A/N: One-shot number three. Really hope you like.

Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto, but I really wish I did. This story is inspired by Sylvia Plath's The Bell Jar, and so is going to be quite depressing.

THIS STORY IS AU.

Please don't forget to review.

Fairytale

0-0-0

Love cannot come here.

A black gap discloses itself.

On the opposite lip

A small white soul is waving, a small white maggot.

My limbs, also, have left me.

Who has dismembered us?

The dark is melting. We touch like cripples.

(Sylvia Plath: Event)

0-0-0

We are two and we are one, we run along the creek bank. The day is hot. It is summer. We don't complain. The water is cool, and the jewelled leaves shelter us. We don't speak either, but that's not because of the heat. It is because we run on opposite sides of the creek. Perhaps it is a metaphor.

This is the ultimate freedom, just your body and mine, our limbs blurring as we run, the wind combing back our hair.

I think you must be like Apollo. You are all gold and clear-sky blue, and when you laugh the sun laughs with you. I think of the cornflowers on my mother's desk. Some time ago, you had the world at your feet. But me – I don't know what I am. Perhaps I am another Neptune, trapped beneath black waves. But that is not a fault: you look down for me and I look up. We still search for each other. Just in different worlds.

I stop by a tree. The creek babbles alongside like an ancient gypsy.

You turn and laugh. "What, out already, Sasuke?"

"Hmmph." I don't admit it, but it's true. "I just don't want to push you too hard."

"Just because you're losing."

"Just because I don't want you to have another asthma attack," I retort.

"Yeah, whatever. You're just a sore loser."

But you stop anyway, you drop to the ground and beam at me happily from two metres away. You look so young. The sun has stunted your eighteen years. When you smile you look fifteen.

I turn away to catch my breath, because I don't want you to see me sucking in my air. You laugh at my back and I hear a wet plop. You've thrown a pebble at me and it's fallen short.

It is only two metres. I turn and look at you. Suddenly, I feel heavy.

It is as if a fairytale has abruptly ended – depleted itself on the dying, concentric ripples in the creek.

I know you are fading. I have known it a while, now.

But you are still smiling, you are so brave. Two months ago that pebble would have met my head. I stand on my side of the creek bank and I study your smile, so bright, so fearless, as smooth as glass, and I feel as if I would crumble under the weight of all that gold.

"You missed," I say. After the light banter of a few seconds ago, it is hard. "I..."

You pull a face. If I did not know you, I would have thought you a child.

But I know you better than that.

"Maah, my arm cramped. And you're just trying to change the subject so I won't remember that you lost the game."

That stupid game – a distraction we made ever since that first diagnosis, as crucial to both as air or religion. A race through the woods, our shadows on the ground, one to each creek bank as if struggling to fly...

My eyes sting. It surprises me. I look away.

"Of course," I mumble. "You win. I lose."

"Wah, you admit it?!" You don't understand my retreat. Or perhaps you do – you just won't accept it, like an unwanted gift. "Then I get to name where we eat tonight! And I want to eat ramen!"

I know you are seeking conflict. It is where we are safe, it is where we do not cross. It is our creek. We have never been elsewhere.

"You know I hate ramen," I say. Just to keep you happy.

"That's because you're stupid."

You poke out your tongue and pick up another pebble. But you do not throw it. We both know why.

The silence descends between us like the curtain on a play. You are still sitting by the bank and I am standing just opposite, my hands in my pockets, my eyes on your face. You are toying with the pebble to avoid my gaze. It is large and flat, and mottled with moss. The sunlight flashes on your fingers and coats your hair, the golden fringes of a fern. Around us the forest is still, the colours sharp as the matter of dreams. I can feel the willows slowly crying into the creek. They are bleeding their leaves like stars.

"Naruto," I say finally.

"What, Sasuke?"

You are more subdued now, the mask is slipping. The Act of our play is drawing to a close. Your eyes, when they flash up, are real. There is a hint of pain. I have to bite my lip to stop myself turning away in despair.

"How's Sakura?" I say instead. Casually.

You know why I ask, and for a moment your eyes show anger.

"I'm not dying yet, Sasuke," you say. "Don't treat me like I'm dying. I'm not."

I nod. Look away, because I feel like something is clawing at me from inside, I feel like crying. You do not want my pity.

"Yes," I say. "Yes, I know. I'm sorry."

"You don't need to apologize, dammit!"

I cannot bear your anger and I turn, lean forward so that my hair will hide my face.

You bring your hand up to your eyes. As if to brush something away.

