Naruto's throat tightened as he stared up at the restaurant's gleaming facade. Crystal chandeliers winked at him through floor-to-ceiling windows, mocking his secondhand blazer. This place wasn't just fancy—it was the kind of establishment where they probably ironed the napkins between courses. Since that charged moment in the conference room when he'd finally surrendered to Sasuke's persistence, Naruto had accomplished exactly nothing at work. Instead, he'd spent the week in a spiral of anxiety, rehearsing conversations in his head and panic-FaceTiming Gaara for fashion advice without revealing who had actually asked him out. He'd even brushed his hair—a historic occasion—before promptly destroying his handiwork when he caught his reflection. Now he stood frozen on the sidewalk, pulse hammering in his ears, palms slick with sweat against the fabric of pants he wasn't entirely sure fit him.
When he stepped inside, Naruto tugged at his collar that suddenly felt two sizes too small. His reflection caught in a wall of mirrors—God, why were there so many mirrors?—showed a stranger in borrowed confidence. He spotted Sasuke across the room, sitting with the easy grace of someone born to occupy expensive chairs, and swallowed hard. The distance between them stretched like a tightrope as he crossed the dining room, hyper-aware of each footfall against marble that probably cost more than his rent.
Sasuke rose to greet him, and they stood facing each other for a second too long, both uncertain which script to follow. Naruto extended his hand, then thought better of it and converted the gesture into a half-wave. Sasuke's hand was already in motion, and collided with Naruto's in a grip that was neither handshake nor fist bump, but the awkward union of both. For a moment, their hands tangled—then separated, as if they'd touched a live wire.
"Hi," Naruto said, voice buoyant. "You look… like a CEO got lost on the way to a hostile takeover."
Sasuke's mouth twitched. "You look like a children's librarian at his own funeral." The old repartee, minus the venom.
Naruto barked a laugh, too loud for the space. A couple at the next table looked up, but Naruto didn't seem to notice. He shrugged out of his jacket, tossed it over the back of the booth, and slid in across from Sasuke. He missed the seat by an inch, landing half on the vinyl and half on the table's edge.
Naruto's elbow knocked against the bread basket as he adjusted his tie. "Sorry," he muttered, yanking the knot slightly askew.
The waiter materialized beside them. Naruto startled, his knee hitting the underside of the table. Sasuke's hand shot out to steady the wobbling wine bottle.
"You ordered already?" Naruto asked, then immediately regretted it. Of course Sasuke had ordered wine—it was sitting right there. He cleared his throat. "I mean, looks... expensive."
"It's adequate," Sasuke replied, lifting the bottle. Their fingers brushed as he handed Naruto a glass, both pulling away a fraction too quickly.
Naruto swirled the wine like he'd seen in movies, then sniffed dramatically. "Smells like... grapes?" He took a sip, his face contorting. "Wow. That's... something."
"You hate it," Sasuke said flatly.
"No! No, it's—" Naruto paused, meeting Sasuke's knowing look. "Yeah, okay. It tastes like fancy cough syrup."
Conversation drifted to the menu, to the reviews on Google, to the fact that Sasuke had been here twice before and the chef changed hands seasonally. Sasuke ordered for both, as if daring Naruto to protest. He didn't.
There were silences, and neither of them seemed equipped to bridge them without resorting to emergency weather chat. Naruto said, "Supposed to rain tomorrow," and Sasuke, not to be outdone, replied, "There's a low-pressure front moving in from the north." They nodded, mutually aware of the absurdity, but neither surrendered.
The first course arrived, and with it, the opening salvo of disaster. Naruto reached for his water, hand trembling just enough to catch the rim of the glass and tip it in a graceful arc across the table. It landed dead center on Sasuke's lap, drenching the immaculate charcoal and darkening it to the color of a dying thunderstorm. For a second, there was only the sound of water pattering to the floor.
"Shit—oh, my god—fuck, I'm so sorry—" Naruto lurched across the booth, napkin in hand, but Sasuke had already intercepted the trajectory. He pressed his own napkin to the spill, eyes flat.
"It's fine," he said, but his teeth were clenched, jaw straining against the impulse to shout.
The waiter appeared with the speed of a paramedic, offering a fresh napkin and a smile that was both patronizing and perfectly polite. "No harm done, sir," he said, dabbing at the table. "Would you like a fresh setting?" His eyes flicked to Naruto, then away, as if to spare him.
Sasuke made a small, dismissive wave. "We're fine." He poured a fresh water for Naruto, who accepted it with two hands like a child handed a Fabergé egg. Sasuke's own pants clung uncomfortably to his thighs, but he made no sign of distress. Instead, he folded the damp napkin with slow, deliberate care and set it aside, eyes locked on Naruto's.
