Chapter Text
Naruto’s face is plastered across his phone screen. Sasuke doesn’t use Twitter very often, and regrets highly opening it now.
“Oh my god, is that him?” Chris asks, peering over his shoulder. Sasuke twinges with annoyance that he’s looking.
Chris is, for all intents and purposes, a nice guy, one of the nicest guys he’s ever met. An accepting, warm, steadfast guy, reliable always, with an even temper and a gentle smile. Sometimes Sasuke hates Chris, he reminds him so much of Naruto. He is the man that Naruto could have been, who leads the life he would be better suited for.
Instead Naruto was on page six, wearing a stiff suit and a terribly unflattering haircut. The price of running for political election, Sasuke supposes.
“Yes, that’s him.”
Chris carefully observes the couple in the picture. His stubble brushes Sasuke’s cheek, and Sasuke is surprised how much he dislikes the sensation. He did last night. “She’s pretty, for a beard.”
She was pretty. And small. Naruto was 6 feet on a good day, but he looked positively gigantic next to her, her perfectly straightened hair and tastefully made-up head barely reaching his shoulder.
“She’s not a beard. Naruto isn’t gay,” Sasuke murmurs. The woman is wearing a business appropriate dress with modest shoes and a neatly pressed cardigan. Naruto is wearing the most ill fitting suit jacket imaginable. Sasuke wants to text him that it’s ugly out of spite. He talks himself out of it.
“Damn, that’s a shame,” Chris says, and goes to the kitchen. “I could have sworn he was your first boyfriend?”
Sasuke force quits Twitter and sets his phone face down on the coffee table. “Not really. He wasn’t.”
"Sasuke, I’m not gay," Naruto said, not ten seconds after they shared a heated kiss. Sasuke initiated it. It wasn’t their first kiss, but the first one had been an accident back in middle school, a simple mistake born from a classmate’s prank. This was their first summer after senior year, and the air was ripe with the anticipation of adulthood and endless possibilities.
Sasuke’s heart dropped to the floor with a sick, iron hot jolt of miscalculation. The past two years have been the softest time in his life. He felt content. He didn’t hide his body in oversized hoodies anymore. He began to sleep on a regular schedule. His teachers applauded his improved attitude. Naruto would wrap an arm around his shoulders almost everyday. ‘You two are like an old married couple,’ Sakura would say, and Naruto would go red, but joke that Sasuke was his old ball and chain. Naruto would come over almost everyday after practice, sweaty in his basketball uniform, and curl up on his bed to listen to him make crude remixes of progressive house tracks from the 90s. They would go to the mall together and share a changing room, their chests pressed close and hands brushing against each other as they exchanged shirts. At least once a week, he’d tuck stray hairs behind Sasuke’s ear, and smile wide as he did so. Twice he’d even called him beautiful. Before Naruto, the thought of being touched by anyone made his skin crawl. Now he relied on the warmth of his hands everyday.
The one time Sasuke worked up the courage to actively do something about it, actually make a move, and this was the result. He wanted to kill himself immediately. He wanted to kill Naruto.
“What do you mean…not gay?” Sasuke asked, praying for an answer, any answer that wasn’t a rejection, but his chest was already aching. He licked his lips, and found them wet. “You kissed me back.”
“Of course I did! I mean, listen,” Naruto pushed himself away, running both hands through his hair. His voice was frayed and frantic. “You know I love you Sasuke, but you’re my best friend. We’re perfect as friends. We are the best friends in the world. I just can’t.. be like that... like be gay. It’s fine that you are, that’s always been fine.”
“Why not?” Sasuke demanded. “Everyone thinks we are already. Sakura jokes about it. Why does that matter?”
“Not everyone thinks that. And even if they did, they were wrong. Sakura is just being silly, like just kidding with us. I’ve never been gay. I didn’t mean to make you think that. The kiss, that was okay, I’m not mad about it, we just can’t do it again, at least I can’t do it again.“
“Don’t worry, I won’t be kissing you again. Even if they are wrong thinking it why the fuck would that matter?!?” Sasuke shouted. “Do they matter more than what you want?”
