It tastes sweet in his mouth, his teeth sinking into the white flesh easily.  The juice that leaks out spreads over his tongue, trickles down his throat, and he swallows reflexively.  He chews meditatively, savoring the sweet yet tart taste, and then throws the rest of the apple away.

 

        “Aniki?” he hears himself say, and he stares up into his older brother’s eyes.  If he tries hard enough, he can remember the hate too big for his small body, the anger that fills his senses and coats his eyes red, the betrayal that lifts its head up and howls to the moon every night.

 

        Itachi does not answer- he never answers, for some odd, Itachi-like reason- but he looks at Sasuke, and that is words enough.

 

        They remain like this, Sasuke curled into Itachi’s side and Itachi almost with his arm around his younger brother’s shoulders, one boy twelve and the other five, and in the background the snake slithers forward, hissing, its forked tongue darting forward.

 

        Itachi killed the clan Itachi betrayed me Itachi made me hate him why

 

        But not here.

 

        Not in this Paradise that Sasuke has created, not in this place where only he can go; not in this world where he and Itachi are as they were supposed to be.

 

        The snake climbs up a tree sinuously, and knocks down an apple.  It lands at Itachi’s feet, and he reaches forward- letting go of Sasuke- to pick it up.

 

       He takes one bite out of it, then turns and offers the rest to Sasuke, who accepts it.  Sasuke lifts it to his lips and bites into it.  For one moment it tastes like everything he’s ever wanted.

 

        And then Eden is no more.