Another disclaimer: Guess what? I don't own Naruto.
Chapter 3: Temari – The Ceiling
She opened her eyes and looked at the ceiling. It was white. The sheets stuck to her body. She had hair in her mouth. Her mouth was dry. She moaned.
"There's water by the bed" said Gaara's voice.
She turned her head to see him sitting in the window, looking down the street. A jug of water and a cup was placed on the floor beside her. She drank some.
"Your sleep was restless" he said.
"Have you been sitting there all night?"
"No."
She fell back into bed. The ceiling was white.
"What time is it?"
"Almost noon."
"Do we have any missions today?"
"No."
Of course they didn't. Nothing ever happened in this crappy village. Temari got out of bed and into the shower.
"Do we any food?" she called out.
"No."
Of course they didn't.
On her to way to get some breakfast her head felt a little tight, but otherwise she was fine. Last night had sucked. She'd had a few drinks at the local pub, with Kankurou and Gaara looking after her of course, before being turned down by that wise-assed red-haired guy at the bar who claimed to be twice her age. The smile on Kankurou's face when she returned to the table had been enough for her to go home. How come every single boy in this town was so bloody boring? No one knew how to have a good time here, much less how to show a girl one. The one guy who a least looked real hot, Uchiha Sasuke, never even went out. Hangover food. Now.
"Here you go."
The ramen girl handed Temari a huge bowl of steaming noodles with all the trimmings. Just as she was about to dig in, she noticed that the pink-haired girl sitting next to her staring at her food. The girl's lips slowly parted and her turquoise eyes swelled. Diet eyes. Temari took a huge bite and chewed exaggeratedly. What was that girl's name again?
"Sakura-chan!"
Oh yeah, that was it.
Temari saw "Sakura-chan" turn to meet the blond kid in the orange exercise gear. Uzumaki Naruto, his name was. Hard to forget, the way he kept proclaiming it all the time. He'd been running.
"Sorry I'm late. I just…"
"It's all right", the girl interrupted, "No one's here yet."
"Oh…Not even Sasuke?"
The girl shook her head.
"Well, if we're gonna wait, we might as well eat. I owe you money, right?"
The girl nodded, and then, through clenched teeth: "I'll have a salad."
Fifteen minutes later, when Temari were getting ready to leave, a masked jounin came walking along with his hands in his pockets.
"Hiya."
"Jou've wate!" pinky-head said, trying to look furious with a mouthful of her second order of salad.
"I met an old friend, so I bought him a drink."
"That's a new one" said the blond kid, more to the girl than his sensei.
"Anyway, I just called you here to tell you that we will meet for tonight's mission at Pansy Dragon Pub. I'll tell you why when you get there. Ten o'clock. Don't be late."
Pansy Dragon was where Temari had been last night. The girl finally managed to swallow.
"Kaka-Sensei, should I tell Sasuke?"
"He already knows. He'll be there."
"Oh."
Temari was already on her way home.
"What?"
"I said," Temari said, putting on mascara, "that we're going to the Pansy tonight." In the mirror, she could tell Karkurou was getting worked up again. He was so uptight nowadays.
"We just went there last night, and you said it sucked!"
"Tonight is Friday, there'll be more people tonight."
"But you hate people. You're always bitching about how everyone here blows. More people just mean more people you hate. I don't get you."
"I know you don't, but what do you want me to do? We hardly ever have missions above C-rank nowadays. Besides training, nothing happens. I have to do something, Kankurou. If I just sit here and stare at the ceiling one more night, I'll go insane. "
"I don't…" Kankurou sighed and turned to his younger brother for support, "Gaara, will you talk to her?"
"I think we should go out", Gaara said.
"What?" Kankurou and Temari said in unison.
"I said I think we should go out. It might be interesting."
Silence ensued. Gaara had never displayed much interest for the night-life before. His face, stoic as always, didn't give anything away. Temari was the first to speak.
"See? Even Gaara is more fun than you. It's settled then. Get your face on."
Kankurou shook his head and followed .
