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Come On Love, Run With Me -XIX

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Part XIX

It was something I had waited for since I could remember, yet when it finally happened, I was crying, dirty, on the ground in the middle of a forest, labeled a traitor. Not exactly how I pictured my first kiss. The only thing that was the same was the boy whose lips were meeting mine. Naruto was the boy that had invaded all of my little daydreams ever since the academy, yet I never pictured it like this.

Because of the shock, I have to admit, it took me a moment to realize what was really happening. I kept my eyes open, trying to figure it out, even though his cerulean orbs were closed and there was nothing to look at but his eyelids. It was like I was reading what was happening instead of actually experiencing it. I could feel his lips on mine. I could feel one of his hands release my wrist and reach up to cradle my cheek. I could feel the fingers of that hand slip between matted locks of my hair. I could still feel the hot tears on my cheeks. And yet, it was like I was a ghost, a third person in the story.

That is until my brain caught up with my nerves and I realized that I was actually kissing Naruto!

My slow mind suddenly ran in fast forward. It was like I was two different people and couldn’t decide which one to listen to. The first side told me to close my eyes, lean into it, use my free hand to grab the front of his shirt. But he pulled away before I could take any action.

I opened my eyes to find that his were still closed, if only for a second before his eyelids pulled back to reveal those deep cerulean pools I’d been lost in since I was little. I could feel the features on my face pull together in a look of confusion, which he obviously thought was funny somehow. He laughed, and it was like a secret melody that had been saved just for me; a little husky, a little mischievous, and more than a little amused. What I would have ever given to be in this position a few years ago! What I would have ever given to hear him laugh like that.

But that didn’t mean he was getting off the hook. I still didn’t understand.

“Why?” I asked, quietly. The tears had stopped now, but I couldn’t manage to bring my voice above a whisper.

Naruto smiled, something I had waited to see for a long time now. But it wasn’t his usual foxy grin, big and cheesy. No, this one was gentle somehow, and knowing. It was a smile not very many people got to see. I could count on one hand how many times I had seen him smile like that, none of them at me. But now I was the only one around.

I waited for him to respond, but all I got was that little smirk. I had to admit it was cute, making his little whisker birthmarks look soft. I wanted to reach out and touch him again. Could I? Would he let me? He had just kissed me, right? Or had I imagined that? Seriously, if that was my imagination, I was getting really good. Either that, or I was going senile. And, considering that happenings of the last few years of my life, that’s a theory I seriously considered.

When he didn’t say anything for a good thirty seconds that felt closer to an hour, I started to frantically search his face. I felt my eyes go wide, saw the panic expression on my face reflected back at me in his eyes. I couldn’t tell what he was going to say. My breath caught. Did I recognize that emotion I saw there? Why was his hand still in my hair? My face got hot under his touch, suddenly electrically aware of his presence. I wished he would say something, anything…

“Hinata-chan”—anything but that… My stomach flipped—“Don’t you know?”

And I did know, but I didn’t want to believe it. It would be the end of me if either of us said it out loud. I couldn’t pull my eyes away from his, finally seeing the emotion there clearly. Why was he looking at me like that? It couldn’t be… Please don’t say it…

I didn’t understand! I was so frustrated it was physically painful to look at him, but I couldn’t stop. Naruto’s eyes, his smile, his lips, his body, his entire demeanor was pulling me in. I wouldn’t say it out loud. To be honest I was still frightened to admit it in my mind.

“Why?” I repeated, my voice even softer. One hand, the one still in his grasp, twitched under his fingers while the other lay limp in my lap.

Finally he answered. I watched his lips move, trying to comprehend what he was saying. Every word he said was reaching me a moment behind the motion of his lips. It was as if my mind was back in slow motion.

