It could go two ways:

Well, or badly.

That meant he only had a fifty percent chance of fucking things up.

Only fifty. But then he also had other factors to take into account.

How he phrased it, when he asked, what had been happening before hand...

That brought the likelihood of it going badly up to eighty-five to ninety percent.

Ugh, why did proposals have to be so damn troublesome?!

He couldn't do it somewhere public, that would just be a death wish. If he did it at sunset, she'd laugh at him, and he didn't want any variety of cheese to be associated with his new nickname.

He glanced up for a split second at where she was seated opposite him at the desk. Her stack of paperwork was almost completely diminished and she had a small frown in place and a smudge of ink in the corner of one of her eyes from rubbing it with her hand.

He shook his head and turned back to his assignment.

He couldn't exactly do it during work, could he?

She'd probabl-

"Yo, what's up?"

He glanced up from the sheet of paper that he'd been staring at blankly for possibly the past ten minutes.

"Nothing!" His voice came out more high-pitched and panicked than he'd hoped, and he winced as she narrowed he eyes at him.

Why was he so helplessly in love with such a troublesome specimen of the human species?

"Temari," he said eventually, dropping the sheet onto the table and looking at her.

"That would be me. Lucky you," she crossed her arms over her chest and leaned back in her chair, giving him all her attention.

Shit. It would have been easier if he'd caught her off guard...

"Um so. Um..."

She arched her eyebrow at him.

"I owe you the world," he began, figuring that he could stall with compliments.

He cringed slightly at how cheesy it sounded. Sure, he did in a sense, but he couldn't just say that.

"The world isn't yours to give." She said smoothly, her eyes still set on his. Smartass.

"My life then?"

"Your life isn't mine to take."

He sighed. "You're making this a hell of a lot harder for me, you know that?"

"Of course I know. That's the point." She smiled at him before turning back to the paperwork in front of her and lined the sheets up neatly.

"And by the way, if you're going to propose, it's going to have to be done properly. Down on one knee, Nara."

"I-I'M NOT PROPO-"

"Do you keep snacks in the box?"

"What box?"

He looked down at his lap where, sure enough, he'd been fiddling with the box that held a ring which he'd spent hours picking out. Shit.

"You just had to ruin the moment, didn't you?' He sighed, placing the box on the table between them.

She chuckled and stood up, picking the box up as she made her way around to his side of the table.

"I guess I have to do all the work, don't I?"

She pulled his chair around so that hey were face-to-face before sinking down to one knee and smirking.

"I guess I really am the one who wears the trousers in this relationship." She said with a voice of mock exasperation.

"Nara. We tolerate each other. You are madly in love with me and you want me to be your wife. The prospect disgusts me-"

He stared at her serious face as it broke into a smile.

"-Far less than the prospect of spending my life with anybody else. Shikamaru, if I say yes: Will you promise to stick by me?"

He realised that his jaw had dropped half way through her little performance. He quickly readjusted himself and tried to hide a laugh.

"How do you know the ring is for you?"

"Cheating would be troublesome. You know how I am."

He laughed out loud and scooped her up onto his lap, kissing her gently.

"Yes, troublesome. Yes."

"Yes what?"

"Yes please. Please let me be your husband. I'll stay by you. I'll stand with you."

"Like a leech." She snorted.

"Stop killing the mood."

"Okay, Mozzarella, now that that little issue is sorted, you have work to get through."

She hopped off his lap and pointed to the paperwork that was piled high.

"But-"

"No buts, chop chop!"

She left the room to brew some tea and Shikamaru sighed.

And so it begins, he thought shaking his head before breaking into a smile.

And so, the Nara legacy continued.


A/N: Hellooo~

Of course, I couldn't let their proposal be typical, could I? Thank you all so much for all the reviews, they prompted me to write this chapter up a lot quicker than I would have!

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~Lee ;)