Summer comes like love, before you know it and all at once. Oto is a swamp. Sasuke wades through July in a swell of damp t-shirts and blistering sunburn; they stick their toes in Suigetsu's kiddy pool that reads more like a hot tub and spray themselves with the hose on mist to keep cool. It's too hot to think. His thoughts flicker between the next time he'll be in an air conditioned room and whether or not everybody can see his sweat through his lab coat. The hospital is a cool, dry blessing against the sweltering sun.

August is gentler. He walks to work sticky with sweat, brain a little less foggy. Sakura would have graduated by now. He thinks fondly of the stage she crossed, imagines what she would have looked like dressed in her Konoha-green graduation gown and chunky heels soaring like a ballerina across the stage, flashing her perfect smile and accepting her diploma. She'd be getting ready for school, picking out her dorm room essentials and packing her clothes tightly in overflowing suitcases. She'd be saying goodbye to her friends, maybe kissing a new boyfriend goodbye, hugging her parents and saying farewell to look directly into the bright light of her future.

He doesn't make himself sick thinking about it. Slowly, Sakura becomes a fleeting thought. He deletes her voicemail. It doesn't matter if Sakura is legal now, that he could find her and be with her, because that isn't the point. He won't be a shadow looming over her dorm planning and late nights with her best friends, over her first kisses and campus wanderings. Sasuke got to experience all of those things, why shouldn't she? Shouldn't he give her the chance to experience one of the most informative times of her life without an older, fully experienced man influencing every moment? It wouldn't be fair to her.

He leaves his infatuation with her in a box deep in the closets of his mind with a pretty, pink bow, and by the fall of what would be Sakura's first semester, Sasuke looses the urge to vomit every time he sees a red-head.

And that's how time passes. Sakura becomes soft and fuzzy to him, like a drunken daydream. He touches himself to girls with light red hair and green eyes, with tiny, athletic bodies and rosy, flushed chests, but it's disjointed. He doesn't have the whole picture of her anymore. He forgets little things, like what color she painted her fingernails, like the exact shade of pink her hair was. He can't remember what kind of coat she wore, and he even forgets her brother's name in passing. Too much time has passed since he's catalogued her exact gait or seen what kind of earrings she wore, if she wore any, when she wore her hair back.

That's just how life is, he figures. Time passes, and he forgets. To pass even more time, he begins sleeping with one of the nurses in NICU and he surprises himself with how hard he can stay as long as the blonde lets him take her from behind and push her face into the pillow. He can picture bottle-green eyes behind his eyelids and when he finishes, low on her back, he can pretend it's somebody else's tiny body he's wiping his cum off of with his dirty sheets.

And that's how two years pass. He breaks things off with the nurse when she refers to him as her boyfriend. He moves out of Suigetsu's apartment into his own that has a community pool and a tennis court that make the summers in Oto a little less insufferable. He loses interest in dating after two, huge tinder mistakes and spends his time instead learning how to cook, and maybe eating a little too much of his feelings. It's fine. He pushes himself harder on his run in the morning then, until his lungs are painfully soar and his thighs burn with stress. His back aches and he curses his thirtieth birthday that's only looming sooner and sooner. Orochimaru makes him head of the behavior health unit. His mentor forces him into a lecture tour on college campuses for a paper he wrote on Paranoid Schizo-effective Disorder and talks across the country about his experiences with patients to the bored and empty minds of the world's youth.

Which is when he finally sees her.

He'd pushed it into the back of his mind, how inevitable running into her would be after touring college campuses for months. He knew by showing up in Suna, he might be showing up directly into her lap. Of course she'd flock to a psychology lecture. Or maybe even, he thought with a tiny flutter of his heart, she saw his name and decided he was worth paying a visit.

