their secret garden

"Even a patch of dirt will become a garden, if given time to grow and love that will last forever,"

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the boy who intrigued her

Rain poured in buckets down on the village of Konoha, like the sky itself had held everything in for too long and now it had exploded in a fit of rage upon the earth. Thunder crackled in the night air and Niwa felt sorry for any poor soul that was caught up in the storm. It was far past closing time for the bookstore her family owned but Niwa had kept it open on accident after being pulled into a book that was recently published.

With a particularly loud crack of thunder, Niwa was roused from the book and looked up in surprise. There was no one in the small family owned bookstore and Niwa rubbed her chest thoughtfully as her heart rate began to slow down from the jump scare. She dog-eared the page she was on, giving it one last glance before finally pulling herself up to begin closing down the bookstore.

She started in the back, as was her ritual that she did every night.

She rubbed her fingers against the spines of books up and down the rows. Some were smooth, their bodies having not been opened yet. Others were all but falling apart at the seams, the way only a old and very much beloved book could hope to achieve. Some gripped at the ridges in her fingerprints as if so say, read me! pick me up! It was all Niwa could do to continue on throughout each row of books, making sure everything was in it's rightful place, carefully tucked away in their special nooks and crannies, like children right before bedtime.

A small smile graced Niwa's lips at the thought.

She likened herself to the bookstore's mother, full of love and compassion for her books and for the children that would come into the store with wide eyes and a finger pushed over their lips in the universal sign for quiet.

It was when Niwa had made her way up to the front of the bookstore that she noticed a visitor. He was dripping, from head to toe and it did not take a genius to realize he had just come from outside the rain.

"Sir...?" Niwa said in an unsure voice.

Oh, how her aunts would have whacked her upside the head for such a hesitant tone. Niwa blinked her thoughts away as the stranger, who was a few inches taller than her, turned around to face her. Upon seeing the gleaming hitai-ate he wore proudly over his forehead, Niwa was promptly reminded of her manners. She patted down her pockets and became more flustered the longer it took her to find what she wanted.

"Aha!" she pulled the light pink handkerchief out of her skirts pocket and held it in front of the shinobi. He glanced at it, then at her without saying anything and Niwa had the feeling she had just failed a test of sorts.

"Um...you can use this."

He frowned at her as he continued standing where he was, completely soaked to the bone and Niwa shuffled her feet and licked her lips in preparation for what she wanted to say.

"It won't help very much, but at least you can dry your face with it," she hedged and he slowly reached a hand out, as if that small act of social politeness took everything out of him. He gave one last look at the pink handkerchief that Niwa couldn't decipher until he began to dab at his face with surprising delicacy.

Niwa stood in awkward silence, wondering if the boy felt just as awkward as her or if he just didn't want to talk to her. The shinobi didn't make eye contact with Niwa and it only served to increase her curiosity of him.

Niwa was pulled from her thoughts as he handed the—now soaked—handkerchief back to her.

Niwa smiled, polite as always, and he looked away from her with his arms crossed. She wondered if it was because he was uncomfortable with her being so close to him and she backed up a little to give him some space. Niwa wasn't surprised when he gave no reaction to her possible thoughtfulness. He was a shinobi after all.

Niwa jumped when another crack of thunder shot through the sky and it felt like the sky was attempting to rip through the crust of the earth itself, for how loud it was.

The shinobi gave her a very unimpressed look and Niwa offered a smile in apology. He nodded at her curtly and turned around to head back outside. In a moment of sheer spontaneity, Niwa's hand darted out to the shinobi's and held onto his wrist. Her hand immediately grew wet from latching onto his drenched shirt sleeve but Niwa was also surprised at the amount of heat he was exuding as well.

Niwa wondered if he was getting a fever or if all shinobi were as hot as him.

"I have an umbrella you can use—" Niwa started but he gently pulled his hand away from her and shook his head.

"No need," he said with a quiet air. Niwa pursed her lips together in thought before she looked up at him and smiled.

"You protect our country so please, let me protect you from getting a cold." Niwa said with a quirk to her lips. She offered him her umbrella, and the frown didn't leave his face as he grabbed it from her with a look down at her hand still on his wrist.

It took Niwa a moment before she realized and she backpedaled as quickly as she could. Once she was a respectful distance away from him and not encroaching on his personal space, he turned the green umbrella experimentally in his hands before giving her a nod that seemed too serious and opened the door of the bookstore to head back outside.

"Thank you," he said, and Niwa had barely heard him over the thunder outside and the water that beat down against the small little bookstore. And in a literal flash of lightning, he was there one moment, and gone the next.

Niwa stared at the closed door before an intrigued smile graced her lips and she turned back to the cash register where she sat down to get comfortable for the night.

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AN: okay, so. I had a lot of fun writing this. Thank jiemae and L1mey for helping me with this, she is literal bae.

No idea how this will play out but it's looking like it might be told in drabbles. Anyways, slow burn romance fic with the military extremist we all know and love—Danzō Shimura.

This is my first time writing romance. Tell me what you think, and if anything is wrong that I need to fix.

Questions:

What are you hoping to see in this fic?

So far, what do you think of Niwa?

Thoughts on the writing? Do you see any errors? What's your favorite part of this chapter?