ofhealinglove:

Ask by @maybe-please and @vesperlionheart: Both men are pressured into marrying to further
their clan lineage and have come to the same conclusion: they both want the
non-clan orphan woman who is apprenticing under Tsunade. She in turn has no
interest since ____________. 

Tobirama/Sakura/Madara

Also includes: Sakura being a major badass.

“What?”

Tsunade smirked, amused, as she watched the scene unfold
before her eyes. Sakura, on the other hand, found nothing funny about it at
all, fuming and red in the face as she was.

On her left was Senju Tobirama, dressed in a formal beige
kimono with dark green leaf patterns adorning it, while to her right was Uchiha
Madara, dressed also in a formal kimono, but this one black and red like his
currently inactive sharingan.

They both looked equally unimpressed with the situation,
although more of their attention was on each other than Sakura herself. Madara
looked coolly unamused, while Tobirama was icily staring him down, daring
Madara to challenge him.

After years of being on the same team as Naruto and Sasuke,
both rivals in their own right, Sakura instinctively knew that the situation
had to be defused before they would be willing to pay attention to anyone else
again. So, with a sharp chop of her right arm, she declared, “I’m not marrying either
of you.”

Both Tobirama and Madara turned to her, Tobirama’s eyes just
slightly widened at her refusal, while Madara raised an eyebrow skeptically.

“And why not?” the latter asked calmly.

“Because,” Sakura said, “I don’t want to.”

Tsunade snorted indelicately behind her.

Tobirama frowned. “You would be allowed to maintain your
career,” he said. “With the status of marrying into the Senju clan, you could
go beyond-”

Sakura turned her heated gaze onto him. “That’s insulting,
Tobirama-san. I’ve made it this far as a civilian, as an orphan civilian, in fact—I have no need to marry to further my
career.” She stared him down frostily. “I think I’ve made it far enough on my
own merits if you, the brother to the head of the Senju, think I’m worthy of you.”

Tobirama frowned more deeply now. “That is not what I-”

“Isn’t it, though?” Madara interrupted calmly. “Perhaps you
should have led with something a little more heartfelt. Sakura is a more than capable kunoichi in her own right
and needs no help from anyone.”

Sakura turned to him now. “No amount of sweettalking is
going to get me to agree to marry you, Uchiha Madara,” she said, even more
coldly now. “I know your type. Manipulation isn’t going to work on me.”

He smiled placidly, neither confirming nor denying what he
had been trying to pull. On his face, though, that smile made him look dangerous—more
dangerous than if he was seething with rage.

“As well it shouldn’t,” he said as though he’d just won a
hard-earned prize. “If you were easily manipulated, you would have no place,
potential or no, in the Uchiha clan.”

“Good thing my answer is a no, then,” she retorted hotly. “Because
I’m not marrying into the Uchiha clan,” and before Tobirama could interrupt, “or
the Senju clan.”

Tobirama took a breath and smoothed over his expression. “Why
not?” he asked mildly.

“Because I don’t want
to.”

“Surely you plan to marry someday?” he pressed. “To have
children and a family?”

“If I do, that’s none of your business,” Sakura said. “And
that’s that. Coming in here and demanding it of me will get you nowhere.”

At that, Madara’s eyes gleamed, and Sakura could tell that
she’d said something wrong, something that was going to bite her in the ass
someday—and from the look on the Uchiha’s face, that someday was soon.

Tobirama also took in Madara’s expression and his eyes grew
wary.

“I understand your position,” Madara said at length, then
bowed to the Hokage and dismissed himself. For a moment, Sakura was
dumbfounded, because no, Uchiha Madara would never make it that easy. In fact…

Yes. That was it. It was all in the words. ‘I understand your position.’ Nothing about
accepting it, though.

Tobirama seemed to come to some kind of conclusion in her
moment of thought, also said, “I understand your position,” and then bowed and
left.

After they were gone, Tsunade burst out into sadistic
laughter.

