There were so many moments when one could focus only on the absence between the spaces. Moments such as he was consistently presented, a dangerous tilting that forced a wider gap within his joyful tidings and weak-kneed psyche only present when the doors were closed. Keeping him surfaced away from horrendous thought was the delicate curvature on his wrist. Even then, it was no longer enough to strive off the bleakness that continued to protrude his vision when he merely graced over thought.

He held in his hands a double-double, the distasteful aroma and burnt coffee bean panging in his mouth as if it weren't a horrible concoction. What a disgusting beverage. He looked outside, the fast paced cars, grey buildings overstanding each other as if in some sort of gross compensation. Darker now than normal with the rain streaming down the sides of brick, stone and concrete. His sunglasses blackened the sky, and the precipitation appeared as if it were a demon's blood. It may as well have been. Representation indeed!

He took a sip.

Then grasped at this purse, pursuing the extra packets of sugar he kept in the back pocket there. The steam stung at his fingertips as he removed the plastic and added the sweetened sugar amongst the cream and caffeine. The lid didn't click satisfactorily into place, and the purr of the normally smooth engine was obscured by the silence. His consciousness rebelled against the sound, and his gut turned at the complete absence.

His clothing was loud, bright white it blinded at his eyes, it was greyed by his dark tinted lenses. His shoes were too tall, and he couldn't walk without feeling so very overstanding, a disturbing occurrence when the floor brought so much comfort. Trousers light and rested away from his thighs, making it seem as if his legs were naked. Even his hair stood against him, it was held to tight to his head, painfully pinched at his skelp, yet the thought of it being put down was all the more alarming.

He took a small packet out from his hidden breast pocket on his tailored white blazer. Looking out the window he wondered, but shrugged without much pause, it wasn't relevant anymore was it, he had been so young when he had made that promise to himself.

Unhesitating he unrolled the window, just a margin, not showing his face to the world. Flicking at the packet he pulled out the cigarette and put it into his mouth, grasping at the yellow lighter from under the seat. An ugly thing that really was unseemly in such a bleak reality. He put his coffee into the holder before him and lit the stick, throwing the lighter onto the car's carpet.

The tang filled his mouth and lungs, a subtle burn that stang, but didn't deter him from taking a large inhale, and holding. The exhale was released in a ring. Holding his fag in two thin fingers. He turned his hidden gaze to his well dressed driver. The man was well at his job, nothing to complain about in honest thought. Although with his mind so plagued by a grey castover he felt compelled to exchange such a knowledge for a falsehood. He swallowed his impulse and it burned on its way down, settling as a stone in his stomach. Sighing at the implication of his dissatisfaction, with his pride holding bearing on his state of mind. Shuffling in on the seat, he crossed his legs and once more popped off the cap of his coffee, adding four more sugars to the brown mixture, it still remained far too bitter, the tang on his tongue was a burnt one.

He took a sip.

Still too bitter his mind whispered, even though the drink had begun to establish a sticking feeling onto the roof of his mouth. With this in mind, he grabbed a single packet, his last, this one was brown sugar as opposed to the others. It fell heavily into the mixture turning darker tone where it impacted.

Another sip. It was too sweet. He counted.

"Une, deux, trois, quatre, cinq, six, sept, huit, neuf." Nine sugars. The irony didn't shock him, for as the universe seems so fit to prove, it had its humour, and it lay within the confines of dark oblivion. Perhaps here, it told of his own demise, of his faults, of his transgressions making way to *this* his reward. Eyes wetting in the method of his thoughts, he wiped them with his arm, a large black smear on his freshly dry-cleaned blazer, covering even the thin black lines with heavily applied black mascara.

He got angry at his own inconsiderate nature, he took out his small mirror, and gazed at the smudged mess that his eye makeup had become. He didn't carry any of his eyeshadow with him, but he did have his wipes. There was nothing to be done, so he cleaned his eyes completely, his face looking plain without the silver shimmer. Putting the packet away, he saw the orange eyeliner at the bottom of his bag. He clasped the purse shut with a final and soft click.

