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After the explosive blow that ended the fight between Naruto and Sasuke, a deafening silence fell over the Valley of the End.
It lasted all of five seconds before Sakura gathered herself enough to leap down to the ledge where both boys lay, on the verge of unconsciousness and missing an arm each.
"You idiots!"
"Maa, Sakura-chan, maybe—"
"Shut up, Kakashi," she barked, head snapping around to look at her old teacher. Then, turning back to her teammates (her boys, her two most precious people), she let green chakra flicker to life in both of her hands.
"You two are the biggest morons I've ever met," she snapped, even as her mind whirled.
Please let them live. Let them be okay.
She might have thought they were both colossal dumbasses, but they were her dumbasses.
"Sakura-chan," Naruto started, sounding far too weak. The usual brightness was gone, replaced with a kind of self-deprecating humor that made her chest hurt.
"I don't want to hear it right now, Naruto."
"I'm sorry—"
"I said I don't want to hear it!" The chakra in her hands sputtered out as her ire turned to Sasuke, and she began rummaging through her pack for two blood replenishing pills.
It was hard to look when her vision was so blurry, though.
One tear dripped onto her hand, sliding down even as she produced the pills and shoved one into Sasuke's mouth and the other into Naruto's.
She'd almost lost them.
Again.
"Sakura." Sasuke tried again, and even though he wasn't saying the words I'm sorry like he had moments before, she could hear it in his voice.
She snorted, brushing her tears away with the back of her hand.
"It's a fine time to start apologizing, Sasuke. And you," she rounded her glare onto Naruto, who was trying to push himself up with his one arm. "What do you think you're doing?"
"We have to undo the Infinite Tsukuyomi," Sasuke explained for him, slowly rising up. It looked more effortless than Naruto's actions, but Sakura could see he was only pretending not to be winded.
Both boys looked at her expectantly, and she rolled her eyes, sweeping her arm out to gesture in the vague direction they'd come from.
"Well?"
She watched as they brought their remaining hands together and formed the seal, skin breaking into goosebumps as their chakra combined and swept outward. It felt soothing, and it pissed her off.
She was supposed to be mad at them, but there she was, taking comfort in the sights and sensations of her two boys being alive and… not well, necessarily, but they would live and recover. As long as they got rest and time in a proper hospital, they would be alright.
First, however, they would need to get back to Konoha, and though they might have been able to sit up by themselves, they were in no shape to make that many-kilometer trip.
With a sigh, she waited until Sasuke and Naruto broke the seal, their hands dropping back to rest at their sides and their gazes darting between each other and Sakura (and Kakashi-sensei, who was a few meters behind her, observing).
"We're going home," she announced, and didn't wait for Sasuke to finish twisting his features into a scowl before hauling them onto her shoulders. Naruto tossed over her left and Sasuke over her right, she carried them as easily as she did sacks of rice.
"Sakura-chan!"
"Sakura."
Ignoring both of their protests, she turned to face Kakashi-sensei, a dangerously fake smile plastered across her face.
"Let's get going, shall we, sensei?"
Kakashi-sensei mirrored her own look of cheer, but when his eyes crinkled up into little crescent moons, she knew he was at least a little genuinely amused (and happy).
"C'mon, Sakura-chan! We can walk, believe it!"
"Put me down, Sakura," Sasuke tried commanding.
"No."
Sakura shifted them to get a better grip and set off, funneling chakra into her legs before leaping upwards.
She ignored their complaints and struggles all the way to the gates of the village, and then past them, into the nearly abandoned Konoha General.
"Miyoko," she called to a passing civilian nurse who'd stopped to gape at the sight of her boss dragging two fully grown men (one of whom was the hero of the village) like they were petulant toddlers.
Which they were.
"Yes, Haruno-sensei!" Miyoko snapped to attention after a split-second delay, her purple eyes still wide as they moved from Sasuke's rear end to Sakura's face.
"I need two gurneys." She raised an eyebrow expectantly.
Like a flash, the woman was gone, reappearing moments later with the requested gurneys.
Sakura dumped Naruto onto his first, then Sasuke.
"Don't even think about it," she snapped as she saw both of them struggling to get off the beds. "I'll tie you both down with chakra string if I have to." She wasn't sure it would work on Sasuke, because of the Rinnegan, but—
Why were they looking at her like that? And why were they both blushing?
It was harder to tell with Sasuke than it was with Naruto, but his ears were definitely pink.
They looked at each other, then immediately snapped their gazes back to her.
"Whatever you're thinking, knock it off," she grumbled. "I'm admitting you and you're going to stay put, do you hear me?"
Neither of them answered, both looking frozen in what she guessed was shock. It prompted her to glare more fiercely than she had been. (The amusement rolling off Kakashi in waves from just behind her didn't do anything to improve her mood, either.)
"Do you hear me?"
"Yes, ma'am!" Naruto saluted.
Sasuke just grunted an affirmative.
She didn't trust it. Especially not Sasuke's response—given his history of fleeing from the village, could she really be blamed?
"Kakashi-sensei," she called out to him, her eyes never leaving the two in front of her. "Would you be so kind as to find Miyoko-san again and have her meet us on the third floor with intake forms for two? The double room closest to my office."
"Anything for my favorite student," he assured her, laughter heavy in his voice.
Why were all her boys so weird today? She could have understood Naruto and Sasuke, because maybe there was some head trauma, but Kakashi, too? Then again, given his reading material of choice…
"Ugh, he's probably thinking something dirty," she grumbled to herself as she began rolling the two towards the elevator.
She could have sworn Naruto and Sasuke started blushing harder at that.
"I'm sorry, Sakura," Sasuke started his apology again as they rode the elevator up in silence.
Her brow furrowed for a moment, then she sighed, shoulders sagging. Naruto seemed to take it as a good sign, and added his own apology.
"Yeah, Sakura-chan. We didn't mean to hurt you."
Irritation flared in her again, but it was overwhelmed by a wave of sadness.
"I'm sure you didn't In fact," she sighed, shaking her head, "Neither of you thought about me at all."
"That's not true!" Naruto immediately began to protest, but fell silent when he caught sight of Sasuke shaking his head.