When they got to Pansy Dragon Pub, a full hour before Uchiha Sasuke was scheduled to arrive, some young ladies were already there. Apparently, news travelled fast in Konoha. Amongst the nobodies in the bar, Temari spotted the bun-haired, shuriken slinging tomboy whose ass she'd kicked in the chuunin-preliminaries years before, as well as the blonde from the flowershop. They'd both brought their team, it seemed, to have some kind of alibi. The hyperactive kid in the green jumpsuit was there, the lard-ass was there and Nara Shikamaru, the supposed genius who'd forfeited his match against her in the exams and still made chuunin (Temari often bragged about this at home: "In Konoha they make people chuunin for knowing they can't beat me").
"It's a bloody shinobi-convention." Kankurou muttered, "Most of them ain't even old enough to drink. Why don't thry throw them out?"
"The girls are good for business" Temari said, walking over to the bar, "A bottle of sake, please. Two glasses, unless…"She turned to Gaara, who shook his head. "Two glasses. And clean ones, damn you".
The next hour passed as most hours did when the sand-trio was out. Temari and Kankurou (who always loosened up after a drink) drank sake and talked trash about the other people there, while Gaara kept sober and silent. Kankurou had just remarked how nice the flowershop-girl looked all dolled-up.
"She just a boring bitch anyway." Temari said.
"Boring bitches need loving too", Kankurou replied, trying to make eye contact with the girl, "You of all people should know that."
"Bastard."
Kankurou finally managed to catch the girl's eye, blinked and raised his glass to the bar. The girl turned away terrified. Some old drunk by the bar raised his glass and yelled out "Cheers, laddie!".
"You've got game, Kankurou. There's no denying it"
"Shut up."
As if all obeying him, the place went silent. Uchiha Sasuke walked in with his team. Without a word, he went to a booth and sat down. The girls followed. Kankurou turned to Temari.
"You knew about this, didn't you?"
"Yup."
"Well, you better get in line, then."
"I'll wait, thank you."
They sat back and enjoyed the farce. While Ms.Pinky got mad at flower-girl and started yelling about her disrupting a mission, a tried to sneak past and give Sasuke their phone number, Flower-girl got mad and yelled at them, Pinky got mad at flower for not paying attention, and the bun-haired girl (Tenten? Was that her name?), stood back just feeling stupid, it seemed. Temari knew this wouldn't work. There was no way she'd get to Sasuke this way. The only girl he'd ever notice would be the one that didn't throw herself at him. Time to re-think the strategy.
"C'mon guys, let's go"
"Wait, this is actually kinda fun."
"Kankurou, we're leaving"
"Ok, whatever."
On their way to the door they were intercepted by Nara Shikamaru. He looked Temari in the eye, if he was going to kill her or something.
"Hi."
"What?"
He drew a short breath, blinked and shifted his weight to the other leg. What the hell was he so nervous about? Was he drunk?
"What?" Temari said again.
"W-Wanna make out?"
Temari had to laugh. That was, by far, the most pathetically delivered pick-up line she'd ever heard.
"What did you say?" Kankurou did not sound happy. Shikamaru completely ignored him, still looking Temari in the eye.
"Hey, jackass, I'm talking to you! What did you say to my sister?" Still no reaction from Shikamaru. Gaara too kept strangely calm. The room had gone quite silent. Temari got an idea.
"Ok, wise-guy, we're going outside" Kankurou reached for Shikamaru's arm. Temari slapped it away.
"Go play with your dolls, Kankurou."
"Oh, come on." Kankurou didn't like where this was going.
Temari grabbed the now apparently paralyzed Shikamaru by the neck and kissed him. It took him a second to react, but once he got his act together, he was actually a decent kisser. The pub was silent as a grave now. Somewhere a glass fell to the floor and broke. Twisting the embrace around, Temari opened one eye and looked at Uchiha Sasuke. She'd gotten his attention now. He was staring at them, his mouth half open. Temari broke off the kiss and looked around. Eyes everywhere, voices nowhere.
"Sheesh, this place is dead! Let's go." She grabbed Shikamaru's hand and walked out, the only sound being Kankurou muttering "I don't believe this".
Outside, the evening breeze was cool, but comfortable. Temari heard the pub coming back to life behind them, girls saying "Oh my god", frantic gossiping taking place.
"I need a drink", she said, "Where's your sake?" He wasn't old enough to drink, to she supposed he'd brought his own. He handed her a flask, smiling.
