Okay, my very first fanfic. Here goes nothing. =) I'll love you forever if you give me your thoughts on this, and constructive criticism is welcome, too.
In this story, Team Asuma (minus Asuma) and Kaida are, I guesstimate, in their early twenties.
Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto or the characters in it, unfortunately. Kaida is mine, as are Wakana and Hotaka. The thing about the making a fool of himself was taken from River Secrets, in which that's a minor plot to the bigger story.
"...Always silent, smart, ready to give me anything."
"What a drag..."
"Just once, I'd like to see you not the perfect man. Why don't you make a fool of yourself for me?"
She hated him. She hated him for being so perfect, for always being there for her, for making her so illogically unsure with a simple question. Worse, she hated herself for hating him.
Kaida was only half listening as Lady Tsunade described the mission and who she would be working with this time. She snapped out of her depressing daydream as the Hokage ended with a "Got all that?"
"Uh, sure," Kaida replied, trying for the endless optimism and energy she always displayed. "This mission will be a success, I guarantee it!"
"Good. Meet the team you'll be working with by the exit to the village in a half an hour," came the reply.
Kaida forced a grin and silly salute, then exited Lady Tsunade's office. On her way to her home to pack for the trip (she guessed to pack enough for a day or three), she laughed much harder than necessary at some of the younger ninja showing off for each other, then again at Gai and Lee as they practiced invigorating and youth-filled speeches. The laughter never reached her hazel eyes.
She packed quickly and reached the exit of Konoha in half the time required by Lady Tsunade. She was eager for a mission and hopefully a fight to take her mind off of how she had yelled at him for no apparent reason.
"Hey, Ino!" Kaida called and waved fifteen minutes later as the kunoichi came into sight, then was followed by Choji. Kaida froze. This was the team she was being sent on a mission with? Maybe he wouldn't be coming, though. Maybe it would just be Ino and Choji.
Just her luck, Shikamaru was right behind Choji. Kaida shook herself and attempted a smile at all three. Shikamaru would never be fooled, but perhaps she could get Ino and Choji to think nothing was wrong.
Ino sighed dramatically as she reached the place where Kaida stood. "This mission is going to be the worst. I mean, we're ninja, for goodness' sake, not movers. I can't believe our mission is to relocate someone from one town to a different building in the same town!" she complained.
Kaida grinned, focusing on Ino's topic choice as a way to avoid saying anything to Shikamaru. Besides, since she had zoned out while Lady Tsunade was describing the mission to her, an update was good. She began to say something, but Choji broke in between bites of chips.
"We're not helping just anyone move, Ino," he reminded her. "A world-renowned restaurant owner and chef. He needs our help setting up, and maybe he'll reward us with some of his famous food."
Kaida laughed. "As we'll be staying with him for the duration of the mission, I'm sure we'll have that chance."
"We'd better get started, then," Shikamaru added. Kaida quieted and developed sudden intense interest in the scenery of where they would be headed once they began moving. "The sooner we get there, the sooner Choji can sample his cooking."
"Right!" Ino agreed, setting off. Kaida forced another laugh and ran ahead, not bothering to wait and see how quickly the others were following.
The group of four spent the day walking along the road that would eventually lead them to the town they were needed at, stopping once for lunch and again for supper. Just before night fell, they set up camp and chatted for a while around a fire. Close to an hour later, Ino shooed the boys off, claiming to want a girl-chat by the light of the fire. Choji rolled his eyes but complied, crawling into one of the two tents. After a long look at Kaida (which she ignored and stared instead at the fire) Shikamaru followed his friend.
"All right," Ino began softly when Shikamaru was in the tent. "What's wrong?"
Kaida looked over at Ino with feigned surprise and innocence. "What do you mean?"
Ino smirked. "You've hardly said two words to your boyfriend all day. What'd you do, break up or something? That's kind of hard to believe." She refilled her glass with water.
Kaida bit back a sigh and stared into the flames again, silent for a while. Then, finally, "Shikamaru wants to buy me a ring."
Ino choked on her drink. Silence reigned for a while again, then Ino broke it. "You say that like it's a bad thing."
Kaida half shrugged. "I'm just being an idiot, I guess. I do love him. But then I practically bit his head off when he said that."
She still remembered every word of their heated argument. Or, at least, she had had the heated and argument parts both; he had just given an annoyed comment every once in a while in reply. 'Why don't you make a fool of yourself for me?' was probably one of the worse things she had said.
"Will you try and kill me if I ask why?"
"No."
Silence, as Ino waited. Then:
"Why?"
"He's a genius, funny when he wants to be, serious most other times, quiet a lot. He acts as though he never wants to do anything 'too troublesome', yet he'll risk his life for me and any other friend in a heartbeat. He demolishes me at thinking games. He hardly ever displays weakness."
