#snippet!pinkhairedlily

[pinkhairedlily]

“I hope you forgive me for intruding.” Sakura’s former mentor sits at her desk. Tsunade still looks like she never ages, but Sakura notes the fine lines that sprinkle her temple. There are things that Tsunade has allowed to be—like time.

“You’re never a stranger.” Sakura approaches her for a hug. “Sorry about the mess, I finished at midnight.” Open scrolls on medicinal innovations litter her usual squeaky clean desk. 

Tsunade rolls her eyes and smirks, “Honey, have you seen mine?"

“Well, compared to Kakashi and Naruto, you did fine.”

Tsunade’s sight lingers on the edge of the files. Sakura traces her eyeline and sees what caught her attention. She fakes a laugh and tries to sweep the letter under another larger scroll.

“He’s writing?”

“To them.” Sakura notes the disbelief in Tsunade’s inquiry that bubbles under the surface. “Not to me.” She just basically told Tsunade that she steals these letters from her other teammates. Not that they would notice anyway, and sometimes Kakashi leaves them on her table.

Her mentor shrugs and throws an arm over her shoulder. They watch the cherry blossom tree outside of the office, long beyond its flowering season, but still a sight to behold. “Makes sense, considering how he writes.”

“It’s sparse, but he has always been economical that way.”

Tsunade stifles a laugh. “Didn’t I teach you about forensic handwriting?”

Sakura shakes her head, unsure of the conversation’s direction.

“Sasuke writes fast. His letters overlap, almost unintelligible, but whenever your name is mentioned, each stroke becomes heavier, bigger, leaves a more lasting imprint on the scroll. He’s also experiencing some intense feelings. It’s intentional, the way he writes about you.”

“What do you make out of it?”

“Like you give him peace.”

Sakura could only laugh. “I don’t….receive letters yet.”

“You’ll know when it comes.”

When her first letter lands on her windowsill a month later, Sakura notes the difference in handwriting. She asks him about it when he comes home and he asks her to go with him on a hike. On top of a hill overlooking the village, a picnic spread under them, a bracelet of forget-me-nots in progress in his hand. 

“Do you use different pens?” she jests.

“For one thing, you’re more critical with things like handwriting than the two. You often complained of Iruka's style, didn't you?” Sasuke replies. He uses his mouth to close the string of flowers, and gives them to her. “I just also like writing your name.”

She wears the bracelet nonetheless but feels as if it’s her heart dangling on her sleeve with the way his answer left her unsatisfied.

“But not as much as I love saying it,” Sasuke adds, staring at her now and the way the afternoon sun paints her skin. “Sakura.”

[keithisbae1]

Noted With Thanks

He doesn't get her.

The way she was giggling at his lame pick up lines. He had better. The fact she accepted his rose, didn't he give her one like that yesterday only for her to throw it in the trash?

And how she was giggling acting all flustered and blushing. She wasn't really taking an interest in him, was she?

"What makes him so special?" Itachi and Shisui stopped mid conversation following his gaze. Ah so that was what was making the youngest Uchiha pissed. 

The new doctor taking his teammate out. Apparently he was quite the flirt like Sasuke, no wonder he seemed so annoyed.

Well it may be a date, it may not be.

It wasn't any of their business.

"Maybe he flirts better than you?" Shisui shrugged with a smug smile enjoying his torment. "And who knows, he might actually be interested in her."

This caused Sasuke to glare at the man, they knew how serious he was about her.

So it was okay for this guy to flirt around and he can get a date. But if he does it, he gets a punch to the face? How unfair was that?

"You should ask him how he does it, then who knows you might actually get somewhere with Sakura." Itachi scolded Shisui because knowing his brother, he might actually do that.

And sure enough he did, as Shisui found a little note thanking him for the idea.

This wasn't the first time Shisui gave a dumb idea to Sasuke (without meaning to) nor would it be the last.

And as for the plan succeeding... let's not go there.

[pinkhairedlily]

The small heartbeat against Sasuke’s chest, despite the layers of his clothes, drowns out all the noises in the background. Erratic, spaced out, faint. Meanwhile, Sakura is working wonders with her glowing green hands against the babe’s mucus-coated back. A moment passes and then the newborn cries out. Strong, loud—an indication that he is alive. Sasuke cleans the baby before passing the bundle to the overjoyed, tear-stricken mother. He just notices now how shaky his hands are.

Sleep doesn’t come to him, long after the adrenaline has faded. Sasuke turns to his side, snaking an arm around Sakura’s waist, and finds that she is still awake.

“Thank you,” he whispers against her moonlit hair, “for making me part of today’s miracle.”

Her breath hitches. “Sasuke.”

“Hmm?”

“Do you want kids?”

“I’m not sure,” he replies, “Do you?”

She faces him, her worried expression in the spotlight by the open window. “You’re the only Uchiha left.”

“I never thought of it that way.” His fingers rise to touch her cheek and smoothens the furrowed brows.

