“Nothing is real. Love is everything. And I know nothing.”
Growing up, her parents always had a simple directive whenever they wanted time alone; in exchange for rare moments of quiet, in their two-room home would they get the front room and she’d be allowed free rein in Iori’s workshop where she could study their Hiden to heart’s content, oblivious to what her parents were doing. As an adult, she knew what it meant. Intimacy of the most primal sort. She and Ise had done similarly when Nagato had been small, but stopped when it became too risky, too selfish when they had to prioritize their survival and their son’s. It was a necessary evil, as that sort of thing was a luxury in the throes of war that would kill every one who wasn’t vigilant enough to survive.
Here, years later, a week into her probation under Jiraiya’s watch, she had started to understand something of his life: that of his fellow Sannin, he appeared to be in a relationship with one of them, and that nightly returns from the local bar, arm in arm, wasn’t unusual. In her silent vigil atop his rooftop, she’d learned to remain there instead of downstairs. Shuffling feet and drunken flirtations would take them upstairs, and with the blonde, they’d do what people that close did. It made sense, right? It was Sannin, not Ichinin. And she was a strange, misplaced observer into something so private.
Still, they were... loud. Even the tin rooftop tiles did little to subdue the shouts of his name, sometimes hers, among other sounds. It just made her wonder: why was this probation still ongoing? She wasn’t a part of his life, but had an oddly close lens to it. Odder still was the way she watched the blonde Senju saunter from his home hours later, likely for hospital work. How her walk wasn’t smug or proud, but almost always, she’d stop to glare at the air. At points Fuso could see, maybe because she was an invader in their lives. And the Uzumaki wouldn’t disagree with that notion.
So, why keep at it? Surely the village wanted to appease the wants of its princess.
Odder still was when Jiraiya made his way to the rooftop, plopping across from her, haphazardly changed and hair barely done up in its ponytail, still blissfully drunk and bedraggled from his encounter with Tsunade. Flashes of skin revealed marks, but it wasn’t scandalizing. Just... strange. “Hey, you don’t believe in anything, right?” he prompted in drunken zeal. “Okay, how ‘bout this: Nothing is real. Love is everything. And? I know nothing!” He clapped his hand upon his knee in boyish amusement. “Thought about it when, y’know.” Jiraiya’s look was sly, but in a benign way.
Fuso merely nodded absently, all before she jerked her head towards the street. He probably needed something more than a morose party to sober up with. “Go walk her home. Stay the night, maybe. I’ll hold down the fort,” Fuso replied tonelessly, yet encouragingly. She needed to think. Alone, preferably.
