Purple 5/5 (Part 5/5)
Title: Purple
Pairing: SasuNaru
Rating: NC17
Chapter Rating: NC17
Warnings: Sexual themes, language
Summary: It's hard learning how to save peoples lives when you're so busy trying to save your own.
Naruto snorted. “Eventually you’re gonna get tired of playing that card,” he said. Nevertheless, he closed his eyes, but not before rolling them in an overly-exaggerated manner in order to illustrate his feelings of Sasuke’s secrecy. His partner mumbled something quickly in Japanese, and then he began to shift. The head of Sasuke’s arousal left his stomach, and the man shifted between his legs.
Shlick
Naruto waited impatiently, twitching his fingers a bit. He was laying with his arms crossed over his chest, and he was all too aware of his position. It was too open to make him feel comfortable, but then again, he hadn’t been comfortable since last Thursday. What was one more bit of awkwardness to the pile of it towering over his senses?
Sasuke was finished with whatever it was he had been doing. He left both hands at his legs now, one damp with what Naruto assumed to be oil. They spread his legs upwards instead of outwards this time, sliding over the back of his knees and pushing them up. Naruto’s arms uncrossed themselves and his hands went to brace themselves on the carpet. “What are you--?” His legs were propped up and over Sasuke’s shoulders then and the hands slid down once more, fondling his ass for a moment or two, spreading his cheeks, fingering Naruto for a moment. The breath caught in Naruto’s throat. Something pressed up against him then, and for a wild moment, Naruto thought his fingers were back, but it felt different.
By the time Naruto figured out what it was Sasuke had pressed against him, and the blunt head of his penis was already being pushed inside. Naruto yelped, but his body was bent in a way that prevented him from squirming away. His arms were spread at his sides, and he struggled to wrap them around his own legs to reach Sasuke’s shoulders. His partner was leaning heavily over the backs of his legs, so close to Naruto’s face he could feel his breath. Naruto’s eyes were opened, taking in the slightly pained expression on Sasuke’s face. He cried out again as Sasuke squeezed himself in further.
“S-stop!” Naruto pleaded. ”Hold on! Fuck, Sasuke! Sasuke! This is d-d-ahh! Different than your fucking fingers! It’s too big, it won’t fit, get the fuck off! Get out!” Naruto feebly pushed at Sasuke’s shoulders, half-heartedly trying to pull away. Sasuke was still pushing in, ignoring him. Despite the ripping pain that was close to sending his mind teetering over the edge of a cliff, he was still curious. Sasuke was right. He hadn’t lied to him yet. Naruto couldn’t think of a reason as to why he would start now.
“C-careful,” Naruto hissed. His head craned backwards, face contorted in pain. “Be c-careful.”
“Stop moving,” Sasuke breathed. Even though his forehead was wrinkled with obvious pain, his obsidian eyes were heated, voice laced with pleasure. Sasuke was enjoying it. “Relax. It feel good soon.”
Naruto couldn’t tell if Sasuke was all the way in, but he was moving back, retracting himself, the movement bringing on all new sorts of pain. He moved forward again, urging himself inwards, deeper than before and at a quicker pace. It hurt--God it hurts, fuck--but the pain hadn’t grown worse. Naruto took solace in that.
When Sasuke repeated the same motion, again there was pain, but a bit less. Naruto was reminded of stepping into a hot tub. When he dipped his legs in, the heat was too much to be bearable, so he withdrew them. He sunk them back in, and it wasn’t so bad. Dipping in a bit further, he’d stand up, then slide back down. The heat was bearable. The pain was bearable. Sasuke dipped in further, kissing the side of Naruto’s thigh with lips and tongue and teeth.
Sasuke did it again, the third time, still deep. On the fourth try, the Japanese boy finally moaned, eyebrows furrowing. Instead of drawing back, though, he jerked his hips sharply. “Uhn!” Naruto grunted, still panting for breath. Sasuke thrusts grew sharper, sliding in further, and Naruto’s eyes felt like they’d roll into the back of his head, that he’d pass out.
Sasuke finally stopped, panting, muttering quickly in Japanese, having pushed himself in as far as possible. He kissed Naruto’s leg slopping one more time before searching blinding for Naruto’s mouth with his own. When he found it, he wasted no time in thrusting his tongue inside. Naruto kissed back furiously, distracting himself from the pain he knew wasn’t as bad as it seemed. He shifted his lips gingerly, causing Sasuke to moan deeply into his mouth. He did it again. The pain was devastating, but was bearable.
They stayed that way for a long minute, their kiss escalating to an unorganized clutter of lips and tongue, neither knowing which mouth they were battling in. But just as soon as Sasuke initiated the kiss, he broke it off, panting heavily, eyes glazed over in pleasure.
“Mine,” Sasuke whispered, the word ghosting over Naruto’s mouth. Blue eyes widened a fraction, and then bulged as Sasuke drew back quickly, leaving him hollow and in more pain than he‘d been with him inside, before thrusting sharply back inside.
“AHH!” Naruto cut his own cry short by biting into his lower lip, face contorting in pained pleasure. The sound that wrenched itself from between his lips was embarrassingly loud, too shattering in such a quiet room. Above him Sasuke growled, the sound a gentle yet strong purr from the back of his throat. His eyes were squinted and teeth clenched, a pink hue on his face from exertion, pleasure marring every line of his face. He let out a low hiss and moved out a few inches before slowly thrusting himself back in, his moan meeting Naruto’s sharp gasp.
He repeated the motion several more times, never changing speed, always pulling out so that only the head of his erection remained inside before hilting himself completely. He was tense above Naruto, the muscles of his thighs and arms quivering with restraint. Naruto kept his own body tense, almost holding onto the pain, afraid to let it go, or feel the new sensation that was starting to settle in.
“Relax,” Sasuke repeated, not stopping his pushes and pulls, “just relax. It feel good.”
Naruto’s mind responded with a stubborn, “No!”, but his body was already acting on its own agenda. His muscles began to unclench, and with the tension left the pain until both were merely backdrops, hidden out of sight. His attention was focused on the other boy’s hardened manhood sliding in and out, hot and still too big, but it was bearable. It was more than bearable, Naruto now realized. It felt almost…
“Ku-…” Sasuke eyes flashed open. He muttered something in harsh Japanese before his hands were at Naruto’s legs, prying them apart into a wide “V” shape. His hips jerked backwards, Sasuke’s back straightened, and he plunged back inside harshly, sinking his entire length inside. The older boy’s chest hitched, and Naruto screamed in shock. His back arched from the floor and his hands balled into fists, eyes flying shut as over-whelming pleasure barreled into him like an eighteen-wheeler spinning out of control.
“Nnh…. Hn….” His breath left him in short, heady gasps that ran in sync with the raven-haired boys thrusts, his head rocking and lightly tapping against the wooden paneling behind him each time. His mind was too lost to properly focus on what was now the mind-numbingly amazing feeling of Sasuke’s pushes into his body, of being filled and just now realizing he’d been empty his entire life.
He was right, Naruto thought hazily, body racked with exertion. He arched his body, trying to take him in deeper. It feels good.
Naruto shifted his head to the side, breathing heavily through his nose, clenching his eyes tight shut. His lungs were burning, and the heat from Sasuke’s breath was making it difficult. His mouth searched for cooler, fresher air. A smooth hand that swayed slightly cupped his cheek, and a right eye peered open with wavering vision to see pale fingers, trembling slightly.
“Look at me,” Sasuke pleaded with bated breath. “Naruto, look at me.”
Naruto did, his eyes lingering on a pale neck that bobbed as Sasuke swallowed, the Adam’s Apple barely there. His blue eyes traced over pale lips which had become even paler and fuller as they were bitten into. Flushed, hollowed cheeks. Dark bags under eyes that looked more like shadow than signs of sleep deprivation. Onyx eyes, blazing bright with a fiery passion, wide and glittering like two giant diamonds. Black bangs were plastered into a knotty mat on his forehead and the spikes at the back of his head were limp, brushing around his shoulders. His body was drenched with sweat and it beaded across his face, tricking perspiration between his slightly parted lips.
“Say my name,” Sasuke gasped, slowing his hips and pounding into him with a long, steady rhythm, hands reaching down to trap his waist in a tight grasp with fingers digging in hard enough to bruise.