"Look," Sakura took a deep breath as the elevator doors opened to reveal the hospital's third floor, "If you really want to make it up to me…"
"We do, Sakura-chan! I promise, believe it!"
"Then you need to stay put, and listen to all of my instructions." She stopped in order to jab a finger in Sasuke's face, who jerked back just a tiny bit, then scowled. "If I have to chase you down like I do Kakashi-sensei…" She let the end of her sentence trail off threateningly.
Sasuke snorted.
"Where would I go? I'm a criminal, Sakura. They're going to execute me either way."
"No, they wont." Both she and Naruto snapped in unison. They startled, looking at each other, then smiled.
"We won't let 'em get you, bastard!"
"I agree," Sakura nodded, settling their gurneys into the room she'd picked, making sure they were side by side, but far enough apart for any necessary equipment (and to keep them out of each others' swinging range). "But," she rapped Naruto's head lightly with her knuckles, "this is a hospital. Save your shouting for once you're discharged, idiot."
"Aww, Sakura-chan!" Naruto whined, rubbing the top of his head and pouting like a puppy who'd been denied an extra treat.
From the corner of her eye, she caught Sasuke smirking for an instant. When he saw her looking, though, he schooled his face back into neutrality.
Cute.
"You can't just expect her to know, bastard! 'Specially after you left her on a bench! In the cold! Where anyone coulda— Oh hey, Sakura-chan!"
Sakura's eyebrows were raised so high as she entered the room, she wasn't quite sure they were still on her face.
"What, exactly, do I not know?"
"Uhh…" Naruto looked at Sasuke, then back to her, chuckling nervously.
"Nothing," Sasuke said.
Sakura felt a wave of disappointment crash over her, and while she tried not to let it show on her face, she knew it must have been obvious. Sasuke averted his gaze and stayed silent for the rest of her checkup, not even rising to take the bait Naruto tried to use to get him to interact.
"It's okay, Naruto," she smiled, hoping it looked convincing enough. "I'm sure Sasuke has a lot on his mind, even with the pardon."
Between herself, Naruto, and Kakashi-sensei, they'd secured a pardon for Sasuke, commuting his sentence from death to house arrest after his discharge. (Like they could stop him from leaving again, with that Rinnegan.)
That house arrest was also how they'd ended up in their current living predicament.
When discharge day had approached, Sakura had offered for the three of them to find a house to share as a gesture of goodwill. Her apartment had been destroyed in the Pein attack (she'd been bunking in a tent before the war, then with Ino afterward, to provide moral support and help Ino cope with Uncle Inoichi's death), and she thought it would be nice for Naruto to get out of his own terrible apartment, rundown as the building was. But she hadn't expected Sasuke to actually agree to it.
She toured more than a few in her spare time, dragging Kakashi-sensei along since the boys were still confined to the hospital then (he was happy to escape his Hokage training, though Sakura was sure he got more than an earful from Tsunade-shishou about it). That they'd both trusted her to pick where they'd be living for the foreseeable future meant a lot… And yet, Sakura couldn't help but feel like they were both slipping farther away from her.
"I think we can bank on the arms being ready for testing soon. Maybe even next week." She smiled, feeling optimistic for once, but then realized they weren't as well versed in medical research—she'd have to temper their expectations. "They won't be perfect, and we'll have to fix issues as they pop up, but we should have them fully functional by Kaka-sensei's inauguration."
Sasuke opened his mouth to answer, then scowled, gaze darting to the doorway.
"Come on, Forehead!" Ino poked her head in, scowling. "Stop babying them and hurry up! It's going to take ages to cover up those dark circles."
Sakura rolled her eyes, but quickly finished her charting.
"Whatever, Pig. Just let me run these back to my office. I'll probably see you both later tonight, but don't wait up," she waved to Naruto and Sasuke, but only made it halfway to the door before Naruto called out.
"Where ya going, Sakura-chan? You don't need makeup, ya know. You're already beautiful, believe it! And what about eating dinner together?"
Sakura felt heat creeping up her neck as she looked to over her shoulder. Even Sasuke looked curious, though someone not so practiced in reading Uchiha might not have been able to tell.
"She's got a hot date," Ino crowed, jubilant. Then, she leveled a threatening finger at both boys. "So don't you dare mess it up by trying to kill each other again, understand? Forehead needs to get laid—"
Sakura slapped a hand over her best friend's mouth.
"Shut up, Pig!" She pushed Ino out of the room, then turned back to Naruto and Sasuke. "I'm sorry, that was too much—"
Their expressions stopped her dead in her tracks.
It wasn't unusual for Sasuke to scowl (he did it so often, after all), but to see him so intent, so murderous? And Naruto looking the same way?
She felt her stomach begin to do somersaults, a tingle running down her spine.
"Oh come on, you guys," she laughed nervously. "We're all adults, don't pull that weird big brother routine." Because that was what it was, surely. Naruto no longer had a crush on her and Sasuke had never felt that way about her, despite her delusions. In fact, they were both practically screaming homoerotic tension, even sitting in the almost cartoonishly small seats of the examination room they were in.
As much as she wanted the both of them, she had to face the facts that they would always think of her as a friend (and even that was a stretch for Sasuke). She wasn't lover material, not for them. She also tried to be respectful and not picture just what sort of antics they would get up to while Sakura was on her date and they had the apartment to themselves.
"We need to meet this guy first, Sakura-chan," Naruto protested. "To make sure he isn't trying to take advantage of you."
"Naruto," her gaze softened, and she stepped further into the room to take his hand in hers, giving it a little squeeze. Then, on impulse, she did the same with Sasuke using her other hand. "Sasuke. I'm not a defenseless little girl anymore. Besides," she grinned, winking at them both, "You make it sound like I'm still some virgin protecting my honor."
She was, in fact, still a virgin, but neither of them needed to know that.
Besides, their choking and protesting as she sauntered out of the room was so sweet to listen to.
"You're supposed to be resting at home. Both of you," Sakura hissed as she stepped into the alleyway beside Kinoko's, where she'd just had the most unfortunate blind date of her life.
In part, it was because neither she nor her date (or even the wait staff) could focus with the overwhelming killing intent aimed directly at their table.
