AN: okay! here is part i, but the sequel is up! it's called Black Tables, so when you finish this one, and if you like it, check it out, okay?

as always, review please, with anything.

And Then You

He actually permitted her to sit on the hospital bed beside him.

Emotions welled thickly inside her. Under normal circumstances, she knew he wouldn't have allowed it.

He had returned three years ago, when they were seventeen, started doing missions again in two. Quickly he had risen through the ranks, quickly he had become one of Konoha's deadly weapons.

He was gone so frequently, so it was a slow process, but he was letting them in. His gaze was not so hateful, spiteful, his demeanor still aloof but less harsh.

She sat on the hospital bed with him. His knuckles showed white where they gripped the metal railings on either side of the cot.

She longed to place her hand over his, try to soothe him, try to ease his pain, but the distance was too far, which would make her attempt too noticeable. She sat on the edge of the bed, down near his blanket-covered knees, had made sure that there was a distance between them that would hopefully not make him uncomfortable.

Sakura hung her head. Plus, in more ways than one, she could not ease his pain.

She stole a quick glance at him through her pink locks.

His expression showed nothing, no emotion, as usual, lips in his seemingly ever-permanent neutral line, forehead smooth with no creases. He was sitting up against the head rail, posture impeccably straight from head to waist until his legs disappeared underneath the hospital blanket.

But she knew. If you didn't know him, didn't know him for who he was, you wouldn't know. But she did. She could see it in his eyes. His eyes, normally keen, sharp, ever-scanning and ever-analyzing, his eyes showed dull, and they focused listlessly on the plaster wall past the foot of his bed.

She could feel the tears well up in her eyes. She looked away quickly, pushing them back down. It was not her place to cry. She was here for him.

The door to the room opened.

Tsunade walked in with Shizune, sealing their somber air into the small room with the click of the shut door.

His eyes left the plaster, and his head swiveled to face the new occupants of the room. His hands left the rail and folded in his lap neatly.

Sakura looked down, and clenched her hands together.

Tsunade broke the silence in the room with the conversation they wished would not come.

"Uchiha Sasuke," she read off the clipboard, but Sakura could read her former teacher, see the lines around her eyes and the tightness of her brow, she knew that she had been agonizing over this case, and so she knew that she didn't need the chart to inform her of Sasuke's condition.

"Your surgery…" Here she trailed off. Sakura quickly glanced at Sasuke to see a glimpse of his eyes squeezing shut, eyebrows scrunching, but quickly they were smoothed, and the brief reaction she had witnessed dove deep beneath glazed black eyes.

Tsunade took a deep sigh. "The state of your wounds by the time you were brought to the hospital was too severe. During the operation, executive decisions had to be made—not necessarily which parts to give up, but which parts to save. The condition of your kidneys, heart, and lungs were too severe to not attend to," Tsunade said, voice slipping into a detached, professional tone.

"Sacrifices needed to be made in order to save your life. You survived your injuries," she paused, glancing up at him before continuing.

"But some parts of your body that were poisoned needed to be removed in order to stop the spreading."

Sakura could feel her nails making beds in her palms.

She didn't look at Sasuke.

Tsunade exhaled before listing: "A section of the muscle in your calf, half the tendons in the knee on the same leg, a section of the quadriceps and hamstring on the same side… You still have your left leg, but it is virtually a mixture of mere skin and bone."

Sakura had known, she had known, she had been there at the operating table, hands covered in his blood, but still, somehow, a part of her had hoped, had hoped that Tsunade had figured something out after she had been asked to leave the operating room.

"Not only that, but the chakra channels to the left leg were corrupted and shut down. We prevented the poison from corroding the rest of the channels in the rest of your body, but enough damage has been done so that your chakra flow in its entirety has severely been disrupted."

Tsunade stopped again, but this time, Sakura could see the emotion, the regret, the guilt, creeping up on her face before her mentor solidly pushed back down.

"You… you will find now that after your recovery, even your easiest jutsus will prove some difficulty and, even done perfectly, will not contain their same strength."

Sasuke had not said anything.

Sasuke had not moved.

Sakura searched his face, waiting for the reaction she was expecting, the demands, the enraged shouts of "Fix this!", "You're a fucking medic, do your goddamn job and fix me, your most dangerous, most valuable weapon!", "You're pathetic! Weak! This is your best? This is you doing your goddamn best?"

But his expression had not changed.

"You will be released tomorrow after we run some post-tests. You honor Konoha with the sacrifice you made, and you have the village's gratitude."

