Naruto Fan Fiction ❯ Poison ❯ Cold ( Chapter 1 )

[ Y - Young Adult: Not suitable for readers under 16 ]

His vision blurred slightly, but he could walk. All the medic nin had said that she fought for her life for a week, and even now, two weeks later, she refused to wake. He silently blamed himself as he found her room, a single dark flower clutched in his hand. He saw her laying there lifelessly as he placed the near black rose in a vase beside her bed. He looked down at her and hated himself for what he saw. He brushed a bitter sweet kiss over her forehead after burshing cherry blossom colored hair away from her face. She was untouchable to him. And he briefly wondered, as he stared down at her, if he'd ever be able to do what was asked of him. His friend's words still echoed in his mind.

* * *

White light...
Sakura thought for a moment she was dead as the half memory half dream of her previous Autumn with Naruto faded. The light burned her eyes so, she sat up with her face in her hands trying to remember where she was and why. Images of blood and war filled her mind hazily. She couldn't remember. The only thing she could recall was that there had been a battle and he had been there.

'Oh god...' she sat up ignoring the burning hospital lights in her eyes, "Sasuke!" she said aloud. She yanked the various tubes and needles from her body and got ready to bolt for the door, but she hit her knees upon resting her hand on the nob. She just got back up, throwing the acheing in her body to the back of her mind. Her run was pathetic and wobbly, but she wasn't walking. She bursted in to each door lining either side of the hallway, startling medics and patients alike until she finally reached the largest room at the end of the hallways. She pressed her bandaged fingers against it for a moment's hesitation then stepped in.

* * *

Naruto woke when she jerked upright, jarring her bed which he had been resting his head on. He pulled his face from his little puddle of drool just in time to see her bolt for the door. He started to call after her but stopped himself. She hadn't even know he was there. She wouldn't hear him if he did call out to her, and chances were, she didn't even know he existed at that point in time.

Maybe he didn't...

* * *

When the Uchiha heir woke he was home again. Well, if he even considered Konoha home. Years had passed but nothing much had changed. When he sat up he alerting the nurse (who was probably a gaurd as well) that he was concious and before long the Hokage was there with questions. The only thing he even responded to was that he wouldn't leave, he could be trusted, and he wanted to be left alone. He could tell that at first she had wanted to deny him that but the Godaime's honey brown eyes softened and the blonde motioned the few medic nin with her to the door. He could tell for sure, her trust was Naruto's influence. He felt sick....

A few weeks passed, he still was rarely allowed to leave his room. He hadn't barely seen his team mates at all, not that he'd know how to face them. He had spent his time trying to figure out what had happened, how everything had gone down, but something blocked his mind. The battle was hazy still and all he could remember came to him in nightmares of blood and death. He thought briefly of his team mates as he stared out of his window that over looked Konoha. He layed back down still facing the window, trying to remember, trying to figure out what he had and what he didn't but his thoughts were disrupted by the click of the door. He didn't have to look to know it was her. He kept his back to the door, he didn't want to face her, not yet, and he hoped that she'd think him to be asleep.



Her breath caught as she stepped in and the air in the room washed over her face drowning her in the heavy scent of him. Positively intoxicating...
She hesitated again, she couldn't run to him like she used to, she was no little girl and he was certianly no twelve year old boy. Then again, he never really had been. She fought her urge to run to him and call out his name crying, and instead forced herself onward.

Sakura nearly lost her breath again as the sight of his bandaged but otherwise bare back came into view. She took in the sight of him as she oh so slowly made her way to his bed side. She was drinking him up, embedding the image in her mind. The way his hair held it's spikey but slightly more untaimed pose. The way the bandages clung tightly to his pale skin, showing a few hints of blood here and there. And oh, the smell, she felt like she could breath no other air, as it was thick and suffocating, spicy with the smell of sweat and the ever so slight hint of vanilla. All of it, everything, it all made her remember why she could never forget him or let him go. He was addictive..

Sakura neared the edge of his bed. Close enough now that any decent medic nin would know he wasn't asleep. She hesitently reached her hand out and the closer she drew, the nearer time came to stopping. Inch by tiny inch her fingers drew closer to the flesh of his shoulder. She paused, then pressed her slender fingers against his skin. A shock ran through her, almost as if he had been charged with electricity. His skin was cool to the touch but when she wrapped her hand completely around his shoulder she could feel the warmth of the muscle beneath.