“So what if I can’t…have them? Don’t want them?” She slightly pulls away, lingering doubts still apparent in her eyes. “I don’t want to be a mother.” The admission is clear in the gap between them. “Not yet, anyways. There is still so much to do.” 

Sasuke places his head on hers, his lips resting on the side of her mouth. “I won’t mind.”

“You’ll regret this someday, take this against me, scorn me.”

He kisses her to silence, smooshes the words out of her mouth. “I’ve spent most of my life alone but now I have you, and I think I’m lucky to spend the rest of my days being with you.”

“Forever will be such a long time. You’d want other things in the future.”

“I know what I want now.” He deepens the kiss. “I know what I want tomorrow.” Another kiss. “And the day after next.” Again. “And the next.” And again.

“You see I’ve never looked too far beyond; it always seemed kind of futile. But it’s nice to wake up to another day, and find you always there. It’s all that I wanted and it’s more than what I deserved. If there are more of you and more of me, I’m okay. If it’s only us two, I’m okay. So long as you’re there, I’m okay.”

He massages Sakura’s back like earlier, willing her heart to beat strong and loud in his embrace.

We’re a miracle, too, he conveys in sure and steady hand, you and me.

[pinkhairedlily]

sasuke's hawk has flown, a roll of a parchment cornerpiece tied around its leg. the message is a single word, sparse, straight to the point: "done".

he tastes the seaspray on his lips. the yellow and orange hues flicker on the unending blue oblivion, a sunset. they eventually turn into tinges of reds and purples, until the moon breaks into million pieces on the surface of the tides. 

has she seen the ocean like this?

and so he writes.

on the night he comes back, sakura asks a minute of his time. sasuke holds off a reply; she could take hours or days even. he finds that he wouldn't mind.

"do you take me for a fool?"

it catches him offguard. "what?"

"do you think it doesn't interest me—your missions?" she says. he stares at her, oblivious as always, and this must exasperate her more. "you intentionally keeping me out of the loop makes me feel like i never grew up in your eyes. they receive letters from you on the important things while i get—"

"they're important things," he replies, "to me."

It's her turn to stare at him, dumbfounded.

"the wildflowers at the mouth of the cave?" sakura asks.

"jugo said it's the only plant allowed to grow on it. they're poisonous, given the soil composition, but you might extract an antidote or something out of that."

she shakes her head. "the lightning festival?"

sasuke shrugs. "it's a force to reckon, seeing the villagers of mist bend the storm to their will."

"the ocean?"

"konoha is land-locked."

"cherry blossom trees growing," sakura continues, "sasuke, there's also spring here."

"they are two different springs." 

sasuke looks away, finding it easier to lean into the truth. "you are a well-recognized medical ninja. you sit in councils that decide important matters. you already know what i sent them. i just wanted you to see the same things i see. that's all there is to it."

"why?"

sasuke has no answer to that. it's merely an impulse, a stupid impulse. of probably a yearning of sorts. of seeing beautiful places and no one to write them to. of visiting foreign lands and wondering—wishing—she was with him.

it is a heavy confession, to which sasuke is unable to let go in naked honesty.

sakura sighs. "you know, that's a convoluted way of saying something."

"how should i do it then?"

"you'd start with, 'sakura, would you like to go to the beach with me?' "

[pinkhairedlily]

“Look how far you’ve fallen. Doing dirty deeds for the village that shunned you and painted you as criminal.”

Sasuke’s face remains impassive, but his genjutsu control tightens over his enemy—a shinobi traitor who sold his clan’s services to tide the sides of a war. 

“Everything I did, I did for my family,” the traitor chuckled through his bloody mouth, “and yet, they never thanked me. Turned me over instead to the elders. Aren’t we the same?”

“You’re good.” Sasuke takes a step forward. “You can converse with me even when you’re in another plane of suffering.”

“Afraid of what you’re hearing from me then?” The enemy tries to shake off his invisible shackles. “Free me and I will let you wreak havoc over your own village!”

“I can’t,” Sasuke replies.

“Do you hear yourself? You shit-of-a-fuck pussy.”

“I may hate my village like you, even harbor rage towards this world, but I will not kill all of them like you did.” Sasuke lowers himself on the ground and touches the grass, blades of green like water, just slipping through flesh.

A crack and the enemy is trapped in his own consciousness. To be drowned in guilt he needlessly pushed down.

Sasuke makes a binding seal, writes a letter, and calls out to his hawk. A parchment tied on the leg—It is done. The shinobi’s remaining family, who had difficulty finding him, will collect him and discuss his fate.

Sasuke will have to agree with his enemy; he has indeed fallen. Soft in more ways than one. So long as the world has Sakura, he is compelled to love—the world, this Earth, and the village that shelters her steps, her days, her seasons.  Soon, he will come home.

[pinkhairedlily]

"aren't you tired?" sasuke says over the top of her head. he nudges it quite a bit so he could read the sentences at the bottom of the book. he snickers, barely audible, but sakura catches it all the same.

"you're too quick! you gave the twist away!" sakura shifts inside his embrace in an attempt to escape but he tightens his arm across her chest and pulls her closer.

