Work Text:
twenty-one.
“Hey, bastard.”
Sasuke doesn’t give any sign of indication that he had heard Naruto, but three seconds later a bottle of cheap beer is shoved in front of him and he accepts it out of courtesy — and he needed a drink anyway. It’s cold, and that’s enough for him, and he relishes the slight burn at his throat as he takes a few gulps.
“What do you want.” He says gruffly. He expects Naruto to start prattling immediately, but the blond remains uncharacteristically quiet, and when Sasuke turns sideways to look at him, Naruto’s face is serious.
He could hear the distant chirping of birds, and the bustle of the town at night. It takes a few more minutes before Naruto finally breaks the unnerving silence.
“Sakura-chan,” Naruto says carefully, quietly, like a prayer, a secret, a desire. Sasuke stiffens, fingers tightening around the alcohol in his hand. It’s pathetic, how the mere mention of her name turns his blood into lead. It’s heavy and metallic, slows down his breathing. Weakens his constitution. Makes him sick.
To Naruto, she’s Sakura-chan. The apple of his eye, the love of his life, the constant recipient of his undying affections since they were in the academy. To Sasuke, it was just Sakura: soft skin, gentle touch, green eyes, pink hair, a walking, shining reminder of springtime. He dreads the next words, and waits for it ruefully, impatiently, the lead in his veins snaking into the pit of his stomach, twisting it viciously.
“I asked her to marry me,” Naruto continues quietly, voicing out an almost disbelieving laugh. “She said yes.”
She said yes.
She said yes.
The words ring across the silence of the clearing, and it washes over him like pouring rain. Sasuke blinks, taking in the news with all the indifference that he could muster. There’s blood rushing to his ears, bile gathering at his throat. Nausea swallows him whole, dulling his nerves one by one. Such a happy moment for his best friend, it would be a shame to throw the bottle across the tree, watch it break into shards.
Sasuke clears his throat, forcing the bile to go back down, down, down. It stews inside of him, alone in its bitterness.
“Good for you,” he replies. “Congratulations, dobe.”
Naruto gives him a little smile, his gaze is almost sorry. “Listen… Sasuke — I know —”
“We don’t have to speak of it. It’s fine.”
The silence is awkward in between them. It’s tense, it’s hanging by a thread.
“I know you love her,” Naruto continues. Sasuke feels his spine go rigid. He clenches his jaw. “But so do I, and you know that — too,” Naruto heaves an exhale. “I guess what I’m trying to say is that — you’ll always be my best friend. But I love her, and would do anything to keep her safe, and happy, and—”
“I said it’s fine, dobe. I get it.”
Naruto stops talking.
“Congratulations,” Sasuke repeats, his knuckles white. The word, slipping on his tongue, feels like a betrayal in itself.
They do not speak another word. There’s no point in further conversation.
thirteen.
At night, he dreams.
It’s uncontrollable, and he reasons that it is because she is the only girl he is constantly in contact with, and that it is only natural — teenagers and their hormones, a teacher from the academy had briefly discussed. His dreams aren’t that much different than his everyday life experience with team seven, except that in there, her affection is much, much more persistent, and while he tries hard to be in his usual stoic manner, he doesn’t protest her advances.
When she sprains her ankle, he only lets out a grunt and crouches on the ground, silently offering her to hop on his back. She lets out a squeak of joy and immediately latches on to him, her long, pink strands trickling the sides of his neck. Her arms weave around him, and he supports her weight by the back of her knees. The skin of her thighs is soft.
“Thank you, Sasuke-kun,” she murmurs shyly in his ear. He ignores the warmth seeping into his face and carries her out of the forest.
seventeen.
They sneak out and meet in private, away from the watchful eyes of his clan, away from the overbearing, knowing glances of Kakashi-sensei. He is busy with his Konoha Police duties, as he steadily moves up the ranks ever since all of team seven had made jonin; and she is just as busy, if not more so — ever since Tsunade-sama has retired she has left everything to Sakura and Shizune, and her time and healing expertise are constantly sought after even by neighboring villages.
