AUTHOR'S NOTE

This is the chapter I've been mentally calling the "chemistry read" and I had soo much fun writing it. It's my favourite one so far. Hope you enjoy! :)

Chapter 3

As someone who had lived through war and more near-death experiences than she could count on her fingers, Sakura was familiar with moments that felt like time stood still.

While, in this moment, the risk to her life was lower than many of her past traumatic experiences, with the only enemies in the vicinity scattered at her feet, this moment was still most certainly one of them.

Sasuke had entered the scene with the stealth and grace of a well-seasoned ninja, appearing on the path so quietly that he might as well have flickered there, like a tongue of fire.

He was wearing all black, save a white belt at his hip for the sword fastened to it, and a black cloak overtop. His presence was straight-up menacing and commanding, as one of the more formidable villains-turned-heroes the world had ever seen.

He was taller than the last time Sakura had seen him more than a whole year ago. But everything else was familiar. Black hair in its signature unruly style, though a little longer. Scowl. Sharp eyes taking in the scene to make a picture of what had just transpired and visually secure the area.

He was breathing a little heavily, like he'd just been running.

Then, he looked at her.

"I thought I felt your chakra," he said, his voice familiar but so strange to hear after months and months of trying to remember it.

Sakura's trance broke. And then she remembered herself and the five medical personal huddled behind her. They were gaping at Sasuke with a mixture of terror and confusion.

"He's not with those guys," she confirmed, but she couldn't blame them for being so jumpy after what they'd just witnessed, and now having a legendary and still highly feared enigma of a war hero join the scene. She tilted her head in Sasuke's direction. "Right?" she asked, prompting him to reassure her squad.

Sasuke blinked and paused a moment before answering. Perhaps he was wondering if she genuinely didn't know.

"No," he said. "I was tracking them."

Sakura nodded and swallowed a growing lump in her throat. Frankly, she was so shocked by Sasuke's appearance that she hardly knew how to conduct herself. She was torn between closing the space between them and finding out anything and everything about his life, keeping a cautious distance as not to send her vitals into overdrive or scare him away, and, most importantly, focusing on the task at hand.

"Well, found 'em," she said and awkwardly gesturing to the crumpled bodies at their feet.

They met each others' gazes and Sasuke's visible eye held a glimmer of amusement. "I can see that," he said.

Sakura failed to contain her nervous laugh as she looked down at her feet to regain her composure.

With a bit of the tension diffused, her mind sharpened. "Is everyone all right to keep moving? No one's hurt?" she asked her companions, who were still visibly grappling with mixed feelings.

They all chimed in and thankfully, aside from being profoundly shaken up, everyone was okay. "Are you?" Dai, a lab technician with a black fohawk, asked. "You just took out like eight guys in under a minute."

Sakura waved him off. "Yeah, yeah. Don't worry about me."

"You're headed to the next town?" Sasuke asked. Sakura's squad mates shrank back as he approached. Sakura observed a miniscule trace of hesitation in Sasuke's movements, only detectable because she'd grown up alongside his mannerisms.

"That's the plan," she confirmed. "Were these the only guys you were tracking?"

He nodded. "Yeah. There shouldn't be any trouble the rest of the way."

Sakura smiled. "Great. All right, then," she addressed the group. "Let's move out." Before leading the trek, she cast a quick glance at Sasuke. "Which way are you headed?" she asked and her heart began to pound because she was still processing the hello and wasn't sure she could take a goodbye just yet.

"Same way."

Sakura spent most of their short trek doting over her squad. After their excellent performance on this particular expedition, she hoped to enlist them for future tours but was concerned that the recent assault would sway their opinions of joining her again.

She'd even tried sweetening the deal by offering an extra thirty minutes at their pit-stop. "We're fine, Sakura-sama," the Ino look-alike, Emi, insisted. "But I'm not gonna pass up a longer stay at the hot spring."

Sasuke stayed a ways ahead of the group during the trek, perhaps not wanting to interrupt Sakura's duties or exacerbate her squad's obvious discomfort around him.

Once she had finished thoroughly checking in with each squad member, Sakura caught up with him, her stomach twisting when he turned towards her.

"Naruto didn't have anything to do with us running into each other, did he?" she asked.

Sasuke raised an eyebrow. "Why would he?"

Sakura rolled her eyes and shook her head. "He told me to say hi to you before I left for this trip. Not that he had a clue where you were or where I was going."

