"Tadaima" chapter 2: Rippled echoes, a drown petal

[ethereal-moonrain]

How many times did he pass this crossroad with her? How many times did he walk pass through this road without even looking back? How many times did he turn his back and ignore her?


How many times did she say ‘I love you’?


And how many times did he not listen?


--How many times did this place taste her bitter tears mixing with the rain?



How many times? How many lies? How many tears? How many losses?


---Would there still be a next time for them to waste?


Would there be?


“Tadaima”

by: ethereal-moonrain


~***~

Chapter 2: Rippled echoes, a drowned petal


Another day inside my world

I’m married to you and this road

This road that do not let me sleep

So there’s no way to escape these demons I am forced to keep

Then I find you here

Thru your eyes everything’s clear

And I’m home inside your arms

But I’m alone for now.

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Closing the door, she slid her back down until she had finally reached the floor to sit, hugging her knees with both her arms. A position she grew accustom into.


“Oka-san—Is my new friend the one you’ve been waiting to return?” And she didn’t answer. Is Sasuke still the one she’s waiting for now?


The hands of the wall clock had pointed to seven. She bluntly wipes her tears away and stood to open the door again to face the already calming weather. “I have a mission tonight I might not be back until tomorrow so don’t stay up and wait for me.” With that said she leave.


“Oka-san . . .” little Aiko look down to her tea she was currently drinking, and a pair of green eyes looks back . . .


-----------------------------------


Somehow the clouds have managed to move on, leaving the streets emptier now without the rain.


Sasuke stopped walking for a while, realizing he was on this very same path again, the one he used to walk on with her. And the same split road he uses to cross with her every time the day ends for team seven, the road that separates them, a path leading to his own house and the other to hers.


This is--- the road that had received a thousand of greetings-- and million goodbyes . . .


--Were both significant and insignificant things happened.


He looked at the direction leading to Sakura’s old home and at the corner of his eyes he saw a petal of cherry blossom fall with the cold spring air. His eyes widened when he saw her—standing there, slowly laying her right fist onto her chest the left one dangling on her side. She was looking like the way she looks before he left her.

She opened her mouth to speak but no words came . . .


Like those times before---


-----------------------------


(Flashback)


Sasuke walked silently with Sakura three paces behind. Reaching the very familiar crossroad she stopped. And both knew what is coming next, something that repeatedly happen everyday.


She nervously put her right fist onto her chest looking at him.

“Sasuke-kun . . .I-- love you.” And as usual he replied with only a sigh, continuing walking away without even turning back not even bothering to listen. And that is when tears started to roll down her cheeks falling down to reach the ground.


(End of Flashback)


--------------------------------


Like those times she speaks and he didn’t listen . . .


The nocturnal air blew erasing the illusion in front of him. He looked down into the puddle of water were the petal fell. For a moment he thought he saw a pair of crying emerald eyes looking back at him.


And now he couldn’t and maybe wouldn’t hear it from her anymore. Wouldn’t see her trailing behind—wouldn’t stop to say how much she love him--


Then one petal fall from the tree, rippling the reflection in the water, memories fading—like a voice of a distant star.


-----------------------------------

There was a sudden blow, sending her body on the nearby river. Water splashes into the nearby leaves and slowly falling down, as if trying to tell somebody about the incident.

She was losing it. It was getting harder for her to breathe every second. The blood was now mixing with the water, and she was going down—below under.


And all the things she sees—all the things she hears – were moving far . . . far away, each seconds making her distant from the world she knew.


All the things—all the things she knew were now walking away from her. Moving farther apart away---


Away . . .


--------------------------------


It was another morning and yet the sun has decided to stay back for another batch of clouds to cry for the whole day. Sasuke had realized he had stayed the whole night outside.


He was the one who told them to move on--


Nobody actually knew Uchiha Sasuke was back except for Sakura and her daughter. And that is why—nobody even bothers to tell him she was now dying.

Clinging onto life, that had never been good to her.


--But the truth is—he was the one who didn’t move on--




But for another second he was discovered still on the same path. “Sasuke?”


He figured to just stay quiet while his former teammate look over him as if he had gone from the death to only come back just to surprise him.


“Y-you’re here.” His voice was low and yet audible for Sasuke to hear. “Oh my god! Sakura-chan --”


“I’ve already met her yesterday, Naruto.”


--he was the one who stayed back--


“But Sasuke, Sakura-chan is at the hospital right now.” The dark eyed boy couldn’t hide his surprise and turned to his companion.


“But she was—when did she--?”


“She was found by an ANBU lying on the river bend last night around eleven” Sasuke knew that Naruto was still saying something but he couldn’t hear them all now, his mind was struggling to understand but was failing.


Sasuke had started to run by his instinct not even sure if he still remember the way to the hospital. But somehow he still did, judging to where he was standing right now.


--on that same road.


----------------------------------

He went on the bedside, witnessing the rise and fall of her chest, the rhythmic sounds of machine trying to help her, the strange smell of the hospital . . .


The image of her facial features was cut by translucent wires; A tube grew like a long weed stem from the side of her parted mouth and reached endlessly into her throat; Another lay evenly across her cheeks, below the slight curl of her nose. Somewhere near the bed, a metal box of a machine was loudly sighing to the hardly visible rhythm of her chest.


