[Naruto] Stepping Stones
I haven't posted in nearly a month! I haven't written for this series in such a long time. But I miss Team 7 and I miss this pairing dearly, so here it is, a gift-fic. :)
The initial set-up: Sasuke is back, but not exactly in the best shape. It's almost amnesia that I tried to go for here, though it's his mind that is messed up as a whole, not just his memories.
Title: Stepping Stones
Series: Naruto
Rating: T
Characters: Team 7 (Sasuke/Sakura), Anko
Word Count: 938; Short short
[Written for annwyd, in thanks for the holiday package <3]
She smiles today; she will laugh tomorrow. Her life is laid out before her: carefully mapped, locations pinpointed, and heartbreaks measured. He simply happens to play a large part for her heart, among those three. His presence glides through like the perfect actor and he’s all glassed and darkened eyes, watching for the right moments to say his lines that make her eyes water up like no other.
It might be fortunate to say that she hardly cries anymore. She has forgotten the taste of tears or the feeling of the warm water upon her cheeks, burning her skin like black steel-marks. Now her cheeks are as rosy as ever and her eyes green, the color of a worn, jaded emerald (because her gaze will never shine like it did when she was twelve, no, not ever again).
“Well, where is he?” They ask. Everyone does.
She answers with a small smile, “He happens to be at the hospital.”
.
She steps onto the cold floor of white tiles that she cannot feel-her shoes have become the rigid wall between herself and anything alive on the ground-and walks toward the bed where he lies without an oxygen mask.
He looks fine, but he really isn’t. (He likes to play pretend. He always did.)
She opens her mouth but does not speak. If I talk now, everything inside me will go out like a candle. She will be out of fire.
So Sakura settles with getting a glimpse of his dark hair and closing the door again, closing the door, closing it against a young love story.
.
“If you left for power, you should have stayed there.” It’s Anko. That man’s past tool, the woman with a thirst for battle, who learned to handle snakes as a young girl as if they were a natural part of her.
Sasuke doesn’t answer, only grunts. It sounds somewhat like disbelief.
She’s smiling and it’s anything but similar to Sakura’s; this gal’s smile tells the world, tells him, ‘You don’t deserve to be here. You’re worthless, a failure on both sides.’
He sees that. He’s sitting up and looking at her face directly. He leans his head back and says, “I don’t need anyone to tell me about my fate.”
“Oh, don’t be childish, now,” she replies, her eyes filled with invisible snake poison. The grin only grows wider, but it threatens to shatter her. Break her skin, her bones. “Don’t say you regretted it.” The smile stops. Her glance is replaced with something called worry, desperation. God, please don’t be like me.
“I’ll never regret anything.” He closes his mouth and his tongue tastes like sandpaper.
.
“What’s the matter with him?” Naruto asks her, ripping out fistfuls of grass and throwing the remains of dead plants across the hill.
Her eyes are open but she doesn’t look at anything. “He’s still, just still.”
The heart’s frustration grows. “No doubt, Orochimaru must have destroyed his mind. He won’t talk, won’t move. What the hell is he, a skeleton?”
“Hasn’t he always been?”
He looks up. “What-”
“We were always longing for the Sasuke we knew. But he’s not there, is he? The twelve-year-old in him is never going to be. Your best friend was already ashes, Naruto, and I loved a skeleton-long, long before we ever found him.”
“God damn it, I don’t need you to be like this.”
“Sometimes we can’t rebuild certain things.”
“And I can’t believe that.”
Now she looks to him and the flame in her is dying. “There’s no way we can piece it all back together. Maybe we should just leave him-”
“I’ll never believe that.” After the words, his gaze is steady. (You’re broken. You’re broken up for good, Sakura-chan.)
.
She continues to linger. She tries eating an apple, peeling it by herself in her room. The taste is sweet and the juice explodes in her mouth. So she tries again in the hospital room, but her arm drops the bag of apples the moment she walks in.
Sasuke turns; it triggers a memory.
“Apple seeds are poisonous,” he tells Sakura, getting up and leaving his bed. His fingers enclose around her wrist, and in her fingers is the apple, red as the richest sunset. He bites into the fruit, his lips brushing against her thumb. She stands there, stunned, trying to find the fire in his eyes.
It’s there, barely but existent, just about as tiny as hers. He lets go of her hand and says, “Now you won’t have to peel them anymore.”
Her knees begin to shake and she is about to fall, but her mind refuses. I won’t let myself fall, she tells herself, not yet.
It has always been her duty-she’ll have to catch him when he falls.
.
“I thought I had lost him.”
Naruto laughs bitterly. “You can never lose somebody completely. Even if they don’t remember, it doesn’t matter, ‘cause you remember.”
She ties back her hair then, her mind ten years older. “Memories aren’t enough to keep you going.”
He sighs. “Yeah, I know. That’s the sad part.”
“He remembers color now.”
“Does he?” Naruto brightens a bit. “He has to know orange and yellow. Those are my trademark colors, after all.”
She smiles. There still might be hope. She’ll have to reach at it and grab it and never let go, but she just might find the threads to meet the ends.
