Title: Spring Is In the Air – Redux
Author: Lovesrainscent
Rating: T
Pairing: Shikamaru/Temari
Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto or these characters and stand to make no profit from posting this story. I do not own Peeps either, they are the product of the Just Born Candy Company.
Summary: Sequel to "Spring is in the Air" - more Peeps and naughtiness with Shika/Tema, this time from Shikamaru's point of view! Re-posted by user request.
(Note: Peeps are a candy abundantly available in the springtime where I live. For those of you who don't know what they are you can check out marshmallowpeeps dot com.)
Spring Is In the Air – Redux
Shikamaru yawned.
Saturday night and he was at a grocery store in Konoha.
Somehow he and Temari had sunk to such a depth of domesticity that they were now spending Saturday evening in the frozen food aisle comparing boxes of Very Early Tiny Tender Young Baby Spring Sweet Peas.
Spring.
It seemed like such a distant memory. The winter in Konoha had been longer and more miserable this year than he could ever recall. There had been very few days of fluffy, white clouds and certainly none where it was warm enough to lie on his back and enjoy them.
And of course, this would have to be the first full winter Temari had spent with him in Konoha.
She had managed to make it clear in no uncertain terms that she was not pleased with the weather. He had lost count of the number of times he had been reminded that it was never this cold in Suna!
But finally, today there had been the faintest hint of spring. The air was clear and very cool but at least above freezing. On the way to the Hokage tower on business this morning he had noticed the first few green shoots of the snowdrops and crocus venturing up from the ground, poking through the remnants of snow.
Birds, too, had started to return to Konoha. Rather than the profound stillness punctuated only by the occasional owl he had heard a choruses of awakening songbirds at dawn this morning when he had come off the overnight shift of guard duty at the village gates.
So once again spring was in the air, the birds were in their nests and Peeps were on the shelves.
Peeps.
He stopped still in his tracks. Directly across the frozen food aisle stood a display of the Holy Grail of spring candy…Peeps. Yes, groundhogs and robins be damned, these were the ultimate harbingers of spring.
Bright, gay colors and beady little eyes glanced cheerfully at him from behind good old-fashioned cellophane wrappers, none of this new-fangled freshness-film shit.
Peeps.
The consummate, unchanging bastion of all that was good and sweet and joyous and cavity inducing about childhood.
You could eat them, stretch them, poke them, decapitate them, burn them, toast them, float them on hot chocolate, even make Peeps-brulee out of them.
Armies of Peeps had lent themselves unflinchingly to numerous scientific experiments as over the years of his boyhood he had microwaved them, attempted to dissolve them, and launched flotillas of Peeps explorers out to sea with Chouji, who wondered why they couldn't just eat them.
Untold numbers of valiant Peeps warriors had faced each other every spring in jousts in his mom's microwave, each armed only with a toothpick and its own courage.
And no matter what you did to them they smiled at you. They were happy you were enjoying them. As a matter of fact, everything about Peeps said pure sugar - pure enjoyment.
The corners of his mouth twitched upward in the faintest of smiles. Last year he had introduced Temari to Peeps and his enjoyment of them, their enjoyment of them, had reached new heights.
For some strange, mysterious reason known only to females, Temari found them a turn-on.
A terrific turn-on.
A terrific turn-on to a mind-boggling, exhausting, inventive, Kama-Sutra rivaling, what-do-you-mean-again-woman-I've-got-to-catch-my-breath orgy of carnal relations.
They were a….a….
He searched for an appropriate word.
Peeps-phrodisiac!
That's it – they were a fucking Peeps-phrodisiac for Temari.
And the prospect of a sticky, sweet Peeps enhanced evening sure beat the hell out of wondering which box of fetal Sweet Peas to choose!
Shikamaru glanced at Temari out of the corner of his eye. She was holding two boxes in her hands, reading the labels. He wondered if he could reach a package of Peeps and slip them into the shopping cart without her noticing.
Too late! She'd looked up and seen the display across the aisle. She stood rigid, frozen, entranced, like a deer caught in the lights of an approaching train. He looked at his woman, then across the aisle, following her gaze, scanning the rows of yellow peeps, pink peeps, purple, green, up higher still to the object that held her mesmerized.
There, on the top of the display! He hadn't seen them earlier….
Holy shit!
Red Peeps!
He knew they had expanded their color offerings over the years, but … but … but always in pastel.
Red Peeps!
Sweet mother of….
What would she do with Red Peeps?
His knees turned weak.
Temari looked up at him and smiled...sweetly.
Without saying a word, he walked across the aisle and plucked a box of Red Peeps from the shelf, tossing them nonchalantly into the shopping cart.
After all, he thought to himself, duty is the essence of manhood.