His driver glanced at him from the rearview mirror, and gave a tentative smile. Naruto leaned his elbow on his door and gazed outside at the bleak outdoors, the smell of city air clogging his senses from the opened window. It was beginning to brighten outside, the clouds obscuring the sun were dissipating, and the morning gloom of fog was nearly gone. The rain still poured. He looked down at his stained sleeve, debating if the cloth was valuable to clean again, or if he should give it to someone less fortunate. With what he wore today he could give the poor nearly a hundred and twenty-five thousand dollars, how obscene.

Even still... Less, he surmised, even if he was bare and naked, he could not give away his wedding and engagement rings, even if they were the most expensive things on his person at fifty and forty-three thousand dollars respectively. He caressed them both, and in turn looked under the black smudge on his sleeve. To the curving letters printed prominently and permanently on his skin in black.

***Madara Uchiha***

His souls mark, never to be erased or disappear even in death, even in tragedy. He glanced to his leaning arm, glaring at the simple resting fabric, hidden from view, under the long sleeve and a layer of caked makeup was the thin and uneven print in silver.

*Tobirama Senju*

Shortly after his marriage, that mark had been covered by an abundance of equally thin, red, scars. He had loved his fiancé, and to be consistently reminded that his best friend was his soulmate as well as his husband, perhaps if he had... No, he shock himself, and sat straight, his red lips thinning at his own unfaithful thoughts.

"Monsieur Kakashi, could you please take me to Uchiha corp?" The man didn't question, only the slightest inclination of his head was the indication Naruto got that he had even heard. Satisfied, he turned on his phone, the screen was bright in the gloom of the day's bleak nature, he opened his text box, and gave himself a moment to evaluate his decision, but only a moment, as before he could really think over anything his hands were flying over the keys.

**"My dearest Tobirama, tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow, creeps at this petty pace from day to day. I trust you'll understand my dishonor at having to make this play, they think me Macbeth, I am, in myself, a folly, I'm a polymath a pain in the ass. A massive pain, Madara is Mcduff, and the Birnamwood is the board on its way to Dunsinane.... You are so far away, do you have to be so far away? Thoughts of it subside, then I get another 'mail, and I cannot put the notion away."** He wrote, stabbing at the screen with his fingers by the end. Sending without revising the rant. Not caring if it seemed as if it was a winded way to vent his frustrations at the turning point his life had become.

He fiddled, his phone providing distraction, it should not be too long a journey until he reached the company. All he wished for these days was for peace of mind, some reprieve of the cold reality he faced all too often. In asking for his husband to be with him as he dulled his mind from the opaque world was not an unreasonable request. He knew the man was swarming himself with work, stacks of paper burying himself with useless tasks that were belonging to someone else. Not coming back home in his own desolation until the early morning sometimes not returning. Those nights were the worst, his flesh felt even colder. Evermore pained, the weight doubled without a pillar to support his own wavering heart.

"Daddy, Daddy look! My name is Obito, I am a poet I wrote this poem just to show it, and I just turned nine, you can write rhymes but you can't write mine!" He startled at the sound and looked around fastly, unbalanced by the song and familiar tone. Kakashi pulled something out from the glove compartment at the front. "I practise French and play piano with my Mother, I have no brother's or sister's, but I love the thought of it. My Daddy is-" Naruto forcibly turned off the damned old phone spilling over his coffee in his haste to do so.

"Pièce de merde." He spoke, his accent thick for the first time in awhile.

The car was silent, Kakashi had even lowered his breathing to not be focused on, he noticed. It remained not for long, as Kakashi pulled into the parking lot of the main Uchiha Corporation building. He nodded his head to the man respectfully, and clicked open the door. Aware that with this decision he was facing an oncoming battle of pride, and stubborn nature. Nevertheless, being a sensible person, he knew that this had to be done. They both needed to take a break.

