Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto, or any of its associated characters!

Summary: Sasuke has spent three years trying to figure out how to live on his own. Maybe it's time to try something different. WIP. Future SNS, updates once a month. Canonverse. Rating may change!

A/N: Hey friends! Hope you're all doing well. It skipped over spring and went straight to summer over here, so I'm posting this before I melt. It's a bit heavier, just as a warning! We are in Sasuke's head, after all.

Onto the fic!

Two is a Crowd

Chapter 3: if not a reflection

Luxury came next. Indulgent, excessive luxury. They tucked into the first small town that Naruto spotted, but not before he turned and glanced back—quick and hidden, as if Sasuke would ever not notice the motion. Naruto's steps even paused, even stuttered and waited, checking if Sasuke's mind had changed. Checking if he was going to turn their steps around. He could. Naruto would have given in. If Sasuke insisted, Naruto would have given in.

Sasuke only gave him the raise of an eyebrow. He bumped into Naruto's shoulder on the way by—a hit to call him an idiot. A hit to tell him so. Naruto laughed as if he'd heard the word.

His smiles were so much calmer in the daytime.

He stepped ahead, and Sasuke lagged behind. All his protests about surviving on his own, existing as himself, not finding someone to follow behind—and here he was, walking in Naruto's shadow. Such a stupid, easy comfort.

He breathed so much easier when Naruto led the way.

Naruto turned, as if sensing the gaze.

"Hey," he said, reaching back an arm that didn't dare touch Sasuke, "remind me to send a letter before we go. D'you see an inn or something?"

"I barely see anything," Sasuke muttered back, and Naruto laughed. It was true. The town was quiet—the type of secluded, still silence that had Sasuke counting his weapons and spreading his senses. It was an automatic response to…peace.

Sasuke shifted uncomfortably at the thought, and Naruto looked back at him again.

"We don't have to stay for long," he said. "Just let me…shower or something."

He sighed out the words, twisting a vague, bandaged hand through his sunlight hair.

"I seem to recall it was hot springs or nothing," Sasuke deadpanned, and Naruto let out a sheepish breath.

"Well, I mean," he said, and his hand has paused to rub at the back of his neck instead. "Not all places have hot springs. But if we find one, we're staying. Not just here."

Naruto turned to point at him. He was stubborn and determined, and Sasuke found himself fighting a familiar smile.

"You've become accustomed to luxury," he told him, and Naruto laughed.

"Maybe I have," he said. "Maybe I have."

It took them a few more minutes to find what they were looking for. The village was quiet and slow—opposite to the bustling chaos Sasuke found himself expecting. The voices were calm and the people were few, and if there hadn't been any, Sasuke might not have found that great a difference from the stillness of the woods. He still caught the colour of strangers passing by through, though. Still twitched at their movements and stifled the instinct to disappear as he was seen. He was skilled at certain things, and inept at others, and he'd been living the latter for…too long, now.

Naruto spotted an inn, and Sasuke's empty sleeve fluttered in the breeze he left behind.

He stood back as Naruto moved forward, staying seen but subtle in the shadows. A tired traveller, studying the walls. Pacing the paths of a new place. He felt awkward and threatening, unsure of when he would be recognized. Unsure of when Naruto would be. Did it matter if he was hated on sight? If he was asked to leave? Sasuke didn't know his own answer.

It would matter to Naruto, though.

He breathed, and Naruto paid. Sasuke occupied himself with the cat in the hall. It had flopped over his feet—raising its paws in the air, squinting its sleep-laden eyes up at Sasuke…

Sasuke knelt down.

The cat bit his hand. It gnawed and held it there, kicking away, and Sasuke fought the smile on his face as he let it. He waited until it let go, and watched as it trotted away.

The cat was orange and white, and its tail caught along Naruto's calves as it walked by.

Sasuke leaned against the wall, and watched Naruto get startled. Watched him laugh, joke with the old lady at the counter—the one who hustled around, picking up the protesting cat as Naruto made her laugh again—

He made it look so easy.

He made it all look so easy.

"Hey!" Naruto greeted him, and he was holding a key. "They gave us—apparently they don't get too many people. We've got the biggest one."

He laughed, and Sasuke let him lead the way. No one had recognized them. Or no one had seemed to. The thought filled Sasuke with relief and answers, all at once—it was good enough for them both. Sasuke had enough of his history following him in every step, and Naruto didn't need his renown to follow him to prove what he was.