“It's just that I don’t want you like that, because I’m not gay!” Naruto pleaded, his fists balled in his shirt. “I’m just… not.”
‘I don’t want you’ beat in his head like a drum. His head swam. ‘He doesn’t want you,’ the traitorous voice repeated, thrumming against the front of his skull. ‘And why would he?’
Naruto wasn’t finished, gesturing wildly with his hands. “Nothing changes for you if you’re gay!”
“What the fuck does that mean?”
“It means you’re artsy and shit, you’re creative. You’re a cool guy. You paint your nails and shit. No one would care if you’re gay and most people think so anyway. You play sports but like, I also play sports, I’m captain of the team.. and I’m like, going to try to run for president someday. I can’t just be like… doing that, you know?”
“No I don’t fucking know,” Sasuke hissed, and shoved him backwards. “Doing this? Is that what it was to you, ‘this?’. You were always flirting with me, pursuing me, fucking touching me. Why the fuck would you do that if you weren’t interested? If you didn’t want me like that?”
Naruto’s eyes are big and bright and so, so blue. Sasuke wanted to claw them out. “Because I am interested in you! You’re my favorite person! I think you’re so fucking cool, and you’re perfect to me, you’re everything I want to be, like you’re so confident and you don’t care about what anybody thinks and I love our time together! I love you as a person and a best friend, I’m just not gay. I can’t commit to being seen as…gay,” he finished, with a whisper. “I’m so sorry.”
“You just can't see yourself committing to ME.” Sasuke could feel the tear running down his cheek before he registered it. His voice was clipped and cold, hollow in his ears. “You fucking used me for attention and affection and now you’re rejecting me when I called your bluff and have expectations.”
“I WAS NEVER USING YOU! That’s not true, those were all things that are real. It’s all REAL.”
“Then how can you say all of these things with a straight face and not be interested romantically? That you love me and you’re obsessed with me and that I’m the best, the most…” he trails off. Sasuke can’t bring himself to say ‘beautiful’. “The closest bond you have. That’s insane. You’re insane.”
“I’m not insane, that’s the truth! I say them because I mean them!”
“You can’t just DO that, say that shit and then not fucking mean it. You’re a fucking liar. This was all safe for you when we were just in school, and now that we graduated you can’t fathom being a fucking adult and you know…” Sasuke said, but he did not know. “Think critically about your fucking life, beyond wanting to be president.”
“I am thinking critically, I want to pursue my dreams and I also want you in my life. I don’t have to own up to anything, Sasuke!! You’re my best fucking friend and you’re the most important person in my life, that’s the truth! Can’t that just be what it is?”
“No, it can’t. Fuck you,” Sasuke said, so furious with Naruto he couldn’t see straight, but more furious at himself for being unable to stem his tears. He shoved Naruto as hard as he could. Naruto offered no resistance. “I fucking hate you.”
Naruto looked as forlorn as he’s ever seen him, his face red and damp. “I’m sorry, Sas. I didn’t mean to make you hurt. I wish I could fix this. Let me fix this,” he extended his hand, like he’s done a thousand times, to brush silky black hair behind Sasuke’s ear. “Please don’t cry, I don’t want you to cry.”
Sasuke slapped his hand away. “Don’t fucking touch me,” he said, from a detached voice that didn’t seem quite his own. “Never touch me again. Never call me again. Stay the fuck away from me forever.”
Naruto’s big blue eyes were bursting with tears now, falling in twin streams into the neck of his hoodie. “Don’t say that. I can’t stay away from you, Sasuke, I don’t want to, I’m sorry. Let me fix this, please? Can’t we just… rewind like an hour? Pretend it never happened?”
The suggestion hurt more than the rejection, more than the disappointment, more than the tears. “No, I can’t pretend.”
