DateMe Entry for December. Pairing-SasuHina

And nope, I do not own Naruto. At all. Nada. Zip. Nothing. I'm not even on Kishi's will. *sigh*

Timeless

She's there again, sitting by his tree post in his training grounds, crying her eyes out for probably some stupid girl reason.

He frowns, knowing he probably wouldn't mind her crying if she would just do it somewhere else rather than where he trains. Her weakness throws him off balance, as much as he hates to admit it, since as an Uchiha, stupid things like girls crying aren't supposed to affect him in the first place.

"Why," he sighs in exasperation, flinging his training supplies on the ground, "Are you here again?"

She looks up at him, making him wince slightly at the sight of her tear-streaked face, and slides the back of her hand across her face to wipe away the tears coating her cheeks.

"I-I'm sorry," she mumbles, "for troubling y-you, U-Uchiha-kun."

He rolls his eyes at her politeness, wondering how she can even see, and eyes her dirt-matted form. He suddenly feels a sense of admiration filling him, since this is a girl—or at least he thinks she is—and girls don't like getting dirty, calling it icky and other things he can't name at the moment.

So, in a strange sense of companionship, he leans down to her level, scrutinizing her muddy knees with a kind of fascination he reserves only for when Itachi devours plates and plates of dango. It suddenly occurs to him that she's crying so there has to be a reason for it.

"You're crying. Why?"

She chokes slightly on her spit and Sasuke goes starry-eyed for a second because he has never ever heard a girl do that before.

"B-because… Neji-niisan s-said there's a m-monster under my b-b-bed," she whispers in a hushed voice before she digs her face into her knees in an attempt to muffle her new round of tears.

Her explanation astounds Sasuke because he has never heard of such a thing. A monster? Under a person's bed?

"Is it some sort of new shinobi training?" he asks eagerly, wondering how he can get a hold of one.

The girl looks at him with a startled expression. "I-I don't k-know…" She wipes her tears one last time as a slow frown starts to grow on her lips. Sasuke watches her expression change warily, wondering if maybe now that she can see, she'd start blinking and unblinking her eyes like those other girls do.

"W-would it h-help with m-my reflexes?" she says aloud, while Sasuke wonders if he's died and gone to heaven since no normal girl would ever ask that.

Thinking that, perhaps this girl could actually make the cut to be one of his friends—grudgingly on his part, he reminds himself, since as an Uchiha, he can't have friends and actually like being with them—Sasuke nods his head fervently.

"Yeah, it could grab our feet when we get off our beds, that way we learn to dodge it." Sasuke ponders on the idea, wondering what else a monster could help with. He's surprised when he hears the girl start to speak, a serious expression on her face.

"I-if it tries to get us when we're sleeping… w-we'll learn to be on our guard at a-all times like Iruka-sensei says w-we should."

Sasuke's so stunned he can't even speak, because her idea is actually smart and it came from a girl.

"M-maybe I'll actually l-like my monster," murmurs the girl.

Just as it is his first time actually talking to a girl, it is also his first time being jealous of one. Sasuke curls his fist but determinedly says nothing, because worse than actually being jealous of a girl is letting the girl know it.

"You will," he says, hoping she doesn't catch the slight desire in his voice that she won't.

She surprises him when she shakes her head hesitantly. "N-no, I won't…" The girl focuses her wide eyes on him, making Sasuke start because although he's seen Hyuuga eyes before, he's never ever seen them look quite so lavender.

"D-do you think…" she begins slowly, "W-we can share him? I d-don't want a monster under m-my bed all the time…"

Sasuke freezes, having no doubt that he must be dreaming, because it's impossible that a girl has offered him a gift more precious, more valuable than even a training session with his older brother. He reasons that although Itachi-niisan's training sessions are always fruitful, a monster will always be there to test his strength, not just when nii-san feels like it.

"Yeah…" he mutters, a plan already formulating in his mind as to how best to optimize the performance of the monster. "Let's share him."

The word "share" comes out clumsily because he's not used to sharing—he's the youngest child of a rich and powerful clan, after all—but he decides it might actually be a nice word when he sees the Hyuuga girl smile, her entire face brightening in the action.

She wonders if had she been faster, had dodged more efficiently, had moved more fluidly like the river currents she enjoys watching so much, would she have won her match against Neji-niisan?

