Ino hummed as she crafted a small wreath made of White Lilacs - a pure white flower that represents purity and youthful innocence - for a flower girl, just one of a dozen other arrangements that were part of their wedding catering bundle.
As romantic as weddings were, they were a lot of work; Every table needed a bouquet, every bridesmaid a corsage, a boutonniere for the groomsmen, and of course the bride's bouquet needed to be the absolutely most perfect thing ever. It would be so much easier if people could just have nice quite weddings with friends and family, but no sometimes half of Konoha was invited.
"Well it's not like mine and Sasuke's wedding would be small." Quite the contrary, hers and Sasuke's wedding would be the biggest and best wedding Konoha had ever seen. She would be wearing an absolutely killer dress that would leave every male in Konoha wishing that they were Sasuke. And she would be the envy of every single female in Konoha for snagging the best man in Konoha leaving them with the dregs like Shikamaru or Naruto, and for looking better than they ever could.
Sakura would be her maid of honor, only so that she could rub it into the little traitor's nose. Ami wouldn't be invited, the rest of her friends would be there, and Sasuke would probably have Shikamaru or Choji as his best man, and the Hokage would be the officiant, wait. By that time might even be the Hokage.
A gasp turned into a giggle at the thought. Her marrying the Hokage! She could be the great woman behind the great man. Rumors would spread far and wide about how she was the real power in Konoha. The best part is that she'd never have to work another day at her parent's shop! She'd probably be Konoha's spymaster or something awesome like that, or she could simply be the Hokage's wife.
Both were good. With Sasuke as her husband, she'd be happy doing anything. He was smart, cool, good-looking, an excellent ninja, there was nothing about him she didn't like. And if it wasn't for Sakura scaring him off he'd be her boyfriend right now.
"Hey, Ino!" The second most annoying person in her class and recent co-worker Naruto Uzumaki snapped his fingers in front of her face, his apron was still untied and hung off to the side, already his ugly orange jacket had dirt on it that could have been avoided if he put the thing on right.
Swatting him away like the fly he was, she carefully placed the delicate headpiece down, as well as her daydreams. Naruto was a coward, all she had to do was glare at him or threaten to hit him and he would hide in the corner. "What do you want?"
Naruto winced at her balled fist and took step towards the nearest exit. "I finished the water the pots."
Oh, that. Maybe, just maybe having Naruto around to do the dirty work wouldn't be such a bad thing. Keeping her scowl Ino walked towards the outdoor garden, "So you watered all the pots to the line?"
"Yea," Naruto folded his arms pouting like five-year-old. "I did it how you told me to."
"Good, now for the flower beds." Ino led him to the hose area where a contraption that her father seemed to rearrange every season. "This is my daddy's flow control system, it makes sure that all the plants in the flower beds get the water they need, each one has its own switch, pressure regulator, filter, and nutrient feeder. The water passes through these pipes which leads to the drip tape and sprinklers that water the plants."
She took a breath and looked up to see Naruto looking incredibly confused. With a deep sigh that caused her shoulders to slack, she stood back up and pointed towards the main valve. "All you have to do is turn it on."
"Oh! You could have just said that!" Without any hesitation Naruto reached down and turned the valve on full blast, the contraption hissed as the pressure regulators did there job and allowed the right amount of water to be sent through the hoses. "That was easy, can I go home now?"
"Pfft, if I don't get to go home you don't get to go home." She had a million better things to do than hanging out with Naruto all day at work. Once she became a ninja she was going to kiss this place goodbye! And hopefully Naruto as well.
Once she ended up on a team with Sasuke everything would be set right.
Naruto continued to pout.
"Alright, next we need to fill the flower beds that you ruined with dirt and plant some seeds." Ino led him to a large shed, where bags of fertilizer were stacked high on the walls, a variety of pots and seeds as well as the larger tools were stored.
"I ruined them? It was just paint," Naruto stopped pouting for a moment and almost looked legitimately sorry.
"Yea, but flowers are sensitive, if you cover them in paint they're going to die, either because the paints to heavy or because they can't get in any sunlight, that and paint is toxic, we had to throw away all the dirt to." She left out the part where it cost her the entire weekend to clean up the mess. "Now," She pointed towards the bags of fertilizer. "It takes two of those to fill a flower bed so bring four of them to the flower beds."
With that Ino spun on her heel and walked out of the shed.
"Hey wait, you aren't going to help me carry these?" Naruto whined after.
"What kind of man lets a woman do all the heavy lifting?"
XXXX
Ino was rude, bossy, annoying, loud, kind of scary, and she wasn't anywhere cute enough to make up for it. Worse still was that she was one of Sasuke's fangirls and Sakura's rival in love. Ino could have Sasuke for all he cared, but just being around Ino might make Sakura mad at him.
It didn't help that she was treating him like a slave. Sure the Hokage told him to help out their shop, but he said he was sorry! How was he supposed to know that paint killed flowers! It was the flowers fault for being so weak.
He could tell when she was thinking about Sasuke, it was the same stupid look the rest of the girls in his class got. They sighed, smiled and spaced out. She was doing it right now, while he evened out the dirt in the flower beds.
"Hey, Ino!" She got out of her daydream and glared at him. "The dirts even, do we start planting now?"
So far gardening was nothing but playing in the dirt and water. It sucked he felt like a baby playing in the sandbox. Only it wasn't sand and it was just dirt and not fun at all."
"Oh, not yet." Ino rose from her seat, looking relatively clean compared to him, He was going to have to laundry soon if this kept up. She walked over another table and flipped open a large binder of sorts. "First we have to decide what to plant by looking up what's in season, what will be in season and what compliments what."
It sounded like a lot of reading. "Can't we just plant all the same thing?"
"We could," Ino's mom walked in through the curtain smiling sweetly, a bag filled with food was slung around her shoulder. "But the point is to demonstrate what we have to offer so that customers will want to buy something."
"Mom, your home!" Ino smiled and jumped into her mother's arms, hugging her tightly even as she rummaged through the grocery bag.
"Yep, I see you two have been busy," Tsubaki petted Ino on the back of her head, "You got the Flower beds ready for tomorrow, I'll be sure to make a list of what I want in them for you tomorrow."
Great more work.
"In the meantime, we're closed so your both free to go!"
"Finally!" Naruto ripped off the apron and flung it to the ground. He was so glad to be out of this place. Even if he had to come back again tomorrow. He had better things to do, like… like… not working at a stupid garden shop!
"Oh Naruto, one moment." Tsubaki smiled at him, reaching around Ino to pull out a wallet from the bag. "Ino gets paid every two weeks, so until we get you on that time loop I'll be paying you every day."
She handed him money. More than enough money for ramen tonight, and tomorrow maybe even enough for the day after that! "Wait, I get paid for this?"
"Of course, it is a job after all."
Maybe working here wasn't going to be completely horrible!
AN: Hey there! I updated this! yay! progress. Anyways, check out Another World Another you if you like this fic. It's a fem Sasuke x Naruto and a Fem Naruto x Sasuke. Best of both worlds really.
Also, still have a P.A.T.R.E.O.N. Supporting me on there nets you with story idea polls, and a thank you list on my profile... which isn't much but its all I can really offer.
Direct link is p.a.t.r.e.o.n..com (slash) Yojimbra is the direct link because I'm not listed on the site for some reason.
Thanks for reading!
