One More Chance

by: Creepy-Kreme

A/N: All right, so first of all the obligatory Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto, the settings, the characters, the blahblahblah. Done. Second of all, I don't know what's after this part. I don't even know if there's anything after this. I just... typed it. And placed 'Prologue' somewhere on top for... I don't know. Well, I had few scenes on my mind but please tell me what you think about this first. This is my first fanfic ever and I know the story is kinda confusing. And if you see any mistakes, I apologize for it. I didn't even proof-read this. So please be good to me. The next chapter after this will be probably written in normal pov. So... yeah.

Oh, btw. Ratings will change in the future.

Read and review?

Prologue

Are you okay?

Yeah. Good question. Am I okay?

This is one of the hardest questions I had ever asked myself as I ogled hard at my own reflection, tracing my chin with my thumb and forefinger. I haven't shaved for days. My eye bags were getting bigger from sleep deprivation and stress. My vibrant black hair had now gone longer. Also, my onyx eyes have lost the youthful glow it once had. I looked older, more mature than my old self was. My person six years ago is a past my current 29-year old self never wanted to go back into. Whenever I do, it seems dim, seemingly almost forgotten.

Are you okay? is an impossible question right now.

As I stepped in the tub, I recalled what Karin asked me the other day.

"Do you believe in soul mates?"

Do I? I never did answer. I wasn't able to. She didn't let me. She just left it like that. She kissed me instead, saying that I am her soul mate. Now that I have a chance to answer myself, I guess mostly, I'm not sure. A part of me wants to believe that there is a person out there in the world that was made exactly for you. And this person's hands fit perfectly into your own, and you can almost swear that the freckles that fall down their back spell out your name if you look at it in just the right light. But the other half of me understands that even if there was such thing as soul mates, they wouldn't be the ones you end up with. They would be the broken hearts and lessons learned. They would be the shooting stars of love. Because when I think about it, having someone made especially for you is a hell of a lot of pressure. What if the you they were made for, isn't the you that you are now? What happens then?

Soul mates are for dreamers. And I don't think I will ever dream like one again.

I leaned my back gently at the edge of the curve of the tub. It was cold, I shivered faintly. My male ego scolded that I shivered at only that. God, am I getting old? A sigh left my lips as I pushed my head back and closed my eyes, recalling Karin's voice once again in my head.

"Tell me, have you ever fallen in love with someone you shouldn't have fallen in love with?"

Like her first question, that too, I wasn't able to answer. The words, "Well, I did. And there's one word to describe it. Stupid." was at the tip of my tongue, but I wasn't about to tell her that. I'm not ready to tell her just yet.

I reached for the remote at the top of the stand next to the tub. I like listening to music. It relaxes me, soothes my aching body. I pressed play, not knowing what song will uncover, and well, to say that I was shocked is an understatement. Waters sprung outside the tub like sprinklers were accidentally turned on as I jolted from my cosy position.

I swallowed hard. Tears sting at the corner of my eyes.

Because it's Sakura's voice. A voice I thought I'd never hear again. I can't make myself press stop.

Call me bitter, but I can now come clean and acknowledge the fact that I haven't gotten over her yet. I can still remember her clearly like it was just yesterday. Maybe the saying "First love never dies" isn't just an idiom after all. Because I can still see her eyes; feel her lips as it presses against mine, feel how soft her hair was as I ran my fingers through it. Her legs, how it felt when they wrap around me, how enticing her body was as it inched towards mine. I can still catch a glimpse of her every time my eyes were closed. Every contour, every line, every crease. Even the smallest of things, I can recall. Vividly.

I love the way she looks at me, like she trusts me and believes in me completely. I love the way her touch sends tingle to my skin whenever our skin meets. I love how she responds to my every touch; she's that predictable, you know? I never imagined myself deserving such a wonderful woman in my life. She's pretty, beautiful even, though not as beautiful as the models I used to have one-night stand with, not as sexy as those models on the ramp flirting with me, however, there's something about her that makes her stand out. Perhaps it's the way she flips her hair or her hair, to be exact, or the way she walks, or the way she talks, or how she laughs, or how boyish she can act sometimes, I don't know. All I know is that I've fallen for her then, hard and right on the spot and there's no way stopping it.

So, is it wrong if I keep on asking what went wrong? Where did it go wrong? I want to know.

I didn't mean for it to end like that. All I ever wanted was for her to fight for me a little bit.

As I replayed the questions in my head trying to find a way out, so far, it remained unanswered. All of it for that matter. I kept on telling myself, not now, not yet. If I knew, what would I feel? Worse, do I really want to know? Yes, I am longing for the answers but no, it felt like I'm not ready to find out just yet. I felt spellbound, almost trapped. And thus, I had been avoiding the question ever since. I don't know whether I know the answer to those questions or not, but I made myself believe that I don't, for my sanity's sake, because sometimes, the only way to understand how everything went wrong is to go back to the beginning. And I'm not ready for that too.

God damn it Uchiha Sasuke! You are such a coward.

Another question popped in my head. It was times like this that I question my own sanity. With the countless arrays of questions that seem to pop out somewhere, a somewhere I could not exactly pinpoint makes me go crazy. Especially when they remain, like most of them, unanswered. I'm a lot more screwed up than most people think.

Someone told me that there will always be one true love for you to have and hold. It might not be the one you expect but it's the one you deserve. Maybe that's where it went wrong. Perhaps she wasn't my true love.

