I hope everyone has been well. Please, take care. Sorry this chapter has arrived a few hours late, either way, enjoy.

Just as Sasuke asked, Hinata didn't return.

Even when her body ached and her heart longed for nothing more but the sweetness and bitterness that makes Sasuke, Sasuke.

It was hard.

And it hurt knowing that while her life came to a complete halt, she knew Sasuke's life continued moving forward.

Whispered secretly by the lips of others, she heard of Sasuke's "uninterrupted routine." Through their words, she heard of Sasuke's flirty adventures with a certain female bathe in riches and elegance.

And it really hurt. It struck her lonely heart.

It tore her self esteem, newly gained by Sasuke's whispered compliments, to know she could be so easily replaced by a another woman so quickly.

But hearing of the gossip didn't hurt as much as bearing witness to the reality she tried so hard to deny.

Seeing Sasuke with a beautiful woman in his arms hurt in ways that left her questioning the state of her heart.

Lost in a world of filthy kisses and feverish skin, lost in a world Sasuke knew all too well, Hinata couldn't look away.

"Don't look." Hinata didn't want to, but found herself unable to look away. She didn't know why she kept staring, as if expecting for a dispersing illusion rather than a present reality.

She kept hoping that if she turned numberless times, Sasuke and the beautiful woman would disappear into air as if they were never there.

But each time she looked back to the crowded bodies on the dance floor, her eyes always saw Sasuke and her.

It made her sick. "Look at me, Hinata." It made her heart sick. It made her soul sick.

She felt green. Nauseous and queasy.

"You look pale." She didn't feel so good. She felt too close to throwing up the contents of her late night dinner.

"We should head out. I'm sorry, we shouldn't have come here. I should've known better." Sakura, her favorite person, mumbles with a tone laced in sadness, regret and anger for the man standing a mere distance away.

If Hinata knew her best friend enough, like she prides himself in believing, she knows Sakura is only holding back for her sake.

She knows that while she may be hurting, Sakura was boiling beyond heedful thoughts.

"I want to go home."

Sakura's eyes soften immediately at the look of pure devastation that crosses the features of her hurting friend. "Of course. Let's leave. I can stay over, we can bake some treats and-"

"Everything hurts." Sakura's attempt to comfort her friend, disappeared in her pain.

The walls Hinata was taught to keep firmly in place in the presence of others, to hide and not show, cracked in that very moment.

And the tears wouldn't stop. Hinta couldn't stop the ache and Sakura couldn't help her. "I-I don't want this."

Hinata should've ran away from Sasuke  the moment it started hurting to be near him.

She should've ran away the moment every touch felt warm rather than hot.

She should've ran away when Sasuke's smiles and mesmerizing eyes were all she thought of late at night in the safety of her room.

But she didn't and now she's stuck in this aching pain that lives inside her. The same ache that threatens to drown her beyond simple suffocation.

She's feels like a fool.

***

Sasuke loves alcohol, loves the burn and the taste that consumes his mind.

He enjoys it to help the ease the tension of a tiring day it as much as any other person.

But lately, he loves it even more than what should be considered normal and healthy.

It's been more than a few days that he's mistakenly decided to partake in the consumption of alcohol in which -at the time- he viewed as his 'cure' to the bitter ache that recently lives inside him.

It helps loosen the ties that anchor him down to the memories he wants to desperately forget.

Of the person he wants to forget.

Alcohol, before to him, was a simple quirk he enjoyed for celebratory events or for the relaxation of long days.

Now, it's an unhealthy and temporary cure from the aching of his soul.

The golden brown liquid, purchased at a cheap price from the small run down store down a block of his residence, has became his haven.

A substance that brought with it a messed up refuge.

It helped sheltered him, it helped caged him in a fantasy of blurry lights, hazy images and incoherent thoughts.

The cheap brown liquid, allowed him to forget, even if it was for a few hours.

