Chapter 3:

Aniki gets a little lost without me. I know that. I don't know how I can tell, but I just can.

Like right now. The way he looks at me, with so much desperation and sadness, makes me feel like I've done something wrong. As if I have wronged him when, in fact, we just got into another one of our typical arguments.

I can't stand it when Aniki cries. Physically, mentally, emotionally: his tears wreck me, and I know it's because of how much I love him. He's the center of my world. When he cries, my world is unsteady.

I turn to look behind me the moment I hear a croak and fully face my Aniki when I see his beautiful face contort in misery.

I can feel my heart tearing underneath his teary gaze, splitting into pieces under the mere thought that I had a hand in the distress he was feeling in this very moment. It fights and it tugs along with my frustration and irritation, because, whereas I think the world of him and share his existence and grandeur with others like a gift, he hides me in the shadows and tells no one. He's ashamed of me.

And that rips me apart and forces me to feel irregular emotions. It's painful. Almost as much as watching the tears slide down his face.

"I love you," he nearly sobs. The words echo and bounce off of my eardrums and I feel my eyes sting. "Please don't do this, Otouto. Don't ignore me. Don't walk away from me."

His words reach me, and I find myself considering whether to abandon the pursuit of my frustration in favor of seeing his happy face rather than the one in front of me.

"I hate it. I hate it so much."

Aniki grips at his chest as if he's experiencing a heart attack, and his grief-stricken, reddened eyes pin me down to my spot.

"You yelled at me," I finally say. I can't help the scowl that slips onto my face.

"I know. He was just so close to you, and I freaked out. I'm sorry. "

"I didn't do anything wrong."

Itach's head dropped slightly. "You're right, Otouto. You didn't do anything wrong."

"Lately, you've been more overprotective than usual. You yell at me for the simplest things."

I see it the second Aniki's face grows defiant, as if he's going to argue against my statement, but he drops it and backs down. "I- I don't know why, but it feels like I'm losing you. It makes me anxious. That's why- that's why I've been… overprotective." He whispers the last word as if he's uttering the word "alcohol" during the Prohibition era. Almost like he's fighting against himself inside his mind over a word he deems restrictive and unfavorable.

I'm willing to bet he doesn't even think he's being overprotective at all, much less over the top overprotective. Usually, I don't mind it. Usually, I find it rather sweet that he cares so much about me. But recently, his behavior has led to quite a number of disagreements between us. Man, for knowing Aniki so well, I just can't understand where his head is at recently.

But like I've said previously, Aniki can be clingy sometimes, and it chews up and swallows his rationality.

"What do you mean? What have I done to make you feel like that?" I reply, brows furrowed.

"You don't let me walk you to school. You run away from me like I'm a monster. It's like you're pushing me aside. I feel like you're breaking away from me. Do you not need me anymore?" Itachi croaked his last few words, a silent tear painting his cheek.

Aniki talks to me as if he has pictured me leaving him a thousand times over in his mind. His words are strung together so tragically, painstakingly so, that it breaks through my cloud of irritation and makes me realize that there's no way in the world that this man, standing before me begging me not to leave him, does not love me.

"Of course, I need you," I whisper. I refuse to join in on the crying party. I wouldn't be able to communicate if the waterworks started. "When have I not? Why are you saying such weird things, Aniki?"

"You run away from me, Otouto. You do it so easily that I'm terrified I'll never be able to find you again. If you don't come home, I'll die." Itachi exhales sharply, a choked sob muffled in his throat.

"Don't say that." I whisper more harshly than I intend to. I find myself biting my bottom lip, attempting to soothe the quake I feel there. "How can you say that?"

I've always known that my relationship with Aniki is a codependent one. Our close relationship far outweighs the nature of any sibling relationship in existence. We always look out for one another, feed off of each other's emotions, and comfort each other in times of need. Often, I would pride myself on being able to recognize Itachi's emotions, but recently, my radar has been off, so much so that I didn't realize how our relationship had shifted. How, you ask? I want to laugh boisterously at that. If I could pinpoint the heart of it, I wouldn't be standing here numbly with blood roaring through my veins.

Another thought reared its head, dancing in front of my eyes to usurp my attention. If Aniki loves me so much, then why would he keep my existence a secret from his companions? That question has been nagging at my brain ever since Kyuubi offhandedly mentioned it.

