crumbling into the overflow.
Fandom: Naruto
Characters: Hatake Kakshi & Haruno Sakura
Prompt: 27. overflow & 061. crumbling heart
Word Count: 1253
Rating: PG
Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto.
Warning: More gen than romance.
Notes: Written for 30_kisses & 500themes . Prompt tables are here & here.
-
Losing someone is never easy.
To her, it is no simple saying learnt from a textbook or a stray whisper lingering in the night air. Loss is a funny thing, she thinks. There’s when she loses a kunai, or misplaces that one sock, or even when the keys disappear from the folds of her pouch. Then, there is loss that comes from death, injury beyond her glowing hands of life, or even simply, misplaced on the many roads that life has paved for her. But even amidst the whole spectrum of difference, the sinking feeling mingled with something akin to deep seated regret is never far from any kind of loss.
There was Sasuke; so shallow were the blubbering feelings of love in her girl-child days, but even seven years later, the wound from that loss still bleeds. Perhaps it is because of the bonds that hold them tightly in its reign still and for infinity in the future, but the loss of one-third of her life is something she cannot quite move on from. And then there were her parents; still so young, so full of opportunity and life. Regret came all too easily for them - guilt for not trying harder to be someone they could understand, regret for not having more time, more guilt for not using the time she did have, and sorrow for the loss.
Loss.
And then she had tried to push it all away, erase from the core of her being the feelings that held her hostage. For Asuma, she offered only her most polite condolences. For Shino, no more than a smile full of all her pity. And for the rest, she offered even less of what she could, because she didn’t want to regret, to cry, to feel. But the surface of one’s actions and the depth of their feeling are too far apart for truth to shine through on either. The more she repressed, the deeper she fell.
It was a one way ride to rock bottom, and she had no more choice but to let herself drift. Until one day, she found that she could wander no more.
x x x
For him, loss is never too far away. So much so that a day without the lingering pain, keeping him carefully wrapped in its tendrils, is as quaint and unexpected as the opposite is for a normal person. But coping, learning, and acceptance are adequate enough as remedies to dull the wound enough to keep him bleeding, but never enough to bleed him out. It is his divine retribution, for outliving his number and cheating death time and again. But he has lived on, devoting his life to duty and the remembrance of his lost ones.
Feelings and emotions on the subject have faded into the recesses of importance. No more does he dwell on the should have, could have’s - instead, he carries on their torch, hoping that perhaps one day, he will be lucky enough to be simply a name on marble. Completely backwards and unconventional, it is so like Kakashi that the ones left around him do not question it. In this line of work, life more often than not blends with the next, and doomsday wishes are not so uncommon.
And so he waits, a contradiction of the need to protect the flame and the desire to extinguish the carrier.
x x x
It is another war that he never wishes to see, but it is exactly that in which they are submerged for the next three years.
The first to follow is Anko, and then, not so long after, a list so long that he no longer has the heart to remember. Some names stick, their faces a blatant reminder of his every breath - there was Ino, Sakura’s loudmouth best friend, Neji, Kiba...and the list continues, stretching into an abyss that will absorb their memory.
But probably most prominent of all, is one half of all he has left. The sight of a blonde head, bloody and matted down with unrecognizable substances had been one of the most welcome in his lifetime - survival. Naruto had survived, and for that moment, it was all Kakashi could care about. The assumption that their last third, of cerise and crimson had undoubtedly made it as well was made and adjourned. Words had been insufficient to convey the lust for peace, for peace so close to them, and for a moment, Sakura had been forgotten, a worry of the wind.
Simplicity though, and hope, come entirely too impossibly hand in hand. The rarity of the blessing is such that Kakashi has long ago given up on ever being blessed with the chance of such a gift, and why he ever believed this time to be different, he knows not. All that remains in memory, is of the bliss of being freed from the clutches of violence, and the living body of Naruto. Everything following the joyous meeting had been a blur for both men, the mirth of life shaken out by the heart-shattering “Sakura-chan”!