“W--ahh!-hy?” the blond gritted, wincing but not letting his eyes break contact with the older boy’s. His body moved against the carpet and he knew his back would be black and blue the next morning, but then again, so would the rest of him. The next morning. It was a foreign concept, to think of something outside the hear and now when the hear and now was so inescapable. Would Sasuke really be gone by tomorrow morning? Would Naruto be willing to ever let him go? Would he be willing to let Naruto lock them in this room forever, just so that neither of them would ever have to face the outside world again? Naruto had admitted, inadvertently, that he loved him. Was that enough? Would it change anything?
“P-please, just say it,” Sasuke said absent-mindedly, picking up the pace slightly, causing Naruto to groan and clench his thighs around the Uchiha’s waist.
“N-n-nhh… Sa--”
“That’s it,” Sasuke encouraged. “Say it, please, say it… Say it for me…”
“Sa--”
“Say it for me.”
“Sa---ahh! Sasukeee…” His eyes narrowed as Sasuke resumed a quicker pace, pushing himself more tightly, grinding down and leaning forward. With one hand he propped himself up, with the other he lightly teased the leaking head of Naruto’s erection.
“Say it louder,” Sasuke commanded, touching but not quite pressing down, pulling his hand back when Naruto thrust up and merely causing Sasuke to slide in deeper.
“S-s-Sasuke…”
“Louder, Naruto. Say it louder.”
“Sasuke!”
“Louder.”
“Don’t leave.”
Sasuke bent over him, dark eyes still glaze with pleasure, looking unsure of what Naruto had just said. “Don’t leave me,” Naruto murmured, watching Sasuke through slanted eyes, gaze wavering as his eyes began to sting. “Don’t. Stay. Sasuke!”
The raven groaned and turned his face away, biting into his shoulder as a means of distraction, pounding hungrily, lustily murmuring Naruto’s name against his skin as Naruto cried out his. Eventually, the word “Mine” began to slip into the mantra, and then the raven was chanting that.
“Mine,” he growled. “All mine. Say it.”
Naruto shook his head once, grunting when Sasuke’s erection dug into his prostate again. “Say you won’t leave.”
“I can’t,“ Sasuke hissed. “Tell me you are mine,” Sasuke ordered instead. “All mine. No one else’s. Say it. Tell me it. Tell me you are mine.”
“N-no…” Why wouldn‘t he agree? Naruto wondered. He’d given Sasuke more in the matter of a few hours than he’d ever given to anyone in his entire life, and he couldn’t extract from the other one simple promise. Why? Why? Just one promise in turn for all the ones Naruto had kept for him. Stay, stay, staystaystay.
Sasuke was back to begging now, no longer forceful, the tone of his voice a perfect match to Naruto‘s broken pleading. “Say that you are mine,” he begged, like it would be the only thing that could save his life. Perhaps it was. “Please!”
“I can’t,” his voice raspy, “I won’t. Not until you p-promise me.” He spoke in fragments, coherency a thing of the past, the tightening in his stomach the only thing he knew. So close, just a bit longer, then, it would all be over. He dreaded it worse than he did dying. “Promise me. Please!”
“Please,” Sasuke tried again, ignoring Naruto‘s request. “Say you’re mine. You are. Say you’re mine, no one else’s, only mine.”
“I’ll be alone,” Naruto whispered. “You c-can’t… don’t leave! Don’t! L-l-listen t-t--ahhhh!’
“You are,” Sasuke repeated, lost in his own train of thought. “You have to be. I have nothing else--I must be allowed to have this. Just this, just you. Say you’re mine.”
“N-no… Nngh, Sasuke…”
“Naruto,” Sasuke returned in kind. “Just say it, that all I need. Tell me you’re mine.”
“Tell me you’ll stay….”
Growling, Sasuke drew back and forced Naruto’s legs forward, knees going to the blond’s ears. Naruto yelped at the suddenly uncomfortable position, and groaned as Sasuke began to slide in deeper, scrotum tapping at his butt cheeks with every thrust.
“Nothing is mine,” Sasuke whispered brokenly, and with a start, Naruto realized that he was crying. Twin tracks of tears cut through the beaded sweat coating his face and his nose was bunched along with his mouth, face brightening as he tried to withhold sobs. “Nothing is mine. Not even this.”
Naruto didn’t think he could go faster, but he did, and now the pain was returning. It added a sharp edge to the pleasure, and his cock pulsed as it was crushed between his stomach and the flat, hard one above him.
“Not even you,” Sasuke whispered. “Please… Naruto, please… belong to me. Just me. Let me have you, all of you…”
“Sasuke,” Naruto cried, back arching, his hips driving upwards and slamming himself onto the raven.
“Naruto,” Sasuke whispered before moaning, eyes finally shutting.
The blond arched himself up once more, so close. One more push, a second one, a third, and the fourth one on the count brought him to his climax. But he didn’t want it. He wanted this to go on, to never end, because then, Sasuke would leave, and Naruto would be miserable. Worse than miserable, he’d be alone. Sasuke had spent the afternoon, the whole year, building him up, and now he was crushing him one broken promise at a time. Nevertheless, it came. Naruto cried out wordlessly, tacking on a garbled version of the older boy’s name towards the end, waves of dizzying pleasure overriding his senses.
He’d been told orgasm was white. The world would suddenly be filled with light, pleasurably blinding, and causing dots to swim across your vision. That wasn’t what he saw. What he saw was just as before, but in a different color. Everything was a different shade of purple, and like a malignant tumor it crept across his mind. The color of a dark beauty, he thought, something so breath-taxingly gorgeous, and one shade lighter than black. The color of violets, the color of bruises. It consumed him as he rode out the pleasure, the tightening in his stomach releasing itself. Everything was drowned in thick purple fog. He could smell it, like sweet grapes, feel it, clawing into his skin. Too dark to see anything, and the color grew darker and darker, dragging away his consciousness.
Something suddenly stilled above him, and then a weight was pressing him into the ground once more. Heavy panting washed over his sweaty skin. The color consumed him still, and he wondered what it was that Sasuke saw.
“I‘m sorry,” the raven whispered into his neck. There was shifting, but Naruto couldn’t make out more than a blurred outline as the weight was lifted from his chest. “You give so much… and I can’t give it in return. I’m sorry.”
Naruto was slipping away. He barely knew what it was that Sasuke was saying, only registering the fact that the one thing he’d ever truly wanted was being denied from him. His whole life was defined now, in one moment. Like a storm, ripping him to shreds. His heart was the aftermath, bleeding, sure to be reconstructed, but never anywhere near the same.
And in those last few moments, the last before he knew he’d never see Sasuke again, he heard him whisper, “I love you.”
A glint of something shiny caught his attention, but only for a split second. The sun had set, he realized. The sky was black, and so were Sasuke’s eyes, gleaming like stars, twin trails of tears sparkling like diamonds as they slid down skin towards eternity.
--
When Naruto woke up, Sasuke wasn’t there.
He lay there for a few long moments, studying the apartment in the darkness. He expected it to look different at night, but it didn’t. It was like seeing an apple in the day and an apple in the dark. He still knew it was red, knew that it would taste the same, even though appearance told him otherwise.
He drew himself up slowly, and let reality settle in. Sasuke could have been in the bathroom, or changing in his bedroom, but Naruto knew that he wasn’t. The world was quiet and still, and he, Naruto, was alone.
“I’m sorry.”
“I love you.”
Naruto wondered what it would be like to get shot in the heart. He doubted that it could come close to rivaling betrayal.
Naruto’s skin felt stiff, like he’d been sunburned. When he loved his legs, he felt them stick to the carpet. He gently shifted onto his knees, stayed that way for a few moments and clenched his eyes shut tightly, riding the pain out. It hurt to move. After a minute, he stood slowly. He shifted his hips, felt the pain, and decided it was bearable. He took another minute to decide if he wanted to wash off, to at least clean off his face. He decided not to. His clothes were by his feet. It took another minute to gather them, wincing as he bent to pick them up. There was a near-constant burning sensation behind his eyes, a rancid lump pitted deeply in his throat. He was going to cry, and he wanted to. But he couldn’t. There was nothing there.