Sakura felt like the blade had lowered. She hadn't said it, but Sakura could hear it in Tsunade's voice—perhaps with he could have adjusted to limited chakra use, only used taijutsu like Lee, but with the loss of mobility in his left leg…. Tsunade had just told Sasuke that he could no longer be an operating shinobi.

Tsunade nodded, and turned to open the door, Shizune at her heels.

Sakura stared with wide eyes trained on the grey tile at her feet. She couldn't look at Sasuke. She braced herself for his reaction, for the insults, for the backlash, for betrayal, anger—

"Thank you," came a quiet, reserved, polite voice.

Simultaneously, three sets of eyes snapped back to the shambled man on the hospital bed.

His eyes were lowered, not meeting anyone else's, his hands were still clasped lightly in his lap, and as Sakura stared at him in shock, he looked up at Tsunade and nodded.

Tsunade quickly composed her face, nodded back before exiting the room. Shizune shot them one last look before shutting the door with a soft click.

She sat on the hospital bed with him, and she waited for him to break down. Her eyes poured over his face, waiting, silent with the shock and realization that yet another important thing had been taken away from him.

Sasuke's still stared at his hands, lying on top of the blanket.

The air lay heavy upon them.

"Sasuke…" she whispered, covering her mouth with her hand.

He looked up at her, eyes tight but shiny. His mouth twisted, before he wrestled it back into a line.

"Sasuke, I… I am so sor—"

"Sakura," his baritone cut her off. Wordlessly she watched him. Something in his eyes changed, but before she could distinguish it they'd sought his hands again, before returning to meet hers, aloof and steadfast.

"You…" he sighed, and her heart broke at the effort it took him to speak, how badly must he be suffering?—"You should leave."

No. He did not have to be alone through this, he should not be alone through this.

"No, don't worry, I'll stay, it's no problem—"

His raised hand halted her words. His expression contorted in pain, his eyes squeezed shut, but his demand was definitive, and she couldn't ignore it.

"Leave now."

He did not look at her as she shakily rose.

Tears fell onto her cheeks as she closed the door behind her.

She was to deliver outpatient service to Sasuke in his home after his release from the hospital.

She sucked in the chill air of the morning, the pale dawn of the sun meeting her tired eyes.

She hadn't slept much since Sasuke returned home from that mission.

She hadn't seen him yet, since he told her to leave. She figured that he needed a few days on his own, to cope, to grieve.

When she arrived at his door, her heart hurt to see that he hadn't.

Sasuke had opened the door, his height looming over her, and at first all thoughts of his injury were struck down by the handsome lines of his face, and then by the cold, hard, angry eyes staring down at her.

Her mind almost hadn't recognized that he was, in fact, propped up by crutches, because he held himself the way he normally would: proud, a bit arrogant, and disinterested.

She bit her lip. From working at the hospital, Sakura had dealt with a multitude of patients, most proud shinobi, and had observed patients dealing with the aftermath of irreparable damage. She had watched as the main aspect of their life got taken away, and she knew the needed steps that followed it.

Sasuke hadn't accepted what had happened to him yet.

He continued to stare her in the face.

"What?" he demanded simply, but coldly. He looked over her shoulder into the deserted grounds of the Uchiha district.

Sakura swallowed. "I'm…" his gaze flickered to her as she began speaking, and she bit her lip.

"I need to do some check-up's on you, even though you were released from the hospital. To make sure everything's alright."

She winced at her stupid phrasing as Sasuke moved back an inch further into the house through the doorway. Of course everything was not alright.

"I'm fine," he stated, and as she opened her mouth to protest, the door slammed definitively in her face.

Sighing, Sakura rested her forehead on the now closed door.

Unconsciously, she extended her awareness and felt for Sasuke's signature chakra. She was accustomed to a great, rolling navy presence, but now she could only feel a weak imitation. She took a deep breath and stepped back.

Sakura banged her fist solidly against the thick, sturdy door one, two, three, four times.

She couldn't detect any movement inside the house, so she yelled to him instead: "Sasuke! You need to open the door, because I need to do my job! Do you hear me? Open the goddamn door!"

As she paused, she heard the signature click and following step of crutches approaching the door before it opened abruptly.

Sakura's mouth had morphed into a smile. She looked up to thank him, but the entry was empty and she just caught his retreating form turning a corner down the hall in the house before he disappeared.

Her smile turned into a frown, and quietly she padded into the house, closing the door behind her.

She wasn't an entire stranger to Sasuke's home—it was just that when she and Naruto spent time with Sasuke, it was either at the training grounds, Ichiraku, her or Naruto's apartment, or on missions.

She'd only been down these bleak halls a sparse number of times, and she wondered why Sasuke would want to live in a place where he would constantly be haunted by his past.