Life seems to stop for him as he turns around, sluggish from exhaustion, to the source and agony of the voice. It is none other than the Hyuuga heiress, one of the few remaining females of their generation, staring down at the corpse of a fallen soldier. Corpses litter the grounds where Konoha once stood, proud, but this particular one freezes his heart, soul and motions in place.
Pink. Cherry. Cerise. Coral. Sakura.
Even from the distance, there is no mistaking her unique shades, even polluted with the outcomes of war. The grief written clear across the Hyuuga’s face is also too clear to ignore, and Kakashi rushes over, Naruto forgotten. There is no miraculous recovery, nor does a pinch wake him from his nightmare in the time it takes for him to fly over, eye wide and full of disbelief.
Hinata finally notices the older man’s presence, and turning her shining silver orbs at him, mouths a desperate, quivering, “I’m sorry.”
x x x
Kakashi heaves a sigh as his fingers brush past the well-worn names.
So many lost to the clutches of death, yet he still stands. He has witnessed life’s process of weeding out the shinobi population, and now, after forty-three years of wondering, he is still left hanging to wonder why. Of course, there is still Naruto left, Genma, Shikamaru...enough have survived, but not enough to make the truth less blearing.
His fingers stop as they arrive at a fresh name. There is no special font to commemorate her contribution to peace, no added decorations to differentiate her from the rest. Here, on this slab of marble, she is just the same as any other - but for those who knew her, it is enough to remember her memory.
Kakashi is one such person. He allows his eye to flutter shut as he reaches this portion of his daily commemoration - it has become practice; habit, almost, to offer her some casual words of conversation, as if she is still here. It is a futile seven minutes spent conversing with a rock, but he is satisfied.
In due time he finishes, and as casually and inconspicuously as one could be, he leans forward to brush his lips over softly. It is only a millisecond and the slightest of grazes, and he is gone almost immediately thereafter, but like the conversation, has nearly become tradition. With a slow limp out of the clearing, he whispers back behind him a soft, “see you tomorrow.”
Characters: Hatake Kakshi & Haruno Sakura
Prompt: 27. overflow & 061. crumbling heart
Word Count: 1253
Rating: PG
Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto.
Warning: More gen than romance.
Notes: Written for 30_kisses & 500themes . Prompt tables are here & here.
-
Losing someone is never easy.
To her, it is no simple saying learnt from a textbook or a stray whisper lingering in the night air. Loss is a funny thing, she thinks. There’s when she loses a kunai, or misplaces that one sock, or even when the keys disappear from the folds of her pouch. Then, there is loss that comes from death, injury beyond her glowing hands of life, or even simply, misplaced on the many roads that life has paved for her. But even amidst the whole spectrum of difference, the sinking feeling mingled with something akin to deep seated regret is never far from any kind of loss.
There was Sasuke; so shallow were the blubbering feelings of love in her girl-child days, but even seven years later, the wound from that loss still bleeds. Perhaps it is because of the bonds that hold them tightly in its reign still and for infinity in the future, but the loss of one-third of her life is something she cannot quite move on from. And then there were her parents; still so young, so full of opportunity and life. Regret came all too easily for them - guilt for not trying harder to be someone they could understand, regret for not having more time, more guilt for not using the time she did have, and sorrow for the loss.
Loss.
And then she had tried to push it all away, erase from the core of her being the feelings that held her hostage. For Asuma, she offered only her most polite condolences. For Shino, no more than a smile full of all her pity. And for the rest, she offered even less of what she could, because she didn’t want to regret, to cry, to feel. But the surface of one’s actions and the depth of their feeling are too far apart for truth to shine through on either. The more she repressed, the deeper she fell.
It was a one way ride to rock bottom, and she had no more choice but to let herself drift. Until one day, she found that she could wander no more.
x x x
For him, loss is never too far away. So much so that a day without the lingering pain, keeping him carefully wrapped in its tendrils, is as quaint and unexpected as the opposite is for a normal person. But coping, learning, and acceptance are adequate enough as remedies to dull the wound enough to keep him bleeding, but never enough to bleed him out. It is his divine retribution, for outliving his number and cheating death time and again. But he has lived on, devoting his life to duty and the remembrance of his lost ones.