"We were worried, Sakura-chan!" Naruto pleaded, turning his big blue eyes on her with great success.
Sakura stayed silent, but turned her gaze to Sasuke. Rather than ask him outright, she just quirked an eyebrow.
Well?
"Shouldn't you be focusing on the Hashirama cell trials instead of some stranger?"
She heard Naruto facepalm, but while it normally would have amused her… She was simply too angry at Sasuke's answer.
"Focus on—" She inhaled sharply. "And just what will a night of enjoying myself take away from that, Sasuke? Did you ever think it might be detrimental to my concentration if I didn't take a fucking break every once in a while?"
She was pleased to hear Naruto gasp and see Sasuke freeze at her rough language. Unfortunately, the latter got over his shock quickly, pinning her to her spot with a heated look.
He was angry, yes, but was it just another case of delusional thinking or did he also look a little…?
He took a step forward, and she held her ground. But then he took another, and she faltered, stepping backwards to avoid his sudden invasion of her space.
She bumped into a solid body that was unmistakably Naruto. One tanned arm, corded with muscle and covered in the black and blinding orange fabric of his signature jacket, wrapped around her waist, trapping her.
Now she was nervous, her heart racing as Sasuke stopped short of pressing right against her. She could feel his breath fanning across her face as he spoke, and was thankful for the darkness of the alley around them for hiding her flushed cheeks.
"You can take a break with us, Sakura-chan," Naruto cooed in her ear.
Goosebumps rose on her skin, and she couldn't stop herself from shivering.
In the dim light bleeding from the street lamp across the way, she saw Sasuke's lips tilt up in a smirk.
They were toying with her.
Righteous fury erupted from her, and she yanked herself out of Naruto's grasp, trying to push Sasuke back so she could get out of there and go drink her sorrows away before stumbling over the Ino's to complain.
He didn't budge.
In fact, his hand moved to rest over hers.
Even if she hadn't been trapped between their bodies, Sakura was have been too frozen with shock to try and escape. His eyes were searing in their intensity, making her feel hot all over.
"Sasuke?"
He ripped his gaze away from her long enough to look behind her and nod.
in the next instant, Naruto's arm was sliding past her waist and wrapping around Sasuke's, trapping her between them once more.
Sasuke's Rinnegan glowed an eerie purple in the dimly lit alleyway, and then they were in Sasuke's bedroom and she was being pushed down onto the massive bed and—
"Stop!" She shouted, throwing her hands up.
Immediately, both of her boys froze.
"Sakura-chan? What's wrong? We thought—"
Sakura felt tears welling up in her eyes, hot and shameful. Would she ever not cry over these two?
"What are you doing? I'm not—" she choked, wiping away a few stray tears as she struggled to sit up, uncaring for the way the strap of her dress slipped off her shoulder. "I'm not some toy you can use to spice up your sex life, or whatever it is you're doing. I'm a person. With feelings."
Naruto looked stricken, and even Sasuke's eyes widened in surprise.
She laughed bitterly.
"I guess it shouldn't surprise me that neither of you considered that. It's always been you two, and I'm just an aftertho—"
"Stop it, Sakura." Sasuke sounded stern, but she didn't flinch away as he stepped closer to the bed. Instead, she pushed herself up and stood her ground, uncaring of the fact she was wearing shoes on his nice rug.
"No. You two have done a lot to hurt me over the years, but this crosses the line."
"But… But we love you, Sakura-chan." Naruto sounded so small and pathetic that Sakura Couldn't help but lose some of her iron as she directed attention towards him.
"Naruto," she stepped around Sasuke, making sure to ram her shoulder into his as Hard as she could on her way, just for a bit of revenge. "You love me as a friend. You can't honestly tell me you feel the same way for me as you do Sasuke."
"I do. We do."
Sakura was overwhelmed by the conviction in his eyes, ocean blue darkening into a stormy sea.
And still, she couldn't shake her insecurities.
"I want to believe you. Both of you. But…"
She saw hurt flash over Naruto's face at the same time something like acceptance washed over Sasuke's aristocratic features.
"We'll prove it, Sakura." Sasuke finally spoke again, and she could hear the resoluteness in his voice.
"Yeah, Sakura-chan," Naruto chipped in, back to his usual enthusiasm. "We'll wait as long as you need! And we won't do anything with each other, either, believe it!"
Sasuke jabbed him in the side, causing Naruto to yelp and start fussing.
It was so familiar, so comforting, that Sakura couldn't help but burst into giggles, even though she'd been distraught just moments before. Both boys stopped their bickering to turn and look at her in awe.
"What?" She stopped laughing, suddenly nervous about the attention being on her once more.
"I haven't heard you laugh like that since…" Naruto furrowed his brow, clearly trying to dredge up the memory. "I guess since we redid the bell test with Kaka-sensei. And that means bastard hasn't heard it for even longer, before he left us for that creepy old snake."
Sasuke was suspiciously silent. Sakura narrowed her eyes, demanding an answer without words.
"I may have checked in on you after I left. Once or twice."
A memory came to her at once: a strange, fleeting sensation brushing over her skin while she was on a solo overnight mission to gather herbs in Tea.
"That was you in Mishima? I thought my genjutsu trap was misfiring! I had to totally rework all my traps from the ground up on the way home!" She gave his chest a whack for good measure, but there was no heat behind it (as evidenced by the fact it didn't cave in beneath her fingers).
"You needed to. Anyone who specialized in genjutsu could have figured it out."
"Not before I would have woken up!"
"Hey," Naruto interrupted, pouting. "Didn't you ever come to check on me?"
"You were with a sannin, idiot. Even if he was constantly in a whorehouse instead of training you like he should have been, he would have been able to sense me."
"Oh." Naruto deflated, but nodded in understanding anyway.
"If I wasn't worried you'd rig them to kill the ANBU who drop in, I'd make you set all the traps on my room for that." Sakura sniffed at Sasuke. "Jerk."
"You shouldn't let them into your bedroom in the first place," Sasuke snipped back. "There's a hospital for a reason."