Their time together is reckless, and they don’t speak more than what’s necessary, having decided that they could utilize their mouths on better, more enjoyable things. She gasps against his ear as his mouth trails down her throat, kissing and tasting her skin. He shifts to lift both of her legs and pin her against the tree, greedily taking more of her mouth, her heavy-lidded lustful green eyes, her sensual moans. Her porcelain, smooth skin feels impossibly soft under his palm, the tip of his fingers tingling with excitement, wariness, awe, wonder.
Somehow they end up with her sitting on his lap, and everything is decidedly warm, the sun, the breeze — dozing languidly in the distance between their bodies, the distance he is thoroughly desperate to eliminate. He is not quite sure how it all led to this, but all he knows is that he does not want this to stop. He is kissing her and she is kissing him, and her lips soft and warm and the contact feels terribly, agonizingly good and she lets out a soft whimper when he tugs on her lower lip, breaking away to catch her breath, her chest heaving, her face red, her hair tousled, her eyes green and vivid and wide.
“Sasuke-kun,” she breathes, her fingers playing with the ends of his hair. His heart thrums at the sound of her voice saying his name, and only his name, he preens at the honorific, at her dazed tone, and he stares back at her, swallowing back the dry muscles of his throat. He is lost for words, with all of his blood leaving his brain and rushing downwards.
She shifts on his lap, and he emits a low, pained groan, and the arm around her tightens, pulling her closer. “Are you okay?” She asks innocently, and he thinks he might be going insane. Her other hand rests on his neck, her thumb tracing the line of his jaw.
“I’m fine,” he murmurs, leaning as his mouth trails kisses down the hollow of her throat. He sucks at the curve of her neck, the skin that meets her shoulders, and she gasps, her head falling back to give him more access.
“Sasuke-kun,” she whispers as he gathers her pink hair aside to give him more liberty to do as he pleases. “ There. ”
He guides her hips, silently urging her to rock against him again, and he hisses under his breath, his erection painfully, ruefully hard. “Sasuke-kun, you—”
“Sakura,” he mutters. “Will you just—”
“ Oh, okay, yes,” she answers, moving her pelvis back and forth, slowly, and his hand inches upwards the smooth skin of her thighs, hungry and greedy. It feels so good, so fucking good, there’s friction everywhere, and he wants more, more of her skin, her gasps, his name on her lips, and he curses under his breath, suddenly gripping her hips tightly, forcing her forward so the entirety of her chest is pressed against his, his heart beating so loudly he knows she could feel it but he doesn’t care. Her face is flushed, her eyes half-lidded as she grinds against him harder, picking up the pace at the most delicious rate. “ Fuck, ” he hisses against her throat.
His erection is right there, only hindered by a few layers of clothing, right against her the heat of her center, and he pulls her faster against his pelvis, and he thinks he might die of friction. He sees stars behind the darkness of his eyelids, and his brain has decided to malfunction, his hips bucking up desperately without any reservations.
“Sasuke-kun,” she whispers. “You know I’ll do anything for you, right?”
He lets out a stuttered, mournful breath, and he pants directly to her throat, relishing her sweet, girly scent. “ Sakura, ” he rasps.
twenty-one.
The wedding invitation is pristine white — the names Uzumaki Naruto and Haruno Sakura written in tasteful, beautiful calligraphy. Only the best for the Hokage’s dear son, a bitter voice in his head mocks. A hawk delivers it to him one morning, dropping it into his table as he nurses a coffee. He stares at it blankly for five minutes and the room begins to decrease in size, the walls sliding towards him, the ceiling going lower and lower.
There is only so much that he could take before it begins to suffocate him. He dresses in his usual training gear and leaves, and the loud thud of the door does not sound even remotely satisfying.
It is the ugliest thing he has ever seen.
eighteen.
“This has to stop,” he speaks bluntly, the words as grating as iron scratching cement. Beside him, she stills. Ceases to stop breathing. She waits for him to continue.
“It’s… you… this was never supposed to escalate to… this. It’s too distracting, it’s bad for both of us. We cannot have our careers suffer. You with the hospital… And I’m taking over the Konoha Police soon.”
A slight rustling of sheets. He refuses to look at her as she puts on her clothes.
