't!"

Minato nods, grinning. "We did but that's not the best part. There were some foreign girls there, had very thick accents. They were camping on the other side of the shore and as you can imagine, we couldn't just ignore them. Inoichi liked one of them and decided to try his luck." Minato snorts and takes a sip from his beer. "You all know the scar he has on his forehead?" You all nod. Inoichi is Sakura's friend Ino's father but you don't know him only because of that. He's been over at your house for dinner. "Well, those girls turned out to be some sort of.. well, masters in material arts. When Inoichi tried to make that move where you're stretching but then you put your arm around the girl's shoulder." You see Sakura and Kushina rolling their eyes at each other and smirk. "Well, she thought he was attacking her. She grabbed his arm and flipped him over her shoulder. He hit his head on this great stone and from there, they sort of attacked us."

"I got away mostly unscathed. I've always been ridiculously charming." He ruffles his hair and grins cockily. Kushina reaches out and slaps him on the back of the head, much like Sakura does to Naruto sometimes. "Ouch. If you ask Inoichi, Shikaku or Choza about that night, they'll fall into a traumatized state. I'm serious. If you ever want to shut Inoichi up when he's being awfully bubbly, just mention that one night. And if you do it in front of Sora, he'll never dare to annoy you again."

"Speaking from personal experience?" Sakura asks with a smirk and you are startled to see how much it changes her face. From the kind-faced, pretty girl to the mischievous, tricky minx.

Minato chuckles. "Maybe."

Naruto snorts. "There so way I'm not bringing this up the next time I see him."

"See what you're teaching my innocent son, Minato?" Kushina asks, a mock-scandalized look on her face as she smooths Naruto's hair away from his face and slaps a smoochy kiss on his cheek. He makes a face and ducks out of her reach.

"Mum!" He whines.

They all laugh after that and even though you can't join them, you enjoy watching and listening to them.

"What about you, Kushina?" Sakura asks. "Do you have any interesting stories?"

"She has plenty of them." Minato says before Kushina can open her mouth. "She was quite the troublemaker. I remember the prank her school played on ours that one time. I've never been able to look at pigs the same way ever again. Kushina was the mastermind behind it all."

"Seriously?" Naruto asks and turns to his mother. "Why haven't you told me any of that?"

"And give you ideas?" Kushina snorts. "I'm not stupid, honey."

"Aw, come on." Naruto says and gives her his infamous pleading look; wide blue eyes, wobbly lip and all that but she remains stony. "You are my mother but more importantly, you are a fellow troublemaker! You have to pass down your knowledge on the youngsters aka me!"

"I can't believe you just said youngsters." Sakura speaks your thoughts exactly.

"He's growing up; using big words and all." Minato says and pretends to wipe away a tear.

Kushina laughs and flicks Naruto's forehead with one finger. "Sorry. You have to use your ideas. It's better for your creativity."

Naruto pouts and crosses his arms over his chest, turning his head away from Kushina. She rolls her eyes and gives you all a look cross between amusement and exasperation. "Sasuke." Her eyes focus on you and you straighten in your seat. "You've been awfully quiet. No crazy plans for your last year as a high schooler?"

That gets everyone's attention. Their eyes are on you and you resist the urge to shrink in your chair. You've never been shy but you dislike being in the center of attention when you don't know what to say.

You can't say what's on your mind because it's too depressing. You know it'll kill the mood in a second flat and you don't feel selfish enough to do that.

Your hands fist over you thighs and you look down at your half-eaten steak. "No." You murmur. "No plans."

...

"So, that was fun." Sakura says on your way back home. It's past ten and you feel tired. You haven't slept but that's become a regular occurrence. Nightmares plague you restlessly and nothing can stop the images from invading your mind, not even the pills Itachi has given you. She has the recipe for her meal in her hands and she's playing with the ruffled side of the paper, ripped from a spiral notebook. You notice that her neon yellow polish is chipped and that's something you've learned to associate with Sakura. She wears different coloured nail polish everyday but it's always chipped. You know it's a nervous tic that stops her from biting her nails instead.

You know a lot of things about Sakura, small and insignificant to her biggest fears and insecurities. But there's one thing you don't know about Sakura and every time you think about it, you drive yourself crazy because you don't know the answer.

You grip the stirring wheel tightly and speak. "Sakura." She stops humming to herself and looks curiously at you. "Tell me about your parents."

You see her freeze and her entire body angles in a defensive stance. "There's nothing to tell." She says tersely and she starts chipping off the nail polish on her right index finger. "Can we not talk about this?"

"You never speak about them." You say, eyes fixed on the road. "Yet, you insist I talk to you about my parents."

"That's different." She says.

"No, it's not." You say. "How is it different?"

"Because my parents are not dead." You hear her suck in a breath after the words leave her mouth and she turns to you. "Oh my god, Sasuke, I — "

"Shut up." You say and your voice is harsher than intended. You see her flinch and your hands tighten around the stirring wheel. "Don't apologise for stating a fact. My parents are dead."

"Yes but..." She trails off. "I'm sorry."

"What for?"

"For your parents." She says quickly. "I'm sorry for your parents. I'm sorry that you're pain. I'm sorry that I can't help you but if you'd just let me in — I'll do my best to.. to help you and understand you. To ease your pain somehow. I hate seeing you like this, Sasuke-kun."

You freeze for just a second. She's stopped calling you Sasuke-kun a week after your parents died, because she knows it reminds you of your mother and causes you pain. Naruto has stopped calling you bastard for the very same reason. You both thank and hate them for being so considerate.

When she sees your reaction, she bites her lip and looks down at her hands. There is almost no nail polish left on her index finger. "I'm sorry." She murmurs.

"Stop — " You say, your voice tight and laced with annoyance. " — apologising."

She swallows and nods, without looking up from her hands.

You don't say anything else after that.

The rest of the ride is spend in silence.