"Sasuke..." she breathed as chills overcame her body, he was real, this wasn't a dream, she could feel him. Silence enveloped the room except for the ruch of blood in her ears and her heart beat. She gripped his shoulder tightly and pulled him slightly as if to let him know she knew he was awake. He replied with a chest heaving sigh and sat up, not looking at her, not lifting his head. He just let his hair fall in his eyes and cover his face.


He noted the way she dropped the -kun from his name. He wondered for a moment if she perhaps thought he no longer deserved the title any more. Maybe she wouldn't always love him like she swore she would and had since found some one else. But then again what did he care? He knew he'd always be alone. 'Of course,' he thought, smirking painfully at himself. She had jerked her hand away when he sat up. Was she afraid? So many questions ran through his mind, but as usual, he remained silent. He could see her face out of the corner of his eye, through the black bangs hanging in his face, she was fighting tears, he could tell. But why? Was she trying to be strong? So unlike her. The face, he decided, didn't suit her. She usually wore her heart on her sleeve. But that face... It said that she no longer wanted to bear her heart to him. Who was she now? And what was he to her? He wondered, so many things. He wanted to break down that wall. The one she had built so carefully, just to keep him out. He wondered if he could. He wanted to. Just because he wanted to know if it was possible.

"Sakura..." he whispered and then turned to face the young girl. He kept his eyes blank and whatever emotion he felt hidden well behind his black eyes. But her eyes screamed with life and she carefully tucked her bottom lip beneath her top teeth when assaulted by those heartless eyes. He knew, he could see it, her heart was breaking with her walls, her pathetic walls. Just one glance and all she built was gone, one pathetic glance and he could see the tears start to pour down her face, she was crumbling right before him and all he had to do was look at her. But part of him taunted him. Maybe he was just jealous because he could no longer cry. Don't be stupid, he told himself.

His thoughts were shattered when he found himself being crushed in her embrace. She was warm, so warm. Her warmth contrasted harshly against the cold of him and chills ran over him. The smell of her hair filled his lungs, the smell of cherry blossoms, with a hint of something sweeter, like cream, or honey.

"Sasuke-kun," she choked out and the word and her tears ran down his back, like fire against his cool skin. But some how the burn of his tears brought him so much comfort. It was sick he knew. He knew he would do this to her and did so intentionally, just to see her cry, because he knew the tears were for him. He'd never out right claim her, no never. He never had, but she still belonged to him, and that thought was selfishly comforting. He turned from her slightly, refusing to hold her as well. And actually, now that he had what he wanted, he kind of just wanted her to leave. Now that he knew he could make her cry, her tears were bothersome. He was sick for that. He knew it. However, he couldn't help it. Caring about some one meant getting close to them, which in turn, meant you could loose them. He had lost enough.

He tried to lay back, hoping to pry her arms off of him, but she was still weak and her knees buckled underneath her. He grabbed her arms, not gently, not harshly. Just to support her. She was crying carelessly as if if she let go now he's simply die, or dissappear. She struggled to pull him closer, struggled to stand, to breath. And he found himself holding her still intstead of pushing her off like he intended. She slipped again. Had she lost her mind? She was a mess. He could feel her struggle for her footing. He sat up again moving to the edge of the bed and pulling her pathetic body up to sit next to him. She still wouldn't let go. He blamed himself. If he wasn't so worthlessly selfish she may have just said something mildly annoying and been on her way. But now he was stuck with the mess she had become, the mess he made of her. And he just sat there as she bawled her eyes out on his shoulder. Just sat there like he always did. He refused to console her or to give her any kind of comfort. Oh how he hated it when she cried. Maybe mostly because he wasn't sure how to react, so he didn't. But also he hated it because he disliked the way it made him feel. It almost made him feel good. It was horrible he knew. But something about the tears she cried, knowing she cried them for no one else brought him some sort of twisted peace.

"Shhhhh Sakura." he said, not soothingly, not harshly. He just said it, lowly in her ear. He didn't care how she took it, because it worked, she silenced a bit and her cries became soft sobs. And she sobed like that forever until finaly She grew silent. "Sakura...?" he asked after maybe ten minutes of silence as he nudge the shoulder she was resting on. Her arms fell loose around him and he grabbed her to keep her from falling. 'She must still be worn out,' he thought to himself putting his arm under her head for support as he layed her down on his bed pulling the covers over her. He headed towards the door to tell a medic but was met by a pair of grim blue eyes.

"We need to talk Sasuke," Naruto said turning his face away.