Sasuke was standing in a clean, minimalistic sitting room befit with navy couches and an Uchiha fan mounted on the wall. The red of the fan stood out like a beacon amidst the navy and white colors of the surroundings.

Sasuke, still and motionless, looked prodigious and stately in this room.

The crutches he was propped up by did not.

His face, she noted, as per usual, was composed, emotionless, and his eyes had lost their rage and were now formed into a blank black slate.

He stared right through her.

She suddenly felt small and unimportant. Sakura had always seen Sasuke as someone stronger than her, and even though the you're annoying's and pathetic's had been washed away with time, Sasuke always managed to make her feel not quite good enough.

Even when he was crippled and without his deadly reserve of chakra, Sasuke could still intimidate and demand respect.

Inwardly, she shook herself. She would not let herself revert back to her weak form. Sakura had worked insistently, and because of it she was one of the most esteemed medic-nins in the village. Her presence called for respect too.

Sasuke raised an eyebrow at her, wordlessly asking for her to get on with it.

Sakura cleared her throat.

"Today I'm just going to check your chakra pathways. I—"

"Why, when you already know?"

Sasuke was looking at her sharply, eyes flint, but his tone was one of boredom and posture indifferent.

She swallowed.

Sakura took a step closer to him, and her eyes flicked down to his hands, which clenched around the crutches at her approach.

Sighing, she looked up at him.

"It is hospital procedure, and technically, you should still be in the hospital, but I convinced Tsunade to let you come home because I knew you don't like the hospital, and she agreed as long as I monitored your condition."

She paused, not entirely expected a thank you, but not receiving a reaction nonetheless. Sasuke's lip had slightly pulled down at one end, but that was the only change.

"So I'm going to need you to sit down, okay, and then I'll explore your chakra network," she said lightly, turning towards the nearest couch.

Sasuke's mouth twitched as if he wanted to say something, she waited expectantly, but no words came and he smoothly made his way on his crutches to the sofa, placing the crutches down on the floor so quickly that Sakura hadn't realized he'd done it until he was sitting on the couch, staring lethargically out the window.

With a frown, she sat down next to him.

"Okay," she began, "I'm going to need you to take off your shirt."

Sakura closed her eyes, gathering herself for this, this examination that would confirm to her that Sasuke was forever crippled from his former self, and she fired chakra to her hand before opening her eyes.

She had heard him taking off his shirt, but she was not prepared for the myriad of bruises and minor cuts that consumed the pale expanse of his torso.

Sakura bit her lip. As her hand touched his chest, Sasuke shut his eyes, muscles flexing.

Wordlessly, she began healing some of the large bruises. She had forgotten… During the surgery, Sasuke's other grievous wounds had taken up all of their chakra until they were exhausted—she was asked to leave the room because she had run out half way through the procedure—and they had not had time to heal these smaller ills before Sasuke left for home.

She jolted as he interrupted her concentration: "What are you doing?" he asked, black, dull eyes peering down at her.

She ignored him, breaking eye contact, resuming her work, moving towards a severely bruised rib that, as she examined it, could possibly be broken.

Sakura let in a sharp intake of breath as long fingers gently encircled her wrist. She looked up to meet soft, gentle eyes.

She struggled with her words. "I'm just… It wasn't done, and it takes only a minute—"

She stopped when she saw him shake his head.

"Sakura…" he breathed out, closing his eyes, "Don't waste your chakra on me. Go back to the hospital."

She stared at his face, which for once was showing hints of emotion. His eyes were clenched shut, jaw locked, eyebrows scrunched from their normally stoic lines.

Swallowing, she ignored him, ignoring the hand holding her wrist, and shakily proceeded, fingers skimming over his cuts and bruises.

She stopped when he squeezed her wrist.

"Sakura."

She lowered her eyes, taking a deep breath, before steeling herself and looking at him in the eyes again.

His expression had returned to his normal, composed expression, the sole exception being the uncharacteristic softness in his eyes. She felt a flutter in her chest—because she was not used to Sasuke saying her name, touching her outside of a spar, eyes showing anything other than nothing—and then she knew something had broken in him, because he was not handling this well.

"Sasuke," she said forcefully, and his eyes remained on hers, steadfast, "You are not a waste of my chakra. "

His eyes shifted away, looking out somewhere over her head. He opened his mouth, and she could feel the beginning of his speech, but instead he just exhaled, eyes telling her that he didn't believe her, but would humor her anyway.

She bit her lip, because she didn't know what to do, how to fix this, because what was hurting Sasuke transcended his physical injuries.

