Chapter Text
This was probably the first time in Sai’s life that he hesitated before climbing the Konoha Art Institute steps. He looked up one more time at the banners fixed between the museum’s thick stone columns, flapping gently in the early spring breeze:
Roaring to Life: An Exhibition of Twelve Unique Artists
Featuring Works by Internationally Acclaimed Sculptor Sasori Akasuna
and Konoha ’ s own Sai Yamanaka
They’d chosen one of his Benevolent Kings paintings for the left-side banner, and Sasori Akasuna’s world-famous puppet, Third, for the right. That was the poster meant to draw the crowds: anyone would recognize Third, with its life-like golden eyes, sleek blue-black hair, and angular features; the puppet always emanated a fierce yet mature kind of power. It seemed alive enough in photographs: what would it be like to finally see the real artifact in person? A shiver traveled up Sai’s spine that had to have been entirely unrelated to the warm breeze pushing against his bare back.
On the other side of the museum doors, complementing regal Third and its dramatic pose, Sai’s black-and-white King bristled with muscular energy, practically leaping off the page, even as a cropped poster reproduction. There was a kind of symmetry to them, Sai’s inkwash king and Sasori’s wooden warrior—but was Third a warrior? Sai had always imagined so, but unlike his earliest work, Mother and Father, Sasori had never disclosed to the press who, if anyone, had inspired Third.
Perhaps Sai would be able to ask him today. He swallowed on a dry throat. There was no more putting it off. He’d have to go inside: the opening day reception had started half an hour ago. All the other artists were most likely here by now. Including Sasori Akasuna.
As he placed his foot on the bottommost step, Sai’s eye was drawn by the dull glimmer of weak afternoon sunlight on his patent leather loafer. He watched the shifting light patterns on his shoes as he climbed the steps, remembering all of the times he’d visited this museum.
The first had been a field-trip with the other kids from the group home. Shin had taken him by the hand, led him through the marble hallways, and shown him all the famous paintings he knew. They’d spent a long time in the Asian ink paintings section coming up with stories for the lonely monks and lounging tigers. It was one of his favorite memories of Shin. As a teenager, finally part of a family that fit, the Yamanakas had brought Sai and Ino here nearly every weekend. They would always pack a lunch and eat it in the museum garden, especially on sunny days. In high school he’d eventually worked up the courage to ask his friends from the martial arts team to accompany him on museum trips, and sometimes they would, especially when there was a special exhibit that interested Sakura: she was always able to convince the others to tag along.
Well, there was no need to persuade anyone today. Today, everyone was coming to see Sai’s art on display.
He arrived at the top landing. The heavy wooden doors were propped open—a true sign that spring had arrived. In winter, the century-old doors were kept closed. They would always stick. You’d have to shove hard to get them to move, and when they did, the thick panes of glass rattled in place. Sai passed through them, silent as a ghost.
The gentle buzz of conversation pulled him forward towards the museum’s main atrium, where the reception was being held. Sai wished the sun would come out: when it shone through the frosted dome of the atrium’s skylight, the whole space looked like a luminist painting, white marble soaked in golden light. Rin Nohara’s Thousand Cranes—a hanging sculpture installed in the center of the space—truly looked like a flock of birds frozen mid-flight. But today the sun was concealed behind a veil of thick grey cloud: muted light filtered through the dome and suffused everything with softness.
Sai made his quiet entrance, hanging back until he could decipher the mixed and mingling crowd. There was a buffet table set up along the wall near the East Wing, a humble spread of cold cuts, cheeses, and platters of fruit. Wait-staff with trays of champagne wove through clusters of people.
Sasori Akasuna drew his eye first.
It was the red hair. No other head was as vividly colored, not Sakura’s pink, Naruto’s blond… everyone faded into the background by comparison. No, it was more than that. He radiated… power. Confidence. He was speaking to someone. It could have been anyone. Sai didn’t recognize them, but despite how short Sasori was in comparison to them, it was Sasori who dominated. Sasori stood in profile, the outline of his features as flawless as the Pompeii Narcissus on display upstairs in Classical Greek Sculpture. His clothing was simple: a thin black turtleneck tucked into subtle grey plaid trousers. An inconspicuous gold chain with a small pendent rested on his chest. He held a cube of cheese speared on a toothpick between thumb and forefinger, and spun it idly. Sai didn’t need to see the expression on Sasori’s face to know that the man was immensely bored. Sai smirked to himself.
“Sai!” It was Ino and his parents. He waved and walked up to them.
Ino enveloped him in one of her bone-crushing hugs.
