"Do You love me with an all-consuming devotion that rules out all other loves?"
CHAPTER TWELEVE
Toshiko had found herself on the back porch of the Uchiha homestead the morning of her grand uncle Madara's cremation. Once again she was the first in the house to awake, which wasn't— had never been —unusual. Her brothers and cousins all seemed to flourish under the night where as she, like a flower, came alive with the early morning sun.
Toshiko had a knitted blanket wrapped around her shoulders; Sela had knitted it before she had died. Madara had left Konoha to see her before she had passed; she'd spit a curse at him and they had spoken behind closed doors and then he had left. Somber and quiet in a way which had told Toshiko whatever her auntie had said to him would be carried with him until the day he die.
It would burn up with him in the crematorium.
Toshiko pulled the blanket tighter around herself.
When her parents had died she had been to young to pick at the bones of her parents; Itachi had too. Her parents bones hadn't been distributed, they, with their ashes were all laid to rest in Toyko. As was Sela; Shisui's father— the great third love of her life, after only Shisui and her van —hadn't had his ashes or bones distributed as per his request. He hadn't want to be split Konoha, a place he'd never really known and his family and Sela, she had followed suit, wanting to be with him for the rest of eternity.
Obito hadn't picked at his parent's either; this would be knew to all of them. Toshiko almost smiled— this would be a kind of loss they experienced together instead of similarly; all of the Uchiha-kids had lost their parents at one point or another —and perhaps had tears not been gathering in the corners of her eyes, waiting to spill over she would have.
A familiar sound rang out from the woods and though no animal moved from behind the tree line Toshiko knew— she could feel it in her bones —it was Osamu. Toshiko was amazed that he was still alive, still as sturdy looking and gallant as the day she had left for university.
Toshiko was confused on why Shikamaru— Shikamaru with his ring and his handsome face and heart wrenching smile —wanted to talk to her. What else could he want, he'd already ripped her heart out. He and that woman Temari— who was probably his wife, mother of his children —had already stomped on it; crushing it.
What could he possibly want from her?
"Oba-san?" Toshiko turned. Hideko stood in the back doors archway in her frilly pink Princess nightgown. She had the stuffed bear Shisui had bought for her the day she'd been born.
"Hideko-chan," Toshiko blinked, "What are you doing up?"
"I had a dream," the young girl said quietly. Toshiko's brows furrowed; Hideko was never quiet. One of the braids Mari had done up for her before bed had mostly come out and the more Toshiko looked at the small girl the more she realized something was wrong; Hideko's eyes were rimmed red and her nose was rosy.
She'd been crying, and that perhaps, broke Toshiko's heart more than Shikamaru ever could.
Toshiko opened her arms and Hideko dove into them. Her tiny arms wrapped around Toshiko's neck and the bear dropped to the floor. Almost, as if floodgates had been opened, years began to pour down Hideko's face.
"Sōsofu-san isn't coming back," Hideko sobbed. Toshiko felt as if a knife had been inserted into her heart. "Why'd he leave?" The knife twisted.
Toshiko felt herself swallow the back of her tongue, pushing down the knot in her throat, before she opened her mouth to speak. Hideko might had asked the same question Toshiko had been asking herself but Toshiko knew she couldn't just shrug and say she didn't know.
Shrugging and saying she didn't know— because she didn't know why her grand uncle had to leave when he could have lived another ten or so years; people lived into their hundred and tens all the time —wouldn't help Hideko. So, maneuvering the girl so that her bear was once more wrapped tightly up in her arms and Hideko was sitting on her lap Toshiko forced a smile to her face.
A tear fell down her face, once Hideko used the palm of her child-sized hand to wipe away.
"Your papa told you about his right? And about his mama?" Hideko nodded, "Well ōoji-san missed them very much. He missed his brothers and his parents-and he missed mine and Obi-nii's too. I mean—" Toshiko looked up at the sky trying to will away the rest of her tears, "—Wouldn't you? If you were ōoji-san?"
"He had us," Hideko sniffled indigently, "He didn't have to miss them."
"Of course he did." Toshiko moved so she could begin to unbraid Hideko's hair and redo it, "You know if you were in ōoji-san's shoes you'd miss Daki and your new little brother so much. No matter who was with you."
Instead of answering Hideko crossed her arms and puffed her cheeks out in a way that reminded Toshiko of Sasuke, not Shisui.
"Did you know ōoji-san Madara met his best friend in the woods?" Toshiko asked as she let out Hideko's other braid just in time as the young girls head whipped around at the factoid.
"But sōsofu-san always said the woods were haunted!"