“I see,” she says quietly.
“Sakura, I —”
“There’s no need,” she interrupts. She smiles at him, her face devastated. He does not understand the sharp, dull pain in his chest. “I always knew from the start that this was going nowhere, Sasuke-kun.” She kisses him on the cheek once, and leaves.
eighteen.
He is stupid. He is so fucking stupid.
fifteen.
“Stay still, would you?” she scolds him as she brings out her medic’s kit. “You boys are idiots. I swear you get stupider every year.”
Sasuke hisses as she forcefully snaps his shoulder back into place.
“And you, Naruto! Don’t you dare move back there, I’m fixing you once I’m finished with Sasuke-kun!”
He hears the blond mutter a yes, sakura-chan. He knows the idiot is pouting.
Suddenly her hands are on the sides of his face, and she moves closer, close enough that he could see the faint freckles on her nose. Her green chakra pulsates around his vision as she heals the bruises on his face. His pulse begins to race. Her eyes are so green it’s ridiculous. He tries not to think of how nice she smells, or how soft her hands are, or how their faces are barely inches away. Of how the thought of pressing his mouth on hers suddenly slides into his mind.
He tries not to think.
twelve .
He is twelve and weary and ambitious for power. She is twelve with long pink hair and large green eyes and loud and touchy in her affections and yet when she clings to him he doesn’t mind half as much as he shows it. He’s not sure when it really all began — when he had started to look at her differently — perhaps it was when he had thought he died in their first mission in the land of the waves and she clung unto him in her surprisingly strong embrace, and her hair smelled good, like flowers and something distinctly girly, and her tears were soaking his shirt because she’s a crybaby and he keeps thinking, he’s alive , and breathing , because there she was — holding onto him like a lifeline. Her vice grip and cold, clammy hands grounding him more than anything else have.
He tells her that she is heavy, and she only clutches him harder.
He lets her.
nineteen.
Team 7 has their monthly dinner at Ichiraku’s. Naruto sits at the center, with Sasuke and Sakura at his sides. Kakashi sensei is late, and they know he’s not going to arrive until at least half an hour of waiting, so they begin to eat without him. They all order their usual, and Naruto begins chattering excitedly about random gossips he’s heard of lately, and Sasuke sees her slip in some of her toppings on the blond’s bowl, telling him quietly to eat more protein, and his fingers tighten their hold on his chopsticks.
Since when has she become so… tender with Naruto? It prickles at his brain, and his jaw clenches.
twenty .
He just came back after a draining mission, jumping through the roofs straight to the Hokage’s office. He catches sight of two heads of pink and yellow, idly walking down the street, Sakura in her healer robes and Naruto carrying her stuff. She’s laughing at something that he tells her, and Naruto is smiling at her and he sneaks in a peck on her cheek. Her face goes red, happy and delighted.
He clears the uncomfortable lump at his throat and continues running to make his report.
twenty-one.
At night, he dreams.
They both sit on the cloak that he laid down to serve for their picnic. She leans her side against his, and they both eat the variety of snacks that she brought. Some tea, onigiri, dango. It’s not much, but he likes it. He likes this. Her. Just the two of them. She tells him about the research she’s currently working on, something about a rare genetic disease and neurological pathways, and he listens, the warmth in his chest blooming.
“You know that you are important to me, and that I love you, right?” she says out of the blue. His stillness is profound, a stone at the bottom of a moving river.
He wants to say something, anything, but how could he, with the stone lodged in his throat? The heartbeat thumping madly in his chest, the emotions flooding his being? He swallows back the stone, and he feels it sink down down down to his empty stomach. She looks at his eyes steadily, far too close, dangerous, and stubborn. The breeze gently blows the strands of her hair. She’s so beautiful.
He looks away and takes the sake and drinks as if the answer is at the bottom of the bottle.
She buries her head on his collar, and he slowly runs his fingers on her hair.
“I know,” he says quietly. She takes a deep inhale, and stays where she is.
##
“I heard Minato’s boy is getting married,” his father begins placidly on their weekly family dinner.
Sasuke stiffens.