He leaned back against the wall of their room, and Naruto beamed as he spun around.

It was huge. It was a palace. It was so, so big.

"Look at this!" Naruto whispered, but he could have been yelling. "Look at this place!"

He spun around again and threw their things on the floor.

Sasuke fought a smile he shouldn't have felt.

"You've splurged," Sasuke informed him, and Naruto didn't care.

"I don't care," he said, and it could have been right in Sasuke's face with all Naruto leaned into it. "I'm taking a shower. I'm outta here!"

"Not a bath?" Sasuke asked, mumbling to the empty room. Seemed a shame to indulge and stop at the final hurdle, but whatever. It wasn't Sasuke's choice to come here.

…

Well, it was, in a sense. He supposed it was. He could have stamped his foot to the ground and demanded it not move, but that miserable cause would have been lost as quickly as it was won. And Sasuke had had enough of his own miserable causes.

Still, Sasuke thought, removing his shoes after standing in place for far too long, he wasn't sure how long he would…like to stay. Naruto had given no deadline. And Naruto had been given no deadline—they seemed happy to have them as long as they would stay, which was its own specific type of…strange. Uncomfortable. Sasuke rolled his neck as if it would release the tension.

It didn't.

He breathed out and walked past their bags. The walls felt cool to his touch. They felt rough and long and…endless. Big for him. Too big for him.

The silence was under his skin already.

The soft sound of running water distorted in his head, moving far and muffled, like something still and large, like the sound of a splash against wood, the movement of a dock in water. They were different sounds. They were different sounds. But the voices in the hall sounded like voices past his window, and Sasuke looked at the ceiling—it seemed so filled with cobwebs, so many cobwebs he couldn't reach—

Sasuke sat by the bathroom door and closed his eyes. Naruto was humming.

…

Naruto was humming.

Sasuke slowly, slowly breathed again.

He held himself there until the door opened. The click of the lock and the tap of Naruto's feet brought him back—he stood before Naruto stepped out, but it still wasn't enough.

"That was so much better," Naruto laughed, shirtless and wet. "You've gotta…you okay?"

"Fine," Sasuke said, but Naruto's smile was already gone. "Did you leave any hot water?"

Naruto turned as he passed him.

"Yeah, 'course I—Sasuke—"

The rest of Naruto's sentence drowned in Sasuke's ears.

There was a mirror in this bathroom.

Sasuke's hair had grown.

And Naruto's voice was still speaking, but Sasuke didn't hear a word—Sasuke didn't hear a thing—Sasuke only heard the blood rushing into his ears, the blood rushing out of him, the blood coating his hands, coming out of his mouth—

Sasuke stared at the mirror and Itachi stared back.

He shoved Naruto out and shut the door. It locked in a snap, and Naruto yelled something Sasuke couldn't hear. His ears were filled with pounding blood, with the rush of panic and adrenaline and fear, he tore his eyes from his brother and grabbed his kunai, grabbed his hair, held them both, come on—come on—

The blade's edge slid by. Slid uselessly by. Sasuke's hand shook as he tried again, he pressed harder, he might have cut three hairs on his head but he pierced a finger good and well—he swore and dropped the kunail, hearing it as it chattered to the ground, feeling the searing in his fingertips as if they were his brother's own, Sasuke's back was to rock and Itachi's bloodied hand pressed two fingers to his forehead—

Sasuke's legs gave way. He landed beside his blade, his fingers smeared their blood over the toilet bowl. His hair was black against his cheeks, and Sasuke was sick.

When he came back to himself, Naruto was beside him. Sasuke hadn't heard him come in. Sasuke didn't know how long it had been. He was still shaking, still heavy in his breath and horror in his mouth—

"I broke the lock," Naruto explained, and it was quiet. "I'll fix it for them."

Sasuke nodded and felt along the ground. His eyes were blurry and vacant, but they found the kunai, and Sasuke didn't trust his mouth to speak as he picked it up again.

"What—" Naruto said, raising a hand—

It didn't work again. Naruto didn't even stop him, and it didn't work again. Sasuke needed a better knife. Sasuke needed his sword. Sasuke needed a fucking flame—

"Oh—wait, Sasuke, hang on, hang on, stay—"

Naruto pulled him around and copied the grip Sasuke had on his hair. The blue in his eyes told Sasuke to let go, and so Sasuke did—letting Naruto take the kunai, letting him hold it up to his hair—he stared at the floor and waited for it to fall—

A moment later, his head was lighter.