He makes it through the presentation without tripping over his words or blundering too badly. He gets a standing ovation and questions are almost another hour long. She sits through them quietly in the lecture center, legs crossed and hair, much longer and wavier and as perfectly pink as he only tried to replicate in his mind, pushed behind her ears. She's wearing an oversized sweater and tight jeans, and her eyes are even greener than he remembered behind a pair of round glasses. Her expression is soft, and she even laughs at one of his sad attempts at a joke. Maybe she's laughing at him, he thinks, but her eyes are too kind. She's still too Sakura, and he can tell that from five rows away in a lecture center.

He takes an awkward seat behind the desk when students start to file out. He watches Sakura carefully. She doesn't make a move to organize her books, just sits comfortably, legs crossed. Someone asks her something briefly, but she waves them off with a laugh and soon, the room is completely empty, except for her and him.

She speaks just loud enough for him to hear. "Hi, Sasuke."

He stands up from his seat. It's too stiflingly awkward, suddenly. He takes a few steps toward her. "Sakura."

"I couldn't believe it when I saw your name on the poster," she said. "I knew I had to come see you."

He swallows. "You did?"

"Of course," she says. "My old mentor doing a lecture series? Too exciting."

"Right." He nods his head, and shoves his hands deep in his pockets. He wears his hair a little longer now, down past his ears, and he wonders if he knew, somehow, he'd need to hide just how red this girl could turn his ears. "It's nice to see you, Sakura."

"Would you like to get some coffee?" she asks. "I'm pretty familiar with the campus. I know where the best stuff is."

His lips curl into a smile. "That would be nice."

She gathers up her things with her own pretty smile, just as wide and white as he remembered. It makes his heart twist a little. She's only gotten prettier, only settled further into her high cheekbones and pointy chin, only become curvier with time passing. Her jeans do things for her legs that one of her old, loose dresses could have never done. She pockets her glasses and he gets a better view of her dark eyelashes and grass-green eyes, and he realizes he's never quite gotten them right in his fantasies. They're greener, a little more demanding, challenging. When he pictures them, he pictures them wide and wet, but this Sakura is much different. Her eyes are much more mature, now.

"Follow me?" she asks, and he does. She takes him across campus quietly, complimenting his lecture and asking him a few of her own questions.

"You know, there was a question and answer portion," he says.

She shrugs. "I know the lecturer."

Sakura is more confident now, and it's easy to tell. She walks more surely, less like a ballerina and more like a grown woman. She wears chunky sneakers that make her look a little taller, and the top of her head nearly reaches his chin. If he pulled her against him now, he could kiss her perfectly—he nearly shakes his head. He can't think about anything like that now.

They wait on line at a small on campus coffee-shop and Sakura treats him with her student card. They slide into a booth in the back corner with secret smiles and Sasuke is the first to speak. "So, Suna?"

"Yeah," she nods her head. "I ended up getting into Konoha, actually, but I decided a little distance would be good for me."

He nods his head. "Probably the best decision."

"I still talk to Tsuande," she says. "And she's trying to convince me to go to medical school in Konoha."

"Don't rush it."

"That's what I say," she agrees with a laugh. "I still have two years here… or at least another year to decide whether or not I want to go to medical school."

Sasuke raises an eyebrow. "Wasn't that the goal?"

"Yeah, well, I had a really good mentor that showed me how far a doctorate in psychology can go."

His eyes widen. He didn't think he was that good of a mentor to Sakura—in fact, he was a pretty terrible one. He dismissed everything she said to him, ignored her work ethic, likely hindered some of her education. If he'd been less of a self-absorbed asshole, he could have helped this poor girl who has no idea what to do with her future. Instead, he'd decided to make her life as hellish as his. How absolutely selfish he had been—he'll help her any way he can, now. "I'm glad I could point you in some kind of direction."

"Like I said, I have time," she says. "I have two years to decide between scrubs or a lab coat."

"One is more comfortable than the other," he admits.

"Don't let Tsunade hear you say that!" she says, and then cringes a little, adding, "well, I guess she isn't seeing you that much, anyway."

"Yeah, she isn't," Sasuke confirms. "I'm still in Oto."