“Kushina and I were just talking about it! Oh, she’s so thrilled. And Sakura — I should have known this would happen. They’re just like Kushina and Minato when they were younger, aren’t they?” his mother says cheerfully, eager to liven up the otherwise usually quiet dinner.
He could feel Itachi’s knowing gaze on him. He continues eating as if he had not heard a thing. The rice tastes like sand on his tongue.
“Naruto-kun is very lucky to marry someone as beautiful and accomplished as Sakura,” Itachi contributes diplomatically.
Sasuke wants to flip over the table and storm off. He doesn’t do that. Instead, he lets out a quiet, noncommittal hum. “They’re my best friends. I’m happy for them.”
##
He sits by the trunk at their old training grounds, where Kakashi had tied Naruto once in their first test, staring at nothing and hearing nothing but the chirping of birds and the rustling of leaves. It’s springtime, and there are cherry blossoms at every corner of his vision, the inescapable regalias of his teammate.
“I thought I’d find you here.”
He looks sideways at her as she sits down on the grass next to him, still on her hospital robes. She looks tired, and there are droplets of blood on her white coat. She looks beautiful. Always has been. An aching pang rises at the back of his chest.
“I’ve only just gotten out of work, I’m on night shift all week because one of the med-nin is on her honeymoon and I’m covering for her.”
“Hn.”
She smiles at him, the way she always did. It’s tiny, and tentative, and he hates that his heart still faintly stutters.
“Here,” she shoves a bottle of sake in front of him. Gilded in the moonlight, her skin appears almost lustrous. Her pink hair is longer than the last time he’d seen her, and it falls just below her collarbones. He drinks from the bottle, and the burn flows smoothly from his throat to his stomach.
“Is it good?” she asks, gesturing at the alcohol. He hums. “I stole it from shishou’s secret stash, I think it’s imported from the tea country. I needed to have a drink. Had a long day.”
“I didn’t think you’d be the type to do that,” he says, slightly amused. She’s always been a goody-two-shoes. She lets out a light chuckle.
“She’s not gonna get mad at me, she adores me,” she stops and considers this. “Well, she’s not going to find out about it.” She holds out her palm expectantly, and he hands her the bottle, their fingers slightly grazing. She tips her head back as she takes a drink, and he takes in the graceful curve of her neck, the way her throat bobs, the line of her jaw. He swallows.
“It’s good to see you again, Sasuke-kun. It’s been a while.” She whispers almost shyly. “You look — well.”
She is almost an arm apart from him. The distance between them feels like miles. He wonders if she’d notice if he suddenly moved to shift closer.
“Ah. So do you,” he says quietly. And her eyes widen a little, almost like she doesn’t expect him to answer back so easily.
“Thanks,” she snorts. “I must look like I haven’t slept in ages. Which is true. Wedding planning takes an awful lot of time. Thankfully I have Kushina to help me through it, and I adore her, honestly, but sometimes she’s just, a lot.”
She tugs at her hair. She probably doesn’t realize that she’s doing it. But he’s aware of everything that she does.
“I sent you an invitation.”
He takes a long drink, yearning for the numbness that it gives. The burn at his throat, down his stomach.
“I saw.”
Silence rings in between them.
“Sasuke-kun—” whatever she was about to say is interrupted by him placing the bottle carelessly on the ground with a light thud, and then as if possessed by an unknown spirit, he grips her wrist and moves his head just right by the curve of her neck, and stops. She shivers as she feels his hot breath on her skin. Tell me to move away. Tell me to fuck off. Tell me —
“What are you doing,” she whispers, breathlessly, and it’s so fucking alluring he hates himself for being weak and obsessive and helpless and vulnerable when it comes to her. He wants to shred his skin, the way he’s seen his snake summons do, and reform a new one, a better one, a more suitable man deserving of her. Growing up, this is hardly the first time he had been envious of Naruto. But this one hurts the most.
His lips are less than a quarter of an inch away from her skin. They are both so still and unmoving. A single breeze could break and topple them down.
“I don’t know,” he murmurs back. “You are so —”
“I’m what?”
“— Annoying.”
She laughs, and it takes him aback, as if remembering just what he’s doing. “Shut up,” she says.
