PART 1: Mis(s) Matchmaker and Palaver Boy

Chapter 1

I changed some things. To Amezaiku, thank you for your trust. A reader continues being one because of trust:')

SAKURA USED TO THINK that bringing Sasuke back could only mean either one of two things: Naruto's death—because he was a reckless, full bore kind of guy and once he got his fangs sunk deep into someone's leg, he will never let go, metaphorically speaking; Or hers—because she also annoyed Sasuke like a leech, unable to see the rest of her life without him in it.

Two years after the war, after Sasuke's surrender to the village, it finally happened. When Sasuke got released on parole, it was almost autumn and nothing short of a miracle. The appeals they made to the village council had been met with indifference, and even Kakashi's petition had only seemed to fall on deaf ears.

The chill bit crisply in the air, but Sakura was far from cool-headed; it wasn't so often that a miracle fell upon their laps. And whatever comes in this manner, seemed to go away just as easy.

So, as in matters of great importance, she spared no effort. Against her parents' wishes, she moved to a humble place in Shukufuku Area where new medium-rise housings were newly erected, and signed a two-year lease for a posh 1LDK apartment for Sasuke, paying the security deposit on the nose.

She cleared several isles at the nearby convenience store to stock Sasuke's cupboards with supplies to last a month and paid for new furniture while she made do with her old things and gave up snacking to save more money. Naruto did much of the cleaning, of course, despite his one handedness. And while he seemed to have much to say about her extravagance on Sasuke, he mopped the floors rankled and tight-lipped, nerve bulging out his forehead.

After the place gleamed mirror-like, Sakura opted out on a calendar or clock, leaving the walls bare. Almost as if she'd rather Sasuke forget time exists. She even arranged for the apartment manager to send Sasuke's utility bills to her mailbox at the daintier apartment across the street. These are but few countermeasures she considered so he'd have nothing to worry about.

Now, Sasuke's cool, sharp gaze surveyed the furniture, the sisal wall-to-wall carpeting, the white walls, the glass windows.

"Do you hate it?" she gently asked, seeing Sasuke's brows tense at the balcony window where sunshine poured in. She couldn't help cross her fingers behind her. Inadvertently, she glanced at Naruto and he caught her on the hop.

They had much debate on this room's one huge window. She insisted the sun would be good for Sasuke. Naruto argued he'd be more comfortable with a shady, single sliding window, comparing Sasuke's habits to a cave bat. Their tempers got frayed. Naruto was sure he knew better from a man's perspective while Sakura , for all the impulsive decisions she had made to prove her independence, just hated for anybody else but herself to be right.

It was his best opportunity to get back at her, she expected it at that moment. Upon catching her unease, however, Naruto landed a brusque hand on Sasuke's shoulder and hooked his arm around his neck. "Let me tell you if you don't keep the windows open like that and let the sunshine in, they'd think you're up to something, the more they'd keep their eyes on you." Whether intended or not, it was by no means an intimidating act. Naruto could hardly haul Sasuke down, the strength in his ripped bicep hardly compensating his height deficit.

"Let them. I don't mind," replied Sasuke as he shook off Naruto's arm. He did this with such casual grace with not a feature amiss on his somber yet august face and turned to the bedroom.

Naruto flashed Sakura a wink and a thumbs up. She rolled her eyes to cover the smile creeping up on her face.

"Don't do unnecessary things, Lord Naruto," she chided, though in a playful manner. He stiffened almost automatically. Everyone calls him Lord nowadays and it never failed to make him break out in cold sweat.

"Don't call me that. I get goosebumps." Naruto feigned a shudder.

"So long as it sets you straight." Sakura stifled a laugh and flipped her pink hair before checking where Sasuke was.

"Is there anything else you need?" She searched Sasuke's face for any hint of displeasure.

"I'd like to rest," he said and sat on the bed, then reaching down to place his sword below it.

"Okay," she perkily said, pleased with how things are proceeding. She spun around to Naruto. "Didn't you say you have work to do?"

"I do?!" Naruto looked genuinely perturbed.

"The report on last year's papaya harvest—"

"What—?!"

"Or that survey on best waste disposal practices—"

"Wait—!"

Sakura rushed Naruto out of the room and closed the door behind them.

Naruto sulked. "Sak'ra-chan, I've never seen those on my desk. I swear I was very careful where I put stuff this week."

"I made it up, baka." She folded her arms. "Why would I know what you're supposed to be working on?"

Naruto's glum face lighted up. "You had me there." He made a big sigh of relief and laughed, his eyes twinkling.

