Chapter Thirteen

Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto

A/N: I apologize for this being so late and not getting the chance to respond to your reviews. I've just been so darn busy. Plus, this chapter was hard to write.

Thank you for all of your reviews. I listen to and appreciate ALL of your thoughts and comments.

Trying to keep things at a T rating, but not sure how long it would stay that way…

Long chapter up ahead.

He'd had the dream again. It wasn't the exact same dream, but the elements and themes remained the same: he was trying to get somewhere, he was very close to arriving there, but for some reason or the other he could never reach his destination.

Sasuke had had so many other more terrifying dreams; ones where he'd wake up sweating and panting and with his kekkei genkai flaring, ready for any attack. There were times when he'd wake up screaming or crying, sickened by what he saw in his mind's eye, but not with the dreams he'd been having lately. They were simple dreams the likes of which were not particularly offensive such as trying to get to the Academy on time or meeting someone for a certain appointment or the most frequent one – getting to that house on the mountain. In all of them the same thing – he came close, but always woke up before he arrived at his destination.

He was no psychologist, but he wasn't daft either. He had a pretty clear idea as to what the dreams were spelling out for him. It left him feeling unsettled and the feeling lingered.

He was just heating up breakfast when a visitor knocked at his door. It was Sakura.

"Happy New Year!" She said cheerfully as she entered and he went back to the kitchen to finish his breakfast. He mumbled something unintelligible that could be taken for Happy New Year, Same to You or Shut the Heck Up.

"Oh, you already have breakfast?" She looked on as he put onto a plate homemade rice and grilled fish with a side of clam soup in a bowl. "Where did you get that?"

"Hinata."

"Oh. Oh, well ok. I brought you breakfast too, but I guess you don't need it." Sasuke didn't reply. She waited for him to say that she should still leave it, but he still didn't reply, only continued to focus on his food. She felt a bit silly and useless. She took out the containers from her large canvas bag and put them in the fridge anyway. When she was done she stood at the counter and surveyed the apartment, looking for any signs that Hinata was becoming more ingratiated into his life.

"How was your New Year? We didn't see you at all. What did you do?" She asked casually as she walked over to the dining area. On the table was a bill that was half-way lodged under a table mat. All that she could make out was the name Tamaki and the figure -000.00. She wondered what had cost at least 1000 ryō.

"I was sick."

"What?!" She wheeled around to face him. "Why didn't you call me?"

"I had the flu. What could you have done about that?"

She deflated. She hated not being able to help him. "Where were you though? Naruto and I passed by on New Year's Day and I passed by a number of times in the last couple of days, but you weren't here."

"I was at Hinata's."

He said it so casually and she felt like someone had dashed a bucket of cold water on her. "You spent the New Year with Hinata? You were over there these last three days? Wasn't her family away?"

"I fell ill and she took care of me. I came home last night."

"Oh. I see." She said very slowly. "She is very into homeopathy. I think her mother was a civilian and that was the legacy she left."

Sasuke didn't answer. He was busy wondering how to go about courting Hinata. He looked back at Sakura who was for some reason surveying his apartment with a critical eye. He wondered what she was looking for. He watched her stop as she saw on a tray on the coffee table, two tea bowls, a whisk, and other chadōgu.

"You…you're into tea now?" She asked as she made her way back to the counter and came to stand opposite him. She had heard the rumours. How much was true? Apparently plenty.

He shrugged. He understood the underneath of what she was asking. There was no need to be blunt because the truth in what one says lies in ones actions. She could see well enough.

He had gone out and re-bought tea bowls and other tea paraphernalia after he had thrown out the last set when he was upset with Hinata. Now that he had decided to court her, the most that he could come up with was asking her to tea – something that he knew for a fact they both liked and found peace in. He thought about asking her to train with him, but the idea seemed cliché. He even thought back to all the times Karin and pre-married Sakura asked him out. They had asked him to see a movie, to go see a play with them, go to a concert, visit the latest restaurant, take long walks in the park or sit and just be. He liked the last suggestion the most because he had already mastered that aspect with Hinata.

