What Went Wrong For Us?

Chapter 7

The day Naruto was dreading for a week and a half had finally come; the day he and Hinata were scheduled to attend their first marriage counseling session.

The morning of the session started well enough, but a few possible omens appeared before him. The most obvious one was at breakfast. Boruto and Himawari obviously knew about their parents' marriage counseling appointment. And they did not look happy that morning at breakfast.

First off, let's set the scene: There was no sun, just a gray, drab, dull, cloudy sky and a potential for rain outside their house. So there was no sunny rays bursting through the windows into the dining room. Everyone sat in their usual spots, with Naruto and Hinata at their respective ends, and Boruto and Himawari on the side. The food sat in front of them, but everyone lethargically reached for it instead of eagerly digging in. They made little sound, and whatever they did make was drowned out by the also-quiet-ish clock hanging over the table. Nobody said anything all breakfast. They only looked at each other with sad expressions and... okay, they did speak on occasion, but it was just to go through the morning motions.

Boruto and Himawari could barely even look at their parents, but they frequently shared worried and sad glances with each other. The only times they could actually look at their parents were few and far between. Boruto would look at his mom sadly, but glared at Naruto. Himawari couldn't glare at him if she tried, but her doe-eyes did enough to make him cringe.

And he didn't need to be psychic or whatever to see that he was damaging his relationship with Boruto even further than it already was. The extent of that damage probably wouldn't be seen for a while.

After today, however, he would not be able to deny the fact that things had not gone as he wanted them to anymore.

He looked at his rice bowl. It was empty, just like how he felt right now. He looked up at Hinata, thinking that seeing her could make him feel better. It didn't. He could also see that she was sad, and he felt bad for her, no question. But he didn't feel the need to walk up to her and kiss her. It would be a gesture as empty as the bowl in front of him. What's so useful about an empty bowl, anyway?

He lingered at the table, staring at that empty bowl for several minutes after breakfast ended; Boruto and Himawari had already gotten up to leave, but not before Boruto shot one more glare at his father. Naruto supposed he deserved it, in a sense.

Hinata got up as well and started cleaning the dishes. Naruto thought about getting up to help her more than once until he finally did. He asked her if she needed help, but she declined. She was just about done, already. Again, he showed no emotion to her reaction. And he had to wonder what was going on.

They had married at 19. He'd overheard someone saying that marriages like that only work if they were arranged, but he'd ignored that comment. It wasn't from one of his friends, anyway, and he felt like he had something good with Hinata. She was the first person he ever really loved. He only had a childish crush on Sakura because of his rivalry with Sasuke.

Did he really?

That doubt was creeping back into his head, and he physically shook it to figuratively get it out. There was no need to get worried. He was just going through a rough patch in the marriage, nothing more. He had faith that the counsellor could help them fix whatever patch they were facing.

The appointment was set for midday, halfway through the horse hour. They had plenty of time to work on what they wanted to discuss with the counsellor.

But they didn't. Naruto should've seen it as yet another omen.

Checking up on Boruto for just a moment, he was still very despondent when he arrived at Sarada's house to pick her up for the trip to the farm again. He and Mistuki waited for a couple minutes until Sarada emerged from the house with Mrs. Uchiha in tow. Mitsuki happily greeted both of them, but had to nudge Boruto to do the same. The other genin could only grudgingly wave at Sakura, who was getting ready for her long-awaited hospital shift.