Chapter Text
Juliet, the dice was loaded from the start
And I bet, and you exploded into my heart
And I forget, I forget the movie song
When you gonna realize it was just that the time was wrong, Juliet?
“We can’t stay here,” Sakura mutters.
“Why not?”
“Because it's not our home!” she exclaims, turning to the tall, blond boy who has already slipped inside the small building and is looking around. “For all we know, we’re committing a break-in, and the owners of this house could return at any moment.”
“In this bad weather?” Naruto grimaces, pointing to the heavy rain that continues to fall outside the house, and as if to emphasize his words, a loud clap of thunder resounds in the air around them. “Do you really want to keep walking in the middle of a storm?”
Now even Sakura's lips twist into an annoyed grimace, faced with the evidence.
No, it's pretty obvious she doesn't want to.
The storm caught them as they were already on their way back to the village, and the small house they are now in was the first they came across after at least half an hour of running in the pouring rain. They're both soaking wet, freezing, and, as if that weren't bad enough, it's starting to get dark outside. It's almost the end of October, and the days are just getting shorter.
Returning to the street now means having to run through the rain and mud again in search of another shelter, with the prospect of finding something worse than this one or, in the worst case scenario, finding none at all.
Sakura really couldn't stand spending a whole night in the rain.
After another quick glance at the awful weather outside, the girl sighs and lets the door click shut behind her, frowning when she notices the cheerful, slightly victorious expression that has just appeared on her friend's face. “We'll leave as soon as it's light, understood?”
“Of course, Sakura-chan!”
“Come here and take off your shoes, they're covered in mud. You're leaving footprints all over the floor!”
“Who are you, my mother?”
Naruto huffs, but hurries to the small entrance and takes off his sandals as Sakura just told him to do. They're taking advantage of the hospitality of people who aren't there with them and who don't even know they have guests in their home, so the best they can do is avoid making a mess and leaving traces of it all over the place. Right?
The dwelling they entered is very small indeed: it is a single room, with a fireplace, a tiny kitchenette and a space marked off by curtains that was clearly reserved for the hours of rest at night. There is only one other door, besides the entrance one, which leads to the toilet, and nothing more. It's a modest but well-kept apartment that feels lived-in, but judging by the layer of dust on the floor and the few objects in the room, it seems uninhabited for some time.
Of course, Sakura doesn't need to worry about the owner coming home any moment.
Instead, this thought never seems to have truly crossed Naruto's mind: once he has freed himself of his shoes, the shinobi resumes his rapid and curious exploration of the accommodation, focusing in particular on the kitchen area and paying little, if any, attention to everything else.
As she sheds her backpack and kneels in front of the wooden chest that sits next to the fireplace, Sakura hears him noisily shifting objects and muttering disconsolately.
“There is no food here!”
“I’d be surprised if there was any left,” she replies as she opens the chest. The lid lifts up with a creak. “Even though it would have already gone bad by now… but I just found some wood!”
“You know I can't digest wood, Sakura-chan.”
The pinkette snorts and wrinkles her nose, trying to keep from yelling at him or bursting out laughing at his bizarre sense of humor. She doesn't even know what she wants to do, but she ignores the moment of uncertainty and turns to watch him as he reaches her and also takes a quick look at the contents of the chest. “We don't have to eat it.”
“And what do we do with it?”
“We use it for fire, baka!” she shouts, slapping him lightly on the forehead protector. “What on earth could we do with wood, huh?”
“Okay, I get it! There’s no need to shout so much,” he replies defensively, and pinches the tip of her nose between his fingers.
It's something that doesn't really make much sense, but it's something that popped up between them as soon as they started working together again as a team: whenever Sakura got angry at his ridiculousness, his antics, or a stupid joke, she would reprimand him with a light slap on the forehead, and soon Naruto was pinching her nose in return, almost as if to say 'okay, sorry.'
They are silly, almost childish gestures, but over time they have become normal, so much so that they have become spontaneous gestures to do without thinking twice.
Sakura doesn't remember the first time she did it, but she's sure it must have happened during one of their first, new missions after the war.
She remembers very well that, at that time, Naruto was still trying to get used to having two hands and two arms again after months spent learning and doing everything with his non-dominant hand, and when they were together, there were constant accidents: kunai thrown who knows where and miraculously recovered, objects falling to the ground, not to mention his terrible handwriting. Unfortunately for him, Naruto had never had good handwriting, not even when they were still in school, and if she had to call the scribbles he made on the paper as 'calligraphy'... well, she certainly wasn't paying him a compliment.
