Chapter 7
When he was young, his mother told him his voice would reach past the ends of the earth.
He’d always had a set of lungs on him, and a voice that was pitched higher than any of the other kids in his classes, but his volume was only the start. It didn’t take him long to figure out that music moved through him in waves that he could feel in his bones—that every note was a guiding hand leading him towards a future he couldn’t even imagine.
He started with humming songs to himself, until the vibrations running over his skin weren’t enough. Words bubbled out of him, spilling under his breath as he walked through the hallways towards his classes, but it was never enough. There was always a thrumming behind his ribs, coupled with the pulsing of his heart, that beat loud and strong—it begged to be let out.
The first time he sang for a crowd, he came alive.
He chased the feeling all over the state, first, and then the country. It wasn’t long before he was traveling the world, singing for thousands, that he realized his mother had been right all along.
“Are you gonna be ready any time this year?”
Naruto glances over his shoulder, eyeing the frightening tilt of Sakura’s eyebrows. Something about her petulant frown and critical gaze speaks of impatience and amusement, and Naruto dances the line between them.
“Sure thing,” he says, lifting himself from his seat and heading towards her place in the doorway. His heart is already racing, even before the show has even begun, and he feels adrenaline kicking through his system. When he glances up, his eyes catch on the gleam of sunshine trailing through the room, lighting the pink of Sakura’s hair aflame. It stops him in his tracks, a sudden reminder of something he’s forgotten. He ignores the way the impatient tilt of her brows makes room for curiosity as he skids to a stop right in front of her, and curses under his breath before turning back into the room.
His eyes trace over the desktop and land on a single cord of silver, threaded through a marble replica of the galaxy. He runs the chain through his fingertips just once before lifting it over his head, feeling the familiar coolness of the metal against his nape and the resulting shiver that trails down his spine. He thumbs the marble for a moment, ignoring the way he can practically feel Sakura’s stare burning through him, before tucking it away under his shirt.
It’s just a necklace. That’s what he always tells his friends, when they ask, but the dreamy look he knows crosses his features whenever it comes up in conversation is the most blatant contradiction to his words, rendering them pointless. He knows the swirls of color, each incandescent and ethereal, as easily as he knows every word to every one of his songs.
And even more beautiful, he thinks, ignoring Sakura’s inquisitive eyebrow as they head for the stage, is that he remembers with perfect clarity the face of the girl who gave it to him.
It’s never been just a necklace; it’s a memory and promise all wrapped up in glass, dense and contained but so easy to shatter.
He doesn’t know her, the mysterious girl with eyes dripping starlight, who gifted him a single marble of the unknown universe upon meeting him, but he thinks he’d like to.
He thinks he’d really, really like to.
The first time he saw her, he was singing to a crowd of stars amidst a sea of darkness. It had been KT7′s first official gig together, and everywhere he looked there’d been flickers of fire and light, flashlights on phones, flames above lighters, and a blanket of blinking stars overhead. The stadium lights had fought for dominance, casting the thriving crowd into molten shadows intermittently visible, and failed.
The stars seemed resolute, that night.
He remembers the euphoria of standing beneath them, amidst them, and the power of his lungs as he sang sentiments his own hands had written. The sheer power of Sakura’s drums behind him, and the electric pulse of Sasuke’s strings coursing through him, and he felt a king on his throne—rules didn’t apply, when he was on stage. He could thrash and scream and cry, he could leap off of a speaker, arms spread eagle-wide, and feel the drop in his stomach even before his body fell through the air. He trusted those closest to him, though. Trust had always come easy.
The familiar feeling of hands holding him up, passing him over a sea of people screaming the words, his words, and pushing him right back up to where he belongs, felt like coming home.
The stage: his throne, his kingdom.
Her eyes, her brightest and most catching feature, found him even in the dark of the stadium. They shone brighter than anything else, and somehow, she overcame the shadows. Even the moon had paled in comparison to her brilliance, and he had been spellbound the moment his eyes landed on her.
She was a couple steps away from the front, and she moved along to his music without hesitation—he watched how it moved her, literally moved her, and his heart became a bomb ticking down from a number he couldn’t decipher.
He spent the rest of the night caught between trying to defuse his own mixed feelings about that girl, and pretending that his eyes hadn’t repeatedly sought her out. He thought seriously about calling to her, unashamedly getting her attention and curling his finger until she was close enough for him to touch, to touch, to touch.
Before he could do anything so ridiculous and tempting, she made the move for him.
It could’ve been so easily overlooked, a single person in a mass of thousands reaching her fist into the air, clutched tight around what could’ve been anything, really. But he’d known the moment he saw the way the shadows of night couldn’t dampen the brightness of her smile that she wasn’t to be overlooked.
Naruto’s eyes caught on her fist and saw the flicker of something gleaming, and it drew him to her like a moth doomed to be consumed by the brightness and heat of her flame.
