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when haruno sakura is seven, she falls in love with uchiha sasuke—at least, as best as a seven year-old who only understood love as a rush of blood to the apples of her perfectly unmarred cheeks can. she is not a kunoichi yet, but merely a girl with hair the color of cherry blossoms, a fringe framing her face, shielding her from the rest of the cruel, cruel world she’s yet to know.
she bristles when sasuke speaks, stirs when he stands from his seat to pass his exam and leave early, and tells ino she wants long hair because that’s what sasuke-kun likes.
ino doesn’t talk to her after that, pointedly looks away when she meets her gaze in the playground and walks faster in the halls. sakura clutches the end of the ribbon she ties around her head every morning, feeling the ends fray worse and worse as the years pass. she doesn’t know it yet, but this is her first heartbreak.
--
when sakura is thirteen, she is a genin and the world shifts with sasuke’s departure.
sakura doesn’t have time to register the back of his hand hitting hers, knocking freshly cut apples out of her grasp and onto the floor—not with the way sasuke’s tomoe spins as he challenges naruto to a duel and naruto rises to it, fists clenched at his sides, ready to strike.
in the dark of the night, sakura is alone when she intercepts him just a few feet before the village gates, standing between them as if she ever stood a chance. to his back, she declares her love and empathy and desperately hopes it’s enough for him to hear her pleas of please, stay.
he hears her, but still he walks away.
she threatens him now, go and i’ll scream—a gust of wind cuts through her voice and he’s behind her. thank you, he says before he’s gone and she’s alone in the chilly midsummer breeze.
--
when she is fifteen, naruto returns to the village with a new air about him.
he’s grown taller, she notices. he still giggles as he calls her sakura-chan, but if she listens for it, she can pinpoint how much his voice has dropped. it’s not a lot, she thinks, but it’s enough to make her forget that he’s the same bumbling idiot who chased after her for years while she blindly followed sasuke's every move—it's enough until he declares his new sexy jutsu, that is.
they still chase after sasuke together except naruto thinks of sasuke more than she does now, and sakura wonders if he knows he sounds like a lovesick puppy who’s been left by its owner at the curbside. she doesn’t tell him yet, but she feels the way his heart grows in the ache of yearning as he wears it less like a thing hanging on his sleeve, and more like a sash, bearing it with something akin to pride.
his aching resonates through her as she clutches the feeling close to her chest.
--
he's no longer the sasuke we used to know, the others argue and they're right. admission doesn't come easy to her but she swallows it like a bitter pill.
at the back of her mind, naruto calls out to sasuke.
you're alive today at my fleeting whim. and you'll die today at my fleeting whim, too, sasuke calls out, seemingly devoid of emotion.
at his words, sakura lets resentment fester where love once was.
so when sakura is sixteen, she brandishes a kunai against the curve of sasuke’s back. her mind’s made up—this is the end of the line. poison laces her blade and a tremor runs through her veins. she didn't tell naruto—couldn't have because he's spent his boyhood chasing after him in hopes that he will one day stop running away from his calls. sasuke has changed and so has she. yet, naruto's heart is stubborn and steadfast, so how can she tell him that she has to kill the only love he's ever known? she can’t because this is a burden only changed hearts have to bear.
with a trembling blade to sasuke's back, she thinks of naruto's grief and fails to assassinate their first love.
--
when sakura is at the cusp of seventeen, she has chakra flowing from her fingertips into the mass of muscle she desperately pumps in her hand. there's sand in her eyes from gaara's hold around her as he rushes to bring them to minato's side and she struggles to breathe life back into his unmoving form. he is surrounded by love now and he's at brink of death, heart stopped to an unnervingly long rest. sakura chews on her own ruddy lip before she takes another deep inhale.
don't die on me now, you dumbass, she thinks as her hand starts to cramp from the continued motion and dives back in to breathe into him for another time.
later, she gives in to obito's pleas to let him save naruto. naruto has changed me, he cries out. he’s changed all of us, she doesn’t say against his lips. she thinks of all the lives he's touched and how even in death, she is changing them all still, chipping away at their hatred bit by bit.
sakura keeps obito at a blade's length when she lets the man release the kyuubi who rips naruto out of death's embrace with a desperate jolt, enveloping him in his warm glow until he’s out of death’s reach and safe in his cloak.
the fox, too, carries the burden of a changed heart, she realizes.
