Naruto: Blind

"The edge is here," she told him kindly, "Sit."

He complied by dropping to the ground, sitting cross-legged on the wooden flooring.

"There's a pole on your right if you want to lean against that," she said in a voice that made him imagine a smile on her face.

"Sakura-neesan!" came the voice of a young girl from behind, maybe eleven or twelve years old, "Do you need anymore help in the kitchen?"

"Iie, Moegi," Sakura's voice was projected back from where they came, "Can you finish up that one flowerbed?"

"Hai!"

Someone energetically rushed by Sasuke as Sakura returned inside; he sat quietly, listening to his surroundings. There was the sound of the feet against grass and then footsteps running across the lawn.

"Konohamaru-kun, are you taking another break?" he heard the young girl exclaim in exasperation.

Konohamaru…that was the kid that used to idolize Naruto when they were kids, Sasuke remembered; that's why the name had seemed familiar to him. Heavens knew why he chose Naruto to admire of all people.

"No, I'm done mowing the lawn," came a lazy retort, "I'm just waiting for—"

Footsteps behind him told Sasuke that Sakura had returned and there was a slight clinking that came with her.

"Yippee!" came the voice of Konohamaru, "Lemonade!"

He acted like Naruto too.

Giving a light laugh, Sakura set something down beside him, "Do you want some lemonade, Sasuke-ku—Sasuke."

"Aa," he responded automatically.

His mind had just become preoccupied as he noticed she had corrected herself and dropped the 'kun' suffix. Mentally he frowned, not that it bothered him that she didn't say his name with the annoying suffix, but it was the fact that it had slipped out, that suggested to him that she still regarded him in a way she had before he left Konoha. However when she had corrected herself, a small sense of surprise came to him. He had thought before when she hadn't used the 'kun' suffix, it had meant that she had held something against him, or something had changed between them, and he shrugged it off, knowing that it was most likely to be expected. But she had just corrected herself, which meant that either it was out of habit, or she was trying to avoid saying it for some reason or another.

"Can I have another glass, Sakura-neesan?" the boy, Konohamaru, asked in an exuberant fashion.

"Hey, I haven't even given everyone their first glass," she scolded with a playful tone in her voice, "You can have another one when everyone else has gotten one."

There was the clinking of ice against glass as she poured some more glasses beside him, and nudging his arm, she handed him one. He muttered a quiet, automatic "thank you" and took a sip from the glass while she cheerfully handed out others to the genin group that was crowding around them. He couldn't say that he particularly liked children—especially loud and obnoxious ones, he added as Konohamaru let out another exuberant exclamation. Once the children had had their fill of lemonade and returned out the yard, he told Sakura so.

"What will you do when you restore the Uchiha clan?" she laughed, sitting down beside him, her legs hanging over the edge of the veranda—he could tell because her feet would occasionally bump the wooden side, "They'll start out as children too."

"They'll be Uchihas," he stated indignantly.

"Oh, and all Uchiha children are quiet and calm?" she teased him, and then there was the jingling of ice as he assumed she took another sip of lemonade.

He grunted in reply and took a sip of his own lemonade, noting that it was made perfectly—it was not too sweet and was a little on the sour side.

"I dunno, Sasuke," she said after a moment, swirling the ice around in her glass so that it tinkled musically, "I wouldn't have called you a quiet and calm child when we were in the academy—that's what made you popular. You were a good student who was nice and talked kindly to everyone; you tried hard at your studies, but you found time to smile and laugh."

A frown descended upon his face. "I don't remember ever being like that," he stated bluntly.

A quiet 'thunk' between them signified that Sakura had put her glass down, "Well, that was before…well, when Itachi—"

"Aa."

He did not want to remember that time.

There was an uncomfortable silence for a moment, Sakura kicking her feet back and forth idly. The genin group was squabbling amongst themselves, arguing over who had to do which task in the garden, and it sounded like the one, Konohamaru, was losing the fight. It was funny how they paralleled Team Seven, but by the sounds of things, the third party of that group was nothing like he had been.

"You know," Sakura pondered serenely, "You smiled a lot back then. That was one of the reasons I liked you—you had a nice smile."

Sasuke did not know what to say to this, so he remained quiet, and took another sip of the lemonade, grabbing an ice cube as he did so. He let it slowly melt in his mouth, the frozen water thawing slowly as time ticked by.

"You laughed back then too," came Sakura's somber voice, "I don't think I've seen you laugh since."

"I laugh," he stated indignantly, the ice cube getting in the way of his tongue and slurring the words slightly.

"I mean really laugh, Sasuke," the projection of her voice turned to face him, "I'm not talking about giving an amused snort once in a while—I mean really laugh, and really smile."

"I haven't had any reason to smile," he said shrugging, the ice cube slightly smaller in his mouth, and not hindering his speech as much.

"I mean, that's understandable, considering what happened to you and everything," she said quietly, her voice turning away from him.

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