“Where have you been?!” she scolded with an enormous grin. “Have you even seen the exhibit yet?? It’s amazing—”
She proceeded to outline every little thing she’d noticed, nitpicking the lighting, the placement of his pieces—they were too close to Sasori Akasuna’s puppets, couldn’t they have spaced things out a little better?—
“Sai!” This time it was Sakura and the others from martial arts. He was beginning to draw a crowd. A little smile grew on his face, but it wasn’t one-hundred-percent real. Maybe someone would notice and let him go see the exhibit… His work, beside Sasori Akasuna’s… It was all he’d ever dreamed of. Sai peered between Yamato-sensei and Naruto, surreptitiously scanning the atrium for Sasori’s shock of red hair. There. Held captive by yet another guest. Sai ought to go over and introduce himself. His guts quivered like jelly. Maybe later.
It took the better part of half an hour for everyone to greet him, congratulate him, shove a glass of champagne in his hand, and force him to drink it—he choked when Naruto slapped him soundly on the back—before he could sneak off down the hall to the exhibition gallery. In that time, he’d completely given up on introducing himself to Sasori Akasuna, having failed to gather enough courage to break away from the group and approach him alone.
On his own once more, he released a sigh—the breath he’d been holding since he’d arrived—and entered the dim corridor.
~~~
Sasori had been tracking Sai Yamanaka’s movement through the room since the young man’s late arrival. One year out of university, Sai did not possess any of the wide-eyed innocence Sasori had expected to see. He navigated the room with an understated grace, politely deferring to his elders, quietly basking in the praise lavished upon him by his peers. His fashion-sense was perhaps a touch too bold for Sasori’s tastes: a cropped, short-sleeved black knit sweater that exposed his toned midriff from the bottom of his ribs to the hip-bones which jutted over the belt that held up his tight slacks. He was unbelievably pale-skinned, whiter than the marble pillars which ringed the atrium. His other features—hair, eyes, eyebrows—were blacker than the inks he painted with. The slacks were tapered, and ended high above the black patent leather loafers he wore without socks, exposing quite a bit of his pale ankles. A small bag was slung diagonally across his back, and when his arms weren’t hanging loosely at his sides, Sai would sometimes place both hands on the bag’s strap, like he was afraid of losing it.
When Sai slipped away on his own down the corridor to the exhibit, Sasori seized his chance to escape.
“Like I’ve been saying, Sasori,” the mayor of Konoha boomed as she snagged another champagne from a passing waiter, “we’re glad to have you here. If you need anyone to show you around the city tonight—”
He held up a hand and arranged his face into a grateful smile. “No, no, thank you, Ms. Senjuu, but really, you’ve done more than enough already. The hotel is wonderful, and I enjoyed the trip yesterday to Memorial Garden. If you’d please excuse me…”
Sai was already out of sight. Sasori traversed the atrium as quickly as he could without seeming to rush and entered the West Wing. To display Roaring to Life, the museum curators had installed several temporary partitions to turn the West Wing galleries into a meandering labyrinth, leading visitors from artwork to artwork in a way that encouraged them to stop and spend a moment with each piece. With the works of twelve different artists to display, they’d chosen to group the pieces according to variations on the theme of ‘life’—life in nature, everyday lives, living water… The water section included an interactive fountain installation by an artist from Kiri. Crystal-clear water tumbled over rounded stones, burbling and chattering like a real forest brook. Visitors were invited to step across the stones, even play in the water.
Since no one was watching, Sasori skipped across the stones, leaping from one foot to the next, arms extended for balance. His brick-red Doc Martens provided more than sufficient grip. He couldn’t even remember how long he’d had these shoes; they molded to his feet as comfortably as a pair of socks.
On the other side of the water exhibit was the heart of the exhibition: his puppets and Sai’s paintings, displayed in a circular room. The black-and-white paintings hung on the walls of the cornerless space, while Sasori’s puppets were all suspended at varying heights in the center of the room. There was no way to prevent visitors from touching the puppets, but a sign had been posted reminding visitors to protect them, and a security guard stood by the door, ready to jump in if anyone mishandled the artifacts. Sasori’s puppets were meant to last forever: they could withstand the touch of curious visitors.
When Sasori saw the display for the first time, he had instantly understood why the curators had chosen this arrangement: despite the vast difference in style and medium, both Sasori’s puppets and Sai’s inkwash paintings emanated the same edgy, almost violent energy — ‘roaring’ to life, indeed. Each of them had works which tread the line between human and animal subjects, like Sai’s two-meter-by-two-meter Vigilant Tiger with its wise human eyes, and Sasori’s winged Birdman.
There were a handful of visitors here, ambling through the exhibit and speaking in low voices. He found Sai in front of Third, staring into his golden eyes, his fingertips hovering millimeters from Third’s sharp cheekbone.
“Sai Yamanaka?” Sasori greeted in a low voice.