"oh honey, i think we both know she's gonna betray her goody shoes friend and get with  her evil gangster client."

"can't believe she'd kiss him just like that! in the safe house her best friend provided for her!"

sasuke lets her anger simmer. "you're done with this part?" sakura nods. "okay you can turn to the next page."

this is how they spend most of their nights, curled up on the sofa, his hand on one side of the book, and her hand supporting the other. it's the coziest thing he has ever known. too bad he reads fast. 

he whistles. 

"stop it," sakura says, exasperated.

he notices her grip tighten on the cover. sasuke leans near her ear and releases an innocent breath. he watches in awe as the pinpricks on her skin travel from her neck to her breasts where her nipples now stand fully erect.

he lets go of the other side, preferring to touch this tangible nonfiction instead.

sakura moans, her body operating in autopilot to his familiar caresses. "you're so annoying," she says breathlessly, "you intentionally chose this book, didn't you?"

sasuke nibbles at her ear, continuing his palmed onslaught despite the fabric barrier. "hmm, the bookkeeper said it made for a nice bedtime story."

the book falls neglected on the floor. "you better take me upstairs then."

[pinkhairedlily]

"sakura, good morning!" shizune waves her over and gives her coffee.

"busy day huh." most days, she's thankful the hospital staff already knows her preferred brew—dark, hot, bitter.

"you wouldn't believe what just happened though." shizune sips her iced latte. "sasuke asked for your schedule."

sakura takes a beat to reply, savoring instead the aromatic notes that slowly wake her 18-hour-shift-riddled senses. "oh yeah. we agreed to discuss new chore arrangements."

"you're living together."

"he's sleeping over."

"living. together."

"should i blush?" sakura winces. "besides, it has only been a few months. well, a year."

shizune slaps her back and leaves in a giddy. "you're already blushing, lover girl."

===

"hey thanks for dropping these off." naruto grins at her through towering stacks of folders.

"we really should organize a courier system or tap into those digital things gaara has been using in suna."

"totally agree with you." he hands her a chocolate bar. for a few minutes, they pass the sugar supply back and forth, grateful for the silence and the little indulgent treat from olden days.

"by the way, sasuke has been asking some weird things."

"such as?"

"like your favorite color, favorite food, favorite music." naruto gets the last chocolate cube. he cracks it into uneven halves and gives the smaller one to her, as usual. "so i told him mine are red and shoyu ramen."

sakura laughs and pops the piece into her mouth. "back to work, future hokage-san."

===

"where's ino?"

sai hands her an apron and an order slip. sakura releases a petulant sigh, rolls her eyes, and begins to pick the flowers listed. she waits until sai settles on the presentation and prods again.

"supplier issue." he shows her a peony and a carnation.

"the peony definitely."

sai shrugs and finishes off the bouquet. "we had a curious customer earlier."

"hmm?"

"sasuke came in. he said he didn't want reds. it would be too obvious, he said. so i suggested whites."

"mums?"

"uh-uh and roses and lilies."

sakura turns pensive at this. "he must have bought them for his family." she smiles at sai and pats him on the shoulder. "you're sometimes kind-hearted, aren't you?"

sai's fixed smile fades. "sakura, he didn't—"

a customer dings the bell and sakura, already sensing sai's intention, slips out of the boutique like a true swift kunoichi.

===

"haruno-san."

"yes, i know it's midnight and i need to go home."

the guard loiters by her door. "actually, you have a visitor. he's at the wisteria arch."

"oh? but it's so late. can't this wait until morning?"

"it's the uchiha ma'am," the guard purses his lips, "he's been camping since eight in the evening."

sakura runs. she hates running in corridors, particularly when half of the people are asleep, but she manages to reach the grounds without an ambush diagnostic or a surprise checkup.

sasuke is waiting. there is a picnic blanket in a hideous shade of bright red under him, a basket, a bouquet, a bottle of wine that must be lukewarm by now.

"shizune said you were free tonight," he said.

"what's all this for?" sakura has to catch her breath. she sits across him and takes him in. gorgeous, even under the pale moonlight.

"i never got the right answers." sasuke pulls every item out of the basket. thermos for hot water, instant ramen packs, dango, a lunchbox that smells like curry, spring rolls. "i don't know exactly what you like. i don't know if you still like the food that you liked when we were kids."

"i still have a sweet tooth," sakura chuckles as she reaches for the dango.

"but i noticed you always ask me to cook curry and you never fail to look for spring rolls." 

"because you cook curry the best, sasuke-kun, that's why i love it the most."

he avoids her chiding glance and hands her instead the bunch of daffodils. "i also don't know if you still like these flowers. you would pick them up in the forest, remember? trying to make me and naruto and kakashi wear these crowns of yellow blooms."

sakura laughs at the surfacing memories. "they're very beautiful, sasuke-kun." she basks for a while in the afterglow of his awkward yet patient persistence as he scoots closer to her side and slowly brushes her fingers against his in reacquaintance.

