Chapter Text
15.
In her pathetic, babydoll heart, it feels like she’s loved him forever. He’s sewn himself into her soft, pink insides and she’s only spoken to him once in her life. He’s so close I could touch him, she thinks as she looks down at his unconscious form. The fire that burns deep down within her gut flares, wishing, longing for contact, a hopefulness that never goes away. A hand reaching from inside her soul – trying to connect to his, but coming up empty.
He’s her friend’s sensei, not hers, and there’s no real reason to talk to him. Her embarrassment from when she was a child keeps her from approaching him when he’s actually awake. He waved to her (maybe) when she and Naruto were eating. She’s so young that he has no interest in her, but it still hurts to hear about the women he dates. That longing again; knowing that she would be able to give him what he truly needs (or what she believes he does).
Kakashi’s been a patient in the hospital since he was severely injured on a mission with Naruto and his team four days ago.
Sakura has worked at the hospital for three years now, but she’s never felt such sadness and fear over a patient before. When Naruto dragged Kakashi’s body in, Sakura had cried in the bathroom for almost ten minutes before she composed herself and went to help the other nurses. His injuries aren’t life threatening, and Tsunade threatened to kill him herself if he didn’t wake from the coma (his body decided was necessary) after a week, so Sakura knows she doesn’t need to worry her nails down to the beds over it. (She does anyway.)
The chair is cold where she sits at his bedside, and she prays to whatever god is listening that he’ll be okay. Seeing someone so strong and revered lying on a bed built for the ill, the weakly, the dying, is startling and she’s not sure how to deal with it. She’s loved him forever and all she wants to do is help him, get him back up on his feet, so he can fight and be sturdy again.
Sakura remembers seeing his masked face out on the street when she was five years old and he was almost twenty. She shook her mother’s arm with wide eyes and told her that he looked like a prince and she was going to marry him someday. He was tall and beautiful, like something out of the books she liked to read. Her mother laughed at that, ruffling her hair to humor her.
“Mama, who is that?” she’d asked, pulling on her skirt.
“That’s Hatake Kakashi, honey.” Her mother replied, tugging her along to visit another shop.
“He’ll be mine right, mama?”
“Maybe one day when you’re not too young for him.” She winked.
Sakura stared at him and pulled away, running over to him before he moved too far out of sight.
She tugged on his pant leg. “Kaka-senpai?”
“Hello there, little one. What can I help you with?” he chuckled, smiling down at her.
“I’m gonna marry you, okay? Don’t forget about me so you can find me when I’m bigger.” Sakura’s little fists curled in determination, brow set to let him know she meant business.
Kakashi bent down to her level and ran his hand over the top of her head. “I won’t ever be able to forget you, don’t worry. Work hard and become a strong kunoichi, okay? Go back to your mom, now.”
“Bye, Kaka-senpai!” Sakura skipped back over to her mother, satisfied with his acknowledgement of her.
Not wanting anything more than to please him, Sakura graduated from the academy and flourished under Tsunade’s tutelage. The hospital welcomed her with open arms when she was unhappy with constantly going on missions, and she realized that healing was her calling. Helping people feels good and she’s learned so much from Tsunade and Shizune, and she can’t help but feel thankful to him for instilling this fire within her. Her strength exceeds men who have been training longer than her, and she feels powerful. She didn’t know that she would ever have the potential to be as great as her shishou.
Sakura looks down at him one more time, and leaves before he wakes. It would be mortifying to have him wake up with her staring at his face like a stalker. There’s still pain as she walks away, however.
In her little girl fairytale land, she knew she would be with him some day, and in her teenage heart, she hopes that one day she’ll prove herself to be enough for him.
(break)
16.
She’s bubblegum hair, rose perfume, and strength in her teens that gets her noticed.
Sakura and Ino like to show themselves off any chance they get, even allowing some of the cuter boys to take them out on dates. She lets them spend money on her and kiss her cheek at the end of the night, but that’s as far as she lets them get.
She’s a tease in the truest sense of the word.
