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Hinata wakes up with difficulty. What surrounds her is a warm, solid cocoon that has a heart beat of its own and allows her limited room to move. Wiggling her toes is the most she can manage. Her right eyelid is pressed to a moving chest, naked and in sync with her own breathing.
The man embracing her kisses her at the top or her head, inhaling deeply, as though he could breathe her in.
"You awake?" A baritone voice, thick and placid, whispers above her, pulling away slightly so she can see him, arms and legs are still on place locking her in.
As she inhales him in, a memory from weeks ago approaches her in a subdued hurl of undefinable nuances. They were in a similar position, the scent of lightning, of him was identical, but it wasn't her bed nor was the sun still perched on her throne in the sky. It was his bed, his apartment, and in the middle of the night.
She remembers what she was feeling at that exact moment and she feels it right now. The feeling as though she's always known how it felt.
What happened afterwards is still clearly pictured in her mind and Hinata can't help feeling the dread of recurrence.
To his chest, she nods, staying on place for a moment before pulling away to look at his face. His eyes readily meet with hers. She smiles, Sasuke expels air through his nose softly.
Just like past experience, there is this invisible thread that binds them…and if they let go of any rationals, nothing would be able to hold them back. Once would never be enough. They would go for second, third, on and on until they couldn't.
But what they've done… it is dangerous.
If it were to happen again, the second time, he wouldn't be able to hold it. One thing he is most certain; he would fill her to the brim.
And he can't risk it.
They can't.
Her eyes flutter downwards, tracing the direction of her hand as it travels down along the length of his arm towards his hand. It hooks at the groove between his thumb and index finger, proceeds to leave little taps on his palm, then her fingers sweep back up to his wrist, tracing the volar side, looking for a strong pulse of his artery. She finds it fluidly; its pulsations are steady, formidable, potent. Her fingers stay there for a longer time, just... sensing, studying, taking in the sign of him being alive.
Her eyes return to his, quizzical, searching.
Sasuke wants nothing more than to be able to give answers.
"What is … this?" she breathes, "….why couldn't I resist you?"
In all honesty, Sasuke has the answer.
He's tried resisting, she's settled on abiding by his rules. Yet, it didn't do them any good. Should they just let this be? Should he just let them be?
"What do you think?" he replies, treading on eggshells, fishing out any information about her knowledge.
Hinata bites her bottom lip. Sasuke wets his to avoid diving in towards her.
"What we have…," she starts, struggling, but determined, "is no ordinary connection."
Sasuke nods, letting go the restrain to kiss her as he takes a mouthful of her breathing. Parting a mere breath away, he reaffirms, "It is not ordinary."
Not ordinary, he said.
They have the same knowledge. The both of them know what not ordinary could possibly entail. The same thing that brings out the same fear, puts their hearts far from peace, floods them in doubts. The difference is while Hinata remains in the stage of not knowing anything definite, Sasuke has advanced to ponder any possibilities and consequences that could ensue.
This responsibility of knowing more is no child's play, so he has to be very careful.
He has to be the one taking the lead.
"What do you know?" Hinata requests, her lithe fingers retrace the way back to his pulse. "Tell me everything you know."
His Adam's apple fluctuates when he swallows down. "What I have," Sasuke begins, low and slow, "would change … things." The pauses he takes speak volume of his effort in being careful. "We're not ready for that yet."
Hinata is silent but her eyes proclaim, loud and clear, You're hiding something.
Sasuke faces her steadfast. "In time, Hinata."
Her brow contorts, suspicion arising the longer she holds back her response.
Fated pair… is this what it truly means?
Her thoughts were so loud she was sure she had said it out loud.
But she didn't.
She maintains her gaze to him in silence. He returns it shamelessly, like he didn't hide things from her, like he only did what was best for her.
"But I can tell you what you need to know now," Sasuke utters, tucking stubborn strands of hair behind her ear. "Know that I've stopped finding reasons."
"Reasons…?" Hinata scrunches her nose. "I… don't understand."
Sasuke lets out a laugh and Hinata is utterly mesmerized.
"Trust me, I don't either," he admits, settling to breathe in her neck.
Hinata pulls back from his head, she has to see him on the eyes to get her point across. "Is this why you told me to stay away, because you were finding reasons?"
"And some other things…" he reveals, burying his fingers amidst her locks, "I thought it'd be dangerous when I—when we knew so little. I needed to sort things out first until I was certain."
Hinata inclines her head to the side. "And you are now?"
Sasuke nods.
"Why is that? Why did you stop finding reasons?"