"He said he wanted to rest." Sakura sweetly smiled. "Our efforts were not in vain. Thank you for everything you did today."

Naruto rubbed the back of his cropped, blond head. "Don't mention it." He smiled back in a relaxed manner, his tender gaze indicating something worthy of note.

"What?" asked Sakura.

"You're prettier happy." His smile widened into his signature grin.

There are times, perhaps more often now that he is a grown man who maintained a neat appearance when Sakura could properly appraise Naruto being on the handsome side. Tanned skin, a husky voice, the will of fire seeming to pervade in the ruddiness of his face and his squarish hands. And for the mere fact that such brief moments made her heart skip a beat or two. Fussed for feeling aberrant, she raised her chin and narrowed her eyes. "It's definitely not because of you," she countered. "All you did was argue I'd be spending way too much. Well, now you see. Sasuke made no word of complaint, so everything was well worth it."

Naruto retracted his happy face, pinched between his eyes, drooped his shoulders. "Geez, you can be hella two-faced. I just complimented you. It wouldn't hurt to treat me like you treat Sasuke," he complained.

"Well…" Sakura pursed her lips petulantly. "I can't help it. You've always caused trouble, it's your fault for conditioning this response from me. But Sasuke's different."

"Yeah, yeah. First day in and he already kicked us out. Should be well worth what you wanted." Naruto snorted and shrugged. "Watch on the spending will ya? You can't go broke. Your mother already banished you and I doubt you'd wanna live with me. I'm never sharing my bed with anybody."

"Argh!" Sakura pulled at her hair. "I can't have a decent conversation with you! Are you really my friend? You sound more like an old fart. And it's not like you're any better. Even if I do run out, I'll never ask for your help!"

After she evicted Naruto out into the stairwell, she went back to clean Sasuke's apartment some more, circling surfaces with a damp cloth while Sasuke remained still on the bed, watching her work.

Dutiful wives did their work quietly. Being gentle and careful are deemed a plus. All the more revered and treasured are those that are understanding, tender in speech, and respectful of individual space. No chitchat even if she were so tempted of otherwise and the silence was almost unbearable. Sakura stroke a line here and there on top of an innocent cabinet, tossed the rug in the bucket, and wrung it as if she were pouring water in a tea ceremony.

"That's enough. I'll do the rest myself," Sasuke said.

"I won't be long…" she replied in a honeyed voice.

"You should go and take a rest, too."

Sakura stopped. Sometimes, she's unable to discern if his downright serious tone indicated he was amicable or irritated. Right now, it seemed more of the latter. As she carefully folded the rug and set it aside, her stomach sank, both from the unfortunate tactical retreat and for skipping out on her usual sandwich to save fifty ryo.

"Just so you know, I live across the street," she begun, lowering her eyes to stare at her freshly painted toenails. "If you look out the window, that's my room right there, on the second floor. So, um… Oh! I almost forgot." She padded to the living room and reached under the settee for an inconspicuous paper bag.

One shy step at a time, she approached Sasuke again. Her heart crashed pounding for an escape out of the confines of her chest, her cheeks burning with a harsh blush.

"For you." She turned her eyes the side as she extended her present to him.

Sasuke shot her a cursory glance and took out the paper bag she held out. Though left with the facility of only one hand, he opened the bag with stately ceremony, fished for the fine, black woolen cloak inside, and held it up in front of him.

She couldn't hide her smile seeing the subtle hints of fascination on his face, the curiosity with which he caressed the fabric. After all, she used a month's worth of salary to have it custom made over at the seamstress. And when he saw the Uchiha fan embroidery on the collar, there was a vague wistfulness that he showed. To an outsider, these things would go unnoticed. But she could see them all. In her heart, she felt impossibly full, ready to burst.

"The compound is gone, but you're still here," she said, sounding choked. "Everyone in your family lives through you. I don't want anyone to forget that."

He didn't say a word. Expectant of his response, Sakura moved a step back—a push and pull sort of thing. "I'll leave now."

As she walked two steps closer to the threshold into the living room, he said, "Thank you, Sakura… For everything."

"Un." She did a shy nod and secretly smiled. He was unable to look at her in the eye, but she knew no words meant more to Sasuke than this.

NARUTO PLANNED TO HEAD straight home after having ramen for dinner. Nine at night when the village gongs alarmed, he found himself taking a detour to Shukufuku Area. No matter how many times he'd come here, it never ceased to amaze him how far Konoha had gone in two years. New high-rise buildings, a supermarket complex, glitzy trend shops. It was as if remnants of the war were magically absorbed by the land, and off it, the dawn of Konoha's new age aborning. Sakura's and Sasuke's new neighborhood was one such development.

