That’s what Sasuke tells himself every day he wakes up in a room that doesn’t belong to him, in a home that’s not his own. It feels like a prison as much as it feels like trespassing, and Sasuke cannot bear to be the captive as much as he can’t bear to be the burden. The council had decided it, they’d told him, the Hokage had signed off on it and declared it all but law. For how long, she hadn’t specified, perhaps until Sasuke was no longer as sought after or so feared and mistrusted. That would be a long time, even Sasuke knew. Still, it’s only temporary.
He suspects Naruto was behind it all. It had been Naruto who stood in Sasuke’s cell, who had freed Sasuke from those awful binds, and Naruto who had been the first thing Sasuke had seen in several weeks. Perhaps it had been months, who’s Sasuke to say? His perception of time has been a bit skewed, lately. Now, though, he seems painfully aware of it. He can do little else but live inside Naruto’s home; bigger than the one Sasuke remembers from childhood. Naruto does take Sasuke out, but it feels…wrong. People stare, they whisper, they accuse, and they judge. If it were all for him, Sasuke wouldn’t mind (he would) but it’s for Naruto, too.
Still, Sasuke goes, though he tries to coerce the times so that they go later at night, when less are around. Things are still skittish, still slow, but they’re moving. Moving forward, actually. Sasuke has to remind himself of that when he’s feeling stuck or trapped in the past. He’s begun training again, learning his body after losing an arm, healing the damage done while imprisoned. Healing the damage done from years of abandoning people who were once his friends. The only ones Sasuke sees for now are Kakashi, Sakura, Naruto, and occasionally that other boy who joined Team Seven in Sasuke’s absence. He’s seen Hinata a handful of times, though he has no true kinship with her, she’s polite and encouraging enough, and Sasuke suspects Sakura has a certain fondness.
It’s all overwhelming, at times. That’s why Sasuke likes to come to hide every now and again. He won’t call it hiding, but when he goes off on his own in the house, finds a place to lurk away and breathe, what else can it be? Today is a good day for “hiding” a little. Last night had been…progressive, if stressful, but that meant Sasuke needed time to unwind and process the changes. Naruto had gotten home only a little while ago, and Sasuke had heard the shower running upstairs for several minutes. It’s quiet, now, a good enough time to come out.
“Mow?” Sasuke cuts his eyes towards the small white cat that’s come up to him, meowing. She’s always meowing, rubbing against him, jumping up on him to sleep. She meows like she believes he somehow understands her. Once, Naruto had said it was because she thought Sasuke was another cat. He’d laughed about it, but Sasuke had never quite caught on.
“What?” he asks her, playing along for the sake of knowing she wouldn’t stop if he didn’t. Yeah, that was why. The cat (Ama) meows again, and Sasuke notices what’s wrong. Ama usually carries around a small, fish-shaped toy with her, a habit from when she was tiny. It’s missing now, though. Sometimes Naruto hides it so that she’ll find it, but clearly she’s given up. Ama meows again, and Sasuke rolls his eyes. “All right, all right, hang on,” he says, holding his hand up as he backs away towards the stairs.
Ama sits and waits, mollified as Sasuke heads upstairs. He grumbles all the way, curious as to when a small cat became the boss of him. Outside Naruto’s bedroom, where the door is open, Sasuke speaks up. “Dobe, have you seen the…oh.” Sasuke trails off, stopping just inside the doorway.
Inside, Naruto stands toweling off his hair, faced away from Sasuke. Sweatpants hang low on his hips, but he’s foregone a shirt. The muscles in Naruto’s back, skin dark from countless hours out in the sun, ripple as he moves his arms. Broad shoulders roll as Naruto pulls the towel down away from his head to settle it around his neck, and he turns to face Sasuke. Warmth rushes to Sasuke’s face, and he feels like he’s walked in on something meant not for him at all, he’s intruded, invaded. Still, he can’t tear his eyes away for a moment. Naruto was always such a scrawny kid, but he’d grown, filled out into someone so…
Sasuke swallows, guilty. He’s just walked in on Naruto and still had the audacity to stare, but…it was so hard to look away. But, look away he did, when Naruto said his name and snapped him out of it. Chagrined, Sasuke’s eyes cut to the floor, and he murmurs something vague; an apology, perhaps, or maybe a dismissal of whatever he’d come asking about in the first place, and leaves the room. He hears Naruto say his name again, louder, but Sasuke doesn’t acknowledge it. He has to…he needs to…clear his head.
To pretend to ignore that when he’d seen, he’d wanted nothing more than to touch.
