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He was three when he managed to put on his sandals for the first time and he was overjoyed.
His older brother ruffled his hair with a gentle smile as Sasuke paraded around, his little chest puffing up with pride. He was growing up, and one day, he would catch up to his brother. Be as strong, as smart, as talented.
“You’re growing up so fast,” his mother cooed, and she clapped softly with crinkling eyes, “Soon you won’t need me anymore!”
His mother had done everything for him for as long as he could remember. She brushed his hair and his teeth, prepared his meals, gave him baths and put on his clothes and sandals.
There was nothing wrong with not needing his mother to put on his sandals, he thought. It simply meant he would be just like the rest of them. He still needed her for other things.
His father placed a hand on her shoulder, and she placed her hand on top of his.
He didn’t understand why her eyes watered a bit. He was very small then, and didn’t understand big feelings meant for big people. He could never grasp why his mother cried when she did, but he knew he didn’t like it when she was sad.
She should always be happy.
He was seven and his small hands trembled as he miserably attempted to adjust his sandals.
The morning came, and the realisation that he was alone didn’t —couldn’t, wouldn’t— properly sink in. Accepting that he was alone meant accepting his family was not coming back, and he did not know how to do that.
He had to deal with emotions he couldn’t name, couldn’t process. But the fact that he couldn’t didn’t change the fact that he was on his own now.
The small things his mother used to do for him became burdens he had to take care of. Responsibilities on his shoulders that served as punishments. He did not know how to cook, or how to wash clothes. He did not even know how to take care of his hair.
His mother had always done all of that. She didn’t prepare him for her absence.
She never prepared him because, no matter how much he did or didn’t learn from her, she didn’t teach him how to be an orphan.
Her memory couldn’t take care of him, not really.
Her memory couldn’t love him.
He gathered very quickly, very harshly, that he wouldn’t be granted a respite or time to learn how to fend for himself.
He deeply wished to curl up on the floor that had been freshly cleaned to remove the blood of his parents.
He was just seven.
He was sixteen and his sandals felt too small. His clothes were uncomfortable. Everything suffocated him. His body was covered in dirt and blood. Blood that could belong to him or his brother.
His mother would be saddened by their actions, he imagined. By their inability to find solace in each other. It had been only him and Itachi left in the world for so long, after all. Until recently.
He would forgive his brother in due time, for Itachi was another victim of a system that used children as soldiers. There was some space in his heart for forgiveness —whatever space that wasn’t already taken up by his devastating, growing grief.
And Sasuke would forgive him for almost every single one of his sins, but he knew he would never forgive him for taking his mother from him.
Because his mother was not a clan, his mother was not an ideology.
His mother was just his mother, and it was not Itachi’s decision to rip her away from him.
Itachi was now gone and he was the one left behind, again, to live some kind of life he never asked for.
He was twenty-three when he showed his daughter how to slip on her own sandals.
The world was at peace, and so was he. For the most part. He’d had some years to feel and accept his sorrows.
Sarada was so incredibly happy, so capable already, and he understood, then, why his mother had looked so melancholic twenty years ago.
He taught his daughter everything he knew at her age, but he also helped her with everything else. He braided her hair, towelled her dry, cut up her food in small pieces.
Memories of his mother were often at the forefront of his mind, when he struggled with parenthood and needed strength and guidance to do better. To be better.
His mother was there when he failed, too. To console him, to remind him that it was okay to be flawed and tired and struggling.
Parenting wasn’t easy. It didn’t come easily to him.
But he loved his daughter, so much so that he never prepared her for his absence either.
He is thirty-three, and he still doesn’t know how to put on his sandals without difficulty, without feeling a knot in his throat even though they sit perfectly under his feet.
He looks over to his wife, and she’s tending to their daughter in that caring way of hers. Sakura lavishes Sarada with attention, with loving words and gestures.
Sarada is her second love —her greatest love— ever since she was first placed in her arms and it is in his wife’s nature to love selflessly, wholeheartedly, unconditionally.
The best gift Sakura has ever given him —one of many— is to be the mother of his child. Sakura was a mother long before their baby was born, as she caressed her belly and sang lullabies to it a few weeks into her pregnancy.
She is a mother like his mother was.
Sakura trims her daughter’s hair, prepares her baths and cooks her favourite meals every now and then even if Sarada doesn’t ask for it. Because it fulfils her.
She is old now, Sarada whines, and she doesn’t need her mother to cut her hair.
He deeply wishes for Sarada to always have her mother, and to allow herself to need her, sometimes.
There's nothing wrong with needing her mother, he reminds her.
He is thirty-three and he will never stop needing his own.