It should have felt like relief.

It didn't.

He moved like a rock. He moved like he was stuck at the bottom of a waterfall, beneath all that would remember him, wedged in between all that was bigger. Sasuke made it to the other room and leaned against the wall, and the moon passed over them. The sun passed over them. Naruto's guilt seeped through the room like poison. He didn't even try to talk. He didn't even try to convince Sasuke to go—not beyond leaving their things packed, and looking at him three hundred times a day, as if waiting for Sasuke to get up and lead them away—

But Sasuke had nothing.

The lights around him changed, but Sasuke stared at the floor.

His hunger awoke him eventually. Naruto had brought food—warm, and well-cooked—around. It wasn't the first time. It was the first time Sasuke tasted it, though.

Just a spoonful.

Just another.

And another.

His bodily sensations came back to him one by one. Parts of him had gone numb, the rest ached and begged him to move.

He never did have that shower.

Naruto stared at him as he stood, and Sasuke gave him an…apology. Naruto was wordless but shook his head, some sort of no, some sort of why would you—

Sasuke walked to the bathroom, and the mirror was gone.

Oh.

Sasuke hadn't even seen Naruto take it out.

He breathed out, and another piece of him came back.

What a stupid moment. Sasuke couldn't really believe he hadn't had it sooner. He never tended to stay in towns, but water was a constant, and something about his rippled reflection should have done that to him.

It hadn't, though.

That had caught him fully by surprise.

He breathed out and closed the door. The lock was fixed again.

Sasuke…clicked it. And then clicked it again.

…

He left it unlocked. No sense in breaking what they'd only just fixed.

And then he was naked, under the water, closing his eyes as if it was the rain. He did end up feeling…cleaner. In some ways. Dirtier in others, weighed down with the memories and the resignation and the reminders of his own weakness, weakness, weakness again. He was set off so easily. He was destroyed so easily.

No growth. No strength, even still. He was the same as he'd always been, only now he had nowhere to hide.

…But maybe that was just the same, too. Naruto had always had a way of finding him. Particularly when it was inconvenient.

The room was filled with steam when he stepped out. It created a fog that coated him, a fog he breathed in. This fog was much more soothing than the one he was in.

He left the mist behind him, and as the door opened, Naruto sprung to his feet.

"Is there somewhere to wash our clothes?" Sasuke asked, and Naruto's smile was filled with relief.

"Yeah. Yeah there is."

Naruto took three clones and a pair of scissors to Sasuke's hair, next. He moved with a practice that Sasuke eyed, but didn't comment on. It was new, but then—a few days was a lifetime to Naruto's regular pace. Sasuke should have known better than to expect him to sit still.

The next time he caught his reflection, he was looking for it. It was a shop window, and Sasuke knew what would be there before they even passed it by—

He didn't look like Itachi anymore.

Not any more than usual, anyway.

He breathed again, and continued to walk. Naruto's stuttered, frozen, panicked form slowly thawed, too. He spared it a glance, and Naruto gave him a shaky smile in apology.

It was alright. It was alright. This one was planned.

It was unfortunate, though, because the parts of himself that had grown to look like his brother had been almost invisible, before. He'd been so used to them. They were new, now. They were new again, and Sasuke found them in his own face like a blade, twisting deeper and deeper. Sasuke's body was filled with daggers. Filled with wounds. Like a hundred needles, piercing into him all at once.

Naruto certainly looked at him the same way.

The peace of the village was ruined, but it returned to Sasuke anyway. The problem was in his own head, he knew. As if that was anything new. They washed their clothes and Naruto bought a hair tie for himself and Sasuke wandered outside of the shop, following a familiar cat that had meowed at him from across the road.

He knelt, and it bumped its orange head to his hand.

It didn't know any better.

"You, again," Sasuke told it, quiet and under his breath. The cat only purred back at him, with the same white under its chin. The same dots above its eyebrows, stripes along its back…it could have been only related to the cat from the inn, but from the way it seemed to recognize him…

"That's Tangerine," came Naruto's voice, and Sasuke lazily glanced back. "You've met him, right?"

Sasuke didn't reply.