But he knew that he had to tread carefully with Hinata. It was so clear to him that she was wary of hurting others, wary of the emotions that could overrun within her and overflow and awash everything. He completely understood how she felt. He was wary of emotions too, but he had learnt over years how to rein them in, not in a way that he was crippled or stilted by them, but where he was able to see past that haze of pain. He had become helplessly fascinated with her because they were quite similar in some respects, not the same, but similar.

"I don't…I don't quite understand her."Sakura said quietly as she took out some oranges from her bag and began to peel them for him.

He looked up at her wordlessly asking that she explain herself.

"I…I tried to apologize once. This was after I had a really embarrassing moment at her house. We were drinking and you know how I can't hold my liquor. I said something that was so out of line. Her sister was really pissed at me, but Hinata was…nice, maybe too nice. She dropped me home. I was deeply disappointed in myself, but yet I couldn't face her. It wasn't hard to avoid her. She was avoiding me too."

Sakura had unexpectedly encountered Hinata in the park atop the bridge. There was no way to turn and hide, only confront. They had both been avoiding each other during the last two weeks. It was a windy and sunny afternoon in the middle of August. The weather was too perfect, completely ignoring the swirling black emotions in Sakura's heart.

"Hinata-chan,"

"Hello Sakura-chan. Umm, I…"

"We should talk."

"Oh no, no. It is how it is. You know, no hard feelings."

She was smiling like a loon and was actually backing away as she tried to dismiss Sakura in a cloud of platitudes. Sakura was not having it.

"We need to speak, Hinata. Let's go sit over there to that bench."

"…okay then."

They crossed the bridge and walked over to the red bench that was situated on the right side of the lake. Little children were flying kites in the afternoon sun, their parents lazily sitting under the shades of trees to keep a watchful eye on them. Hinata sat and saw nothing. Sakura did a double take at the frosty, hermetic gaze. Hinata seemed to notice that she was being stared at and smiled at Sakura politely, slightly. Sakura took a deep breath.

"Hinata, I just want to say that I'm really sorry about the other night. It…it was uncalled for."

"Do not worry about it."

"Of course I must worry about it. I was insensitive and…I know that if you were to tell me the same about Sasuke-kun, that I'd feel hurt and betrayed."

"You can't help the way that you feel. Even if you didn't say anything then, you'd still feel the same way."

"Yes, but the damage would have been less."

Hinata smiled as she thought, 'probably'.

"Have you spoken to him since he's been back?" Sakura asked.

"Umm, yeah, yes." Hinata looked away. Her voice quieted.

"What do you think? How did it go?"

"He looked good. I didn't stay long. Sasuke-san was there."

"You didn't talk about anything else?"

Hinata looked over at Sakura shrewdly. "Sakura-san, did he tell you what we spoke of?"

"Yes, actually. I can't believe that you told him what I said. Do you really wish him the best with me?"

"It…It might be a comfort to know that he is happy. I've damaged him for life. I feel so guilty around him knowing what I've done and how I've dealt with the situation. I just…I just want him to be happy. I've seen him with you. You two always had that ease."

"I didn't know what to say, especially when we did get together, I heard that she sort of regressed. I don't know what was the right thing to do. I don't understand her mind." She said as she placed some orange slices in a saucer for him.

Sasuke said nothing as he took up a slice of orange. He understood what happened to Hinata – she underestimated her emotional capability. You have an idea of what you want, of what you think should happen and then it happens and you're not ready at all for the feelings. Every time he encountered Itachi, dead or alive, it was the same. No matter how he told himself that things should be a particular way and the universe actually listened to him and engineered things to his myopic outlook, he was never prepared to face the fact that that was not what he actually wanted all along.

This led to his other problem. How could he change her mind to him? He knew that there was something there between them, a sort of eroticism to their spoken and unspoken words, that she was drawn to him even if she didn't realize it. Or was he simply assuming because he knew that's how most women felt about him? Maybe he was seeing that because he felt that way about her.

A knock on the door and Sakura moved to answer it.