She wonders if he can recall the green leaves of the trees they climbed as children (and her eyes, the greenness of her eyes).
The initial set-up: Sasuke is back, but not exactly in the best shape. It's almost amnesia that I tried to go for here, though it's his mind that is messed up as a whole, not just his memories.
Title: Stepping Stones
Series: Naruto
Rating: T
Characters: Team 7 (Sasuke/Sakura), Anko
Word Count: 938; Short short
[Written for annwyd, in thanks for the holiday package <3]
She smiles today; she will laugh tomorrow. Her life is laid out before her: carefully mapped, locations pinpointed, and heartbreaks measured. He simply happens to play a large part for her heart, among those three. His presence glides through like the perfect actor and he’s all glassed and darkened eyes, watching for the right moments to say his lines that make her eyes water up like no other.
It might be fortunate to say that she hardly cries anymore. She has forgotten the taste of tears or the feeling of the warm water upon her cheeks, burning her skin like black steel-marks. Now her cheeks are as rosy as ever and her eyes green, the color of a worn, jaded emerald (because her gaze will never shine like it did when she was twelve, no, not ever again).
“Well, where is he?” They ask. Everyone does.
She answers with a small smile, “He happens to be at the hospital.”
.
She steps onto the cold floor of white tiles that she cannot feel-her shoes have become the rigid wall between herself and anything alive on the ground-and walks toward the bed where he lies without an oxygen mask.
He looks fine, but he really isn’t. (He likes to play pretend. He always did.)
She opens her mouth but does not speak. If I talk now, everything inside me will go out like a candle. She will be out of fire.
So Sakura settles with getting a glimpse of his dark hair and closing the door again, closing the door, closing it against a young love story.
.
“If you left for power, you should have stayed there.” It’s Anko. That man’s past tool, the woman with a thirst for battle, who learned to handle snakes as a young girl as if they were a natural part of her.
Sasuke doesn’t answer, only grunts. It sounds somewhat like disbelief.
She’s smiling and it’s anything but similar to Sakura’s; this gal’s smile tells the world, tells him, ‘You don’t deserve to be here. You’re worthless, a failure on both sides.’
He sees that. He’s sitting up and looking at her face directly. He leans his head back and says, “I don’t need anyone to tell me about my fate.”
“Oh, don’t be childish, now,” she replies, her eyes filled with invisible snake poison. The grin only grows wider, but it threatens to shatter her. Break her skin, her bones. “Don’t say you regretted it.” The smile stops. Her glance is replaced with something called worry, desperation. God, please don’t be like me.
“I’ll never regret anything.” He closes his mouth and his tongue tastes like sandpaper.
.
“What’s the matter with him?” Naruto asks her, ripping out fistfuls of grass and throwing the remains of dead plants across the hill.
Her eyes are open but she doesn’t look at anything. “He’s still, just still.”
The heart’s frustration grows. “No doubt, Orochimaru must have destroyed his mind. He won’t talk, won’t move. What the hell is he, a skeleton?”
“Hasn’t he always been?”
He looks up. “What-”
“We were always longing for the Sasuke we knew. But he’s not there, is he? The twelve-year-old in him is never going to be. Your best friend was already ashes, Naruto, and I loved a skeleton-long, long before we ever found him.”
“God damn it, I don’t need you to be like this.”
“Sometimes we can’t rebuild certain things.”
“And I can’t believe that.”
Now she looks to him and the flame in her is dying. “There’s no way we can piece it all back together. Maybe we should just leave him-”
“I’ll never believe that.” After the words, his gaze is steady. (You’re broken. You’re broken up for good, Sakura-chan.)
.
She continues to linger. She tries eating an apple, peeling it by herself in her room. The taste is sweet and the juice explodes in her mouth. So she tries again in the hospital room, but her arm drops the bag of apples the moment she walks in.
Sasuke turns; it triggers a memory.
“Apple seeds are poisonous,” he tells Sakura, getting up and leaving his bed. His fingers enclose around her wrist, and in her fingers is the apple, red as the richest sunset. He bites into the fruit, his lips brushing against her thumb. She stands there, stunned, trying to find the fire in his eyes.
It’s there, barely but existent, just about as tiny as hers. He lets go of her hand and says, “Now you won’t have to peel them anymore.”
Her knees begin to shake and she is about to fall, but her mind refuses. I won’t let myself fall, she tells herself, not yet.
It has always been her duty-she’ll have to catch him when he falls.
.
“I thought I had lost him.”
Naruto laughs bitterly. “You can never lose somebody completely. Even if they don’t remember, it doesn’t matter, ‘cause you remember.”
She ties back her hair then, her mind ten years older. “Memories aren’t enough to keep you going.”
He sighs. “Yeah, I know. That’s the sad part.”
“He remembers color now.”
“Does he?” Naruto brightens a bit. “He has to know orange and yellow. Those are my trademark colors, after all.”
She smiles. There still might be hope. She’ll have to reach at it and grab it and never let go, but she just might find the threads to meet the ends.
She wonders if he can recall the green leaves of the trees they climbed as children (and her eyes, the greenness of her eyes).