His shoes clicked loudly on the fine polished tile floors of the extravagant building. It was of marvelous construction, modern in every facility and design. Sleek and bright, even with the gloom of the present. He had never been in the building before, despite being the CEO's wife for nearly thirteen years, he had all access, though he had never used his security card provided. It looked worn, but that's because he had gotten it when they had been engaged fifteen years prior, and its smooth surface felt nothing like his credit cards, odd.

"Can I help you?" The receptionist stood tall, a unpleasant scowl on her face. Naruto returned it with one of his learnt glares, derived from his husband. Unashamed at his own feeling of bitter return, he matched to the large oblong desk with swaying hips and a resolute scowl in place. The familiar feeling of being judged by someone who had no knowledge of him or who he was sending a cold vibration down his spine. There was a reason he had never visited the main company after all.

"Yes, I'm here to see my husband. Can you let me in please?" She rose a brow, but otherwise said nothing derogatory, besides the cunning look, and sweetened tilt of her smile.

"Can I see your ID card please?" Her eyes flickered in irradiance at the sight of his light blue card, clearly she hadn't been expecting him to have one. Annoyed by her posturing, he purposefully moved a lone strand of blond hair from his face with his decorated hand. She spilled a dark drink on her desk while coveting the many large diamonds on his wedding ring, and the large yellow diamond on his engagement ring. Her own hand blandly decorated with a copper band as she automatically swiped the card.

He gained smug satisfaction, at watching her scramble to close her mouth and regain basic posture and dignity as she looked towards his information on the screen.

"Uchiha Naru, thirty-seven, born in Paris, France. Blond hair, blue eyes, spouse..." He watched her jaw slacken. "Madara-sama... ahem. You may head on in." He didn't hesitate to grab the card from her lose grip as he sighed at the nervous smile, a common theme, people changed mood when in face of someone influential.

"Merci." He replied as the security fence clicked open, and he almost felt his heels dragging as he made his way into the elevator. Swiping his card as designated and pressing for the hundredth floor. He leaned against the back onto the wood, not unsure of his decision, but cluttered in his thoughts. His skin felt tighter simply being in this building, understanding that the Uchiha board hated him, it felt as if he walked into enemy territory, even if he held more power than they did.

The doors opened, and he stepped out without losing himself to uncomfortable and unwilling emotions, these were the offices and he could surmise that his husbands was the large, only he knew not which on the was. Many confused faces watched him enter, after all he was not a common visitor, putting his sunglasses on his head he looked around for someone to ask. Everyone seemed to be in a state of working and talking, papers in mid transition to another, and pleasant conversation had been a buzz before he had entered.

"Hello," A younger man with dirty blond hair asked, a curious brow, but no jeer or taught in his tone. "Can we help you?" Naruto paused, knowing that he would seem uncertain if he asked. Still it was a more simple solution then wandering around and attempting to find the correct door, the building was one of the largest in the city.

"Yes, could you tell me where Madara's office is please?" The man's face crumpled into a cautious one. Naruto was not in the mood to deal with whatever that meant. "Or buzz him, I don't care, I need to speak with him if you please." The younger man clicked his tongue but complied pressing a small button on a nearby desk, and gave him an amused glance.

"Hope you know what you're doing, boss has been in a bad state all month." A smirk upturned his cheek, and even with his self restraint being a point of pride, the older Uchiha felt inclined to slap the arrogant idiot.

"Naruto? What are you doing here?" Madara entered, his hair pulled back messily into a nearly undone back ponytail. His skin looked healthy, but his eyes were lined by a dark purple, and his hands shook from where he had them folded over his chest. However, his husbands lips were quirked up a fractional amount in the beginnings of a joyful smile. He returned it tenfold, the action feeling strange on his previously stiff face.

"I wanted to talk to you." He replayed.

"You never come to the company."

