Work Text:
With a long sigh, Naruto rolled his head to look at the bright red numbers of his alarm clock.
3:38 a.m.
He’d been lying in his bed for hours, counting every breath, every cricket’s chirp, every fissure in the drywall of his ceiling, trying to escape into the blissful unawareness of sleep.
But it evaded him.
Instead of the sweet unconsciousness, his thoughts relentlessly replayed each moment from the day: Sasuke standing closer to Sakura than he’d ever naturally done before, the blush that dusted across her cheeks at something he said, the absence of sadness in her smile that had always been there when she thought of Sasuke.
Bile churned in his stomach like an uneasy tide. He hated that he felt this way…that, when it came to them, he always felt this way. Of course, he was happy that he’d brought Sasuke back—he had promised Sakura, and Sasuke was his first friend—but he also knew what it meant for them. Naruto had known it from the way Sakura had latched onto Sasuke when they were genin. There was this bubble around them that he could never penetrate.
For a time, Naruto had thought that she was finally seeing him. Maybe he’d fooled himself. Fooled himself into thinking that the way she’d hugged him after Pain’s attack meant something more. Or that the way she’d begun to position her bedding closer on missions had meant that she found comfort in being near him. Or even that the first time she had slipped into his sleeping bag had meant that she needed him in a way beyond words. The way he had always wanted her to need him. The way he needed her.
He couldn’t explain it, why every part of him was tuned to her. Why his chakra and blood hummed beneath his skin when he was near her. Why time slowed when he looked at her. He couldn’t put into words why, when he thought of sunshine, he thought of her.
Sighing again, Naruto turned his head back and tossed his arm over his face, hiding from the taunting lights of his clock. He should really get some sleep.
His mind had finally started to drift when he heard the soft, tell-tale drag of his bedroom window sliding open.
Wordlessly, she stepped into the darkness, pausing only long enough to meet his gaze. The room was silent, save for the rustle of her clothing while she undressed; he was afraid to breathe too loudly, lest it scare her off like a startled rabbit.
Her footsteps were light, befitting her craft, as she walked over to his dresser and picked out one of his black shirts, slipping it over her head as if she had done it a hundred times. And maybe by now, she had. But it was still surreal to him, to see the hem of his shirt brushing against her smooth thighs.
He kept his eyes on that hem, all the while she drew closer to his bed. Still without a word, she slipped beneath the covers, forcing him to shift his arm under her head as a pillow. Instinctively, he pulled her leg over his lap, tracing his fingers from her delicate ankle, to the curve her calf, and finally gripping her toned thigh. He hated that his prosthetic was the hand touching her; if this was going to be the last time he held her like this, then he wanted it to be him holding her.
Sakura traced her nails over his collar bone, brushing against the faint stubble that had started to grow on his jawline: stubble that had felt wicked each time it brushed against the sensitive junction between her thighs, heavenly as he left kisses on the inside of her knee.
Naruto finally let himself focus on her in the moonlight: her jade eyes wide with an iridescent sparkle, her lips, chapped and bitten, her pink hair, slightly longer than usual, shimmering silk against the tan of his arm. Slowly, he brushed her bangs behind her ear, revealing her full face to him in an intimate gesture he knew he wouldn’t be able to do much longer. This was her saying ‘goodbye’.
She curled her fingers into the warmth of his skin, feeling the solidity of his heartbeat, matching her breaths to its rhythm—a rhythm that had stopped—a rhythm that she had made with her own hand. Sakura looked into his cerulean eyes, always kind, always gentle, and wondered what she’d ever done to deserve him looking at her like that.
“I…—Sasuke’s leaving the village,” she whispered, as if she was just as afraid of breaking the silence. Naruto closed his eyes and took a deep breath. He tried not to feel that pang in his chest, that deep, corroded feeling. Of course she would start with Sasuke. He should be used to this by now.
“It’s not like last time. He…he needs…time… he wants to atone for what he’s done. Kakashi-sensei said that he would make it an official mission this time; he’ll have to check in at regular intervals. That should be enough to satisfy Kumo if they get word that he’s out of the village.”
Sakura stopped and waited, noticing that he hadn’t said a word, hadn’t protested like she’d expected him to. He simply opened his eyes, looking at the ceiling, and nodded.
“I told him it may be better to wait a bit. Build stronger connections to Konoha before he left, but…it’s hard for him here.”
Still, he said nothing.
She waited a bit longer.
“Naruto?”
“Are you going to wait for him?” He hated himself for those being the first words out of his mouth. But he couldn’t stand this long, drawn-out delivery.
“What?” Sakura’s eyes widened in confusion. Finally, Naruto looked at her, a fiery determination in his eyes. Sakura searched his gaze, trying to understand his shift.
“Are you waiting for him, Sakura?” His grip on her thigh tightened subconsciously, as if he could physically hold her to him. If he asked her, would she choose him?
From the way she looked down at his chest, he had his answer.
“He asked me to.” Her voice came weakly. That acidic feeling built in his chest, burning his throat. Why was she taking so long to tell him what they both already knew? He could stand by her side, keep every promise, could open himself up to her, but it would never be enough. When it came down to it, Sasuke, without even trying, would always have her heart.
His mind was at war with his heart. He should push her away, shouldn’t be holding her like this. She belonged to another man. But he clung to her, wanted to hold her tighter, wanted to shut the world out and drown in her.
For just a little longer.
“You should go,” he began to slip his hand from around her when Sakura grabbed his arm and pulled it back. She kept her grip firm until he had no choice but to look at her.
“I told him about us.” Her brows were set in a “V,” eyes resolute, matching the fire that his had held earlier, but there was something else there. A vulnerability that belonged to a younger version of her.
His breath caught in his chest. His previous resentment gave way to shock.
“Us?”
“Yes, ‘us’,” she paused, waiting for him to say something. Anything. “There is an ‘us,’ right?”
He looked at her, stunned. Us. Was there a “them”? Was that what this was? What had been building slowly between them since the Land of Iron, maybe even since he’d returned from his training with Jiraiya?
With each second he didn’t answer, Sakura’s determination faded into doubt. She worried her lip, wincing as she reopened a cut from her earlier absentmindedness.
“Look, Naruto, I—” her voice cracked. Tears watered in her eyes, but she refused to let them fall. She had promised herself.
“Sakura-chan—”
“I know, Naruto,” her voice held its watery waver, but she knew she had to say it. He of all people deserved to hear it. “I was awful to you. I was careless and insensitive, and it took me far too long to really look at myself. I know that I should have been standing by your side from the beginning. I know that—I know that saying ‘I love you’ now might not be enough. I—”
“Sakura-chan,” he stopped her, waiting for her to take a deep breath. Naruto shifted them so that she was fully on top of him. He pressed his prosthetic hand to the curve of her lower back and brought his natural hand to her cheek. He brushed his thumb against the softness, catching the water droplets his sudden movement had coaxed to fall.
“I love you.” He smiled at her, that full, bright, mischievous smile that she never wanted to see fade. “And I’m going to make you my wife. Believe it.”
She laughed, releasing a few wayward tears. “I’ll always believe in you, Naruto.”
Nodding, he pulled her down to him, sealing their promise of a lifetime with a kiss.