"How is that?"

"It's good. I'm heading the Behavior Health Unit, working on a few more papers."

"That's so cool!" she cheers. "See, like, that is interesting—I wanna do that. Your lecture, working with patients like that, that is what I wanna do."

"You absolutely can. You're already attending psychology lectures, have you decided on your major?"

She blushes. "Psychology."

"That's in the right direction." He smiles a little. "I'm sure Tsunade will get over it."

"It won't be exactly following in her footsteps."

"Forge your own path," he counters.

"You're probably right." She takes a long sip of her coffee and her nose scrunches up. "Ew. Did you order black?"

He raises an eyebrow. "Yes."

"Our orders got switched." She rolls her eyes, and switches the cups. There's a little pit of light pink lipstick on his lid. She switches those, too. "Nasty, Sasuke, really."

He smirks. "It's an acquired taste."

"Acquired in hell, is more like it."

He actually laughs, a little. "Don't be so dramatic, Sakura."

She takes another long sip of her coffee, something sugary and decadent, he's sure, and sighs delightfully. His eyes widen as hers close happily. "So much better."

He swallows and hums in response.

"Hey, so…" she trails off, after a long, comfortable moment of silence. "Did you ever get my voicemail?"

His eyes widen. "Um—"

"I'm sorry I did that." She grins sheepishly. "I was in a really weird place in my life. I should have never reached out to you—or, well, kissed you, I guess—"

"Sakura—"

"What I'm trying to say is, I'm sorry about everything," she says, and adds, "and anything that I haven't covered, I'm sorry about that, too. I don't know if I was… a driving factor in you leaving."

He shakes his head. "Sakura, no—"

"Let me finish," she interrupts with a kind smile. "Even if I wasn't, the timing was impeccable. I want to say sorry for all of it. For you leaving. For acting inappropriately. For putting you in a weird position."

"You didn't do any of that," he tells her. "You were seventeen. You did nothing wrong."

"I acted like a total idiot," she counters.

"You acted like a seventeen-year-old," he corrects, and she rolls her eyes with a groan. "You didn't have to do anything. It was my job to protect you. And I did, by putting space between us."

She frowns. "Huh?"

"It was my job, as the adult, to make sure you were safe and comfortable, and I did just that. You shouldn't have kissed me, but I should have never given the idea that something like that was okay," he explains. "I put you in a situation where you thought I reciprocated your feelings. That was my fault. That was inappropriate, and I'll have to live with that for the rest of my life."

There's a long moment of silence. And then Sakura's soft, small voice, asking, "did you?"

"Did I what?"

"Reciprocate," she says. "My feelings. Did you?"

"What I felt then," he says, "doesn't matter. It was inappropriate."

"I was seventeen—"

"That doesn't matter, Sakura," he tells her. "You were too young. Whether or not I had feelings for you meant nothing. I withheld them for a reason."

"And what about now?" she asks.

His eyes narrow. "What about now?"

"You're here," she says. "I'm nineteen. I'm a consenting adult. What about now?"

"You have no idea what you're saying."

"Of course I do, Sasuke." She leans closer, across the table. He can count the freckles on her cheeks if he really wants too, her cheeks as pretty and rosy as he remembers. "It's been almost three years—"

"Two and a half, really—"

"Since I last saw you. I'm a different person. We are different people," she concludes. "What's stopping us now?"

"Sakura," he warns. "This isn't a good idea."

She shrugs. "Why not? Wouldn't be the first time I brought someone home from this coffee shop." A growl nearly rips from his throat and she's laughing. "Kidding! Where are you staying?"

"What?"

"What hotel are you staying at?"

"Suna Regency. Why?"

"My dorm is closer," she says. "Will you follow me again?"

"I don't think this is a good idea."

"I think this is a great idea." She pushes her hair behind her ears, revealing four gold earrings on each ear. He doesn't remember if they're new, or if she's been getting piercings since she went to college. He doesn't know much about her, except her favorite lunch order, and how many moles she has on her left wrist, and how soft her lips felt when she kissed him, once.

