50 sentences on Sakura and Sasuke
Pairing:
SasuSaku
Rating:
PG-13/T
Notes:
for the lj comm 1sentence, theme set Alpha.
various side-pairings, past-pairings, one-sidedness
included/implied.
01 - comfort
"I don't think he could have loved you," Sai offers, almost pensively, in front of Sasuke's grave.
02
- kiss
"Let's
be very clear," Naruto says, his eyes intense and serious and
without, for once, the faintest trace of humour, "I am only
helping you with this for Sakura-chan's sake and because I never,
ever want to hear even one more word about the fucking
apocalyptic tragedy,
quote Sakura-chan, that was your first kiss, got it?"
03
– soft
He's
always found her vaguely insignificant, female, overly-emotional and
easily-thwarted, suffocating him like the Leaf with her warm
sweetness and her tears; and then one night, he returns to Team
Hebi's encampment to find Naruto and the replacement watching over
Juugo and Karin – who are both immobilised with strong chakra seals
– and Sakura unwrapping instruments he's seen between Kabuto's
hands, and ordering Suigetsu to tell her where's Sasuke.
04
– pain
Sakura
has cried too many tears for him; thus, when Orochimaru's voice
utters her name with a drawl that is a mockery of Sasuke's, she
steels her arm and lets go.
05
– potatoes
"If
you're hoping to lure him back here, you'd better learn how to cook,"
Ino deadpans in the face of Sakura's best effort at – burning water
with something in it? – and Naruto waves the problem away, saying
that Sasuke cooks well enough for two anyway; the remark sends Ino
into a blinking daze, and leaves only Sakura to wonder how
Naruto knows this.
06
– rain
He glances right, then left, and ignores the smile she's doing
her best to repress but which is still threatening, trembling at the
corners of her lips, and he heroically resists the urge to activate
the Sharingan to make sure no-one's watching and instead he tips his
head back and opens his mouth wide, the drops running down his face;
"You have to wag your tongue to taste it," Sakura's helpful
voice rings, and, after a beat, he does.
07
– chocolate
Naruto
is intransigent; no matter how much
Sasuke loathes sweets, and no matter how much
Sakura's cooking is a S-rank jutsu in disguise, he will
have to eat and like
the chocolates Sakura is bound
to make for him, with her own
two hands,
because it's traditional; unless he'd rather she experimented with
tomato-flavoured chocolate, Naruto adds perversely and doesn't bother
to hide his grin when Sasuke stops dead.
08
– happiness
Waiting for Kakashi-sensei on the bridge, Sakura alternatively
sighs after Sasuke and yells at Naruto; years later, she pushes all
of her energy into Sasuke's flickering life force as Naruto puts his
hands on hers, so she can use his near-endless chakra supply.
09
– telephone
After
the twentieth completely stupid person who came up to her to ask if
the twentieth completely ridiculous rumour concerning Sasuke's
apparently completely unexpected return to the Leaf is true, Sakura
loses it and makes a scene that gives the gossips something
completely new to talk about.
10
– ears
"Wow,
you really suck at this, bastard," Naruto comments, and Sasuke's
already faintly pink ears turn a shade of red previously unknown
outside of the Uchiha fan as he realises his dead-last clumsy pimp
teammate has witnessed Sasuke's pitiful fumbling stunted attempts to
ask his other teammate on a date.
11
– name
She
always attached a '-kun' to his name – it annoys him, like
everything she does, but he only thinks to question the habit years
after he's become a traitor and she still calls him 'Sasuke-kun'; and
that's when he realises that to her, it's his name.
12
– sensual
Sakura
lazily stretches, long and languid like a young cat; time stills in a
moment made of clothes crumpled after training, cheeks streaked with
dirt, and sunshine kissing her sweaty pink locks, and then Naruto
says something Sasuke isn't listening to and Sakura straightens, her
body tight and controlled once more; Sasuke looks away to find
Kakashi gazing evenly at him, and he bristles without wanting to.
13
– death
His
long-ago dying promise, I
never want to see people I care about dying in front of me,
flits through his mind at the same time as his annoyance that he'll
never get to kill his brother now,
and his unspoken shock that he jumped in front of Sakura, not even
Naruto, but Sakura;
he only hopes that she will be strong enough to flee now, flee and
cling to life and forget him and not try to take Itachi on her own,
and he would like to tell her that, and that it's neither Sakura's
fault nor Itachi's if Sasuke was stupid enough to get killed by the
one person he
was supposed to kill, but he feels his lips moving and no sound comes
out.
14
– sex
She
swore, a long time ago, that she wouldn't be left behind again, but
some things she's never managed to outgrow; she's unaccountably
elated when she realises that for this at least, he's waited for
her.