When he was dressed, he looked around. On the floor was a half-empty bottle of extra virgin olive oil. There was a quilt on the floor, and he realized that Sasuke had covered him before the blanket had fallen off. The curtains were drawn so that only a thin line of black sky could be seen between the gaps. Nothing else had changed.
Naruto saw that his bag was where he had left it. The papers from Sasuke’s homework were still scattered across the living room floor. It seemed centuries ago. Those papers, that bag, shouldn’t be here. This was a place where nothing from the outside world should be allowed in. Naruto, however, couldn’t let himself move them. To throw them in the trash can, to throw them out the window. He didn’t even want to even look at them. It seemed sacrilegious.
He wanted to look around. To maybe fine a hint as to where Sasuke had gone, or where he was leaving for tomorrow. He wanted to know what it was like, where Sasuke lived. But that too seemed sacrilegious.
So Naruto limped to the door, opened it, debated locking it. Sasuke seemed the type not to forget things like keys. He locked it, aware that this would mean he couldn’t reenter.
He shut the door firmly behind him. The loneliness increased tenfold. Everything had turned upside down. Suddenly, a monster was glaring at him from down the hallway. Its hackles were raised. The darkness was closing in. The light bulbs on the ceiling glared crookedly down at him. He had to get back inside, where it was safe. Even if Sasuke never returned for him, even if he was alone in that apartment for the rest of his goddamned life, he would be happy. He would lie on that same patch of carpet every night for the rest of his life. He would sit himself in that red light for every sunset there ever was for the rest of his life. The rest of his life. It was a choice between loneliness, and an unbearably barren life. He chose the former.
The monster from the darkness crept closer. Naruto spun around, yanked on the doorknob, and remembered then that he had locked it. He began to pound on it, knowing that no one would answer. He screamed, knowing no one would answer. No one was home.
“Sasuke! Sasuke! Sasuke! SASUKE!”
Poundpoundpound
His heart beat uncontrollably.
Poundpoundpound
His hands were going numb.
“SASUKE! SASUKE!”
“What is going on here!?”
Naruto recognized that voice. He turned, and found that in place of the monster, there was the doorman from before. He looked angry and pompous, just like he had before. It was like waking up from a long nap in the middle of the day. It felt like Naruto was both in the same place he’d been hours earlier, and like he was ten years in the future.
And his eyes. Those narrow, shrew eyes, like livid mirrors, reflecting back to Naruto the true monster in the hallway. He saw his own angry, haggard, aged face, so old in a boy so young.
“Is something the matter?” the doorman asked in his nasally, cruel voice. Naruto couldn’t be angry. He was an old man who had nothing accomplished in his life but becoming a doorman at a ritzy apartment complex. He had every right to be bitter.
And Naruto had every right to feel dead.
“Hey,” the old man said as Naruto brushed by him. “Wait a--”
Naruto knew that he didn’t care enough to press any further. He couldn’t hear any footsteps following after him. He was alone when he got to the elevator, and he didn’t turn to look at the monster reflected in the man’s eyes. He waited until he heard the doors slide shut with a mechanical hiss behind him before turning. He folded his aching hands into his pockets and envisioned himself home. Home, with its barren walls, comforting amber glow, wide expanse of solid carpet, the smell of smoke that was only good because he knew that there would be no fire following it.
He left the apartment building without any further human contact. There was no one in the lobby, nor the office. Naruto wondered how late it really was. He wondered how many people he’d woken up with his screaming.
He wondered how many had heard, but simply hadn’t the guts to do a thing about it.
The outside world was just as quiet as it was inside the apartment building. Naruto walked in silence for a long while, thoughts blank, and ignoring the temporary insanity that drove away any and all thinking processes. Naruto didn’t need to think. Thinking would tear the rest of him apart. What was left, he had to keep. He had to at least keep it for Iruka’s sake.
Until he heard voices.
“Hey… Hey, Uzumaki! Is that you, Uzumaki!?”
It was sickeningly comforting to feel the fear in his stomach at those words. Naruto recognized him, of course, even if it had never been that close. They were somewhere behind him, and Naruto knew that to get out of this with the most minimal amount of damage possible, he’d have to show a backbone, turn, and face them. But unfortunately, Sasuke hadn’t broken him quite far enough. He could compare the feeling to a scraped knee behind the ripped knee of a brand new pair of jeans. Expensive jeans, completely ruined, with only a scrape to show for it, one that didn’t even bleed, only stung for a few hours and didn’t so much as bruise. If something was to be ruined, there should be a suitable amount of damage to show for it.
So Naruto kept on walking.
“Hey! Ha ha, shut up, just a sec. Hey, Uzumaki! Where ya runnin’ off to, ya crazy faggot?”
A heavy arm encircled Naruto’s sagging shoulders, and the nauseating smell of cigarette smoke and stale beer filled his senses. Shadows swiveled into his line of vision. He wondered if they could smell him over their own nauseating stench.
“How’re you doin’, fag?” Kisame asked in his gravely voice, squeezing Naruto’s shoulder and shaking it like he would a friend, although he probably wouldn’t grip a friend’s shoulder hard enough to bruise like he was doing now. “Haven’t seen you around lately. What’s up with that, huh?” Naruto heard laughter in the background. Combining that with the numbers of footfalls he heard, Naruto guessed that he had three of his cronies with him. Maybe four. He didn’t bother to turn around to check.
“Hey, hey, lost your voice, buddy?” Kisame was laughing, his loping gate even more so due to the alcohol he’d no doubted been guzzling before he’d run into Naruto. The other boy was tall, taller than Sasuke, and probably older, too. Naruto knew he’d been held back a few grades, just as he knew he didn’t have parents who gave enough of a damn to kick him back into gear. He had to have picked up that drinking habit from somewhere. And for that reason, Naruto couldn’t hate him.
“The fuck is wrong with your voice, you little shit?” Kisame asked jovially. With a grungy finger, he forcefully dug it at Naruto’s ear, causing the blond’s head to rock on his neck. The laughter grew louder. Naruto knew this street, and knew that before they crossed the next street, there was an abandoned store at the corner. Behind it was a dark alleyway the store managers always threw their trash in, although it was abandoned and dark now from years without use. Naruto had never seen inside of it before, but knew now that he’d see it soon enough.
Kisame and his gang had picked up their pace, and the tall student was practically dragging Naruto now as he gabbed into his ear. “Where were you this late, eh, Uzumaki? At your boyfriend’s house? That little Japanese fag? I heard he lives in that prissy building over there. You came from there, right?”
They were getting closer, and Naruto almost tripped over his own two feet. He was laughed at, and wondered why he couldn’t (wouldn’t) fight.
“You look like shit, buddy. He give it to you bad, huh? Do your good buddies have to go and wring his little faggot neck?” Kisame sneered. “Or is that how you like it? Fucking figured. I never understand you homos, ya know that? Hey, hey, you listening pal?”
They were at the alleyway now. Kisame took one great, overly dramatized step forward, paused, and in that short moment Naruto wondered if he should act surprised, if only for their pathetic sakes, before he was shoved into the alleyway. His back, already aching from bruises and rug burns, flared with fresh pain. Naruto grunted, wincing.
“What’s wrong, you fucking monster? I thought you liked it like this?’ More laughter, so dark and haunting, ugly. Naruto felt filthy in its presence. “Hey, hey, I’ll make you a deal, huh? How ‘bout that? Since the Jap ditched you for a guy with a bigger dick, why don’t I make you a deal? I’ll give you a nice punch in your fucking face and you can get on your knees and suck my dick. How ‘bout that, fag face? Like th-that?” He could hardly peak coherently over the haze of alcohol, over his own egotistical amusement--he thinks he’s so damned funny--over his own self-loathing.
“Hey, hey!”
Hey, hey
“I love you.”
Hey, hey
A fist garnished with several thick and clunky rings slugged him across his cheek. The side of his head slammed into the side of the building. He saw stars, bright in the darkness of the alley, illuminating their faces like the beam of a flashlight over a freshly undug grave. Slurred and grimy faces, leering, tears of hate streaming down their cheeks and their faces, making them hideous.
“Hey, you little bitch, get the fuck on your knees. Hey, hey! You little faggot monster, get down!”