“…see if there’s any more.”
“Huh? What did you say?” she asks foolishly, because while she was remembering she remained watching Naruto speak without hearing a single word of what he was saying to her, and she didn't even notice that he moved away from her.
And he even put his shoes back on.
“I said I’m going to see if there’s any more wood out there,” he repeats, one hand already on the door handle. “That won’t be enough if we stay here all night.”
“But it's pouring with rain!” she exclaims, as if he hadn't noticed yet. “You'll catch a cold if you come out in the rain again. I can go and—”
“Better me than you, right? So you can take care of me if I get sick.” Naruto chuckles and winks at her. “I’ll be right back. I won’t be long,” he murmurs, and steps out into the pouring rain, apparently unaware that he’s just left Sakura, still kneeling in front of the dead fireplace, in the throes of genuine emotional turmoil.
The flirting, the constant teasing… these are also nothing new in their friends relation.
When you train and work closely with the same person, at a certain point jokes become part of your daily routine. But if your partner and colleague is also one of your best friends, you shouldn't just expect these.
They become inevitable.
And Sakura has discovered that inevitability has become a constant in her relationship with Naruto.
It's inevitable, when you stop lying to yourself and finally accept what you've always tried to accept and ignore. It's inevitable, when you open your eyes to the sunlight after months, even years spent wandering through the fog, and you feel that warm, tingling sensation in your stomach again, finally understanding why you always feel it when you're around him, and no, it's not because you've gotten angry with him for the umpteenth time.
It's inevitable, and it's something that can happen if you've known your best friend since school and find yourself on the same team as him for almost a decade: after all these years, you learn to recognize nuances of his character that you'd always ignored until then, you tolerate and ignore as best you can the behaviors and little quirks that have the power to drive you crazy and, above all, you respect and accept him as he is.
Even though the flaws that have accompanied him throughout his life make him somewhat imperfect, in your eyes he remains the best person in the world.
It's inevitable.
Yet, Sakura never realized she had fallen for Naruto until it seemed too late, and the memory of her desperately trying to keep him alive after the Kyuubi was extracted from him returned to visit her often, at the moments when she least expected it and each time leaving her terrified beyond belief, as if it were happening before her eyes for the first time.
A little over three years have passed since that day.
For a long time, when she thought back to the past, when she tried to remember the feelings and state of mind that accompanied her during the first, difficult weeks following the end of the Fourth Shinobi World War, she tried to justify herself by telling herself that, if she hadn't immediately realized the sincere affection she was beginning to feel towards Naruto, it was mainly due to her obsession with Sasuke and the sense of love she, for years, believed she felt for him.
She thought she loved him for years, only realizing after the war that she had never actually loved him, and that she was more in love with the idea of love than with her teammate.
Everything became much clearer when Sasuke left the Leaf Village again, not to satisfy his craving for revenge but, this time, to embark on the long and inevitable journey of redemption he had imposed on himself. Sasuke left and, unlike when she did it at the age of thirteen, this time Sakura felt no pain or anger watching him go, but only relief. Relief at realizing that that love had been just an illusion, but also hope that his friend could finally forgive himself for the serious actions he had committed, and that this could spur him to go back to living the life he truly deserved.
Sasuke's new departure definitively sanctioned the dissolution of Team 7 as they knew it, but this did not mean that Sakura and Naruto stopped seeing each other or working together, on the contrary. They both worked hard and dedicated themselves to supporting each other, and this support for each other in their fragilities and uncertainties helped them grow, helped them become even stronger than they already were, and, perhaps most importantly, helped them understand each other more than they had ever done before.
Spending time together without feeling the pressure of a constant, imminent threat was a real breath of fresh air for Sakura. There had been ups and downs, but for the first time they both found themselves living the quiet, carefree seventeen-year-old life they deserved and had never truly had the chance to experience. Now, the days seemed endless, lightheartedness reigned supreme, and she saw with her own eyes that perhaps this could be the right time for them.
The world was at peace, life continued to take its course, and next to her was the sunny, kind person she had known all her life and who, little by little, she was learning to love.
She could step out of the shadow of the wall behind which she had hidden her feelings and try to see if their turn to be happy, together, had come…
…but that moment arrived, it was lived, and it passed in the blink of an eye.
