THE TEMPEST
CHAPTER TWO: Pouring Out
It's all so… big. There's just enough space for everything. For the never-ending skies to swallow him up. For the vast forests to steal any sound he makes. For the rivers to wash him away.
It's overwhelming.
Sasuke has never had many phobias, hasn't had enough time to think through what life and feelings may lay for him beyond his brother's death. That was the point of his life; his sole purpose for nearly a decade was to get stronger, kill Itachi, and avenge his family in that order. Sasuke never imagined – never really let himself truly believe – that there would be an "after" to his plans.
But now, he's here. Sasuke is eighteen, wandering the continent aimlessly. He is mostly without a plan beyond redemption. He thought this would be freeing, a penance in exchange for his soul. This is supposed to be his chance to learn how to feel everything beyond suffocating grief.
But everything is overwhelming.
The skies, the grasses, the sands; they threaten to engulf him.
Sasuke once was living fire. He raged and the earth underneath him bent to his will. The mere mention of his name stills the chatter with fear. His heart ran wild, lighting up every stray leaf caught unaware in tears. His image was enough to make even the most delicate flowers shed their beauty, chase some semblance of strength to withstand Sasuke.
And now? Sasuke is eighteen, too paranoid to sleep unguarded in this world.
Tonight's inn is not too different. Sasuke is far from Konoha, visiting Yukigakure to deliver a message from Kakashi to the new daimyō. The storm outside thunders against the walls, the roof shakes, and the mess hall is lively. It is midafternoon, barely 4:30PM according to the clock on the far wall, but the dark is deep outside the windows. No one here knows Sasuke, wrapped in thick ponchos. No one here can see how his toes fail to stretch from within his socks. No one here can see how his dry hair scratches at his skin. No one here can see how unsettled he is by the large crowds surrounding him but not talking to him. No one here can see how Sasuke keeps having to disengage his Sharingan from recording.
There are too many people here. It's too loud in here. The darkness clouds everyone that's too far from the light bulbs. But the shimmery fabric keeps tricking his nervous system into false starts.
'It's not their fault,' Sasuke chastises his warrior spirit, ready to jump at every unexpected glimmer of unnatural light. 'They are just waitresses.' They are not too much older than Sasuke. Hell, one of them might even be younger than him under the layers of exaggerated makeup on her face. Their skirts defy the cold, too short for any foreigner to wear. The sequins are gaudy, too big and plastic to be mistaken for quality garments. The click-clack of their shoes betray their uselessness against the piling snow.
'No. They're prostitutes,' Sasuke's mind corrects. Adorned with just enough red herrings to capture their prey, the three women stalk the crowds. pretend they're not in control here. They feign interest in the travelers that don't know any better. Their faces are painted with the veneer of false desire, designed to entice and ensnare. Their bodies are draped in clothing that is both revealing and concealing, a tantalizing glimpse of what lies beneath. They dab on perfume that lingers long after they have walked away. They ply the men with alcohol, playful with their banter as the sake cups stack beside them. They pretend they're not completely in control.
And, normally, Sasuke wouldn't pay them any mind. He hardly notices their advances.
The shortest woman catches his eye. The short strands sway every time she laughs too hard. Her pale blue eyes are rimmed with too much black. Her legs are pale under the short purple dress she wears. Her voice is too fried, trying to sound sexy outside her vocal range. This Fuyuka is not witty enough, trying but failing to act smarter than the average patron in this inn.
But her pale hair glows a soft pink in the candlelight. And maybe if Sasuke were to close his eyes –
No. No, no, no.
This particular ghost keeps trying to haunt Sasuke, hazy smoke trying to seep through his drinks and make his skin sticky with yearning.
Sasuke had always been an observant child, even back before he lost his family. As the years went on, unsupervised and alone, Sasuke would take one too many wrong turns back to his apartment and find the seedy corners of Konoha.
He remembers being ten years old the first time he passed the red-light district. There was no one to pull him along or tell him to look away. No one to teach him what was happening. No one was there stop the ugly feeling that seeped from every single pore. Some of Sasuke's last remnants of boyhood were ripped away from him once he understood why the civilian women flirted so loudly from the windows, why their lips were painted so red, and why they dressed so lavishly.
As a soldier in training, Sasuke learned that his body would become a tool for Konoha to wield, selling his skills and his Sharingan to the highest bidder. He was no different than the young "waitresses" working at the brothels. Sasuke trained to throw shuriken, and they learned how to give massages. They learned how to control their voice pitch, and Sasuke learned how to walk without a sound. They learned that their skin was not their own, and Sasuke…
Chills run down his spine and Sasuke visibly shudders. No. Sasuke does not like to be touched. Sasuke's body gets sold in other ways. Sasuke can handle a punch. Sasuke doesn't mind being shoved. Sasuke knows what to do when a kick lands on his gut. Sasuke is unafraid of touch with violent ends. It's the intimacy that makes his skin crawl.