She wasn't expecting to see Hinata and neither was Hinata expecting to see Sakura there. They mirrored each other in barely controlled surprised and veiled disappointment.

"Hinata-chan! Come in. Sasuke-kun is having breakfast."

"Oh, okay. I…" She trailed off as she entered and noted the rather domestic scene she walked into. Sakura went back to slicing some oranges as Sasuke tilted his head back and gulped down a vial of medicine that Hinata had prepared for him.

"I came to see how you were doing." She said as she noticed him with the vial. His skin still looked repulsively pale and waxy and his eyes were red-rimmed.

"The fever comes and goes, but it's not as intense. The headaches are gone too. I haven't gotten many aches, but I might have developed a cough."

"You need some fresh air. This apartment is really stuffy." Sakura said. Hinata felt that the pink-haired beauty was actually quite qualified to take care of Sasuke. He was in good hands. She suddenly felt useless and regretted coming over in the first place. She was about to take her leave when the conversation took an unexpected turn when Sakura said,

"Some of us were thinking of going strawberry picking today in Sobetsu. There'll be a buffet and afterwards we thought of staying the night at one of the cottages and watching the fireflies. Naruto-kun won't be there, you know how busy he is, but you should come along Sasuke-kun. That fresh country air will be good for you."

Hinata looked at her feet and smiled. She knew that she had pulled away from her friends in the last two years and she also knew that she had a reputation for being… 'overlooked', but she also thought it quite rude that Sakura had not invited her, even just for the sake of inviting her. She was standing right there!

Sasuke didn't answer her, as was expected and Hinata just stood there in the middle of the room looking worse than useless. They both looked like they were waiting for Sakura to leave. There was awkward and then there was I-want-to-slash-my-wrists-just-to escape-this awkwardness. In the end, Sakura decided to leave first.

"Think about it Sasuke-kun."

He gave his usual non-committal reply. "Hinata-chan," she greeted on the way out and Hinata returned with her usual watery smile that didn't reach her eyes.

It was just the two of them in the apartment now and Hinata realized that she had never been in his apartment before. There were huge cracks in the walls and the coffee table had to be propped up by sticking a wad of paper under one of the legs to balance it out. There was a bit of an incline as she moved from the kitchen to the living room.

"At least the earthquake didn't damage your furniture. It's nice furniture."

"It came with the apartment."

"Oh. Are you going to buy furniture for the farmhouse then or maybe," She paused as she gently suggested the idea and took up a seat on the sofa, "maybe use furniture from the Uchiha compound?"

Sasuke wondered if furniture hunting in the place where his family was brutally murdered counted as a date that was romantic and off-the-beaten-path or a hurt/comfort healing session or a tactical lesson in PTSD tolerance.

"We'll see how it goes." He answered evasively. "I thought you were heading to Shimamura." He came to sit on the loveseat.

"Umm, I changed my mind."

"Why?"

She shrugged.

"What do you usually do in Shimamura?"

"Funnily, there is a strawberry farm there too. I'd pick enough to make jams and pies and tarts. There're some hot springs too. It's quite nice. It's just my family that would be there though. We don't offer tours."

"Sounds like something that you would like."

"It is."

He looked at her pointedly and she sighed and played with the end of her jacket.

"I was supposed to follow immediately after. I wasn't supposed to stay home with you. I received a letter last night from Hanabi."

Sasuke didn't understand the Hyuugas. Hinata had already been married and divorced. She was an adult. She seemed to notice his train of thought.

"It's now more than ever that they'd tighten control. I haven't proven trustworthy in my decisions."

"Yet you're here." He smirked briefly, almost predatorily and Hinata's heart skipped a beat. Maybe she should have gone to Shimamura after all.

Defiant. She had a touch of iron and he liked that. Sasuke suddenly had an idea, except, he was having a bit of trouble actually forming the words out loud. He had never asked someone out before. His chest felt constricted. The last time that happened he was stabbed in the chest by Madara. At least he had a legitimate excuse for feeling that way then, but now…

"Would you like to go to Sobetsu?"