"And who would be summoned to the hospital to do the surgery anyway?" Sakura shot back. She'd let the boys know about her… arrangement with certain ANBU members (Yamato, she suspected, as well as Genma and a few others she'd worked with on missions after she'd cleared chuunin), but nothing had prepared them to find Sakura hunched over a barely-breathing masked person, shoving their intestines back inside their body.
That was the first and last time they'd barged into Sakura's room at two in the morning after sensing the traps being broken.
"Tsunade is going to be taking over the hospital after she retires, isn't she? And her other apprentice still lives here, does she not?"
Sakura was touched that Sasuke was taking such a vested interest in her well-being (and still a little in awe that he'd apparently been doing so even when he was under Orochimaru's tutelage, if it could be called that). But mostly, she was irritated.
Because he was right, in a way.
"Shishou is going on a month long bender after she gives Kaka-sensei the hat," Sakura pointed out. "And Shizune-nee is going to go with her, so it will be up to me anyway."
"Don't you think you're doing too much, Sakura-chan?" Naruto interrupted, using a surprisingly gentle tone. "You said you needed a break earlier, but you won't let yourself have one, will you?"
Naruto wasn't totally unobservant or ignorant of emotions, as some people seemed to think, but such a moment was rare enough that Sakura felt herself soften just a bit. A wave of something overcame her—love? Relief? Sadness? And then, Naruto made it worse.
"You can depend on other people, ya know? Like me an' bastard."
A sob tore its way out of her throat all the overwhelming emotions of the night crashing down on her at once, and suddenly she was being enveloped by two arms, sandwiched between her boys as she got snot and tears all over Naruto's jacket.
They slept together that night—not in a sexual way, though. They just curled up under the blankets of Sasuke's too-big bed and held each other and slept.
Sakura woke up with her legs tangled with Sasuke's, and Naruto clutching both her and Sasuke with his one long, stupidly muscular arm. It was cozy and familiar and soothing, and she wanted to stay there forever. Even with two very obvious cases of morning wood poking into her from either end, she felt truly comfortable for the first time in years.
Alas, nature called, and she was forced to try and wiggle her way out from between her two boys. Naruto refused to let her go, though.
When she felt Sasuke shift behind her, letting out a little sigh that was so adorable she had to refrain from squealing, she thought help was on the way. Surely he would help her get Naruto off and—
His arm reached over and trapped her even more.
When she felt Naruto's little snort into her hair, she knew it was intentional. On both their ends.
"I am going to pee whether you two let me up or not," she grumbled. "So unless you want this to be a water bed—"
Both arms vanished from her, Sasuke and Naruto in perfect sync as they rolled away from her to allow her up.
"You're both ridiculous," Sakura huffed as she marched towards the bedroom door. Luckily, with her back turned, neither of them were able to see the little grin playing about her lips.
She was still in a good mood when she was accosted outside her own bedroom door not even half an hour later. Naruto grasped one of her shoulders in his hand and stopped her from her intended path towards the front door.
"You gotta have breakfast, Sakura-chan! It's the most important meal of the day, believe it!"
"But I never—"
"That's probably one of the other reasons you're so tired, ya know? But don't worry, we can take care of you like you take care of us."
Stunned, she allowed herself to be steered towards the kitchen, where the scent of grilling fish and frying eggs wafted into her nose and hit her stomach like a futon jutsu. She flushed at the loud gurgle that erupted from her, and elbowed Naruto as he started cackling.
"I told you," he wheezed, still grinning. "You need to eat breakfast."
"Sit down, both of you," was all Sasuke said, not even bothering to face them as he worked the four burners of the stove with an ease that Sakura envied.
She didn't bristle at being ordered around, as she would have were it almost any other person giving the orders. Instead, she obliged, slipping into a seat as she watched Naruto start to set the table.
She tried not to look too impressed, but she couldn't stop herself from making a tiny statement.
"I didn't know you could cook, Sasuke."
Sasuke shrugged, turning off the burners before looking back at her.
"I had to learn, or I wouldn't eat. Not that it stopped this idiot," he nodded at Naruto, who let out a yelp of indignation.
She winced, but stopped herself from apologizing. Sasuke hated feeling pitied.
So instead, she got angry.
"I know he was shishou's teacher, but I can't believe I cried for that man at his funeral." It was obvious who she was referring to, of course, and while Naruto looked a little uncomfortable, he didn't say anything to defend the dead man. "Leaving two children to fend for themselves like that, I could just—"
"He's dead and it's never going to happen again," Sasuke interrupted, putting a stop to her tirade before it could truly start.
And then, after he placed a plate laden with fish and vegetables before her, he gave her byakugo a little poke with his index and middle finger.
Sakura blushed, and averted her eyes.
"Shut up, Naruto," she complained when her eyes caught sight of the offender in question giggling.
The quips and banter and teasing flowed naturally after that, like life was finally settling into what it should have been all along. It made Sakura think long and hard about things as she headed off to the hospital.
Was everything Sasuke and Naruto said the night before true? Did they want to be together, all three of them, as a… well, a couple was two people, so she supposed the term for this would be throuple? Could she see herself with both of them?
Yes.
The answer to the latter question came as naturally as breathing, and it shook her. Probably because she was still confused about the sincerity of the offer her boys had given her.
Her boys.
It had always been so obvious, that she would end up loving them both, now that she really considered it.
In fact, she was considering it so much that she barely managed to toss out her usual greetings to the other staff members as she wandered through the halls of Konoha General towards her office.
She'd barely shrugged on her white coat when a nurse came busting down her door.
"Haruno-sensei, they need you in OR seven!"
Well, at least she could put her whirling thoughts of romance aside for a few hours. She lost herself in the rhythm of bringing a person back from the brink of death (a cocky chuunin who'd been stupidly experimenting with seals unsupervised) and didn't let herself focus on anything but the task at hand until she'd stripped off her gloves and gown, scrubbed up again, and given the attending nurses to let her know when the boy woke up (so she could properly chew him out).
Then, she had no choice but to think of Sasuke and Naruto, because they were sitting in her office, waiting for her return.
"Hello?" She couldn't keep the question from her voice.
"You didn't bring a lunch," Sasuke stated, holding up a cloth-wrapped bento.