Naruto's ears were burning, the tips glowing red enough to be visible even in the low light. He ducked his head, picked up a fork, and used it to prod the amuse-bouche with a ferocity that suggested it might fight back. He took a bite, then another, as if the food could insulate him from the memory of what had just transpired.
"I told you I was a disaster in restaurants," he said, after swallowing too quickly and nearly choking. "Last time I tried one of these places, I got food poisoning and spent twelve hours in the bathroom. And that was before I ruined anyone's pants."
Sasuke reached for his wine, and this time, he actually drank it.
The conversation, such as it was, drifted to office gossip: the new marketing hire who looked like a Bond villain, the rumors that Jiraiya was ghost-writing his own erotica again, the fact that someone had installed an actual hammock in the break room. Naruto told a story about the copier jamming so badly that it spontaneously caught fire; Sasuke countered with the tale of an Uchiha board member's toupee coming loose during a live Zoom presentation.
They talked about the weather, the restaurant, and the new coffee place downtown—everything except the five years of silence between them. Naruto kept checking his phone under the table, pretending to turn off notifications while actually making sure it hadn't been a full hour yet.
The second course arrived: duck with some kind of shiny glaze. Three identical carrots stood at attention on the plate like they were being punished. Naruto grabbed the nearest knife and attacked his meat, sawing back and forth until a chunk flew off and landed squarely on Sasuke's pristine white plate.
Sasuke's left eyebrow twitched upward. He picked up the stray piece with two fingers and placed it back on Naruto's plate with the precision of someone handling radioactive material.
"Sorry," Naruto mumbled, his face hot. "Wrong knife, huh?"
"You ordered duck but you're eating it like it might still fly away," Sasuke said, the corner of his mouth lifting slightly.
Naruto reached for his wine glass too quickly and sloshed red liquid onto the tablecloth. "Shit—I mean, shoot." He blotted frantically with his napkin, making it worse.
Naruto glanced up, catching the look in Sasuke's eyes. For a moment, the past threatened to breach the perimeter, to overwhelm them both with its gravitational pull. But Sasuke blinked, retreated, and poured another round of wine.
The rest of the meal played out in a minor key: Naruto mistook the fish fork for the salad fork, used the soup spoon to eat a tomato amuse-bouche, and was corrected, gently but unmistakably, by the waiter every time. Sasuke alternated between offering mechanical compliments ("The sauce is well-balanced," "Presentation is impeccable") and sitting in total silence, as if expecting the food to do all the talking.
Dessert arrived: a cloud of something pale and ephemeral, barely more substantial than the tension that now filled the booth. Naruto tried to spear it with his fork, missed, and watched as it dissolved under his touch. He laughed, the sound small but genuine. "It's like eating air," he said.
Naruto set down his dessert spoon. The check appeared between them. Neither reached for it. The silence stretched, growing heavier with each passing second. Naruto's leg bounced under the table. He cleared his throat. Sasuke examined his water glass.
"So," Naruto blurted, too loud. A woman at the next table glanced over. He lowered his voice. "Did I tell you about TenTen's new intern?" He didn't wait for Sasuke to respond. "This kid, right? Nineteen, maybe? Walks in wearing a tie that's definitely a clip-on—"
Sasuke's eyebrow twitched. Was that interest? Naruto leaned forward, hands coming alive.
"—and TenTen asks him to bring the galley proofs from the printer, and this kid—" His left hand swept out, fingers splayed to indicate the magnitude of what was coming next. The side of his palm caught the base of the table's centerpiece. The vase wobbled. Naruto froze mid-sentence, watching in slow-motion horror as the arrangement—roses, lilies, something spiky and green—tipped toward the flickering candle at the center of the table.
Sasuke's reaction time was legendary in some circles, but nothing in his life had prepared him for the pyrotechnic properties of dried baby's breath soaked in ethyl alcohol. The tablecloth ignited with a sound like an old filmstrip catching in the projector. In less than a second, blue fire licked up the center of the table, consuming floral foam and part of Naruto's napkin before either of them could process what was happening.
"Shit!" Naruto yelped, grabbing for a water glass, but his hand slipped and the glass bounced off the centerpiece, shattering on the floor and missing the flame entirely.
Sasuke, ice-cold, upended his own glass with surgical precision. It sizzled on contact with the burning edge, but only succeeded in producing a column of smoke and a sickly sweet smell of scorched greenery.
The nearest waiter, seeing smoke but not fire, hustled over with a napkin and a forced smile. By the time he arrived, the flames had reached the decorative ribbon, which sparked and threatened to leap to the adjacent booth. The waiter hesitated—protocol not covering "client spontaneously combusts centerpiece"—and then did the only logical thing: he yanked the burning arrangement from the table and sprinted toward the kitchen, trailing smoke and petals behind him.