“It wasn’t pretending,” Naruto cried, dropping to his knees. “It wasn’t fucking pretending, I mean everything, like I always meant and do mean everything I’ve ever said, or promised. You’re everything to me, you always have been, from the moment I met you.”
“Can’t you see what you’re saying? How if you mean these things, it can’t possibly be… friendship? How are these statements not romantic? Tell me, Naruto, what does a friend look like to you? Do you share this intimacy and these words with everyone?” Sasuke shot back.
“No I mean…” Naruto opened and closed his mouth like a fish, trying to summon a rebuttal, but Sasuke wasn’t finished.
“Answer me one fucking question, actually,” Sasuke forced out, and he didn’t want to, but he had to ask, even if it killed him. “If I was a girl, would you have rejected being more than just ‘friends’ with me?”
The agony across Naruto’s tear streaked face revealed his grief, and his silence spoke his answer clearer than any words. He let out a soft sob, one he tried to conceal with his hands.
Sasuke didn’t bother trying to hide his. Tangled strands of hair stuck in clumps to his cheeks, sticky and wet. “You made me feel loved, for once in my life. And I was stupid enough to misinterpret that love, I guess. You win,” he conceded, and the words were ashes in his mouth. “I wasn’t pretending, Naruto. I loved you. Not as a friend.”
He turned his back, letting Naruto sit in the dirt with his tears and his regret.
Sasuke writes a song about it. He plays the keyboard and synthesizers over a mix of his own vocals and sound samples on his bootlegged copy of Ableton Live. One month later he releases it independently, using his inheritance money to rent the shittiest, cheapest recording studio he could afford. Three weeks after that, it reached the top 2 ranking on Spotify's billboard charts. It stayed there for seven weeks. Virgin records offered to sign it to their label, and requests three more tracks.
Sasuke packs his midi board, Itachi’s turntables, his busted MacBook Pro, and the minimal clothing he had into a suitcase and moves to America the next week.
Over the next four years, he produces two more albums. He gets better at mixing and mastering and playing the keyboard and becomes intimately familiar with the facets of his voice. His agent books him shows at concert venues and tiny nightclubs in every major city across the world. He travels with his iPad and sketches memories in thin pencil on Procreate and sees them embossed into posters and compressed into tiny little squares on instagram. He replies to Naruto’s messages only sometimes, when his brain feels heavy and full and aching with a feeling he can’t quite name.
Sasuke sighs deeply and shakes away the memories, and follows Chris into the kitchen.
When Naruto texts him a year later, Sasuke is so surprised he calls Sakura immediately, just to confirm he hasn’t finally gone insane. She picks up on the first ring.
“Naruto just texted me.”
Sakura screeches so loud he holds the phone a foot away from his ear, wincing. It takes her a full 10 seconds to calm down.
“Today????? About WHAT!??”
“He says he’s coming to Seattle on business. I don’t know what kind. He wants to stop by.”
“What does ‘stopping by’ mean?”
“I guess he wants to just meet up. I don’t know yet, I haven’t texted him back yet,” Sasuke said, running his hand over the thick green sound dampener cushions on his studio wall. It is late and he was here alone, stuck on a melody for his latest album. It isn’t coming along as easily as he hoped.
“That’s so random…I thought he stopped emailing with you all the time a few years ago.”
Sasuke thinks about Twitter, the picture of the pretty dark haired girl. “Exactly a year ago.”
“This is too juicy, you have to figure out what he wants,” encourages Sakura, and Sasuke knows she’s been starving for some drama. “I’m sooooo curious, like obviously he’s been pining all these years to reconnect but maybe now you might finally be ready?”
Sasuke sighs, pinching the bridge of his nose. “Yeah I might.”
“Okay so it’s been a year since you two even exchanged some emails, I know he used to send them all the time. Maybe you two could make actual amends, instead of like, dancing around the topic, you know? He probably wants to apologize.”
“I don’t know.’”
“Either that or he’s trying to milk you for free fundraising concerts or to pander to the gay community, but you should at least try to hear him out on that, don’t you think?”