"I'm sorry, Sasuke," you say then. Your voice is very quiet. "I just – "

"No. It's fine."

"Right. Of course it is."

The forest waits for us, but the water doesn't. It escapes, trills down toward the sea like a lost opportunity. Over the black-grey pebbles. Under the water, they have been worn skull-smooth.

You speak again. "Sakura is fine, she's at the clinic now. I think she's... booking me an appointment."

I know why she's there, and it's not to book an appointment. It hurts me. If I tell you she is seeing someone else, it will hurt you too. So I do not speak. I nod as if you have told me something altogether new.

"How... how is the treatment going? What did the doctor say?"

You throw the pebble. Plop, plink, plink.

"I don't want to talk about it," you say.

I shrug to hide my hurt. "Fair enough."

You look up to seek out my eyes, and your cornflower-blue orbs beg for a wordless pardon. I don't understand why you need it, but I cannot keep such a request from you. I forgive you with all my heart.

"I'm leaving tomorrow," I tell you, to show it and to change the subject.

You know this already. It has been in the papers.

"I know. That scholarship at Harvard. Good work on that, by the way. I never got to congratulate you."

I swallow. The words are painful. "You know I only got it because you gave me after-school tutorials every day."

"Don't be an idiot. You would have gotten it anyway."

"It should've been yours."

"You know I can't go to Harvard. Not with the state I'm in." Plop goes another pebble. "You deserved it, Sasuke. Don't let anyone tell you that you didn't. Better you get it than it go to waste on me."

"Naruto, don't speak like that."

"It's the truth."

"It wouldn't have been a waste."

"I won't live another year, Sasuke." You are so matter-of-fact about it, it is almost as if you are speaking of a distant relative. "I wouldn't even see my graduation day. I call that a waste."

I know how hard it is for you, to admit your illness. You are doing it for me. It is your only way of sacrifice. You are so brave I feel like I am dying.

"Naruto – "

"Don't, Sasuke. Please."

"I can't do this – "

"Sasuke!" Your blue eyes flare in warning. "Go to Harvard. Shut up before I throw another pebble at you, and this time I won't miss."

I have my doubts but I don't voice them. I do what you want me to do. I meet your sacrifice with one of my own, and I leave you the best of myself. Tomorrow I will be gone.

Our time together is running out. I feel as if I have forgotten something, as if there is still something within me that I have not told you. But I cannot fully grasp what it is. It is captured behind a glass sheet in my brain, and when I reach out for it my hand meets the glass and goes nowhere.

"You will write to me, won't you?" I say, as if to stall.

You snort. "Don't get sappy on me, Sasuke. I won't forgive you."

"I know."

"What time does the plane leave?"

"Twelve. Noon. I'll have to get there at eleven, though." I catch the look in your eyes and I decide to face the matter once and for all. Perhaps this is what I have forgotten – but no, there is something else behind the glass. I push it aside for the moment. "I don't want you to see me off, Naruto."

"What?"

"I don't want – "

"I'm not so bad that I can't go to the airport!" You are frustrated by your weakness. It is what hurts you most. "I'm going, dammit! I don't give a – "

"Naruto, the doctors said – "

"No!"

I see you as you once were, alive, the fire flaring bright in your eyes. For a moment you are yourself again. I smile at you.

"You don't need to go, Naruto. I'll be alright."

"Knowing how stupid you are, you'll probably walk onto the wrong plane," you grumble.

It is a pointless argument, but I treasure it. "I've flown before."

"Yeah, with a chaperone. That's not the same thing."

"With my brother," I correct. "And it's not like he did anything. I had to go through Customs and everything myself."

Strangely enough, you drop the issue. I don't expect it. I expect you to keep arguing.

Instead, you say, "Whatever."

You make an effort to get up but your strength is not enough, your body betrays you. You disguise it as a stretch. I want to reach out across the water and help you, but I know you wouldn't want me to.

"You up for another race, bastard?" you say, to compensate.

"No," I say. For you. "I'm worn out. Let's stay here for a while."

You see through me. It angers you.

"If you don't think I can do it, then just say so," you snap. "I hate it when you pity me."

I kick at the pebbles around my feet. I don't know what to say.

Finally you sigh, and you try to get up again. This time you make it to your feet. I cannot bear to watch you struggle, a swan with a broken wing. I fix my eyes on a tree instead and swallow to clear my head. My sight is swimming and I can't work out why.

You wait for me. But I have nothing to say.

Your blue eyes fall.

"Well, if you don't want another race, then I guess I should get going."