"what's with all these though? what did i miss?" sakura entangles their hands together, his thumb caressing her knuckles.

"happy anniversary."

"..."

"..."

"fuck."

"not here sakura."

"i forgot about it! fuck!"

"it's okay, let me." sasuke plants her down with a hand on her cheek. "you're busy, and there are few things in life i look forward in celebrating."

"i'm so sorry."

"i think it's me who has to apologize. i haven't nailed down everything."

"well, we've got the rest of our lives to figure that out."

sasuke hides a smile. "that's a plan."

[pinkhairedlily]

pamamanhikan

ss month 2024 | day 9: wedding traditions | ao3

pamamanhikan - (noun) a Filipino tradition where the families of the bride and groom first meet.

They were a weird bunch, standing over unnamed graves at the farthest corner of the town. It rained earlier, the cusp of autumn lingering in the aftermath of the light showers. This was the designated spot, Kakashi said, where everyone can easily forget and forgive.

Despite its remoteness, someone took the time to cut the grass and plant perennial wildflowers, the bare minimum for the excommunicated. Sarada snuggled closer to the breast of her grandmother, still too milk-drunk to watch what was happening.

Sasuke shifted in his feet, unaccustomed still with the presence of Sakura’s parents. He cleared his throat and swept his arm across the grounds. “Well, uh, this is it.”

“I can’t believe they didn’t even put their names. So disrespectful.” Kizashi shook his head in dismay. He glanced at Sasuke briefly. “And I’m not saying this because you’re my son-in-law, but I think everyone who gets on their deathbed wishes to be remembered.”

“Papa,” Sakura whined.

“Ah, let your father speak his mind,” Mebuki said softly, adjusting Sarada against her waist. “Now, Sasuke dear, I think it’s time you make the introductions.”

Sasuke cleared his throat and went to the two highest headstones in the middle. “These are my parents, Fugaku and Mikoto.” Sakura watched him gather his composure. “Mom, Dad, these are Sakura’s parents—Haruno Kizashi and Mebuki.”

Kizashi took out an incense holder and sticks and lit them in between the graves. “Nice to meet you, Fugaku and Mikoto. On behalf of my daughter, I apologize that we only have this meeting of families after their wedding.” He playfully glared at Sakura which she dutifully returned with a tight smile. “I believe we can agree that what they did was more of an elopement and that we agree on a second, more traditional wedding—”

“Papa—”

“---eventually.” Kizashi pulls Mebuki to his side, his hand gently patting Sarada’s head. “Me and my wife, we’re not really from a prestigious family.”

“We’re normies,” his wife suggested. 

Kizashi agreed, “Yes, we’re not a ninja clan, like yourselves although I heard you’re very prolific.”

“Lots of prodigies, very good genes,” Mebuki added, “It shows in his handsome face. I understand why my only daughter has pursued him since they were kids.”

“Very intelligent too.”

“Yes, I agree. Very smart.”

Sakura can only close her eyes in embarrassment. “Mama, not you too. Can you spare me some dignity?”

“Well, Fugaku and Mikoto, he had a good upbringing,” Kizashi grinned at Sasuke who by now was staring at the ground and probably counting the number of bugs that have made their journey across his feet. “Your time here was short, but I’d like to believe some traits are genetic. Like kindness.”

Mebuki nodded. “He’s also very helpful. You must have been good cooks as Sasuke here likes to pass time in the kitchen. He loves making my daughter a variety of dishes.”

“She’s busy at the hospital,” Sasuke interjected in his wife’s defense. He cleared his throat, suddenly aware that he cut off his mother-in-law. “She’s a doctor, Mom.”

“You’re right, and an excellent one at that,” Mebuki replied, “So it’s really a big help that he keeps her full with energy and nourishment. He’s a very good kid.” She turned to Sasuke. “You’re a good kid.”

 Sakura wondered how Sasuke was taking all of these in. Prior to this meeting, her parents really never told her what they thought about him. But calling him a good kid, after all the things he had done, all the crimes he committed, and all the consequences that ensued, must be something foreign to him.

Because it was all true. Underneath that exterior, he was a good kid.

Kizahi placed an arm across Sasuke’s shoulder. “Don’t worry about him, Kizashi and Mikoto. We will do our best to take care of him.”

“We will make him his favorite dishes. Of course, it wouldn’t be like yours, but if it’s something he wants, then we will cook it for him,” Mebuki seconded.

“Don’t you worry about him. We’ll keep an eye out for your only son.”

Sakura saw the slight change in Sasuke’s features. “He has a brother, Papa.”

“Oh you do?” Kizashi removed his hand and pulled away to give him space. Her father must have noticed him tensed up.

Sakura waited for anger, for denial of existence, for the lack of recognition, but maybe it was the time or the presence of the ghosts of his family.

“An older brother. Uchiha Itachi,” Sasuke looked at the older couple, “He doesn’t have a grave here.”

“I see,” Kizashi simply said. “Is he a good brother?”