So quietly, she ignored his surface injuries and monitored his chakra network, trying not to locate the defeat—because she knew it was there, and it would kill her, Sasuke, always so invincible—undermining his usual apathetic demeanor.

She knew that Naruto had returned from his mission the previous night, but she didn't know, hadn't realized, that there was no way for Naruto to know about what had happened before it was too late.

Sakura was following the now customary path up to the Uchiha compound when she first heard it.

Shouting, crashing, breaking.

She didn't know what was happening, but reflex had her sprinting through the empty streets to the house in which Sasuke stayed.

The house was in sight, she had reached the gate when the front door slammed open, exposing a seething Sasuke, his anger almost palpable to even her, down the stretch, blocked by the familiar blonde and orange.

"Get the fuck out of my house!" yelled Sasuke, and she could see Naruto visibly flinch. She flinched too, hands snaking up, one to stifle her gasp, the other to cover her heart, because since when had Sasuke ever yelled at Naruto and meant it?

She couldn't hear the words, but she watched as Naruto took a brave step closer to Sasuke, hands outstretched showing his pure intentions, but Sasuke just shoved him out the door.

Naruto clearly hadn't expected that, because instead of balancing the force, he fell and skidded in the dirt.

Her wide eyes flicked to Naruto, who was shocked, lying in the dirt, his characteristic grin, his happy aura, nowhere in sight.

Her eyes relocated to Sasuke. For one moment, he appeared as if he were to crumple, and his eyes locked on hers, but then the door slammed shut once more.

Sakura stood in shock before running to Naruto's side.

He hadn't moved yet, and as she crouched in front of him, his blue eyes were wide and dazed, looking at the closed door.

"Naruto," she said softly, touching his cheek lightly with her fingers.

Slowly, he turned his head towards her. With a pained expression, she removed her fingers to find that they were wet, covered in the tears that had began escaping his wounded eyes.

"Sakura," he whispered roughly, looking at her desperately.

"I'm sorry, I worked late last night, I couldn't… I didn't have time to tell you… I thought I would catch you before I came here this morning…"

He lowered his head, blonde hair flopping over his forehead protector and into his eyes.

She stared at him helplessly, trying to come up with the right words, but failed.

He watched his hands, before looking back up at her.

"I just…" he took a deep breath before continuing. "I didn't know… and it's just, it's Sasuke, how could he not… I mean I just barreled in there and told him to get his ass up because we were going training, I didn't see… wasn't thinking… oh God…" he groaned, putting his face in his hands.

"Sh… Naruto, you didn't know. There was no way for you to know."

He gave a strained chuckle. "I guess… it's just knowing… that we'll never all three go on a mission together again. We just got him back…"

"He's not dead, Naruto," she spat.

She closed her eyes, trying to push his words out of her head, the thoughts that she had avoided ever since it happened.

He looked affronted. "Sakura," he stressed, placing a hand on her knee, "you know I didn't mean that."

She opened her eyes, meeting Naruto's sad ones, as he softly repeated, "You know I didn't mean that."

She nodded.

Slowly, Naruto stood up, offering her a hand. Sakura took it, and he brought her into a brief hug before letting her go.

"You need to go in there," he said as he took backward steps towards the gate.

She bit her lip and nodded.

"You can do it, Sakura-chan. He needs you to be in there."

She nodded again, and then Naruto was off sprinting on rooftops towards the village. She knew that Naruto was still in shock, still hurting, but she would worry about him later.

She took a deep, shaky breathe before turning back towards the door.

Sakura made the last remaining steps and didn't give herself time to think before pounding on the door.

There was no response.

She pounded once more, getting angrier. He had no right to treat Naruto that way, how was he supposed to know, weren't they friends, didn't that count for anything, and when no one came to the door again, she tried to door knob. After she found out it was locked, she wrenched the door knob off and kicked the door open.

"Sasuke!" she yelled, "What the hell! You can't fucking treat your friend like that!"

He wasn't in sight, so she began stomping towards that sitting room in the back of the house.

The feeble response she received stopped her in her tracks and ebbed all the anger away.

"Go… the fuck… away…" came his broken cry in gasps.

Blinking, Sakura hurried into the sitting room before the sight before her stopped her dead.

The room was a disaster. The furniture was ripped, vases smashed, shards of mirror littered the floor. The Uchiha fan, previously mounted, was embedded halfway into the wall opposite its prior location.

The crutches were lying at the base of a wall, cracked in half, seemingly having been thrown all the way across the room.

But then there was Sasuke himself, and that image was so far from the norm it was horrifying.