The glass is still strong in my mind, I cannot break through it. A nameless panic is overtaking me, because I cannot remember what I need to tell you, and you are beginning to walk away. The window is closing, you are leaving the creek. You are turning home. You have given up on me, I have not been able to save you, I have not been able to save myself.

"Naruto," I say. The word rings in the air, as clear as an afterthought.

You turn. Tiredly. Too tired, even, to pretend a smile. "Yes, Sasuke?"

"I – don't go yet. Stay for a while. It's still early."

The statement doesn't make sense, because everything now is late. We are in the final stages of everything. Overhead, the sky is fading.

"I can't, Sasuke. Sakura told me to be home before five, she needs to get ready for tonight."

"It's only four-thirty."

"She said before five, Sasuke."

For a moment I am so tempted to blurt out the truth, but your beautiful, sad, trusting face stops me.

"Just ten minutes. Five, even. I can drive you home, if you want. You don't need to take a taxi. It'll be faster. Please. And I'll be gone tomorrow."

It sways you. You don't understand my desperation, but you turn back around. You face me.

"Fine. Five minutes. Then I have to go."

It is my chance. Somehow, I know it is my last one. I clench my fists and fight for my words. But they will not come. The glass will not give way.

I wet my lips. "Naruto, I..."

You wait. Despite yourself, you wait. "Yes?"

"I think..."

I am drowning. The swimming intensifies before my eyes and I realise with a start that I am about to cry. It feels strange and unnatural but it does not feel shameful. It feels so perfect. It feels so right.

"I'll... I'll see you when I come back for Semester break, won't I?" I manage finally.

You know I am clutching at straws, but you are so good to me, you do not leave. "Of course you will. I'll be here waiting for you. I have at least a year left, after all."

I begin to nod – but then I catch something in your eyes, something I cannot define. And it strikes a discord in me, like a note sung out of tune. You are smiling but for some reason it does not feel right, it does not feel real. And the panic begins to rise again.

"You'll be here waiting," I repeat to myself.

"Yes. I'll be here."

There it is again. A slight flicker of your eyes, like the dart of a candle flame. And your smile saddens, as if there is something within me that you are seeing, and it hurts you in a way that cannot be put into words.

The realisation strikes me like a bus.

My breath hitches suddenly. The air goes from my lungs in one frenzied rush. And your eyes grow sadder, because you know now that I know.

"You – Naruto – "

You smile. It bruises. But you say nothing.

"I – how long? How long do you have left? Tell me, Naruto. Tell me now. It isn't a year, is it?"

"Sasuke – "

"You lied to me," I breathe in revelation. My eyes are fixed somewhere behind your face, as if I am unconsciously trying to see into you. "You lied. You don't have a year left at all."

"I didn't want to worry you – "

"How long, then?" I feel as if I am breaking, as if you have taken me into your hands and allowed me to fall apart. "Naruto – "

"Five months," you say.

And the words fall.

(One second, two seconds, three seconds, four...)

Five.

(Five – and it links us, the blue of your eyes the fifth band on a shattered rainbow – )

Five months. The numbers trickle past like water.

I will not see you at Semester break.

After today, I will never see you again.

I will never...

"I didn't want to stop you going to Harvard," you say from your side of the creek.

I realise then that you are crying too, very softly; that the tears are bleeding over the scars on your cheek. And I want to scream, I want to reach across and hit you for not telling me, I want to take you into my arms and hold you. It is too much for me to process and I fall back heavily against a tree trunk, my eyes still fixed on your face.

"I didn't lie to you," you say. "The doctor said I could make it to a year. If I wanted to. If I took some more treatments and had some radiotherapy – "

"Then take it!" I cry out. My heart is twisting between your hands, you are killing me. "Take it!"

"No. I don't want to."

"Naruto!"

"Five months, one year, what difference does it make?" You turn away from me as if you cannot speak the words to my face. "They'll stuff me full of drugs and at most I'll live an extra six months or so. A year of sitting in hospital staring at the ceiling. That's not what I want, Sasuke."

"Then what do you want?"

"I want freedom." You raise your head and your hair lifts with the wind. The purest gold in the world. Suddenly your tears are gone, I can almost taste your smile. "I want... I want to be free again. I want to fly. I don't want to lie in a hospital bed with eyes staring pity at me from the bedside. I just want to be free. You know?"

"I can defer a year," I start wildly. Desperate. "I can call Harvard and ask for a deferral – "

"No. I don't want you to do that."

"It's my life!" I yell at you. "I'll do what I want!"

It is only when the words leave me that I realise how selfish they are.