"Why does no one in your life know that I exist?" I say, heavy sorrow blanketing my accusation. My Aniki looks slightly startled as if I have caught him off guard. "Why is it that I had to find out from Kyuubi that you've wiped my existence from your work life? Am I not special enough to you to be worthy of a mention to your friends? I tell my friends all about you, so why do you hide me away like I'm hideous and a stain to your existence?"

I can hear the sharp intake of Itachi's breath as my words leave my mouth unchecked and unfiltered. The truth is I am beyond hurt, and it shows like black ink on blank paper.

"Is this why you're mad at me, Otouto? Because an outsider told you that you're not special to me?"

I glare at him. "Tell me," I demand. "I want to know the truth." My Aniki hesitates, eyes darting to the side like he's contemplating how much to reveal to me. That rubs me the wrong way. I call him out on it, too. "What happened to never keeping secrets from each other?" I spit out. "You do remember our promise to each other, don't you? You said you would never keep a secret from me and that you would never lie to my face."

"Do you want me to be completely honest with you, Otouto?" Itachi grunts, taking a step closer to me. This is the first time he has advanced in my direction since he flagged me down from going upstairs with my snack. His need to close the distance is a dead giveaway to his withdrawals from being away from me for so long.

Or at least that's what he calls them when he's itching for physical contact.

"Spare me the sugarcoating, Aniki," I tell him.

"Fine," Itachi says harshly. "If I have a treasure, should I not keep it for myself? Why should I tell anyone about you? Why should I have to reveal your existence to the world when you are solely mine to have, to look at, to be with?" he says, voice growing progressively louder and tone riling up with unfettered blatancy, defensive as he is petulant, as if he believes every word that leaves his mouth. "The more people who know you exist, the more I have fend their grubbing hands and disgusting eyes off of you."

My jaw drops and my mind spins. Not a trace of amusement reflects back in Itachi's eyes. He was dead serious. Before I know it, I take in a sharp breath before I can get my next words out. "Aniki, I don't know whether to be frustrated or really angry at you right now. You don't tell people about me because you're jealous that someone is going to take me away? Are you kidding me?"

My incredulity punctuates my words. Oddly, somewhere deep, deep down, I think I feel almost flattered. Almost.

"No one is going to take you away from me!" Itachi hisses, closing the distance between us. I see his arms extend, and next thing I know, I'm pressed up against the wall, and the items in my hands drop to the ground with a resounding plop.

"Ouch," I mutter as I reach up to rub the back of my head. It had knocked against the wall with a light thud.

A streak of guilt fills Itachi's face and he closes in to embrace me in his arms. He digs his face into my neck, nudging against me like a baby cub apologizing for its rampant ways.

"Aniki…" I say with a sigh, but he only digs his face closer, adamant and refusing to let go. I find my palms gently resting along the broadness of his back and his muscles contract and move underneath them. "Where is all of this crazy paranoia coming from?"

Aniki refuses to answer me. A part of me thinks it's because he thinks I won't understand so he doesn't bother to waste his breath, but the other part of me believes he's too wrapped up in his emotions to think straight.

"Why do we keep arguing like this?" I whisper.

"No, we're not. We're not arguing. We're just having a disagreement."

God, sometimes, I have the luxury to forget that my Aniki can be unbelievably immature, but then, the lord throws it back in my face, laughing like a madman while declaring,, 'Aha! Just kidding!'

"Isn't a disagreement the same as an argument?"

"No," Itachi mutters against my collarbone. His arms shift and I realize they're getting tighter around my waist. "I won't let you go to your room until you stop being mad at me."

Oh. My. God. How can a statement be so incredibly frustrating and cute at the same time?

I feel my lips twitch and I can't tell if I want to smack him or cuddle him like a cute guinea pig. Oops. Wrong thought. If I had said that aloud, I would definitely get grounded or worse. Not that I usually get grounded, but it's definitely a foreseeable consequence. My Aniki's voice breaks me out of my impromptu musings.

"... don't understand. You're my Otouto. I raised you. You can't go talking to strangers. It's not safe. You need to be more careful. I was just trying to protect you. What if they hurt you? What if they touch you?"

I sigh. "Is it so wrong for someone to touch me?" I snip.

"Yes!" Aniki hollers. His head jerks up from its position on my shoulder and he looks so alarmed that you'd think the world was ending. He seizes my shoulders in his grip and bestows upon me a ghastly expression. Blood drains from his face, turning it a sickly shade of white.