Sakura reached out for Sasuke’s hand. It was cold, clammy, and rough, but he held her gently. She noticed the grass stains on his nails, and some blades of grass got stuck on the side of his pants. 

“He was,” he answered.

Sarada stirred in her sleep and her chubby fingers found Mebuki’s chest finally uncomfortable. 

“I think we’re done for the day,” Kizashi said. He gestured to Mebuki and the couple made a bow to the headstones, murmuring a shared prayer under their breaths.

At the gates, Sasuke looked back one last time. “This garden’s gonna be overgrown with weeds in a year.”

Mebuki shrugged. “Hmm, sometimes nature does the upkeep.”

======

“Sarada, wait up!” Sakura left the comfort of Sasuke’s grip and ran after their dawdling toddler. “She’s an adventurer, this one.”

Sasuke managed to corner the black-haired babe. He helped her clamber up to his shoulders for a better view. While Sarada might have discovered the joy of walking, she still preferred the joy of her premium seating—as if she was on the top of the world. She laughed, toothless and spittles, as she grabbed the strands of her father’s hair.

“It’s a bummer that Mama and Papa aren’t here,” he said.

“Aren’t they too overbearing for you?” Sakura sighed. “I love them, I really do, but five days in their house didn’t really give us privacy. This free day is like a breath of fresh air.”

“There’s privacy,” Sasuke reasoned out. “I kissed you with lights out, honey.”

“That’s not the point.”

“And they made me lots of onigiri.”

“Okay glutton.”

They stopped in their tracks once they saw the full view of the graveyard. In her periphery, Sakura thought she saw Sasuke sway. She held on to his elbow nonetheless. The grass remained tame and perfectly tamed. The flowers were vivid and bright and warm, and someone surrounded the headstones with bushes of camellias.

The blank slates now have names. Beside Fugaku’s was a new stone: Uchiha Itachi.

Sarada giggled, her hands reaching out to touch the first bud of a cherry blossom tree, an ushering of spring. 

buy me and my cats coffee?

[pinkhairedlily]

it is unfamiliar and foreign, the first time sakura washed him. a side mission, on the riverbank, he was getting a hold of all the functions and routines of a single arm, and she offered to scrub his back.

sasuke flinched at the featherlight grazes. something so gentle couldn't possibly ran over his scars and rinse them clean.

"you're allowed to ask for help, you know." sakura's hands were steady and calm, so when his senses faltered, he knew it was his skin trembling—and his soul, his being, all of him—quiet aftershocks dissolving in the suds. 

he starts to look forward to home and these gestures that become his constant. sasuke shrugs off the clothes that bear the world and all its secrets and sakura holds him in an embrace that tethers the lightness of him.

against her rosette crown at midnight, he confesses the worst, "this village remembers the me from long ago. him, too, itachi, and the things we did."

"hush." she burrows closer to his warmth. "tonight, you are just you. you're sasuke, only sasuke. you exist in this moment and that's all you need to do."

he realizes, bit by bit, from his fresh wounds to stitches to scabbing, her tender touches had the strength to never let go, the tenacity to believe he would heal, and the trust to hold him if he doesn't.

this is how he stays.

[pinkhairedlily]

A sliver of bare skin shows as Sakura's shirt rides just above her navel. She strains with toes fully stretched out, fingers doing the finding along the cupboard’s edge.

“Here.” Sasuke easily gets the can of peaches on the topmost shelf as if plucking a fruit from a tree’s lowest branch. He comes into contact with her bare skin and lets his fingers linger just a little while longer on the groove of her hips.

“Thanks, Sasuke-kun!” Sakura pats his cheek before and disappearing in the busyness of weekend chores.

He actually has a secret. He likes placing some of her groceries out of reach so hyper-independent Sakura could rely on him.

And that he could hide behind mundane incidents, like holding on to her waist for balance or kissing the air on her nape, saying it's just a breeze, or grazing her back just as he would lean forward so she could feel his length.

It's stupid but he's only waiting to be caught.

Meanwhile, Sakura hums in feigned obliviousness. She is letting the tiny earthquakes to subside across her body.

In her periphery, she notices the slightly open utility closet, a shadow of a stepping stool inside, strategically hidden. She walks towards the closet and closes it with a muted thud.

Why look for a stool when this tall man is always so eager to help her? This current arrangement is definitely better anyways.

[pinkhairedlily]

seven years

sasusaku month 2024 | days 1 and 3: the start of everything x hospital visits

AO3 ✍🏽https://archiveofourown.org/works/57048928

It has become a habit—Sasuke’s nightly vigil by the window. 

Part curiosity: he watches people, sees them come and go, uses his honed senses for a pinprick of residual danger in the aftermath of the war. Humans are creatures of habit. The daytime shift security marshall takes a nap across the bench and waits for his partner to finish at eight. They have this secret handshake that lingers a few seconds too long. The two pediatric receptionists sneak out under the dogwood tree to eat their okonomiyaki at the nearby yatai. It’s the one that has long lines where nobody seems to be in a hurry. The novelty of a good taste. An elderly bald patient prefers to take his walk around the oval, twice and a half. Tonight, he is faster by ten minutes.

