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He doesn’t remember the day when he was a year old.
He doesn’t remember the day when he was two years old.
He doesn’t remember the day when he was three years old, or maybe he does, but there’s this sort of unconsciousness memory repression he has, regarding events involving the majority of his family members.
He remembers one thing from the day when he was four years old. His mother walks over, she sits down next to him on wooden steps outside the house and she meets his eyes and there’s this summer bright smile all over her face and she asks Itachi how he’d feel about having a younger sibling. He returns that smile, teeth white like the unblemished moon and says that would make him very happy. His mother hands him a small box of chocolates, the outside pink as soft flower down and there’s a cartoon animal, looks almost like a ferret, on the side. He’s replayed the memory a few times in his head, and he can never remember the time of day, the weather. It’s different each time, midday, hot breath of breeze and flinching young leaves, midnight, an ink sky with stars indented in it as if it’s been fashioned with millions of tiny diamonds.
When he’s five, the day is far more memorable. Itachi is going to be joining the academy soon, there’s pulsing in his heart over that, excitement, he’s been working on the fireball jutsu and shurikenjutsu outside of class, has mastered the former even to the point of his father’s satisfaction. His body was glowing warmer and brighter than those licks of red and orange and red and yellow and red tongues of flame hot inches above the lake’s surface. Anyways, he sits outside, Sasuke there in his arms, and their mother’s gotten Itachi a box of chocolates, same as last time, namesake cartoon of an animal right there, curled up into the pink of the box. He’s been told Sasuke isn’t allowed to have any of the chocolates yet, and Itachi, he can’t wait until he’s old enough to share. Itachi loves sweets, the way they melt so soft against his tongue. He wonders if Sasuke will feel the same. There’s a half moon like a sideways smile thousands and thousands of miles up in the air.
When he’s six, just months from seven, things again are crystal bright in his mind. A few weeks left before Academy finals, which Itachi has no worry over, none at all, and he’s sitting outside on the porch again, Sasuke there too, few months from two, sitting in his older brother’s lap. Itachi is eating chocolates, same brand as before, same gift from his mother, and Sasuke reaches for one. “Oh? You want one of these?” Itachi says, small grin, closed lips on his face, sweet expression, and Sasuke nods, reaches out further. Itachi gives him one, and Sasuke chews it for just a bit, before spitting it out, all disgusted, lip curled high at the edge, and Itachi sighs.
“Ew.” Sasuke whines, and Itachi lets out a light breath of amusement.
“Sorry about that, Sasuke.”
When he’s seven, it’s another memorable day. He’s nearly mastered the sharingan, the third black comma mark edging the iris is finally there, and something Itachi realizes that he likes is genjutsu, mind manipulation and alteration and shifting of reality. He’s getting better and better at it. Sasuke sits to the left of him, again on those wooden steps, damp and rotting inside from the recent rainfalls. And it’s even become a joking tradition to give Itachi the chocolates, brand name a play on his own, word for weasel. Sasuke watches him eat in silence, seems to have learned his lesson from last time, swings his legs back in forth in loose scissor motions. Itachi looks over at him.
“Hm?”
Sasuke’s head whips up and he looks at Itachi like he always does, like his older brother has given him the world. “How do I make my eyes red?”
Sasuke’s seen him training, probably, Itachi thinks. “It’s called the sharingan. You’ll probably be able to do it when you’re older.” Tries to keep it simplistic, terms for a two and a half year old.
“Sha…rin…gan.” Sasuke seems to feel out the word on his tongue. It’s quiet again for a few moments and crickets sing in the dusky light, brightness dying down as the sun edges into sleep. Sasuke points to Itachi’s chocolate box. “Can I have one?”
Itachi smiles softly and hands one over to Sasuke, who chews it, looks all disgusted, but at least has the decency not to spit it out this time. He swallows with a grimace. “Ew.”
Itachi smiles almost guiltily. “Sorry about that, Sasuke. Try not to eat any more in the future.”
Sasuke just pouts at that.
Year eight is uneventful, year nine even more so.
When he’s ten, Itachi is in the middle of the Chunin exams, and deep down in his heart he nearly pleads for Sasuke to be the focus of their parents’ love and adoration, to have a day of his own. He’s a few hours into the Forest of Death, trees stretch long necks of trunks up to reach for the heavens, knotted branches grasp into thin air. Drops of light bleed down between the few areas where the sun can slip through wood and leaves. Itachi reaches into his small pack of tools for a kunai knife, there’s a fish in his other hand, ready to be gutted, and Itachi feels an. Object. Of some sort, in the ninja pouch. He pulls it out.
Pink box of chocolates, “Good Luck!” sprawled across the top in Sasuke’s rough and messy handwriting. Itachi smiles. He’ll pass the exam. He won’t let Sasuke down ever.
