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"Haruno-san, I've come to- what are you doing?!" he rushes to shut the door quietly behind him, hoping no one rises to follow him. She's scrambling away from him, knife no longer pressed to her abdomen but bloodied partially at the sharp tip.
"Don't! Don't come any closer, Shisui-kun." Sakura's eyes are frenzied as she finally meets his panicked gaze. He holds his hands up in a gesture of good faith.
"Please, don't. Put the knife down."
"I… I can't go forward with this. You should know, I… I can't marry him, he's a monster." Her hand is shaking violently as she raises the knife towards him in an effort to keep him away.
He takes a step forward anyway.
"I said stop!" She quickly turns the knife back to herself, rightly figuring that threatening him would not keep him away, and that injuring herself is the only thing that could. He hates how right she always is.
He lowers himself to a crouching position, trying to meet her at her own level. Trying anything he can to get her attention on him, and not on finishing what he interrupted.
"You're right, he is." Shisui slightly edges himself closer, hoping the movement goes unnoticed.
"Talk to me, Haruno-san."
She flinches at the honorific. He moves closer.
"I think-" she hiccups a soft chuckle that sounds more like a sob, "I think at this moment, you can call me Sakura."
"Sakura."
Another inch closer.
He looks to her hands, where she's grasping the knife in a white-knuckled grip. They stopped shaking when he spoke her given name. A good start.
"Sakura."
"You-" she pauses to gather her thoughts and breathes, "you can't convince me to- there's nothing you can say that would make me want to marry Sasuke."
He moved closer while she spoke, hoping she was distracted enough not to notice him encroaching on her.
"Alright."
He moves closer again. He's so close, just a bit more and he could-
"St-stop!"
He freezes, puts his hands back up in hopes of placating her. His eyes flick between her face and her hands. Her bottom lip is quivering in her pathetic attempts to control her breathing. Her eyes are shining with tears she's trying so hard to contain. Her brow is furrowed, willing herself to focus on him, or perhaps on the task he's hoping she was never fully convinced was the solution at all. Her hands are shaking again, any calm he had offered a moment ago gone as quickly as it came. The knife's edge is pressed up against the soft flesh of her stomach, glimmering in the sharp gaze of the moonlight through the window. Her yukata falling away as she cuts through the silk fabric.
The deer scare in the garden snaps as it becomes inundated with water.
The knife digs deeper into flesh.
His eyes snap to hers, he hopes his panic is as clear in his eyes as it is in hers.
"Sakura, please."
Two things happen at once. Her tears finally spill over, filling her vision with water, and he snaps forward and wraps his strong grip over hers, ceasing the knife's deadly forward movement.
"Don't kill yourself,"
She blinks away the tears, trying her best to meet his pleading stare. He looks so different from his usual smiling self. His laughter seemingly the only laughter to ever grace this house. Now he looks soft, so comforting that all she wants is to do what he asks, even though she knows her life with Sasuke would be utter misery. Just because he asked. Perhaps she could learn to live with Sasuke, just in the hopes of occasionally seeing Shisui. If anyone could brighten hell it would be him-
His grip around her hand and the knife sharpens considerably, crushing her fingers, and his eyes darken.
"Kill your fiancé, instead."