"Well yes, but I'm concerned," He paused noting the other people nearby. Grasping onto himself, he walked closer and when his husband had too look down to gaze into his eyes, he made an unexpected move and closed his hands around the taller man's waist, staring right back. "I haven't seen you in three days, you only come home late, and your car's gone by the time I wake up. Even still, you barely take anything out of the fridge for lunches, or dinner." The lump in his stomach returning uncomfortably he looked down at the polished floor. "You're scaring me." Suddenly his shoulders were grabbed, and for a moment he felt as if he was being attacked, but when he looked up, it was Madara's arms holding him, but he didn't have much time for thought. Warm lips being pressed firmly on his own, in a liplock, and the passion underlying the action took his breath from him. Pressed closer to his husband as the hands tightened. It broke quickly, and Naruto smiled at the pink smudge left on his man's mouth from his own dark lipstick. A light returning in his vision. Yet, blushing as he knew there were other people staring. He proceeded.

Reminding what he had found on his phone earlier, when he had been waiting to arrive.

"Take a break." Smiling he ignored the large lines under his husbands face, and instead opened up his phone to where he had found his old hometown, and they had just built a new airport near where he had grown up, and displayed it to the taller man. "We can both go stay with my Father."

"My love, I've got so much on my plate." The darkened, and regretful gaze met his own, but he did not falter, this was one battle his man was not winning. So he continued as if he hadn't been interrupted.

"There's a lake I know... In a nearby park,"

"I'd love to go."

"-you and I can go when the night gets dark!" He had already asked if Hashirama would like to join them, knowing that Madara's best friend -and follow CEO- would encourage the stubborn man to reprieve.

"Take a break! Run away with us for the summer let's go to Paris! We can all go stay with my Father." He was imploring now, knowing that this man lay himself vulnerable at his feet. This man who held the world encased in his iron and brimstone grasp, in the face of his wife's resolve crumbled and succumbed to emotional inclination. Grasping at the heavy feeling of unease he held high, even as Madara's heating gaze was stuck fast onto him as if he had made a great mistake in asking. There were murmurs around them as the many workers began to gossip at the exact nature of their relationship, his embarrassment was near null with every sensation rippling through him.

He took in a large breath, the sweet, sickly, stick of his earlier coffee returning. He rubbed at his soulmark. Ignoring the bubble of self-dread rising.

"Your eye makeup in gone... Have you been crying?" He didn't answer. Instead taking a long breath. He sang, softly, afraid for his own voice, afraid that it would leave and never come back as the acute pain in his chest grew ever larger. It wasn't meant for his soft singing tone, it was harsher than that, but he couldn't force himself anymore then that.

"Mon nom est Obi, Je suis un poète, je écrit ce poème précisément pour montrer cela, et je suis... Seulement a neuf ans, vous écrivez des rimes, mais vous ne pouvez pas écrire le mien! Je m'entraine le français et le jouer de le piano avec mon Maman! J'ai pas le frères et sœurs mais J'adore y pense! Mon Papa est créer le technologie! Une, deux, trois, quatre, cinq!" His cheeks were wet once more and for once he just wanted his own weakness to stop displaying itself. He viewed the others in their posture, as they stared without shame. Perhaps they had not the mind to think that their chairman was married.

"Naruto..." Madara seemed so resolute in his ambition to remain in a torturous torrent of self-suffering. Yet his eyes flickered with a pained recognition at the soft song. He felt the turning in his stomach tighten in anger.

"I suggest you all go somewhere else for a spell, if you would." A kind, and compromising voice interrupted, on that Naruto would recognize anywhere. The employes all grumbled, but seeing as Naruto could see Madara glaring at them from his peripheral vision they all complied without a scene. Tobirama must have told of his distressful text, he had never been glad for his best friends intuition to interpreting his own desires. Hashirama was the perfect clutch, and Madara seemed to know this as well as he let lose a large sigh shifting his tie and loosening it so slightly.

"Hashirama!"

"Naruto!" They hugged comfortably, Hashirama in a suit of tree brown with awkward hiking boots on foot, having not changed from the last time they had gotten together, sweet and kind as could be with a slight margin of anger present in her eyes.

"The thorns in my side..." Came the whisper from behind, and Hashirama rounded.

"Madara! It's good to see your face!" She embraced him tightly, Naruto could tell from the way the poor man's face tensed in pain, her rather well endowed breast pressed closely to his chest as well, she was one of the strongest women he had ever met, and it was lovely at how her and Madara were the most treasured of friends to each other.