She remembers the day it happened well: she had just finished a grueling fourteen-hour shift at the hospital, but she had still decided to stay late to keep Naruto company in the room where he was still recovering from surgery. He had been fitted with the prosthesis two days earlier and was recovering well: he could clench the fingers of his right hand without too much pain and his arm mobility was already very good. He would have to undergo a rigorous schedule of physical therapy and training before he could return to duty again, but there was really no need to worry.
That evening, after dinner, they had started playing cards more to test the dexterity of his fingers than out of true boredom or entertainment, and it was then that Sakura's hopes first faded, and then died out altogether.
It was when Naruto told her that, once he was released from the hospital, he would ask Hinata out on a date. A real one.
It made sense, she told herself as she looked at her cards and tried to hide how much his words had hurt her.
The Hyuga heiress had never hidden the love she felt for Naruto from anyone and it was only right that he wanted to try to reciprocate her love. Hinata's quiet and introverted nature was the opposite of Naruto's more exuberant and extroverted one, and the two together seemed like two pieces of a chaotic and heterogeneous puzzle, created specifically to seek out and complement each other. They would be happy together… and Sakura had no right to break that happiness.
So she didn't tell him anything: silently, she took her hurt and bruised feelings and pushed them forcefully and deeply into her heart, witnessing from afar their first dates and, later, the progression of their relationship. God only knows how painful it was to see them together, but it was something she could bear, and with time, she would get used to living with him close by, but not in the way she really wanted.
It was better to have him near as a friend rather than far away as a stranger.
Sakura repeated and explained it to herself endlessly, until those words actually started to make her nauseous, and as time went by, she became more and more convinced of it. She made do with it. She did it even when, in reality, there was no longer any real need for it.
Naruto and Hinata's relationship ended after a few months.
Neither of them ever revealed the real reason behind their breakup, both simply saying that their personalities were too different to be in love and get along and that they would remain friends, good friends, and in fact this was a promise they kept. The relationship between them has remained good, and when they happen to go out together with the rest of the group they never show resentment for what happened between them and went wrong. They talk and joke together as if it had always been this way… normal, right.
With Naruto single again, with no sign of a new relationship in sight, and with her feelings once again pressing to come out in all their strength and vehemence, Sakura once again toyed with the idea of confessing them to him, but she never really got around to it. She knew she was acting like a coward and that she would regret this cowardice for the rest of her life, but the fear of rejection was too much, too great to face and bear.
Naruto had moved on and, as far as she knew, had put his childhood crush behind him.
And yet, she still thinks as she watches the flames she lit crackling happily in the fireplace, the jokes and little teasing he constantly plays on her every day over the last two years send back a different version to her, as well as filling her stomach with fluttering butterflies every time. She could be wrong, of course, but for some reason those don't seem at all like the gestures a mutual friend might make if they didn't have feelings for the person they were addressing. They delude her, somehow, and make her believe that, perhaps, that childhood crush never really went away and that it might have evolved into something stronger.
It would be nice… but Sakura knows it's just an illusion, a futile thought.
But it's so hard not to think about it…
Sakura sighs, poking a piece of charred wood lightly with the poker. The heat from the flames warms the skin on her face and arms, which the short sleeves of her kunoichi outfit don't completely cover, and it's a truly pleasant sensation. She didn't really realize how cold she'd gotten running in the rain until she lit the fire, and it's not going to get any better if she keeps wearing wet clothes.
She feels an overwhelming urge to replace them with something dry, and once that part is resolved, she can begin trying to find the best place to try to dry them. Since the fire is on, they'll be dry and ready to wear again by morning. She should tell Naruto to do the same as soon as he gets back and—
She can't finish thinking about that sentence before the front door bursts open, letting in a gust of freezing air that is immediately drowned out by three perfect Naruto copies entering the house in single file, dripping water all over the wooden floor as they rush towards her. Sakura barely has time to move before the shadow clones, one after the other, rush past her and throw the piles of wood they are clutching in their arms into the chest – although some pieces miss their target and fall crashing to the ground – before disappearing in a cloud of white smoke.
The original Naruto, falling behind his copies, leans heavily against the door to close it and tries to slip his sandals off his feet without using his hands, which are busy supporting two large, heavy logs at his sides. When he fails, he gives up and hurries to join Sakura in front of the fire, where he places the logs on the ground and then sits down cross-legged.