The buildings were modern and stunning, the people hanging around in the alleys more polite in ironed linen and slacks while smoking cigars. They tipped off their fedora hats to him and asked what he was doing, all mellow and not ninja-like. Even the electric posts seemed better off. The wires were reeled nice and tidy. Between neighboring balconies, no clotheslines run where tapestries hung as he was used to.

Leaning under a shiny lamppost with his hand in his pocket to get a good look at where his friends were, Naruto felt strangely out of place in his orange cargo pants and sandals. Even Sakura looked fancy in her pink silk pajamas while looking out her window.

She seemed busy going back and forth, though she glanced now and then at Sasuke's apartment.

Sasuke didn't look out. Not even once. Not even after his lights went out. On the opposite side, Sakura stayed to gaze at her window into Sasuke's apartment.

It was a different face she wore, much different from when he'd seen her in the afternoon, all sweet and later becoming riled up.

As he walked home, Naruto couldn't get past thinking about it, hunched into his sweater like a sad old man.

Sakura was right calling him an old fart. He had noticed himself aging rapidly as he got further entrenched into becoming the future Hokage. No wonder Kakashi's hair turned grayer than gray and Tsunade was, in reality, all shriveled up like medicinal dried gecko by the end of her term.

Kakashi had given him a small administrative function as part of the training, but it didn't mean short working hours. Shizune brought him new stacks of documents in the morning, a few he needed to sign, the others, he needed to review. In the afternoon, they'd have classes where Kakashi required of him to do research, take surveys, do the math, and write reports.

His brain had also never been so worn, so ragged by the constant haggling of old geezers to take their daughters or granddaughters as his wife. He sought reprieve in his friends, in level-headed adults like Shizune how to best deal with those kinds of disturbances, and the singular answer he'd gotten was he should date somebody.

He never imagined getting a girlfriend. In this life subject, getting from point A to point B brought Naruto more perplexity than how the former Root got past audits. He couldn't comprehend the logic by which these elderlies go by day in and day out, egging him on to get married so he'd appear more reliable in the future. (Kakashi was a bachelor all his life, yet he deserved an exception or so they told him.)

As for himself, girls flood his mailbox with their confession letters. At times, they approach him to confess while he waits for his order at Ichiraku's. There's also Hinata who he doesn't know how to deal with. She's a precious comrade, strong, kind, and easy on the eyes, but he hasn't gotten around how to talk to her about her confession yet.

His bedtime state of mind used to be clear and microscopic. Getting Sasuke to come back, mastering Rasengan, then, set ablaze with motivation over these simple thoughts, he'd clench his fists, roll on his side to hug his pillow in rage, and close his eyes determined. Somewhere in the drift of sleep, he'd snore, mouth open wide and bubbling, loose from his initial position, draped near the edge of the bed.

Nowadays, sleep was hard to come by. He glanced at his bedside clock to find it flashing 3:16 a.m. Naruto sighed miserably. He no longer panicked as many times before at how he'd spent five hours staring at his ceiling.

Sometime past four, he found himself thinking of Sakura again. Now that Sasuke's back, for sure they'd get together like Sai and Ino. Then they'd get married and have kids.

Where does he fit into the picture? Like a bolt, the thought of his friends getting to the next stage made him sad.

He rolled to his left, restless once more.

He is happy for them. Sasuke will have a family and restore his clan, then Sakura will have her dream come true.

She always gets what she wants, either he let her have it or she found ways herself. And there was only one reason she looked sad looking out her window that Naruto could think of…

"Should've left his curtains open," he muttered. He pulled more of his blanket around himself. As he finally closed his eyes, there came a dull rapping at his door. His eyes shot wide. "Who's there?"

"It's me." Sasuke. Not only from the voice, but Naruto could also tell by the chakra. Though it didn't make it less shocking how Sasuke got there faster than a blink.

"Y-Yo…" Naruto hesitantly got up. "What's the matter?"

"Let's spar. For old time's sake."

Naruto grinned, flung away his blanket, and carelessly got out of bed. "You bet I waited for this!"

A mile from the east side of the river lay the gullies. These were areas untended to by reconstruction. Strips of earth lay bare, cracked and swirling with dust. Dried roots of trees upturned casted eerie shapes in the dark which many unsuspecting tourists searching for haunted capers mistook for an abandoned graveyard of long-forgotten beasts. The fog was thicker there.