15
– touch
Sasuke
wakes up with Sakura's hands on him; it takes him a moment to realise
she's healing his wounds.
16
– weakness
Her
punch catches him in the chest, making his heart skip a beat.
17
– tears
"Are
you… crying?"
he asks incredulously (Sakura crying, who—),
but then she looks up and her smile is neither sad nor fake; she
shifts her body away from the table, and he can see that she's only
peeling onions.
18
– speed
Sasuke
is fast, fast enough that he could match Itachi in that last battle;
but recently, he's become aware that Sakura is faster still – it
took him years to reach the point she stood at before he left, to
reach the point where he wants to say, 'I love you'.
19
– wind
"Let's
go," Sakura snaps at a blinking Sasuke among the rumbles of what
used to be a cell wall, "we're breaking you out, Naruto'll catch
up with us later," she says as the echoing cry of "Rasengan!"
seems to shake Sasuke out of his stupor; he opens his mouth to speak,
then closes it and starts moving (good,
Sakura thinks fiercely).
20
– freedom
So
Sasuke's under house arrest, big deal; it's not like Sakura can't
move in with him.
21
– life
They
tell her to let go, grow up, forget him, yet she's stronger in that
she never does.
22
– jealousy
There
are many perfectly avowable reasons why Sakura hates Uchiha Itachi,
and at least one more that is not.
23
– hands
Sasuke
is uneasy when they walk together through Konoha, when they meet
people they know – people she knows – and he wants to drop her
hand and go back to the compound (it wouldn't be a shock, he's never
done well with human contact), but Sakura, of course, only squeezes
his hand tighter.
24
– taste
Ino
takes in the disaster; she looks thoughtful for a moment, then says,
"you know, Forehead, after seeing that… for lack of a better
term and though I shudder to use it, I'll just go with the word
dress,
I think I'm coming to terms with the fact you're going to be Lady
Uchiha."
25
– devotion
Socking
someone in the face never felt so good as when Sakura punches her new
replacement
teammate in the jaw.
26
– forever
"How
long are you going to spend waiting for him?" Ino asks; "how
long are you going to blind yourself?" Tsunade asks; "how
long before you let
go?"
Sasuke hisses.
27
– blood
The
girl is wearing a bride's red gloves, and her eyes are glistening
with the tearful shine of a bride's eyes, her dress is several shades
of red (she's always loved red), and she's looking at him as if, to
her, he is the most precious thing in the world; above and behind
her, he spots a patch of sky and thinks that yes, it would make sense
that they had an outdoor wedding (he can't remember how he forgot,
but it doesn't matter; similarly, it doesn't matter that he can't
remember how far along in the ceremony they are); Sasuke just wants
to tell Sakura that she's never been more beautiful and that he's
happy he's married her.
28
– sickness
Sakura's
lips twist into something of a wry smile, recalling the time when she
imagined taking care of a sick Sasuke with chicken soup and simpering
blushes and when she'd never have imagined battling a cancer for each
of Sasuke's cells; the curse seal is inactive now but is eating at
him, its darkened flames covering a little more of his skin everyday,
and she hasn't found yet the seal that will put an end to its growth,
and Sasuke doesn't interrupt her anymore when she tells him about her
progress – she is
making progress because she refuses to let go – with a "you're
annoying" she knew she would miss.
29
– melody
The
snake's hisses are coming regularly, rhythmically, like the lullaby
that he's forever reminded of and that forever reminds him of her,
a worthless memory from a worthless D-rank mission he's supposed to
have left behind;
"You have no idea what I'm thinking about," Sasuke hisses
at the animal – a real animal, one that cannot talk or understand
him, not a summon, one that doesn't know a thing about girls with
flower names and bittersweet childhood songs and wouldn't be able to
tell Orochimaru even if Sasuke started talking – and he pretends
that the following hiss doesn't resemble his master's laugh.
30
– star
In
the middle of the fight, there's suddenly a lull and Sakura feels
time stretching to a stop, hears only the blood pounding in her ears,
as she sees with sudden clarity, like in slow motion and more than
fifty meters away, a dark-haired head turning to reveal a pale,
handsome face, and she crazily hears herself think "And
here is the star of the show."
31
– home
He
thought Konoha wasn't his home, but his years in Sound have taught
him that he carries it in the very way he breathes; that must explain
the pleasant warm feeling when he crosses paths with her, when
they're so far away from the village that it might as well never
exist.
32
– confusion
"Your
face
when Sakura-chan sent you flying, man!"
33
– fear
Sasuke's
face and Orochimaru's laugh.
34
- lightning/thunder
She'd
recognise the Chidori's colour anywhere, even when she's too far to
hear its trills, she'd remember it even if the sound didn't haunt her
nightmares, so when she sees the pale bluish reflection on a
blood-red rock, she breaks into a dash.
