A/N: Honestly, you could replace Shikamaru with Sasuke or Neji, the way I wrote him. But it's kinda what I imagine him acting, I guess. I've had bits and pieces of this one-shot for about a year now, but I decided ehhh why not just break it into parts and do a multichapter to see if people were interested in me continuing it...As much as I love SasuHina, I will always have a thing for ShikaHina, because To Be A Cool Adult by gracemis was one of the first fanfics I ever ever read. (So if you haven't read it yet, go read it!) Thanks for reading, and don't forget to review! xoxo
If there was anything he was, it wasn't a selfish lover.
And yet, for all that he was, and all that he wasn't, was that all she could say about him right now?
Maybe. And rightly so.
She could feel the outline of his chiseled chest pressed against the back of her head, each of the muscles in his lanky arms as they wrapped around her. She feel his breath softly on the back of her neck as he slept-soundly, and without dreams. She could feel every inch of him pressed onto every inch of her as they lay tangled underneath the sheets.
A genius, a strategist, a leader, a godfather, a teacher, a son, a teammate, a friend-and all she could come up with was that he wasn't a selfish lover.
She mentally berated herself and curled herself into a tighter ball, only to be held closer by the naked boy-man-beside her.
It was times like these when she thought to herself he might love her. After they had slept together. There was something in the way that he pulled her to him that made her question him in awe and wonder.
Because Nara Shikamaru wasn't the type of person to use people. And he certainly didn't use her. Not the way he was the one who left her breathless on the nights they spent together.
"It's because you're a woman, Hinata," Ino told her once. "Of course you're going to think of these things."
And of course he wouldn't?
But as she felt his heart beating in time with hers against her back, why couldn't she believe that he, the genius that he was, didn't think or feel the same way she did? As she felt his fingers stroke her ribs, could she allow herself to believe he wanted her the way she thought he did?
And then she'd have to think back and and try to figure out for herself. Mostly during these times when he was asleep, like in bed now or in their frequent naps in the shade, as she lay listening to the sound of his soothing, steady breaths. Just him and her and her thoughts-because this, this felt so right.