When the door to his room opens and the antiseptic cuts through the air, Sasuke is also reminded of his own ticks. He tenses just a little bit, leans forward towards his bent knee, and gives a nonchalant nod as greeting. 

This is the other side. Part pretense. Pretending he didn’t notice that her shift is over a while ago and that she is late today. He had told himself earlier, that she has a life outside of her white robe and maybe she smells something other than alcohol and betadine. On some nights when she did just that, Sasuke couldn’t help but feel it again—loneliness.

Everyone in his line of sight has somewhere to go, something to do, some place to be, while he is here, in his hospital room, in an existential limbo. What will he do tomorrow? It depends on his chart. Does he have someplace to be? Where even is home? What happens when he gets discharged? Untethered, he is.

The bottom corner of Sasuke’s bed sinks as Sakura sits.

“Did you have an emergency?” he asks.

She nods. “A gastrointestinal case.” Her nose scrunches up as if reliving the memory. “It was a quick one.”

“Hn. You better go home. I heard from Naruto you’ll have an early start tomorrow.”

“Ah yes, the boring council meetings. Kakashi and Tsunade-sama insist we attend, for the transition or something.” Ever perceptive, she picks up on his brooding. “What is it?”

Sasuke shakes his head, feeling silly now. “Nothing.”

Sakura learns, over the course of their nightly conversations, to wait the silence out and carry in comfort the weight of the yet unspoken. It’s the hospital, she said to him one time, it’s the people on these beds that taught me patience while knowing that time is precious.

So eventually, he lets it go. “Great things are waiting for you. Kakashi will be hokage as will be Naruto given his birthright. And you, you’ll be the hospital director.” The green eyes staring at him glimmer at the anticipation. She has been waiting for this, he realizes. “You’ll be the best,” he adds and her smile only gets bigger.

“I know,” she tells him, “Thank you.” In that split moment, Sakura seemed unrecognizable to him. Gone is the girl who would shy away from compliments. Here in front of him now sits someone who basks in her own light.

Everyone has found their place after the war, like stepping into shoes already made for wear. What happens to an avenger? Sasuke muses. No one tells stories of the avenger who survives the battle and lives. 

Sakura inches a little closer to him, the proximity of their fingers jolting him out of his self-pitous revelry. “The girl we operated on today had to have her intestines dissected and sewn together again to get rid of a tumor. It’s an invasive procedure, but I can better control her vitals than risk cutting through everywhere. Her gut lining, however, got wiped out, but it didn’t scare us one bit. Ask me why.”

“You’re treating me like your intern,” Sasuke winces, but then relents, “Why?”

“Like blood, the cells in our gut lining live under a week. They get replaced rather very quickly, a day, in three to one hundred and twenty days. About 330 billion cells get replaced daily, equivalent to about 1 percent of all our cells. In three and a half months, these would be like 300 trillion cells,” Sakura explains. “Some cells that make up our organs also get replaced, did you know that? Your esophagus, your skin, your eyelashes, your lips. They say, it takes seven years. Seven years to become a whole new you.”

Sasuke couldn’t help but look at the stump that borders his arm, one that prevents him from reaching out to tuck the stray strand that keeps on escaping her headband. “Some parts don’t grow back.”

“You’re right.” She throws both of her legs on the bed and sits under them. “Some cells regenerate very slowly—your brain, your heart—but I think it’s better that way, isn’t it? After all, they hold our memories, our feelings. I would never want to part with them.”

“It’s a dangerous thing.” Sasuke thinks back to his past, to the many unspeakable sins he committed, the wrongs he tolerated, the decisions that put him on this bed, in front of a girl he once tried to kill with the limb that is now missing. “To be promised with a new beginning.”

“It’s the universe’s way of giving chances to our bodies, I guess.” Sakura lies down completely across his bed, barely grazing his leg, her fingers gingerly dancing with the breeze from the window. “We don’t really have the power to deny life.”

Sasuke recalls this view. She is fourteen, splayed across the blanket in the middle of a clearing, and the storm has just passed. The grass is wet, and the forest is thick with the sound of crickets and frogs and buzzing of insects. The air is clear and so is the sky. The villagers said that a comet will pass by the earth after traveling for one thousand years in human time. Kakashi and Naruto are asleep while Sakura plays with the embers from the campfire, incandescent particles that burn too bright and too hot and fizzle out just as quickly but leave them with a warmth that lingers. She knows this, Sasuke realizes, that’s why she’s not afraid.

He doesn’t witness the comet’s arrival. He was busy watching it make its journey in her eyes.

“Seven years is too long,” he tells her in the hospital room.

“There’s no reason to rush now that peace is here,” Sakura assures him. “Besides, we’re not leaving Konoha anytime soon. I mean, Naruto and Kakashi, and me.”