“Damn, it’s coming down in buckets out there!” he exclaims, sighing with relief and shivering slightly at the noticeable change in temperature. He immediately reaches toward the flames to warm his hands.
“I told you not to go out,” she scolds him good-naturedly, looking critically at his soaked jacket that is dripping water onto the floor.
“But I found more wood, Sakura-chan! We needed it… I know how unbearable you can be when you're cold,” he sneers. His eyes narrow in amusement and he sticks out his tongue.
Sakura rolls her eyes, and is about to reply to his teasing when she sees him shaking his head like a dog to get rid of the excess water that's soaking his short, blond hair. He doesn't succeed, of course, but Naruto doesn't seem to mind too much. He pulls off his forehead protector and squeezes the elastic band tightly in front of the fire, causing a sizzling sound and several puffs of gray smoke where water droplets have fallen on the coals.
It's getting worse and worse.
The girl sighs and moves away from the warmth of the fire to fish something out of her backpack.
“Wait, Naruto… you really risk catching a cold this way,” she mutters, returning to his side.
“What are you saying? Mpf!”
The towel lands squarely on his face, followed immediately by Sakura's hands moving it away and rubbing it vigorously through his hair in an attempt to properly absorb the excess water. Naruto starts laughing and raises his hands in an attempt to stop her.
“Hold still,” she says to him, smiling even though he can’t see her at the moment.
He raises a thumbs up.
Sakura stops drying him after a minute, at least, then slides the towel behind his head and drapes it over his shoulders. When she does, she finds Naruto staring intently at her face: his eyes, framed by thick dark lashes, have turned even bluer, perhaps due to the dim light inside the house. Sakura has always loved his eyes. They're beautiful, bright, and sincere, and they've always been his trademark, along with his bright yellow hair.
Naruto was never an ugly boy, not even when he was an awkward and unbearable child. Over the years, as he grew older, his features lost the plump, rounded features characteristic of childhood, settling into bold, yet delicate lines: a straight nose, a sharp jaw, and slightly sunken cheeks that always reveal dimples when he smiles. As soon as she saw him again after the two years of training spent away from home with Jiraiya-sensei, Sakura immediately thought he had become a very nice boy; and now that he's twenty, instead... he's truly become very charming. Handsome.
It's hard to ignore the gorgeous boy staring at her so intently and not think that beneath his blue gaze lies something more than simple friendship. It could...
Oh, if you keep looking at me like that…
“We need to get changed and hang our clothes out to dry,” she says in a low voice, coming back to reality and thus breaking the sort of spell she’s been trapped in and which, judging by the way she’s blinking, seems to have also captured her friend.
Naruto nods and remains silent, letting the hand he had raised to touch her cheek fall back onto his knee. The tips of his fingers are burning, and he knows full well that this is not just due to the heat of the fire.
-
Their drying clothes are now hanging from a thick line that Naruto has strung between two walls.
They got rid of them after having decided on their shifts to go and change in the small bathroom… or rather, Sakura had decided so. Naruto had urged her to go to the bathroom first, and when she returned to the room, dry and wearing the huge sweatshirt and shorts she wears to sleep, she discovered that he had already changed and was finishing tying the line on which to hang his wet clothes.
As soon as he had the line strung and his clothes were hung up, he took the opportunity to go and use the bathroom himself and left Sakura alone to take care of her laundry. In reality, the pinkette was just grateful that her friend hadn't had the crazy idea of changing in front of her, or walking around without a shirt... not that the one he was wearing, black and simple but tight, did anything to hide the lean, toned muscles that lined his arms and abdomen.
Let's get this straight: Sakura has seen Naruto without a shirt many times, in fact, to be completely honest, she's seen him even more naked than that, when she had to patch him up after his injuries. However, we are talking about different circumstances and she had always managed to camouflage the nervousness arising from his nudity by passing it off as concentration and attention while she treated him.
Looking at her friend half-naked right now, when they're alone in an unfamiliar house in the middle of a storm… well, she couldn't have hidden her reactions so well this time.
And Naruto doesn't even have a wound to heal.
There's not much left to do after she's finished hanging out her uniform: the fire is lit, there's more than enough wood thanks to the intervention of Naruto's shadow clones, and the accommodation doesn't offer much else to do. Electricity must have been a luxury the homeowners couldn't afford, because there's only an oil lantern that can provide minimal lighting, but Sakura decides not to turn it on.