“Because when you ran away, it hurt like close to nothing I’d ever felt before, and trust me, I’ve been through a lot. A part of me went missing with you. See, I know because when I saw you again, that day in the valley, I felt something shift and knew things would be okay again. It started when I read that letter you wrote. I never understood much about love and it took me a long time to realize that when you left, you had actually broken my heart. And you know, Hinata-chan”—a gleam formed in his eye as his smile broadened a bit—“only people you love can break your heart.”

I nodded, knowing all too well what he meant. When I had left, at first a giant part of me was missing, too. I thought I had filled it up, but coming back to Konoha made me realize it was only a temporary filler. The people I had always loved and always would love were the only things that could truly make me complete. Sure I still had that hole in me that Ren left, and the people who had yet to forgive me, like Kiba and Shino (I hurt them the worst when I left, and I hadn’t yet been brave enough to really try and talk to them). But bits and pieces of my heart had been put back together. I only wished I could keep it that way.

When Naruto leaned in this time I knew what to expect. His lips were soft and kind, almost like they were made to fit against mine. This is what I had been missing. What the hell had I waited for?
Again one side told me to close my eyes, lean into it, use my free hand to grab the front of his shirt. And this time I did. It was obvious he wouldn’t pull away this time.

But God if only I had a little more sense… This is what would break me. Meeting his eyes wouldn’t, telling him what I was thinking wouldn’t. But kissing him? Kissing him would. Especially after he had just told me he loved me.

And yet, greedy, guilty, selfish me… I had to indulge. I had been so conserved lately, so quiet. I’d kept to myself so much. And yet this is what kept me so quiet, imagining scenes like this. It was actually happening. I couldn’t pull back. Not right away. I just wanted a little more, a little more, more, more…

I leaned farther into the kiss, moving towards him, almost sitting in his lap I was so close now. I could feel his hand reach through my hair, tangling in it as he pulled me closer into him. God it felt good! Naruto’s lips were like fire against mine: One sweet, burning, addictive fire. It burnt to kiss him so hard, but I couldn’t pull away. I tried to come up for air, but only found myself being pulled back in.

I knew it was wrong. I knew kissing him was selfish. I knew it would break me. I knew it would hurt to pull away. I knew I the force was not just coming from a need that had built up inside of me since I first saw him, but also from frustration and anger. I knew all of this, but I couldn’t stop. His lips were a prize I couldn’t resist, didn’t want anyone else to have. It tingled and stung and I swear I was feeling things emotionally and physically I never deserved to feel. Yet I couldn’t stop.

My lips parted against Naruto’s, his breath invading my mouth as my own caught. He even tasted good. Naruto still had one of my wrists in his fingers, but the other held the back of my head, tangled in my hair. I pressed myself against him, sitting in his lap now. A soft moan, a noise I never expected to come from me, escaped my own lips. His hold on my wrist tightened.

And that’s when I realized I had to stop.

I pulled my lips away from his and the fire was gone, my lips left only with a faint tingle of remembrance. I released his T-shirt, which had become fisted between the fingers of my free hand, and grabbed his wrist, pulling it from my head. Concentrating chakra into my hand and wrist, I watched as he pulled his hand away from me, letting go and almost jumping as if I had a disease he didn’t want to catch. In a matter of two seconds from pulling away I was standing two feet in font of him.

I let my head hang, my dirty, indigo locks falling down in front of my face and masking it in a shadow. I couldn’t see the look on Naruto’s face and I didn’t need too. I was finished, and he didn’t need to see it. Looking at him would make it complete. I just wanted to hold on a moment longer. Try to be strong.

I heard leaves crunch as he got up. “Hinata-chan, did I do something wrong?” This time when he said my name my stomach didn’t flip. It clenched hard and it felt like someone had knocked the wind out of me. From personal experience I’m qualified to make that comparison.

Naruto took a step forward and I took a step away, shaking my head slowly from side to side. My bangs shaded my features, and I could only imagine how distorted they must look. “No, Naruto-kun, you didn’t do anything wrong.” It was painful to say his name.