There’s no stars tonight, and the air rides on the cusp of spring and the start of everything. Sakura is still playing with the wind, and her hair is a mess of wisps. Sasuke reaches out and tucks the persistent strands behind her ear. He doesn’t look at the window, but the moon is full tonight. 

buy me and my cats coffee here (❁´◡`❁)

[pinkhairedlily]

On a random weekend morning, Sasuke catches his daughter lingering for quite a while in front of the mirror. 

Sarada fixes her hair, trying to change the parting from side to middle. Upon realizing that she looks like a dusty old broom inside the university library, she lets her hair be and shifts her attention to the hitai-ate. She usually wears it across her forehead, but committed to trying things out, she fashions it today like a headband. 

A longer stare at her reflection. A twist and turn. A sigh of exasperation. The hitai-ate is sprawled across the counter.

Sasuke guesses it's time for some sort of intervention. In the earlier days, it felt like he was always grappling at the most mundane accidents, teetering towards breakdowns, but now—now, he's learning. He's coping. He clears his throat as he pretends to just notice her. “Sarada, is something wrong?”

His daughter gives him a lopsided smile and shakes her head tentatively. “It's…nothing.” Sarada glances again at the mirror and sees him looking too.

Sasuke wraps his arm around her shoulder. “You resemble me a lot.”

Her fingers start playing with the tips of her hair. “I'm thinking of dyeing it to pink.”

He wonders what tone he should use for a bubbling sign of rebellious reinvention. “Like Mama?”

Sarada nods. “I'd love her green eyes as well.”

“Me too. They're my favorite color.”

“Do you think,” Sarada stares up at him with a disarming sincerity, “I'd look like her if I did?”

He leads her to the veranda overlooking the garden they have been toiling for the past summer. What Sakura enjoyed the most was the fresh supply of flowers, clumped wild blooms that spruced up their space, as if it had always been their home.

“It's not that I hate your genes, Papa. You have a very nice genetic makeup, the best actually, but—” Sarada blurts out in innocent defiance. “—sometimes I wished I looked like Mama too so people could tell immediately I am that great doctor's daughter. I don't even have her medical skills, which sucks so so bad. You know how my friends always seem like they had a 50-50 share in their parents’ features? Look at Himawari. Or Inojin. Or Chouchou.”

“But you do look like her, peanut.” Sasuke smoothes down the tension that lined Sarada’s face.

“Mama. I want to know what she looks like when she grows old. How the wrinkles and age would shape her face. How she would smile without dentures. Her smile when the laugh lines end up staying. The crow’s feet that would only get more prominent by the years.”  The child clasps the knuckles of her father. “So maybe if I look like an exact replica of her, we would see her alive again.”

Sasuke opens up his palm and entangles their hands together. Tiny fingers too small for the spaces that her mother once fit perfectly. 

“As I said, you do look like her.” He smiles, internally fighting the waves that have surfaced on his recently calmed shores with Sarada’s confession.

“You laugh exactly like her. You yell shanaroo at the smallest inconvenience. You have her brute strength and her wit and that makes you the strongest kunoichi alive. You're Sakura's daughter.”

In the distance, Sasuke makes out the first blooms of daffodils. “To me, to us, you're perfect the way you are.”

Sarada slyly whisks away the pooling tears in her eyes. “I still want to dye my hair pink though.”

“I think Mama will kill me if your hair gets fried with the bleaching.”

“Fine Papa, let's try first with a wig.”

[pinkhairedlily]

it's the first time sakura wakes to sounds and smells not of her own making.

on her small counter, with a space only enough for her arms, is sasuke. his shirt is bunched up on his sleeve as the omelet sizzles on the frying pan.

"good morning," he says, even when the sun has not risen yet.

his poncho is on the pile of her laundry. his hair is tied in a ponytail. the sword on the floor, beside her medical scrolls. when sasuke moves, she hears the extra set of keys jingling in his pocket.

"good morning." it truly is.

they drink tea on her balcony while the village comes alive in staggered specks. sasuke is still finishing his when she steps out of her room, ready for another shift.

"i'll go now, sasuke-kun." she's blushing as she closes the door, this time with someone on the other side.

"sakura."

"hn?"

he pulls her inside slightly, the door inches ajar.

"i'll see you later. come home—" sasuke hides behind his too-long hair "—quickly."

sakura laughs quietly.

and so, enamored, he kisses her cheek. a little more sure now, he repeats, "come home quickly."

[pinkhairedlily]

ss actors au

“Nice chemistry, you two. We managed to capture lots of perfect shots for some behind-the-scenes dump. Please pick your top ten, okay?”

It’s a normal day—fishing through the stacks of print to choose the photos with the right amount of skinship, dubious angles, but definitely some space to appease both shippers and individual fans.

“A selfie?” Sakura suggests. She shows him her signature wink and a v-hand pose with him looking mildly happy at the back.

Sasuke merely nods and offers an option where she is obviously in the middle of an outfit change for a swimsuit and he poses (yes, with abs exposed) to cover the rest of her. “This is buzz-y enough.”

