（ he folds laundry while sasuke talks. works his way through the pairing of socks and the neat, square dimensions of shirts. his hand will sometimes linger on something he's had direct experience peeling off of the boy — that blue sweater that he loves so well — and then he moves onto the next piece, and the next. and when he's done, he sets the bin down beside the bed and then turns to sasuke and kneels to either side of his hips on the bed, sitting across his thighs as he finishes speaking. ）

What if it never stops. （ the flat affect strips the question from the words. ） That's not the question people ask themselves if they care about stopping, you know?

（ he lifts a hand to sasuke's cheek, brushes his hair away from his eyes. ）

You're telling me, you thought you were dead. You were in a miserable shithole of a place with something influencing your mind and your thoughts, calling on darker impulses. You were grieving a man you love, thinking you'd never see him again. All that pressure, all that pain, and you still held back.

（ his hand slips downward, palming against the side of sasuke's throat before he tugs him nearer to press a soft kiss to his forehead. ）

It's natural to lash out when you're hurting. It doesn't make it right, it doesn't mean it's justified, and it doesn't mean things will be okay afterwards, for those people you affected. But it also doesn't mean you're a monster. （ a beat. ） Are you the same man you were six months ago?