"Sounds like Naruto logic," he mumbled, smirking. Sakura sniggered. "But no. I'm just passing through."

"Us too. We're taking a pit-stop in town."

That was when Emi chose to pipe up. "You know, Sakura-sama is free for the next two and a half hours," she chimed in loudly, directed to no one in particular.

But Sakura knew exactly what she was up to, and shot the mischievous girl a warning look while her cheeks warmed. "I could drop it back to two hours if you'd like, Emi," she challenged.

"No, no, we'll take the two and a half!" Dai said as he gave Emi a shove.

While the squad bickered amongst themselves, Sasuke asked, "Are you gonna work?"

She shrugged. "Might get a head start on my status report to Kakashi-sensei. But mostly rest up. And eat something."

He nodded. A long pause followed while their eyes trained on the path ahead and the first signs of the little town poked through the trees.

"I could stick around for a bit."

Sakura took a shaky inhale. "Okay."

Upon arriving in town, Sakura dismissed her squad, but not before confirming the time and place they were to meet up after the break. Then, every last one of them made a beeline for the hot spring.

While Sakura had originally intended to join them, she couldn't say she was disappointed by the change in plans. Instead, Sakura found herself seated in a small run-of-the-mill restaurant that had its walls opened up to let in the fresh spring air and revealing a view of the quaint town nestled in the forest on Fire country's boarder.

To her left sat the person whose sparse letters got her through her days, who had owned her heart for most of their lives, and who she barely knew anymore.

She was ecstatic. And curious. And terrified.

"I'll get a drink too," Sasuke said, breaking her trance. Only then Sakura realized she'd been staring towards the bar while lost in her thoughts.

Her subconscious must have been telling her something because a cold, stiff drink sounded perfect right about now.

Sakura rolled her eyes but didn't correct his assumption. They got drinks along with lunch when their orders were taken.

Then she leaned back and bent a leg to perch her foot on the edge of the seat, making herself more comfortable. Sasuke, on the other hand, hadn't even removed his black cloak, like he was ready to leave at any moment.

Sakura redirected her gaze from him to the table. "So what brings you here?" she asked.

Sasuke's eyes roamed the restaurant, probably scanning for threats, while he answered. "I'm headed west. Following some leads. Then I heard about those guys causing problems, so thought I'd chase them out of town before leaving." His gaze settled on her. "But you got them first."

Sakura raised her eyebrows. "So is that what your day-to-day life is like? Wandering around, chasing leads, fighting crime?"

He averted his eyes. "Something like that." Their drinks were set down on the table and Sakura eagerly reached for her glass. "You're on one of those medical trips?"

Sakura relished the cool liquid and familiar burn of alcohol chasing down her throat while she nodded. Sasuke must have remembered her description of the medical tours from their letter exchanges. "Yeah, just wrapping one up. It was good. Busy. And the closest I get to a vacation nowadays." She laughed humourlessly then took a second swig of her drink.

Sasuke did the same. After he set his mug back down, and perhaps detecting some of the friction she was failing to mask, he asked, "How are things?"

Sakura smiled, her eyes trailing upwards while she recounted the latest updates in their friends' lives. "Well, everyone's busy with something nowadays. Kakashi-sensei rarely leaves the Hokage tower. Ino and Sai got engaged – I can't remember if I told you that already – but now they're always doing wedding planning stuff. And Naruto's well. He might have already wrote to you about it, but he just moved to a new house with Hinata."

Sasuke shook his head. "Honestly, his letters barely make any sense," he said.

Sakura snorted. "Of course they don't," she chuckled. Back in the day, she and Sasuke had entirely shouldered Team Seven's report-writing tasks and for good reason. "Naruto's always running around these days. His latest thing is giving guest lectures at the Academy."

Sasuke raised his eyebrows. "The next generation's fucked."

Sakura nearly spat out her drink and covered her mouth to stifle her laugh. How she'd missed Sasuke's deadpan. She felt a spark of warm nostalgia over their teasing of their former teammate.

That was when their lunch was served. While Sasuke thanked the waiter, Sakura observed him and noticed, upon closer inspection, that he looked incredibly tired, his dark eye that wasn't concealed beneath his hair glazed over with exhaustion.

Her eyes skirted away when Sasuke turned towards her again.

"You'd make a better teacher," he continued.

Sakura separated her chopsticks and shrugged. "You would too, not that beating Naruto is that high of a bar."

