The room is dim, cast in the amber wash of streetlight filtering through the paper-thin curtains. Your apartment still hums faintly with village life beyond its walls — a dog barking, the distant chime of someone closing up their shop for the night. But inside, it’s quiet. The kind of quiet that only settles between people who’ve known each other too long to need to fill the silence.

You’re both lying on your futon, on your backs, close enough for your shoulders to brush. Sasuke’s hair is inky, loose and a little messy, the strands brushing against his cheek, and his breathing is soft, steady. The same breath pattern he had when you were twelve, passed out under a tree between missions, Sakura’s forehead pressed to her book, Kakashi somewhere on a branch above, pretending not to smile and coo.

“Feels like that summer mission in the Land of Rivers,” you murmur, fingers drifting up to push a strand of hair from his face. “Remember that? You fell asleep with your mouth open and a bug crawled in.”

Sasuke exhales, not quite a laugh, but close enough. “You never shut up about it for a week.”

“I was traumatized,” you say with mock solemnity.

Sasuke huffs lightly, eyes still closed. “It was a grasshopper. Don’t exaggerate.”

You turn onto your side, propped on your elbow. He doesn’t move. You raise your hand, hesitating for a breath before gently brushing your fingertip along the line of his brow. He opens one eye, lazily, but doesn’t stop you. Just watches.

“You always look like you’re scowling,” you say, tracing the arch of his eyebrow, then down the slope of his nose.

“Maybe I am,” Sasuke mutters, but there’s no heat in it.

You smile faintly and run your finger along the edge of his jaw, over the sharp line of his cheekbone, the faintest scratch there. He’s so still beneath your touch, not tense — not like he used to be. Not like he’d bolt the second someone got too close. Maybe not healed, but softer now, like he’s learning to stay.

“It's from a mission escorting a scroll convoy through the western border,” he mutters, voice low, like if he speaks too loud, the moment might break. “Bandits thought we were carrying gold. Idiots. Got three of them with the sword and the rest gave in."

Your hand stills against his temple. “You okay?”

“Yeah.” A beat. “Better than I was.”

You nod and trace a slow line across his forehead. “You don’t always have to be doing missions, y’know.”

Sasuke's eyes open again, meeting yours in the half-dark. “I do. For now.”

You want to say you don’t, that the village owes him something more than endless penance, but you don’t. Not now. Instead, you let your hand drift to his cheek, brushing your thumb under the shadow of his lashes.