[He's no stranger to crying in front of other people, even if it is a little embarrassing, and even if it only makes him look even more uncool. Naruto wears his heart on his sleeve for better and for worse. He isn't ashamed of the depth to which he feels things, or the importance of the people he cares about. Every conversation he's had with Sakura and Sasuke has felt like all three of them were just moving around some invisible thing in the room with them, this thing they couldn't name or change or talk about. Naruto knows that they're keeping secrets from him in the same way that he knows, in his stomach, that they're doing it to keep him safe- that they aren't trying to hurt him and that they're just doing their best.
But in that- in the small admissions that they have made, in the way their eyes find his only to slide away- it hurts. It's unreal how much it hurts. Time and again Naruto thinks I failed you. He knows he has his world to go back to, that he still has to do a lot more stuff to get to the point in time his friends are from, but that doesn't erase the sadness. He doesn't know how to fix that any more than he knows what to do to find peace and end the years of hatred and revenge that have consumed all their lives. He doesn't know how this happened. Because he should have stopped it.
Sasuke and Sakura- they're the first people to have known him and accepted him, and they did it when no one else would. Naruto loves them both, fiercely, but if that's really true-
How did he let this happen? How did he stand by for it? How could they have fought so hard, for so long, and settled for this?
He can't talk about it with them the same way, because it isn't their burden to bear. They're living with the consequences of actions Naruto can't fathom and in that quiet the words are adding up. He feels like he's suffocating beneath them.
The mattress dips as Bolin shifts and Naruto moves in turn an echo for a gesture he doesn't even recognize yet. And then there are arms around him. For the span of two heartbeats, Naruto's body is rigid with surprise. He can count on one hand the number of times he's been hugged like this- that he'd been able to feel the rise and fall of someone's chest against his own, that he'd been able to fit his chin over someone's shoulder and heard their voice near his ear. Bolin doesn't reach for him like he's scared. It isn't pity or fear or congratulations. He doesn't have a name for the way it feels, it just feels- and Naruto, hands trembling, recognizes the moment he could pull away and instead throws himself into it, trusting that he'll be caught. Naruto's arms wrap around his shoulder and chest, they roll along the mattress in his push to get closer, and his face is buried in the slope of Bolin's neck as if he's the only solid thing in the whole world.]
no subject
But in that- in the small admissions that they have made, in the way their eyes find his only to slide away- it hurts. It's unreal how much it hurts. Time and again Naruto thinks I failed you. He knows he has his world to go back to, that he still has to do a lot more stuff to get to the point in time his friends are from, but that doesn't erase the sadness. He doesn't know how to fix that any more than he knows what to do to find peace and end the years of hatred and revenge that have consumed all their lives. He doesn't know how this happened. Because he should have stopped it.
Sasuke and Sakura- they're the first people to have known him and accepted him, and they did it when no one else would. Naruto loves them both, fiercely, but if that's really true-
How did he let this happen?
How did he stand by for it?
How could they have fought so hard, for so long, and settled for this?
He can't talk about it with them the same way, because it isn't their burden to bear. They're living with the consequences of actions Naruto can't fathom and in that quiet the words are adding up. He feels like he's suffocating beneath them.
The mattress dips as Bolin shifts and Naruto moves in turn an echo for a gesture he doesn't even recognize yet. And then there are arms around him. For the span of two heartbeats, Naruto's body is rigid with surprise. He can count on one hand the number of times he's been hugged like this- that he'd been able to feel the rise and fall of someone's chest against his own, that he'd been able to fit his chin over someone's shoulder and heard their voice near his ear. Bolin doesn't reach for him like he's scared. It isn't pity or fear or congratulations. He doesn't have a name for the way it feels, it just feels- and Naruto, hands trembling, recognizes the moment he could pull away and instead throws himself into it, trusting that he'll be caught. Naruto's arms wrap around his shoulder and chest, they roll along the mattress in his push to get closer, and his face is buried in the slope of Bolin's neck as if he's the only solid thing in the whole world.]