Sasuke thinks of the inbox full of apologetic emails, friendly one sided banter, and their handful of sparse text exchanges about music and sports and travel. He thinks of the last selfie Naruto had sent him from two years ago, in front of a concert venue in Osaka where Sasuke’s tour poster still hung.
“Sorry I missed your show!” the text read, followed with a crying emoji. “Next time, I won’t miss it, I promise!”
“Yeah,” Sasuke tells Sakura, tearing tiny fuzzy pieces off the carpeted wall. “I’ll see what he wants.”
At the front door to his apartment, Naruto looks a lot better than he had in the twitter picture from a year ago. He’s grown his hair longer and is wearing a snug orange pullover and dark jeans, paired with a winning and rueful smile. Sasuke studies his face. It looked slightly different from the one he remembers, with slight creases in the crinkles of the eyes, but the little faint freckles were still there across his tanned cheeks, splashed across his nose like stars.
Sasuke is standing too close, but it still didn’t feel close enough. Their heights matched exactly now. He remembers being 18 and laughing together in a Uniqlo dressing room in Shibuya. He remembers Naruto’s pant size, 30 x 34, and the thick material of denim on his fingers as they would stack pants on the little stool. How Sasuke’s pants were slightly too small on the hips and always needed a belt, and Naruto would laugh and tighten it for him.
As much as he wants to hate him, his first instinct is still to kiss him. Instead he body blocks him from entering his apartment.
“Hey, What do you want?”
“A weary welcome I see,” Naruto smiles as he talks, and it’s even brighter than Sasuke remembers. “I wanted to see you, duh. It’s been forever, hasn’t it? Can I come in?”
Sasuke doesn’t trust his voice yet. He moves aside, and he can smell Naruto’s shitty 5 in 1 body wash shampoo. The scent hasn’t changed despite the years. He’s always liked it. “Yes. Make yourself at home.”
Naruto wastes no time doing a once over of Sasuke’s apartment. Sasuke watches him move comfortably around from shelf to counter to window as if he’d lived there for a hundred years. “Damn Sas, this loft is swanky! I was expecting something super nice you know, all the glass windows in the big old high rise and all, but you have such a good view of the Sound from here. And the art and stuff too. I love it. Are any of these yours?”
Sasuke tears his eyes away and looks at the wall adjacent to the bay, covered in prints and illustrations of various sizes in matching black frames. “Not many. Mainly just from people I know.”
“You did do this one though, didn’t you?” Naruto asks, pointing at a black and white lineart drawing of entangled hands on a field of lavender.
Sasuke busies himself with grabbing beers from the kitchen. “How did you know?”
Naruto smiles ruefully at him as he settles into the couch. “Just instinct, I guess.” He glides his fingers slowly across Sasuke’s electric keyboard on the coffee table. “This is so cool. I’ve been trying to learn guitar, but I’m shit with it. I’ll keep practicing though, you can’t be the only artsy one around here.”
Sasuke hands him a beer. Their fingers touch, just briefly, and neither man pulls their hand away. He can feel the steady beat of his heart in his chest, and worries Naruto might hear it too. He sits on the ottoman facing Naruto, and does not look away.
“I can’t believe I allowed you into my apartment.”
“Honestly me either, but I’m happy you did. It’s so good to see you. I watch your tour videos and music and everything on YouTube and social media. You’re killing it. Everyone I know loves your work, I know I do,” says Naruto. “It’s so fucking good. The little animated music video for that ‘Entangled’ song, for real for real, is my favorite thing I’ve ever seen. The picture is my Lock Screen.” Naruto pulls out his iPhone 14 max, sporting an orange case and cracked screen protector. The photograph is his latest album cover, of a deep blue sea with a white outline sketch of a man afloat atop of it.
Sasuke has spent the past week telling himself that whatever came out of Naruto’s mouth, he would refuse, deny, and scorn. He practiced it like a daily affirmation- “do not take anything that blonde clown tells you seriously,” but the praise warms him despite himself. A ghost of a smile graces his lips. “I’m glad you like it.”
