Naruto was hyperfocusing on the citrus peel floating in Gaara's cider when a shadow fell across the table. His eyes snapped up just as Sasuke slid into the booth beside Gaara. Naruto's mouth fell open, his half-formed protest dying in his throat. His teeth clenched so hard his jaw ached. Sasuke had moved so smoothly it barely displaced the air, like a predator claiming territory. Suigetsu followed, shortly after getting drinks, planting himself next to Lee with the ease of a cat dropping into a sunbeam. Naruto's knee jerked in surprise, banging the underside of the table as his thigh mashed against Lee's, Lee's against Suigetsu's. The circumference of the booth had gone from "generously social" to "hostage negotiation."
Sasuke's presence changed the local gravity. Naruto shifted his weight, pressing himself deeper into Lee's side, his shoulder angling deliberately under Lee's arm. His fingers drummed a nervous rhythm against his glass before he forced them still. "We were actually just about to head out," he said, voice clipped and cold as he glared at Sasuke, eyes darting meaningfully toward the exit. "Early day tomorrow."
Sasuke settled more firmly into his seat, one eyebrow lifting a fraction. "We're not staying long." His palm flattened against the table, claiming the space as if he'd reserved it weeks ago.
Naruto's fingers tightened around his glass until his knuckles whitened. He exhaled through his nose, a short, sharp sound that made Lee glance at him sideways.
Suigetsu made a show of signaling the server. "Two slivovitzes, a pickled egg, and whatever you're having," he said to Lee, eyebrows waggling. "You look like a man with daring taste."
Lee, always a good sport, raised his hand in salute. "I will try anything once!" He shot Naruto a look that said: help, but also, this is hilarious.
Gaara didn't so much as blink when Sasuke scooted in beside him, but their knees touched under the table. Sasuke's body angled away from the contact, shoulders squared directly toward Naruto as if Gaara were merely furniture. Naruto's jaw clenched so hard a dull ache spread to his temple. He deliberately looked past Sasuke to the exit sign glowing red in the distance.
Sasuke leaned forward. "Ready for Monday's review?" His voice dropped to a register meant for Naruto alone, as if the others had suddenly ceased to exist.
"Done." Naruto's response came out like a door slamming shut. He didn't meet Sasuke's eyes, just tapped his glass twice against the table. "Finished yesterday."
Lee seized on the tension, throwing his arm around Naruto's shoulders. "Our boy's been a machine!" He squeezed Naruto closer with a theatrical wink. "We were just discussing his... endurance. The way he just keeps going all night long." Lee's tongue darted out to wet his lower lip as his eyebrows bounced suggestively. "Some mornings he can barely walk straight."
Sasuke's jaw flexed. His eyes narrowed a fraction, lingering on Lee's arm draped around Naruto's shoulders before dropping to where their thighs pressed together. Something dark and possessive flashed across his face—there and gone in an instant—but the muscle twitching at the corner of his mouth betrayed him.
Suigetsu, delighted by the tension, leaned in. "You three an item, or is this more of a… rotating roster situation?" He gestured with his shot glass as the drinks arrived. "No judgment. I just like to understand the vibe."
Gaara's hand, palm-down on the table, drifted until it covered Naruto's. His thumb traced a slow, deliberate circle over Naruto's knuckles while his eyes never left Sasuke's face. Sasuke's nostrils flared—the smallest, most damning giveaway—and Suigetsu let out a low whistle.
Lee squeezed Naruto's shoulder, then dropped his hand to Naruto's waist, pulling him closer until their thighs pressed together. Before Lee could speak, Gaara leaned forward, pale fingers interlacing with Lee's free hand on the tabletop. "Lee and I have are together," he said, voice flat but eyes never leaving Sasuke's. "Though Naruto is always... welcome. When he's lonely." The corner of Gaara's mouth twitched upward.
Naruto inhaled sharply at the same moment he tried to swallow his drink. Cider burned up his nasal passage and down his windpipe simultaneously. He doubled over, coughing violently into his fist, eyes watering as Lee patted his back with theatrical concern.
Sasuke's mouth curved, but whether it was a sneer or a pained smile was hard to say. "You won't ever have a reason to be lonely again," he said, voice low enough that only their table could hear. His eyes never left Naruto's face, even as Naruto continued choking.
A heavy silence dropped into the booth, the music and bar chatter receding into the background. Naruto finally caught his breath, his face burning not just from coughing. "They're just messing with you," he blurted, wiping cider from his chin with the back of his hand. His voice came out raspy. "These two think they're hilarious." He shot Lee a pointed glare, then pried Gaara's fingers off his hand. Gaara's mouth twitched at the corner—the closest thing to a smile Naruto had seen from him all night. Naruto couldn't bring himself to look back at Sasuke. "And for the record, I'm not lonely. Never have been." He gestured between Lee and Gaara. "Not with these two around.