"I know you're very busy, I know your work's important, but I crossed the ocean because I couldn't wait. And now you're not an ocean away, I'm only a moment away." She smacked him over the arm, and it became apparent to the man that both of the most important people in his life were now begging him. Still, Naruto saw hesitance in the tilt of his downturned mouth, and fear, in his eyes.

"I cannot join you in Paris." Naruto suppressed his urge to hit something, his fist curling, and Hashirama gave his shoulder a squeeze. He himself had forgotten that Hashi had been on a business trip in China, so the fact that she was here telling Madara to rest with them was enough to raise his respect for her ever more. Even question Madara's choice in not having married her.

"Madara I came all this way..."

"She came all this way!"

"Take a break!" He glared at them both, and it was certain now, that the reason for the long nights, and avoidance was about to come to light. Dark blackness speckled at his vision as his husbands form turned to him, a snarl on his lips and a fist forming.  

"The hospital could call any minute! What if he wakes up when we're gone!? You never think these things through!"

"Madara!" Hashi yelled, outrage in her voice beside him.

He felt his resolve crumble, the bitter pieces he had been holding away from himself slipping back into the crevasse of his mind, tilting him so close to the ledge. The ledge which he had been inching away from, the cold reality pushed into the warmth he had created for himself and it *stang.*

"He is my son too ya know! I gave birth to him! I fed him and clothed him and held him! I was the one who picked up the phone that day! I'm the one who knew first!" His voice began to waver, pitching higher until he was nearly screeching in his rage, the frigid cold invading his mind numbing his senses as his despair broke free for the first time since that day he had been told his son was in a coma. Since the blood had spilled from his legs in marking of tragedy, and in the making of another grief. The black speckling his vision corrupted more.  

"I'M THE ONE WHO HAD A MISCARRIAGE. DON'T YOUFUCKINGDARE ACCUSE ME OF NOT THINKING THIS THROUGH!" Energy spent, the damp on his cheeks didn't lessen. "I wait each day for my husband to come home... to have some warmth return in my acknowledgement that my son is... absent from my life, and my baby is dead. I take pauses in my misery to find solstice in the fact that my spouse is alive at least. I waited for you to take a break from your own hurt and be there for me as I have done for you... That's all I want... you bastard." He turned his back to both his husband and Hashirama, ashamed of having lost his well earned control. Crying silently as the tears kept flowing down without consent and his voice pounded, sore in his throat.

"Take a break..." He hear Hashi's soft tones behind, singings in her soft and sugar voice to his husband. "Run away with us for the summer... We'll go to Paris, there's a lake I heard, in a near park, you two can go when the night gets dark" There was a pang from his phone, and with shaking hands he checked the text. With what he felt, it was as if everyone, the universe even was against his happiness, even Hashi, though he knew that was simply his knowledge that she held feelings for his husband and always had. The text read:

**"My dearest, Naru. I know you'll get through to Madara, sit down with him and compromise, I know he'll eventually agree. Your favourite friend, me- reminds you there's someone in your corner all the way across the sea. In a text I received from you two hours ago, I noticed a comma at the beginning of the phrase. It changed the meaning, did you intend this? One message and it consumed me. It says 'My dearest Tobirama,' with the comma after 'dearest.' You've written, *My dearest, Tobirama...* Anyway all is to say, I sent my sister over there to convince your ailing husband to go to Paris for the summer, she'll be there with you when you go up North.

All my Love,

    Tobirama"**

He smiled, well, not everyone.

"-I'd miss your face... Screw your pride and let's get away... For your wife..." He perked up at that, and a feeling of calm settling over him. Suddenly he was surrounded by the musk of forest firewood and enclosed in two long arms, feeling muscles underneath thick fabric for the first time in far to long. A deep baritone sang in his ear, warmth pressing on his back, supporting.

".. I'll take a break..." A soft kiss was placed on his cheek. He grinned as a soft feminine giggle echoed from behind them, and the arms holding him only tightened further.  He dropped his phone.