Disclaimer: Naruto belongs to Masashi Kishimoto.

A/N: I decided to give Sasunaru month a try in English this year, so here you have it. This is a collection of individual and mostly unrelated drabbles. Both Sasunaru and Narusasu tropes will be included and each chapter will have its own warnings, as well as a tag to specify if it's SN or NS.

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Prompt #4: I'm happiest when I'm with you (-)

Warnings: This is set in the same timeline as yesterday's prompt. Just Sasuke getting a bit angsty.

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For a long time, Sasuke hadn't had a place to call home.

He'd been on the road most of his life, since he left Konoha for the first time. That time, though, he had been too busy focusing on… other things to actually pay attention to his surroundings.

Now, at almost twenty, he had finally let himself enjoy what the world had to offer. Sure, his main purpose for being away from the village was atonement, but he had come to appreciate the little things life had to offer. From the bees buzzing from flower to flower, to the way the sunlight reflected in the clouds and made them shine.

He'd been granted a new opportunity, and he wouldn't waste it, not this time. He didn't owe the village anything, but he believed in Naruto's dream and vision for the future. Sasuke had been wrong. He couldn't blame what happened to his family on every single person in the village. The citizens were innocent, for the most part, and the new generation deserved a chance too. So he would help Naruto so things like the Uchiha Massacre never repeated again.

He couldn't make himself live there, though. Not anymore. He had embraced his new life and accepted his role outside the village. He would be Naruto's support from a distance, taking care or whatever threatened to end the peace they so hardly fought for.

This was his life now, and he was content with it. Not happy, but content. He didn't aim to be happy, didn't think he deserved it. But he had made his peace with it. This was more than he thought he'd ever have.

And yet…

Of course you deserve to be happy, Sasuke! Everyone does, you're no exception.

He could even hear him in his head, that idiot. He hadn't seen Naruto in years and yet it was like he was right here, by his side… Telling him he deserved everything when he didn't.

And Sasuke couldn't help but long for him, sometimes. His one and only friend, the person who'd saved him over and over again. The one reason he was still alive.

You deserve to be happy.

But what did happiness even mean? He couldn't quite pinpoint it, the meaning of that word.

Because for Sasuke, happiness came in the form of spiky blond hair and bright blue eyes, and he had been denying himself of it for so long, making himself believe he could live his entire life just being content.

So, when he found the shinobi net of human trafficking in that godforsaken village, and Kakashi told him he would send Naruto to help, he decided to take matters into his own hands and finished the mission by himself.

Not even a week later, he'd gotten a letter from Naruto, asking him if he was alright, how the situation in that village (in which he wasn't currently anymore) was, and telling him he was kind of disappointed at not being able to meet him on this mission.

"I was really looking forward to meeting you after all these years. I heard from Kakashi-sensei that you took care of the net on your own. I guess they weren't a match for you at all, huh? …"

And he kept going, telling Sasuke how he was doing, narrating silly things that happened in his life and what the others of his generation were up to, which Sasuke honestly didn't care much about. He felt his heart aching with longing, again, wishing he could hear all that blabbering directly from the blond's mouth.

And then he read that line.

"Hey, Sasuke. I don't really know where you'll be when this gets to you, but do you wanna meet up? I'd be really happy to see you."

I'd be really happy to see you.

Would he, really?

He thought about it for a long time, until one day he finally sent his response.

Naruto's smile when they reunited a couple of weeks later had been worth it all. He seemed genuinely happy to see him, even after two years being almost no contact.

And Sasuke was too. He let himself be happy, just for a little while, just as long as he could be by Naruto's side.

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A/N: I struggled a lot writing this prompt and I'm not really satisfied with the result, but I also wasn't about to spend hours on this when I've got other prompts that got me pretty inspired haha

See you tomorrow!