Feelings and emotions on the subject have faded into the recesses of importance. No more does he dwell on the should have, could have’s - instead, he carries on their torch, hoping that perhaps one day, he will be lucky enough to be simply a name on marble. Completely backwards and unconventional, it is so like Kakashi that the ones left around him do not question it. In this line of work, life more often than not blends with the next, and doomsday wishes are not so uncommon.
And so he waits, a contradiction of the need to protect the flame and the desire to extinguish the carrier.
x x x
It is another war that he never wishes to see, but it is exactly that in which they are submerged for the next three years.
The first to follow is Anko, and then, not so long after, a list so long that he no longer has the heart to remember. Some names stick, their faces a blatant reminder of his every breath - there was Ino, Sakura’s loudmouth best friend, Neji, Kiba...and the list continues, stretching into an abyss that will absorb their memory.
But probably most prominent of all, is one half of all he has left. The sight of a blonde head, bloody and matted down with unrecognizable substances had been one of the most welcome in his lifetime - survival. Naruto had survived, and for that moment, it was all Kakashi could care about. The assumption that their last third, of cerise and crimson had undoubtedly made it as well was made and adjourned. Words had been insufficient to convey the lust for peace, for peace so close to them, and for a moment, Sakura had been forgotten, a worry of the wind.
Simplicity though, and hope, come entirely too impossibly hand in hand. The rarity of the blessing is such that Kakashi has long ago given up on ever being blessed with the chance of such a gift, and why he ever believed this time to be different, he knows not. All that remains in memory, is of the bliss of being freed from the clutches of violence, and the living body of Naruto. Everything following the joyous meeting had been a blur for both men, the mirth of life shaken out by the heart-shattering “Sakura-chan”!
Life seems to stop for him as he turns around, sluggish from exhaustion, to the source and agony of the voice. It is none other than the Hyuuga heiress, one of the few remaining females of their generation, staring down at the corpse of a fallen soldier. Corpses litter the grounds where Konoha once stood, proud, but this particular one freezes his heart, soul and motions in place.
Pink. Cherry. Cerise. Coral. Sakura.
Even from the distance, there is no mistaking her unique shades, even polluted with the outcomes of war. The grief written clear across the Hyuuga’s face is also too clear to ignore, and Kakashi rushes over, Naruto forgotten. There is no miraculous recovery, nor does a pinch wake him from his nightmare in the time it takes for him to fly over, eye wide and full of disbelief.
Hinata finally notices the older man’s presence, and turning her shining silver orbs at him, mouths a desperate, quivering, “I’m sorry.”
x x x
Kakashi heaves a sigh as his fingers brush past the well-worn names.
So many lost to the clutches of death, yet he still stands. He has witnessed life’s process of weeding out the shinobi population, and now, after forty-three years of wondering, he is still left hanging to wonder why. Of course, there is still Naruto left, Genma, Shikamaru...enough have survived, but not enough to make the truth less blearing.
His fingers stop as they arrive at a fresh name. There is no special font to commemorate her contribution to peace, no added decorations to differentiate her from the rest. Here, on this slab of marble, she is just the same as any other - but for those who knew her, it is enough to remember her memory.
Kakashi is one such person. He allows his eye to flutter shut as he reaches this portion of his daily commemoration - it has become practice; habit, almost, to offer her some casual words of conversation, as if she is still here. It is a futile seven minutes spent conversing with a rock, but he is satisfied.
In due time he finishes, and as casually and inconspicuously as one could be, he leans forward to brush his lips over softly. It is only a millisecond and the slightest of grazes, and he is gone almost immediately thereafter, but like the conversation, has nearly become tradition. With a slow limp out of the clearing, he whispers back behind him a soft, “see you tomorrow.”