She throws out their cups of coffee and then takes his hand. She makes awkward, stilted small talk as she drags him back to what he assumes is her dorm. He hasn't been in a dorm since he was twenty-two. He never thought he'd be back in a dorm, but there's a pretty girl more than ten years his junior dragging him back to her bedroom that he's praying is a single talking to him about some kind of early principle of psychology she's studying that he doesn't care about.

And he hasn't even kissed her yet. He'll have to fix that.

"Wait," he says, and tightens his grip on her hand. He pulls her up against him, and presses his lips to hers. They're soft, and she tastes sweet. Her tongue darts out of her mouth and across the seam of his lips, entering his mouth, hot and soft. He wraps his hands around her waist and groans into her mouth. What should have been a chaste kiss becomes heated and fiery. Sasuke hears someone whistle at them, and he pulls away. "Sorry," he says.

Her eyes are lidded and her green eyes are dizzying. "Don't be," she says after she swallows.

She drags him a little quicker back to her dorm. She swipes them into a building and he follows her up three flights of stairs, all the way to her—thank god—single bedroom. She's already undressing by the time he's shutting the door.

"Wait, wait," he says as her dress hits the floor. His throat goes dry. She's just as perfect as he imagined in her little, pink panties and lacy, white bralette; virginal, almost. He prays she isn't, actually. God, wouldn't that just be the end of him, taking this girl's virginity. He could picture himself now on the front page of hell's daily news as sinner of the year. "Why are you rushing?"

"I want you inside me," she admits. She wraps her hands around his neck and presses a hot kiss to his mouth. She tastes like cinnamon and coffee, and she's light as a feather as she leans into him.

"Fuck, Sakura," he groans against her lips. He puts a hand on her soft, cotton panties that are already damp with her arousal and presses his thumb into her clit. She hisses into his mouth. He pulls away. "I want to eat your pussy."

"Fuck, fuck, okay." She backs herself into her twin size, extra long bed. They'll barely fit. It's perfect for missionary, which is good, because he wants to look right at her while she cums. He wants to look her in the eye while he finishes inside her. She rips her panties down her legs and opens herself up like she's the best gift anybody has ever given him, and he's greeted with pink, curly hair and her pink, wet cunt. He wants to devour her.

He drops to his knees in front of the mattress and wraps his hands around her thighs, pulling her cunt closer to his face. She whines as he breathes against her, shimmying but his hands keep her put. He presses a kiss to the inside of her thigh, and then her labia, and then a hot, opened mouth kiss to her perfect slit that leaves her grinding herself against his face. He licks a long, hot stripe down her pussy, wet with arousal and his saliva, and then takes her clit between his lips and sucks. She groans his name like a prayer. It's a sound he was born to hear, his name rolling from her lips while she fucks his face. He sucks on her clit until she's coming, gushing against his face. She tastes sweet and tart, absolutely perfect as he laps her up.

"Oh my god," she whines when he doesn't stop. She wraps her fingers in his hair and tugs him, hard. "Stop, Sasuke. Sensitive."

"You're amazing," he says, pressing kisses to her stomach, and then her covered breasts. He groans with his teeth on her bra. "Take this off."

She does, throwing it over her head and revealing her chest, flushed with her orgasm, nipples rosy, pink, and pointy. He takes one in his mouth and sucks, hard. So hard she might bruise, so hard that she moans lewdly, loudly.

"Fuck me," she says. "Please, fuck me."

He nods his head against her breast. Still, he takes his time. He kisses her small swells and licks them, taking her neglected nipple between his lips and gently tugging until she moans. Flicking her nipple with his tongue, he uses his other large hand to fondle her. She grinds up against his torso, and he can feel how wet she is.

"You're soaking," he moans. "For me?" He doesn't mean to, but it comes out more like a question, and she seems happy enough to oblige him.

"For you," she agrees, squirming underneath him.