"I wasn't invited."

"I'm inviting you."

She looked at him in confusion, eyebrows crumpled with those pale eyes that made her look like she was too dumb to comprehend basic words.

He was looking at her in that way again. She felt her heart rate speed up. She wished she knew what he was thinking. Well she kind of had an idea…

"Umm…maybe you should rest up. And I should go…do something." She mumbled as she bolted to the door.

So this is what rejection feels like, he thought morosely. He was angry for a minute or two, but remembered that he had admitted that it was not going to be easy. He would simply have to keep trying.

She kept a steady pace behind him in the trees and Sasuke thought that maybe he wouldn't need to actually do an evaluation on her physical abilities after all. The rain was stinging and icy despite it being early still – just about ten in the morning.

He couldn't believe that his plan had worked. He felt quite proud of himself too. He knew that she didn't want to be around people, not even her own family as she had not gone to Shimamura to be with them, so he had no idea what to say to convince her to come to Sobetsu with him. He had sat thinking alone of what to do for almost an hour, long after she and Sakura had left. He was this close to giving up and using genjutsu on her, when he got into a coughing fit and the idea came to him. He hurried over to her house.

"Sasuke-san, I thought you were going on the outing." She said as he met her in the Wisteria garden. She was trimming some dead leaves. The garden was actually quite pristine, so she didn't have much to do. He realized that she was in one of her moods.

"I am." He coughed and made quite a show of it, slapping his chest and all too.

She looked at him in concern, her large deliquescent eyes wobbling with worry. He almost smiled.

"Maybe you should stay at home. I don't think you're well enough to travel."

"Do you have anything for the cough?"

"Why do you insist on going? You should stay home and rest."

"Look, do you have anything for the cough or not?"

Her expression was quite placid when she said, "No."

He was not expecting her to say that. He stared at her, willing her to change her answer, then he remembered who he was dealing with. She looked at her feet and still did not change her answer.

Luckily for him, the universe, apparently feeling sorry for him after all the years of constant abuse and personal intervention to make his life miserable, finally decided to throw him a bone. Rain began to fall. She ran to the veranda expecting him to follow. She looked back quite surprised.

"Where are you going?" Rain was falling rather hard now.

"I have somewhere to be."

"Get out of the rain. Your cough will only worsen and your fever might come back."

He shrugged and left.

Five minutes later as he was hurtling through the trees, he felt her presence behind him. He smirked.

Almost two hours later. Sasuke coughed for nearly five minutes straight. He couldn't breathe. He thought he was going to bring up his lungs.

Hinata stood next to him as he leaned to the side of the wall of the small shed on the strawberry farm and listened to him hack and rasp. She made no moves to rub his back as she remembered when he pushed her out of a third floor window and didn't even try to help her up.

He looked up at her and his expression was clearly one of warning. Not that she had any intention of saying I told you so. She did subtly fleck the raindrops off of her rainproof jacket and was it him or did she give his black, high collared jacket (that was now soaked and was becoming a real danger of being a harbinger of pneumonia-induced death) a look of disdain?

"Why did you follow me if you're just going to stand around and look like that?" He practically growled at her.

"Look like how?" She asked innocently and he felt like strangling her.

"Come on, let's go." He brushed past her and she struggled to hide her giggle, especially when she heard him mumble something about, "fucking universe."

The sky was clear and the air was crisp and cool after the rain had cleared. The smell of wet grass clung to the air as Hinata looked up at the acres and acres of land dotted with plastic greenhouses. In the distance she could just make out rows of cottages set against well manicured gardens. It looked idyllic, like something out of a dream. She smiled contentedly, but faltered when Sasuke again began coughing next to her. He looked like the incarnation of death. He looked like his own personal thunder storm. She wanted to feel sorry for him, but he was so adamant in coming here and persistent in his bad mood!

"We should go. I know you really wanted to taste some strawberries." She said sweetly, wondering why she was only ever sarcastic with him. He glowered at her. She smiled politely at him. This was shaping up to be the worst date ever, he silently thought. Not that he had any to compare it to.