"I came to realise…" There is a pause as he runs his fingers along the length of her hair and finishes his reply in an undertone. "I don't need one."
Hinata doesn't know why she thinks she needs to smile. So she smiles.
Or maybe she just wants to.
Still smiling, she lowers her gaze to a random space between them. "How did you know I was injured?" she asks, making circles on his chest with her finger.
Sasuke lets out a sigh, the kind that summons a memory of fractured porcelain of her recent Beta partner. Hinata's eyes widen as she looks up to his face again.
"Devil Ray!" she exclaims, "Devil Ray, isn't it? You had me under his watch."
His answer comes immediately. "It wasn't the wisest decision. But, yes, I did."
The first emotion that got to her was indignation. Humiliation. Self-doubt. A very reasonable thing to happen. But they pulsed weakly, and were easily overruled by others; thankfulness, security, … and yet vulnerability that is not entirely unacceptable. A sense of dependability towards the man embracing her.
So she settles to be an accepting receiver.
"Okay."
Sasuke's brow furrows. "Just okay?"
Hinata nods, a subtle smile on display. "Just okay."
Silence lingers between them as Sasuke studies her expression. He inclines his head, facial lines smoothening by each second.
"Hinata," he says suddenly, just her one-word name.
Said woman blinks owlishly. "Hmm?"
"I might have found something..." he continues also so suddenly, so out of nowhere. "to secure you on the safe side as Omega Anbu."
She had been taken aback when he changed topic so suddenly. But now, this piece of information, this offer… is something else. Gradually, her eyes widen.
"You have?" she asks, and there was a wistful quality to the way she said it.
Sasuke nods, his expression lines solemn. "But I'm still trying to find faults in it. Give me more time."
Awed, her eyes widen even more. "Is that the 'some other things' you mentioned? Because you've been looking for answers? For more truths?"
Locking her under his gaze, Sasuke scoffs softly. "Nothing got past you?"
Hinata lowers her gaze, cheerful. She chuckles lightly to her curled fingers, still looking downwards.
Sasuke's lips twitch. He tightens his hold around her, burying her face to his chest.
He eventually gives in to the temptation to smile.
"I'll tell you when the time is right," he whispers to her hair.
To his chest, she nods. Then, after a moment, comes a muffled utterance to his chest. But he can make out every word clearly.
"I haven't thank him properly."
A mere rise of a dark eyebrow.
"Devil Ray." Another muffled response.
Sasuke sulks and lets the silence fill her room.
Hinata suddenly pulls away and he was not prepared for the strength she's put for this change of position alone.
"Sasuke," she says, eyes pulling him in. Pulling him in because the sight of her beige-painted wall blurs, a part of her wardrobe that has acted as the background the whole time disappears so suddenly. All he sees is white, with a hint of lavender, and a glimmer quality that owned only by her eyes. "In the mean time... what should we do, then?"
Sasuke swallows. "What do you have in mind?"
Hinata diverts her gaze from his, as if considering. In truth, she's decided, way before.
Her eyes return to his, lips trembling, not from worry, not from uncertainty. It comes from the thrill of keeping her emotions in check, of how she finally comes to say what she knows she truly wants.
"I ... don't want to stop seeing you."
Hinata imprints the shift in his expression to the deepest recess of her brain; how his eyes has widened, how he has sucked a breath before resolving to release a quiet breath, fully morphing into a man of conviction.
"Then, you won't," he claims, holding her gaze. "You're trapped now, I won't let you go."
Still holding his gaze, her fingers return to the pulsation on his wrist. His pulse is strong, mighty, honest. Honest, like how she is. "... I'm not going anywhere."
"Good," Sasuke says before sealing the deal by claiming her lips. He doesn't have the intention to utilize the kiss as an opening to another, more heated, more purposeful session. Because he severs the kiss as fast as he first landed his lips on hers. Unenlightened, she follows blindly. Sasuke stops her by placing his index finger to her lips.
Taken aback, her eyes open, widen, then blink.
"I made breakfast," he says. "Let's eat?"
Eyes wide, lips sealed, Hinata nods slowly.
Presented on her table is a typical local breakfast a parent would provide their children. She'd been eating them growing up in the Hyuuga Compound. The taste of home still lingers and she's made it a habit to prepare one herself from time to time. In fact, she's made them far too frequent that the way she has arranged her ingredients must have emitted a signal to him, a signal to be picked, to get cooked by him.
"Sit," he orders, "I'll fix one for you."