It was actually more than he could bare, though he had seen more, more drastic, in fact this wasn’t a bit of horrible sight but to see her lying down in there almost half-dead with only the stirring machines helping her was more than the word ‘horrible’ itself.


Even how much he denies it she does appears like she’s facing upward at her open grave, only waiting for the dirt that would come and finish her off, making her officially dead.


He does know that she was still something that existed, something that was still alive. But she couldn’t open her eyes, couldn’t speak, she could no longer even breathe on her own.


This couldn’t be happening at all. He had just met her after so many years and now it would only be like this? It can’t be. She was too brilliant, her smile was too sweet, and he would forever deny that she would be gone, taken—away from him. No—not anymore, not this time, not like this, he was confident that he wouldn’t lose her.


She meant too much to him.


Sasuke moved a little bit closer to her, sitting down on the chair beside the bed. He took her hands into his giving it a soft squeeze. But still she didn’t move.


She looks more fragile now, he once thought of this too back then, she cries so easily on the simplest things, and now it was much worst. She was actually the most delicate person he met. And right now at her state it seems that her hands would even detach from her body once pulled. It was like yesterday he was squeezing this same hand to suppress the pain from Orochimaru’s curse, the same hand that would reach out for him every time he would fall, the hands that rested on his heart when he was being taken over by the curse fighting with the sound-nin.


The same hand he used to push away.


He wanted to gaze at her eyes right now. Those eyes, so impossibly bright and green. Those eyes that had shown him so many emotions he doesn’t have. But she couldn’t open them right now. And when he calls her name those long lashes wouldn’t flutter.


“They said she’ll be alright for now, but they need to confirm it when she woke up.” Sasuke was startled he was too caught up with his emotion that he didn’t notice a presence nearby.


“Frankly speaking, I didn’t expect that you would defeat Itachi at the age of 19, let alone return in one piece and alive.”


“And it seems that you’re not glad that I did, Kakashi-sensei” the atmosphere in the room changes, it was very uncomfortable and unnerving. Kakashi leans on the wall just beside the door.
“I think it is better that you would leave before she even wakes up Sasuke.”


“And why is that?” there was something in Sasuke’s voice that makes Kakashi’s ears twitched.


“We could have assassinate you for coming with Orochimaru, but things do have their own way.”


“Then how about Sakura? You know she’s with Itachi right? You can’t hide it from me.” Sasuke was taunting him; it clearly shows into the tone of his voice.


“What are you up to Sasuke?” Kakashi didn’t really answer Sasuke’s question, he was aware of the dangerous glare from Sasuke and he didn’t like that one bit.


“You like her, do you?” Sasuke speaks out, making Kakashi’s lazy eyes widened than normal.


Luckily, the doctor came in temporarily breaking the dark atmosphere in the room. He walked closer to the bed, to the opposite side of Sasuke.


“Aside from the deep wound she received near her chest was little scratches probably because of struggle.” Both other occupants of the room stayed quite for the time being. Maybe both were fleeting somewhere.


The doctor asked some question if there’s someone after her, they went to the Hokage’s office and found out she doesn’t have any mission assigned that time. The two of them shook their heads. Who would gain something by killing her? They weren’t really sure about the motive of this person was it to cut her until she had lost too much blood to struggle? And then slit her throat viciously to draw the air from her a little faster? Then left her on the river for the world to find? Who could have done this?

After some minutes of silence the doctor spoke again. “We’re very sorry, but it is very important that you tell us anything you know. Because whoever did this-- raped her too.”


Both Sasuke and Kakashi gasp, they know she was in so much pain, but to go as far as this was—unbearable.


Sasuke holds her hand tightly bringing his lips down to kiss it. She . . .


...She must have cried out when this happened to her. Must have had her eyes open, staring openly at her attacker.


“And aside from the stab on her chest, there is one more lethal injury on her head. It would be hard for her when she wakes up, I do not mean just physically but her mentality too, and if not—she might actually don’t remember anything. She was even lucky she survive. Maybe it would be better if she would just forget, rather than let her suffer” the doctor shook his head and muttered a low apology then leave.


Sasuke glance at her again, Sakura do look as if she was frozen. Trapped in her very own world, a place no one knows, a place even maps has yet to know.


Maybe-- Sasuke thought,



he was losing her,



no—



Maybe he had lost her.




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Author’s notes: Anywho! I hope you like this chapter!

[csmlee]

I love your little pre-chapter character introspective speeches.

But but but! Poor Sakura-chan! And poor Aiko-chan! No one is going to take care of her now that Sakura is in the hospital!

And Kakashi-sensei likes Sakura too? So... what stopped him from pursuing Sakura during the time when Itachi and Sasuke were away? Or I'm guessing he understands he will never hold a place in Sakura's heart like Sasuke (and perhaps even Itachi)?

And it's about time for Sasuke to realize Sakura means a lot to him! *whacks him* Men are so dumb! They can't figure out the simplest thing even if it's set out right in front of their eyes!

So... Sasuke is going to find those bastards who did all this to Sakura and kill them, right?