"Yeah! So we brought you some, Sakura-chan!" Naruto leapt from his seat to wrap his arm around her shoulders, dragging her to her own chair and pushing her down until her knees gave and she sat.
It was a little too easy, with the chakra she'd had to expend on the surgery. She was suddenly aware of how tired she was, and knew that had her boys not shown up, she would have just covered it up with cup after cup of coffee from the break room and forgotten to eat anything approaching a proper meal.
"You don't have an appointment until the arms are finished, though," she looked up at them both.
"And?" Sasuke put the bento down in front of her.
Sakura tried not to look too giddy as she opened the lid to reveal rice with a piece of umeboshi in the center, then chicken glazed in what looked like teriyaki sauce and a small mountain of fresh vegetables in the compartment underneath. She must have failed, though, because when she looked up at Sasuke again, the corners of his lips were tilted up ever so faintly.
"Thank you." She broke eye contact with Sasuke to turn to a still-eager Naruto. "Both of you."
Maybe… maybe she could give this, whatever it was, a trial run.
Maybe she could trust them with her heart again.
Maybe they wouldn't shatter it this time.
"I'm sorry, what's the question?" Ino looked at her as though she were insane. "You have two of the most eligible bachelor's in the village chasing you, making you lunch—getting you out of that damn hospital for more than a few hours at a time. Which, mind you, I've been trying to do since before we made chuunin. You can't honestly think they aren't serious after all that?"
Sakura stayed silent, proving her guilt, and Ino sighed (rather dramatically for the situation, in Sakura's opinion).
"Look, Forehead," Ino reached across the table, careful not to knock over either of their steaming mugs, and grasped Sakura's face in both hands. "You said it's been going on for a week, right? Ever since that date," she wrinkled her nose, adding, "I can't believe one stupid blind date was all it took to get them off their asses. So—"
"What do you mean, Pig? All it took? Did they… did they say something to you?"
Ino dropped back into her seat and rested her face in her hands for a moment, sighing yet again.
"Sakura, I love you so much," she started after a moment. Then, for dramatic effect, she stopped to take a sip of her drink. Sakura even had time to roll her eyes before she started talking again. "But you have got to stop playing this insecure, woe is me card. You're the best damn medic in the world, one of the new sannin, and you punched a fucking goddess in the face. If anyone deserves a pity party, it's those two idiots who have been chasing your tail since we were genin."
"Don't be ridiculous, Ino. Naruto had a little crush, but—"
"Oh, shut up, Forehead. Are you forgetting that Sasuke nearly ripped a guy's head off in the Forest of Death because he'd hurt you?" She scoffed.
Sakura felt her cheeks redden, but shook her head. Sure, now that she understood his drive to leave the village, and about everything the Sandaime and Danzo had done to wrong him, she knew she couldn't have stopped him form leaving the village, but…
But he said thank you. He put me on that bench knowing an ANBU rotation was due to come by just a minute or two later.
He'd always shown he cared about her, he'd just done it in a different way than he showed his care for Naruto. (And to be honest, she didn't want a constant knockdown, drag out fight like those two had in their younger years.
Her eyes widened, and she watched a look of smug satisfaction settle across Ino's features.
"You ought to know by now that I'm never wrong, Forehead."
That snapped Sakura out of it, and she scowled as she took a long sip of her overly sugary latte.
"Now, how are you going to proposition them? You're giving their new arms a test spin today, right? Maybe you can ask them if they'd like to put those extra sets of fingers to use—"
"Pig!"
"Well, it seems to be integrating into your systems fine," Sakura muttered as she rapidly jotted down notes. "Your grip strengths are approximately what I'd expect for your non-dominant hands, and your dexterity seems fine." She looked up to find them both watching her intently.
Hungrily.
Ino's earlier taunting flashed through her mind, and she tried not to blush.
"I'd normally ask you to come back in another week to give me updates on how they're working, but given our living arrangement, I don't think it's necessary. You can just come to me directly if you encounter any kind of problems, alright?"
"Nah, we're not gonna have any problems, Sakura-chan! You worked so hard on these, there's no way it won't work out, believe it!"
She couldn't help but grin back at him. Leave it to Naruto and his boundless optimism to make her feel more confident in her science experiments.
"Sasuke?" She shifted her gaze to her other patient, and felt her grin melt into a softer smile at his nod.
"It feels… natural."
"Yeah!" Naruto inserted himself back into the conversation immediately. "Like the whole missing arm thing was a weird dream. Or like my arm went to live in Obito's weird Kamui place and just came back all of a sudden, ya know?"
Sakura wasn't sure she did, but she nodded anyway. It almost sounded like some kind of phantom limb syndrome come to life. But as long at it was working, that was all she could ask for.
"Good. I'll just finish up these charts and then check on a few patients and be home soon, okay?"
"No." Sasuke's refusal startled her, and she turned a questioning look on him. "If you start charting in your office, we won't see you until close to midnight, and that's if you don't get roped into another emergency that isn't actually an emergency. We're taking you home with us."
Sakura bristled.
"I'm not that bad!"
"You kind of are, Sakura-chan," Naruto said gently. "You barely even make it to the couch some nights, if you make it home at all."
"That was one—" she bit off the end of her protest, because Naruto and Sasuke were right. It wasn't just once, as she wanted to say. It wasn't even once a week. While it had lessesned with their newfound vigor for involving themselves in her life, it was still frequent enough that she knew it was one of the main factors in her near-constant state of exhaustion.
Still, she wanted to smack the smirks off of their faces. Smug bastards.
But there was no use in that—all it would do is wreck the room, if she hit hard enough, and they were so stupidly powerful that it wouldn't even really hurt them.
She resigned herself to her terrible fate: admitting she was wrong, and they were right.
"Fine," she grumbled. "But I'm taking this chart with me. Just in case I need to make any observations."
Neither of them protested, though she did have to pinch Naruto for rolling his eyes.
As though they thought she would try to make a break for it, they boxed her in, Naruto on her right and Sasuke on her left, as they left Konoha General. They were right to do so, because not even ten steps out of the doors and Sakura tried to turn back.
"I should grab the paperwork for—"
"No, Sakura." Sasuke caught hold of her arm before she could even shift all the way around.