They entered the greenhouse and Hinata worried a bit about Sasuke's lungs and the humid air inside. There were met by a kindly elderly couple handing out plastic containers with one side half filled with condensed milk and the other empty so that one could put the stems from strawberries after they were eaten. She bowed and smiled politely, while Sasuke snatched the container without a word of thanks. She was mortified! She apologized profusely, though the couple seemed to realize that he was Sasuke Uchiha and apologized to him.

She decided to leave Sasuke on his own and followed down a different path away from him. A guide began to tell her about the different types of strawberries and how to pick them and she was too polite to tell him that she knew all of this already, so she listened attentively. When he was finished he gestured for her to start picking and she turned to start, trying her best to forget about Sasuke. Before, that would not have been a problem. She was magnificently good at forgetting about Sasuke, but now, now he consumed her thoughts. When did this happen to her? She was starting to feel depressed since she realized that he was ignoring her just as much as she was ignoring him. Maybe she shouldn't have followed him. But he had originally invited her. She was confused by his actions. She jammed a strawberry soaking in condensed milk into her mouth.

He chanced a look at her and saw her jamming a strawberry that was more condensed milk than fruit into her mouth. That meant that she was feeling upset. When did he get to know her so well? 'Slowly over time'? In the last six months he had greedily devoured her, his thoughts completely dominated by getting to know her.

He knew that he was in a bad mood because of his pride and she done nothing wrong. Every time he coughed he felt angrier. Sure she was right and he should have stayed home, but knowing that didn't make him any less annoyed. Pride induced anger was one of his least controlled emotions. It took him quite a while to calm down and so he decided it was best for him to stay away from her for a while. Their 'date' was going south very fast. Failure irritated him.

"Sasuke-kun!"

He'd know that voice anywhere. He turned to see Ino holding one of his godsons. Sakura was right behind her holding Ryoichi and she was looking shocked.

"What are you doing here?" She asked.

"You invited me."

"Yes, but I didn't think you'd actually show up."

Me neither, he thought as he again chanced a look in Hinata's direction. The things he did for her…

"How are you feeling?" He gave her a look. "You didn't have to actually come in here and pick strawberries. I meant that you should take in the country air. Inside here is actually kind of stuffy. Maybe you should rent a cottage." Sakura felt horrible for not explaining thoroughly what she meant. But in her defense, she didn't really expect Sasuke to show up. He never shows up to anything she invites him to!

Ino babbled more than the baby for a while as she informed him that she was there with her mother, Sakura's parents were there and Shikamaru and his mother, Kiba's sister was here with her husband together with Chouji and his parents as well. As a matter of fact, he noticed that it was a rather family-oriented affair. He felt a strange hollowness and he could feel the old and familiar anger bubbling up to fill that void. He was in a dangerous situation. He turned on his heel and left the girls floundering.

He marched up to Hinata who was two more condensed milk-dipped strawberries away from entering a diabetic coma. He grabbed her by her arm and bent to whisper in her ear,

"Let's get out of here." She felt a shiver when his breath caressed her ear and she flushed.

He could feel Sakura's and Ino's eyes on him as he left with Hinata.

Outside the chill of the unseasonably cold January weather in the Fire Country hit them like a slap. His bad mood was infectious. She pulled away from his too hard grip rather violently. His kekkei genkai activated automatically.

"Sasuke-san, if my presence is upsetting you this much, why did you invite me here?"

"Why did you follow me?"

They stared at each other as their breaths came out in nacreous wisps. She looked wounded, but before she got the chance to say anything, he turned and left her.

He was in the restaurant and he was looking as miserable as ever. There was a variety of foods – sushi, grilled meats, soups, curries, fresh fruits and vegetables – yet, he didn't have any appetite. He wasn't sure if it stemmed from his worsening cold or his bad mood over how everything happened between him and Hinata today. He wanted to leave, but he was unsure where she was. Had she left? From his enquiries, it didn't seem so. Lots of people purported to have seen her in the last hour or so, yet she clearly wasn't here. He ate his food desultorily and ignored questions that were posed to him and gave dirty looks to anyone who asked where was Hinata.