With the steady, pounding sound of the rain continuing to fall, after watching the shadows fall further into the forest from the window, she retrieves a clean sheet from the sort of cabinet in the sleeping area and spreads it out in front of the fireplace, so they can sit on it while they eat their dinner.
They have to thank the little man who hired them for the mission for the fact that she and Naruto now have four bento boxes filled with all sorts of delicious food to eat without having to resort to the usual, unappealing, yet nutritious, mission supplies they always carry with them as a precaution.
Since the day before, as soon as they foiled yet another sabotage attack he was the victim of and captured those responsible for trying in every way to prevent the inauguration of his new education center, Akimo-sama has done nothing but thank them for their actions and made sure they don't leave for Konoha empty-handed... and thank goodness!, thinks Sakura, as she takes a generous bite of a delicious fish ball, because she really didn't feel like eating those rubbery, tasteless crackers.
Naruto seems to think the same way: his cheeks are swollen with rice and squid, his lips are shiny with sauce, and he's craving the last onigiri that Sakura has saved for herself, since he's already wolfed down all the others.
How can he be so cute even when he's gorging himself?
“You’re disgusting,” she points out with feigned indignation, pushing away the bento box containing her precious onigiri to keep it safe from his clutches.
Naruto's eyes narrow as he tries to laugh and continue eating at the same time, but he manages to cover his mouth with a hand as he speaks to her with the food still in his mouth. “I can't help it, this stuff is just too good!”
Well, he's not entirely wrong…
It's a shame we can't properly thank Akimo-sama's wife, who prepared all this for them and who has proven to have a fantastic talent for cooking. And it's a shame that the food is already running out, Sakura observes after seeing the little that remains inside their bento box: a few more meatballs, a piece of tempura... her onigiri.
She looks at it and, contrary to what she has said and done so far, she no longer has much desire to eat it. Her belly is pleasantly full and she's sure that Naruto's is in the same condition, even if her friend has the extraordinary ability to ingest an exorbitant amount of food despite his physique, just like Choji... no, no one can beat Choji. But he still eats a lot and remains thin, without even a hint of fat on his belly.
She has often wondered if his metabolism was somehow affected by the Kyuubi's chakra…
“Shall we split it?” she asks, showing him the rice bundle she’s holding as he finishes chewing the last piece of tempura.
“Are you sure?” he stammers, unconvinced, but his eyes are saying otherwise.
“Sure. I'm full… I think I ate too much.”
Naruto picks up his share of onigiri that Sakura is offering him and pauses to look at it for a few seconds before raising his head and observing her face. He smiles to thank her, then puts it in the bento box in front of him and stands up.
“I hope you at least have some room left for dessert,” he says as he walks away.
“Do we have dessert, too?”
Apparently so, because Naruto returns a few moments later clutching a small square box, which he must have had in his backpack the whole time. He resumes his place, sitting on the blanket, and hands it to her.
“I bought them this morning before leaving,” he explains, watching her curiously lift the lid of the box: inside, there are four small white spheres. Just the sight of them makes her mouth water.
“Mochi?” she asks, an ecstatic smile forming on her lips. “They are my favorite sweets!”
“I know, Sakura-chan!”
“When did you get them?”
“I told you, I bought them this morning… you were distracted by all those stalls full of tonics and weird stuff, ya know.”
Oh, right. That's why she didn't notice... and suddenly, the memory of Naruto rushing to hide something in his backpack as she caught up with him on the market street that very morning flashes through her mind.
He made sure to get something sweet they could share, and of all the sweets in the world, he chose her favorite. He knows what she likes... and, even more amazingly, he remembered it.
It's not a small detail, and it makes another light bulb go off in her head. This is another sign that adds to the list and which, inevitably, only fuels her false hopes. Naruto really can't...
“Here! Take one!” Sakura almost screams in an attempt to silence the horrible voice ringing in her head, and it must have been a little abrupt because Naruto jumps back, but the moment of shock at her reaction quickly disappears, replaced by a gentle smile as he lifts his bandaged hand to gently place it on hers, the one that is holding out the little box of mochi.
“You can eat them all, Sakura-chan. I don't really like mochi… they're too sticky! I almost choke every time I eat one.”
“Oh,” she hisses, looking at the sweets.
Not only does Naruto remember what she likes to eat, but he's decided to buy his least favorite sweet, just to leave them all for her. He gave them to her, in a way.
How can you not…
“Take the rest of my onigiri, then. That makes us even, right?”