He presses his mouth on her neck, in defeat and resignation.
She lets out a tiny squeak.
The skin tastes faintly of vanilla, antiseptic, and salt. He wonders if the vanilla is from her lotion or her soap. He wonders if the rest of her would taste the same. He counts the seconds in his head. One, two, three. Four. Five. He’s not sure if she’s still breathing.
“Sasuke-kun,” she whispers the plea right in his ear, and he shivers.
His lips slowly trail upward, taking his time, and she’s gripping the back of his shirt and moves her throat back to allow him more liberty. When he sucks the skin just below her jaw, she lets out a moan that makes his erection twitch. He bites her earlobe, and she’s panting his name.
He has never wanted anything more in his life than this.
But he musters his strongest will to lean back, breathing just as hard as her. Her mouth is open and her cheeks are red and her eyes are so wide. Sasuke commits the image to his memory.
She abruptly moves to an appropriate distance from him.
“Sasuke-kun, I’m engaged.” She says, her voice tight. “Don’t do this. Not right now.”
He breathes out, pinching the bridge of his nose.
“Sakura —”
“You’re an asshole, you know that?” she says thickly. “I have loved you since I was seven, that’s fourteen years my life.”
He quiets.
“I’ve waited for you, almost my entire life, for years and years. It destroyed me when we — when what we had — you suddenly broke it off,” she exhales shakily. “I just. I couldn’t keep on chasing and chasing. I have more self-respect than that. Or at least I try to. Shame has never applied to me when it comes to you, has it?”
The silence that follows rings in his ears.
“Even when you were mine,” Sakura murmurs, fingers raking through the long blades of grass, “I was never allowed to yearn for you. And I tried so hard to move on. And I have — I’m happy. I love Naruto, and he loves me.” She lets out a bitter laugh. “It’s more than what I could ever expect from you.”
Nausea clings at his throat, blocking his airways. His mouth opens, but words fail to come out. He swallows hard instead. He averts his eyes down to the ground. It hurt to look at her.
“I do love you,” he says quietly.
“Not enough,” she smiles bitterly.
If you only knew.
“What if I asked you not to marry him?” It only registers to him now how frigid the air is, and it seeps into his bones.
“Would you?”
“I don’t want you to marry him,” the taste of sake sticks at his tongue. “But I don’t have the right to ask you that.”
She laughs a little. “Of course you’d say that.”
“I have spent years, regretting that I’ve let you go.” He murmurs. It’s painful to admit, an ugly, shameful thing to say. But it’s not like he has any more face to save. He wants to say, she’s young and beautiful and has all the time in the world to settle down. That he misses her, that he wants her, that he yearns for her that his lungs ache. He doesn’t say all those things.
“I’m always going to love you, you know,” she says. “I always will. But I’m getting married, and I’m looking forward to have a life with Naruto, and —”
He sees her wipe a tear away.
“I should go.”
He looks at her for a while, even though it hurts, and he deserves it, he knows. There’s nothing more to say. She leaves.
##
He resigns from his position in the KPF, and asks the hokage for long missions after another. The farther it is, the better.
seventeen.
The three of them walk towards the border of the land of the lightning after a particularly grueling, near death mission, Sasuke and Naruto leaning on either side of her. The pace is slow and unhurried, and they only stop to get a drink from the river and eat some berries that Kakashi had picked. There is silence, but it is the comforting kind because he thought that he was dead, and he didn’t. She hugs Naruto first, and then him in her strong embrace, and he registers that she still smells the same as he remembered, like flowers and something distinctly girly and musky. She smells like sweat, antiseptic, and exhaustion. Alive, he thinks. He’s alive and breathing because there she was — holding onto him like a lifeline. Her vice grip and cold, clammy hands grounding him more than anything else have.
Out of nostalgia, He tells her that she’s heavy, and she laughs a little and only clutches him harder.
He lets her.
This is how you lose her.
She is stubborn to a fault and beautiful and hot-tempered and bossy and loud and acted silly and flustered around you and you thought it’s adorable — not that you’d ever say that, not to any living breathing person. And you — you are a coward, and prideful, and undeserving of her. There’s nothing else to say.