The first time Shino Aburame had visited the house of his new teammate and prospective friend, he hadn't seen her. It was during his second stay that he'd laid eyes on the tall, lean figure of Hana Inuzuka.
He still remembered their original meeting clearly. She had frantically burst open the door of the Inuzuka house, expression wild with rage. Her features were perfectly sculpted and her expression seemed to reflect the righteous fury of perhaps an angel descended from Heaven above.
The words she had spoken still sounded within Shino's memory as distinctly as if they had been declared only the previous day.
"Kiba, you fool!! You left the east gate open! All the wolf pups have escaped! Don't give me that look! Get your damn failure of a lazy ass down there and CATCH THEM!!"
Ah, her voice was as the clear, ethereal ringing of a bell, only bolder and far more beautiful. It was cherubic, to say the very least, and even that term paled to its splendor in reality.
From that moment onward, Shino was completely smitten with Hana Inuzuka.
In the years that followed, Shino found himself making excuses to visit Kiba more and more often, if only to catch a glimpse of the incomparable beauty that was Hana's exquisite face. Her slender body was no less elegant or lovely. Hana's muscles were well-toned due to the harsh life she led as a shinobi. Working alongside dogs and wolves had given her a certain natural, feral charm that Shino couldn't help but admire. Her canines protruded farther than the rest of her perfectly straight, white teeth (although that was a common genetic trait of the Inuzuka clan and not solitarily hers), which only enhanced her already wild appearance. Large, perfectly rounded and soft-skinned breasts graced her fair chest, but it seemed that whenever Shino found the chance to stare at them rapturously, Hana's expression would change and she would turn away. Life was so often unfair.
If there had ever been any hint of sexism pervading the Inuzuka clan, any presumed predominance of male strength or superiority, Hana Inuzuka would have immediately shattered it. Her personality was even more ferocious than her incomparably divine countenance. She was domineering, pretentious, and undeniably competent. Still, there was a distinct compassion underlying her roughness, and Shino couldn't help but feel lightheaded whenever it emerged.
Indeed, Shino would often bring Hana gifts when he frequented the Inuzuka household as wordless expressions of his undying love. In the past, he'd graced Hana with countless flowers (the beauty and aroma of which could not, of course, hold a candle to her own), expensive jewelry, and even once an unfathomably rare species of beetle he'd spent hours searching for in the woods surrounding his own home.
This last gift, to Shino's intense dismay, was not received well. The object of his affections had, without a moment's hesitation, mangled her present using a shoe the moment he'd released it into the Inuzuka household. In retrospect, it may have been been wiser to have kept the insect caged.
On one occasion, Shino had gathered up the courage to ask Hana out directly. She had laughed.
Laughed.
Apparently, as Kiba had later awkwardly revealed, Hana had thought it a joke. She would never have even considered dating someone so much younger than her.
Shino had gone home that day rejected, utterly dejected, and with a heart shattered into a million seemingly irreparable pieces. He didn't make another attempt at winning Hana's affections for the duration of several seasons.
But he did eventually return. Three years after suffering Hana's painfully amused reaction to his heartfelt offer, Shino once more stood on Kiba's doorstep. He'd changed a great deal during those years; he was older, wiser, more mature, and had honed his skills well. His control of the innumerable chakra-consuming beetles that resided within his body was now absolutely flawless. Shino had become an excellent shinobi, and this achievement was marked not only by the hood and mask he wore furtively or by his ascension to the rank of Chuunin. There was so much more behind those shaded circular glasses he refused to take off.
The door opened and he was greeted with Hana's divine presence. This was the moment for which he'd so long prepared. This was his chance. This was it. Shino opened his mouth to speak and-
"Kiba! Get your butt down here! Your teammate's here to see you!"
Another wave of disappointment washed over him but he bit it back with determination. He refused to surrender now, when he was so close.
"Actually, Hana, I wanted to speak with you."
She blinked twice, surprised. Oh, if a face more heavenly existed anywhere on earth, Shino couldn't imagine it.
"You…" he began, but lost the words as a blush rose in his cheeks, although invisible behind his coverings. No, he had to be cool. Suave. Persuasive. Let her know that he was serious.
"Would you… go out with me?" the words spilled out of his mouth quickly and regrettably clumsily. Shino felt his face grow even hotter at his evident failure.
Hana blinked once more before beaming as if a child had just proposed to her. And although her expression was divinely wonderful, the amusement in it all but infuriated Shino.
"Do you think I'm kidding?" his indignation bestowed on him renewed confidence. Shino took a few steps closer to Hana and she backed up accordingly, eyes widening.
"Ah… no, of course not, Shino. It's just that…" her words were silenced as Shino slammed one hand on the wall that Hana had been forced up against and moved his face closer to hers.
"W-What are you doing?" had Shino always been so… forceful? It obligated Hana to reconsider her view of her younger brother's teammate as a child.
Hana had always considered that boy who turned a brilliant shade of crimson whenever he neared her like another little sibling. But there was something markedly different about him now. That masculinity, that strength, that assertiveness… it most certainly had not existed before.
When had he grown up?
Hana's own cheeks reddened as Shino removed the mask covering his mouth and pressed his lips firmly over hers.
She closed her eyes and the fingers of their left hands intertwined.
From that moment onward, or perhaps even before it (although it had gone unrealized until that first kiss), Hana Inuzuka was completely smitten with Shino Aburame.