“I don’t envy you at all,” she said, snickering, and Sakura
stormed out of the Hokage’s office in a blatant show of disrespect.

Tsunade was a little harder on her during training the next
day, and showed no sympathy for her plight, but otherwise, all was well. A week
passed without incident, peaceful and monotonous and routine, just the way she
liked it.

Then…

Day One

The hospital was busier than she would have preferred, and
due to an emergency in the middle of the night, Sakura hadn’t had a chance to
eat breakfast…and then lunch…and then dinner… And by the end of the day, it was
all she could do to trudge her way back home, too exhausted to even thinking
about walking far enough to get takeout, and of course cooking at home was out
of the question. She knew she had to eat, but for today, she would just…take it
easy, she decided. Subsisting off coffee and soldier pills was never a good
idea, but she just…couldn’t, today. She collapsed on her couch the moment she
closed the door, barely taking the time to take off her shoes.

She woke up to her doorbell ringing, and when she finally
got up to answer it, she found a plastic bag with a bowl of udon, two sticks of
anko dango, and a thermos hot jasmine green tea inside.

Sakura didn’t think much of it. She sat down to eat with a
quiet ‘Itadakimasu’ and then went back to bed.

Day Two

It was good to see Naruto, Sakura thought to herself as they
sat down for dinner. They had a lot of catching up to do—with Sakura at the
hospital all the time and Naruto a new father, they hadn’t had much time with
just the two of them.

“And how is Hinata holding up with her post-partum
depression?” Sakura asked as Naruto was draining his fourth bowl of ramen.

“She’s doing okay,” he said after swallowing. He gave her a
foxy grin. “I’ve been cheering her up dattebayo!”

Sakura smiled. “That’s good. Tell her she needs to bring
Boruto in for his first round of vaccinations, alright?” As soon as it left her
mouth, though, she remembered that it was probably best to just go straight to Hinata
with the instructions. As good of a father as he was in some aspects, Naruto
still had to learn a lot about the responsibilities of being one.

They chatted amicably for a little while longer and then
Naruto claimed that he had get to back to Hinata because he was doing the
nightshift for monitoring Boruto. Naruto slapped his money down on the table
with a cheerful exclamation, but when Sakura pulled out her wallet, Teuchi shook
his head.

“You’re on the Uchiha tab now,” he told her.

Sakura gaped. “But-why?”

Teuchi gave a mysterious little smile but wouldn’t
elaborate. It took a moment, but then Sakura remembered the marriage proposals.
So Madara was trying to cozy up to her, was he? Trying to make her feel
indebted to him, perhaps? That would certainly be right up his alley.

She took it with grace for Naruto’s sake—no need to put up a
fuss when he needed to get going—but inwardly, she was fuming.

He was probably behind the food yesterday, too. Well, she’d
let him spend his money on her. It was his to spend, after all.

That just made it even more important that she not give in.

Day Three

“I told you no already,” Sakura said with no little
irritation, arms crossed as she stared down the Senju on her doorstep.

“I haven’t even asked anything of you,” he replied, although
from his tone, he had been going to
ask her something.

“And let’s keep it that way.”

His brow furrowed. “I just ask for a walk. A conversation.
It’s a lovely day out. Surely that’s not too much to demand between friends?”

“You see, that’s the thing. It’s not too much to ask for
friends—but we’re not. Friends. You want to marry me. Why? It’s certainly not
because of our stellar rapport.”

“I didn’t realize you held me in such contempt,” Tobirama
retorted dryly.

“I don’t, necessarily,” Sakura admitted. “But I also don’t
know you well enough to like you, either. And you don’t know anything about me.”

“I know your favorite foods,” he objected.

She frowned. So then Monday had been Tobirama, not Madara.
Of course. Madara was certainly the kind to throw money at a problem until it
resolved itself.

Against her will, she softened a little at Tobirama’s
obvious effort. When compared to Madara, it was…at least a little admirable.