"Yeah," Naruto chimed in, nodding sagely. "We said no work tonight and we mean it! You have to take the whole night off!"
She opened her mouth to argue, to remind them that she could technically be called in at any time, if there was an emergency. But then her boys put their hands on her lower back and began pushing her forward, in the direction of home, and she felt the fight begin to bleed out of her.
Was it so wrong, to let herself be taken care of? After everything she'd done, not just for Sasuke and Naruto, but for the whole village?
She tried not to think about the fires she'd probably have to put out at work in the morning because of her impromptu time off.
They got a few stares on their walk, even a jaw drop or two, once people's eyes drifted down and saw just where Sasuke and Naruto not only had arms where none were before, but that those arms were resting very low on Sakura's back.
More than surprise, though, there were knowing looks. Like people had been waiting to see such a spectacle.
Like they were always meant to be together as more than just teammates.
Ino's words replayed in her head as they slipped into their house and traded sandals for slippers and Naruto chattered about his spar with Sai earlier in the day and Sasuke baited him into bickering ("I kicked his ass, believe it!" "You screamed when one of his ink birds got tangled in your hair, idiot." Shut up, bastard!").
If anyone deserves a pity party, it's those two idiots who have been chasing your tail since we were genin.
Somewhere deep inside her brain, it felt as though a the last piece of a puzzle was clicking into place.
"Oh."
Her little slip up caught both boys' attention.
"Sakura-chan?"
"I… You…" She struggled to voice her thoughts, brow furrowing as she tried to string together words that made sense.
"Come help with dinner." Sasuke gave her an out, a way to keep her hands busy while her mind whirled and worked through the problem.
He knew just what she needed, as she was finding out had always been the case.
Are you sure you want me to get in the middle of this?
Too unsure. Especially since she'd finally come to see that they did want her in the center of their relationship with each other. In between them.
I decided you were both right, and we should all fuck about it?
No, that was too crass (too Ino in its directness, much as she loved her best friend).
Naruto had finished washing the dishes by the time she finally settled on something, taking a deep breath and then blurting out the words as they all moved towards their respective rooms.
"I want to try."
Since they hadn't made it that far down the hall, they were standing close enough together that Sakura felt the air displacement as Naruto whipped around. She could also feel the tension radiating from Sasuke, who also turned to face her, but with much more reserved motions.
"Try what, Sakura-chan?"
Sakura gestured between the three of them.
"This. Us." She paused, then, because that stupid voice of self doubt couldn't help but creep in, added, "If you still want to."
"Yes!" Naruto shouted, making Sakura cringe away, bumping into Sasuke in the process.
"Are you sure, Sakura?" was all Sasuke asked when she looked over at him. "We said we'd wait."
She smiled softly at him, feeling some of those last residual walls of ice around her heart melt.
"I wasn't, until today." She felt an embarrassed flush creeping up her neck and averted her eyes. "But I realized that you both really did mean it, and that we all fit too well together to just… not be with each other. All three of us, I mean."
She would not, however, admit that Ino was the one to knock sense into her. She was already ashamed it took her so long, she wasn't about to make it worse for herself.
When she felt brave enough to look up again, the first thing she saw was Naruto. His blue eyes were bright, brighter than she'd ever seen them, and he was concentrating on her.
"Do you really mean it, Sakura-chan?"
This was it. There would be no backing out once she gave her answer. But rather than getting cold feet or suddenly feeling unsure, she felt right. She felt certain.
Sakura nodded.
"I do."
"And do you…?" Naruto took a step forward, something she would have considered invading her personal space a few years ago. But now?
She could only feel the heat radiating off him. Could only see the hope and lust mingling in his eyes.
He didn't have to finish his question for her to understand what he was asking. A fire roared to life within her, heat building rapidly until it took real effort not to rub her thighs together.
"Yes." Her voice was breathier than she was used to, but there was a surety to it.
She rarely got to see Naruto smirk, not like Sasuke, but confronted with the sight in that moment, she felt herself grow wetter.
And when he scooped her up, forcing her to wrap her arms around his neck and her legs around his torso, feeling a very obvious sign of his attraction to her pressing into her? She had to bite her lip to keep from moaning. She registered that they were moving down the hall, going to a bedroom, but she wouldn't have been able to pinpoint which one.
"We're not going to your room, idiot," Sasuke grumbled, stepping behind Naruto to grab the blond's shoulders and steer him in the opposite direction.
"Aww, why not?"
"Have you cleaned it once since we moved in?" Sasuke snipped back.
Sakura snorted, some of her arousal giving way to fond humor.
Two sets of eyes zeroed in on her, and then, Naruto gave in.
The walk to Sasuke's room wasn't long at all, and in no time, Sakura was back on her feet (and trying not to pout).
"Are you really sure, Saku—" She cut Naruto off with a kiss, as firm as her decision.
She loved them. Both of them. No matter what happened from then on, she wouldn't regret spending the night with them.
Hands, four hands, tore at her clothes, unzipping her vest and unlatching her medic skirt and—
And then Sasuke let out a growl of frustration and spinning her around and there was the cool metal of a kunai barely whispering past her skin as it sliced through her sports bra.
"That was expen—" Her protests were swallowed by his mouth sealing over hers, and she felt the last bit of fight drain out of her.
The world became a blur after that. Those same four hands, callused from years of shinobi life, sliding over her skin, pressing her down onto the bed, and finally tugging her shorts and underwear off.
Then, they stepped back, leaving her feeling both chilly and vulnerable. She didn't hate it, though, not when they were looking at her so hungrily.
"Well?" She managed to power through her lustful haze and direct a question towards them, expectant. "I can't be the only naked one here."
Sasuke grunted, but didn't protest. And Naruto? Naruto grinned, sly and fox-like.
His hands immediately got to work, not on his own outfit, but on Sasuke's. Hooking his fingers into the black fabric of his shirt, dragging it up and over the moon-pale skin of Sasuke's torso.
Placing a kiss on the back of Sasuke's shoulder while Sasuke kept looking right at her.
Sakura kept that eye contact as she rubbed her thighs together, unashamed. If they wanted to put on a show as some kind of foreplay, she wasn't about to stop them. The boys also seemed to enjoy how excited she was at watching them, making sure to drag out every touch, every kiss, performing purely for her delight.