“Of course I do.”
“I’ve seen the work you’ve done too, when I read the Japanese papers. Congrats on winning the mayor nomination. The basketball camp for orphans too. It probably means a lot to them that you’re giving back to the community,” Sasuke says. “Even if the uniforms are ugly. I’m sure the kids don’t care.”
Naruto laughs so loudly it’s startling in the vast apartment, reverberating across the high ceilings, warming the bright white walls. “I knew you’d say some shit like that. I know, I know, I’m tasteless, but it wouldn't really be MY idea if I didn’t design them, you know?”
Sasuke did know. Planning the details into one’s personal projects- however minute- connotated a deep respect. “Your dad would be really proud of you,” he offers, and he’s surprised at how deeply he means it.
Naruto does not laugh at that. He inhales deeply, and responds softly. “Thank you Sas. You have no idea how much it means to me that you said that.”
“Of course,” Sasuke replies, and waits a moment. “So…Are you actually here in Seattle on Business?”
“I sure am!! I knew y’all would think I’m lying. I’m the Seattle-Tokyo foreign exchange program ambassador for Tokyo University. They are having a conference, it’s only for a week, but I should have a fair amount of free time. My hotel is pretty close to here actually. I didn’t even have to Uber.”
“How is your girlfriend?” Sasuke forces himself to ask. He takes a big swig to wash down the insincerity. He can’t bring himself to meet Natuo’s eyes.
Naruto laughs nervously. “Wouldn’t know. We broke up a while ago, and don’t really uh, keep in contact.”
“Oh.”
“What about your boyfriend, then? Sakura told me you were dating a nice dude from the label or something.”
“Wouldn’t know either, we broke up a long time ago too.”
Naruto waggled his eyebrows in a fake conspiracy. “Sakura gave me old intel then I guess. Why’d ya break up?”
Sasuke already has trouble envisioning Chris’s face, let alone the breakup. “I was too emotionally unavailable, apparently.”
“Damn that’s crazy because that’s exactly what she said about me too,” Naruto laughs again. “Birds of a feather, huh?”
“Listen,” He can’t stop himself from interjecting. The words are dry in his mouth. He takes another swig of beer. “Why did you really come here, Naruto? I understand that you’re here for work but I doubt just that warrants a house call. We’ve barely interacted in the past five years.”
“I know,” Naruto swallows hard. His fingers tap against the frosted glass of his beer nervously. Sasuke’s already peeled the wrapped off of his. “I guess there isn’t an easy way to say it. I wanted to let you know that like.. my biggest fucking regret in life was letting you go. And treating you the way that I did. I’m so sorry. I know I can’t ever take it back, and I know that, but still, that’s the truth.”
“Yes, you’ve already told me that you’re sorry before, over text. Many times.You didn’t need to come all this way to say that.”
“No, I did,” counters Naruto, and he sets his bottle down on the table to grasp Sasuke’s limp hand. Gently, he peels the sodden wrapper out of his fingers. Sasuke watches him do it, the experience so out of body it feels like he’s observing a private movie screening of someone else's life in crystal clear 4k. His fingers shake, but Naruto’s grasp is tight and warm. “I had to say it in person, because if I didn’t, the words would be empty. I know you.”
“You don’t know me anymore,” Sasuke replies, but can’t bring himself to pull his hand away. Naruto tightens his hold.
“You’re right, I don’t. But I want to. I’ve been doing a lot of thinking, especially in the past few years. About things I was afraid of, and about how those same things don’t seem so scary anymore, compared to how hard life has been without you. About how much of a coward I was, to run away from the best thing I ever had, and how shitty it was of me to not take responsibility for how my actions affected you and your feelings for me. And, um…my own feelings, if I’m being honest.”