Nobody touches Sasuke with that level of care, not even himself. He can handle a handshake. Sasuke is accustomed to the crushing weight of heavy crowds. Hell, Sasuke can even fight alongside other people. But to be held like he's something delicate, like he's something that should be treasured, like he's someone to be kissed senselessly… It would break him. Logically, his neurons cannot accept that. He's supposed to be Sasuke, the living embodiment of raging fire. He does not have it in him to crave.
And yet, Sasuke's eyes keep tracking the young waitress as she makes her way through the crowd, picking up plates and bedmates. Her dark-rimmed eyes flutter, batting her eyelashes as she says something to another patron. Their hands connect, fingers intertwining, and Fuyuka lingers.
No touch ever lingers on Sasuke.
'No touch except Sakura's,' his mind throws back at him.
That's all it takes for Sasuke to fall again. It keeps happening to him. His throat constricts, his pupils dilate, and his pants tighten. He wants to rush to get the overwhelming feeling off him. The sick feeling of his skin straining against his bones and muscles makes him want to vomit. The mere thought made his stomach twist into knots but also sent an unexpected jolt through him, lower down. He shifted awkwardly on his stool, unsettled.
Another waitress comes into view, much closer than Sasuke expected. He thinks her name is Tomoyo, but Sasuke can't look anywhere but her pushed up breasts peeking out from her unbuttoned qipao top. The deep maroon makes Tomoyo's cleavage the focal point of her outfit. It almost looks like the same kind worn by S–
"Can I get you more sake, sir?"
Sasuke looks down, eyes landing on his empty plate and three dry cups that held alcohol just a few minutes ago.
He's drunk. He's just drunk. That's why he feels this way. It has nothing to do with pink hair, or green eyes, or a goodbye caress scorching through the tips of his index and middle finger all the way down to his groin. No. None of that. It's the alcohol. Just blame it on the alcohol.
"I'm heading upstairs," he mutters as he stalks away to his rented room. He's not running away despite the blush spreading from his cheeks to the tips of his ears. Definitely not running away, desperate for solitude to sort through the mass of conflicted feelings churning inside. For the first time, that detached, judgmental part of himself was questioning what it really wanted.
Sasuke can't sleep. He doesn't sleep outside anymore because the open wide sky chokes his breath away. And how he can't sleep inside because his insides feel like a rolling boil, cooking Sasuke alive so long as he keeps these butterflies inside.
'Goddamn it.'
He tosses in his rented futon, feeling both too spacious and so incredibly cramped. His frame has changed, widening with daily travels, strengthened every time some idiot needs to be cut down after obstructing Sasuke's path. And still, he feels like he's lost his mind, trying to calculate if there is enough space left in his bedding for another person.
'Not just any person…'
Sasuke sits up with a jolt, too pissed off with himself to pretend to sleep.
He could do it. He could rip his skin from his muscles, splinter apart his bones. He could dig up every vein and ventricle, pull out every pore and nailbed. Sasuke would do all of that trying to find Sakura rooted deep in his stem cells.
He wants her. Gods, does he want her. Sasuke's skin is on fire, calling out for attention. His chest feels hot, drenched in need pouring from every hair follicle. He's breathing hard. His ears home in on some faraway laugh, whether it's real or not doesn't matter. It doesn't make sense, but Sasuke can almost smell sweet almonds at his periphery.
Sakura is all around him, except in his arm.
Sasuke grew up with Sakura. Even when he left Konoha, Sasuke aged just as much as any of his childhood classmates. They all grew taller, grew smarter, grew stronger. In the messy tapestry Sasuke is trying to unravel, Sakura is woven through over and over again. Here is Sakura's bright pink hair in the earliest sunlight of an overnight genin mission. Here is the squeeze of Sakura's hand keeping Sasuke tethered to this world as he fought the Cursed Mark's pain during their first Chūnin Exams. Here is where Sasuke's resolve to defect was nearly shaken when tears ran down her cheeks. Here is the surprise written across the greenest green eyes when they first reunited. And here is the deepest scar left on his heart when Sakura tried to kill him.
Sasuke tried to convince himself that she wasn't burrowing into his heart, letting her roots grow wild. Now spring breaks through his every thought and Sasuke is too far away. And every time she writes to him, Sasuke wants it to be enough but it never is. He knows it should be enough – 'they're just friends, for godsake!' – Sasuke shouldn't need it, shouldn't want it, shouldn't admit it even to his own self.
