Something shifted in his mind the day his daughter was born. He'd heard said that a woman became a mother by the third month of pregnancy, but a man was not a father until he actually held his baby. It was a quote he gave little mind to until Sarada was actually in his arms.
Fear, more than anything fear filled his mind. The amount of hate, well deserved hate, he had from the denizens of the village where he lived was suddenly thrice as important. The countless people he'd killed who had to have children or siblings or loved ones of their own, people who might want a revenge worse than simply killing him, not even mentioning the countless who might want to hurt him but be too weak to attack directly.
Fear paralyzed him as he looked down at the pudgy, pink, hairless blob in his grip.
He would have to train her, make her the sharpest blade of a person that she could possibly be, as a matter of her own safety. Was he selfish for having a child? His whole life it felt like the thing he was supposed to do, his destiny to have many children, but now he wasn't sure, now looking down at her, he second guessed himself. How would he be a good, loving father and the dedicated drillmaster that she needed? Sarada seeing him the way that he'd seen his own father growing up was a fear that surfaced at that question.
Emotions he'd buried for a long time, surfaced just the slightest bit by his new relationship with Sakura, were suddenly yanked from below far faster than he was prepared to handle. The sheer volume of conflicting thoughts likely the only reason why none of them appeared on his face. Not that it mattered much.
Sakura had already nodded off.
Nearly thirty hours of labor after nearly a year of carrying their child exhausted her to a point she'd never felt, not in all her years of training as a warrior. It suited him fine for the moment; he didn't want their daughter anywhere he couldn't track her presence by the feel of her soft breaths. Sasuke couldn't help but worry about his wife's vulnerability too.
He didn't have a sleep proper until all of them left the hospital.
Not until his wife was strong again.
The next six months made him grateful beyond words for all the training done to function without sleep, an essential skill at times for ninja out on long missions. His personal record was four days without any noticeable degradation of his faculties. Though that feat didn't account for a sleep schedule already and persistently fucked up to at least a moderate degree, and he was younger then. Sarada could be a grumpy child, and she definitely preferred her mama over him.
That often got a laugh out of him, that she took after him in that regard.
Even though she was only a few months old, he saw so much of himself in the little treasure. The big inky eyes that promised a future sharingan, the short, soft locks of equally black hair, and more than anything the glare. Perhaps he was projecting, but her default expression seemed to house a constant, unimpressed gaze with hard, inquisitive eyes.
Even Sakura said it was just like him.
Even her crying seemed more like fury and righteous indignation than any form of sorrow or vulnerability. Maybe it was the way she waved her chubby limbs around wacked at either of them so often. It didn't affect anyone's ability to soothe her. Despite her face, she was quite a happy little girl, and that brought him such immense relief.
Although she still ate so much of his time, brought so much chaos to the routines and patterns that he enjoyed. Mostly he missed training. He still did, of course, even cutting into his sleep to do so for at least a few hours a day; his strength was a matter of his family's security, and security was more important for them than most after all.
This became doubly true when Sakura went back to work.
It came as a surprise to him and led to more than one fight, but with Naruto backing her up, it was hard to argue. The blonde idiot was his de facto king now. More importantly, he'd done so much for him, forgiven the unforgivable and, in a sense, given him the life he now had. The opportunity to settle, start clean, and have a family here in the city of his birth. Naruto was the one who first voiced his desire to have more medics trained.
Sakura made it her personal mission to find an apprentice she could train to her skill level.
Sasuke made it his focus to try to get through life a day at a time.
With his workload as a parent more than doubled, and a crabby youngster who didn't understand where her mama was, life became significantly harder. It became a challenge just to fit his sleep needs in. Cutting training just to do so became the only option, and a problem that Sakura didn't seem to find nearly as serious as him.
"She'll get bigger Sasuke; this isn't forever. Everyday she'll get a little more independent, a little easier; you worry too much, we're safe here!" she assured him one night, after his final attempt to get her to stop working or at least cut her hours. He'd just admitted to training an hour or less every day this week and still not sleeping enough in spite of it. It was hard to not feel dismissed by her response. She didn't even pause her changing, getting out of the scrubs and into a proper pair of pajamas, at his request. Even as he sat upright at the end of the bed, staring at her, trying to communicate just how desperately he was struggling, about the fear and doubts swirling in his sleep-starved mind.
"If only for my peace of spirit, Sakura, I have to be better than this!" he tried to explain. "I need to be stronger, more alert, more capable of protecting her, you,"
"I can protect myself hubby," she jived, missing the point completely as she slid into bed, but not under the covers. Still, the feel of her arms wrapping around him from behind brought some comfort. Even if the way she lingered against his back, lying there still, revealed just how tired she was too. It made it hard to be too angry with her, seeing her grinding away too. "Besides, I think you're just perfect~" a few kisses along the back of his neck.
Sasuke couldn't help but feel he had it harder.
"We should hire someone to help out; it's not like we don't have the money," he replied, ignoring her advance. Even the thought of sex felt difficult, like yet another chore keeping him from his rest. That felt like a failure too, a particularly painful one, that he barely wanted to sleep with his wife after almost two weeks without intimacy.
