CCNote: Please enjoy my Day 16 contribution to SasuHina Month. It's just a small snippet into a life, that wasn't perfect but was always consistent. For more content, check out my P(A)treon under WritingandCurls. Thank you!

Take My Hand, Take My Whole Life Too

It hurt to look at her.

Small

Frail

He feared that she would blow away with a strong gust of wind. He feared that when he opened his eyes she wouldn't be there. He feared an existence…a life without her. A life without her would not be a life. He barely had one before she entered the picture. He could not imagine what his world would be like once she left.

He could remember life before her. He was able to go through the motions of what could be considered living. He went to school and got top scores in all of his classes because that was what his father would have wanted. He made his bed, ate all of his food because that was what his mother would have wanted. He continued to breathe day in and day out despite how empty it felt because that is what his brother would have wanted.

His life progressed because theirs could not. He would not let their sacrifice be in vain but it was a painful, lonely existence. When Hinata entered his life, she was met with much resistance. He had up walls to keep others from getting close to him. If they got too close they would see that he was just an empty shell. If they got too close, if he cared too much- they would one day disappear like his family. Yet, Hinata had persisted.

She persisted in ways that were small. Silently bringing him lunch every day at school after the accident had become known. When he was absent, class notes and assignments were always placed neatly inside of his locker. On the day they graduated from middle school and he was the only one without a family member to pin his carnation to his uniform, Hinata was waiting at his desk to do it for him.

He pushed away her attempts every time. Threw away the lunches. Tossed the schoolwork. But on that day he let her pin the flower on and that may have been his biggest mistake. When they entered high school together he watched her from afar. Watched how the shy mouse from middle school made friends that were willing to do anything for her. He watched her excel in all of her classes and become a reluctant class secretary. She grew out her hair and embrace clothing that flattered her figure more. She fell in love and had her heart broken.

When he found her crying silently on the school steps in the rain he knew that her heart had been shattered into a thousand pieces. He had no words of comfort to give her. Only an umbrella to help shield her from the downpour. She didn't accept it so he stood in the rain next to her as the shower picked up.

"My cousin and my sister died in a car accident yesterday." She said and the bright woman he'd once known dimmed.

From that day on, he'd stood by her side. In the rain. In the snow. In the heat. He stood by her side at graduation and when she told her father she wouldn't be going to college. He stood by her side as she opened her own art studio and saw a vision no one else could see. He stood by her side as light reentered her life and his own didn't feel so lonely.

When she wanted to get married, he was there with a ring in hand and a vow on his lips. A vow that promised to love her for better or for poorer. In sickness and in health. Til death do they part. She had smiled for him then. She had smiled and the emptiness in his heart began to fill with hope. Hope for a future that they would build together. She had vowed that they would stay together. Yet here she was…

Pained

Hollow

She struggled to rise from bed in the morning and get to sleep at night. Her hair had all fallen out from the chemo treatments and her body was wasting away. The art that once gave her joy lay abandoned and her shop shuttered close. Her usually sharp mind was fading as a side effect of the medication she was given.

He had been right to shut down her advances. He knew that in the end she would leave him. Everyone always left him in the end. His eyes stung with unshed tears as he finally looked at her. She was simply sitting there in their bed with a giant book in lap, her head covered with a lavender cap she'd knitted. As he approached, she slowly looked up at him and a smile spread over her face.

He hated how she looked at him. He hated how even now she lit up with so much life. He hated how his heart skipped a beat and longed for a few more decades. Years. Anything. When she reached out her hand, he took it. He could feel the small bones, her fingers cold from iron deficiency. He held on tight despite everything inside of him screaming to let go.

"Sasuke…" She said, her weak voice was barely above a whisper. "Thank you."

He grunted and pressed her cold fingers to his lips. There was nothing she needed to thank him for.

"When I first heard your family had passed my mother said I should be your friend." She said. "She died not long after that and I felt I had to try to be your friend even when you didn't want me to. I had to do it for her."

"Hinata…"

"You didn't like me…I suspected you hated me but I did it anyway because it was all I knew how to do. Then Neji and Hanabi died and you were there. You were always there. When I didn't know what to do. Loving you was something I could do…something I had to do. So thank you for letting me love you."

Loving her was something he couldn't help. Something he had fought so hard against and here she was thanking him. He hated her. He loved her. Unable to express his feelings, he squeezed her hand and prayed that he could force his own life into her. He would half his life span if it meant a few more years for her.

If it meant she would live to see another day…