Gaara leaned forward, his pale eyes never leaving Sasuke's face. "Interesting," he said, tapping his index finger once against Naruto's wrist, "how some people chase after what they threw away." His mouth curved into something not quite a smile as he tilted his head. "Almost like they never deserved it in the first place."
Sasuke flinched—a small, involuntary motion that rippled across his features before he could mask it. The carefully maintained facade cracked, revealing raw hurt underneath. He swallowed hard, adam's apple bobbing once. "You're right," he said quietly, gaze dropping momentarily to where Gaara's finger still rested against Naruto's skin. "Sometimes it takes losing something to know how much it means."
The silence that followed felt like a blade pressed against skin—not yet cutting, but promising blood. Naruto's pulse hammered in his throat. The server materialized at their table, oblivious to the tension or perhaps immune to it. "Pickled egg for the shark, two shots, and another round for you three." He set everything down with practiced efficiency and vanished before anyone could ask for a napkin.
Lee's face brightened with sudden inspiration. "Oh! Remember that time in sophomore year when we tried to make ramen at 3 AM after that horror movie marathon?" He swirled his drink, ice clinking against glass. "You were so convinced the dorm kitchen was haunted you kept throwing salt over your shoulder!" His laugh cut through the tension like a machete through cobwebs.
Suigetsu perked up, leaning forward. "Salt? For ghosts?"
"For demons," Lee corrected, slapping Naruto's back. "He spilled the entire shaker!"
Sasuke's knee nudged Naruto's under the table. Naruto shifted his leg away, but Sasuke followed, pressing more deliberately. Naruto's jaw tightened as he slid his foot back another inch. Sasuke's eyes never left Naruto's face, even as Lee continued his story.
"The RA found us covered in broth and screaming because the microwave sparked!" Lee wiped tears from his eyes.
Naruto felt Sasuke's foot hook around his ankle. He yanked his leg free and finally looked up, meeting Sasuke's gaze with a sharp glare that could have cut glass.
Sasuke's lips barely moved. "Some stories are worth remembering," he said, the words meant only for Naruto despite the daggers in his eyes.
"I know one worth remembering!" Lee's hand shot up like an eager student's. His bushy eyebrows bounced as he leaned forward conspiratorially. "Remember sophomore year when you and I tried dating Naruto?"
Naruto's cider sprayed across the table in a fine mist. "Lee!" he choked, eyes wide with betrayal. "You promised you wouldn't tell that story anymore!"
Lee's laugh ricocheted too loudly off the walls, completely unfazed. "We set off the fire alarm making ramen at 3 AM because—" his fingers curled into exaggerated air quotes, "—we were 'hungry' after, you know." He slapped the table, gaze ping-ponging between Naruto's mortified face and Sasuke's darkening one. "The RA made us stand outside in our boxers—Naruto's had little frogs on them! Six months of great cardio, terrible cooking, and now—" he threw his arm around Naruto's shoulders, "—practically brothers!"
Suigetsu cackled, nearly spilling his shot. "Best reveal all year," he crowed.
Sasuke's face had gone very still. His eyes flicked from Lee's hand on Naruto's shoulder to Naruto's flushed face, a muscle working in his jaw. "Six months," he repeated, voice flat but eyes burning. "And now you're 'practically brothers.'" His fingers twitched against his glass. "How convenient."
Gaara's hand tightened on Naruto's, but when he spoke, it was to the room. "Some people just aren't meant to work out."
"No," said Sasuke, eyes locking with Naruto's. "Some people are exactly meant to." He pushed back from the booth, the motion abrupt enough to rattle the tableware. His chair scraped against the floor as he stood, straightening his cuffs with military precision.
Naruto's jaw clenched as Sasuke's back turned. "Asshole," he muttered, the word barely audible even to himself.
Naruto glared after Sasuke's retreating form, anger burning through his veins like acid. Good. Let him walk away. Let him feel a fraction of what Naruto had felt five years ago. His fingernails dug half-moons into his palms as he watched the rigid line of those shoulders disappear into the crowd, mentally hurling every curse he knew at Sasuke's back.
Then Sasuke paused at the door, turning just enough for the neon to catch his profile. The look on his face wasn't anger, or even the jealousy Naruto had been trying to provoke. It was something raw and wounded that made Naruto's chest constrict mid-breath.
