Songs For The Heartbroken: That's What You Get

Chapter 2

Meditating as an exercise to get acquainted with the feeling of one's chakra is quite the experience. One starts with breathing, eyes closed. Eleven seconds in, and seven seconds out. Evening out and balancing the intake and outtake of oxygen going into the body; gradually taking longer with each breath. Then, one can properly feel the body; the heart, the blood pumping through the veins, the energy of each and every part of our body that keeps us alive. This last one is what makes the physical part of energy in chakra.

It starts out dark, the emptiness in the black of the back of one's eyelids. Even if one cannot see it, we definitively can feel it, it's warm and comforting, like an embrace created by the realization that we are in fact alive. And then, there is a light; a tiny bluish glimmer burning within one's body. It starts out little, maybe the size of a rice grain; but given time and encouragement, it grows. You can gradually see more of it. Although a more appropriate word would be 'feel'; you can feel it growing, or to be precise, you feel more of it. Like a light that is being shed over your body, making those corners that were once in the dark, visible. With patience and time, you slowly discover parts of your chakra system you did not know existed before.

If getting a feel of my coils and their shortcomings and weak points was hard; then I expected actually channeling chakra would be a bitch and a half. But even before I even got to that, I had to learn how to identify and separate it. Yeah, separate a 'light' that I could see inside my body. Notice my enthusiasm please.

Here is where meditating turned hardcore.

The aim was to identify and separate the physical and spiritual portions of my chakra in order to make its manipulation easier. That was the theory; I understood what I was supposed to do. Now carrying it out was another thing entirely. Have you ever tried to separate a light? To say I was having a hard time with it would have been an understatement; but I wouldn't say I hadn't improved either. I just wasn't improving at the rate I would have hoped.

"Nope, I lost it again." I said opening my eyes and whipping the sweat off my brow with the back of my sleeve. Sat across me, was Shisui, eyes scarlet staring right at me with a steaming teacup in his hands.

The glass panels of the veranda were closed to keep the freezing November wind out. And even though it still hadn't snowed, the low temperatures were preventing us from training outside. The chakra flow to Shisui's eyes was cut, making them go back to their original black. His face remained as relaxed as ever, with the same soft warmth he always had radiated. There was no frustration, no impatience, no disappointment in his eyes when he looked at me. and as much as that put me at ease, I wanted that expression to change to one of pride.

"It took you less time to find your core, this time. And you held it for fifteen more minutes than last time. You are showing progress, Akane-chan."

Two years had passed since both my brother and the Uchiha heir had promised to help me become a kunoichi. Itachi and I were scheduled to start the academy on spring, and my brother had graduated early and was now on the active genin corps. Because of the ongoing war, Shisui was not in Konoha that much anymore, he had to run supply missions to the outposts and camps across the entire country. But when he was home, he spent every spare moment he had either training me or just making me company while I did my chores.

When he wasn't though, Itachi would take over for him and help me out; to his two year old otouto's great annoyance. When Sasuke had turned two, I had made the toddler my little sidekick, even if his brother was not fond of the idea, and every time Itachi brought him over to our home, we would plot against him. The thing is, Itachi loved nothing more than he loved his little brother, so whenever we would do this, he would get extremely annoyed, even if he would never show it, even less admit it. But he always appreciated the help when he had clan meetings to attend and couldn't bring Sasuke with him.