Boys in the village understand: you do not get to fuck Sakura, and you certainly do not get to love Sakura. Many boys try.
Her softness is saved for one man.
(break)
17.
Sakura and Ino have always liked to spend their time at Naruto’s because there aren’t any parents there to tell them what to do.
They’re seventeen (finally) and take advantage of the friendship that Naruto offers up so generously. Neither of them go on missions anymore, preferring to work solely in the hospital, so when he’s gone they take care of his apartment for him. Sakura feels bad for him, she really does. She has no idea what it’s like to be an orphan and have no one to watch over you, but sometimes he’s so god damned annoying she’s able to forget about how it makes her heart ache. There’s always a fluttering within her chest, however, no matter how much she tries to ignore it, that reminds her how lucky she is to have him. All the times that he’s stood up for her, regardless of what it cost him, saving her from being shunned as he was when he was so young.
The girls like to lay on his bed in skimpy clothes and talk about the hottest boys in the village. Sakura isn’t convinced that anyone is more beautiful than Kakashi-senpai, but Ino says it’s a tossup between Shikamaru and her own sensei, Asuma. Naruto sits on the floor and whines that he’s gonna stop letting them hang out here if they don’t think he’s at least a little cute.
Sakura kisses Ino for the first time to get information about Kakashi out of Naruto.
“Please, tell me something else about him!” Sakura whines, rolling around on his sheets like a child, knocking into Ino as she does.
“No way! You’re way too obsessed with him. He’s so old!” Naruto gripes from the floor.
“Don’t you dare say that! He’s perfect!” she narrows her eyes at him.
“Is there something we could do to convince you?” Ino says coyly, shifting closer to Sakura on the bed. “How about a game?”
Naruto’s eyes widen and he gulps. “Like what?”
“Oh, I don’t know,” Ino traces the side of Sakura’s face with one dainty finger. “How about for every question you answer, we’ll do something you want us to?”
Redness overwhelms his entire face. Sakura looks at Ino skeptically, but decides to go along with it. “Yeah, okay.”
“Like what?” Naruto stutters.
“Like, who is he dating right now?” Sakura suggests.
“The lady from the hat shop.”
“Ew, okay. What do you want us to do, Naruto?” Ino asks, voice dropping lower.
“Kiss!” Naruto blurts out before hiding his face in his hands.
“Sure, but you might want to open your eyes for this.”
Ino leans in and the first thing Sakura realizes is that Ino’s lips are soft. The second is that this is her first kiss on the mouth. The third is that it’s not gross or weird, in fact, she really, really likes it. It’s not just a peck, like Sakura expected, but a slow, unhurried kiss, and a sharp tingle runs through her core when Ino’s tongue runs along the seam of her lips. Ino knows how to kiss well, so well that Sakura makes a mental note to ask her later where she learned it from.
Sakura finds herself chasing after Ino’s mouth when she pulls away, trying to get the warmth and slick back, which makes Ino chuckle.
“Holy shit.” Naruto breathes.
“Next question, Sakura. I like playing kiss and tell.”
(break)
18.
The game turns into something dangerous, Sakura comes to find out, when they start asking Naruto about mundane things just so they can all kiss each other.
Sakura is in love with the game. The closeness the three of them share when their limbs are tangled in Naruto’s bed is something small and precious that she holds near her heart in her little palms.
Sakura wants to be held and kissed, wants to be treated tenderly. She wants to be someone’s baby. The tightness in her chest she gets when she sees classmates fall in love torments her constantly and she hates it. Feeling so pathetic and desperate is mortifying for someone who can smash boulders into dust. Her two friends are the only people that know her whispered secrets of being so in love with Kakashi that she thinks she might die from it. They’re sympathetic, and so she steals their attention, drinks it down into her soul, like the pathetic girl she is and will always be.
Things have escalated this time, turning the game from something lighthearted and fun to something they may never be able to come back from as friends.