The answer to that frightens her because she's still not sure if it would have made a difference.

She forces her thoughts away from the depression, and instead imagines what her ramen-loving crush is doing. She smiles at the thought of him—bright and always-smiling, with so much more to his loud personality than what first appearances make him out to be—because secretly, he has always been her prince, her light in the all-consuming darkness.

Despite the fact that she is enlivened by the mere image of him, tears still find a way to stubbornly course down her cheeks, because she knows he had been cheering her on, not even acknowledging the fact that she is a failure—she realizes, in the midst of feebly wiping away her tears, that he has always been a failure, at least to those seeing, not watching—and yet, she still lost. In front of him, the boy she admires, she failed to succeed in her goal; she failed to change.

She hates that even though she tried so hard—to the point that her life came very close to ending, Kiba and Kurenai-sensei make sure to constantly remind her—nothing has changed, nothing at all.

It's frustrating, as much as she hates to admit it.

The sound of her window sliding open startles her, the person sneaking in's harsh breathing drawing her attention. She forces herself to stop crying because crying would really mean she hasn't changed at all and wasn't it a part of her ninja way to not go back on her words, meaning she obviously shouldn't be crying over something as trivial as her crush being disappointed in her.

"You're crying," a dull voice intones.

Hinata pauses because she knows who this is, never mind the staggering sense of déjà vu suddenly overtaking her.

"S-Sasuke-san?"

She gasps when she looks up and sees his exhausted form, the bandages around his neck looking infinitely more serious than the ones encircling her chest. His dark spikes are drooping and he is leaning against the wall as if without it, he wouldn't be able to stand upright.

Still, even in his drained state, he sends her a smirk.

"I checked," he says in a low voice, his body inching towards her hospital door. "And there was nothing under your bed."

Her heart flutters in her chest when she realizes that he still remembers that fateful day in the training grounds—when young girl cried because of monsters under her bed and young boy desired for one under his—despite the fact that, to her, it has become all but a distant memory.

"Which means," he says as he slips out the door, "You're crying for a different reason."

The door slides shut silently; the action is simple in hindsight and disguises the fact that just hours earlier, the door had squeaked in protest when moved.

Hinata stares mutely at the door for the next few minutes, wondering when such a vast distance had grown between them.

He walks through the emptying streets of an unnamable town—he ignores the fact that it is only unnamable to him because Orochimaru has already issued the order to destroy it—avoiding the random assorted vegetables littering the dusty ground from failed attempts to steal a cabbage or two. A passing wind sends chills across his chest, his new haori doing little to protect him from the elements, but he pays it no mind.

His meandering steps take him past a children's playground, a pair of swings still moving, as if the persons swinging on it have just jumped off for a brief second with intentions of returning.

Sasuke sends one last glance at it, wondering if, through Orochimaru's twisted way of seeing things, the playground will be spared. He shoves those thoughts away—he is an avenger now; he doesn't have time for trifling things like sparing a playground—and mentally claims this place as his first visit when night falls.

He tenses when the cry of a child reaches his ears, his body already reacting to the sound. A kunai is hidden in his sleeve as he scours the area in front of him, searching for the crying child, but the only person in sight is a young girl who appears as if she is looking for something. Sasuke slips behind a nearby tree and watches the ragged-looking kid, not for curiosity, but for the sharp blade of the kunai pressing against his skin.

The girl wanders into the trees bordering the playground and Sasuke follows to see her enter the thick underbrush and promptly trip over a tree root. A pained gasp escapes her lips, but she stands back up and wipes away a tear or two from the fall with a determined pout.

She leads him deeper into the thick undergrowth of the woods before finally coming to a stop. He directs his attention forward, watching the girl stand in front of a boy sitting by a tree with a small frown on her face. She scrutinizes the crying boy—Sasuke doesn't miss the slight guilt that flashes across her face when the boy trembles as she brushes her hand against his forehead—before releasing a short sigh.

"Stop crying."

The boy hugs his knees and turns his body away from her, sending her a resolute glare as he leans into the trunk of a tree. Another flash of guilt passes the girl's face before it fades away to anger. She kicks the boy in the leg with a fierce snarl and drags him up by the elbow as a colorful stream of curses, unbefitting of her young age, escape her mouth.

Sasuke observes the scene with interest, taking careful note of some rather creative insults, and wonders what the foul-mouthed young girl will do next to the weak, pathetic boy.