The group's next plan was to move on to mustard flower viewing or something asinine like that and Sasuke took the opportunity to hunt, he meant search, for Hinata. He wondered if they were playing hide and seek again on a greater scale.

It was nearing six o'clock when he found her near the 'river' where the tour was scheduled to view the fireflies later. There was still a bit of light out, but the sky was darkening quickly. The 'river' was a ditch with ideas above its station. Tall blades of grass shot up from both sides and she was sitting on a boulder with her knees drawn up as she hugged herself close.

"Sasuke-san,"

"Where the hell have you been?" He hadn't intended to start with that tone, but it just sort of came out. She looked up at him and you would swear that he'd just kicked a newborn kitten over the ditch, by the wounded look she gave him.

"Stop looking at me like that." He took up a seat next to her, his chest aching because he was coughing so much. As evening neared it seemed to worsen.

"I bought some honey at the gift shop and managed to get one of the farmers to give me some lime juice. It'll help with the cough until I can get home and make you something better." She handed him a plastic bottle half-filled with something thick and dark brown in colour. He glugged down some gratefully.

They were silent for a while as they listened to the crickets chirping and birds whistling.

"You should stay away from rice."

"I had rice today for lunch. If you were around, you might have been able to stop me."

"Probably not. You usually do what you want." He conceded that she had a point.

"I should have listened to you and stayed at home. I feel like hell."

She couldn't take it anymore. "Why did you invite me here?"

"I know that you like these kinds of things."

"Why should it matter what I like?"

He turned to look at her. To him it was obvious. He was behaving uncharacteristically in pursuit of her. Anyone with eyes could see that. But her question made him wonder about something more and not just her genre blindness.

"Why do you think that what you like shouldn't matter?"

She didn't answer, only hugging herself closer, resting her chin on her knees.

It was getting darker and they hardly noticed, but they could still make out each other's faces.

"Here." She looked up to see that he was handing over a small, rectangular plastic container filled with strawberries. "I don't have any condensed milk, you sugar addict."

She smiled and tried to take the container from him. Their hands were brushing. She looked up at him and he was looking at her in that way again. If I kiss you now what would you, he wondered.

"Why do you look at me in that way?"

"Why do you think?"

She tried to pull away, but he now had a firm grip on her hands.

"Why don't you like to be touched?"

There was a dangerous sensuality between them, dancing right underneath the surface, bubbling like soup.

The thing was that she knew what passion was. She could feel the tension between her and Sasuke. She could very easily imagine lips on her lips, kisses on her breasts, small bites on her neck. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath to steady herself. She felt so disgusted with herself as guilt sludged down into her mind.

When Naruto had thrown her down on the bed she had squealed in delight. They were both so busy and it had been so long. She had experienced sensory overload in less than a minute when he greedily kissed her neck and cupped her breasts and put his hand between her legs.

"It…" She swallowed thickly, as she tried to explain herself to Sasuke. "It's not that I don't l-like to be touched." Their opaline ribbons of frosted breaths were mixing together.

She couldn't remember feeling so much pleasure. She was smiling with so much satisfaction when she got up from the bed.

She remembered feeling as if she had unexpectedly fallen off of a cliff. The trickle of blood that pooled around her little boy's mouth. She could see it so clearly. She had screamed. This could have been avoided. She felt that she was worse than a whore.

"It's that I don't think I deserve to be touched." She pulled away from him.

It was dark now, but her eyes were glistening with tears, reflecting light. They heard the sound of voices. She hastily wiped her eyes and jumped down from the boulder.

"I umm, I think I'll leave now. Thank you for inviting me." She said stiffly. "Keep taking the medicine and the honey and lime mixture."

She leapt up into the trees and he followed silently behind her. His own question echoed in his mind, "Why did you follow me?" He already knew her answer. It was the same as hers.

"Because I care about you."

He followed her silently.

A/N: What did you guys think of Sasuke and Hinata's first 'date'? More insight into the past up next. Review please!