Ino gave Kaida a weird look. "You're not making any sense. You sound like you're listing all his good points."
Kaida shook her head and stood. "I am."
She entered into the other tent, leaving Ino confused as to what could possibly be making her friend act this way.
The next morning was spent much the same as the previous one. Kaida laughed and joked enough with Ino and Choji to give herself a headache; and this time she made it a point to include Shikamaru in some of the topics, still conscious of last night's conversation where Ino had mentioned that she had hardly talked with Shikamaru. She made an extra effort to pretend everything was normal.
They found themselves at their destination about an hour after lunch. It was a large building; the interior held many boxes and tables and chairs and several other items. The upstairs, Kaida guessed, led to where the owner or owners lived, probably stuffed with more evidence of moving.
The four ninja waited around in the room they found themselves in when they entered. There was a violin playing in the background. Choji broke open another bag of snacks.
Eventually an older man came into view from the upstairs and started in surprise at the small group waiting for him.
"We're closed, sorry. I suggest coming back a few weeks earlier," he said. Kaida grinned politely at the comment that seemed to be intended as a joke.
"Actually, sir, we're the ninja from Konoha, here to help you move your things," Shikamaru explained, though he seemed slightly distracted, thinking hard, Kaida noticed. He hadn't been like that outside.
"Ah, yes!" the man brightened. "Wakana!" he called upstairs where he had been moments earlier. The violin playing stopped and a few seconds passed before a young girl with red hair similar to Kaida's appeared.
"Yes, Father?" she asked, smiling at the visitors.
"These people claim to be the help we hired," he told her, then turned to the group once again. "My name is Hotaka, and this is my daughter, Wakana."
"Ino, Choji, Kaida, and Shikamaru," Shikamaru said, motioning to each one as he said their names. "Just tell us what to do."
In minutes, the six of them were going around and helping to pack up and get things ready to be moved. The chore lasted the rest of the day with little conversation. Finally, around seven o'clock, Hotaka announced that supper was ready.
Choji was the first to abandon what he was doing and seat himself at a table still useable. Kaida laughed and joined him quickly at her stomach's insistence, whereas Ino and Shikamaru and Wakana finished what they were doing first and then sat for the meal.
The next day was much the same – packing, eating, packing, chatting, packing.
That night, at supper, Wakana brought down her violin to play for them. She played happy and sad songs both, lively and slow, and somewhere in between. Kaida saw Choji shoot Shikamaru a look and wished she understood what it meant.
Speaking of looks, though, Ino said no more of Kaida and Shikamaru's problem, but she seemed to try and get the two to find each other conveniently working near each other on a regular basis. The looks she sent Kaida were clear enough: Make up with him! The silence when that happened was far too loud.
Finally, after another day had passed, they were ready to move the things. The day after, they set out in pairs, Ino and Choji, Kaida and Hotaka, Shikamaru and Wakana. Kaida couldn't help but feel a twinge of jealousy creep up at a secretively pleased expression on Shikamaru's face when he and Wakana returned from one of their trips to the new and bigger building.
She was immediately distracted, though, as a large and heavy box was shoved into her arms by Hotaka. With difficulty, she turned her attention to him as he described his new place proudly.
"I'll be able to fit even more people into it," he continued. "More people means more business, which means more money, which means more food items can be bought and made into a recipe and added to the menu, which means more business. It's a never-ending cycle. Soon I'll probably be moving to another bigger building!"
Kaida had definitely not packed enough to last the duration of this mission, and Ino somehow knew it. When Hotaka announced a day of rest after a week of work-well-done, Ino seized the moment to drag Kaida off shopping. It was one of her least favorite activities, made worse when Wakana grabbed Shikamaru to do something together. But Ino would not take no for an answer, so Kaida grudgingly obeyed.
One way or another, Ino got Kaida to blow much more than half of the money she had brought with on clothes – one fancy dress in particular. If asked later how Ino had talked her into it, she never would be able to remember, or perhaps she just didn't want to tell.
Most of the day, though, was spent on Ino trying on clothes, not Kaida.
"How do I look in this?" she asked, only to ditch it for another outfit. "Do you think Sasuke would notice me in this?" "What do you think of this?"
Halfway through the day, Kaida simply grabbed a boring book (it was more interesting than watching her shop-a-holic friend model every stylish outfit every store in town had) and gave a noncommittal "hmmm" or "mhmm" each time Ino asked her opinion.
Ino was loaded down with shopping bags by the time she was ready to return, whereas Kaida had only two with a few outfits in each, plus that one book. Suddenly, when they were almost to the restaurant, Ino stopped.