But he wants Sakura. Sasuke's never wanted anything like how he wants Sakura. Sasuke is hot and flushed at midnight and can't think of anything beyond how badly he needs Sakura to linger on him. He needs the taste of her neck on the tip of his tongue. Sasuke needs to see his touch blooming across her ribcage. He needs to make Sakura cry for him out of pure bliss.
He's taking off his shirt and pushing down his pants. Sasuke is so tense, every muscle straining and contracting. His shoulders, his fingers, his abdomen; all contracting at the lack of touch. A live wire, set off by his simple imagination.
Sasuke's sole hand wraps around his hardened member, exhaling a breath he didn't even know he was holding. He's throbbing against his palm, swirling thoughts alight with both panic and need. Unsettled, wanting, and out of his mind, Sasuke touches himself and knows this is not what his body is screaming out for. His own touch is not soft enough, not sickeningly sweet enough, not warm enough, not safe enough as he slides it up and down his cock. Sasuke is touching himself and needs to shut his eyes tight. Because he can't stop once Sasuke starts thinking about Sakura.
Sasuke lets his mind pretend.
His imagination runs away, imagining the feel of Sakura's creamy thighs against his. The satisfaction seeps through his chest when he thinks of pulling off those insufferable black shorts off Sakura. Sasuke thinks about the brush of her hand, the sweet friction of the callouses on her fingers against his navel. He thinks about her pretty pink mouth on his lips, letting Sasuke become addicted to the taste. He gasps for breath, knowing Sakura's stolen it yet again.
In the haze, Sasuke knows he needs more. He needs something else to get the edge off, thoughts dizzying with every stroke of his hand against his cock.
His mind offers it, then. Sakura walking closer to him, chin down, palpable eye contact. Stalking her willing prey, like those waitresses. Her chest presses firmly to his, and Sasuke can feel every curve on her body begging to be touched. Her kiss. Her eyes, her thighs, oh, goddamn. He can feel his mouth curling up into a grin like some type of lovestruck idiot.
It's perfect. It's so good. No one has ever touched him like this, has never been able feed the craving within him before. No other eyes but green. No other laugh but hers. No other comfort but Sakura. None of it has made Sasuke safe enough for this feeling, this satisfaction.
It's not a punch, or a kick, or a shove. It's an imagined intimacy, but it's better than anything. Because he isn't being restrained. No, Sakura's touch could set him free. He imagines Sakura's moan against his mouth, her kisses painted across his collarbones, her body dripping in want for him, her body fitting around his manhood. She was made for him,
Could she want this? Does Sakura want him the way he wants her? He imagines Sakura inviting him into her bed, gasping against his neck, body moving against his. Sakura hides her eyes in the crook of his bad shoulder. She bites down, trying to stifle the sweet sounds she makes as he pumps in and out of her.
This isn't a hug but it's close. It's better, even, because Sasuke isn't being trapped, isn't being held in place. It's all love. Safety in love. In her arms, Sasuke could love wildly. Against her body, Sasuke could crave freely. By her side, Sasuke could love safely.
Unashamed, Sasuke thinks maybe his knees would shake. Sakura's breath ghosts across his mouth and Sasuke lets out a tiny, trembling noise. She squeezes his hand, and he presses his chest against hers even harder. Sakura in his lap, her fingers in his hair, kissing him like no one else ever could.
Sasuke can feel himself losing control as pleasure overtakes his senses. His breathing comes in gasps, body trembling with each exhale. Between his legs, an ache is now unbearable, every part of him hyper-aware as tension escalates towards release.
Gripping himself tightly, he pumps frantically, movements becoming more erratic. The tatami under him creaks in protest as his hips rock to meet each pull. Toes curl against the sensations rippling through his form. Every thrust sends electric charges firing along his nerves, each pulse bringing him closer to the precipice.
A noise falls from Sasuke's mouth, and he sees stars. That's all there is for a brief moment, black and white static clouding his eyes and his cock leaking against his lone palm. Pure sensation overwhelms as ecstasy claims him in waves, again and again. It emanates from his core in pulsing bursts, radiating outward to permeate every cell. Fingertips to scalp, his whole being vibrates on the crest of rapture until sheer bliss drains him, sated and drifting. Breath returning slowly, heart rate stabilizing, Sasuke lays limp in aftermath. That felt...different than he expected.
Sasuke doesn't tolerate touch, but even just thinking of Sakura makes it the most bliss he's ever experienced in his miserable fucking life. Maybe he is some type of idiot.
END OF CHAPTER TWO.