Sasuke shook his head and snapped his chopsticks apart with the fingers of his sole hand. "Problem is I hate dealing with most people."

"Well, so does Kakashi-sensei," Sakura pointed out. "And he loves us."

Sasuke actually smiled at that while looking towards his food. "Like little siblings or kids he cant get rid of, maybe," he mused.

"Speaking of, if you think Naruto teaching is bad, he's been talking about trying for kids."

It was Sasuke's turn to nearly choke on his drink. Once he regained his composure, he simply said, "That's horrifying."

"Right?" Sakura exclaimed, feeling a knot in her chest begin to unravel. Normally, when such milestones came up in conversations, most people got all excited or asked her about her own timelines for them.

This feeling of mutual horror was refreshing.

"You haven't said anything about what you've been up to," Sasuke remarked after a few bites.

"Oh, I guess not." Sakura swallowed her mouthful. She proceeded to tell him about her work, because that was all she really had going on these days. She described what her shifts being acting head-of-hospital were like, the struggles of negotiating funding for her mental health clinic, and also how rewarding it felt, despite it all. Even in peace time, the pace at the hospital never slowed down and Sakura felt she still had endless things to learn.

"I meant it when I said this trip is like a vacation. This is the most normally I've slept in months. And the change of scene is… nice," she mumbled while fishing through her bowl absent-mindedly. "My job is my life. But it's just… Sometimes I feel like it's not…" Sakura trailed off, not sure what she was trying to say. Catching herself, she cleared her throat and hurriedly added, "Nevermind. I'm rambling."

Sasuke, who had been listening quietly throughout her spiel, offered, "You want to do other things too."

Sakura's stomach twisted at how bluntly he had portrayed her life dilemma.

As if it were that simple.

Their second round of drinks was set down on the table.

"Well, I do some other things," she added. "Like go to the gym."

"The gym?"

"Yeah, like to exercise. Lift weights, go biking, and stuff."

The look on Sasuke's face suddenly made her feel silly for bringing it up. "You at a gym. Lifting weights," he said with raised eyebrows. "You could lift the building."

Sakura swallowed as discomfort settled over her. As much as she knew she derived no real challenge or satisfaction at the gym, going there was one of the only things she'd done for herself in ages. A place where she'd been striving (and failing) to fit in, in the absence of knowing where else to go.

"Yeah, I… suppose I don't really belong there," she said as images of warped ellipticals and exploded punching bags and shameful departures at the end of unfulfilling workouts appeared in her mind's eye.

"No, you don't belong there," Sasuke said simply. "You're a ninja."

Sakura took a long sip of her drink. "Well, I'm more of a fulltime medic now," she muttered, eyes downcast.

"You taking out those guys on the path says otherwise," he countered.

Sakura couldn't help the corners of her lips lifting and face warming. "Guess so," she said and meeting his eye. He diverted his gaze to the food.

They ate in silence for a few minutes as a refreshing breeze wafted through the relaxed ambiance of the restaurant, tinkling wind chimes and rustling leaves on the trees out front.

Sakura took a moment to reflect on how easy the conversation was going, with fewer awkward moments than she'd expected. The two of them had always gotten along, save when Sasuke had been an international terrorist, but she couldn't recall a time, since their days as Genin, when they'd talked so comfortably with each other. Sure, they had been together a lot immediately post-war, but back then, Sasuke had been more distant. Reserved. Scattered.

It pained Sakura to admit it, but maybe all this time away from Konoha, away from her, really was doing him good.

She released a breath but the tension in her chest didn't give.

"Okay, enough about me," she said, changing the subject. "What else have you been up to?"

To her delight, Sasuke offered a glimpse more into his journey while they finished their meals and downed their drinks. He described snippets from his travels, villages he'd been to, trouble he'd uncovered and tried to resolve. Given his rather direct manner of speaking, Sakura's imagination filled in the gaps.

"Sounds like there's still a lot of chaos in the war aftermath," she noted.

Sasuke nodded. "It's not peace time everywhere. I find one problem and it's never long until the next one comes up. I'm always moving."

A twinge of jealousy crept through her. While his unstructured way of going about the world sounded rather stressful, even downright chaotic, the idea of spending one's days seeing new things, solving crimes, and doing basic ninja stuff had some thrill to it.

Not that it was a lifestyle that could make sense for her, with her duties and passions holding her in place. But at least she could live some of it vicariously through Sasuke's stories.