Naruto didn't mind the bite of cold on the tip of his nose. He tore after Sasuke, working up a sweat. They raced as far as the barricades into the southern border. Each blow directed on each other showed no signs of holding back. Only pure zeal for competition and showing off technique, on who mastered taijutsu better with a regrettable singular arm until the most awaited limb reattachment surgery by Tsunade.

By the time sunshine bathed the meadows, sparkles glinting from the smallest dews clinging to the weeds, both men were on their backs, gasping for air. Though out of breath, Naruto was laughing, filled with euphoria. For the first time, he was truly happy for Sasuke to be back. Catching up to the familiar, tasting once again the zing and fizz of boyhood adventure, the pure exhilaration of catching up to the interesting, Naruto beamed at the sky in relief.

Sasuke stayed silent, his eyes trained at the pure, clear sky. Naruto thought it a good chance to tell him to keep his window curtains in front of Sakura's apartment open. But Sasuke's face looked so blank and peaceful that Naruto smiled to himself and followed suit. His eyelids blinked slow and heavy.

"I'm leaving the village," said Sasuke.

"Hn?" Naruto drowsily hummed. As the words sank in, he did a double-take and jerked alert, raising his head. "What? Like, right now?"

"Ah."

"Where are they sending you? But you just got out."

Sasuke didn't answer immediately. "No. It's not a mission like that. I'm setting out on a journey for good. I already got Kakashi's permission."

Naruto's brows furrowed in deep thought. "So what? You're gone for two to three weeks then be back."

"No. As much as possible I'd like to stay out of the village."

"That's crap." Naruto clenched his fist and slammed it hard on the ground producing a dent. "That's crap, you hear me! What's it about this time? Are you still angry with the village? That's crap." He got up and stood in front of Sasuke, huffing, and overshadowed him. "What are you even angry about? I'm the future Hokage so why don't you take it all out on me right now, huh? Forget leaving the village, let's settle this now, once more."

Sasuke only snickered. He was a sly dude, full of secretive thoughts. And it irritated Naruto to no end when he made it appear like he was always a hundred steps away from anybody else.

"I didn't think you'd miss me too much, dobe. I'm almost touched."

"Cut the crap, Sasuke. It's not funny. I've already given my all just to get to come back. If you wanna start all over again, I'd go after you all over again!"

When Sasuke stood, he had a calm look on his face. "It's not what you think. I'm doing this for myself. For my atonement. Besides, it's my life. You can't take responsibility for the things I did in the past or where I'm headed to in the future." Sasuke patted him on the shoulder.

"What about Sakura?" Saying her name almost brought Naruto to tears. She had been so happy buying things for Sasuke's apartment, set aglow by his presence in the village. He couldn't exactly pinpoint why he felt this way. As if his heart was being wrung out to rip to pieces imagining Sakura's big disappointment. "You're gonna…" He gripped Sasuke's arm with every ounce of strength he could muster to inflict the pain he felt inside. "You're gonna leave her?"

Sasuke didn't even flinch. "Sakura has no business being with me."

"How could you do this to her?!" Naruto's voice turned gruff. He snagged Sasuke by the collar of his shirt. "She only ever had you in mind. She's your home now, Sasuke! Don't miss this."

"You're confused about something. If you're encouraging her to go to me, you're not making her any better than someone who didn't know any good. Don't allow her to go after the man who tried to kill her many times. Don't let her be a fool."

"That just proved she was willing to die for you!" Naruto threw in a punch aimed at Sasuke's face. Sasuke caught his fist, looking down at Naruto who was red-faced out of desperation as he was gelid and without pity.

"We're not the same," said Sasuke. "I wasn't there for her. That was you. Think who deserves her more if you truly care about her, that is. You'd never let her get the short end of the stick."

Naruto growled and his wrist gave in. It was as if all strength had left him. No, Sasuke didn't use any underhanded tricks. Only, for the first time, he was without defense, no fight in his knuckles, the will of fire fizzling to timid smoke. Being thrust into that spot by Sasuke, he realized he was a big coward and gently dropped on his knees, fingers digging into the red soil.

"Please, Sasuke." Naruto breathed out shakily. "Please reconsider. She… she waited for you for so long."

Sasuke turned on his heels. "What Hokage is this pathetic? So this is all it'd take to get you to bow down."

DM Corner:

Prayers from my corner of the world to yours. Be strong and of a good courage.

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With love.

God will take care of you.