His hand falls to the little lump on her belly, he can feel
the new life forming inside her. Proof that there is hope after war, after
everything he’s seen.
Sasuke feels her hand on his face, it lingers on his cheek
and when he looks up to meet her gaze he’s taken aback. You’re the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen. She smiles, small
but bright.
“Wait until you meet our daughter.” She murmurs and it takes
him a moment to notice he had spoken the words out loud.
“Daughter?” He asks out loud, he hadn’t thought about that.
“Or son, it’s still too early to know.”
“No, no. It will be a girl.” He speaks with certainty, it’s
something he feels and something she feels as well. “I hope she has your eyes.”
“That is very unlikely, there’s a higher chance she’ll be
born with your dark eyes-”
“That’s not what I meant.” He interrupts her, before adding
in a gentle murmur, “I hope she inherits you’re way of looking at the world,
the way your eyes shine.” I hope my curse
won’t taint her. The last he doesn’t say aloud, but he knows Sakura hears
it anyway.
“Well thanks to me, she might not get the Sharingan.” She speaks
the words half-afraid, as if it were a bad thing. A part of him is hoping she
won’t, Sakura knows this as well, but she doesn’t share his fears. She’s sure
the curse of hatred is behind them, and maybe she’s right, because it is love
that drives them forward now.
Finding a person was more difficult than she would have imagined. Especially if that person was Uchiha Sasuke. It’s been two months now and she was still nowhere close to figuring out where on earth Sasuke could be by now in his travels. Sakura was beginning to think that she may have been too hasty when she made the decision to leave Konoha on her own in search of him.
Sakura walks slowly through the new town she just arrived at. She was short on supplies and money at this point. She takes out a small pouch from her bag as she checks the inside contents. With a frown, she sighs. She needed to start making money fast. Throughout her travels, she had stopped to help those in need of medical treatment. Often, she refused their money and instead only accepted food or lodging.
‘Then how can you be low on money?’ the little voice in the back of her mind asks. Sakura sighs again as she lowers her head. The hood of her cloak falls over her eyes as she walks glumly towards a food stall. “Because I accidentally destroyed the town hall,” she mumbles. She hadn’t mean to but at the last town she was at, she had saw a group of thugs bothering a young woman and without thinking, she charged in and gave them all a good beating and effectively destroying part of the town hall in the process. Luckily, no one else was injured. Although the mayor told her not to worry about it, she ended up feeling guilty and helped foot the bill for repairs.
“Look, is that the person?”
“Mm, from… Konoha? Was it?”
Sakura’s ears perk up as she hears a group of women whispering and gossiping to each other near the food stalls. Were they talking about her? Did news of her destroying the town hall travel to this town so fast? Was she going to be kicked out of here before she even find a place to stay?
She pulls the hood of her cloak even lower as she tries to hide all traces of her pink hair to keep it from showing. Then she begins to scold herself. She wasn’t a fugitive. Why should she be scared? Yet, she did feel slightly ashamed for her reckless temperament that brought her to this mess in the first place. If the town was this gossipy about her, it would make it harder for her to dig up information on Sasuke.
She approached the food stall as her eyes glanced at the food for sale. Her mouth was salivating by now and quickly, she sticks out a hand to point out the item she wanted. “One yakisoba bun, please,” she orders. As the stall owner wraps up her bun, Sakura opens up her small money pouch again as she gingerly takes out the coins inside.
Before she could pay, someone from behind her drops some coins in the hand of the stall owner and takes the wrapped bun.
“Hey, that’s supposed to be mine!” Sakura shouts as she whirls around to see who dared try to steal her bun away.
She only gapes when she sees who it was. She blinks once and then brings two hands to rub her eyes to double check that her vision hadn’t gone bad.
“Here.”
The yakisoba bun was now in front of her face. She takes it in stunned silence. “Thank you,” she says in disbelief.
A murmur of whispers get louder as the group of gossiping women continue to chatter on the side. “It’s him, right?”
“Yes, Uchiha Sasuke, isn’t it?”
Sakura turns to look the women for a moment but they seem to pay no attention to her. So they weren’t talking about her after all. She turns back to look at the man who was now walking away from her. It is him. It really is.
She runs towards him, her feet practically leaping off the ground, her two hands still clutched on the yakisoba bun he gave her. The hood of her cloak flies back behind her to reveal her pink hair as her tresses dance in the wind.
The man stops in his footsteps as he turns back and looks at her. She stops when he stops and for a moment, they stare at each other. Then he directs a small smile at her and she smiles back.
She had been looking at all the wrong places. She didn’t need to find him. He had found her.
He holds up one of her knee-highs. Sakura grabs the article of clothing quickly from his grasp. She mumbles a quick, “thank you,” and proceeds to pull the silk over her legs.
Sasuke watches her, “so…” he begins, “we should…talk about this”.
She responds with a non-committal, “uh-huh,” whilst continuing with her task to clothe herself as quickly as possible. It is the perfect contrast to Sasuke; he continues to sit on the hotel bed, nude under the sheets without any intention of changing that state any time soon.
“Sakura,” he grumbles.
She stops, and stands upright. She turns to him, “this didn’t happen”.
He doesn’t even bother hiding his smirk, “Sakura, we should talk about this–”
“I’m sorry,” she blurts out, turning to face him completely. Her words are genuine, “I’m sorry, we shouldn’t have done this”.
“I know,” he replies softly, “but there’s no point in thinking along those lines now – it happened, so we–”
“I’m going to leave,” Sakura interjects, glancing quickly at the door, “my team is most likely wondering where I am and you…” she pauses, noting his lack of clothes – still, “you, um, you’ll probably head off. Konoha may not actively look for you, but if they do find you then they’ll–”
“They’ll what,” Sasuke cuts in, “will they treat me as, accommodatingly, as you did last night?”
She gapes at his cavalier attitude towards the situation at hand. “What is with you?” she hisses.
Sasuke exhales, “Sakura–”
She holds up her hand.
“No,” she steps towards him, “no, you’re right. I was wrong. I am in the wrong”.
As he’d not predicted Sakura to admit this (nor had he wanted her to), he decides that the appropriate response to such an admission is; silence.
She bites her lip, “I don’t know why…why did…”
His demeanour softens. Sasuke gets out from under the covers, and out of the bed. He takes a step towards her, “I don’t regret it,” he tells her softly.
Sakura looks up to him, smiles, and blushes. He knows that she doesn’t either – despite their circumstances.
She opens her mouth to speak, then pauses before saying, “um…could you maybe put on some pants, Sasuke-kun”.
He holds his position, then looks down to his state of undress.
He scoffs – it isn’t like she’d not seen him like this before.
In SS fandom we usually affiliate ‘thank you’ with that iconic chapter 699 forehead poke moment. And as much as I love 699, I also feel like this little moment between them is quite underrated. Sakura doubted herself, Sasuke noticed it, he tried to boast her self-confidence because even he knows she is a smart girl, she thanked him quietly and he smiled to himself. They have a unspoken connection and I think it’s beautiful.
“Mom, Dad…Nii-san… are you watching this? I have such a beautiful family. This is happiness right? What you wanted me to have? Thank you for the love. And you should really be thanking Sakura. She never gave up on me. Look at me, look at my family, now. I’m happy.”
Sakura, thank you. You have my whole being now and forever. Always. I love you.”
________
I have such low everything (light, skills, etc) pics. And I don’t have a scanner (I’m bribing my dad all the time, no progressss huhuhu )
I did a lot of art on Day 5: Blood, Sweat and Tears. Ugh. I love it. I;m still on it. Hoooeee
SasuSaku Month 