"What about doing things for fun? Or to relax?" she asked and folding her arms on the table.

"That's not what this journey is about," he said flatly.

Sakura frowned. "You're telling me you don't enjoy yourself ever? Not once in a whole year?"

Catching her by surprise, Sasuke steeled over, his eyes pulling away from her and his posture becoming rigid.

It seemed she had ventured into a sensitive area. Suddenly, Sakura wondered if Sasuke's stories were painting an incomplete picture of his life lately.

She bit her lip and tried a new angle. "Are you taking care of yourself? Your arm still okay?" Sakura asked, a more familiar topic that came up often in their letter exchanges.

He sighed. "Fine. Still some phantom limb but not as much."

She nodded. "That can linger awhile. Glad to hear it's improving though."

Sakura fidgeted through the strange tension that had settled between them. It also occurred to her that she was just about due to meet with her squad, the two and a half hours having flown by during their conversation.

She made a trip to the bathroom and completed a quick inventory of her rations for the next leg of the trip while Sasuke asked for their tab.

But when the server returned with their bill, Sakura swiped it. "The acting head-of-hospital pay is pretty good. And maybe this will bribe you into visiting the village some time?" she joked, but failing to fully conceal the trace of hope in her voice.

Sasuke's half-smile didn't meet his eyes when he said just what she dreaded he would.

"I won't be back for awhile."

The tightness returned to her chest. "Thought so."

The heaviness between them didn't dissipate as they walked through the town towards the squad's meeting place, while Sakura's heartbeat thundered in her ears, louder and louder with each step. Any moment now, Sasuke would turn around and disappear for another eternity. She didn't have it in her to sustain small talk and Sasuke didn't make any effort to either.

They rounded a corner and Sakura spied her colleagues, congregated in the agreed-upon spot near the path into the forest that would lead them to their next destination.

Sakura stopped and turned around abruptly, her back to the squad, as the waves of heartache began to surface. She took a shuddering breath and covered her face with a gloved hand, trying to regain her composure and chalk up an air of professionalism in front of her team.

She felt Sasuke's questioning stare on her but kept her face covered while she blinked back the sting in her eyes and tried to steady her breathing. "I don't want to do this… Not in front of them," she mumbled and was frustrated by how small her voice sounded.

Seeming to understand, Sasuke backtracked and stood in front of Sakura, so she wouldn't have to face her squad when addressing him.

The trouble was, she hadn't a clue what to say.

Sakura lowered her hand but kept her eyes on their feet. She laughed lightly and said, "I'm not ready to say goodbye yet." Then she looked up at Sasuke, while plastering on the best shaky smile she could. He was gazing at something over her shoulder, his brows furrowed in deep thought. "But I guess we have to –"

"Then don't."

Sakura snapped her mouth closed. And blinked.

Don't… say goodbye?

She turned his words over in her head, unsure how to interpret them. Meanwhile, it was Sasuke's turn to redirect his troubled gaze to their feet.

Sakura swallowed. "You aren't coming back to Konoha, are you?" she tried because maybe she had misunderstood their conversation over paying the tab.

He shook his head.

Still unclear about his line of thinking, Sakura hurriedly added, "If you mean skip the goodbye altogether and just go our separate ways, then –"

"I mean stay."

Sakura looked around in utter disbelief. Surely he didn't mean stay in this town.

Then, it clicked. And Sakura had to consciously focus on keeping her legs from buckling.

Sasuke was inviting her to join his journey.

His unstructured, world-travelling, crime-fighting ninja adventure. This was the next time he had promised her a year ago, at the end of the war.

But just as quickly as her heart began to swell with excitement did she remember her colleagues. Her duty. Her life. She glanced at them over her shoulder, and noticed she had indeed been spotted, with Emi waving to get her attention.

When she turned back around, she and Sasuke locked eyes, his ominous Rinnegan peering at her through strands of dark hair.

Correctly reading her thoughts, he nodded and said, "You can't."

Sakura squeezed her eyes shut and whispered, "I'm sorry." The words tore at her throat and her heart as they left her.

She didn't open her eyes until, a moment later, she felt Sasuke's fingers flick a stray strand of hair away from her face and tap her forehead, directly on her Yin seal.

Sakura's brain short-circuited at the familiar, intimate gesture while Sasuke searched her eyes for something.

Then he retreated his hand, released a breath, turned, and left.

Sakura mirrored the motion.

And when she looked back over her shoulder, he was gone.