“Would I be lying if I told you I wasn’t even thinking about your onigiri?” he asks, biting his lower lip lightly to hide a laugh.
“You wouldn't just be a liar, you'd also be a terrible friend,” Sakura purses her lips, taking advantage of this moment of respite from her confused thoughts to tease him a little and finally take a bite of the little rice sweet. The sugary, familiar-tasting filling immediately invades her taste buds: red beans.
Damn.
“Terrible? Why?” Naruto sulks, then goes back to eating his onigiri. “You're the bad friend, since you always treat me badly!”
“I’m not the one trying to make you fat,” Sakura blurts out, barely holding back a giggle. “And what's more, you're doing it just weeks before the wedding! I already bought the dress and I have no intention of having it stretched because of you!”
“Aaaah, how stupid! You have no reason to think like that! You’re—” he chokes out the last word and becomes nervous, turning his gaze toward the fire. Sakura can tell by the way he starts touching his hair, right at the nape of his neck. She's seen him do that gesture countless times, and always when he's been upset or uncomfortable about something.
“What am I?” What did you mean?
“You look… good. That’s all,” he says finally. Naruto continues to touch his hair, but he's looking at her now. “You work out so much. It’s hard to gain weight if you keep working out, right?”
“Hmm,” she murmurs, a little disappointed by his answer. She puts the rest of the mochi in her mouth and chews it slowly, while placing the small box containing the rest on the ground, bending her legs and tucking them under her body.
A strange atmosphere creeps between them now, an atmosphere made of silences and things left unsaid or perhaps hidden out of fear. For Sakura it certainly is, for Naruto… she is unable to know what he is thinking. The only sounds that resonate, besides the light tapping of Naruto's finger against the floor, are the crackling of the burning wood and the incessant patter of the rain against the roof boards. It doesn't seem to have any intention of stopping raining.
“Can I ask you a question, Sakura-chan?” asks Naruto, the first of the two to speak up and break the absurd silence that, if it had continued, would have become quite awkward.
“Sure.”
“It’s about the wedding,” he says, slowly tracing an invisible trail across the blanket. “By any chance… are you going with Sasuke?”
“Eh?” Sakura widens her eyes.
“I mean… did Kiba and Hinata invite Sasuke to their wedding too?”
Kiba and Hinata's wedding has been the talk of their entire group of friends ever since it was announced, and on the one hand, it was news that had been floating around for some time. They knew it would happen.
The two shinobi, longtime friends and trusted colleagues having been part of Team 8 alongside Shino for almost a decade, began dating some time after Hinata and Naruto's breakup, and none of their friends expected them to end up dating, as well as continuing to work together as a team.
Normally, there is a tendency to stop working together if two members of the same team fall in love and subsequently decide to get married: it is part of a rule that was established years ago to prevent any arguments or problems related to the shinobi's private lives from spilling over into the working relationship and, consequently, determining the success or failure of a mission. It's something that has happened in the past, but there have also been exceptions. Many shinobi relationships have ended in divorce, while others, though strained, have stood the test of time.
Sakura has thought a lot about the possibility that this could happen to her and Naruto if they got together, and that's also why she's tried to hide her affection for him as much as possible. They say you should never try to mix work and love…
“Naruto… why are you asking me?” Sakura asks him in turn, slightly dazed.
“It’s been a few months since he’s been through Konoha. I was thinking,” Naruto shrugs, “ya know, I think it would be nice to see him again and talk to him for more than five minutes, at least once.”
Sakura remains silent, shocked as she always is when her friend's brutal honesty comes crashing down on her.
Since the beginning of his journey of redemption, Sasuke has broken the sort of forced isolation he has imposed on himself only three times: the first occurred exactly one year after his departure and coincided with the beginning of the new, important role that the Sixth Hokage has created specifically for him, which consists of monitoring the minor conflicts that continue, inexorably, to erupt in the lands of the ninja and reporting periodically to the highest echelons of Konoha. The task, needless to say, suited him right from the start: all he had to do was stay alone and hidden, observe and periodically send the dispatch with the information. He returned to the village only twice more, the last time, in fact, four months earlier, and he never stayed longer than necessary: he was summoned to Kakashi's office, exchanged a few polite words with Naruto – if he managed to catch him and stop him – and then quickly left.
The last time Sasuke was in Konoha, his visit was so brief that she didn't know he was coming until she saw him disappear in a flash, heading back to the village gates.