A punch to the gut, Naruto doubled over, gasping. Heavy fingers had threaded into his hair. He’d never be able to wash away the filth they left there. Down, down, pulling him down, the hand tried but couldn’t. His legs stood resolutely firm. The last man that had brought him to his knees, Naruto thought distantly, would be the only man to bring him to his knees. Because that had ruined him, once and for all. Ruined him for women, ruined him for men, too. Ruined any friendships he’d ever make. Ruined the trust he thought he had in Iruka, the one person in the world who loved him. Ruined everything.
Naruto realized then, a moment too late, just how broken he was. Why ask for more?
So when Kisame prepared to shove him to the side, to the dark ground Naruto knew he’d never be able to stand up from again, his fist flew out and Kisame’s head snapped back like lightning.
His cronies stopped laughing. Naruto shakily stood his ground, stood up at every unimpressive inch of his diminutive height. They were taller than him, bigger, bulky with muscle, pumped full of alcohol-fueled rage. Naruto didn’t stand a chance. But he could still stand. That counted for something. It had to!
“Grab his arms!”
No, no, I was wrong, I’m broken enough.
It was useless. There were far too many of them for Naruto to handle alone. He didn’t get a single hit in, although not for lack of trying. All too soon, his arms were captured behind his back, and he was straddling a world that wouldn’t stop trying to buck him off. Everything was shaking, everything and everyone was weak, but he was weaker, disgusting, pathetic, run, moron, be strong enough for that.
But he wasn’t.
“Mother-fucking monster,” Kisame spat, swiping the blood away from his cheeks. It crusted along the three long, jagged scars on the older boys neck, catching Naruto’s frantic eye. Kisame noticed, and grinned. “Like ‘em?” Kisame asked. “I did ‘em myself.”
Kisame’s hand disappeared behind him and then reappeared, a black rectangle in his hand, the size of a lighter. But when Kisame flicked the catch, a blade popped up instead of a bubble of flame. “You like this, too?”
Naruto couldn’t trust his voice. Afraid of what it would sound like. He jerked his head to the side, but hands were in his hair once again and forcing his face forward, naked in the darkness.
Kisame grinned. His teeth were as rotted as the rest of him. He twiddled the blade, the shiny metal dirty, grimy, spotted with flecks of rust. It caught no light.
“You’re a fucking monster.”
“I love you.”
Makes sense, I guess.
Only another monster could ever love a monster.
“Now you can look the part.” Naruto didn’t trust himself to talk, or even scream, afraid he would sound like a rabid animal instead of a human. So he settled for gritting his teeth, eyes bubbling with pain, hair jerked as his head was held steady, body shaking as Kisame began to cut into his face.
--
Naruto didn’t come to the realization that he was awake until he was a block away from his house. He paused at the street corner. He saw blue and red flashing lights. He kept walking, arms hanging loosely by his sides. He limped heavily and stepped slowly, each inch he gained paying him back with gratuitous amounts of pain. His skin was itchy with drying liquids; blood, sweat, semen and oil. He didn’t want to know what he smelled like. Probably road kill.
His clothes clung to him, too small. He’d grown so much in one afternoon, and now he felt the world could not contain him. Or that he could not contain it, and it felt like the whole weight of the world was trying to cram itself onto his back. There was a broken nature in his gate. His blond hair smelled of rust and musk. Fingerprints left in black and blue marred his skin. He felt like a decrepit and beaten shoe box without the shoes. There was nothing left inside. There’d be nothing left in the morning. There’d be nothing left when he walked into school. When people talked to him, he wouldn’t be able to understand. English didn’t make sense to him anymore. He’d be empty next week, and the week after. He’d be empty in high school, and college, and the loneliness, the anger, the betrayal threatened to swallow him whole.
He could feel their rancid breath.
He could hear the whispered ‘I love you’.
He could feel their fingers around his throat.
Naruto didn’t remember how he’d gotten out of that alley. He didn’t recall picking himself up and off the ground without losing any piece of himself with the trash cans and the broken beer bottles where the gang had abandoned him. Naruto couldn’t blame those boys for leaving him there. They hated themselves more than they could ever hate Naruto, or anyone like him. Instead, he hated someone else. Someone who gave him the sweetest words, and threw him out into the streets. He left him alone. He left him alone in school, and at home, in his town, his city, this country, this world. Alone.
You let me go?
Naruto heard voices now, and in them, Iruka’s was the loudest. Strong arms, but not as strong as his had been, wrapped around his lanky figure, and spikes of pain shot through him.
“Naruto, oh God, Naruto.” He heard sobbing, but at least it wasn’t him this time. Swarms of men in blue shirts surrounded him, but his vision had suddenly been filled with warm brown eyes.
“Oh God, Naruto.” A hand brushed his face, which Naruto just realized was burning. “Your face… what happened to your face!?”
His face? Nothing had happened to his face. Don’t let him see it. It was the rest of him that Iruka should have been paying attention to. It’ll be the first thing that anyone ever sees. But as if run by unseen forces, his head slowly revolved to the left, towards the windows that ran alone the bottom floor of the apartment. The white blinds had been drawn, and orange light emitted from the lamp post behind him allowed him to see. From the bottoms of his eyes down to his neck, everything was caked in blood. It looked like a mask that only covered the bottom half of his face. So much blood should not be normal, he thought. It couldn’t be.
And in that buddle of blood were six distinct tracks, so dark they might as well have been black. Three on each cheek, diagonal slits, like whisker marks.
“Now you can look the part.”
Where did he get those marks? Those marks on the streets, those marks in the dark, that made him a monster.
“I love you.”
“Look the part.”
What makes a monster? The things they do on their own? The things done to them?
“You fucking monster.”
Were they right? It wasn’t their fault if it was.
I don’t feel human anymore.
“I love you.”
No.
“I love you.“
No.
Liar. Liar.
Liarliarliar.
“Look the part.”
“I love you.”
Liar.
--
The sky was dark and heavy with night now. They’d heard the last door shut around an hour ago. The digital clock on Naruto’s bedside table told them it was two in the morning, but neither felt tired. Exhausted, yes, but not tired. The bed was slightly cramped with the two practically laying on each other. Sasuke promised that they could move the beds together the next day. Tonight, he was too lazy to move. Content to stay just where he was.
“Naruto,” Sasuke muttered, eyes hidden in the darkness. Naruto felt his body shift beside him, causing the blanket to slip down his shoulder.
Grumbling, pulling the blanket back up and over him, he asked, “Yeah?”
“Why did you do this?”
Naruto rolled his eyes. He was too complacent to brew up a proper argument, so he went along. “Because I wanted to.”
Sasuke frowned. Naruto could feel it against his forehead. “You didn’t do this for me, right?” he pressed. “Because you felt guilty?”
Naruto snorted softly. “Now who’s the idiot?” he asked. “I’ve always done what I wanted, moron. And unfortunately, that still hasn’t changed.”
Everything, everything, everything on a whim, on a promise made years and years ago, between two people unfit for humanity, what a beautiful disaster this is.
Naruto leaned in and kissed him.
Like fire
I love you
Sasuke hummed softly against his lips, pressing Naruto’s head into the pillow with the pressure. They kissed slowly for a long few minutes, no tongue, just soft, wet velvety lips, languidly memorizing the shape of each other’s mouths, getting used to the fact that this would now be a constant craving. To feel the other’s presence. To know that they existed. To hold onto, to kiss.
“I love you.” Sasuke didn’t say it, just mouthed it softly against Naruto’s lips. “Love you.”
This is ridiculous. It’s like were drunk. The hangover’s going to be fantastic. I’ll live with the migraine for the rest of my life if I have to, don’t take this away, never again, never take t away from me.
Don’t leave me.
“I won’t leave,” Sasuke whispered when they drew apart from the night. He held Naruto tighter, looked him in the eye. Naruto wished he could wash away the lingering look being Sasuke’s eyes, the one he still couldn’t identify, but still, for now, it was fine. He’d try again later.
“I know. Go to sleep.”
The pillow was soft. The love was real, as was the look in his eyes, the one Naruto would never see again. Because he didn’t want to see it. Not again.
Naruto softly kissed Sasuke’s naked shoulder.