A soft sigh paused the affections of her mouth.
"Sasuke we've talked about that," she protested. "Letting a stranger that close to our little girl is a security risk in itself, and I don't like the idea of our daughter thinking some cute 20-something-year-old-servant is her mom,"
Her husband only huffed, annoyed and unsatisfied with the reply.
A bit irked, Sakura dared press harder.
"I also don't like how much my husband wants a hot younger woman living in his home while I'm off at work every day."
"I never said I wanted to hire a woman," he bit back.
"You know damn well most childcare workers are!" she countered.
"So, it's okay to hire a servant if it's a guy? I'll make that compromise," he offered, not hiding his irritation at the implication in her objection. About the accusation she'd made about his intentions. As if it wouldn't be trivial for him, at any point in these last four months, to sneak out to the redlight district and buy a fuck if he wanted. Mostly though, he hated how ridiculous she was for not wanting assistance they could more than afford.
"NO Sasuke it's…." she sighed, resting her forehead back on his spine. "Come on Sasuke, it'll get easier!" she pressed again.
"Yeah, what about when we have our second kid? Or after that? Will it be easier when I'm trying to manage an entire clan by myself with no help and no wife at home?"
"Well, first of all, we're not having more children until I get my replacement trained, so we're worlds away from that concern," she replied dryly, letting the fatigue show plain in her voice. "Find a daycare or something if you really need it, I just don't want live in help,"
"Fine, I will," he said firmly, finally the slightest bit relieved. Though the chore of finding where exactly to bring her, where could be safe, and where he could convince himself was acceptable, began weighing on him immediately. A kiss on the cheek comforted him the slightest bit.
"I do appreciate everything you're doing, I'm glad we had a child together," she insisted, hugging him more tenderly again.
"I'm obsessed with that little girl; everything she does is just incredible, it seems," he admitted, finding a small smile grow at the mention of the cause of all this chaos. The adorable loaf sleeping not five yards away right now in her nursery. It brought love back to the forefront of his mind.
She kissed him again along the side of his neck as her hands went back to combing up his chest. Wearing only a white wifebeater, the feel of her digits on his body was quite apparent and delightful. While he wasn't as starved for affection anymore, doubly so now that his sweet little girl was here, it still warmed him to be caressed like this.
"You know I'm still a little obsessed with you~" she claimed, one hand dipping lower to rub his thigh. His cock was already hardening. "I can't believe I have such a sweet, handsome husband waiting for me at home. All the other lady nurses and doctors are jealous every time I mention you ya know,"
"Yeah and half the men in this village would kill for your attention too," he rebutted, turning his head slightly and letting her see his tired smile. She kissed him, and he sighed. They held each other as they fell to the bed, the relief of finally lying down a tremendous pleasure in itself. The slow, tender pace of their making out was delightful as well, even if he had to fight to keep from slipping out of consciousness.
It helped immensely when one of her hands came up to tug gently at his hair, guiding him in the kiss as she pressed harder against him. He hadn't kissed her much more then he'd fucked her this past month. Not like this at least, nothing beyond polite morning or evening pecks that were more greeting than real acts of affection, intimacy like this had become rare.
Still he went through the motions she liked with practiced ease. Probing her breasts and poking at the tits every so often with one hand, the other sliding her nightgown up to fondle the ample ass under it. Her underwear covered most of it, but that was easy enough to remove. They kissed more fervently as his hand came up to her cheek, giving her space on the legs to shake the plain white garments off.
When he saw them kick away out of the corner of his eye, that hand slowly slid down her body, from her face to her neck to her shoulder to her side, not stopping until it curved around her ass and poked her pussy.
She was damp by then.
He was far too tired to drag out the foreplay for too long. With a hard push, he had her flat on his back. The kiss broke abruptly as the hand at her snatch began probing her, tracing the outline of her lower lips and dipping in just down to the first knuckle. All the while, his face fell over her top, devouring her sensitive breasts. Sakura was able to keep one hand in his hair, the other covering her upper lips in an effort not to make noise.
It wouldn't be the first time her squeals woke up their daughter.
A problem he would have to deal with when she had work in the morning, not to mention 'deal with' in the longer sense that Sarada would be lower on sleep and in a shittier mood in general all day. With that thought in mind, he replaced her hand with his own, gripped her chin firmly, and bored his eyes down into her beautiful emeralds.
She didn't mind.
He continued on like that until her huffing became laborious, strained, then he rolled over on top of her. Lining up his cock in the dark, one handed and stretching slightly, was a bit of an ordeal, but it was worth it. The tight, warm, perfect place between her legs always made his cock feel so good.
Alas, they were both too tired to continue much longer. Less than two minutes, if he had to guess, barely enough to finish her off after the fingering, nothing that filled him with all that much pride. Though the bliss and release of filling her pussy were always a comfort.
"Sasuke!" she grumbled as soon as his hand slipped off her face. "You're not going to make me cum again?" her words were pouty, not entirely serious, but a complaint none the less. It annoyed him. It made him so angry that he didn't even answer her; he didn't even offer to run off and grab her a towel or do anything to help with the cleanup.
He ignored her gentle words and requests to move until the moment he slipped from the waking world.
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