Hokage

A little after six in the morning, the sky had not yet fully brightened.

Outside the window lay Konoha's characteristic quiet gray-blue dawn. Before there was even the sound of pedestrians on the streets, Satsuki had already carefully sat up from beneath the covers.

Naruto's arm still rested at her waist. She cautiously lifted his wrist with her fingers and moved it away bit by bit, then tucked her pillow into his arms in its place.

Naruto mumbled indistinctly in his sleep and hugged the pillow tighter, his breathing returning to a steady, deep rhythm.

Satsuki took out the clothes she would wear today from the wardrobe, then quietly closed the bedroom door and washed up and changed by herself in the bathroom.

She dried the droplets from her face with a towel, carefully combed her hair and tied it into a neat high ponytail, then only pushed open the bedroom door again after confirming there was nothing improper about her appearance from head to toe.

Naruto was still asleep. His blond hair, which had never been willing to lie flat, had been rubbed into tufts sticking up all over the pillow. He was truly sleeping deeply—so deeply that even when Satsuki stood by the bed and leaned down until she was only a fist's distance from him, he did not notice at all.

Satsuki's throat bobbed unconsciously. She remained bent over like that, her gaze sliding from his faintly trembling eyelashes to his lips as they pressed together slightly, where it stopped.

The fingers at her side curled slightly. She quickly straightened up and took half a step back, forcibly tearing her gaze away from Naruto's face and turning it toward the sky outside, which had yet to fully brighten.

Her heartbeat sounded especially loud in the quiet bedroom.