“Fine. A walk.”

Day Four

Flowers. Everywhere.

Her entire doorframe was covered in flowers. But not just
any flowers: rare flowers that could be used in poultices and poisons and
herbal remedies. Kinds that only the best money could buy, and that the
hospital and her own personal research was sorely lacking in.

This was obviously Madara’s doing. She wished that she could
be mad at him for trying to manipulate her—first the permanently free food at
Ichiraku’s, which she wouldn’t ever not
go to because Naruto—and now stocking her stores for at least a year if she got
to preserving these right away? She couldn’t be mad at him now.

It wasn’t that she was materialistic. She could help people with this. If this was what
marrying into the Uchiha clan was like…

No. That wouldn’t be fair to her or Madara. Not that she
particularly cared whether it was fair to him; she didn’t want to marry him
anyways. Even if it meant this. It would be wrong to sell her body to him like
that, because she certainly wasn’t in love with him, and so that was all the
marriage would be. Sex. And children. And being a matriarch.

No, she’d pass, thanks.

Still, though…

She spent the rest of the night safely storing Madara’s
gifts.

Day Five

And so it continued.

Day 30

A whole month of being courted by two very rich, very
capable clansmen had taken its toll on her. She had more things than she could
ever want—and so did the orphanage and charities that she had donated most of
those things to. Now, she found herself standing back in the Hokage’s office,
Madara to her right, Tobirama to her left.

“Have you chosen?” Tobirama asked in that presuming way of
his. It was something she didn’t think she’d ever shake him of, despite their
sort-of friendship.

Madara didn’t say anything, just standing there, looking at
her smugly. He was so sure he’d won.

But Sakura knew the game. “I have chosen,” she said. Tsunade
was radiating amusement, but luckily, neither of the clansmen picked up, or
perhaps just didn’t find it of concern.

The silenced stretched.

“Well?” Madara prompted.

Sakura smirked, victorious. “I choose neither of you.”

In their own ways, both Tobirama and Madara looked
gobsmacked.

Tsunade burst into rude, haughty laughter.

“But…after all this?” Tobirama asked, shocked and probably a
little hurt, too. Madara was quickly veering off into anger, but Sakura didn’t
care. She was sorry that she’d hurt Tobirama, but she’d never once given any
indication that she would choose him.

“Yes, after all this,” Sakura said. “I told both of you that
I didn’t want to marry you. You chose to try a woo me in ways that I often couldn’t
refuse.” Here she eyed Madara. He’d been the most devious about it, more often
than not forcing his gifts onto her. “I’m sorry if I hurt either of you, but I
already gave you my answer. From the very first day, in fact.”

Madara straightened now. “And why,” he asked, “do you
refuse?”

“Because I don’t want
to marry you,” she said.

“But-” To their horror, both Madara and Tobirama spoke at
the same time.

Tsunade interjected. “Is that not reason enough?” she asked
sternly.

Madara turned his glare on Tsunade, but Tobirama was more
deferential. “Hokage-sama, if I may-”

Tsunade settled them both with a cold, dangerous look. “That’s
enough. If I hear of your harassing my apprentice—the Hokage’s apprentice,” she emphasized, “there will be consequences
that you will not like. She has given you’re her answer.” Before another word
could be said their defense, she ordered: “Dismissed.”

Both men left with undue fanfare, and then Tsunade turned to
Sakura.

“Really, though,” she said curiously, angry façade melting
away. “They both would have treated you well.” She paused. “Tobirama, anyways.”

Sakura shook her head and smiled. “I said it already,
shishou. I don’t want to get married. That’s the only reason.”

Tsunade looked her up and down appraisingly, then an
expression of fond pride came over her.

“Good for you, Sakura.”

2100 words because apparently I’m not capable of drabbling. It’s 1am where I’m at and so not only is this barely edited, I am also retiring for the night. You can still leave an ask, though, and if I’m up to it, I’ll write it tomorrow!