When she parted her thighs and began snaking her hands down her body, however, they drew the line.
She didn't even make it to her clit before Sasuke was kneeling behind her, lifting her arms above her head, which he kept pillowed on his thighs.
Her attention was immediately pulled away from him, though, when Naruto crawled up on the bed to kneel between her thighs. But he wasn't far up enough to—
He grinned again, and hefted her thighs up a bit as he lay on his stomach. She only realized what he intended to do a second before his mouth sealed over her sex.
"Naruto!" she cried his name as his tongue set to work. It was one thing to touch herself, to play with a few toys and explore what felt good (rare as it was, given her schedule and the constant threat of ANBU interrupting her). But it was an entirely different sensation when someone she loved and trusted so much was doing it for her.
Naruto groaned in response, only pulling back to give her a little glare when her hips wiggled a little too much.
"You taste so good, Sakura-chan," he complimented, sinking two fingers into her all the way to the knuckle.
Sakura felt her whole body heat up in response, a flush creeping up to the very roots of her hair.
Then, Naruto dove back in to his dessert and she tried to turn her head, wanting to ensure Sasuke didn't feel left out, but he shook his head.
"No, Sakura. Tonight is about you." He smirked, and she felt a new wave of arousal pulse through her. "When I cum in you, it won't be your mouth."
Right after he made that impossibly sexy statement, Naruto curled the fingers he had within her as he sealed his lips around her pearl and sucked.
She wasn't sure whose name she screamed as a white film settled over her vision—she was pretty sure she babbled both. No matter, by the time she could see straight again, Naruto was hunched over her, one arm holding onto her hips while the other grasped his (rather generous, in her professional opinion) member and began aligning himself with her entrance.
Inch by inch, he sank into her, stretching her more than any toy ever had.
Sasuke let go of her arms as Naruto hilted within her, and she used one to wrap around Naruto's broad shoulders, drawing him down into a kiss. At the same time, she used her other arm to reach up and blindly grope for one of Sasuke's hands, until he took pity on her and laced their fingers together.
Just as in every other aspect of his life, Naruto was very eager when it came to sex. He started out slow, thoughtful enough to give Sakura time to adjust… for all of a few moments. Then, he was off to the races, getting faster and faster until Sakura had no choice but to wrap her legs around him, trying to ensure he couldn't slip out of her entirely in his haste.
When she did that, however, it shifted her hips just enough that he began hitting that one spot inside her.
"Naruto," she moaned his name, unable to form words past just his name.
He leaned down and kissed her in response, just as fiercely hungry for her mouth as he had been for other parts of her. (She could taste herself on him, and it made her walls clench involuntarily.)
When he pulled back, blue eyes dark and intently focused on her, Sasuke struck.
His free hand, the one not squeezing Sakura's, slid down, toying first with her breasts, but then going further, further, until finally, he began toying with her nub.
The heat growing within her grew and grew, and her moans of their names turned into incoherent babbles. And when he gave a particularly rough jerk of his fingers, she shattered.
The release she'd felt from Naruto eating her out had been nothing in comparison to what she felt in that moment. The whole world fell away, her focus narrowing to everything happening at the apex of her thighs. Of how Naruto groaned her name. Of the way he gave a harsh thrust and then stilled as he filled her with his very essence.
She was so overwhelmed that, once he recovered, Naruto had to pry her legs from around him so he could pull out.
"Do you need a break?" Sasuke asked as he slipped out from behind her. He didn't let go of her hand until she looked up at him with big, teary eyes.
"No!" She protested a little too quickly. Then, feeling a little embarrassed at how needy she was, added a please that was far too meek for her usual liking.
Neither of her boys judged her, though. Instead, Sasuke nodded and took the position Naruto had just been in moments before.
But Naruto, instead of kneeling behind her, began rummaging in the bedside table, finally producing a bottle of lube after a moment. Sakura noted, with no small measure of awe, that he was standing at full attention again.
The residual chakra of the Kyuubi might be affecting his refractory period, she theorized as her gaze stayed on the cock that had just filled her only moments before.
"Stop bringing work into this," Sasuke scolded as he adjusted her hips with one hand. His other hand he used to direct her face to tilt towards him. He slid into her more quickly than Naruto, his path eased by the mix of cum and arousal.
"Yes, sir," she teased, trying to keep a level head despite her increasing need to be filled again.
Sasuke scowled, but her sensitive walls felt him twitch within her.
She smirked up at him, winking but not saying a word, and his scowl deepened for a moment before relaxing into something hinting at pleasure.
It was mutual—he felt incredible. Not as thick as Naruto, but longer, and curving just so slightly.
And speaking of Naruto…
She watched with interest as he finished spreading the lube on his cock and tipped Sasuke further forward onto her. She felt as he slid into Sasuke, because it pushed him deeper into her, his eyes fluttering shut as he let out a groan that was surely too attractive to be legal.
Unfortunately, with the sensual sounds and sights came an unpleasant side effect. Sakura tried not to wince as the tip of Sasuke's cock jammed into her cervix with Naruto's first thrust, but Sasuke had opened his eyes again and was studying her intently enough to catch the way the muscles of her face were fighting to remain neutral.
"I'm sorry," he murmured, easing himself back even as Naruto took up a rough pace, grunting and groaning and very obviously enjoying himself just as much as he had with Sakura.
It took a few moments to find a proper rhythm, a pace where Sasuke wasn't hurting her but wasn't going too slow to bring her pleasure.
Like she hadn't been on the brink of cumming since he apologized. Her genin self would have been incandescent with joy (and mortification at all the gory details of sex, but that was besides the point). As it were, Sakura was just happy and in love and being properly fucked by her two most precious people.
It was a heady combination.
Since Naruto was fucking Sasuke, she didn't get to wrap her legs around Sasuke as she wanted to. But he had a solution, bucking Naruto off for just long enough to hike Sakura's legs over his shoulders.
Despite her practical inexperience, she knew exactly what the position was called.
A mating press.