-
after they save the world, naruto and sasuke lose an arm. sasuke leaves the village to find himself and when sakura sees him off, she tells him to choose. naruto might have changed sasuke’s heart, but hers remembers its resentment.
"don't you think it's time you stop running away from him?" sakura accosts him as he passes the village gates.
"he won't need to chase after me this time," he reassures her.
"he'll wait for you," sakura pushes herself off the column. as he always has, she doesn't say. doesn't need to because this, they both understand.
"i'll be back in a few months."
"and then?"
sasuke doesn't answer.
"stay gone if that's what you need. but that’s not what he needs nor what he deserves," sakura says, turning away. he needs you, she thinks, but this too, they both already know. "so don’t do this to him. not when we both know he'll bear anything for you."
sakura leaves first and sasuke doesn't thank her this time around.
--
when sakura is seventeen, she teaches ino how to perform open-heart surgery. ino is better than her at sensing foreign chakra in chakra pathways flowing through narrow capillaries and sakura watches her excise it with ease.
"hey, thanks for letting me assist you there, i really need the experience," ino tells her in the hospital pantry later, sliding a fresh cup of green tea towards her as thanks. sakura nods, taking the ceramic in her hands.
"cosmos are in bloom right now," she continues, relaxed. "i could get you some for your room. do you still like them?"
sakura nods as she takes a sip. there’s a smile tugging at the corners of her lips, looking to match ino’s.
“that’s good, i’ll drop it off at your office tomorrow,” ino says. a beat passes between them. until, “what about sasuke? do you still like him?”
sakura places the mug back down—ino had always been brutally honest, especially when she wanted something; she’s always envied that of her—sakura shakes her head and lets her voice mirror her actions, “no, not anymore.”
“yeah, me too,” ino says, taking a sip of her own drink.
“what about sai?”
ino snorts. “he was just my rebound guy after sasuke. not surprising that he turned out gay too.”
sakura nods, a tremor passing through her. “then, what about you?” she asks before she can stop herself.
“are you asking if i’m gay too?” ino asks her before she can take it back. sakura’s heart threatens to break through her ribs, pulse roaring in her eardrums making her almost miss it when ino’s voice breaks through her silence, “because the answer is yes.”
ino finishes the last of her tea and shifts to stand. “i’ll bring the flowers before your shift starts at six,” she says, bidding sakura farewell as she exits the pantry.
sakura takes another sip of her tea, hiding warm cheeks behind its heat as she realizes that she never told ino her schedule.
--
when sakura is eighteen, naruto beams at her, waving an enthusiastic GMO-arm and tells her sasuke’s coming back. they eat lunch by the training grounds as naruto counts the hours down to sasuke's arrival.
"say, sakura-chan," he says, lying down on the cool grass with his hands tucked behind his head. "did you know hinata liked me?"
"everyone knew, naruto."
"huh," he responds absently. "she confessed to me."
"i know," she says, thinking he never would've known otherwise. "what did you say?"
"nothing. she left because i could respond."
"figures," she tells him and a beat passes.
it settles between them, strange and uncomfortable, then morphs into a question, "what do you think i should say?"
sakura turns to study his features, and then, "do you like her?"
"i don't hate her but—" he sighs like the world is weighing down on his shoulders (and maybe it is, she realizes as she looks at his bandaged fingers.) "—i don't think of her."
"well, there you have it."
"i just don't know how to tell her."
"you'll figure it out," she teases, ruffling his hair and he relaxes into her touch. she hopes it conveys what her words cannot.
he sits up so he's beside her, head on her shoulder and heart on his sleeve, he speaks, "i think of sasuke."
"i know," is all sakura says.
"do you, too?" he asks, except it's not a question—but a plea, a requisition.
