Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto or any of its characters, merchandise, TV rights, ect… (I think you get the point.)

Summery

ONE SHOT – Christmas is all about tradition, some are good, some not so good and some that Uchiha Sasuke thinks should be for him alone. (Sasuke/Ino)

Like all of my work this is just something that happened to float through the empty void inside my head. Like it or hate it please R and R as honest opinions are always welcomed, as are random acts of worship.

Lamb: This is just my way of saying thank you to all the amazing SasuIno writers out there. I've loved reading your fics and I've really appreciated all your support when I posted my own. So thank you all for making me feel so welcome.

Muse: Though if any of you had had any sense you would have told her to get lost right at the start.

Dedi: Like we should have done with you.

Lamb: As always sorry for any bad spelling and if you feel the need to throw things at me please wait until I've hidden behind the sofa kay!?

Muse: On with the fic!

She runs on 100 proof attitude power,
And the more she ignores me,
The more I adore her,
What can I do?
I'd do anything for her,
'cause she's bittersweet,
She knocks me off of my feet,
And I can't help myself,
I don't want anyone else,

Christmas Customs

Sasuke groaned inwardly as the small bell hanging over the shop door rang merrily for what seemed like the millionth time in the past hour. The welcoming jingle-jangle was slowly driving him mad and he really didn't know why he was putting up with it. It was like being in hell, the constant chiming of the bell, the persistent chatter of a rabid fangirl and all her other tendencies when all he wanted was to be left alone.

No, that wasn't exactly true.

Hypocrite even though he confessed himself to be even he couldn't swallow that lie. He had come into the Yamanaka flower shop of his own free will and no one had forced him to remain there for over and hour and a half. If fact the blonde kunoichi who was currently working was doing a very good job of showing that if she had any choice in the matter she'd be forcing him to leave, rather than trying to get him to stay.

Ino had changed a lot in the years since he abandoned and then returned to Konoha, she was now nothing like the fangirl she had once been. All the chatting she was doing was with the customers that hurried in and out of the shop, mostly after mistletoe and holly this being the day before Christmas eve, and was doing her best to act as if her one time crush was not there.

But as for the last… he didn't so much want to be left alone, more like left alone by his oh so clingy and affectionate pink haired team-mate. It seemed that Sakura's adoration of him had not dwindled with the passing of time, if anything her obsession had grown. But he had figured what better place to hide than with her rival? That way if she should find him, she would be more intent on ragging at Ino than trapping him under the mistletoe and therefor he should be able to make his escape.

Though looking at the arctic blonde, who was still steadfastly ignoring his presence, he got the sinking feeling that Ino would simply hand him over to Sakura, like the proverbial sacrificial lamb, and then sit back and enjoy the carnage. Post fangirl Ino was definitely better company, not to mention the amazing things time had done to her figure, but fangirl Ino had been much easier to read and predict. Now if only there was some way he could find a cross between the two. One he could read like the young Ino but with an attitude and a body like the eighteen-year-old version.

Passing thoughts about the body of the mind walking kunoichi no longer took his breath away as they had done that first time the image of a beautifully naked blue-eyed female had appeared in his head. Unable to sleep one night some six months ago he had gone for a walk, intending to try and clear his head and thus make sleep more of a viable option. What he had found instead had been one Yamanaka Ino skinny dipping by the light of the moon, only he hadn't known that at the time. It wasn't until she was alerted to his presence, Sasuke blamed shock as the reason his control over his chakra had failed, and she had come strolling buck naked out of the lake did he realise she had been skinny dipping and not just swimming.

She had picked up her shift like dress from where it lay on the shore, but did not bother to put it on as she walked up to where he was standing. The slow up and down look Ino had given him, if it were possible, had still more of his blood heading south. One perfectly plucked blonde brow had risen mockingly as she had almost hissed at him, "Cat got your tongue?"

Without waiting for a response she had vanished into the night and Sasuke had headed back to his own bed, knowing full well that any thought of sleep was a non-starter.

A soft throaty chuckle awoke Sasuke from his musings and he looked up to see Ino and, he made no attempt to suppress the wave of loathing that washed over him, Sai, watching as Naruto kissed a blushing Hinata under the mistletoe that hung just inside the shop. The dark haired artiest looked perplexed while Ino talked animatedly to him even as she waved farewell to the couple that had just been making out on the shop floor.

"I still don't understand." Sai said in a confused tone as his eyes trailed to the door before fixing beseechingly on the leggy blonde. Almost as if he were begging her to help him understand this strange aspect of human nature.

"It's tradition Sai." Ino said in a resigned yet affectionate way. A little too affectionately for Sasuke's liking.

"But why?" And there was the faintest edge of something that just might have been desperation in his voice. It almost made Sasuke laugh but it only seemed to give Ino more incentive to try and make things clear to the boy.

Because it is you emotionally retarded little shit! Sasuke didn't say the words out loud but it was a close run thing. His opinion was clearly written all over his face if anyone had chanced to look, neither did. Ino was trying to explain the symbolism behind the mistletoe while Sai was listening intently as if he were trying to understand but his face was showing that he didn't. Not that he understands much, Sasuke added to himself.

"I fear it is one of the many things I will never understand, Ms. Beautiful." He shook his head in a sorrowful manner, but to Sasuke he just looked like a dog trying to get water out of its ears.

'Ms. Beautiful.' He scoffed at the nickname. Sasuke knew all about Sai giving people nicknames the opposite of what he thought them to be. Ino was one of the hottest females in the whole of Fire Country, and if the emotionally stunted painter couldn't see that then he was even more of an imbecile than Sasuke thought him to be. And that was saying something.