He lay crumpled in the middle of the room, curled up in a ball. His shoulders were shaking, and he clutched at his left leg in agony. Ever so slightly, he rolled from side to side, not speaking a word of pain, but which was evident on his face.

Blood ran down his forearms from where the glass had punctured his skin.

"Sasuke!" she gasped, hurrying to his side.

He looked up, speaking to her through clenched teeth.

"No… leave," he managed to say before rolling to his other side in pain.

Sakura paused, but then ignored him. She couldn't leave him here like this… not for his pride. His wounded expression told her that much.

"What is it?" she urged, rushing over and crouching next to him, hands splayed out frantically. "Your leg?" Obviously. "Hold on I can make it better!" she gritted out before the accustomed green chakra fired around her hands.

She reached out towards his leg, starting to close her eyes, concentrate—

"No!" he yelled, taking a surprisingly strong hold on her wrist and yanking her arm away from his leg.

She gasped in shock. His eyes glared at her indignantly, wide with a mix of anger and pain, inches from her own. She knew that had he been capable of it, Sasuke's eyes would have bled red into the Sharingan.

He was breathing heavily, each exhale hotly reaching her mouth, and suddenly the expression in his eyes changed so quickly—and he turned his head away from her, dropping her wrist as if it had burnt him.

It had been shame. Shame had shown in his eyes.

Sakura looked at him, and she could tell just by looking at his back that he was desperately trying to recompose himself, see the gasps he was trying to drown his pain with.

Instead of giving him space, she gently framed his face with her hands and turned his head back to face hers.

He fought weakly against her to turn his head back, but she firmly kept his head facing hers and her eyes meeting his.

"You have to let me help you," Sakura said calmly.

Sasuke stared back at her, she could see the fight in his eyes, to deny or accept aid, before he faintly nodded.

As she softly smoothed away some of his hair with her hand, his eyes closed.

"I can ease the pain," she whispered softly before gently laying his head back down on the wooden floor.

She moved closer to his leg, not oblivious to the clenched fists and taught muscles that showed the pain Sasuke was not vocalizing. Quickly, she placed her chakra-enveloped hands on his emaciated leg, wondering through clenched watery eyes how, why, why to Sasuke…

As she finished, his breathe was finally slowing, although still coming out in loud exhales.

Sakura turned, casting a broken look at the broken man in front of her. His hands were still fists, and his eyes were still clenched shut.

They looked wet.

She focused on his hand as she softly stroked it, watching the appendage relax as her fingers skimmed over it.

Sakura bit her lip, trying to force the tears to go down as she saw it, his shoulder beginning to take on that tell-tale jerk, that signature sign, and slowly, he rolled over on his side facing away from her until she was only looking at his back.

However, a warm hand touched hers, the same she had been focusing on earlier.

With surprised, yet saddened eyes, she took it, smoothly slipping her small hand into his larger, rougher one.

Sasuke grasped it, clutched on to it, their fingers became intertwined, and suddenly it was as if she could understand all of his pain.

Still his shoulders shook.

"I…" he began, shakily, watery, and she waited, kneeling beside him, and squeezed his hand, "I… was trying—" choked up—"I was trying… to answer the door… for you," he said, before he finally, finally, broke into sobs.

It was a sound she would never forget, as she had never heard it before, and hoped to never hear again, because all of that pent up emotion, sadness, had just burst out, and her heart ached for him.

He rolled to face her again, eyes wild, as if he had finally realized the implications of his injury. As their both teary eyes—she had let the tears fall not long after him—met, she now could see the demands, the how?, what?, no, you have to be able to fix this, fix this, fix me goddammit what else do I have left.

She could only shake her head, denying him that foolish hope, it broke her heart, but he had to know, and he only sobbed harder still.

Through blurry, eyes, she reached out for him, sitting and pulling him into her lap, where she cradled his head to her chest.

Gently, her fingers ran through his dark hair, over and over, and his arms snaked in a tight hold around her waist, his sobs racking her body.

Soon, as they sat together amidst the chaos, the broken mess of that sitting room, it was hard to distinguish her sobs from his.

AN: again, the sequel, Black Tables, is out. Go to my profile and check it out.

AN (cont.): oh god! and now it's finished!

So the story behind this one is as follows: I came home from the doctor with bad news, that I tore my ACL and I wouldn't be allowed to play any of my three sports for six months. And it was just this feeling... I mean believe me I'm not as self centered to think that this is the worst possible thing that could happen to me, because I realize there are way worse things, but just no being able to do what I do... and then I started to write this and it just kind of wrote itself. One of my easiest writes ever.

So please, please review. I want to know what you think DESPERATELY hahah.

Seriously though. I love reading reviews.