"What's wrong?" Kaida asked, afraid Ino would say she had missed a store and therefore had to go try on more outfits.
Ino looked down at her bags, mumbling unintelligibly to herself. Finally, she spoke up so Kaida could understand her. "I forgot one of my shopping bags!" was the horrified reply. "Would you go get it for me?" Ino asked Kaida, her tone more ordering than requesting.
Kaida grimaced. "Why me?"
"I would be buried under all these bags if I were to add another one. You only have two bags; it wouldn't be too, too much trouble for you to get it for me, right?" Ino gave her a puppy-eyed look.
Kaida groaned even as she turned around. "Which store did you leave it at?"
Ino's expression suddenly changed mischievous behind Kaida's back, but her tone was kept the same as before as she answered Kaida. As Kaida left to retrieve the forgotten purchase, Ino opened the door of the restaurant to the worst violin-playing she had heard. Was Wakana botching some musical piece on purpose? Kaida could think of no other explanation for the horrid sound.
The next few weeks either flew by or dragged by, depending on what mood Kaida was in. Most of them dragged, especially when she caught herself thinking about Shikamaru. She still was unsure what caused her to react the way she did to his simple statement, but she was no more willing to back down now than she had been at the start.
Setting up all the stuff in the new building proved a difficult task made even more difficult due to Hotaka's continuously changing mind on where he wanted things to go and how he wanted them arranged. Not only did they have to set up the things coming from the old building, but also some new furniture and kitchen things that had been bought. Goodness, had Kaida been wrong when she thought this mission would take only a few days at most. She was beginning to get homesick. And fightsick. She had little time during the day to devote to training, not to mention she had no partners to train with. She could go without the partner, but not getting much training in was starting to bug her.
But only when Choji jumped in surprise when she snapped at him for the smallest thing did she realize she really needed to find some way to get rid of the cooped-up feeling she was having from this indoor routine that was establishing. From then on, she woke before the sun and went just outside the town to train vigorously. It felt wonderful, and well worth waking up earlier.
The next day that Hotaka declared a holiday, before Ino could take her shopping again, Kaida escaped to her training spot outside the town bent on spending all day there.
Hearing a noise in the shadows around midafternoon, Kaida was about to thrust her kunai there when Shikamaru appeared, yawning.
"What are you doing here?" Kaida asked, scowling at him for surprising her.
"Thought maybe you'd want a training partner," he replied lazily. Her expression softened ever so slightly and he continued, "It's a pain, training. But never training is an even bigger drag."
Kaida considered him for a moment, debating whether to accept his offer or tell him to get lost. "Okay then," she agreed, albeit somewhat reluctantly.
While they trained together, Kaida had to force herself not to attack him with everything she had. It was difficult not to let out all the frustration she was feeling through attacking him. He wouldn't complain if she did, she realized. Other than the usual complaint that she was troublesome, he had never tried to stop her from letting out all she was feeling through attacking him back at Konoha when she got mad at anyone and everyone except him.
So did that mean she was angry at him now?
She wasn't sure. The more she thought about it, the more she was convinced that she was just angry at herself, none at him anymore, if she had been at all in the first place. And yet she still couldn't – wouldn't – bring herself to apologize.
Still, she did determine to be friendlier towards him from then on.
Suddenly she caught his hand as he aimed an attack at her. Instead of counterattacking or letting go, she held onto it and studied it.
"Your fingers are red where I think Wakana has calluses," she commented. From violin-playing or helping her father in the restaurant or something else? Kaida wondered.
Shikamaru flushed slightly. "Your point?" he asked, sounding an odd mixture of annoyed and bored and even a small hint of nervousness.
She shrugged, let him go, and went back to training.
"Can you believe we're almost done with this mission!" Ino exclaimed weeks later. "The day of the grand opening will be our last day here!"
Choji grinned. "I gotta say, I'll be glad to get back to Konoha and my many favorite places to eat there, though I'm going to miss this food a lot, too."
"Don't get too impatient," Shikamaru advised. "We'll get back to the village soon enough."
Kaida wrinkled her nose even as she grinned. "I don't know if I even want to stick around for the opening ceremony. I'm going to have to get dressed up, aren't I?"
"Of course!" Ino laughed. "Look, just wear that dress you bought here. I promise I won't force you to go shopping with me to get something better," she vowed.
Kaida smirked. "Good."
A few days later, the day of the grand opening dawned. Ino set off immediately after breakfast to hunt down the perfect outfit. Choji entered the kitchen with Hotaka to help cook for that night. Kaida stuck around, bored. She had almost decided to spend most of the day training, but had changed her mind when she saw Wakana and Shikamaru exchange a look at her near-departure that Kaida swore said they were glad she was leaving.