Sasuke aches to admit how much he’s missed Naruto. His smile, his laugh, his stupid obnoxious style, his easy banter and the quiet comfortability that makes his heart go quiet and feel at ease. He hasn’t felt that since the last day he saw Naruto. His positive attitude and his reassuring touches that no one ever has been able to emulate, despite every effort to banish Narutp from his mind. He keeps his mouth firmly shut. Naruto continues.
“I miss you so much. I think about it all the time, all the time we spent together, and how close we were. I want it back. Your friendship and your attitude and everything else that makes you you,” Naruto says, and his voice is soft and quiet now. “Everything that made us, us.”
“Us?” The statement makes Sasuke draw his hand away, suddenly carved from ice. “There isn’t any ‘us.' I can’t, won’t, be able to just be your friend, Naruto. That’s the problem, I never could.”
“I know,” Naruto swallows heavily. His foot taps nervously on the polished concrete floor. “I realized that I couldn’t just be your friend either.”
Realization knocked on Sasuke’s heart, and with it, the disbelief. A small part of him, locked away under heavy lock and key, has fantasized about this moment. A change of heart, a confession, a affirmation that he wasn’t just fucking insane, that there was something, had been something, IS still a potential to be something. He’s always dismissed it as a weak, pathetic cope, a longing for a past life that didn’t quite seem his own. He was better than that. Stronger.
“What?”
“I’m saying I want to repair things, Sasuke. I really do. I have for a long time. And, if you’re willing, I’d like to try again, but with.. Different intentions this time. Um. Romantic ones.”
“Romantic ones? Don’t make me fucking laugh. You’re not gay,” Sasuke spits out. “You made that abundantly clear to me. So you had an epiphany about missing me, and now you’re what, a new man? Don’t lie to me.”
“I promise you, I’m not lying. It wouldn’t have been this painful if I was. It’s not an epiphany. I’ve always missed you.”
Naruto isn’t lying, Sasuke knows. There was a folder on his desktop called ‘Naruto’s emails,’ and if anyone selected one by random chances were almost 100% that it would contain a few ‘I miss you’s.’ In his weaker moments, sometimes he would write back a ‘You too.’
“If you wanted to..” Sasuke ventures, trying to keep his voice in check. “Genuinely reconcile... why did you fucking wait five goddamn years? Spare us both this entire fucking ordeal?”
“Well you had my number blocked for a long ass time for a while. And I was in school and campaigning and you’ve been on your music stuff and then on tour and then we were both seeing people… And I had a lot of shit to work out, about myself and my.. Sexuality I guess. Coming to terms with a lot of stuff I didn’t want to think about and never addressed.”
“Thanks for waiting for years and years to figure it out. I can’t believe you. You know how much time we wasted, by taking your sweet time trying to ‘figure it out?’ We wouldn’t have had to see anyone else,” Sasuke throws back with vitriol. “I never wanted… to ever have to be without you.. or be with anyone, to ever be touched by anyone other than you. From the day I was 14 years old until even now. One person was too many. I could barely stand it,” he laughed bitterly. “No wonder he left. You can’t just turn back time.”
Naruto is already crying. Sasuke forgot how incredibly bright his eyes looked when filled with tears. “I know, I know. and I feel the same way. I was so fucking ashamed at myself for making it be this way. Wasting your time and ruining what would have been.. Different, this whole time. Special. I know we can’t turn back time but we can start again, if you’re willing.”
Sasuke’s eyes were misty with his own. He glanced down to hide them, stifling a choked cry.
Gentle fingers brushed his hair behind his ears. Sasuke’s heart lurched. “Don’t cry, not for me. I’m sorry, Sasuke. I’m so sorry.”
“You keep saying that,” he says, but doesn’t shake the hands off. Naruto’s cradling his face in both hands, the most tender touch he’s ever felt, and by far the most meaningful. He looked up to meet Naruto’s eyes. Black met blue, and his entire world shifted. “I’ve tried for so long to hate you. I want to hate you. But I can’t.”
Naruto smiles, a soft, rueful thing. “I know. God, you’re so beautiful.”