And then Sasuke was gone, leaving Naruto with the hollow victory of having survived the confrontation but not a clue why his anger had suddenly tangled into something he couldn't name.
As soon as the door shut behind Sasuke and Suigetsu, Naruto whirled on his friends with the whiplash speed of a man trying to outrun embarrassment by sheer force of motion.
Gaara's pale eyes narrowed, the rim of his glass hovering an inch from his lips. "What was that?" he asked, voice barely audible above the bar noise. "You just let him do whatever he wants." He set his drink down without taking a sip, the glass meeting the table with a deliberate click.
Lee had the decency to flinch, ducking his head as he plucked a napkin and began dabbing nervously at the spilled cider, eyes darting between his lover and friend like he was tracking a particularly intense ping-pong match.
"I didn't—" Naruto started, then stopped, his protest withering under Gaara's unflinching stare.
Naruto's beer sloshed dangerously close to the rim as he gestured. "I was just—I was being professional!" The lie tasted sour on his tongue. "You think I care what he thinks? I've got a million-dollar deal on the line. I can't exactly tell him to go fuck himself." His face burned hot enough to feel it in his hairline. "It's called being strategic. I'm playing the long game here."
Lee's eyebrows climbed toward his hairline. "The long game where your foot chases his under the table?" His smile was gentle but knowing. "Very strategic, Naruto. Sun Tzu would be impressed with such advanced tactics."
Gaara leaned in, voice low and steady. "Every time you react to him, you hand him the controls." His pale eyes held Naruto's, unflinching. "He's still playing the same game from high school, and you're still letting him win."
Naruto slumped back, the anger draining out of him as quickly as it had sparked. His fingers traced the wet ring his glass had left on the table, a perfect circle with no escape route. "So what am I supposed to do?" he mumbled.
Lee's voice was gentle. "We are just worried about you. Last time—" He broke off, as if the sentence itself might shatter the glassware. "You deserve better than someone who hurts you."
"I know that," Naruto said, but the words were thin. He drew a lazy finger through the wet ring on the table, tracing circles that grew smaller and smaller until his fingertip hovered over a single point.
Gaara reached over, slid the glass an inch closer. "You're not the same as you were," Gaara said. "He isn't, either. Maybe."
Naruto stared at his reflection in the cider, the faint upside-down ghost of himself blurring and doubling with each shallow breath. "He always finds a way to make everything about him," Naruto said, but it didn't sound convincing.
Lee reached across, his hand landing atop Naruto's. "You do not have to prove anything. Not to him, not to us. You are enough."
Naruto wanted to laugh, to tell them to stop with the Hallmark moments, but his throat was a tightrope. Instead, he nodded once, eyes burning. "Thanks," he managed. "I mean it."
The conversation drifted then, Lee launching into a saga about his most recent gym client, Gaara chiming in with dry commentary that made Lee laugh so hard he nearly snorted cider out his nose. Naruto let himself ride the surface of their banter, but beneath, his thoughts coiled around the Monday meeting, and the way Sasuke's face had twisted—not in anger, but in something a lot like hurt.
He didn't want to care. But the truth was, every time Sasuke looked at him, it was like getting dragged back to the first time he'd fallen in love, and the first time he'd realized how dangerous it could be.
Naruto ran his finger around the rim of his glass, the low, hollow ring matching the emptiness in his chest. "Every time he looks at me like that, it's like..." He swallowed hard. "Like I'm finally getting what sixteen-year-old me would have killed for. That validation. That attention." His voice dropped to barely a whisper. "And I don't know how to turn it off."
Gaara's pale eyes softened with understanding. "You can't keep working with him if this is what it does to you."
"That's the problem," Naruto said, staring into his drink. "I have to. This deal is everything I've worked for." His laugh was hollow. "Funny how the universe works, right? Five years trying to forget him, and now I'm stuck in conference rooms with him three times a week."
Lee squeezed his shoulder. "Perhaps some boundaries—"
"Boundaries," Naruto echoed, the word tasting foreign. "With Sasuke? I wouldn't even know where to start."
They fell silent, the weight of unspoken history settling over the booth. Naruto traced the rim of his glass, watching the last bubbles rise and burst. Monday loomed like a storm on the horizon, and Sasuke would be there at nine sharp, with those eyes that still saw too much.
He took a deep breath. Maybe it was time to stop letting old ghosts dictate his reactions. Five years was long enough to keep bleeding from the same wound. Whatever they were now—colleagues, former friends, strangers with shared memories—it couldn't be what they'd been before.
He took a deep breath. Maybe it was time Sasuke understood exactly what breaking someone's heart actually cost.