The young man spun.
“Sa—Mr. Akasuna!” Sai exclaimed, shoving his hands into his pockets. His dark eyes were wide; his pale lips, which seemed to rest in a perpetual pout, were slightly parted. He looked down at the floor. “I’m sorry, I wasn’t going to touch it…”
Sasori crossed the distance between them and held out his hand.
“It’s alright,” he said. “He won’t bite.” Sai looked up and accepted the offered handshake. Sasori continued: “It’s a pleasure to finally meet you.”
A nervous laugh escaped Sai’s mouth and his lips curled into an embarrassed smile. “That’s my line!” he said, rubbing the back of his head bashfully. His heart was beating a mile a minute. “I’ve been a fan of your work since… Well, I can’t even remember! It feels like you’ve always been famous…”
Sasori’s laugh was derisive, a little bitter. “It does feel like that, actually…”
He took a step and began to wander the gallery. Sai followed him. They walked in silence for a moment, each carefully inspecting the other’s works in a painstaking effort to resist the growing urge to inspect one another. They paused in front of Sai’s largest Benevolent King: Fūjin, modeled after the Shinto God of Wind.
“You know…” Sasori broke the silence. “Before you said it, I knew you were a fan of my work. I didn’t see it right away, but the more I studied your paintings, the more obvious it became.”
Sai tilted his head. “Really? How? I don’t copy your works. My style is completely different from yours.”
The corner of Sasori’s mouth tugged upwards into a sly grin. His suspicion had been confirmed.
“That’s precisely it,” Sasori replied, brown eyes glinting. He turned to face Sai and crossed his arms in front of his chest, freeing one hand to gesture. “You go to monumental lengths to make sure nothing in your works resemble mine. Take this piece for example, your ‘wind god.’ It’s almost comical to me how many choices you made to deliberately avoid it coming out like Third.”
Sai stared. How could it possibly have been that obvious? It was like Sasori had snapped his fingers and Sai’s clothing had disappeared: he stood exposed and vulnerable before the redhead’s scrutinizing eyes. He shifted uncomfortably and gripped the strap of his bag.
“H-how…?”
Sasori continued, smirking like the cat that caught the canary: “We could start with the pose. Third is usually posed in a defensive crouch, whereas Fūjin is depicted mid-attack, extending his arm to direct a blast of wind… Then, we look at the physique: Third is gaunt, all sharp angles and edges. By contrast, Fūjin bulges with muscle; one could almost claim to see overcompensation for Third’s thinness. Third’s iron wings are messy—I modeled them on the shape of iron filings held together by magnetism. But you play with symmetry, in Fūjin fixing all of the imbalances I produced in Third’s mismatched wings. Should I continue?”
Sai, dumbstruck, shook his head. Spying a wooden bench near the center of the room, between Mother and Father and Birdman, he crossed the room and sank onto it. He rested his elbows on his knees and looked up at Sasori with a smile that was somewhat sheepish, but mostly relieved.
“I don’t know how I expected meeting you to go,” Sai said, shaking his dark head, “but I think I can safely say you’ve exceeded all my expectations…”
“There’s one thing I can’t really get my head around, however,” Sasori said, continuing as if he hadn’t heard Sai. “It’s… a really strange coincidence…” He sank onto the bench beside Sai and faced him. “What was it about Third that inspired you to paint a god of wind?”
Sai had no answer, but his curiosity was piqued. His black eyes sparkled. “So there is some story behind Third!” he said in a low, conspiratorial voice. “Is it designed after a real person? Will you tell me? I promise I will keep it a secret, if it’s meant to be a secret. I’ve just… always wanted to know.”
Sasori narrowed his eyes. Time to close the door he’d just opened. “Well…” he began slowly. “You’re correct, Third was someone I knew. But it’s irrelevant for you to know who he was. Let it suffice for you to know that he had a connection to wind.”
They lapsed into silence as visitors continued to trickle in and out of the gallery. Sasori’s gaze kept straying to the curve of Sai’s neck and the pout of his lips. Sai’s ears took on a slight pink tinge as he wracked his brain for something to say.
“What is it that you’re trying to achieve with your puppets?” he finally asked, his tone respectful and curious. He gazed at Sasori with an open expression, although he still felt quite nervous.
“True art is eternal,” Sasori replied. The mantra dropped from his mouth before he’d even thought about the question. Had he not fielded hundreds of inquiries like this in interviews? Of all the things to ask… “My art is intended to preserve the beauty I’ve encountered throughout my life.”
