who Sasuke and Sakura
what a oneshot, AU
where all over the place
when various years
why wanted to try something new

WARNING small section that calls for some sexual maturity – but just a little bit. oh, and something else too. you've been warned.

disclaimer not mine, thank you.

She had known him since elementary school.

Always the quiet, calculated one with the stunning eyes and the super-hairdo, thanks to his cool big brother. The gods of alphabetical order smiled down upon him, as he was always assigned to the back corner, next to the window, enabling him to escape the boring days of ABC's and 123's. Not that it stopped him from being the top student of the third grade, or anything. But he sat back there, emitting a confidence that no normal eight year old should posses.

And then there was her. Back in third grade after a severe bout of mono, all frail and weak and shy and pale. She sat two rows ahead of him on the same side, her forehead seemingly reflecting the light from the window with a small red bow in her pastel hair. Quiet as a mouse, she caught up abnormally fast to the rest of the class and soon took a close second in ranking. But missing out on the beginning of the school year, she had not had the chance to make friends and a spent a majority of her time eating alone during snack and lunch time.

However, the boy had found rival in the girl. And they had forged a friendship. Kind of.

He would sit with her breaks on occasion and give her whatever sweets his mother would pack for him since he did not like them. And she, in exchange would partner up with him during pair activities and save him the grief of having to deal with the girls who were slowly noticing his boyish good looks.

They were formally introduced at the beginning production of their grade level play, It's a Small Fruit World After All, as Uchiha Sasuke and Haruno Sakura. She was assigned the part of the strawberry and he, the blueberry. Their part was long for a grade school play, a seven minute conversation, with her doing most of the talking and hand-holding, with a little added peck to his cheek at the end. And he sulked, but got over it, because he was a boy with pride and was not to be replaced with that funny-looking, blonde-haired Naruto kid.

So the play went on without a hitch, each of them memorizing their lines perfectly, astounding the crowd of proud parents and faculty. Then the end of the scene came, and Sakura was to deliver the kiss. At that moment, just as she went in, her foot slipped on the felt material of her costume, and she caught his lips instead of his cheek, before steadying herself. Sasuke had just looked the other way with an embarrassed frown–her hand still in his–a light blush making its way across his cheeks.

And when he glanced over at her, he noticed she was blushing too.

Then once the audience had gotten their pictures and their videos, and the play ended, everyone left. But there they sat together, on the edge of the stage, Sakura swinging her little legs against the wooden platform, while Sasuke watched his parents and hers talk about their performance and perhaps setting up a little play date for them in the near future.

Itachi had been enlisted to help clear the props from the stage and had wandered off with his teacher, Ms. Konan, quite some time ago, and Sasuke could help but be a little curious. But it was then, as he eyed the room from his spot, that he had noticed that the thumping had stopped. He looked to his left and noticed that Sakura had her head bent and her small fingers on her lips, looking highly contemplative at such a young age, and he was worried.

So he scooted a little closer, and she looked up, momentarily startled. Her tiny fingers stayed on her parted lips and bright green eyes shone with unshed tears, as though something important had been stolen away from her. Something she was waiting for the right time, the best time to give someone close to her, and he suddenly understood.

He acknowledged her sentiment with an action so unlike his stoic manner that even he had to think twice after performing it–a simple kiss on the cheek. Sakura stared at him in all her bright-eyed wonder, because he basically had just asked her out in little kid language.

And she smiled.

-

You're my first.

-

They had grown apart.

Up through the end of elementary school, and well into the middle of junior high. Sasuke had moved uptown in the beginning of fifth grade to go to some advanced preparatory academy, and left Sakura behind in PS. 21. No letters, no phone calls–not even an IM was returned by the Uchiha. He seemed to have silently severed the ties of their friendship, without her ever realizing it.

She had chalked up the courage to go visit him once in seventh grade. Ridden her bike all the way through the center of town, up Suicide Lane–where everyone went to sled in the winter–and across the bridge by the doctor's office. By the time she had arrived, she was sweaty and tired, but infinity times more proud of herself. And when she rang the doorbell, she was so nervous and excited, she knocked too.

Itachi came to door.

He looked surprised to see her, but didn't let her in, and left her standing at the doorstep. And as she stood there, something about him had troubled her very soul. It wasn't his looks–but man, were they heart-stopping–or his stance, or even his expression. It was his eyes–she had figured out. It was as if something had died in the very pit of his soul, and not even his stoic persona could hide the pain. Hesitantly, Sakura had stepped forward to look deeper into his dark eyes, but abruptly he turned away and motioned her inside with a slight gesture of the hand.

The inside had been almost as startling as Itachi's eyes. Normally, from Sakura's last memory of being in the large home, the interior was always touched by the golden sunlight of outside and the foyer welcoming in appearance. But it was if every memory of Sakura's had been flipped and shredded. The foyer darkened by the closed curtains, appeared to Sakura like a large tomb, and light coating of dust lay neatly on every bit of furniture–as if it hadn't been touched in days.

For second, she had stopped breathing.

Sakura inched slowly to the staircase, wary of Itachi's lifeless gaze and worried about Sasuke's well-being. The climb to his room tortured her, for it was silent as it was empty. Not a soul had seemed to move, and she had sworn time had stopped when she opened the door to his room. At first, it had been hard for her to tell where he was deposited. But once she'd concentrated, she saw his motionless body lent up against the foot of his bed. For the quickest moment, she thought he was dead, but his head had slowly turned in her direction once she had stood there for a minute of two.

Again, something crept up in her throat when his eyes had properly focused. They had been the same as Itachi's then, dead and remorseful, but more so than his older brother. To her, he looked like he was in accepted denial – that state of mind where a person accepts their loved one is gone, but still cannot process the situation in its entirety.

