Chapter Text
Hashirama opens the wooden box that contains his most prized possessions, symbols and dreams that no one will understand but he. The magpie feather from Itama, a lock of hair from Kawarama's head, a kunai marked with the hiraishin…
And a rock from the river, plain and ordinary.
No one else looking at it would know that it was the first present Madara ever gave him, a rock born in fire and worn smooth by water, perfect for skipping from one bank of the river to the other. From the Uchiha to the Senju.
From Madara to him.
He brushes the tips of his fingers over it, feeling the tiny amounts of roughness that even the tumbling water of the Naka could not polish away, and mourns deep in his heart.
Madara, his friend, his almost lover... what could they have had?
The possibility of what they could have shared still pains him, but he's no longer the boy that he once was. He's a man and has a man's responsibilities.
He places the leaf that Madara left with him, the hole a lens through which to view their dream, over the rock. Madara has chosen to walk another path and nothing that Hashirama said could sway him.
Perhaps, in time, his friend will come back. Hashirama will keep Madara's leaf ever green in the hopes that will happen.
In the meantime, Hashirama will do what he must to carry his duty.
His responsibility to the village demands it.