All on a whim.
I love you.
Pairing: SasuNaru
Rating: NC17
Chapter Rating: NC17
Warnings: Sexual themes, language
Summary: It's hard learning how to save peoples lives when you're so busy trying to save your own.
Naruto snorted. “Eventually you’re gonna get tired of playing that card,” he said. Nevertheless, he closed his eyes, but not before rolling them in an overly-exaggerated manner in order to illustrate his feelings of Sasuke’s secrecy. His partner mumbled something quickly in Japanese, and then he began to shift. The head of Sasuke’s arousal left his stomach, and the man shifted between his legs.
Shlick
Naruto waited impatiently, twitching his fingers a bit. He was laying with his arms crossed over his chest, and he was all too aware of his position. It was too open to make him feel comfortable, but then again, he hadn’t been comfortable since last Thursday. What was one more bit of awkwardness to the pile of it towering over his senses?
Sasuke was finished with whatever it was he had been doing. He left both hands at his legs now, one damp with what Naruto assumed to be oil. They spread his legs upwards instead of outwards this time, sliding over the back of his knees and pushing them up. Naruto’s arms uncrossed themselves and his hands went to brace themselves on the carpet. “What are you--?” His legs were propped up and over Sasuke’s shoulders then and the hands slid down once more, fondling his ass for a moment or two, spreading his cheeks, fingering Naruto for a moment. The breath caught in Naruto’s throat. Something pressed up against him then, and for a wild moment, Naruto thought his fingers were back, but it felt different.
By the time Naruto figured out what it was Sasuke had pressed against him, and the blunt head of his penis was already being pushed inside. Naruto yelped, but his body was bent in a way that prevented him from squirming away. His arms were spread at his sides, and he struggled to wrap them around his own legs to reach Sasuke’s shoulders. His partner was leaning heavily over the backs of his legs, so close to Naruto’s face he could feel his breath. Naruto’s eyes were opened, taking in the slightly pained expression on Sasuke’s face. He cried out again as Sasuke squeezed himself in further.
“S-stop!” Naruto pleaded. ”Hold on! Fuck, Sasuke! Sasuke! This is d-d-ahh! Different than your fucking fingers! It’s too big, it won’t fit, get the fuck off! Get out!” Naruto feebly pushed at Sasuke’s shoulders, half-heartedly trying to pull away. Sasuke was still pushing in, ignoring him. Despite the ripping pain that was close to sending his mind teetering over the edge of a cliff, he was still curious. Sasuke was right. He hadn’t lied to him yet. Naruto couldn’t think of a reason as to why he would start now.
“C-careful,” Naruto hissed. His head craned backwards, face contorted in pain. “Be c-careful.”
“Stop moving,” Sasuke breathed. Even though his forehead was wrinkled with obvious pain, his obsidian eyes were heated, voice laced with pleasure. Sasuke was enjoying it. “Relax. It feel good soon.”
Naruto couldn’t tell if Sasuke was all the way in, but he was moving back, retracting himself, the movement bringing on all new sorts of pain. He moved forward again, urging himself inwards, deeper than before and at a quicker pace. It hurt--God it hurts, fuck--but the pain hadn’t grown worse. Naruto took solace in that.
When Sasuke repeated the same motion, again there was pain, but a bit less. Naruto was reminded of stepping into a hot tub. When he dipped his legs in, the heat was too much to be bearable, so he withdrew them. He sunk them back in, and it wasn’t so bad. Dipping in a bit further, he’d stand up, then slide back down. The heat was bearable. The pain was bearable. Sasuke dipped in further, kissing the side of Naruto’s thigh with lips and tongue and teeth.
Sasuke did it again, the third time, still deep. On the fourth try, the Japanese boy finally moaned, eyebrows furrowing. Instead of drawing back, though, he jerked his hips sharply. “Uhn!” Naruto grunted, still panting for breath. Sasuke thrusts grew sharper, sliding in further, and Naruto’s eyes felt like they’d roll into the back of his head, that he’d pass out.
Sasuke finally stopped, panting, muttering quickly in Japanese, having pushed himself in as far as possible. He kissed Naruto’s leg slopping one more time before searching blinding for Naruto’s mouth with his own. When he found it, he wasted no time in thrusting his tongue inside. Naruto kissed back furiously, distracting himself from the pain he knew wasn’t as bad as it seemed. He shifted his lips gingerly, causing Sasuke to moan deeply into his mouth. He did it again. The pain was devastating, but was bearable.
They stayed that way for a long minute, their kiss escalating to an unorganized clutter of lips and tongue, neither knowing which mouth they were battling in. But just as soon as Sasuke initiated the kiss, he broke it off, panting heavily, eyes glazed over in pleasure.
“Mine,” Sasuke whispered, the word ghosting over Naruto’s mouth. Blue eyes widened a fraction, and then bulged as Sasuke drew back quickly, leaving him hollow and in more pain than he‘d been with him inside, before thrusting sharply back inside.
“AHH!” Naruto cut his own cry short by biting into his lower lip, face contorting in pained pleasure. The sound that wrenched itself from between his lips was embarrassingly loud, too shattering in such a quiet room. Above him Sasuke growled, the sound a gentle yet strong purr from the back of his throat. His eyes were squinted and teeth clenched, a pink hue on his face from exertion, pleasure marring every line of his face. He let out a low hiss and moved out a few inches before slowly thrusting himself back in, his moan meeting Naruto’s sharp gasp.
He repeated the motion several more times, never changing speed, always pulling out so that only the head of his erection remained inside before hilting himself completely. He was tense above Naruto, the muscles of his thighs and arms quivering with restraint. Naruto kept his own body tense, almost holding onto the pain, afraid to let it go, or feel the new sensation that was starting to settle in.
“Relax,” Sasuke repeated, not stopping his pushes and pulls, “just relax. It feel good.”
Naruto’s mind responded with a stubborn, “No!”, but his body was already acting on its own agenda. His muscles began to unclench, and with the tension left the pain until both were merely backdrops, hidden out of sight. His attention was focused on the other boy’s hardened manhood sliding in and out, hot and still too big, but it was bearable. It was more than bearable, Naruto now realized. It felt almost…
“Ku-…” Sasuke eyes flashed open. He muttered something in harsh Japanese before his hands were at Naruto’s legs, prying them apart into a wide “V” shape. His hips jerked backwards, Sasuke’s back straightened, and he plunged back inside harshly, sinking his entire length inside. The older boy’s chest hitched, and Naruto screamed in shock. His back arched from the floor and his hands balled into fists, eyes flying shut as over-whelming pleasure barreled into him like an eighteen-wheeler spinning out of control.
“Nnh…. Hn….” His breath left him in short, heady gasps that ran in sync with the raven-haired boys thrusts, his head rocking and lightly tapping against the wooden paneling behind him each time. His mind was too lost to properly focus on what was now the mind-numbingly amazing feeling of Sasuke’s pushes into his body, of being filled and just now realizing he’d been empty his entire life.
He was right, Naruto thought hazily, body racked with exertion. He arched his body, trying to take him in deeper. It feels good.
Naruto shifted his head to the side, breathing heavily through his nose, clenching his eyes tight shut. His lungs were burning, and the heat from Sasuke’s breath was making it difficult. His mouth searched for cooler, fresher air. A smooth hand that swayed slightly cupped his cheek, and a right eye peered open with wavering vision to see pale fingers, trembling slightly.
“Look at me,” Sasuke pleaded with bated breath. “Naruto, look at me.”
Naruto did, his eyes lingering on a pale neck that bobbed as Sasuke swallowed, the Adam’s Apple barely there. His blue eyes traced over pale lips which had become even paler and fuller as they were bitten into. Flushed, hollowed cheeks. Dark bags under eyes that looked more like shadow than signs of sleep deprivation. Onyx eyes, blazing bright with a fiery passion, wide and glittering like two giant diamonds. Black bangs were plastered into a knotty mat on his forehead and the spikes at the back of his head were limp, brushing around his shoulders. His body was drenched with sweat and it beaded across his face, tricking perspiration between his slightly parted lips.
“Say my name,” Sasuke gasped, slowing his hips and pounding into him with a long, steady rhythm, hands reaching down to trap his waist in a tight grasp with fingers digging in hard enough to bruise.