For a fraction of a second, there was silence. Then, with the inexorable logic of fate, the restaurant's overhead sprinkler system came to life.
A single, belligerent droplet struck Sasuke squarely on the scalp, just above the hairline. It was cold enough to leave a welt. Then the next hit Naruto's nose, and another dropped, and then the full system activated with a thunderous clatter, unleashing a biblical torrent on every table within a fifteen-foot radius.
Within seconds, everyone in the front half of the restaurant was soaked. Sasuke's suit, which had survived ice water and emotional strain, darkened in slow, spreading rings until it clung like wet cement. Naruto's shirt, never truly crisp, gave up entirely, plastering to his skin and rendering the frog tie an amphibious casualty.
The chaos was total. Diners shrieked and scrambled for cover, the maître d' attempted to corral guests toward the bar, and at least one elderly woman used her bread plate as a makeshift shield. The lights flickered, waiters panicked, and Sasuke—through it all—sat completely still, water streaming down his face in elegant, dignified rivulets.
Naruto, mortified beyond the ability to make sound, tried to help by mopping up the mess with his napkin, only to realize that it had become a sodden mass with the structural integrity of oatmeal. He tossed it aside and stood, jacketless and dripping.
"Fuck, fuck, I'm so sorry—" He tried to appeal to the nearest staff member, but was met only with a glazed stare and a hand gesture indicating the exit.
Sasuke rose in a single, controlled motion, set his glass down with a click, and surveyed the carnage. He looked at Naruto—hair matted, eyelashes beaded with water, blue eyes wide with a fear that was somehow more genuine than anything he'd shown all evening—and did not sigh, or glare, or raise his voice.
He simply reached for his wallet, removed a couple hundred-dollar bills, and set it delicately on the table. Then, ignoring the gathered crowd and the fact that his shoes squelched with every step, he walked out the front door, never once looking back.
Naruto followed, after a hasty attempt to apologize to every employee he passed. He trailed Sasuke onto the sidewalk, where the cold night air immediately multiplied the misery of their soaking-wet clothes. For a moment, neither spoke; water dripped from their sleeves and pooled at their feet, the streetlight above them painting both men in a pale, shivering blue.
It was Naruto who broke first. He tried to say something—"I didn't mean to," or maybe, "I swear this happens to me all the time"—but what came out was a weird, breathless snort that echoed off the glass storefronts. The snort turned into a sputter, and then into outright laughter. He doubled over, hands braced on his knees, laughing so hard he nearly slipped on the rain-slicked curb.
Sasuke stood, motionless, for exactly four seconds. Then his lips twitched. His shoulders started to shake, small and controlled at first, then harder as he tried to rein it in. The shaking escalated, until he too was laughing, the sound strangled at first, then open and helpless as it overtook him.
The two of them stood under the streetlight, water running in little rivers down their arms, both laughing so hard that at least once, Sasuke had to hold onto the lamppost for support. Every time they tried to stop, one would look at the other and it would start again, a feedback loop of hysterical, cathartic release.
Naruto wiped tears from his eyes, or maybe just tried to clear the water. "I'm so—" He gasped, unable to finish. "Oh my god, did you see that guy's face when the flowers caught fire?"
Sasuke, breathless, managed, "He ran like it was a live grenade." Which only set them off again.
Finally, when the laughter had run its course, they both slumped against the side of the building, letting the last of the rain do its work.
Sasuke spoke first, his voice softer than before, but carrying the weight of surrender. "This was a mistake," he said. "Not you. The restaurant."
Naruto grinned, wide and shameless. "Yeah, next time let's just get ramen. Less chance of open flames." His hair had plastered to his forehead in odd spikes, and his tie hung limp around his neck, but his smile was the same as ever—unbreakable, irrepressible, and, for the first time in ages, at peace.
Sasuke looked at him, at the ridiculousness of it all, and something in his face shifted. "You know," he said, "I think I'd like that."
Naruto straightened, shaking droplets from his arms. "You mean it?"
Sasuke nodded, and in the glow of the streetlight, the exhaustion that had clung to him all night finally melted away. "I thought you'd never ask," he said, and the way he said it made the phrase feel like a promise.
They stood there a while longer, letting the world slow down, before turning and walking together toward the only place that had ever really been theirs—a noodle shop, open late, no dress code, no centerpieces. Just two boys, older now, but not so different from the ones who'd once shared a table and a secret and called it happiness.
They walked side by side, water trailing in their wake, laughter lingering in the air like the aftermath of a summer storm. And for the first time in a long, long time, it felt like enough.