Kaida supposed she was no longer considered Shikamaru's girlfriend, and she told herself she didn't care. But when jealousy seemed to strike at seeing the two together, she realized she did care. She at least cared that Shikamaru found a girl good enough for him.
So when Shikamaru ducked into the kitchen to help Choji and Hotaka, she claimed Wakana for a stroll around town, talking and laughing and just generally getting to know her better.
"So what's your opinion on Shikamaru?" Kaida finally asked, just before the time they should be heading back.
Wakana seemed suddenly interested in scrutinizing each store and restaurant they passed by, not looking at Kaida. "He's a very nice man," she answered slowly, seeming to choose her words with care. "He seems lazy at times, but-" here she looked over at Kaida "-he loves you, and he'll do anything for you." She stopped, blushed, and looked away again.
Kaida stared at her for a moment, then looked up at the clouds. "That's how he used to be," she said softly. "I didn't think he still did, after..." She stopped, unwilling to tell Wakana what she had told Ino.
When it became clear Kaida would say no more, Wakana changed the subject, seeming grateful for the change in topic. "It's getting late. We should head back and get ready."
Kaida forced another grin and nodded. "Right. I bet Ino will want to do something major with my hair, and she'll need plenty of time for that!" With that, Kaida grabbed Wakana's hand and pulled her along at a half-run back to the restaurant, laughing most of the way as the girls dodged and weaved their way through whatever crowds were in their way.
As Kaida guessed, the moment she and Wakana returned, Ino pounced on them to get ready, gave them both tips on how to look more presentable, and fixed Kaida's hair just the right way. Wakana's hair style for the night, she declared, was perfect already.
When Ino finally declared the three girls finished, they walked down together to the already-crowded restaurant. Wakana picked up her violin and began playing softly in a corner with a couple other instruments and musicians. Kaida and Ino stood with Shikamaru and Choji as Hotaka welcomed them all and sent a special thanks "to the ninja from Konoha, without whom I never would have opened up again so early."
Dinner was delicious and filled with conversation and laughter. Shikamaru seemed to have his mind on other things, but Kaida figured he was just anxious to get back to Konoha. Midway through, there was a sudden silence and Kaida realized Hotaka and Wakana had grabbed everyone's attention again. Wakana held her violin as she stood silently next to her father.
"Now we will listen to someone play the violin solo," Hotaka announced. Kaida noticed he didn't say his daughter's name, but she still expected Wakana to lift the violin to her chin and begin to play.
And she was extremely surprised when Shikamaru, blushing ferociously and deadly serious, moved from his place beside her to join the father and daughter.
'Why don't you make a fool of yourself for me?'
That one line she had spat out in a fit of frustration eons ago came back to her now. "Shikamaru," Kaida whispered.
Wakana handed Shikamaru the violin and she and her father stepped back. Shikamaru lifted the bow to the strings and began to play. In front of more than a hundred people, he began to play. Shikamaru, who had never been able to do anything musical, began to play.
And it sounded horrid.
The look on his face was pure concentration, and yet each note sounded painfully awful. A few guests covered their ears. Kaida sent them a venomous glare that would've wilted any plant, listening intensely.
As he played what sounded vaguely like a love song she had heard a few times before, Kaida wondered how she could have been so blind. His thoughtfulness as he heard Wakana play for the first time. His spending time with Wakana more than anyone else during this mission. The terrible violin-playing she had heard as Ino entered the building after their day of shopping. The way his fingers were red where Wakana had calluses, doubtless now from all her years of playing the violin. Wakana's blush as she talked carefully of Shikamaru, because she hadn't wanted to give away the surprise, Kaida now realized. And there had probably been other hints she hadn't seen that she should have.
The last note sounded. Shikamaru had finished playing and was staring at her, his face still red from embarrassment. He seemed to be trying to gauge her reaction. She stared right back. Complete silence reigned as the guests began to realize that there may have been something more significant to the song than first appeared - or perhaps they didn't know if they were supposed to clap for Shikamaru's performance or not.
Kaida felt tears sting her eyes and make their way down her cheeks. Blurry vision caused her to trip over guests and chairs and her own feet more than once as she finally broke into motion and ran towards Shikamaru, ran towards the man she had never stopped loving, ran towards the man who had never stopped loving her.
She tackled Shikamaru in hug. "Yes, I'll marry you," she said, smiling through her tears. He slowly grinned, then leaned forward and kissed her, ignoring the crowd that saw and burst into loud applause.
Don't forget to review! 8D EDIT: Liked Devotion? Now there's DEVOTED! It's the same thing, but from Shikamaru's point of view, so it shows some stuff not seen here in Devotion. Check Devoted out? Please? Thank you? xD