Sasuke removes himself from her quickly to remove his shoes and socks, slacks, and boxers. Naked from the waist down, he crawls on top her. He's nearly pushing in when he stops himself, almost groaning. "Condom?" he asks. He'll wear a condom, for her, but god, he doesn't want to. He wants to finish inside her, fill her up and watch it drain out of her onto the bed.

"Birth control," she says. "Are you clean?"

"Yes, fuck, yes," he says, and he doesn't even ask her in response. Instead, he pushes into her cunt, the tip of him catching between her lips, leaving them both hissing. "You're so tight," he moans as he pushes into her, and even with how wet she is, it's a tight fit. A perfect fit. He nestles himself snuggly inside her, and her walls pulse around him, gripping him tightly.

"Move," she begs. "Please, move."

He doesn't want to move yet. He wants to stay inside her, where it's warm, and perfect; he wants to absolutely live inside her tight and wet pussy. But for her? He'll do anything, so he begins thrusting, slowly at first, and then he begins to pick of speed. The perfect little mewls release from her mouth and he watches her eyes close with ecstasy. He can't remember the last time he had sex in the missionary position, but it has it's merits, like watching the woman of his dreams orgasm around him or feeling her legs tighten around his waist in a vice-like grip. He finds her clit between them and flicks it with his finger, her beautiful moans the response he was looking for.

"I'm gonna come," she says. He can see her beautiful face, red with want, mouth open and little, pink tongue flicking against her lips. This is the moment he's been waiting for all his life: Sakura, the girl of his dreams, coming around his cock, because of him. He can't ask for anything more. She finishes, and her cunt tightens around him, an impossible grip that rips his orgasm from him. He finishes deep inside her, and as she settles beneath him, content and sated, he doesn't want to pull out. He kisses her delicate neck as she runs his fingers through his hair and sighs, dreamily.

Finally, she says, "you're heavy."

He huffs. "There isn't a lot of room."

She rolls her eyes. "Get on your back."

He pulls out of her slowly, and she whines when he does. They switch positions, so he's on his back, and she's on top of him, naked and soft, her leg swung over his. "Better?"

"Yeah," he agrees. "Sakura, that was…"

"It was," she agrees, and she kisses him, casually. She's a lovely kisser, not too much tongue and she tastes sweet. He wonders if she tastes herself when she kisses him.

"You're even better than I imagined."

She tightens are grip on him. "You imagined me?"

He stares at the popcorn ceiling. "Yes."

"When do you imagine me?" she asks.

Sasuke doesn't say anything. He runs his fingers through her hair, which is much longer than he remembered. He prefers it this way. It makes her look older—she is only 19, he reminds himself. 19 and the woman he's been dreaming about endlessly for the best of four years.

She falls asleep against him. What a good girl, he thinks, falling asleep in his arms after he makes love to her. He presses a kiss to her head, and her temple. Then he gets a better look at her dorm: it's small, with her tiny bed, a desk, and a little dresser. She has a closet and a wrack for a towel, and Sasuke realizes he'll be walking down the hall at some point to use the bathroom. He nearly rolls his eyes; maybe they should have just walked back to his hotel.

That thought goes out the window when he sees the photos Sakura has hanging up in her dorm room. Just seeing photos of her smiling is enough for him to be grateful she allowed him into her home. There are pictures of her from when he first met her, pictures of her with friends he doesn't know, pictures of her with her brother, and her family, from when she was a little girl to maybe a few months ago with her new glasses. She's amazingly photogenic and he has half a mind to sneak one of her photos away. He's trying very hard to deal with all these feelings he's feeling at once.

He never thought he'd find himself, years later, in Sakura's bed, his cum drying between her legs, admitting he's fantasized about her, but here they are. Sasuke closes his eyes, shielding himself from the eyes on the photos that suddenly seem judging. Sasuke did the right thing, and waited, so why doesn't this feel like a victory?

He presses another kiss to her head and dozes off.