"Seems like he recognized you," Naruto said, and Sasuke still…didn't reply. Maybe. Maybe it recognized a soft touch. A warm hand. Maybe Sasuke recognized something that wouldn't flinch when he reached out. That was twice, now, it had survived unscathed.

The cat disappeared amongst the buildings, and Sasuke turned away.

They got on their way again—off to send a letter Naruto had yet to send. Days of being here, and he'd dodged past every opportunity he'd had. It was as if he was putting it off, or something.

Sasuke looked to his side, but the blue of Naruto's eyes stayed on the ground.

It was difficult to understand, to Sasuke, what Naruto was…doing here. Why Naruto had come. Why Naruto was bothering to stay. Even all his time chasing Sasuke had really been about bringing him back—Sasuke's return, Naruto's ascension to Hokage, Naruto's drive for change—all of his goals circled with each other, and their center was Konoha. A place which Naruto, apparently…no longer wanted to be.

Sasuke understood, but he wasn't sure he believed it.

He could certainly empathize with a hatred of the place. A dislike, if nothing else. But Naruto held it dear. Even now, he held it dear.

And so they went to send a letter.

"To Sakura," Naruto told him, fiddling with the page, "just to check on…stuff. I dunno. Feels weird not…knowing how things are doing. Um."

Naruto didn't finish the thought, but Sasuke lingered with it. Desire or obligation—he wasn't sure Naruto knew the difference. Maybe he never had. But Sasuke stood steadily by as Naruto read it over, grabbing a pen and scribbling something out. Adding something else. He was well-acquainted with the way Naruto wrote. Even more so, now. It was loose and it was honest, filled with thoughts that started and didn't finish until six others had begun between them. Sasuke was yet to be done with the words Naruto had written for him. And yet…

He found himself envious of those getting more.

Naruto sent the letter, and Sasuke turned away.

"I gave her like a—like an area. Just if she wants to reply. Or anybody else," he told Sasuke. "That okay? We weren't planning on going anywhere farther, were we?"

Sasuke looked over at him, and Naruto laughed.

"Okay, okay. Yeah, I know."

He laughed again, as if whatever he knew was something good and funny—Sasuke wasn't sure what it was, but he thought he might know it too.

The smile he fought was so familiar, now.

They came back to the room as the sun began to set. Sasuke stood at the windows and watched the sky paint its reds and purples, and Naruto hummed as he fiddled with something behind him.

Sasuke wondered when he picked up the habit.

"We'll head out tomorrow," Naruto told him, as if that was the reason Sasuke was staring out at the rest of the world. "I just wanted to—send the letter."

Sasuke turned, and Naruto rubbed the back of his neck. His lips were pressed together, and his eyes were somewhere down and slanted, like there was something about the frayed corner of the windowsill that he was studying…

"I'm sure they would reach you," Sasuke said, "if something was truly wrong."

Naruto's laugh was slanted and humouring. Sasuke caught the disbelief along the edges even as Naruto's smile widened past them—

"I mean," he said, and it was another shrug. "They could, if they tried. If there was an emergency or something. Um. I dunno if they want to bug me or anything…but I dunno. I—there's a lot that I…started."

He paused, and he breathed.

"I dunno how it's all going," he finished, and the sky was painting him colours, too. Sasuke scanned the way the light tinted his face…the creases in his eyes. The way the scars stretched across his cheeks. The memory of his smile was written all over his face—Naruto's big, toothy grin. His soft, smaller understanding. The sunset caught along the strands of his hair, as if the rays of the sun found one of their own, and Naruto's eyes turned to him—

Sasuke looked away.

Nerves, again. Nerves, sparking under his skin. No adrenaline. No blood pumping. No fight to drive his feet, no fist to throw, no chidori to channel—Sasuke stood here, and felt it. He felt Naruto beside him. Felt the shift in the air, like the world curved to let him have his place. Like the air needed to change.

It was warmer, now.

"C'mon," Naruto said, and he made a motion as if his bandaged arm was reaching out for the one Sasuke no longer had, "let's get packed up."

By the time Sasuke turned, the motion was gone.

The world curved back again.

A/N: That's it for now! Thank you for the love, it means more than you know. Posting once a month is so much slower than my usual, I know, but it's really nice to be able to take my time here - and still know you're around and looking forward to when I post. So thank you!

Until next time,

- Kinomi