"What are you doing Sakura-chan?"
Naruto's voice trembled.
Since when did her touching him hold such an illicit tingle to it?
Hadn't he memorised the feel of her fingers on his much abused face?
Hadn't she held his most intimate part in her clasp, pulling forth that elusive beat from the mouth of apparent oblivion?
Sakura continued caressing his face, welcoming the palpable weight of crossed lines.
Lines they had drawn together in the glow of their delusions.
"You have become a busy person Naruto. Too busy to say more than a hello to your former best friend."
*
Sakura's hands drew circles on Naruto's chest, as if mapping esoteric diagrams lurking underneath his robes.
He was getting distracted by her long wandering fingers. They didn't feel innocent any more.
Why was she doing this?
Wasn't he playing by their rules?
What right had she to accuse him of staying away when she did exactly the same?
*
"You haven't been exactly available Sakura-chan."
Sakura's eyes held an unusually violent glint in them.
"I was busy playing house, didn't you hear?"
Thoughts of a spartan room pregnant with regret rose in her mind.
She pushed those down.
She was beginning to develop quite a flair for repression.
But no more.
Lingering discontent bred familiarity in the hearts of some people.
Not for Sakura.
She was ruthlessly determined to snatch the vestiges of joy from that cowering, self sacrificing dunce of a man.
*
Naruto couldn't really blame himself for his part in the facade. He would easily crush his own anguish if everybody else was happy.
He would see the deserted Uchiha compound come alive with perfect gladness in his soul.
He would.
He would.
But nothing seemed to have fallen into place.
Their fiction was falling apart.
He was slowly falling apart with the way her fingers viciously marched across his skin.
*
When Sakura pressed him against the wall and filled his mouth with fury and tongue and a thousand burning dreams, Naruto stopped thinking.
Perhaps it was time to set old ghosts on fire.