Sakura’s lost her shirt, Ino has no panties on under her skirt, and Naruto is in the process of removing his boxers. She’d always promised herself that her virginity would be saved for Kakashi. In her fifteen year old mind, Kakashi was the only person worthy of being that close to her; the idea of even being intimate with someone was so scary and far off that waiting for him didn’t seem bad in the slightest. Now, though, she has urges. She doesn’t want to wait. She loves Naruto and Ino, and sharing this part of herself with them seems like something to be cherished. She’s safe and loved in a place she thinks of as home, and suddenly the thought of being with someone doesn’t seem so scary.
“Come on, Naruto, take it off and I will.” Sakura says, and Ino’s head whips toward her so fast Sakura worries for her.
The girls can see Naruto physically gulp, but he slowly inches his boxers down his hips and they fall to his feet. His face and neck are flushed, and he’s probably waiting for them to laugh at him, but that’s the farthest reaction they could be having. Sakura catches herself licking her lips as she eyes the light trail of white-blond hair that leads from his abdomen down to the curly thatch that nestles around his obviously hard cock. She casts a nervous, but excited, glance towards Ino (who looks just as enamored, if not more), and knows that it’s now or never.
True to her word, Sakura unclips her bra and lets it fall to the floor. Naruto and Ino stare at her chest, and it makes her flush, but she can’t stop now. Her skirt is the next to go and then she’s taking the biggest plunge of her life and slowly slipping off her panties. She lowers herself back down next to Ino, grips Ino’s hand tight, and spreads her legs.
Naruto touches Sakura between her legs for the first time and her head falls back, chest heaving. He takes her virginity that day, and Ino’s the next.
It’s the most magical, intense experience, and the three of them get to share it.
She realizes that this was what she had waited for, Kakashi be damned.
(break)
20 (Part 1).
Ino goes on a date with Shikamaru after admiring him for fifteen hundred years and their love-affair is sized down to two.
Sakura isn’t that jealous, funnily enough. They knew eventually that their time together would have to come to an end. A polyamorous relationship such as theirs is not exactly widely accepted, and the possibility of their secret being exposed weighed heavily on their minds anyway. She’s okay with it, and she knows that Ino will always love her, even if she can’t show it. Thankfully she still has Naruto.
“Harder.” She commands, gripping Naruto’s shoulders tight as he slams his cock into her.
“You’re bossy.” Naruto huffs, but increases his pace, always trying to please her even when she’s rude to him.
They’re surrounded by the quiet of Sakura’s own apartment after a night out with friends, and she feels comfortable, relaxed with Naruto inside her.
“We’ve been doing this long enough, I’d like to think you’d know how to do it right.” Sakura pants.
This is what works best for them: she tries to get Naruto as angry as she can while he’s fucking her (because it’s just better this way, holy shit) and he unleashes the filthiest dirty talk he can to rile her up even more. She loves this.
“What, you think you could find someone else that’ll fuck you better?” he snarls.
He slows his hips until all she can feel is the slow drag of his cock in and out of her, sending shivers up and down her arms. She tries to buck her hips against his to get him to speed back up and she whines as he continues to tease her. Naruto leans down close to her ear, bracing himself on his elbows, and slows to only a grind.
“Or do you think Kakashi would do a better job?” he whispers.
Her breath catches in her throat and she lets out a low groan. Bringing up Kakashi is something he saves for when he’s really tired of her bullshit because he knows how it destroys her. Sakura doesn’t imagine that it’s Kakashi who’s fucking her because she doesn’t want to forget that she’s with Naruto. Naruto is solid and warm and so lovely when they’re like this that it would feel cheap to use him that way.
“I bet he’d take you home after dinner and get you a drink,” he continues, kissing up and down her neck. “then kiss you a little, try to warm you up. He’d assume you’re some sweet little virgin who needs him to take it slow, but then he’d lift your skirt and find your panties already soaking wet. Isn’t that right?”
Sakura shakes her head, trying to move away from Naruto and get closer to him all at once.
“He wouldn’t know that you’d been ready for him all night, that he could have fucked you on the table, right in front of everyone. He’d touch you and you’d beg him to fuck you, just like the slut you are. Wouldn’t you, Sakura-chan? You’d spread yourself wide open for him, show him all this pink that only I get to see, and he’d laugh at you.” He’s mocking her, being so fucking mean, but he’s started fucking into her with all that anger, and it’s so perfect she could cry.