A little moan escaped her, and Sasuke seemed just as pleased, leaning back over her as Naruto began fucking him in earnest. The position pressed Sakura's knees to her ears, and had the added benefit of giving her bud the delightful friction it needed by Sasuke's sparse pubic hair rubbing against her with each thrust.
"Sasuke," she cooed into his ear, reveling in everything happening. She got her yaoi show (though she couldn't exactly see it, given her position) and her own pleasure at the same time.
She felt Sasuke twitch within her, and knew he got some enjoyment out of her talking to him. So, she egged him on, moaning his name and talking about how good he was making her feel, until his pace turned erratic.
Finally, Sasuke groaned, stilling as the first rope of his seed spurted into her, joining Naruto's and sending her over the edge again as well. Then, with a thrust of his hips that pushed Sasuke further into her, Naruto gave a grunt and collapsed atop both of them, rolling off only when Sasuke bucked him off.
Sakura knew what she needed to do after sex, in theory—she'd read enough books and received plenty of education from shishou, despite never putting it to use before that night. But she was so tired that by the time Sasuke pulled out of her, the best she could do was send a bit of chakra to kill any bacteria that had crept into her urethra during the course of all the fun, then to the muscles of her inner thighs, to prevent any lingering soreness in the morning.
Then, she was airborne, scooped up in Sasuke's arms like she'd been in Naruto's earlier that night.
"Go start the bath, idiot."
"Why don't you start it?!" Naruto shot back, only see Sasuke lift his arms, still laden with Sakura. He couldn't come up with an argument against that, so instead he just grumbled and turned to go do as he was told, his well-muscled ass on full display as he did so.
Sasuke sighed, but the corners of his lips tilted up as Sakura started giggling.
"He's still such a kid sometimes."
"Hn."
They didn't say anything else to each other until they reached the bathroom, when Sakura tried to scramble out of his arms only to find herself squeezed against his chest.
"I can wash myself, Sasuke," she reminded him. "And we all need to wash off before we get in." She eyes the tub warily, where Naruto was monitoring the taps with a sort of concentration she found endearing. "If we can all even fit in there at once."
Naruto spun on his heel to grin at her.
"Don't worry, Sakura-chan! Well make it work, believe it!"
She was skeptical, to say the least, but dropped it. If her boys wanted to pamper her a little, she wouldn't complain. This time, at least.
The only problem with letting Sasuke and Naruto wash her hair and scrub her from head to toe was that she was so incredibly sleepy by the time they made it into the bath (where, to her delight, all three of them fit).
"You can rest, Sakura-chan, don't worry," Naruto reassured her.
"Mmm," she replied, eyelids fluttering shut under their own weight.
The last thing Sakura felt as she drifted off to sleep were arms wrapping around her waist and a pair of lips pressing gently to the top of her head.
She woke slowly, no longer in the warm bath, but trapped between Naruto and Sasuke as she had been after the first night they'd confessed to her.
This time, however, they didn't fight her when she tried to extract herself to go pee, still naked as the day she was born.
"Hurry back," Naruto grumbled, then rolled into her spot and shoved his face into the crook of Sasuke's neck. Had she not needed to relieve herself so desperately, she would have stayed to watch the show.
They were wrapped around each other lazily when she shuffled back in the room, and she paused in the door to watch them.
Did they really want her to intrude on that, on what they already had?
Then Sasuke lifted his head and stared at her, his Rinnegan like a beacon in the still dark room. Beckoning her without words to rejoin them.
She slipped into the spot Naruto had been in, letting out a little sigh of contentment when she found the sheets still warm.
Naruto took it as his signal to roll over and begin nuzzling into her neck instead. Then, grumbling, Sasuke leaned over Naruto's head and kissed her. It didn't have any heat as their kisses the night before had, but it was comforting.
Sakura's eyes fluttered shut, and even when Sasuke pulled away, Sakura kept her eyes closed. She hovered there in that soft, gentle feeling, drifting in and out of consciousness, until her thoughts finally began taking shape again.
Slowly, she was dragged back into the world of the waking for good, watching lazily as Sasuke and Naruto took their turns in the bathroom and returned to bed just as she had. Finally, she was back in the center of the bed, wide awake but comfortable enough for her tongue to loosen.
"How is this even going to work?" As much as she wanted to give in to her hopeless romantic side, life experience had ensured her pragmatism reared its head whenever any big life decision was being made (sometimes it was after that decision was made, but it still counted).
"If you both… You're both the last of your clans, so if there were children— Do either of you even want children?" As much as she wanted them both, wanted this all to work out, Sakura knew she wanted kids. If they didn't, she would have to walk away.
Naruto and Sasuke lifted their heads to exchange a look, but it was too fast for Sakura to properly interpret. Then, they sat up, uncaring for the way the sheet fell from their waists, uncovering not only their own nakedness, but Sakura's as well. She shivered a little at the chill of the room's air brushed across her, but it didn't break her focus.
She pushed herself up into a sitting position to make sure she was meeting their eyes and—why was Naruto grinning like that? And Sasuke might not have been smiling, but he had that look in his eyes that was undoubtedly self-satisfied.
"We haven't even proposed and you already want kids, Sakura-chan?" Naruto teased.
"It's a valid question," she snapped back as her cheeks filled with color. "If we're not all agreed…"
"Of course I want kids with you, Sakura-chan! And with bastard, too, but I guess he can't have kids like you—"
"Who says I'd be the one having them? You're the one with that weird jutsu—"
"It's not weird, it's sexy—"
"So," Sakura interrupted before they could continue their fighting. It was too early, and she hadn't had any sort of caffeine. "You both want kids, is what I'm hearing?"
"Hn."
Naruto just nodded emphatically.
She let out a sigh of relief, and leaned back against the headboard as the tension that had been building up within her bled from her muscles.
"You realize you'd have to actually take time off work to have a child, yes?" Sasuke asked, looking far too smug. "And stop inviting every ANBU into our bedroom."
"Our bedroom?" Sakura asked at the same time Naruto blurted out his own question.
"Does this mean Sakura-chan and I get to move in here?" He wiggled his eyebrows.
Sasuke rolled his eyes.
"If I see so much as a crumb in the sheets, you're going back to your room. Permanently."