“W--ahh!-hy?” the blond gritted, wincing but not letting his eyes break contact with the older boy’s. His body moved against the carpet and he knew his back would be black and blue the next morning, but then again, so would the rest of him. The next morning. It was a foreign concept, to think of something outside the hear and now when the hear and now was so inescapable. Would Sasuke really be gone by tomorrow morning? Would Naruto be willing to ever let him go? Would he be willing to let Naruto lock them in this room forever, just so that neither of them would ever have to face the outside world again? Naruto had admitted, inadvertently, that he loved him. Was that enough? Would it change anything?
“P-please, just say it,” Sasuke said absent-mindedly, picking up the pace slightly, causing Naruto to groan and clench his thighs around the Uchiha’s waist.
“N-n-nhh… Sa--”
“That’s it,” Sasuke encouraged. “Say it, please, say it… Say it for me…”
“Sa--”
“Say it for me.”
“Sa---ahh! Sasukeee…” His eyes narrowed as Sasuke resumed a quicker pace, pushing himself more tightly, grinding down and leaning forward. With one hand he propped himself up, with the other he lightly teased the leaking head of Naruto’s erection.
“Say it louder,” Sasuke commanded, touching but not quite pressing down, pulling his hand back when Naruto thrust up and merely causing Sasuke to slide in deeper.
“S-s-Sasuke…”
“Louder, Naruto. Say it louder.”
“Sasuke!”
“Louder.”
“Don’t leave.”
Sasuke bent over him, dark eyes still glaze with pleasure, looking unsure of what Naruto had just said. “Don’t leave me,” Naruto murmured, watching Sasuke through slanted eyes, gaze wavering as his eyes began to sting. “Don’t. Stay. Sasuke!”
The raven groaned and turned his face away, biting into his shoulder as a means of distraction, pounding hungrily, lustily murmuring Naruto’s name against his skin as Naruto cried out his. Eventually, the word “Mine” began to slip into the mantra, and then the raven was chanting that.
“Mine,” he growled. “All mine. Say it.”
Naruto shook his head once, grunting when Sasuke’s erection dug into his prostate again. “Say you won’t leave.”
“I can’t,“ Sasuke hissed. “Tell me you are mine,” Sasuke ordered instead. “All mine. No one else’s. Say it. Tell me it. Tell me you are mine.”
“N-no…” Why wouldn‘t he agree? Naruto wondered. He’d given Sasuke more in the matter of a few hours than he’d ever given to anyone in his entire life, and he couldn’t extract from the other one simple promise. Why? Why? Just one promise in turn for all the ones Naruto had kept for him. Stay, stay, staystaystay.
Sasuke was back to begging now, no longer forceful, the tone of his voice a perfect match to Naruto‘s broken pleading. “Say that you are mine,” he begged, like it would be the only thing that could save his life. Perhaps it was. “Please!”
“I can’t,” his voice raspy, “I won’t. Not until you p-promise me.” He spoke in fragments, coherency a thing of the past, the tightening in his stomach the only thing he knew. So close, just a bit longer, then, it would all be over. He dreaded it worse than he did dying. “Promise me. Please!”
“Please,” Sasuke tried again, ignoring Naruto‘s request. “Say you’re mine. You are. Say you’re mine, no one else’s, only mine.”
“I’ll be alone,” Naruto whispered. “You c-can’t… don’t leave! Don’t! L-l-listen t-t--ahhhh!’
“You are,” Sasuke repeated, lost in his own train of thought. “You have to be. I have nothing else--I must be allowed to have this. Just this, just you. Say you’re mine.”
“N-no… Nngh, Sasuke…”
“Naruto,” Sasuke returned in kind. “Just say it, that all I need. Tell me you’re mine.”
“Tell me you’ll stay….”
Growling, Sasuke drew back and forced Naruto’s legs forward, knees going to the blond’s ears. Naruto yelped at the suddenly uncomfortable position, and groaned as Sasuke began to slide in deeper, scrotum tapping at his butt cheeks with every thrust.
“Nothing is mine,” Sasuke whispered brokenly, and with a start, Naruto realized that he was crying. Twin tracks of tears cut through the beaded sweat coating his face and his nose was bunched along with his mouth, face brightening as he tried to withhold sobs. “Nothing is mine. Not even this.”
Naruto didn’t think he could go faster, but he did, and now the pain was returning. It added a sharp edge to the pleasure, and his cock pulsed as it was crushed between his stomach and the flat, hard one above him.
“Not even you,” Sasuke whispered. “Please… Naruto, please… belong to me. Just me. Let me have you, all of you…”
“Sasuke,” Naruto cried, back arching, his hips driving upwards and slamming himself onto the raven.
“Naruto,” Sasuke whispered before moaning, eyes finally shutting.
The blond arched himself up once more, so close. One more push, a second one, a third, and the fourth one on the count brought him to his climax. But he didn’t want it. He wanted this to go on, to never end, because then, Sasuke would leave, and Naruto would be miserable. Worse than miserable, he’d be alone. Sasuke had spent the afternoon, the whole year, building him up, and now he was crushing him one broken promise at a time. Nevertheless, it came. Naruto cried out wordlessly, tacking on a garbled version of the older boy’s name towards the end, waves of dizzying pleasure overriding his senses.
He’d been told orgasm was white. The world would suddenly be filled with light, pleasurably blinding, and causing dots to swim across your vision. That wasn’t what he saw. What he saw was just as before, but in a different color. Everything was a different shade of purple, and like a malignant tumor it crept across his mind. The color of a dark beauty, he thought, something so breath-taxingly gorgeous, and one shade lighter than black. The color of violets, the color of bruises. It consumed him as he rode out the pleasure, the tightening in his stomach releasing itself. Everything was drowned in thick purple fog. He could smell it, like sweet grapes, feel it, clawing into his skin. Too dark to see anything, and the color grew darker and darker, dragging away his consciousness.
Something suddenly stilled above him, and then a weight was pressing him into the ground once more. Heavy panting washed over his sweaty skin. The color consumed him still, and he wondered what it was that Sasuke saw.
“I‘m sorry,” the raven whispered into his neck. There was shifting, but Naruto couldn’t make out more than a blurred outline as the weight was lifted from his chest. “You give so much… and I can’t give it in return. I’m sorry.”
Naruto was slipping away. He barely knew what it was that Sasuke was saying, only registering the fact that the one thing he’d ever truly wanted was being denied from him. His whole life was defined now, in one moment. Like a storm, ripping him to shreds. His heart was the aftermath, bleeding, sure to be reconstructed, but never anywhere near the same.
And in those last few moments, the last before he knew he’d never see Sasuke again, he heard him whisper, “I love you.”
A glint of something shiny caught his attention, but only for a split second. The sun had set, he realized. The sky was black, and so were Sasuke’s eyes, gleaming like stars, twin trails of tears sparkling like diamonds as they slid down skin towards eternity.
--
When Naruto woke up, Sasuke wasn’t there.
He lay there for a few long moments, studying the apartment in the darkness. He expected it to look different at night, but it didn’t. It was like seeing an apple in the day and an apple in the dark. He still knew it was red, knew that it would taste the same, even though appearance told him otherwise.
He drew himself up slowly, and let reality settle in. Sasuke could have been in the bathroom, or changing in his bedroom, but Naruto knew that he wasn’t. The world was quiet and still, and he, Naruto, was alone.
“I’m sorry.”
“I love you.”
Naruto wondered what it would be like to get shot in the heart. He doubted that it could come close to rivaling betrayal.
Naruto’s skin felt stiff, like he’d been sunburned. When he loved his legs, he felt them stick to the carpet. He gently shifted onto his knees, stayed that way for a few moments and clenched his eyes shut tightly, riding the pain out. It hurt to move. After a minute, he stood slowly. He shifted his hips, felt the pain, and decided it was bearable. He took another minute to decide if he wanted to wash off, to at least clean off his face. He decided not to. His clothes were by his feet. It took another minute to gather them, wincing as he bent to pick them up. There was a near-constant burning sensation behind his eyes, a rancid lump pitted deeply in his throat. He was going to cry, and he wanted to. But he couldn’t. There was nothing there.