He’s a Chunin at eleven, in ANBU at twelve, or maybe earlier than that, these are all all memories he wants nothing more than ever to forget.
When he’s thirteen, it’s the worst. He stands in the Hokage’s office because he is supposed to be on a mission right now, the sky is milky pale with dawn and caterpillar bloated white clouds, and Itachi is talking to the Hokage, oh so very annoyed and scared and anxious, a barely teenager just restraining shaking at the edges of his skin.
“My clan won’t relent. The likelihood is that we’ll have to continue with our last resort plan soon.” Itachi keeps his voice placating. “Lord Hokage. Don’t send me on the mission. I would like just one last holiday with my parents… One last holiday with my brother.” Sasuke, pure and clean of all this black sin and corruption, one last holiday for Itachi’s favorite person in the whole wide world. And the third Hokage looks Itachi Uchiha up and down with those wise old owl eyes, assessing everything about him, every one of Itachi’s movements, fidgets gnarled and wrinkled fingers down the neck of his pipe. Makes a ‘hmmm’ sound.
“Very well.”
His voice is so, so raspy, Itachi thinks.
That night, Itachi sits with his brother on the porch, and Sasuke goes on to talk about his day at school and all of the kids in his class and this one boy who particularly annoys him, and Itachi drowns himself in every word because his aching heart knows that he may never hear them again, Sasuke sounding excited, happy to see him. Eventually, their mother tells them to go inside, and Itachi walks up to his room, and there’s this pink box of chocolates with a cartoon ferret on the side nestled there in his sheets, and Sasuke’s handwriting is across the top, quickly scrawled note of “I love you forever, Itachi!”.
Life is cruel, Itachi thinks.
He eats one of the chocolates, unable to stomach the rest.
When he’s fourteen, he spends his first Valentine’s day in the Akatsuki. They don’t celebrate Valentine’s day, not really, and he’s recently been assigned a new partner, ocean mist blue-gray skin and shark gills, tall man named Kisame, who Itachi respects, he’s a strong fighter at the very least. The two have a sort of mutual understanding, they leave each other alone, communicate only when necessary, not because they don’t like each other, just because Itachi truly just wants to be isolated from most everyone. He’s reclusive. They both know this. And that’s why Itachi is surprised when Kisame sits next to him, out in the rain speckled grass outside the inn, looking up at the white spider eyes of stars in the darkness and forcing his face, his body into not displaying emotions.
“Eh? Somethin’ on your mind?” Kisame asks, and Itachi is silent. Doesn’t even look over.
Neither of them speak for a long, long time.
Kisame gets up. “Look, I’m not one for drinking myself, but you’re down right now, so c’mon, I’ll pay.”
Itachi keeps his eyes on the stars. “I wouldn’t be able to, even if I desired it. I’m fourteen.”
“Yer HOW OLD now?!” Kisame gapes. “Heheh, fourteen? Damn, I thought you were twenty or somethin’. You sure look it, and ya act that way. I guess the world is full of surprises, huh?” He waves his hand as he walks back to the inn. “G’night.”
“Kisame.” Itachi turns, oh so slightly, looks straight at Kisame.
“Hm?” Kisame turns to meet his gaze with his shark eyes, black and pale.
“Thank you.”
That night, Itachi looks deep, deep into his tools pack. He finds a small pink box, writing on the top, at the bottom. He eats a single chocolate from it, and none of them have gone stale, even a little bit.
He reads the writing at the top again and again and again before he goes to sleep that night.
It’s starting to get harder to.
The words are a bit blurry.
When he’s fifteen, nothing all that important happens. He and Kisame are in some small village in the Land of Fire, their organization’s numbers are growing, and Itachi is glad, at least, he has a partner he can tolerate, one he’s even grown to consider a close friend.
His only friend.
Really, it’s… not as if there’s a large pool to choose from. But Itachi isn’t very social, as it is, isn’t fond of making or maintaining friends in the dangerous world he lives in now, wearing a black cloak with red clouds. There’s no important mission that day and so Kisame takes Itachi to a small tea shop, one of his favorite things, there’s mainly silence, Kisame shares a few words to a nearly empty room, Itachi nods at a few of them, responds to even fewer. It doesn’t bother his partner, though. They’ve come to accept this as their friendship.
They camp under a full moon that night and Itachi eats another chocolate, again miraculously not stale. He reads the words on the box until his head hurts.
His heart hurts, too.
He knows Sasuke doesn’t mean them anymore.
But that’s for the better.
Years sixteen and seventeen are uneventful. Itachi eats a chocolate each time.