Sai nodded with understanding. “I try to capture beauty, too,” he said. “It’s hard for me to express my emotions in words, but there have been so many moments in my life worth remembering. I found if I pour that into my paintings, I can preserve some of what I felt, and share it with others…”
“I appreciate that your works celebrate both positive and negative emotions,” Sasori murmured. He blinked as he stared at the floor, long lashes batting slowly. “Anyone can feel the pain you’ve been through, looking at pieces like the Benevolent Kings series, or Escape from the Den of Snakes. Then again, you can call me sentimental,” he said with a wry smile, “but I think Friendship has to be one of my favourite pieces…”
Friendship was Sai’s only color painting in the exhibit, slightly more impressionistic than his other works: it depicted a large oak tree off in the distance, with vague-yet-brightly-colored figures standing around its base. The entire piece radiated joy and warmth. Sasori couldn’t quite put to words what it was that drew him to the painting. It was probably not Sai’s intention to make the viewer feel as sad as Sasori felt when he studied it.
“What do you think of the exhibition title, Roaring to Life?” Sai asked, hoping to shift the conversation away from his art. He wanted to take advantage of this chance to get to know Sasori, be alone with him: he knew that the countdown timer to Ino’s, Naruto’s, or even Yamato-sensei’s appearance had already begun. They never left him on his own for too long, and were probably already looking for him.
“I think it fits,” Sasori replied with a thoughtful frown. “Your works in particular capture a sense of vitality that I’ve never seen in 2-D media.”
“And yours!” Sai interjected, sitting up a little straighter. “I honestly believe Third would have slapped my hand away from his face if I’d tried to touch him…” Him. Sai noted the pronoun shift—when had he gone from thinking of the puppet as an ‘it’ to a ‘he’? He realized that Sasori had referred to the puppet as a ‘he’ earlier. He continued speaking, hoping Sasori hadn’t noticed how his train of thought had been disrupted: “Every single one of your puppets looks alive. Like they each possess a unique and—dare I say it—immortal soul.”
Sasori’s gaze became distant. He was looking in the direction of the puppet before them, Birdman. “They do,” he said quietly.
Sai noted this softening. He drew a breath. Perhaps this was the right time for him to test out a hypothesis he held regarding Sasori’s puppets:
“You’ve always been frank about the fact that Mother and Father are representations of your deceased parents,” he said, timidly leading up to his theory. He hesitated: what if he was wrong? No, if he was wrong, Sasori would just tell him, no harm done. And Sai had to know the answer. “People assume your other puppets are based on real people, but I don’t think everyone realizes that they’re all dead.”
Sasori snapped to attention, his pale brown eyes smoldering as he leveled his gaze at Sai.
“Say that again.” His tone was ominous, almost threatening.
Sai swallowed, then repeated: “They’re all dead. Am I right?”
Without another word, Sasori stood. He took two steps. He stopped. He brought his hand to his mouth. He turned.
“How?” He was utterly distraught. Three words. They’re all dead. How could this boy know that?
Sai stood too, took a step closer. Sasori had folded his arms tightly in front of himself. That was when it struck Sai just how petite Sasori was. His doll-like size made him seem eternally young, and in this moment, uncharacteristically vulnerable.
“It was just a guess!” Sai pleaded. If he had known how upset the statement was going to make Sasori, he’d never have said a word. "I'm so sorry. I've overstepped. I should be getting back to my family now…"
Sai stood and turned to leave.
"Wait."
The word was a marionette string: it yanked Sai to a halt. He turned to face Sasori.
Sasori hung his head, shaggy red hair obscuring his face from scrutiny.
"You're right, of course," Sasori said in a low voice. "Every one of them. I knew some better than others, but it's a secret I thought no one knew. What even made you think it?"
“I just…” Sai began slowly. He met Sasori’s gaze with sympathetic eyes. “I see your grief. I see it in every piece.”
He took a step over to Birdman and brushed a fingertip down the length of the white clay wing which encased the puppet's body. The puppet’s youthful, avian face tipped upwards as he launched himself into the sky, wide-eyed and determined to reach the sun.
"What was his hurry?" Sai said softly.
Sasori drew a shuddering breath. "I wish I knew… He was an artist I mentored a few years back. Young. Died for a performance piece he'd named his 'Ultimate Art.' I'll never understand it. Such a waste…"
The hairs on the back of Sai's neck prickled. It was more than the weight of Sasori's words: he sensed—
"Sai! There you are!" Ino’s voice carried across the gallery.
He turned with a forced smile, then shot a glance back at Sasori. The expression on the redhead’s face was difficult to read: regret, embarrassment, gratitude…? Sasori flicked a hand out of his pocket; a small white card appeared between his fingers. He extended the card to Sai.
"Call me later. Let’s continue this conversation over a drink tonight," he murmured into Sai's ear as he stepped past to leave.
Sai's gaze was glued to Sasori's back until he disappeared from view.