When he was dressed, he looked around. On the floor was a half-empty bottle of extra virgin olive oil. There was a quilt on the floor, and he realized that Sasuke had covered him before the blanket had fallen off. The curtains were drawn so that only a thin line of black sky could be seen between the gaps. Nothing else had changed.
Naruto saw that his bag was where he had left it. The papers from Sasuke’s homework were still scattered across the living room floor. It seemed centuries ago. Those papers, that bag, shouldn’t be here. This was a place where nothing from the outside world should be allowed in. Naruto, however, couldn’t let himself move them. To throw them in the trash can, to throw them out the window. He didn’t even want to even look at them. It seemed sacrilegious.
He wanted to look around. To maybe fine a hint as to where Sasuke had gone, or where he was leaving for tomorrow. He wanted to know what it was like, where Sasuke lived. But that too seemed sacrilegious.
So Naruto limped to the door, opened it, debated locking it. Sasuke seemed the type not to forget things like keys. He locked it, aware that this would mean he couldn’t reenter.
He shut the door firmly behind him. The loneliness increased tenfold. Everything had turned upside down. Suddenly, a monster was glaring at him from down the hallway. Its hackles were raised. The darkness was closing in. The light bulbs on the ceiling glared crookedly down at him. He had to get back inside, where it was safe. Even if Sasuke never returned for him, even if he was alone in that apartment for the rest of his goddamned life, he would be happy. He would lie on that same patch of carpet every night for the rest of his life. He would sit himself in that red light for every sunset there ever was for the rest of his life. The rest of his life. It was a choice between loneliness, and an unbearably barren life. He chose the former.
The monster from the darkness crept closer. Naruto spun around, yanked on the doorknob, and remembered then that he had locked it. He began to pound on it, knowing that no one would answer. He screamed, knowing no one would answer. No one was home.
“Sasuke! Sasuke! Sasuke! SASUKE!”
Poundpoundpound
His heart beat uncontrollably.
Poundpoundpound
His hands were going numb.
“SASUKE! SASUKE!”
“What is going on here!?”
Naruto recognized that voice. He turned, and found that in place of the monster, there was the doorman from before. He looked angry and pompous, just like he had before. It was like waking up from a long nap in the middle of the day. It felt like Naruto was both in the same place he’d been hours earlier, and like he was ten years in the future.
And his eyes. Those narrow, shrew eyes, like livid mirrors, reflecting back to Naruto the true monster in the hallway. He saw his own angry, haggard, aged face, so old in a boy so young.
“Is something the matter?” the doorman asked in his nasally, cruel voice. Naruto couldn’t be angry. He was an old man who had nothing accomplished in his life but becoming a doorman at a ritzy apartment complex. He had every right to be bitter.
And Naruto had every right to feel dead.
“Hey,” the old man said as Naruto brushed by him. “Wait a--”
Naruto knew that he didn’t care enough to press any further. He couldn’t hear any footsteps following after him. He was alone when he got to the elevator, and he didn’t turn to look at the monster reflected in the man’s eyes. He waited until he heard the doors slide shut with a mechanical hiss behind him before turning. He folded his aching hands into his pockets and envisioned himself home. Home, with its barren walls, comforting amber glow, wide expanse of solid carpet, the smell of smoke that was only good because he knew that there would be no fire following it.
He left the apartment building without any further human contact. There was no one in the lobby, nor the office. Naruto wondered how late it really was. He wondered how many people he’d woken up with his screaming.
He wondered how many had heard, but simply hadn’t the guts to do a thing about it.
The outside world was just as quiet as it was inside the apartment building. Naruto walked in silence for a long while, thoughts blank, and ignoring the temporary insanity that drove away any and all thinking processes. Naruto didn’t need to think. Thinking would tear the rest of him apart. What was left, he had to keep. He had to at least keep it for Iruka’s sake.
Until he heard voices.
“Hey… Hey, Uzumaki! Is that you, Uzumaki!?”
It was sickeningly comforting to feel the fear in his stomach at those words. Naruto recognized him, of course, even if it had never been that close. They were somewhere behind him, and Naruto knew that to get out of this with the most minimal amount of damage possible, he’d have to show a backbone, turn, and face them. But unfortunately, Sasuke hadn’t broken him quite far enough. He could compare the feeling to a scraped knee behind the ripped knee of a brand new pair of jeans. Expensive jeans, completely ruined, with only a scrape to show for it, one that didn’t even bleed, only stung for a few hours and didn’t so much as bruise. If something was to be ruined, there should be a suitable amount of damage to show for it.
So Naruto kept on walking.
“Hey! Ha ha, shut up, just a sec. Hey, Uzumaki! Where ya runnin’ off to, ya crazy faggot?”
A heavy arm encircled Naruto’s sagging shoulders, and the nauseating smell of cigarette smoke and stale beer filled his senses. Shadows swiveled into his line of vision. He wondered if they could smell him over their own nauseating stench.
“How’re you doin’, fag?” Kisame asked in his gravely voice, squeezing Naruto’s shoulder and shaking it like he would a friend, although he probably wouldn’t grip a friend’s shoulder hard enough to bruise like he was doing now. “Haven’t seen you around lately. What’s up with that, huh?” Naruto heard laughter in the background. Combining that with the numbers of footfalls he heard, Naruto guessed that he had three of his cronies with him. Maybe four. He didn’t bother to turn around to check.
“Hey, hey, lost your voice, buddy?” Kisame was laughing, his loping gate even more so due to the alcohol he’d no doubted been guzzling before he’d run into Naruto. The other boy was tall, taller than Sasuke, and probably older, too. Naruto knew he’d been held back a few grades, just as he knew he didn’t have parents who gave enough of a damn to kick him back into gear. He had to have picked up that drinking habit from somewhere. And for that reason, Naruto couldn’t hate him.
“The fuck is wrong with your voice, you little shit?” Kisame asked jovially. With a grungy finger, he forcefully dug it at Naruto’s ear, causing the blond’s head to rock on his neck. The laughter grew louder. Naruto knew this street, and knew that before they crossed the next street, there was an abandoned store at the corner. Behind it was a dark alleyway the store managers always threw their trash in, although it was abandoned and dark now from years without use. Naruto had never seen inside of it before, but knew now that he’d see it soon enough.
Kisame and his gang had picked up their pace, and the tall student was practically dragging Naruto now as he gabbed into his ear. “Where were you this late, eh, Uzumaki? At your boyfriend’s house? That little Japanese fag? I heard he lives in that prissy building over there. You came from there, right?”
They were getting closer, and Naruto almost tripped over his own two feet. He was laughed at, and wondered why he couldn’t (wouldn’t) fight.
“You look like shit, buddy. He give it to you bad, huh? Do your good buddies have to go and wring his little faggot neck?” Kisame sneered. “Or is that how you like it? Fucking figured. I never understand you homos, ya know that? Hey, hey, you listening pal?”
They were at the alleyway now. Kisame took one great, overly dramatized step forward, paused, and in that short moment Naruto wondered if he should act surprised, if only for their pathetic sakes, before he was shoved into the alleyway. His back, already aching from bruises and rug burns, flared with fresh pain. Naruto grunted, wincing.
“What’s wrong, you fucking monster? I thought you liked it like this?’ More laughter, so dark and haunting, ugly. Naruto felt filthy in its presence. “Hey, hey, I’ll make you a deal, huh? How ‘bout that? Since the Jap ditched you for a guy with a bigger dick, why don’t I make you a deal? I’ll give you a nice punch in your fucking face and you can get on your knees and suck my dick. How ‘bout that, fag face? Like th-that?” He could hardly peak coherently over the haze of alcohol, over his own egotistical amusement--he thinks he’s so damned funny--over his own self-loathing.
“Hey, hey!”
Hey, hey
“I love you.”
Hey, hey
A fist garnished with several thick and clunky rings slugged him across his cheek. The side of his head slammed into the side of the building. He saw stars, bright in the darkness of the alley, illuminating their faces like the beam of a flashlight over a freshly undug grave. Slurred and grimy faces, leering, tears of hate streaming down their cheeks and their faces, making them hideous.
“Hey, you little bitch, get the fuck on your knees. Hey, hey! You little faggot monster, get down!”