His voice never trembled or hitched, never wavered or dipped. He leapt from the stage until his feet landed on solid ground, and he moved past security and gestured for her to step towards him, his eyes never leaving her. A break in the music, a guitar solo that allowed for him to catch his breath, and then she was right there in front of him, reaching out with a shy smile.
It happened so fast, after that.
He opened his hand to her and felt the gentle weight of something insubstantial, and his lips parted around an endless wave of questions—who are you, what’s your name, can I see you again, will you be here when this is all over?
She turned and the crowd swallowed her hole, a creature bloated and thirsting and ravenous, and he lost her in its teeth.
He doesn’t remember getting back on stage, or slipping the necklace over his head in front of a curious crowd of thousands, or even singing one final song. All he knows is that even hours later, when he’d exhausted himself at an after party and fallen into a friend’s spare bed, his mind ran circles around that girl, and the strange gift she’d given him.
A marble universe with the barest hint of a silver chain threaded through the center of it, just long enough to settle beside his heart.
His heart beats out every question he never asked her, that night.
And he wears the necklace every day for two years before he sees her again.
✧
Two years is a long time.
It takes him several months for him to stop thinking about the girl with the starlight eyes, and the gentle smile. It takes several more for him to stop seeking her out in every crowd KT7 plays for. He does not forget her, though.
How could he, with her universe around his neck, hanging over his heart?
Naruto has had a lot of time to think about how he would approach her, should he find her again. Yet, even still, the words that usually come so easily to him in the form of his feelings, specifically crafted for songs, don’t come to him in this time of sudden need. He can’t pin down a single sentence that sounds right for her, that would let her know how much of an impact she’d had on him. Naruto is not one for giving up, but he knows redundant patterns when he falls into them, so he stops trying to find the words, and starts hoping to find circumstance.
It comes much later than he ever would’ve imagined, and as such, he is utterly unprepared.
KT7 sells out again, playing for an arena of thousands with not an empty seat in the house, and Naruto finds himself at another celebratory after party. It’s held in the hotel he’s staying in, on the first floor, and he enjoys the music the dj’s spinning almost as much as he enjoys the way that his manager, Sai, is fast losing a bet to see who could out-drink who, between he and Sakura. Sai is still holding his clipboard, for heaven’s sake, and Sakura isn’t even wavering. It was a poor bet to take, Naruto thinks cheerily, moving through the crowds.
There’s nothing about the party that’s wrong, per say, but something about it has Naruto excusing himself earlier than usual. He gets out with a few autographs and a couple pauses for inquiring conversations with fans, before he’s heading towards the elevator with his hands shoved deep in his pockets. He leans against the wall, already thinking about stripping down to his boxers and putting on a movie in his room when the elevator doors clang open, and the girl whose universe hangs around his throat is right in front of his eyes.
He watches her eyes widen, her shoulders tense, and her mouth wrap silently around his name. Just like that, and he can feel his stomach in his feet, his mouth going dry. He licks his lips and his heart goes into overtime, and it takes the automatic closing of the elevator doors to knock him back into reality. He lunges forward just as she reaches out and their hands are only a breath away from each other before they both pull back, the doors clanking wide open once again.
Naruto steps into the tiny space and can do nothing more than stare at her, his heart in his throat, his eyes tracing every feature as if to store the sight of her in his memory for good. The realization that follows, that he might only ever get to see her in his memories yet again, is enough to finally spur him into motion.
He wishes desperately that he’d found those words he’d wanted for her, so long ago.
“Hi,” he breathes intstead, shaking his head a bit as a smile brushes across his lips. “Hey.”
He watches the pigment in her cheeks flare ashen rose, and her smile lift to brighten her entire expression into something he wants more than to simply know, but to feel.
“Hi,” she whispers, and she sounds so shy—this image of her, now, in stark contrast to the unabashed, uninhibited dancer that raised her universe above her head and placed it in the palm of his hands. He finds neither of them more interesting than the other, equally entranced by the enigmatic nature of her, enough so that he finds himself unconsciously leaning towards her, as if he could soak up the mystery of every facet of her. He wonders if, by sheer proximity, he will appear as luminescent as she does without even trying—or perhaps, he thinks, it might be enough to simply reflect the brightness of her spirit.
“I’m Naruto,” he says, and somehow the introduction feels silly. Her smile grows until creases appear beside her eyes, remnants of frequent joy, and Naruto feels the incredible sensation of falling without having even moved.
“Hinata,” she responds. “Nice to meet you.”
“Finally,” he blurts, and doesn’t even have the grace to blush or look chagrined with his lack of filter. He merely watches her, endlessly intrigued, eyes wide and perceptive. She doesn’t seem to mind his brash behavior, though; she laughs.
“Finally,” she agrees, a swathe of that confident girl in the mass of KT7’s fans, and then not a moment later a wisp of shy admission. “I didn’t think you’d remember me.”