She surprises him yet again when she grabs the boy by the scruff of his dirty shirt and pulls him close. "Look," she snarls, her grip tightening on his collar as a faint red colors her cheeks, "I'm sorry, okay?"

The boy is unceremoniously shoved to the ground as the girl looks anywhere but at him. A slow grin spreads across the boy's face as he jumps up and hugs the girl—Sasuke thinks it is a mistake when the girl punches him square in the nose—only to stand back up with a beaming smile on his face, ignoring the blood dripping down his nose.

"I forgive you, Reika-chan!" he chirps. Sasuke's hand twitches at the boy's embarrassing display—his kunai is getting cold, he muses.

He much more approves of the girl who sends the boy a withering glare. "Good," she all but grunts.

A strange sense of nostalgia builds in him as Sasuke watches her hand the boy a grimy handkerchief before turning around and leaving him. The boy skips after her, humming, as he wipes his nose with tender care.

It's later when he cuts down two children at the playground—one whimpers at the sight of his katana, the other sends him a baleful glare—that Sasuke realizes why.

Innocence is reflected in his blade as crimson blood splatters against his unfeeling skin.

The innocence of childhood days.

"You're crying. Why?"

She chokes when she hears the other boy's question, wondering why he won't just leave her alone. She answers quickly—she trembles at the thought of the monster—and buries her head into her knees, not being able to take his inquisitive gaze any longer nor being able to bear the teasing that is sure to come.

"Is it some sort of new shinobi training?"

It is not his eager question that surprises her, but the fact that there is no rebuff nor insult. She looks at him, stunned, because this is so utterly strange and bewildering. She blinks when she sees that he is waiting for her response and hurriedly stutters out an "I don't know." And then his question hits her again and she realizes that perhaps Neji-niisan had been trying to help her. So she thinks and thinks as to how it would help her, letting a small frown overtake her lips.

"W-would it h-help with m-my reflexes?" she asks, because a monster would definitely be beneficial there and Neji-niisan has already seen her poor reflexes first-hand.

From above, she sees the boy nodding his head in agreement. "Yeah, it could grab our feet when we get off our beds, that way we learn to dodge it."

Again, she is shocked by the Uchiha boy's willingness to talk to her and discuss with her the possibilities of what a monster would bring. So, with a sudden burst of courage, she voices the first thing that comes to mind. "I-if it tries to get us when we're sleeping… w-we'll learn to be on our guard at a-all times like Iruka-sensei says w-we should."

He is quiet for a few moments with a look of deep concentration on his face. Hinata watches his expression in awe, now realizing why so many of her classmates are infatuated with Uchiha Sasuke.

He's really nice… to talk to. And... he has nice hair.

"M-maybe I'll actually l-like my monster," she thinks aloud.

He voices his agreement, but Hinata catches his reluctant tone. She doesn't want him to mad at her, she realizes, nor does she want him to be sad, so she shakes her head, wanting to return the favor that Uchiha Sasuke has so graciously given to her.

"D-do you think… w-we can share him? I d-don't want a monster under m-my bed all the time…"

She looks up at him, wanting him to see the sincerity on her face, but is instead enraptured by the look of complete shock on his. His eyes are a tantalizing abyss of onyx and conceal his emotions so well—much better than hers do, she thinks wistfully—and are framed with the most prettiest eyelashes she has ever seen on a boy.

"Yeah… Let's share him."

His response astonishes her, but by this time, she is used to the feeling. She smiles because although no one has ever wanted to—she only has a blonde-haired prince with eyes the color of the sky—Uchiha Sasuke has somehow become her first friend.

Friend.

She's surprised at how warm it makes her heart, but by this time—she muses that when it comes to Uchiha Sasuke, she will most likely always feel this way—she is used to the feeling.

End.

The first three parts lead into each other well, but the fourth probably seems off, I suppose. In hopes of clarifying the entire thing, I added the last part to show that Hinata has always thought of Sasuke as a friend, no matter how much both have gone through. It's not clear, though, I suppose, and I apologize for that. Originally I thought of rewriting the ending, but SasuHina evades me right now, and I don't really plan on going back to this pairing any time soon. If looking for something more SasuHina-y, I point you in the way of aixyutin's SasuHina for DateMe: "Fairytale."

I do hope that you enjoyed regardless. :)