“Then what are you doing?” I could hear the confusion in his voice, the hurt, but I couldn’t bear to look up to see it. Another step forward, another step back. “You know, if I’m really that bad of a kisser you could have just said something.” His poor attempt at humor didn’t make me laugh; it almost made me cry.

All I wanted to do was tell him how much I loved him and how sorry I was for hurting him and say that I never wanted to trouble him ever again. I wanted to tell him not to come near me, that I would disappear after my next month was up and he would never have to see me again. I would never be a burden to him after then, and everything would be okay. Then he said the words that cut through me like a knife.

“Hinata-chan,” his voice was soft and hesitant. This time when he took a step forward I didn’t move away. “In case you didn’t catch what I said earlier, I love you.”

It’s amazing how three little, innocent words can wound someone so deeply. My head shot up, finally looking at him. He looked hurt, but honest. How could he stand there and say that? It didn’t make sense.

“Don’t lie, Naruto-kun!” I shouted, getting angry instead of trying to hear him out. I didn’t want him to love me. Okay, that was a lie, too. What did I want? I wanted to forget him. I wanted him to have never existed… or for me to have never existed. But that wasn’t the case, and I had to deal with the cards I was given. And what I was given was a boy who said he loved me, who I wanted to love me, who I loved. And yet it hurt to hear him say it out loud, for me to see it in his eyes.

So what did I want right that instant? I wanted to be invisible. I wanted the kiss to have never happened. I wanted to be his charge, because I didn’t even deserve his kindness, let alone his love. What kind of selfish monster was I?

“I’m not lying, Hinata-chan…” He took another step towards me. I watched him with wary eyes, but didn’t back away. “I love you.”

I shook my head faster, strands of my dark hair whipping my gaunt cheeks. I could feel the tremble start to radiate through me, starting in my shoulders. “Stop saying that!” I shouted. My words echoed around us but I still felt like I was suffocating. When did it get so dark? Did I hear thunder? Naruto must have been thinking the same thing.

“Hinata-chan, why don’t we head home,” he said it like I belonged there, with him, and it hurt so badly… “It’s going to rain, soon, and we need to get inside.” Another step forward. I didn’t shrink back. I couldn’t move. Was I still shaking? I couldn’t tell.

Naruto extended a hand towards me. I stared at it, wondering what he expected me to do before I realized he wanted me to take it. “No!” I focused chakra into the tips of my fingers and whipped his hand away. It was all coming back to me, the training I had gone through with Ren, how strong I really was. I needed to hit something.

Naruto was the closest target, but I wouldn’t hit him. I at least had enough restraint to hold back. So instead I whirled on my feet and focused the chakra into the palms of my hands, sending an open palm straight into the trunk of the nearest tree. (How had I forgotten how well I could focus my chakra now?) The sound the impact made rumbled through the forest like thunder. When I pulled my hand away, a large dent was smashed into the tree, splinters falling to the floor from my palm, though none entered my skin.

I stared at the hole, dumbstruck. What to do next? Another rumble of real thunder echoed off the trees and reverberated around me. I could feel the sensation of Naruto’s eyes on my back and barely hear his footsteps as he walked up behind me.

“Hinata-chan?” He was only half a foot away from me now. I wouldn’t turn to face him.

”No, Naruto-kun,” I said, my voice back to a normal tone, though it sounded desolate even to my own ears. “No. No. No.” I repeated the word over and over again until it felt like I couldn’t say it any more.

“No what, Hinata-chan?”

He had asked a question in response to something I had said, but thinking about it I wasn’t exactly sure what I was saying no to. Instead I said what was on my mind.

“Naruto-kun,” I started, my voice relatively even, “I’m broken. You know that. I killed her. I pushed everyone that ever loved me away. They won’t come back, Naruto-kun…” I felt the first raindrop fall on my head as a tear slid down my wasted cheek. My stomach hurt and I remembered I hadn’t eaten in at least three days. “And you don’t really love me. You just feel sorry for me. I’m your mission, nothing more. So stop lying, please. It’ll just hurt worse when I leave.”