Sasuke’s been on magazine covers and stood in front of stadiums, always fully dressed but constantly being sexualized. Instagram pages were dedicated to clipping his videos, posting his outfits, no matter if they were a simple tee shirt and jeans. The comments below them are always fawning messages of adoration, disgusting sexual solicitations, or confessions of love and appreciation for his looks. He dislikes them all. They made his skin crawl, exposed and raw in a way so invasive it made him want to hide behind his old shapeless hoodies, the only uniform he wore in middle school. Naruto had been the first person to encourage him to take them off. ‘Aren’t you hot in that? You look great. You don’t need to hide.’ He’s been trying his best not to ever since. He blinks more tears away. “How can you just say that?”
“Because I mean it. You’ve always been the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen. No one compares to you. They never have.”
Sasuke thinks of the black haired little girlfriend, her porcelain skin and limpid eyes. “Not even your ex?” he scoffs. “I saw her.”
“NO one,” Naruto reiterates, and glides the pads of his thumbs across the sharp ridges of Sasuke’s cheekbones. Sasuke closes his eyes. “Literally never anyone.”
He grabs Naruto’s wrists, letting himself enjoy the hold for a second longer. “Okay.”
The tip of Naruto’s nose brushes against his own, just for a moment, startling his breath back into his mouth in a soft gasp. Naruto releases him, and settles back into the couch. He pats the spot next to him. “Would you sit with me?”
Sasuke wordlessly consents, pushing himself back against the cushions. He doesn’t move his keyboard mixer off the edge. It forces them to huddle next to one another, side by side. He debates telling Naruto how hurt he’s been, using the most colorful, hateful language he could summon, but it would be fruitless and redundant and cruel. Naruto knows what he’s done. That’s why he’s here.
Naruto laughs nervously as he rubs his eyes with his sleeves. “Thanks for listening. Thanks for even having me over. I’m sorry, I can go, I just need a minute.”
“Go?” asks Sasuke sharply. “I never said I wanted you to go.”
“Oh yeah?” Naruto smiles then, one close lipped and private. “I was just offering, in case you wanted me to.”
“If I did, you never would have made it inside.”
“Yeah well I’m glad you did.”
The sun was setting. The windows glowed with golds and pinks, the shadows of the furniture stretched to endless ribbons across the glossy floor. Exhaustion set in as he watched them grow and peak. They sat in silence for a long time.
“Besides being scared of being labeled as gay, what else was so scary about the idea of being with me? What were you so afraid of?” Sasuke asks quietly.
“What it might mean, I guess, what might change. I didn’t want anything to change, you know? We had this perfect relationship, and I was so afraid that if we addressed it, like labeled it officially and pushed to the next level that it would change somehow, or disappear.”
“It ended up disappearing anyway because of that.”
“I know, right? A hell of my own making, and that’s what I regret the most.”
Sasuke rested the back of his head against the couch cushions, staring blankly at the exposed piping in the ceiling. His head hasn’t felt so heavy in a long time, his thoughts so clouded. ‘This has to all be a dream,’ he thinks. ‘The thing I wanted to happen but never thought would happen actually did. God called my bluff.’
“Is this real?” Sasuke asks, his voice cracked and hoarse.
“Yeah. I know you can’t just trust me out of the blue. I know that this.. This can be hard to repair. Maybe we can’t. I know that it’s scary and uncertain, and you have every right to tell me to fuck off again. But maybe we can. I’d like to see if we could, you know?”
Sasuke rubbed his eyes. The singular beer he had churned in his stomach with the contents of the last two hours of conversation, impossible to digest. He sighs deeply, and presses his eyes closed to the ceiling and the shadows and the setting sun. It helps.
“If it’s okay with you, can I stay here a little while longer? We don’t have to talk, or do anything or figure it out yet. It just feels nice to sit here with you,” Naruto says, from somewhere next to his shoulder. “This is what I’ve missed most, if I’m being honest. Just sitting quietly with you.”
Sasuke nods. He extends his hand. Naruto takes it.
The sky turns from gold to indigo to black.