"... What's wrong?" She whispered, unwilling to break the silence.

Moments passed.

Sasuke mouth had begun to function by the time Sakura had made it across the room, as she sat at a comfortably close distance from him, where the hands were only inches apart. They both stared forward in silence, Sakura's eyes trained on the ebony dresser, while Sasuke's focused on nothing unparticular.

Finally, sound found Sasuke's voice. "My mother's dead," he rasped as if his voice hadn't been used in decades. Sakura's throat constricted that his confession and she said nothing, for 'I'm sorry' would mean nothing. Silently she grabbed his hand and held it tight until she felt pressure back as built up emotion began tumbling out of the suffering boy. Slowly she lowered his head into her lap, stroking his hair gently and as his tears began to stain her jeans she hummed a quiet lullaby until his tears stopped and the room became silent once more.

-

-&&&-

-

College days were the best, Sakura admitted.

They were filled with forgotten friends of the younger years, freedom, and love.

Soon after she had been accepted into one of the world's most prestigious universities, she had stumbled – then after the first time, they were more like premeditated meetings – into what she could only describe as her childhood sweetheart plus. Their secret excursions could be tallied from once in the library, to twice in a randomly selected supply closet, and four times in an empty classroom.

In these secret – mad, hot sex-crazed – excursions, Sakura had noticed he had grown. The way his muscled arms held her against the professor's desk and his hard pectorals would press just right into her bosom as he dripped, what seemed to be, searing lava down the nape of her neck, showed her that he'd been busy in the years they hadn't seen each other. Not that she hadn't been busy in her own right, she had transformed from the young, boyish figure that haunted her teenage years to a mature, voluptuous physique and traded in her long flowing hair for shorter, choppy locks that left many admirers lusting after – male and female.

Officially dating, one year after their clandestine convenes, they'd moved in together. It was mutual agreement, with Sakura transferring to an esteemed medical intuitions and Sasuke interning under a CEO at a world renowned eyeglass business corporation with his boisterous best mate, Uzumaki Naruto – neither one wanted to be separated by an hour or so of incessantly continuous traffic. So they had decided on an apartment, split the rent, and ended up with a sub-averagely spaced – one room, one bath – loft.

And then their anytime jaunts in the bedroom could be just that – anytime.

"Sasuke," Sakura breathed out one night. "I think I love you."

She watched as his chest expanded and contracted with deep pants, his hair messy and askew from her fingers raking through his ebony locks only moments before. Their room shadowed in the ethereal glow that was night – it had to have been around 2 am. Eyes strained to see the dim red numbers of the digital clock on the bedside table – again they had failed to make to the bed, and had settled for the cool surface of the mahogany wooded floors.

Sakura grabbed for the blanket off the bed, and dragged it over their tired, naked bodies. She curled up into Sasuke's side, his warm body a welcomed contrast from the chilling floor and closed her heavy lids, ready to sleep. It had been almost thirty seconds later when deep bass of Sasuke's voice rouse his lover to open her eyes.

"Aa," he said, reaching into the pocket of his discarded slacks.

Sasuke rose his arm slowly, letting whatever rested in between his thumb and pointer finger glitter magnificently in the moonlight and catch the attention of the beautiful women in his arms. He watched as her eyes widened at the silver lined princess-cut, diamond engagement ring reflected in her bright gaze.

"– I think I love you too."

-

You're my last.

-

The hospital room was cold.

Hallways dim, and the only sign of active life were the nurses working the graveyard shift in the ICU. Various beeps resonated down the desolate corridors and traveled into rooms of patients who had given up hope long ago. All rooms were dark, except for one in the middle that was occupied by one patient and a visitor. The drum roll of the defeated hadn't reached the couple yet, and probably never would.

They said it was too late – too late to save her, they said if they had caught it earlier then maybe there could've been a chance. But it was too deep in her brain, the tumor was too close to everything important. They said that –

A halo of pink hair was sprawled across the hospital pillow.

– It was terminal.

"Don't cry... Sasuke," the woman coaxed, bringing a shaky hand to rest on his cheek.

Haruno Sakura's once peach complexion had been reduced to the opacity of a white sheet of paper, reflecting harshly off her bed's overhead light. Even her rose tresses were sucked of their floral hue. An IV drip settled itself nicely underneath the layers of her skin, coaxing the necessary hydration to her organs, adding to the plethora of medical equipment attached to skinny body.

But her eyes to still hummed with life.

Thirty-two is too young to die.

He gripped her hand gently, leaning against the flesh of her palm. His lips quirked into a small, tender smile, "I'm not crying," he protested half-heartedly. "Uchiha Sasuke does not cry."

Sakura managed a snort through all her tubes.

"Uh-huh, and you don't watch the entire tape of our 3rd grade play just for the kissing scene, when I'm not home."

"Shut up," he ordered lovingly, planting a kiss on the palm of her hand. The heart monitor suddenly began beeping faster, signaling her heart was doing the same, and they knew their time together was thinning.

"I love you," she whispered tenderly.

Sasuke stared at her, slowly letting the words I love you too, fall from his lips.

And she was gone.

-

You're my everything.

-

I've been trying to get this oneshot out for AGES.
and when I mean ages, I mean a good couple months to a year.
to the people who read this: please tell me how I did?
it was my first character death, I'm curious on how the overall of my story is.
Ps. – Sasuke maybe a little OOC and yes this was inspired by the song by Barry White, My Everything. it's a lovely song, but it actually doesn't go with the story at all.

please&thankyou