"What are you grinning about?"
"As if you don't know."
"Yeah, well, don't get cocky." She took a sip. "Now what, big man?"
"Now we do whatever you want."
"How about dancing?"
"I'll do it if you want to, but I don't want to."
"Dancing it is."
They made the rounds. To her surprise, Shikamaru seemed to know every bartender in town. Wherever they went, he'd get a thumbs-up and a pat on the back, and then free drinks would start appearing. She'd say something she felt like doing, like dancing, gambling, shooting pool, or even watch a cock-fight, he'd take her somewhere appropriate, and everything would be free. On the house, from a guy in the corner, on his fathers tab and so forth. Temari had the most fun she'd had in months. Shooting pool, she decided to ask him."So, how come you're such hot shit in this town?"
"Hot shit?" Distracted, the end of Shikamaru's pool cue hit a guy behind him in the butt.
"Hey, watch it punk!" The guy spun around and yelled.
"Oh. Sorry."
"Yeah, you better be sorry kid or I'll kick your ass!"
Temari walked around the pool table. This could get interesting.
"Look, there's no need to be all rude. It was an accident, I'm sorry."
"Good, because…"
Temari pushed Shikamaru at the drunk guy. They both stumbled, Shikamaru confused, the other guy already in a drunken rage.
"Hey…" Shikamaru quickly abandoned this attempt at diplomacy as the drunk swung his pool cue at his head. He ducked it easily of course, saying "Kage Mane no Jutsu". Then he ran out the door. The other guy ran also, but in the other direction, knocking himself senseless as he rammed into a wall. It took Temari a second to figure it out, but when she did, she laughed her head off.
She found him sitting on a roof nearby looking up at the night sky.
"That was hilarious. You kicked that guy's ass without even touching him."
"What the hell did you do that for?"
"What the hell did I do what for?"
"Pushing me."
"Oh, that. Just trying to toughen you up a bit. You can't just let any idiot talk to you like that. You're a chuunin."
"Thanks to you I might just have seriously hurt a member of my own village."
"He didn't have much of a head to hurt. Take it easy, geez."
"As if that weren't enough, you're hogging the sake."
"Oops."
Silence.
"There's one thing I don't get, though." Temari said after a while. "What're a cool guy like you doing hanging out with that loser?"
"What loser?"
"The fat guy."
"Chouji is not a loser, he's my best friend. You don't know him, so shut up."
"Yeah? How is he better than your other friends?"
Shikamaru thought for a moment.
"When he says "good morning" he really means it."
"That's it?"
"That's a lot."
"Whatever… Hm. No one ever says "good morning" in my family."
"Why not?"
"Because it's stupid. Mornings aren't good, they're boring."
"That depends on the morning, doesn't it?"
"Not in these peaceful days, it doesn't."
Another silence. Raindrops started hitting the roof.
"It's raining" Shikamaru said.
"I see why they call you a genius. Come on, I know a place."
She got up to leave. Shikamaru looked at her hesitantly.
"Come on, you're doing fine."
"So this is your place, huh?"
"And Kankurou's, and Gaara's."
"I see."
He was standing by the mirror in the hall, one of the only things to break the monotony of the white walls of the apartment.
"It's nice."
Temari looked at him. He was completely lost, looking around after something to talk about. She decided not to say anything, just to see him freak out. After a few seconds he picked up a tube from the bottom of the mirror and read what it said out loud.
"Royal Purple."
"That's Kankurou's face paint, he wouldn't like you touching that."
"Oh." He put it back. He looked adoringly miserable. More endless seconds of silence followed. She could actually see him shrink.
"You have absolutely no idea what do to, have you?"
"I suppose I don't."
She let him squirm for a few more seconds.
"My room's this way. Are you coming?"
He was really bad, but at least he was someone. Afterwards, he whispered something in her ear, but she was falling asleep already didn't catch the words.
She opened her eyes and looked at the ceiling. It said "Good morning", written in purple paint.
(End)
Authors Comments: This chapter was a pain in the ass towrite but I hope you couldn't tell. Huge thanks to everyone who reviewed, your comments really helps. Once again: I hope you take the time to tell me what youn think. Thank you for reading.