title: an absolute affection

summary: sasuke's love is a heavy thing and sakura is the one to shoulder it. but she's very small and exhausted and doesn't exactly mind the excessive petting.

pairing(s): Sasuke/Sakura/sasusaku

rating: T but i said the word 'sex' like 3 times

notes: i just feel like sasuke would be a cuddler to the point of suffocation and neediness ya know since he begged off real love most of his life

notes 2: we'll call this incomplete for now. i may want to explore sasuke's smothering love in multiple scenarios in the near future

notes 3: if you listen to this (youtube (.com) /watch?v=3MRRHdX64LY) around the 5th/6th paragraph it kinda sets the mood but like i'm not forcing you or anything

disclaimed & written with its faults at 1am.

It is a quarter past one in the morning and Sasuke is stumbling around in the dark—muscles slack, hair unruly—outside on the balcony of a third floor apartment, searching for a key he knows with unwavering certainty is beneath the lone sandal by the door. He can't see well in the dark, and can neither activate the Sharingan nor the Rinnegan, having depleted much of his chakra reserves in his haste to return to Konoha, to be home again.

The air hangs thick around him; hot and humid and smelling of wet dirt, a late summer storm having rolled through not an hour ago if he had to guess by the water pooled where the uneven red tiles dip in the floor. He takes in a deep breath, has the front door opened moments later. He pauses before entering to collect his disjointed thoughts, to cope with the sudden feeling of ease and avidity swelling in his chest, coursing through his exhausted body.

Two and a half weeks is how long he has been away. Two and a half weeks on a B-rank mission, suffering through countless hours of scouting and sitting, of watching and waiting. Two and a half weeks is a long time these days. By noon of yesterday he was yearning to head out, had darted ahead of the rest of his teammates through the tall trees and made it to the gates with just enough chakra left to drag himself to the apartment building on the opposite side of town than his own.

Now he kicks off his sandals on the mat inside, throws his sheathed scabbard offhandedly to the floor, and navigates the dark of this tiny flat by memory alone. In the kitchen, he knows, there are used teacups stacked one within another by the sink, text books and scrolls across the coffee table, and undergarments hanging out to dry on a rack in the far corner of the room beneath the only window that receives adequate sunlight throughout a majority of each day.

His eyes finally adjusting to the dark, Sasuke makes his way down the narrow hallway, shoulder sliding along the wall enervated. He hears soft inhalations from the room he enters, sees the tiny body wrapped in the sheet, a hand thrown over the pillow and he smells the lingering fragrance of a candle blown out not too long ago. He wrinkles his nose, cracks his stiff neck, stretches his arms over head as he makes his way to the foot of the bed. He takes off his belt and unwraps his kunai holster from his thigh and the tiny sheet lump moves around only to settle flat before him.

He doesn't think he's being noisy, doesn't care all the same if Sakura wakes to find him standing above her—he almost anticipates it even, being away from her for almost three torturous weeks. But when she remains sleeping, Sasuke leans into his hands and knees on the bed, crawls idly up her length where he decides to flop his spent body upon her unceremoniously, and with a great sigh of contentment. He brings his arm to cradle the back of her head and burrows his face in the sweet, small bow of her neck, reveling in the comfort of her warmth, her smooth skin, the eminent floral scent he's hardly forgotten about.

This is what he has missed the most, has craved liked a starved beast since the first night gone. Sakura's peacefulness, her softness, the way she dissolves into his tight, possessive embrace. Sasuke shuts his tired eyes only to be awoken momentarily by her voice in his ear groaning, "You're so—heavy," as she pries one arm out from beneath him.

At twenty-one, Sasuke stands a foot and some inches taller than Sakura, and his dead weight is suffocating to say the least. She wriggles him off just enough to breathe without gasping.

"Hn." is his typical response.

A man of great affection but of little words.

She's stroking the back of his head deliberately and he's nuzzling her, hoping probably to see how possible it is to meld their beings into one. Though conscious, both are too tired for any real communication.

"I'm so glad you're back," she says to him, absently pulling at the hair at the nape of his slender neck.

"Yeah," he replies, falls silent for a minute or more. "Me too." Then, eyes still shut tight in half-slumber; Sasuke's hand on the back of Sakura's head comes undone, down her shoulder, between her breasts, under the sheets, and rests on her stomach before discreetly sliding under her shirt. She grabs his wrist, not missing a beat, knowing full-well his hormone-fueled intentions.

"You can't just leave me for three weeks and wake me in the middle of the night for sex upon return, Sasuke-kun."

His brows furrow, thwarted, but he does not test her. "In the morning?" he asks, his hand returning to coddle her head as if it were just another pillow. She nods and he feels satisfied enough. Promised sex in the morning, he can't complain.

And honestly, his current complacency knows no bounds. He's in a real bed, nestled to the small, soft breasts of the woman who has been kind enough to let him stay the night on numerous occasions, the prospect of good sex and a hot shower hangs over him... These were the simplest of necessities. He throws his leg over hers, rubs his fingers against her scalp. He could die in his sleep tonight and have been content 'til the end.

"You are like a leech, Sasuke-kun," Sakura turns toward him, tucking underneath his chin, her hands squeezed firmly between their rising, thumping chests. "If I had known you were such a parasite," she yawns. "I would've thought twice before inviting you into my bed that first time."

He runs his hand along the hills of her spine, up and down up and down up and down reminding himself over again that this is his to hold and to hold him back, and he needs to keep her close to protect her and for his protection.

He hasn't had anything like her in a long while, having been denied it at such a young age and denying it for so long afterward.

Sasuke sinks his teeth into her exposed shoulder. "We're symbiotic, deal with it."