"not for a while now," she grants permission, not that it was ever hers to give in the first place. she feels him nod against her and the wind whistles through the shivering branches behind them.
"do you think he thinks of me?"
"i think you should tell him," is her only reply.
--
when they are nineteen, kakashi reunites them on their first mission as team seven and they prepare for it like it's their last. they are on the verge of adulthood and they steel their nerves as their sensei-turned-hokage informs them of stakes they already know.
it’s her turn to stay on guard and from where she’s sitting, leaning back against the trunk of a cedar tree, she can hear their whispers.
“i missed this—going on missions with you.”
a hum escapes sasuke, barely audible even in the quiet of the night.
“and sakura too, of course. but,” hesitation seeps in his voice, like floodwater through a negligible crack—slowly, and then all at once when he continues, “you’ve been away for a while.”
sasuke doesn’t hush him, listens to his musings in silence. sakura holds her breath, as one would when breaching enemy territory.
“did you feel lonely when you were away?” naruto asks, and then pleads, “cause i did.”
“i wrote you,” is sasuke’s weak defense.
“still.” i missed you, is what sakura hears. “when will you be coming back?”
“they wouldn’t want me back.”
“i would want you back,” naruto maintains.
“i’m a chink in your armor, naruto,” sasuke counters. sakura can hear the village’s murmurs behind their backs, hushed voices throwing daggers—murderer, criminal, traitor.
“what would make you come back then?”
“if i’m needed there.”
“and if i need you?"
“do you?”
“always,” naruto tells him plainly.
if sasuke speaks, sakura does not hear it. she cloaks her chakra around her earlobes, warming the tips of her ears as she blocks off the rest of their whispers.
--
when she is twenty, naruto asks her out.
“a date?” she asks, incredulous. he follows her around as she reorganizes her charts, histories strewn about by interns who don’t know better.
“a double date!” he announces, practically bouncing.
ah, she thinks. this is one of those attempts. “with whom?”
naruto’s cheeks take on color as his face splits in half, “me and sasuke.”
sakura can’t help the smile that takes her over. “congratulations, naruto.”
“thanks,” naruto says, bringing up an index finger to brush the tip of his nose sheepishly—he looks twelve like this, barely a teenager and giddy at being spoon fed by the young uchiha.
“i’m really happy for you two, and i’d love to join, but i don’t date, naruto.”
“aw, come on, you always say that.”
“because it’s true,” sakura insists. “between seeing patients and research, i’ve barely got time to see my parents, what more someone i don’t live with?”
“what if it was someone you worked with?” naruto says, wiggling his eyebrows in a way that spells trouble.
“i don’t shit where i eat.”
“you won’t be shitting, i promise!” naruto clasps her hands in his, “just go with us once, okay? i promise if you hate it, i’ll never bug you about your abysmal sex life ever again.”
“fine,” she says with an echoing flick of her hand that releases her from his hold. she doesn’t bother to correct him on her sex life and instead, resigns to her fate with a resounding sigh.
a week later, naruto drags her from the clinic to the salon. “what’s with all this?”
“don’t you wanna look pretty for your first date?” naruto says, inspecting the array of nail polish lining the shelves. “you always used to doll yourself up for sasuke when you liked him.”
“but i don’t like him anymore and i don’t even know who you’ve dragged into this.”
“just relax and let yourself feel giddy knowing that the person wanted to go on a date with you.”
“wait, they know i’m going? am i the only one going in blind?”
“pretty much, yeah,” naruto shrugs like it’s the most obvious answer.
“ma’am, i need you to unclench your fist so i can paint your nails.” sakura closes her eyes and tries to will away her rage.
at some point during the procedure, they put a warm face towel over her eyes to “relax” her which proves all too effective when she wakes up thirty minutes later, opening her eyes to meet turquoise ones.
“took you long enough,” ino says, hoisted up on a stool beside her salon chair, blonde hair flowing freely down her torso.
“ino, huh? are you also here for a treatment?” sakura says, raising herself up rockily, still disoriented from the power nap.
“i’m here to pick you up, actually,” ino moves closer, fingers closing around sakura’s armrest.