(Because it isn't my life – somehow, it is mine and it is yours as well, it is ours together, because you have given me this opportunity, you have given me everything...)

"I've always wanted to become a doctor," you say then. Very quietly. Almost to yourself.

And suddenly I know why you are telling me this. I know what you are planning to do. I know now why you need my forgiveness. And I understand now that the knowledge has been within me all that time, behind another pane of glass, and now that pane has melted away like ice in the sun.

I cannot help myself. I turn away to hide the pain of seeing you.

But it is your decision. It is your wish. I must grant it. I understand.

You smile. So beautiful. "I have to go now," you tell me then.

It is four-fifty-five.

And the window is closing...

And I feel that finalistic panic again – that emotion that comes when the end is approaching, when you know that it is. And still that mysterious something stays buried in my mind, and I cannot find the words to tell you. I begin to sob, deep and choked. And through my tears I see you beginning to turn again, beginning to leave me behind, like the steady sweep of hands across a clock face –

This is the last time that I will be alone with you. Tonight, when we go out for your beloved ramen, Sakura will be with us.

(I've always wanted to become a doctor...)

I realise that I have no choice.

I cross the creek.

It is hard but I do it for you, for me, for both of us. I force myself into the ice-cold water and I force myself across onto your bank, I force myself towards you. It is as if I am struggling through a different realm, the water swirling thick as memories. When I close my eyes I see your face behind my eyelids, flickering as if you are underwater; I see you sitting in your bedroom, I see the tiny bottle with the faded label, I see you placing the glass of water calmly beside you on the bed...

And when I reach the earth on your side I feel as if I have been torn apart.

But when you tear something – there must be something that remains, gleaming between the two torn shells like a pearl from an oyster, the purest part of yourself...

And – standing on your side of the creek, so familiar and yet so foreign – I know then that something has finally, finally, finally been purged from me. It is as if I have walked through Purgatory.

(Because you will be the one to free me, Naruto, you and I; and we will fly – )

And, suddenly, the glass is gone. I can breathe freely again. And I know in that instant what I had forgotten, what I needed to tell you, what I needed to say.

And I see you.

Nothing but you.

You are staring at me as if you cannot believe that I am so close, your lips are slightly parted. Standing here, on your side of things, you look so beautiful with the sunlight cascading over your cheeks that I cannot help myself, I sob again. And again. And again. My tears come thick as your goodness.

It should never have been you.

It should have been me.

You – Naruto Uzumaki, top student, charming, popular; quick to anger and quick to smile; your laugh so bright it could blind whole crowds – so good to everyone, good enough to show kindness to a broken young boy orphaned at six, good enough to talk to him and laugh with him and give him after-school tutorials every single day –

– Good enough to talk him out of razors and sleeping pills, home-made nooses and kitchen knives...

And what for?

What else is there, in the end, but death? Goodness or evil, nameless, faceless – in the end, all that we meet is death. Your goodness has not saved you. You will not survive the year.

I know what you are going to do.

And I love you.

"Sasuke," you say.

I go to you. And when I put my arms around you you are surprised, because we have never touched like this before, but I need you to know before I leave.

I love you. There is nothing else.

But I do not say it. Sometimes, silence has far more meaning than words.

It is the first time and it is the last. We will never be like this again.

(Because this is just a fairytale – you and I, our shadows flitting over the creek bank as we run in the golden sunshine, running from everything we are too afraid to face – )

It is five o'clock.

(And that number rings with our magic – five hours, five minutes together, five months left for you to live – )

I kiss you. Just once, soft and chaste, a simple press of my lips to yours.

You do not fight it. When we break apart, you seek out my eyes.

"I forgive you," I whisper.

Because it is not my love that you need any more. It is forgiveness for what you will do. Forgiveness for your freedom.

"Thank-you," you whisper back. And when I kiss you again you do not pull away, because you are granting me my last wish, and there is no time left between us for anything more.

When I place my hand against your chest your heart beats strong. I close my eyes and I memorise it.

I am, I am, I am.

Naruto Uzumaki, aged 18, died on the 13th of January, 2006.

He was found in his own bedroom, lying on his bed, with a glass of water and an empty bottle of sleeping pills beside him.

Later, when his body was analysed, his time of death was estimated to be twelve noon.

At that exact same time, a certain plane left Brisbane International Airport bound for Cambridge.

Sasuke Uchiha was to become one of the leading leukaemia specialists in America.

He never married.

Owari.

This story holds a certain significance for me, so please do not flame.

Thank-you.