“Yes!” she sobs.
“You’re not with Kakashi, Sakura-chan. He wouldn’t ever touch you because you’re not a good girl.” Naruto says, grunting as he lifts her right leg onto his shoulder to change the angle. She scrambles to hook one arm around his neck and the other on his waist as he lifts her up, and her eyes practically roll back into her head at the sensation.
“No! I’m a good girl!” Sakura cries, clenching harder around his cock as she feels herself getting closer. “Naruto, please!”
“That’s right, you know who you’re with. Come for me.”
Sakura’s eyes close and her head falls back, mouth open on a silent scream as she shakes around him. She vaguely hears Naruto cry out as she trembles and she can feel him spill inside her. His hips slow and then he’s pulling out and collapsing next to her. He pulls her into his arms, rubbing her back and shushing her.
“You were so good, Sakura.” Naruto kisses her temple.
“You’re a dirty man.” Sakura laughs, but lets him baby her all the same.
Naruto smells like salt and wood and home when she’s able to take the time to breathe him in. His love is indescribable. He doesn’t shame her for still wanting Kakashi after all this time and they’re both free to date whenever they want to. She doesn’t feel the desire to be with other men (other than Kakashi, of course), though, when she has him right here with her, cuddled so close they share the same breath.
Something that she’s not sure she could describe happens after they’ve been together, a pleased ache almost, that renders her practically useless. A rush of love for him that’s stronger when she’s pliant and sated, compared to the irritation at his crass performances for others. Here, in the stillness of her bedroom, he’s a soft, sweet version of himself that she can melt and mold her body to. She wants to keep him here, like this, forever.
She’s content, and if he is too, well, it’s good enough for her.
(break)
20 (Part 2).
Life for Sakura is easy.
Train, go to work, come home, shower, fuck Naruto, go to sleep – repeat.
The monotony of day to day life is easy on Sakura’s anxiety and the repetition of her schedule keeps her from having a nervous breakdown.
Really, life is easy, until she’s appointed co-director of the hospital because Shizune needs the extra help. There’s no way she could say no to Tsunade, so she accepts the position and finds herself in charge of a large number of nurses and doctors that don’t always like to listen to her.
The hospital has become her home, whether she likes it or not, now that she spends most of her days and nights there. Her patience is running thin after three hours of sleep on a cot in the breakroom and she’s this close to losing her shit.
She’s trying her best not to yell at a younger nurse that gave a patient the wrong amount of medicine (even though Sakura told her exactly how much to give him three separate times) when Kakashi and Naruto come through the front doors. They’re laughing, Naruto talking animatedly at Kakashi. She notes that neither of them look injured, and she breathes a sigh of relief, so she sends the nurse off with a final warning, to which the other girl looks grateful.
She moves to make her way towards them when Naruto spots her. He says a quick goodbye to Kakashi before running over to her excitedly, and she vaguely thinks that he looks like a puppy. He picks her up and swings her around, laughing about how great his date with Hinata was, and she allows herself to look at Kakashi properly as she clutches him. His head rests in his palm, one elbow leaning on the front desk as he charms one of the girls there. He looks so devastatingly gorgeous that she almost feels lightheaded. Kakashi spares her a glance and she looks away quickly, cheeks flushing, embarrassed at him catching her.
Sakura’s never felt guilty about sleeping with Naruto before, but being able to stare at Kakashi so closely stirs a cloud of something dark and ugly inside her that makes her ask Naruto to put her down. Seeing him like this is too much to bear. The invitation for Naruto to follow her to her office is given, and she sees Kakashi exit the building out of the corner of her eye.
Why couldn’t she bring herself to just talk to him? He was right there! It’s not like he remembers her and that would be the obvious first step in trying to form a relationship with him. She’s so dumb.
In that moment, she feels fifteen and sorrowful all over again. Pathetic and weak to her own heart, and she feels like she’s betrayed herself and Kakashi all at once.