"It's Ok, just believe me when I say that anyone can kiss anyone under the mistletoe." She laughed while he shot her a disbelieving look. "Come on I'll show you."

Ino grabbed Sai's hand and pulled him towards the door and the mistleto that hung just inside the entrance. It was at that point that Sasuke conclude that enough was enough and catching the other male's frantically darting eyes fixed him with a glare that could have burned him to a crisp. Sai's grasp of human interaction was limited but he knew that alienating one's team-mates was not a good thing to do. And from the look he was getting whatever Ms. Beautiful was about to do Uchiha Sasuke did not like it and that was enough to have him pulling his hand free and bolting for the door, mumbling apologies as he went.

For a moment Ino remained rooted to the spot, anger running through her veins like boiling lave. It was her father's number one rule; you didn't kill people in the shop. But at that moment in time it was taking all of her will power to keep from charging across the floor and ripping the last Uchiha limb from limb. She was a ninja for fuck sake, she had felt the way Sasuke's chakra had spiked when he glared at Sai, she'd seen that in the reflection of the window after all. He really needed to lean to control his emotions and to realise that people weren't things to be played with.

Sure Sai could be a pain at times, still after all these years failing to grasp even the most simple and basic aspects of human interaction. But that was no excuse for Sasuke to treat him in such a way, cruelly prodding and poking at him all the time just so he could get a reaction out of the unemotional male. In a way Ino could understand the Uchiha's resentment towards the person who had effectively replaced him not just on team seven but in the rest of the village as well. Yes, she could understand it but it still didn't give the traitorous little snake the right to act like he did.

"And why exactly did you do that?" When Ino spoke her voice was hardly more than a whisper but there was an edge to it which, though dangerous, Sasuke ignored.

"You were going to kiss him." It was a statement of fact said in such a disinterested tone of voice that the blonde almost lost her grip on her already exceedingly short temper.

"So?" Ino was surprised, yet very pleased, at just how much icy venom she managed to coat that one tiny little word in, not that Sasuke seemed to notice, or even if he did he didn't care.

"So what?" Again with the board voice only this time it was accompanied by a half hearted shrug. "I didn't want you to."

"And since when does what you want matter?" Her tone stated that what he did or did not want really didn't bother her in the slightest. And the dismissive wave of her hand that accompanied the words only confirmed that fact.

"It's always mattered to me." Sasuke growled, showing his amazing ability to turn a complete emotional 180 in a split second. Without seeming to move he went from lounging on the stool to standing over the girl, trying to use his greater height to intimidate her.

"Yes," Ino drawled, clearly not phased by the way he was trying to dominate her. As a kunoichi of Konoha she was trained to face down S-ranked criminals so Uchiha Sasuke throwing a temper tantrum hardly even registered. "So much so that you abandon everyone just to get what you want."

"That was a low blow Yamanaka," Sasuke hissed, stepping forward so that, even if he hadn't been before, he was now defiantly invading her personal space. "But you're right. And if I'd do that to get what I wanted then, shouldn't you be asking what lengths I'd go to to get what I want now?"

"I don't care what lengths you'd go to," She sneered jabbing her index finger into his chest to emphasise her point. "As long as you go to them far away from me!"

"Wrong." The last of the proud Uchiha clan snapped his eyes blazing with barely suppressed furry as he glared down and the smirking, unrepentant teen.

"I don't -" Her retort was cut off when Sasuke lunged forward, crushing her mouth to his, and taking advantage of Ino's momentary state of shocked confusion to thrust his tongue violently into her mouth.

Greedily he explored the hot cavern that tasted faintly of candy she had been pinching from the small bowl that sat on the counter for the customers. Sasuke's hands snagged the blonde's wrists and forced her arms down so that she could not push him away, his grip so firm that there was a risk that it might leave her bruised, but he didn't care. All he cared about was the delicious heat that scorched through his flesh when he pressed against the body of the girl he's been fantasising about for months. However the sensation lasted only a moment before the violated blonde managed to shove him off of her.

"Bastard!" Ino snarled her eyes flashing, as she wrenched her arms free before bringing her right hand round in a hard slap that caught Sasuke a stinging blow on the side of his face.

Then before he could blink she had grabbed fistfuls of Sasuke's dark raven hair she pulled him into another hard and bruising kiss. He ravished her mouth even as Ino, backed towards the counter wincing when her back was crushed against the hard wooden surface, and onto which he lifted her with one easy move. Instinctively the blonde kunoichi wrapped her legs tightly around his waist, the contact with her body created a brain dissolving friction in his groin. He groaned into her mouth and continued to war with her tongue until both of them were out of breath and were forced to brake apart.

"See I told you that you were wrong." Sasuke murmured, his hands sliding under her dark purple and coming to rest on her breasts, pleased that she wore not bindings to keep him from kneading the soft flesh in his fingers. "And now I've got you."

"It's going to take a lot more than a few kisses for you to get me." Ino's snarl turned into a gasp as his thumb stroked her left nipple, and she couldn't stop herself from arching into the touch.

"Ahh, but you agree I will get you in the end Yamanaka." He smirked lightly, his forehead pressed against hers, and he could see that way light danced in her extraordinary eyes at his words, almost as if they were a challenge.

"Bastard." Ino said once more, though this time there was not so much heat behind the word. Ino pulled his mouth back down to hers, loosing herself in the wonder of his cleaver lips and skilled tongue, and pressed her body into his eagerly exploring hands.

Lamb: (laughs) I love it when these two start off fighting and then end up f… doing something else.

Muse: You have a sick and twisted mind.

Dedi: You are living in her head. Well Merry Christmas to you all and we hope that you liked it.

Please R and R I'd love to know what you thought.

Big love and happy Christmas

Lamanth