Disclaimer: Naruto does not belong to me unfortunately
YEAH! I managed to finish this early so here it is...and please note to check out the author's notes at the bottom of the page regarding fan story requests. Enjoy!
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It wasn't surprising that the Nara family and the Inoshi family lived pretty close to each other. The men had grown up together in the village ninja academy, passed all their exams together and were even on the same team during most of that period. Suffice to say, our hero and heroine were in close contact with each other for most of their lives. Especially when the men had to go on missions and the wives were left back home. When that happened, it wasn't unusual for them to get together, chat about what big babies their husbands were and to coo over their real babies as they crawled around on the freshly swept floor.
Now baby Ino was growing up to be a real beauty. Her adorable little face was composed of huge blue eyes, glowing white-blonde curls and a little pink rosebud of a mouth. Her daddy often woke up yelling, or alternatively crying, at night from nightmares of his little princess being chased by hoards of nasty boys who wanted to steal her away from him. Perhaps Inoshi's nightmares were somewhat delusional or, at the very least, oddly soundless because if they were anything like reality, they would consist of baby Ino shrieking at her attackers and chucking various household items at them.
Ah yes, baby Ino was, for lack of a better description, a real handful. Two handfuls even. Not a day went by without her mini-tantrums, which her daddy proclaimed as 'the cutest thing he'd ever seen,' before he hastily scampered out the door as quickly as he could. Her mother spent most of her time searching for her during one of her daily explorations and baby Ino was currently fascinated with a big blow-up ball she had found.
Down the street in the Nara residence however, baby Shikamaru was almost the complete opposite. He pretty much slept all day and even when he was awake, he didn't do much besides lie in the exact same position as when he was sleeping, occasionally yawning and scrunching up his face. It was a cute face too. His mother had tied his messy black hair into a little spiky tail at the top of his head so it wouldn't bother him when he was asleep and although his eyes were rather small, they were of an intense black colour.
Did baby Shikamaru know how to crawl yet? Sure he did. He showed off his skill one day when he wanted a particularly bright blue pillow but decided that maybe it was too troublesome to find some way to communicate to his mother what he wanted. It wasn't really in his nature to cry so if he did, his mom would undoubtedly be shocked and start fussing over him. So baby Shikamaru simply rolled over, spent a while figuring out how his baby limbs were supposed to function and made his way over to the desired destination. His parents had gleefully tried to encourage him to do it again, but the kid wasn't interested. He wasn't some show monkey after all. His mother often complained that her son didn't seem to want to do anything, but Shikato wasn't worried. In fact, one of his favourite past times when he was at home was to sit next to his son's crib and drink a beer, yawning in tandem with baby Shikamaru.
Unlike most children, baby Shikamaru's first word was not 'Otousan' or 'Okasan.' Oh no, it was not even his own name, although that might have been because it was too long to pronounce. In fact, much to his parents' surprise, it happened like this:
Baby Ino was almost a year old and her parents had brought her over to the Nara house again for one of their frequent, small get-togethers. She had recently taken her first steps and her proud papa had been eager to show off his little princess to his friend.
"Come on, sweetheart. Come to daddy."
Baby Ino took a few tottering steps towards the beckoning arms of her father before wobbling and landing on her butt. Displeased with the way the adults were laughing, she started shrieking, the wails increasing in both volume and pitch. In truth, baby Ino seldom truly cried anymore. It was more like making enough noise and commotion to distract them from laughing at her.
Her mother scooped her up and sat her down in her lap on the sofa, trying to placate her with a sweet. The men were just in the midst of trying to make some excuse to escape the headache-inducing sound when baby Shikamaru, who just so happened to be lolling next to her in his own mother's lap, made his grand statement.
"I…I-no…"
Complete and utter silence filled the room. Yes, even the screaming monster who looked like an angel had fallen silent. All eyes were fixed on the spiky-haired boy reaching over to clumsily pat baby Ino on the foot.
"I-no."
Chaos erupted in the Nara house.
"My boy's a genius! You hear that, Yamanaka? His first word…and not even a year old! Genius!"
Shikato swooped down to pluck his son out of his mother's arms and whirl him enthusiastically in the air. Unimpressed with his father's uncharacteristic display of energy, baby Shikamaru merely yawned at him, opting instead to close his eyes until it was all over.
But baby Ino did not close her eyes. No indeed, hers were focused on the boy who had mumbled what she recognized to be her own name. And although her inability to form his name frustrated her little mind, baby Ino did not cry as she usually did. Instead, she clapped her hands as she let out a gurgle of merry laughter.
And even though everyone else might have missed it, neither we, nor the baby girl who was staring so intently at him, did. At the sound of her laughter, the corner of baby Shikamaru's lips curved up in a faint, reciprocating smile.
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A/N: Okay so I had posted this up on my profile page but then I wasn't sure how many people actually read that thing so here it is again:
Since I'm goingtohave more time during Christmas and I'm kinda feeling in the "groove" right now (please excuse the 70s language lol), have decided to take fan requests for NARUTO pairings. So please feel free to drop me a line in a review or message me via the link on my profile page telling me what kind of pairing and maybe the general storyline idea you would like to read. The resulting stories...I'll probably do a couple or more depending on how much time I have...will probably be one-shots, ok? Thanks and happy reading!