"And they are." Toshiko didn't bother to hide the real, genuine smile that played on her lips as Hideko's eyes widened.
"His best friend was a ghost?" Toshiko's nose scrunched, the nail of her left index finger tapped against her chin thoughtfully.
"Perhaps," Toshiko joked. Senju Hashirama had been Madara's childhood friend; the pair of them had met by a river that cut through the woods and while their friendship had ended when Uchiha Madara left Konoha— when Madara had come back, Senju Hashirama was dead —Hashirama had been the man that had turned the pre-war village into a post-war town. He had brought the farms that Konoha had started from and turned the tiny market into what Toshiko and Sasuke— and so many others —grew up knowing.
"Sōsofu-san knew a ghost!" Toshiko began to braid Hideko's hair. It was quite for a moment; Toshiko had her back against the porches post. "Hey oba-san?"
"Yeah?"
"Do you think sōsofu-san will come back a ghost to watch over us?"
This time, Toshiko didn't have to lie. She didn't have to come up with something because, "I'm sure he's already watching over us. You know, he could never trust Obi-nii or Sasu-nii not to burn down the house."
Hideko giggled and as Toshiko focused on braiding the young girls hair she could have sworn she heard— as the morning breeze began to roll through —Uchiha Madara's dry chuckle float through the air.
Toshiko stood in front of her bedroom mirror. A black skirt that went down to her knees, the pair of flats she had worn yesterday and a black shirt that she tucked into the band of the skirt; she was cremation ready and she hated it.
"Are you almost ready?" Toshiko looked to her left and saw not her brothers in the doorway or one of the children sent to fetch her— they and Mari and Masshu, her dog would all be staying behind for this part of the funeral procession; Masshu couldn't come, Shisui and Mari didn't want the kids to experience it and he didn't want Mari to experience any added stress —but Obito.
He was in all black save for his bright green hearing aid.
"I am," Toshiko nodded. Her palms pressed flat against the front of her skirt. Obito nodded and his chin tilted up; he was the oldest out of all of them. He had lived with Madara the longest; he and Kakashi had both been the ones to find him. "You look nice."
"I look old," Obito joked, his nose scrunched up and his tongue boking out behind his teeth.
"You've always looked old Obi," Toshiko said with a wobble to her voice. Obito's face softened as he stepped into the room.
"How are you?"
"What?"
"Minato-sama told me what happened yesterday." Toshiko let out a whine as she covered her face with her hands. "No hey, don't be embarrassed." Toshiko peaked out at her cousin.
"Do my brothers knows?" Toshiko squeaked. No one had asked her why she had been late the day before; when she had arrived Sasuke and Itachi had already ended up brawling before their grand uncles casket, Toshiko had assumed everyone was still too focused on them to ask her where she'd been.
"No, knowing them they probably thought you got caught up with an old friend." Toshiko made sound; her brothers wouldn't be wrong.
"I'm sorry," Toshiko said.
"For what?" Obito blinked.
"I ran away from ōoji-san's funeral?" Toshiko replied, "It was wrong of me."
"You showed up," Obito replied with a shrug, he stepped close to Toshiko when he saw her face hadn't changed from guilt-ridden and embarrassed. HIs hand gripped Toshiko's shoulder; "When my obasan died do you know what happened?"
Toshiko shrugged; she knew next to nothing about Obito's grandmother. She'd died before Sasuke had been born.
"I went missing."
"What?"
"How do you think my accident happened? I couldn't see her in the casket so I made Kakashi and Rin skip the service with me. Ōoji-san would wring my neck, I knew that but I didn't care. Not when the alterative was—" Obito looked away, his lips pressed together. "Anyway you know what happened next."
Toshiko nodded; she knew all about the rockslide that had almost claimed Obito's life. Kakashi and Rin— both of whom Obito had pushed out of the way, and who had managed to get to higher ground because of him —had dug him out. Kakashi had stayed with Obito while Rin had run for help.
"When I woke up in the hospital ōoji-san was there and I thought-I thought he was going to be so mad at me. I skipped obasan's funeral, I almost died. He didn't. Usually he loved yelling at me—" he didn't. Toshiko knew well enough their ōoji-san adored Obito even if they bickered more like an old married couple then grand nephew and ōoji-san. "—But this time he thanked me."
"What?"
"The old man thanked me for not dying on him. Leaving him all alone. He helped raise my old man, he had already lost a son, and he had just lost someone he thought of as a sister a few weeks before. So he thanked me and then called me the Motley Crew of Uchiha's for doing something as stupid as getting caught in a landslide but—" Obito's hand dropped from Toshiko's shoulder so that he could wave it in the air. "—He already said thank you. And what I'm saying here is, the old man loved you so he'd probably say thank you for showing up in the end."