“huh?”
ino knocks a knuckle on her head softly, “i’m your date, stupid.”
-
she holds the cosmos in her hands with care as they walk down the streets of konoha side-by-side. there's an itch that creeps up on her that makes her wish she could hold her hand, but they are lost in the stems of the flowers, carding through them like they’re trying to seek shelter from the cold breeze.
“can i ask you something?” sakura says, counting the petals of one particularly pink cosmos.
“ask away,” ino says in an even voice that has sakura wondering if she’s the only one with a thousand questions racing through her mind.
“why did you agree to go on a date with me? i mean, do you actually like me like that?”
"you know," ino frowns, looking at her with what looks like pity in her eyes, “for someone real smart, you can be pretty dense.”
“i just—it’s kinda hard to believe you’d actually like me," sakura says defensively. "for one, we hated each other for years.”
“i thought i hated you,” ino corrects her, jogging up to walk past sakura then turning to face her as she walked backwards and talked, “and at first i just hated that you stopped being friends with me, and then later that you kept getting better at, well, everything and it felt like you were totally leaving me behind.”
“that still doesn't tell me why you like me,” sakura muses, figuratively scratching her head.
ino laughs, “i like you cause you’re pretty.”
sakura knows she’s blushing furiously when ino smiles at her. “thank you,” is all sakura can manage, barely audible underneath the saturday night bustle of konoha’s busiest street. she brings the cosmos closer to her face, hiding her flush behind the equally pink flowers.
they walk for what seems like miles in silence, then finally sakura, eager to hear ino’s voice again, asks, “do you think we should be looking for them?”
ino shakes her head, “i think they’re fine.”
“i’m worried they’ll fight again,” sakura confesses. old habits never die.
“you sound like a mother, sakura-chan,” ino teases and sakura feels like a little girl again. “they’ll be fine. i have it on good word that they’re getting along very well,” she reassures her, punctuating it with a pointed look towards the Hokage-iwa, where two figures stand atop the fourth’s visage, pressed up so close against each other that they seem to move, breathe, and exist as one.
--
when sakura is twenty-one, she has her first real kiss—the first one that makes her realize that the world can spin on its axis the wrong way around if she tilts her head just right, the first one that has her feeling like all her bones have dissolved to putty in ino’s hands, and that she’s been reduced to a thundering pulse against her.
ino’s chakra-gloved hands find their way all over her, mapping her with a steady heat that has her synapses misfiring in overdrive. deft fingers find their way down and push into her own insistent heat and sakura briefly thinks that this—ino rediscovering sakura’s essence, rewriting the memories of her flesh—is what chakra was made for as she unravels and turns anew with a guttural cry under her lover.
--
when sasuke is twenty-two, naruto still asks him stupid shit like why he stayed away for years and why he wouldn’t come back for so long; and most of the time, he looks at naruto with the same exasperated look he had always worn around him since they were kids, calls him a sore loser as he pulls him into a kiss to shut him up.
“you know, you’ve changed,” sakura tells him once over dinner, and sasuke thinks in some ways, she’s right because these days, sasuke answers his questions, tells him about the voices he used to hear: one that sounded an awful lot like his brother, telling him to atone, to run and leave everything behind, to accept desolation.
then there was the other voice—the one that constantly buzzed beneath the chilling rage of the first, one that always broke through the surface whenever there was quiet—and when he was alone, there was always quiet. it sounded a lot like naruto: loud and obnoxious, but also: light and persistent, like a constant breeze trying to steer his sails back home. this voice tells him a never ending list of things—about its favorite ramen toppings, iruka's birthday gift to him, shikamaru's new forehead protector, kakashi-sensei wearing a mask in an onsen—but it always ends with a call: to go back because the cactus it gave him is wilting, because the cactus understands, because the cactus, even after all this time, thinks he should come home.
so sasuke comes back home and waters the damned succulent and naruto grows him a garden. each morning, sasuke snakes out of naruto's ever imposing arms, sluggishly drags his feet over to the backyard where he waters the previously despondent patch of land with years worth of pent-up feelings and watches it bloom.