“I did,” Naruto immediately says, grin quick and hot as wildfire. “I do.”
It makes sense, then, to reach up to the chain lying flat against his chest. He trails his fingertips over it, watching her watch him, and pulls until the marble of the universe she had shared with him—their shared universe—dangles freely between them. He hears her gasp, a surprised inhale, and it charms him into speaking in a hushed, insistent whisper.
“I’ve been wearing it every day,” he says in a rush, as brazen as always. “I wondered if I’d see you again.”
Hinata glances from the marble in his fingertips, an amalgamation of gleaming colors and swathes of transparent blips, like newborn stars just getting their luminous teeth, before looking up into his eyes with the same level of awe.
“You kept it,” she breathes, and her smile is every core to every star in the known universe, hot enough to sear right through him, wrapped ever tight in heat and promise. Naruto’s heart aches, his next pull of breath shakier than those before, and oh, he thinks he loves her.
The elevator pings, startling both of them enough to see that they’re on Naruto’s floor. The doors open and he thinks, too soon, too soon, and he doesn’t take a single step. There’s a knowing edge to the pale wonder of Hinata’s eyes, as she glances over at him, looking through her eyelashes. It’s this look, conspiratorial and charmed, that has him saying, “Come with me real quick? I got you something.”
He sees the flicker of hesitation, and realizes that even though he feels like he knows her already, feels like they’ve known each other for years, they’re essentially strangers.
That, in reality, they’ve known each other for only moments, and he’s asking her to his room.
“Not in a creepy way!” he blurts, sticking a hand out to prevent the elevator doors from shutting. “I just, you can wait in the hallway if you want. I can run and get it.”
“Okay,” she agrees, after a moment of contemplation. She moves and it’s a reminder of the graceful fluidity of her, the way she seems to glide over the floor. He leads her towards his room, and his nerves sharpen and suddenly present themselves. He rubs at his nape, hand a little shaky, and slides his keycard into his door. When he has it wedged open, he turns back to her and smiles, saying, “Okay, I’ll be back in like, five seconds. Tops.”
The door shuts on her laughter, and he races to his suitcase and finds the gift in an instant, seeing as it’s always in the same exact spot, just in case he’d ever run into her again.
He races back to the door and peels it open, beaming when he finds her still standing there, leaning against the wall with a raised brow.
“More than five seconds,” she says, looking smug. He snorts, surprised at her playfulness.
“Sorry I’m late,” he jokes, and comes to stand before her. He extends his gift to her with far less ceremony than she had, mostly because he’s too excited to finally be having this moment, this chance, and he really just wants the gift to finally be in her hands.
He drops it into her open, waiting palm, and watches the change move over her face as she realizes that she now has his universe in her hand.
“I hope you like it,” he rambles, nerves pulling tight. “I hope the shape is okay, it’s actually kind of embarrassing why I chose it, but—”
“I love it,” she interrupts, voice trembling. “A sun. Thank you.”
“No big deal,” he says, even as he feels as though for the first time since meeting her in that elevator he can finally breathe easy.
“How did you—”
“Make it?” he guesses, glancing self-consciously down the hall. There’s no one around, just the two of them, and he’s grateful for it. “I tracked down the original maker of this, of yours,”
“Yours,” she corrects softly, her expression just this side of bashful.
“Mine,” he agrees, and his smile lifts and grows until his eyes are nearly closed. “I had it special made. It only made sense to share my universe with yours.”
Hinata lifts the sun-shaped marble, spun similarly to hers, but with distinct intricacies that Naruto recognizes to be his own, and slips the chain over her head. The universe, tied within the sun, rests beautifully against her fair skin, and the rosy flush that rises to greet it.
“I’m happy,” she admits, “I never imagined being here, with you.”
“I did,” Naruto asserts, and he steps closer to her, cautious yet insistent. She doesn’t flinch or waver; instead, she leans towards him, tilting her head ever so slightly. They’re so close, close enough to kiss, and he wants to kiss her more than he’s ever wanted anything else in the world—except that that’s not entirely true, not now, not when the words are finally here, on the tip of his tongue, needing to be said.
“I don’t want to lose you again,” he admits, and this is what he wants and needs more than anything else; he remembers the way the crowd had engulfed her, and how easily she’d stepped out of his life. Then, in a tone ridden in wonder, “I feel like I know you already.”
“You don’t,” she says softly, “But if you want to, I’d like that.”
Naruto laughs, and he watches the way her features soften into a muted kind of joy, one that reaches deep and spreads wide, in just the way his voice had. “Hell yeah, I do.”
“Okay,” she says, and it’s so simple.
She reaches out and slides her fingers through his, and he can tell that she’s shaking, but he’s shaking too, and when she pulls him closer to her until their foreheads are touching, he hears the soft clang of their universes colliding.
He feels the soft beginnings of his heart tracing the lines of a new rhythm, and he knows without having to wonder that it’s a rhythm hers has been singing to all along.