“You must miss him a lot, Sakura-chan,” Naruto murmurs to her, looking at her sad, thoughtful face.
“Uh… yeah, a little,” she murmurs back.
Her eyes fall again on the little mochi box and, subsequently, on the larger, now empty and abandoned bento boxes. Wanting to distract herself and not try to think too much about the solitary life Sasuke has chosen, she quickly collects and piles them up, silencing Naruto's attempts to help her. She would put them in the small kitchen corner and take care of cleaning them later, maybe before going to sleep-
“I really hope he shows up and comes to the wedding. It’s not fair to leave his girlfriend alone for so long every time.”
The bentos slip from her hands and fall to the floor with a metallic clang.
Girlfriend?
“Oh, be careful, Sakura-chan!” he chuckles, mistaking this incident for a moment of clumsiness on her part.
Standing, her breathing slightly quickened, Sakura watches Naruto begin to collect the bento boxes. She watches him, just as she did moments before, carefully stack them on top of each other, get up, and walk the few steps to the kitchenette to leave them in the small sink.
“I’m not… I’m not his girlfriend,” she says, and her voice is so low it’s barely audible above the clatter of the bento boxes as Naruto puts them in the sink.
“Hmm? What did you say?” He reaches her again and frowns, seeing her still and in the same position he left her in.
“Sasuke and I are not together.”
“Eh!?” Naruto gasps, shock and surprise clearly visible on his face. He's a very expressive boy, and he's never been good at hiding his emotions. “You and Sasuke… have never been together?”
Sakura shakes her head.
“Really?”
“Why are you so surprised?” she exclaims, piqued, and in reaction she wraps her arms around herself. It almost seems as if Naruto doesn't want to believe her, or that he's judging her.
“No, I mean… oh, Sakura-chan,” he blurts out, nervous again. He sits down on the floor with a slam and presses his palms to his knees, his eyes returning to her, which suddenly seem to burn like headlights as he watches her. They burn more than fire on the skin. “I thought you were in love with Sasuke!”
She sighs, biting the inside of her cheek hard. Slowly, she drops back onto the blanket and sits in front of him, keeping her gaze down. This way, she doesn't notice Naruto moving slightly forward, gaining a few centimeters to get closer to her.
He almost hoped this moment would never have to come.
“I’m sure I had feelings for him, but I don’t think it was ever love,” she says, barely able to look him in the face as she speaks, revealing to him what she’s always tried to avoid telling him. Even if it's just what she felt for Sasuke and, in a way, it's something that affects Naruto as well.
Isn't it his fault that she realized she doesn't love Sasuke and is, instead, in love with him?
“What do you mean?” he asks her, concentrated and entirely focused on her figure.
“What I said: I don’t love Sasuke, and maybe I never really did.” Sakura chuckles nervously as she shakes her head and gives him a quick glance. “I mean, I definitely had a crush on him, a pretty big one at that. I liked him… but it was just a teenage crush. It wasn't love. Even though I kept telling everyone… who's the fool who falls in love at twelve and hopes it can last a lifetime?” now it's a real raging river. “I entertained the idea of loving him until I realized I was in love with—”
You.
She was about to say it, but her voice trailed off and her tongue suddenly stopped, preventing her from getting to the bottom of it and revealing, finally or unfortunately, the truth to Naruto.
When she left to carry out the mission entrusted to them by Kakashi-sensei a few days ago, she would never have expected that at a certain point she would find herself on the edge, one step away from confessing everything to him during a dark and stormy night.
This mustn't happen. Everything must remain as it is, you must not say anything…
“Do you… do you love someone else?” Naruto asks her, his eyebrows tense and his voice filled with what sounds like… disappointment?
His posture, slightly hunched forward and strangely stiff, also suggests it, and his hands are clenched into fists, gathering part of the fabric of his shorts, as if he were nervous… or jealous.
No, Naruto can't be jealous.
“Isn’t that how it happens?” she squeaks, ignoring these details and desperately trying to save the thorny situation she has gotten herself into. “We grow, we change, and the love we think we feel for someone comes and then disappears… isn’t that what happened between you and Hinata?”
Naruto blushes and backs away at her question, and Sakura immediately regrets bringing him up.
“Oh, Naruto, I'm sorry! I-“
“It's a little different than that,” he says shyly. She's never seen his cheeks so red. “Hinata and I… we, um, we realized we had other people on our minds.”
“Oh” now it’s her turn to be disappointed.
