Forced Paths

Living

It was unnatural, the way his hands trembled, when she linked their fingers and guided him inside.
Unnatural, because he was the one with the experience, he was the one that was supposed to know what he was doing.
What was that he was doing?
She passed the doorway and stepped into the living room, only for a moment, because in the next she was in the corridor leading to the bedroom.
She turned her head and smiled, without stopping, never stopping.
Perhaps he understood it all wrong. Different for what it truly was. Perhaps, but she opened the door and his hands still trembled.
She let out a small laugh and she brushed away the hair above her forehead. She seemed disheveled of sorts.
Well, that was a thought. An image.
It resonated more than it should.
He raised his hand and he fixed them.
They stood in the middle of the room, as they had done before. Yet now, she was looking at him, now she was close, here.
He should ask. He should. But she kissed him again. And her hand was still intertwined with his.
He should ask, but the words were lost for now.
So he passed his finger by her lips.
Perhaps she could speak.
She let out a small sound. Out of surprise or maybe something else. She parted her lips, but no words escaped.
And he shouldn't pressed her hand with his, as if he needed strength, but he did.
This time, the noise that she made was that of surprise, followed by her squish on their hands.
He moved away for a moment, a second. He looked at her and she was flustered and perhaps red was her colour.
There should be a question, a word, something.
"Is this..?" Two words, perhaps that was enough.
She nodded.
"Are you sure?" He asked and it was a question for both. For different reasons.
"Yes." She said in a breath. "Are you?" She asked and he laughed.
"Am I?" Sasuke said and he thought that he sounded a little bit crazy. "I want you since that night in the sea."
"Oh." She said and her eyes widened.
"I'm sorry." Sasuke looked at her eyes. Focused on them. "Is it too much?"
Her eyes moved, a tiny wrinkle formed at each end. He looked at her lips, she was smiling again.
"You can have me." The embarrassment, the inexperience perhaps, kept her voice low. "You do have me."
Sasuke wanted to laugh again, because he seemed like he was the one that didn't know what to do. How to behave. He kept staring at her, at all of her, frozen, enchanted, waiting for guidance.
"I'm...I don't..." He seemed stupid. He felt like it.
He cleared his throat.
"You're perfect." He said. "And I don't know what to do about it."
"It's fine if you want to wait." She said softly.
"I don't want to wait." He said and he sounded like a boy.
"Okay. What is it then?"
"I don't want to hurt you." A foolish boy. He should be the one to calm her. But she was already calm.
"I'm not scared, Sasuke. Not with you. Never with you." Hinata said and guided his hand on her cheek. Her throat was next and then lower, just under her neck.
"I'm just..." She began, her palm resting above his as an anchor. "I don't know how..." She bit her lips. "And I don't want to disappoint you."
She laughed a little.
"Since you are...And I am..." She breathed and she looked at him.
"Am I making any sense?" She asked.
"A little." Sasuke matched her smile.
"I want this to be easy." She said.
"Nothing is easy with you." He responded.
She hit his arm lightly and he laughed.
It was different, Sasuke thought, from how he was used to. The air didn't hold any urgency, the room echoed laughter. Different, lighter, pure. Like a first time should be, like a first night.
He didn't rush to remove his clothes, not even move them from the spot they were standing.
It wasn't because she was afraid, she wasn't, but he wanted to see her smile some more, like a part of a ritual, he was only now learning.
It felt important and he was utterly engrossed to hear as her laughter reduced to a breathing. To move slow, intentional, because everything was meaningful and not a reach to an end.
The reveal of her skin not to be hasty and quick, so he would be able to absorb her every part.
He made it on purpose, to show a piece of him for one of hers, as an exchange, a play, as if they were equals in that moment. Even if Sasuke knew they were not, she could do anything and he would comply at her every whim.
And as Hinata laid on his bed, that was not his any more, as much as this house, this family and his body, she was shy and certain and brave, stupidly, unfathomably brave.
He wanted to laugh at his past self, at a Sasuke from months before who had claimed that this woman, who could fight with the same easiness she could nurture and laugh, wasn't his taste.
And because she was so sure that he would not hurt her, that Sasuke was somehow better than he was, he could not be anything other than gentle. Effortlessly and without thinking.
And he hugged her to make the moment tender and he only touched the scars on her back with his hands, because she had asked him not to look, not today.
And she had bit her lips and Sasuke had waited, because he knew that she was in pain. And he had kissed her forehead for her bravery and her nose because he was causing it. Then her lips, because he loved her.
Hinata was looking at him, like she did always, never a side look, or an advert of her eyes, honest as she was, perfect that she was, and every breath Sasuke took was a question and every breath she exhaled was an answer.
Like she was putting everything in their right place, where they should have been, as she had did with everything else in his life.
And in the end, Sasuke had answered her back, with his own exhale, with giving her the reins, because he didn't need them anymore, she could take control of him if she wanted. And she would never, even if she told her to.
Sasuke tasted his name at her lips.