Her eyes widen, “Wow, you’re so generous.” She slides a flattering shot of her in a two-piece as she frolicked in the waves while Sasuke is merely a silhouette in the frame. “If you’re doing that, why not this one?”

“No.” He turns the photo upside down and takes it off the table. “Choose another.”

After sifting through the pile the second time around, Sakura yelps in delight. “This is a treasure mine, Sasuke-kun. Look!”

His brows furrowed in annoyance smoothen into a firm line which often signals frustration during their taping. Sakura checks the shot again. There could be nothing wrong here. It’s the golden hour, the sunset drapes over their sitting figures on the shore, she is busy holding on to her hat being stolen away by the wind, and Sasuke—

“No.” He tries to take it from her hands, but she quickly dodges him.

Sasuke is looking at her, smiling.

“Why?” She watches him watch her realize the implication of this simple yet very rare action. “Why, Sasuke?”

He sighs and pulls her wrist this time, making her lean towards him, inches away, tension mounting, as if they’re shooting an intimate scene where he’ll almost take a kiss. “Do you want them to know,” he asks, “how much I like you?”

🍃

[pinkhairedlily]

Sasuke’s hand is no longer an afterthought.

He catches hold of Sakura’s stumbling, mismatched-pace form inside his tent. She lands on his bed, a heap of mumbled words lost in his sheets. Stray hairs escaped from her neat low bun, which had meant business, that meant tending to others, that meant he had to stay at a distance, and let his hand trace the memory of her bicep against his palm when she called him back across dimensions.

“Sasuke-kun, why aren’t you outside?” Against sloppy intonation, he manages to pull out a question.

“I could only go out with a handcuff,” he teases her. Drunk, alcohol-steeped her. “No one wants to mingle with a criminal.”

Sakura turns to face him with genuine green eyes arresting his mockery of himself, her body sinking lower in his cot and leaving ghosts of her form to torment his sleep later. “That’s sad. You’re gonna end up single.”

He wonders if he would even have such a need for intoxication when he wilfully volunteers his damnation. He lowers his head to hers and falls enraptured to the seal that grew in his absence. “That depends on whether you’re taken.”

Sakura mirrors his smirk which turns into a laugh which becomes a gasp and then she pulls the weightless Sasuke to her, drowning him in whiskey kisses and thank-you-you’re-safe and how-come-you’re-here and are-you-even-real.

Certain now of conquest, Sasuke discovers lands on her skin despite the darkness in his tent, in this night, in war-torn grounds stripped of delineations and boundaries, in this corner where no one wants to go amidst the celebration. Sakura, so beautiful in her assertion, leads his fingers to where heat is most needed. Inside her mouth, on her chest, between her legs, around her neck. His thousand birds once marred her skin, a telltale chakra thread sewn under her veins, but right now, they’re gliding gently, freeing their wings to bring her to zenith.

Sasuke’s body moves on its own accord despite the unfamiliarity, following a dance he barely learned but knows the tune to. Her moans and whimpers stitch a ballad of mounting release, and he obliges with a single strong thrust. “Are you hurt?”

“Yes, you’re too big,” she replies in honesty.

He takes a blow. “You have a point of comparison then?”

“Does examining corpses count as visual?” she chuckles against his ear.

He lifts her legs higher and pushes further inward, and soon enough, the chuckles taper into whispered pleas. He pounds her over and over again, relying on the throb of his pulse, the gush of his blood, and he crumbles at the moment she twists and convulses.

Sasuke tethers to Sakura’s lithe body, the only way he knows how to pass this alien vortex that is taking over his senses and hers. It takes a long while, maybe a lifetime, but it passes, and he thinks there’s already sunrise on the edge of his makeshift quarters.

“Are you drinking again later?” he whispers.

“Depends,” she murmurs against his collarbone.

“Hope you’ll find your way to my tent.”

“Hmm, let’s see. I’m no good with directions.”

[pinkhairedlily]

After he came back briefly to Konoha, Sasuke’s weekly routine consisted of dropping by the hospital and waiting for Sakura to clock out.

Even if her work day ends at midnight.

He would invite her to a 24/7 diner and pay attention to her food. When she kept on glancing at his bowl, he would say, “Here, have mine.”

When it’s Sakura’s turn to conduct diplomatic affairs outside the village, she’d come home to a sumptuous dinner. The market vendors often reported to her:

“Your husband was here as early as four in the morning.”

“He only took the freshest produce.”

“He reserved your favorite sweets two days ago.”

Fall and winter seasons meant random tucks in the middle of the night when the blanket uncovered half of her. Summer was making sure the fan remained steady on her feet. Spring was pots of bug-free, sun-soaked herbs.

Dinners where he holds her hand under the table and traces the lines of her palm even if he already memorizes how they meander. Breakfasts where she brings a thermos of coffee he brews and shares it to her colleagues. Late nights where he stares at her long enough until she gives him a kiss.

At the gates, before another mission, she has to see him off.

In so many ways, Sasuke asks, “Do you love me?” and Sakura answers as she accepts.