A small, uncomfortable sensation begins to form in Sakura's chest, exactly at the level of her heart. It's a tingling sensation, almost a burning sensation, an insidious and at the same time painful sting. This pain… she has felt it before. And the memory is still so vivid and still hurts so much that she wants so badly to push it away so she never has to experience it again.
It's the pain of rejection, mixed with the knowledge that she can never be the person Naruto wants.
“We tried to make things work,” Naruto continues speaking even though Sakura fears what he might say, “believe me, Sakura-chan, we tried… but it’s hard, when your heart beats for one person and that only person. Hinata’s heart beat for Kiba, and mine… for someone else.”
Sakura's stomach twists and the pain in her chest becomes more intense; in fact, it feels like it's starting to dig deeper.
“Does she… she know?”
Naruto shakes his head. He's leaning forward again, hunched over and intently picking at the layer of bandages covering the fingers of his right hand. “I’ve never told her. Not yet, at least… she’s never seemed very interested in me.” A sad smile forms on his lips, and the ghost of his smile, as far as she can see, is also reflected in his blue eyes. “I know she loves me, but I don’t think she loves me that way… and, until very recently, I thought she had a boyfriend. I didn’t think I had a chance with her,” he concludes, looking up at the last second to observe her.
Sakura's lips are trembling now, combined with her churning stomach and her aching heart pounding in her chest. She feels her eyes starting to sting and burn, and her cheeks on fire. She recognizes the first signs of impending tears and absolutely does not want to cry in front of Naruto because she has just heard what seems like a full-blown declaration of love... only, a declaration of love that is not addressed to her, but to the person he loves.
And Naruto seems intent on tormenting her about this even though he doesn't know he's actually doing it, when he asks, "What about you, Sakura-chan? Does the person you're in love with know you love him?"
Why do you want to know?
Sakura forcefully swallows the bitter pill that has filled her mouth. “No,” she croaks before clearing her throat. “No, I… he doesn’t know. He’s my friend, Naruto. A dear friend of mine… I’d ruin everything if I told him,” she sighs before pushing on and saying something else that might compromise her further.
What's the point of doing it now when she knows Naruto will never be able to love her back? A tear rolls down her cheek and she quickly wipes it away before actually bursting into tears in front of him. What's the point?, she asks herself again, but then thinks: why hold back any longer?
Isn't it better to tell everything now and get this burden off your chest, even if you get nothing in return?
“I've known him for a long, long time, Naruto. He's a kind, sincere, honest guy… he's one of the beautiful people I've ever met and I… I think I've hurt him more than once in the past" she whispers. Her voice grows hoarse and cracks as she continues to speak. “I certainly hurt him when I lied to him and told him I loved him… but what could I do? There was a war, and I was just trying to stop him because I… I feared for his life,” she sobs, taking deep breaths to calm herself. “I lied to him, and he didn't deserve it. That's not the best way to try to build something together, is it?” she exhales, her lips twisting into a sad smile and fresh sobs filling her chest.
“I only realized later that I loved him… that I love him. Oh, I love him so much, Naruto… but it's too late now, you know? It's too late…”
Her voice breaks again and that's the exact moment Naruto wraps her in his arms.
Suddenly, Sakura's face is pressed against his chest and she finds herself crying into his shirt, while he gently strokes her hair in an attempt to calm her crying. Her fingers tighten on the fabric as she sinks further into his embrace, crying, listening to Naruto's faint, reassuring whispers that are supposed to calm her but instead seem to have the opposite effect. Her crying intensifies at the thought of being in his warm, strong arms, which should be a safe place for her… but which she doesn't really deserve.
“I got you,” he whispers as he hears her crying louder. “I’m here, I got you.”
His lips brush her temple and his breath hits her skin, and it's so hot, his breath. It sends a shiver down her spine, along with the movements of his fingers that she can feel so well despite the thick sweatshirt and that only accentuate the sensation.
“It's not too late, Sakura-chan,” he murmurs again, his hands running over her back and arms in a caress, showing no signs of stopping, “You still have time…”
His hands slide up and, when they reach her shoulders, Naruto pushes her slightly so he can look at her face and, not content, he also cups her cheeks with his hands. Sakura continues to cry, stubbornly keeping her eyes closed so as not to look at his face.
“Sakura-chan, were you talking about me before?” he whispers, sending a new shock through her as his breath hits her skin. “Because I… I was talking about you.”