35
– bonds
"We're
a team, Sasuke-kun," Sakura patiently repeats as Naruto
viciously kicks Sasuke, who is bruised and bloodied and not in a
state to defend himself, much less call upon the curse seal –
"listen to Sakura-chan, fucker!"
36
– market
"I
hear he's not on the market anymore," Ino says with an
interested gleam in her eyes beneath her nonchalance, "well
done,
Forehead."
37
– technology
"This,"
Kakashi says cheerfully, holding up a bit of plastic Sasuke is trying
his utmost to pretend is not
really there really,
"is called a condom;
use it if you don't want Sakura to kill you."
38
– gift
Sakura's
routine doesn't change for her birthday, or Sasuke's, or even the
anniversary of the day he left, there are too many loving people
surrounding her on those days trying to make sure she's alright,
trying to make her forget; but it's on her routine birthday that she
found the date of the Uchiha massacre.
39
– smile
She
wants to tell them it's not a smirk, it's a smile,
but the three people in the world who matter to Sasuke already know,
so she doesn't and just enjoys it when it's directed at her.
40
– innocence
Sakura's
father is looking at him with hard suspicious eyes, and Sasuke wants
to tell him that his intentions, honourable or otherwise, should be
the least of this man's worries, not when his daughter's would-be
suitor has tried to kill
her
in the past.
41
– completion
On
the first day of his trial, Sasuke knows that he will be executed,
and he almost wishes that he could tell Kakashi he's sorry to destroy
his last chance at a vicarious happy future through his two other
students; on the last day of his trial, he is surprised to have a
Leaf hitai-ate handed back to him, but less so than by Naruto's
bawling, making him look tired and small after every day he has stood
to Sasuke's defence, glaring and awe-inspiring in his stupidity; on
the next day, he isn't sure what to think when someone knocks at
Naruto's apartment where Sasuke is assigned for now and he hears
Naruto opening the door, and a moment of silence, and then the door
closes again and Sakura enters the living room, alone and calm.
42
– clouds
Sasuke
isn't surprised by the storm brewing on Tsunade's brow, nor by the
cutting lecture she aims at both his teammates but more particularly
Sakura, but he is startled by her resigned sigh and her reluctant
admission that she'll see what she can do about the Council.
43
– sky
"Hi!"
Ino says brightly, dragging a wet and slightly reluctant Naruto by
the sleeve as soon as Sasuke (his expression
grumpy-turning-sour-by-the-second, his clothes askew and his hair in
wild disarray) has opened the door, "we were just walking by and
it started raining something awful, and since your house was closer
we thought you'd let us stay until it stops – oh, you're here
Forehead, that's a surprise, I hope we're not interrupting anything,
are we?"
44
– heaven
It's
the end, he's done it, Itachi is dead and Orochimaru is perfectly
locked away in his mind and he is freer than he has ever been,
euphoric and drunk on victory – and now he can turn toward her and
tell her that he's coming back, because this is the happiest he has
ever been and everyone deserves to feel that way, but especially
her.
45
– hell
He
turns to look at her, drenched in Uchiha Itachi's blood, but this
isn't what makes Sakura want to scream; it's how Sasuke's smile is
Orochimaru's, and his eyes are Itachi's.
46
– sun
Sun
lotion: Sakura learns to cherish it after she sees Sasuke looking
like a boiled lobster at the end of the afternoon; aspirin: Sasuke
learns to stuff a small quantity in the drawer of the bedside table,
in prevision for when Sakura says that there are no medical jutsus to
soothe sunburns; gloating: Naruto learns to tune it obnoxiously up,
as Sasuke is in too much pain to do anything about it and Sakura is
studiously avoiding looking at either of them.
47
– moon
The
moon grows and fades and disappears every month; when Sasuke comes
back, she will never let him vanish again.
48
– waves
"I
AM NOT A WATER TYPE!" Sakura bellows into Sasuke's ear when he
exposes his plan to subdue Hoshigaki Kisame, which involves raising a
prison out of sea water and hinges mainly on Sakura's supposed
ability to pull major suitons off; Naruto watches Sasuke work his
mouth soundlessly as he tries to readjust his world view while Sakura
rages on about predictability and smug ice cold handsome jackasses
who never bother to look at her instead of through
her, and Naruto is having so much fun
that he's almost willing to forgive Sasuke for falling rapidly in
love with Sakura.
49
– hair
"Their
kids will have pink fowl hair that will clash horribly with the
Sharingan, and
they'll have big scowly foreheads,"
Ino announces in drunken heartbreak, and Naruto nods gloomily.
50
– supernova
Every
time she sees a falling star, Sakura makes a wish.