When he’s eighteen, things begin to get worse. He’d seen his brother again, for the first time in years, and he looks colder, Itachi thinks, he looks broken, and he charged at Itachi with lightning in his hand and fire in his eyes and sharingan irises the color of the petals of lover’s roses and Itachi grabbed his arm, and forced Sasuke to relive his pain again and again and again and he told him how he lacked hate, a motivator, if anything, and he wants his brother to get stronger, but he’s beginning to wonder, really, if he’s doing this the right way, because Sasuke has become someone made of cracking glass.
“He looks like you, ya know.” Kisame said, at the time, and Itachi agrees, silently. They’re brothers, after all. But Kisame says little about it after that. As far as he knows, as far as everyone knows, Itachi could care less about Sasuke, if he lives or dies. It’s not an appropriate topic to broach, even with his best friend.
The day itself is boring.
He spends most of it on the road, walking under trees alive with birds.
Itachi eats another chocolate that night.
It takes significantly more effort than he’s used to to make out each word written on the pink box, with the ferret on it.
When he’s nineteen, things are the worst they’ve been in a long time.
Itachi is at the side of the road, his whole body is aching and rush after rush of hot blood leaves his mouth with each cough, his whole body shivers, wracked with trembling and spasms. Eventually, he leans back against a tree, breathing heavy, and Kisame sits next to him, watching oh so very carefully.
“It’s gettin’ worse.” There’s concern, actually, in his voice.
“I’m aware.” It’s not dismissive, it’s sad, lonely, like a lost ghost. It’s hard to come to terms with these things, after all. “I’ve been taking medications and trying to care for my body otherwise, but there’s little more I can do than that.”
They try to start down the trail again but it’s clear that it really isn’t a good day for Itachi, not at all, so they camp in the woods that night, and Kisame catches some fish for them, and Itachi starts a fire with a Fire Style jutsu, and Itachi doesn’t want it but he takes it anyways, thanks Kisame for the effort he’s put in.
Itachi keeps track of the days. He eats another chocolate.
He can only read two of the five words his brother has written, now. But maybe if Sasuke’s handwriting was better at the time, that would be different.
When he’s twenty, he eats the last chocolate in the box. Only one of the words Sasuke wrote is distinguishable to fading, dying eyes.
Now he’s twenty one, and he’s grocery shopping, of all things, with Kisame, they’re walking down the aisles and Itachi cannot believe even a little bit that nobody has approached them yet, that there haven’t been any strange looks. Still. They reach what is probably the candy aisle, Itachi thinks, and his eyes drift down it all bored before they stop on something.
Familiar, almost.
It’s pink, and there’s a shape on the side, white and brown, amorphous, indistinguishable. He tries to read the brand name, the lettering, any of the words.
He can’t.
They’re all faded blurs in his eyes.
Itachi picks up the box, motions to Kisame, who walks over. “What is the brand name?”
Kisame tells him. It’s… exactly what Itachi expected.
“You like sweet stuff. We should get it for you, it’s even got a ferret on the box. A weasel, just for you, heheh.”
Itachi thinks. He’s silent for a while.
He puts the box back on the shelf.
“I’ll be alright.”
That night, Itachi is back at the inn, and the moon in the sky is full and bloodied red, crimson dripping over it like a fresh severed corpse, like a heart pumping fast from love. He pulls the box, empty, from the bottom of his bag. It smells like chocolate, faintly. Itachi walks outside, walks for a long, long time before he’s nowhere, at least to him. He sits on the ground, under a pine tree that’s likely older than the oldest building in the whole entire land. Itachi’s chest jolts in pain and then he’s coughing out warm blood, digging his fingers into fabric, clenching to alleviate the suffering somehow, he has one hand over his mouth but even then drops slip between fingers and when he pulls it back his hand is stained liquid garnet. Itachi cleans his hands and mouth with some water from a small canteen. He’s started carrying one for this purpose.
Itachi uses his ninja tools to carve a small fire pit into the dusty soil.
He looks at the area on the box where black meets pink, and he can’t even read a single letter anymore, but he knows what all of them say, he’s read Sasuke’s note over and over and over again, he knows the words by heart. Itachi places the box in the pit, nestled into loose earth. He is dying, and he knows he is dying, and he wants to and will soon be dead, and he knows how he wants it to happen. The Sasuke who gave him chocolates is not the one he will meet in a few weeks, or at most, few months. It’s best to cleanse these memories from his mind. Give them the funerals they deserve.
He uses fireball jutsu to set the box aflame, it’s careful and controlled, and within minutes there’s nothing left but puffs of silky gray ash and charcoal.
Itachi looks up at the sky.
The reflection of a blood moon dances across the crow talon darkness of his irises, sharingan dormant.
I love you forever, Itachi!
“I love you forever too, Sasuke.” Itachi whispers, and there’s nobody to hear him except the night sky and the moon and the trees and the millions and millions of stars all around them.