"They," he spits the word out like venom, "they are not allowed to touch you. You can't let them. Only me, only I get to touch you. It's not okay. You're my baby. Mine. Haven't I told you before, Sasuke? Watashi no tamashī. You're my soul, my whole person. You can't be anywhere, but beside me. If other people touch you, they're trying to steal you away from me. You can't let them, Otouto. I won't allow it."

I can't help, but frown at Aniki's words. Not because I disagree with them or hate what they conveyed, but the absolute distress in my Aniki's tone makes me uneasy. It sounds like he's convinced I'll pack my bags and leave the moment he turns his back. Or I'll be abducted by aliens, never to return.

"You know how many years I've spent taking care of you to make sure you were safe and loved, Otouto? Your whole life. My whole life." He releases a frustrated sound akin to his version of an ugh, and his sharp, widened eyes pin me down.

I forget about this sometimes, too. The rambling. He goes on a tangent of rants when he obsesses over something and tries to explain himself to me. Simultaneously, he gets so clingy that it would be horrifying if I was a normal person who didn't know him well enough. Typically when he rationalizes his perspective, he would eventually catch himself and stop, but today, he just goes on and on.

"'Tachi." I rarely call him by his name, but I do because I want to get his attention. He tenses and stands rigidly straight with his full attention on me as if he was a soldier at roll call. I would regard it fondly if not for the scenario. "No one is going to steal me away," I say softly. Reflexively, my fingers reach out to brush across his cheeks and cup his face. They're tinged pink from exertion and I can feel the heat radiate down to my wrists. "And I'm not a baby anymore. I'm old enough to take care of myself now, so you don't have to worry so much."

Aniki growls. Not at me, I don't think, but most likely at the scenarios popping up in his head, which was the opposite of my intention in uttering my statement. He sounds like a Doberman gone mad.

"No," Itachi denies vehemently. "You're still my baby. You'll always be my baby. I raised you. Even when we were kids, I was your protector. I am your Aniki. I'm never going to stop. I'll take care of you until I die. I need to take care of you. It feels wrong if I don't keep my eye on you. Like today… you ran away from me today…. Fuck. I nearly had a heart attack."

A pained, guttural sound fills my eardrums, invading my mind. It illustrates how fixated Aniki is on this topic and how much it bothers him, and I can already tell he won't let this go. He won't be convinced of this in any way.

Aniki's hands drop from my shoulders, but he doesn't move away. Instead, his hands go in his hair as if he's expressing his uncollective thoughts and emotions. When that doesn't give him relief, he smothers his face with his hands and makes another muffled noise between a grunt and a growl. He looks away from me at nothing in particular for a moment.

"You're not allowed to leave me, Otouto. I- I… how do I make you understand, Otouto? Can't your world just revolve around Aniki?"

Aniki's stare is probing into my soul. He appears so earnest and his words are littered with such honesty that I feel my heart responding, but I don't know where some of it is coming from. Hence, with each word, the incredulous expression on my face grows until it's so out of proportion that my face is distorted with worry.

"I don't understand where your crazy jargon is coming from, Aniki. Do you know something that I don't? You know I plan on going to the same university as you in town. I even turned in the enrollment forms." My brows furrow at the center of my forehead. "Is there something you're not telling me?"

Aniki looks frustrated as if he's not getting his point across. I bet he isn't either, because I have no freaking clue what's got him so worked up.

Finally, he snaps. "Do I need to chain you to my side for life so you can understand?"

He's grumpy… and yelling at me again.

And his words aren't nice. In fact, they're kind of offensive and uncalled for.

I glare. He can be such an asshole sometimes, but twice in one day is a new record. "What is there to understand? You never yell at me like this. Why are you being so mean to me?" I demand, frustration taking the form of tears. My back hits the wall because I feel like I need space away from Aniki just to breathe. The extra, yet minimal, distance helps, and I feel myself sagging against it for support.

Aniki's scowl falters slightly and he's invading my bubble again, pressing his palms back against the wall between my head and resting his forehead on my shoulder.

"…I'm sorry. I- I didn't mean to yell, Otouto. I… I am just frustrated. I don't want you to leave me."

"Is this like some sort of separation anxiety?" I find myself muttering. "But I'm not going anywhere, so why are you so anxious about it?"

I don't get a straight answer from Aniki. I receive his roundabout one.

"I love you…. I love you like fish love water."