Hinata chooses to sit on one of four chairs of her dining table, the closest to her bedroom, the one she isn't used to sit on. She watches the way he makes his way about her kitchen, no hesitancy, no awkward gestures, confident in every step, like he's been there before. He retrieves two bowls from the first drawer closest to the sink, opens her brand new rice cooker, stirs the rice uncaring of the steam that floats to his face in continuous waves.
He comes to the table with two bowls filled with rice, then returns to the kitchen to retrieve chopsticks, spoons, and glasses filled with tap water.
Once he is seated across from her—on the only gray painted wooden chair, the one she favors the most because of its price and history, the one she always remembers to sit on because it's way too expensive not to—he gives her a look to start.
Hinata smiles. "This looks delicious. Itadakimasu."
Sasuke reciprocates his gratitude for the food and without minding her, he starts eating.
Hinata starts by picking a piece of tamagoyaki. Aside from its crooked appearance, it tastes delicious. Just like how she would have her eggs; the adequate fix between savory and sweet. She then takes a careful sip of the steaming miso soup. Then a spoonful, then another one, she then swallows down a handsome amount of rice, another tamagoyaki, rice, the soup, more rice—
"Slow down," he says before sipping on his soup.
Hinata chews slowly, then gulps down some water. "I didn't realise how hungry I was."
Sasuke reaches to his glass. Once in his hold, he raises the glass before saying, "You'll get the chance."
Hinata watches his Adam's apple fluctuate as he swallows down. A drizzle manages to escape from the corner of his lips down to his neck, his clavicles, then stops on his bare chest, over the sternum. "Chance? What chance?"
He puts his glass down. "To thank Devil Ray properly, you'll have the chance."
Taken aback, but not entirely shaken, Hinata giggles promptly. This man… is something isn't he. He sulks, then recovers on his will, no one would even notice that he was initially upset. But she noticed.
She takes the last tamagoyaki since Sasuke has done with his rice. "This tastes delicious. I didn't know you were a good cook."
Sasuke smirks, eyes wandering on her frame, tracing her delicate shape beneath his shirt. "I didn't know you didn't have a lot of ingredients."
"I stick to conventional tastes. I rarely …" Hinata scrunches her nose, looking for the right word. "…experiment."
Sasuke's smirk widens. "Understandable."
Hinata blushes, embarrassed, but not enough to interfere with her breakfast. She finishes her food in two more mouthfuls and the remnant of her water.
"You know… I've read something," she begins, hands fumbling with the glass.
The man before him merely watches her in silence. In fact, he's done nothing but watching her eat after he finished.
"After an Omega had sex," she continues, cheeks heating up, yet her tongue carries its job fluidly. "They would be free of induced heat episodes for a period of time. And that explains why I didn't go into heat for about a month after we did it for the first time."
Sasuke nods. "I've read the same thing. The more you have sex, the longer you're immune to triggers." He leans towards her over the table, motioning her head to move closer. She does as told. To her ear, he whispers, "so, let's have lots of sex."
Hinata recoils, blushing throughout her whole being.
At the sight, Sasuke chuckles, standing up. "I'm buying more bandage," he informs, gesturing to her wounds with his eyes. "Want something else?"
Still blushing, and looking at everything but his eyes, Hinata nods.
"What is it?"
She hesitates at first. "Emergency pills… for extra measures."
His face takes a serious turn. He nods, silently appreciating her choice because she has chosen right.
"Anything else?"
"Condoms. Lots of them."
"Alright…." Her face is so serious he almost had a good laugh out of it. And he laughs anyway. "Then, can I have my shirt back, please?"
She hasn't recovered from the previous warmth of her embarrassment, so even if she blushes some more, no one will know, she is already red. And the fact she only just realises that she isn't wearing any undergarment underneath his shirt, it only further intensifies her shame.
Hinata looks downwards, biting her lips. "Give me a moment to change…"
Amused, Sasuke turns around and lets her do whatever she wants to do. "I'll wash the dishes."
After a short while, Hinata returns to the kitchen, clad in an oversized sweater and tights. She walks towards him and extends an arm to give him his shirt.
Sasuke wears said shirt promptly.
Now back to being proper, he smirks. "Be right back."
Watching him walk towards her door then close it, Hinata nods slowly.
Be right back… he said.
To be back for someone, is this how things are done between them starting from now?
He's coming back… to her.
To her.
Author's Note : Here's another self-reward for you and I (not me updating on my birthday... AGAIN lol). Broad exam is a month away and I'm still breathing, so it's looking good so far. I mean, I could even sneak times to write!
I've missed writing and doing updates. I'll definitely be back to my good ol days. But after I share you the good news.
See you next time!
- Crowds