A punch to the gut, Naruto doubled over, gasping. Heavy fingers had threaded into his hair. He’d never be able to wash away the filth they left there. Down, down, pulling him down, the hand tried but couldn’t. His legs stood resolutely firm. The last man that had brought him to his knees, Naruto thought distantly, would be the only man to bring him to his knees. Because that had ruined him, once and for all. Ruined him for women, ruined him for men, too. Ruined any friendships he’d ever make. Ruined the trust he thought he had in Iruka, the one person in the world who loved him. Ruined everything.
Naruto realized then, a moment too late, just how broken he was. Why ask for more?
So when Kisame prepared to shove him to the side, to the dark ground Naruto knew he’d never be able to stand up from again, his fist flew out and Kisame’s head snapped back like lightning.
His cronies stopped laughing. Naruto shakily stood his ground, stood up at every unimpressive inch of his diminutive height. They were taller than him, bigger, bulky with muscle, pumped full of alcohol-fueled rage. Naruto didn’t stand a chance. But he could still stand. That counted for something. It had to!
“Grab his arms!”
No, no, I was wrong, I’m broken enough.
It was useless. There were far too many of them for Naruto to handle alone. He didn’t get a single hit in, although not for lack of trying. All too soon, his arms were captured behind his back, and he was straddling a world that wouldn’t stop trying to buck him off. Everything was shaking, everything and everyone was weak, but he was weaker, disgusting, pathetic, run, moron, be strong enough for that.
But he wasn’t.
“Mother-fucking monster,” Kisame spat, swiping the blood away from his cheeks. It crusted along the three long, jagged scars on the older boys neck, catching Naruto’s frantic eye. Kisame noticed, and grinned. “Like ‘em?” Kisame asked. “I did ‘em myself.”
Kisame’s hand disappeared behind him and then reappeared, a black rectangle in his hand, the size of a lighter. But when Kisame flicked the catch, a blade popped up instead of a bubble of flame. “You like this, too?”
Naruto couldn’t trust his voice. Afraid of what it would sound like. He jerked his head to the side, but hands were in his hair once again and forcing his face forward, naked in the darkness.
Kisame grinned. His teeth were as rotted as the rest of him. He twiddled the blade, the shiny metal dirty, grimy, spotted with flecks of rust. It caught no light.
“You’re a fucking monster.”
“I love you.”
Makes sense, I guess.
Only another monster could ever love a monster.
“Now you can look the part.” Naruto didn’t trust himself to talk, or even scream, afraid he would sound like a rabid animal instead of a human. So he settled for gritting his teeth, eyes bubbling with pain, hair jerked as his head was held steady, body shaking as Kisame began to cut into his face.
--
Naruto didn’t come to the realization that he was awake until he was a block away from his house. He paused at the street corner. He saw blue and red flashing lights. He kept walking, arms hanging loosely by his sides. He limped heavily and stepped slowly, each inch he gained paying him back with gratuitous amounts of pain. His skin was itchy with drying liquids; blood, sweat, semen and oil. He didn’t want to know what he smelled like. Probably road kill.
His clothes clung to him, too small. He’d grown so much in one afternoon, and now he felt the world could not contain him. Or that he could not contain it, and it felt like the whole weight of the world was trying to cram itself onto his back. There was a broken nature in his gate. His blond hair smelled of rust and musk. Fingerprints left in black and blue marred his skin. He felt like a decrepit and beaten shoe box without the shoes. There was nothing left inside. There’d be nothing left in the morning. There’d be nothing left when he walked into school. When people talked to him, he wouldn’t be able to understand. English didn’t make sense to him anymore. He’d be empty next week, and the week after. He’d be empty in high school, and college, and the loneliness, the anger, the betrayal threatened to swallow him whole.
He could feel their rancid breath.
He could hear the whispered ‘I love you’.
He could feel their fingers around his throat.
Naruto didn’t remember how he’d gotten out of that alley. He didn’t recall picking himself up and off the ground without losing any piece of himself with the trash cans and the broken beer bottles where the gang had abandoned him. Naruto couldn’t blame those boys for leaving him there. They hated themselves more than they could ever hate Naruto, or anyone like him. Instead, he hated someone else. Someone who gave him the sweetest words, and threw him out into the streets. He left him alone. He left him alone in school, and at home, in his town, his city, this country, this world. Alone.
You let me go?
Naruto heard voices now, and in them, Iruka’s was the loudest. Strong arms, but not as strong as his had been, wrapped around his lanky figure, and spikes of pain shot through him.
“Naruto, oh God, Naruto.” He heard sobbing, but at least it wasn’t him this time. Swarms of men in blue shirts surrounded him, but his vision had suddenly been filled with warm brown eyes.
“Oh God, Naruto.” A hand brushed his face, which Naruto just realized was burning. “Your face… what happened to your face!?”
His face? Nothing had happened to his face. Don’t let him see it. It was the rest of him that Iruka should have been paying attention to. It’ll be the first thing that anyone ever sees. But as if run by unseen forces, his head slowly revolved to the left, towards the windows that ran alone the bottom floor of the apartment. The white blinds had been drawn, and orange light emitted from the lamp post behind him allowed him to see. From the bottoms of his eyes down to his neck, everything was caked in blood. It looked like a mask that only covered the bottom half of his face. So much blood should not be normal, he thought. It couldn’t be.
And in that buddle of blood were six distinct tracks, so dark they might as well have been black. Three on each cheek, diagonal slits, like whisker marks.
“Now you can look the part.”
Where did he get those marks? Those marks on the streets, those marks in the dark, that made him a monster.
“I love you.”
“Look the part.”
What makes a monster? The things they do on their own? The things done to them?
“You fucking monster.”
Were they right? It wasn’t their fault if it was.
I don’t feel human anymore.
“I love you.”
No.
“I love you.“
No.
Liar. Liar.
Liarliarliar.
“Look the part.”
“I love you.”
Liar.
--
The sky was dark and heavy with night now. They’d heard the last door shut around an hour ago. The digital clock on Naruto’s bedside table told them it was two in the morning, but neither felt tired. Exhausted, yes, but not tired. The bed was slightly cramped with the two practically laying on each other. Sasuke promised that they could move the beds together the next day. Tonight, he was too lazy to move. Content to stay just where he was.
“Naruto,” Sasuke muttered, eyes hidden in the darkness. Naruto felt his body shift beside him, causing the blanket to slip down his shoulder.
Grumbling, pulling the blanket back up and over him, he asked, “Yeah?”
“Why did you do this?”
Naruto rolled his eyes. He was too complacent to brew up a proper argument, so he went along. “Because I wanted to.”
Sasuke frowned. Naruto could feel it against his forehead. “You didn’t do this for me, right?” he pressed. “Because you felt guilty?”
Naruto snorted softly. “Now who’s the idiot?” he asked. “I’ve always done what I wanted, moron. And unfortunately, that still hasn’t changed.”
Everything, everything, everything on a whim, on a promise made years and years ago, between two people unfit for humanity, what a beautiful disaster this is.
Naruto leaned in and kissed him.
Like fire
I love you
Sasuke hummed softly against his lips, pressing Naruto’s head into the pillow with the pressure. They kissed slowly for a long few minutes, no tongue, just soft, wet velvety lips, languidly memorizing the shape of each other’s mouths, getting used to the fact that this would now be a constant craving. To feel the other’s presence. To know that they existed. To hold onto, to kiss.
“I love you.” Sasuke didn’t say it, just mouthed it softly against Naruto’s lips. “Love you.”
This is ridiculous. It’s like were drunk. The hangover’s going to be fantastic. I’ll live with the migraine for the rest of my life if I have to, don’t take this away, never again, never take t away from me.
Don’t leave me.
“I won’t leave,” Sasuke whispered when they drew apart from the night. He held Naruto tighter, looked him in the eye. Naruto wished he could wash away the lingering look being Sasuke’s eyes, the one he still couldn’t identify, but still, for now, it was fine. He’d try again later.
“I know. Go to sleep.”
The pillow was soft. The love was real, as was the look in his eyes, the one Naruto would never see again. Because he didn’t want to see it. Not again.
Naruto softly kissed Sasuke’s naked shoulder.
All on a whim.
I love you.