I find myself snorting. "Fish don't love water. They need water."

"I know."

"Oh…. Does that mean you need me?"

"I've never needed anything else, Sasuke. I love you. You're my precious baby. I raised you. You're my soul."

Aniki utters that a lot when we get into arguments. As if that was his holy grail, as if raising me and loving me was justification for anything that he did.

He acts tough in public, always stoic, unapproachable, and flicking people away with simply the weight of his glare. If that didn't work, his next line of attack was his impressive vocabulary bank of profanity. He doesn't typically get along with people. In fact, the only time he actually makes an effort to do so is when he's with me.

Which brings me to my actual point: Aniki is the opposite of tough behind closed doors when it's just him and me. As I have said before, sometimes he can be a bit much. Often, he gets really clingy and needy and overprotective after we've gotten into a fight. I've lived with him long enough to realize that's never going away.

But I'm also self-aware enough to realize that I never get tired of hearing his affirmations.

"Are you going to tell me why you're so anxious or not?" I ask, shrugging the shoulder that he's resting his forehead on. Aniki pulls back, but he's still caging me in. I should feel claustrophobic and intimidated because Aniki is more than twice my size and he can be alarmingly scary when he's so fixated on something, but this is such a cyclical interaction between us that I don't feel threatened. I know Aniki would never hurt me no matter how scary or mean he's being.

"I'll tell you," he finally mumbles as if he's not happy about it.

"Don't hurt yourself," I tell him, and I swear I see his lip twitch.

"You know how moms and dads sleep in the same bed? They give each other hugs and kisses. That's how I feel about you, Otouto."

"Well, yeah," I respond easily, blinking in surprise. Was that all? "We sleep in the same bed together all the time. I slept in your bed with you just two nights ago. Don't tell me you don't remember?"

I see Aniki's lips moving and his eyes are averted and his words are inaudible, but I swear I hear him mutter a curse underneath his breath.

"What?" I ask, eyes narrowing in on his odd behavior. "You're the one who started talking about sleeping in the same bed and hugs and kisses. Don't tell me you're complaining about things you do all the time? Because that's not what I asked you. I asked you why you're so high strung when I haven't done anything to warrant that?"

"It's because I love you," Aniki repeats.

His response is almost infuriating, cliche, but I let it slide because he's looking at me so fondly and earnestly that his words convey his honesty.

"I know," I tell him. "You know I love you, too, Aniki. Right?"

"You do?" There's that anxious tone again.

My gaze softens. "Yes. Always."

"Okay," Itachi says gently as if he's accepted my response. He's such an easy person to please. It's like he can easily be soothed by my words.

"You know, along with my promise to never keep secrets from you, I also promised never to allow you to feel or be alone, Aniki. You remember that, right? I've never broken a promise, have I?"

"Only once," Aniki mutters petulantly, arms finally slipping away from the wall. He tugs on my hand, leads me to the living room, and gently coaxes me onto the L-shaped couch.

I nearly roll my eyes at his words, but allow him to guide my body. "You know that time had extenuating circumstances."

He gave me a pointed look, a glimmer of his normal self returning. Aniki doesn't join me on the couch, but he does lean down to smooth my bangs away from my forehead and kiss my temple. "You left me alone for nearly eighteen hours while you got drunk at a party under someone else's roof. Your phone was left on silent mode and you did not, not even once, call me or answer my calls."

"Ah… I see you're never going to let that one go," I mutter. Then, sheepishly, I add, "How was I supposed to know the wine coolers weren't soda pops?"

Itachi grunts as he straightens out. "This is why Aniki doesn't let you out of his sight," he states as if proving his point.

My lower lip juts out indignantly. "It's not my fault," I whine.

Aniki shakes his head gently. "It is not, watashi no tamashī. Now, sit there. I will make you something yummy to eat."

My pout deepens. "You're so bossy, Aniki."

"I know, Otouto. You've been telling me that this whole time."

Aniki turns to head to the kitchen, but pauses and looks back at me. He appears hesitant, opening and closing his mouth twice before he speaks. "Sleep in my bed tonight?" he asks.

I want to die because the way he says it, nervously and sweetly, is so freaking adorable. It was enough for my heart to skip a beat. It makes m

I smile warmly at my Aniki. "Okay, 'Tachi."

The corners of Itachi's mouth curve upward, and I feel all tingly inside, because it's absolutely breathtaking.

I'm mesmerized.