Innocence
"Dad?"
"Hmm? What?"
"It was just a monster movie, right? Just a movie?"
Shikaku looked at his 7 year old son as they walked home from the theater in the early evening together and smiled. "Yeah, it was just a movie. Why? You scared?"
Young Shikamaru shrugged. "No…not really…well, okay, maybe a little."
They walked along in companionable silence, their footsteps sounding lightly on the smooth cobblestones.
"Dad?"
"Yeah?"
"Does anything scare you?"
Shikaku looked at his son and wondered how to tell the boy that the only thing that scared his father was if something were to happen to him.