I can still remember the day my Aniki proposed to her. It was 2 years after they got back together. Oh sorry, correction. It was 2 years after I vanished from their love story. She looked so happy then. But was she really? Or was she just deceiving everyone that she was and try to tear down the walls that I carefully built for my brother? A mouth can tell a million lies. A mind could deceive a million hearts. But the eyes will and always will tell the truth. As I stared into those eyes, those emerald eyes that I fell in love with, I can see without a doubt that she is not. Even when she smiles, even when she laughs, I can see it in her eyes, because her eyes were always honest. Deep inside, she wants to cry. Deep inside, I can hear her screaming please just save me from this darkness.

At the end of the party, I told her I was happy for her. That's just the saddest lie.

I can't love her, or so that's what I've been telling myself for the past fifteen years. We were fifteen when my brother asked her out. And that was the day when she was instantaneously hauled out of my reach just as the thought of going near her ever exist.

The first time I met her was when we were 9. I just got back from America. I had been living there for like, forever, as far as I can remember. She was sitting on the swing placed in our garden, her pink hair shimmering under the setting sun as she stared into the horizon and I know from then on, I flipped. I don't know how, or why, I just felt it. I had never been in love; not that I knew of, anyway. I'm the kind of guy who doesn't get into serious relationships back then while she's this silly girl who believes in true love and happy endings. We were so different, like chalk and cheese. We were poles apart, yet even so, she doesn't seem to care, and so do I.

Seeing something that kills you, and having to act like you're fine is hell of a lot harder than I thought.

As I watched her walk down that aisle wearing the wedding gown my brother carefully picked for his bride, I felt that if I called out her name then, she would turn around and come back to me. But I can't do that. Not to her. Not to my family. Especially not to Itachi.

I glared at the clock's reflection who glared 8:06am back at me. Damn, I'm late.

Again.

My mind wandered a bit further again today. But it's okay; I am my own boss after all. I finally had the courage to press the stop and get out of the tub, although Sakura's voice is still ringing loudly in my head. I gave myself a mental pat on the back as I made my way to my walk-in closet to get dressed. Trousers first, then shirt, tuck in, close the buttons, pick a vest, dress in, pick a tie, tie it, choose a pair of shoes, put it on, left first then right, pick a coat. It was monotonous, and it seemed like a never-ending cycle.

Same old, same old.

I stopped shortly in front of the window. I feel lost then. Broken, even, as I thought just how lonely I really feel. For so long, I had been lying to everyone, even to myself that I am not. For that long, I started to believe my own lie. Reality, once more, flooded back in. No one ever asked me what it feels like to be me. Every morning, I get up and put on a fake smile. But what if one morning, I didn't? Would anyone notice? I wonder if anyone cares.

As I got into the limousine parked in front of my hotel, the sound of the engine relaxed me. It always does. Don't ask me why. I, myself do not know either. I propped my elbow on the handle of the car door and crossed my left leg over the other as I stared right through the window. And I wonder how many people I ran past is just as broken as me.

I wanted to rewrite the past. I wanted to go back, hold her close and never let go. I regret letting her go, to stop fighting for her just as she stopped fighting for me. Every passing day without her in my arms is only a constant reminder that I'm the one who screwed things up, and I beat myself up for it after that. What am I supposed to do? Can I really choose between the only person who ever loved me, and the one I truly loved? If I choose her, I will lose Itachi. If I choose Itachi, I will lose my heart. And so, I chose the latter, because I can't stand without him. He was like my other leg. I would rather lose my heart than to lose my ability to move on again. My brother can make her happy. I am sure he will. I just know that.

But can you blame me if I feel so wasted? Can you blame me if my insecurity to my brother grew every second as I speak? Can you blame me if I still I wanted to tell her I love her and wrap my arms around her, wake up every morning with her by my side? Was it too late now to ask for a second chance?

She can't even decide who she loves more between my brother and me. I know she loves me. I can see the way she looks at me, the way her gaze traps me in. But she still loves my brother. This time, I can feel it. And its killing me, so silently that even I, myself can't hear it.

If I were to be true to myself, I don't really want to let her go. Breaking up with her is like having the worst nightmare, after having the best dream.

They say if you love someone, let them go to see if they come back. But, let's face it. If you really love them, you're not letting them go.

But I chose to let her go. And it destroyed me.

These vicious thoughts were ended by the sudden unlocking of the door. I was at the front of the building already. Damn, I lost track of time again. I really should stop thinking about what went wrong. I had chosen between the past and the future, between holding on and letting go. But letting go once again would make me lose it and I doubt if I can ever feel normal again.

Being an Uchiha, you are expected to act and be like an Uchiha more than anything. Emotions, thrown away. Relationships, banned. The folk wants us to marry a rich girl, with high status, even if we do not love them. Love, for them, doesn't mean anything. If you think arrange marriage died out in 17th century, then you're plain dead wrong. Since I turned in an age where there is a -teen in the end, they started sending me to those kinds of "social gathering", as I liked to call it. But maybe that was where I learned my ways of womanizing. It wasn't just me to blame, after all.

Can love truly rewrite the past? For the first time in years, I want to prove myself right again. I want to make things right, to correct the things that I had done wrong. I want to apologize to her, to tell her that I still love her. I have so many things to say. Even if she won't believe me, even if she would never believe me, I just want to tell her, explain to her why I let her go. I want to make her understand. I just need a second chance, one last chance.

Just one more chance.