I felt a hand on my shoulder but simply concentrated on the chakra nerves there. Naruto released his grip as quickly as if he had been shocked.

More rain.

“What are you talking about, Hinata-chan? You’re not going anywhere.”

I took a deep breath. “After my next month is up and you don’t have to watch me any more, I’m going to run away again,” I told him as simply as possible, trying to make things as effortless as they needed to be. “But this time I won’t stop. And I’ll disappear forever, and you’ll never have to worry about me hurting you again.” By the intake of breath from behind me I assumed Naruto knew I wasn’t talking about physically running away again. I was looking for another way out.

“Hinata-chan, you can’t do that. You’re honestly not just a mission to me. I love you. Really.”

More rain. Harder. Faster.

“I really wish you’d stop saying that.” He couldn’t love me. I hadn’t done anything to deserve it.

“But it’s true.” He was lying.

My stomach clenched and ached. I lifted my hands and looked at them, looking at my thin fingers. I saw how knobby my knees had become. I lifted a hand and touched my skeletal cheek, feeling the bone beneath it. I touched my eyes, feeling the places where I knew my skin had turned purple from lack of sleep. Rain seeped from between the leaves above and landed on my pale skin, almost burning as it landed drop by drop. I ran a hand through my matted hair, which hadn’t been brushed in days, probably since the last time I had eaten, and pulled out a few strands in the process.

Who had I become?

“Naruto-kun… I don’t deserve you. You shouldn’t have to pick up my broken pieces. I love you, but it’s not fair for you to love me back.” I hoped my voice had a tone of finality in it. But then Naruto spoke again, and it almost took my breath away.

“But that’s the thing about love, Hinata-chan,” he said, taking a step closer and wrapping his arms around my skeletal frame. “It’s irrational and unjustified. And sometimes you just have to listen to your heart. So why won’t you let me do this for you, because I love you?”

I felt his arms around me, felt the rain pouring down on the two of us there in the middle of the forest. And in that moment time seemed to stand still. It didn’t matter I was sickly thin and writhing with guilt. It didn’t matter that I was being eaten alive from the inside out by my memories. It didn’t matter that I was wet and dirty and that I had killed a girl I had loved.

No, none of that mattered because there in Naruto’s arms it felt like, despite all the misgivings and terrors in the past, everything would be okay.

I could have turned my whole body blue, forced the chakra outward to shock him off of me. I could have, but I didn’t. Because everything just felt right.

I turned in his arms and lifted my bony fingers to touch is face as rain poured down and over the whisker birthmarks on his cheeks. Somehow his blue eyes seemed like lights in the midst of the cold, early spring rain.
I bent my head forward, making our lips meet for the third time. Even with the rain Naruto’s lips returned to being that addictive fire. My hand cradled his cheek. One of his hands held my lower back while the other shifted to the back of my head, tangling in my hair again. This time when I fisted his soaked shirt in my hands and opened my mouth against his, I didn’t force him away. Instead I savored it, tasting his lips and the rain and knowing everything would be alright.

Naruto’s lips broke from mine for just an instant, and in that moment of release he whispered, “I love you,” against my lips.

And that time, somehow, I knew he wasn’t lying.
The final chapter!
(except for the epilogue)
:D

I really hope you all have enjoyed my story.
I'm really proud of it and want to thank everyone for sticking with me through it all, even though it took me forever and a half.

Much love,
Kinsey

- Naruto and its characters belongs to Kishimoto Masashi.
- The title of this story is based on a line from the song "Beauty in the Breakdown" by The Scene Aesthetic.

[Part 18]
[Epilogue]
© 2008 - 2024 Change-Love-Live
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This was really really good Naruhina story and the ending was the best =) Good job!