And perhaps the cheap brown liquid loosen his self restraint, allowing him to act like a fool.

Perhaps, that's what allowed him to stumbled upon his feet to answer the front door late at night. 

A bit too intoxicated, his movements clumsy and ragged, he began to question the state of his ability to differentiate between reality and non- reality.

"Hinata?" His voice was raspy.

"Sasuke."

Sasuke stared longingly at Hinata, his mind burning from questions left unsaid. His heart weight heavily, not understanding but not caring.

He blames it on the booze.

He blames it on the booze 𝒂𝒏𝒅 his heart for practically begging him to let go.

'Just this once.' His heart whispered. 'Just one more time.' It plead him.

It'll be okay.

He blames it on his desperate need to stop the ache that was consuming him in waves of suffocation.

With a need for a release, he moves closer to Hinata, wanting to be near her warmth.

Needing to be near her.

"Just this once.... please." Hinata whispers into the cold air, begging Sasuke for a temporary cure that Sasuke needed as well.

Something that could only be given to her by him, even if it did hurt so wonderfully.

"You shouldn't be here, Hinata." She really shouldn't. She shouldn't be here. She should be anywhere but here. Anywhere but in front of him where he could so easily reach for her.

To reach for something he holds no privilege of holding.

"Why are you here?" Sasuke aches. His skin and his tongue longed for a taste of sweetness.

It's been so long. Far too long.

"Just once more." Hinata repeats softly, afraid to speak too loud and destroy the trance they find themselves wrapped in.

And with her words and Sasuke's need, all reason is thrown out the window.

Hinata holds his heart and hides it away, as she melts warmly against Sasuke.

Sasuke tames his fear, if only for a brief moment. Enough for him to enjoy his time with Hinata moaning beautifully underneath him.

Enough for him to feel like he isn't falling apart everytime he caresses Hinata.

Enough for him to ignore the damn longing and itch that has made home in his heart ever since he pushed Hinta away.

He's a fool, he knows.

A fool with fears and filled to the very brim with pain and past heartbreak.

But he's a fool with a mission left ignored for tonight.

***

"I disapprove of this situation.... I have since the beginning. I hate it. It leaves a foul taste." Sakura, her pillar through all the good and bad, says firmly. Her eyes somber.

Hinata finds herself agreeing wholeheartedly, because she hates it as well. More than anyone.

"What you're both doing isn't healthy at this point." Sakura stops to retract herself, wanting to say more.

"I know."

"If you know, then stop this." Sakura persists.

"I can't." She wants to, more than anything. She wants to stop and move on.

She wants to let go and walk away, with her heart in pieces but with a hopeful thought that it'll be okay someday.

That she'll be okay.

"I'm trying to protect you from all this hurt. I want to protect you from him." Sakura doesn't want to see her friend break, trying to fix someone else.

She doesn't want to witness her crumble.

She doesn't want to see her wither away into an empty shell.

Because Hinata deserves all the good things in life.

"I know what I'm doing." Hinata murmurs with a small smile. "I just need you to trust me that i'll be okay."

"I don't want you to lose yourself in the admist of this mess. Talk to him. Be upfront and if he can't man up and treat you-"

"Now isn't the time."

"Hinata, now is the perfect time. I promise you, if he-"

Hinata's ringing phone interrupts Sakura.

"It's him."

Sakura sighs, deeply. " I don't like him. But I know that look in your eyes...." She bites her tongue, holding in the urge to be more upfront on her distaste.

"I want to ask him to accompany me for dinner." Hinata whispers, softly. "Do you think it's appropriate?"

"No." Sakura sighs. "You're my best friend Hinata. Please don't ask me to encourage your decisions under this circumstance because I can't. He's asshole and you deserve better. "

"I at least want to try."

There's a heavy silence that follows. A silent disagreement and a conflicting burden followed by a reluctant acceptance that can result in nothing but pain.

"I know."