Toshiko felt her chest warm, her lips flickered up.
"He might have loved us but nii-san was his favorite," she joked. Obito's eyes lit up as he let out a hardy laugh.
"Please Itachi doesn't count, he's every guardians wet dream, fuck him."
"Is that so?" Both Toshiko and Obito jumped at the sound of her eldest brothers dry voice.
"Nii-san," Toshiko smiled. Itachi raised a brow, "How-how long have you been standing there."
Itachi's eyes narrowed and Toshiko felt sweat accumulate at the back of her neck. She was almost never at the receiving end of that look growing up. This was the look Sasuke or Shisui always seemed to receive after opening their mouths.
"We should get going."
"Right!" And just as she would have ten or fifteen or even twenty years ago, Toshiko ran out of her room, leaving Obito behind to face her brothers sharp looks, dry wit and silver tongue. Because for everything that did change, something else never would.
The six of them— Toshiko, Sasuke, Itachi, Kakashi, Shisui and Obito —sat together as they waited for Uchiha Madara's cremation to finish. Once it did and they would use unusually large chopsticks pick his bones from the ashes and place them into different cremation urns. They'd all take an urn; another one would go to the cemetery while the last urn would be buried in Tokyo, with Izuna and Toshiko's parents.
Toshiko sat on the olive loveseat with Sasuke. Itachi and Shisui sat in the seats across from them while on the couch next to them, facing towards the door they would be lead through, cuddled together, sat Kakashi and Obito.
No matter how old they got the pair of them continued to act like lovesick school girls.
"Ōoji-san liked to say Mari was too good for me," Shisui announced, his hands clasped together in his lap and a sad smile on his face. "Ma liked to say the same thing but somehow it always sounded more serious coming from him."
"He used to say the same thing to our father," Itachi said; both Sasuke and Toshiko's heads swiveled from their cousin to their brother.
"You kidding?"
"Not at all," Itachi shook his head, "Father liked to say ōoji-san liked mother more then him."
"Probably because she smiled like a normal human."
"Papa smiled!" Toshiko shot back at Obito, to which he and the rest of her family— sans Kakashi —responded simultaneously, "Yeah, at you!"
"Ōoji-san probably terrorizing oji-san," Shisui smirked only to stop, "Fuck he's probably waiting to terrorize us. I pet he can walk wherever he is without his cane." A collective shiver ran though the five Uchiha's at the thought of Madara finally being able to catch up with them after years of bullshit on their parts.
Kakashi started laughing, he looked to Obito, "You almost set the house on fire once, right?"
"Really?" Toshiko asked her eldest cousin who looked up at the ceiling almost impishly.
"Yeah," Obito nodded;
"Imagine if Madara could have caught up to you then."
"Why did I marry you?"
"How did you almost set the house on fire? Were you trying to cook?" Sasuke wondered.
Obito's hand gipped at the back of his neck, "This was long before you guys came to live with us-before I got hurt in the accident. It was fathers day and my grandmother had gone out to get ōoji-san his soba noodles only I tried to make eggs for him."
"And you set the house on fire?" Itachi wondered.
"Almost!" Obito clarified, "I almost set the house on fire. The old man woke up before the flames did any actual damage."
"How did he not strangle you to death at some point?" Sasuke wondered.
"How didn't he strangle you?" Obito fired back, "I remember when you dropped out." Everyone in the room— Sasuke included —broke out into a flurry of snickers.
"Yeah I thought he was going to kill me but when I told him how much money I'd be making—"
"—He said he'd kill you if you didn't take it," Toshiko finished, "He also said he'd kill you if you didn't come back from a job." She added that part in pointedly; Sasuke slung his arm around her shoulders and pulled her against him.
"He held me after the crash," Itachi said suddenly after the laughter had died out. "The doctors had just said you—" Itachi looked at Sasuke, "—Might never wake up and, you—" he looked at Toshiko, "—Had just fallen asleep and I needed a minute so I walked around the hospital. He found me by the ambulance entrance and ōoji-san just held me when I cried."
Toshiko was sure why Itachi's confession seemed so jarring, she knew he cried at some point. Like her he had watched their parents car sink below the river; he'd watched them drown just like her. But unlike her he had gone back to the car so that he could save Sasuke before it went fully under.
Unlike Toshiko— Toshiko new, she was old enough now to know —that he had to have seen their father fighting to keep his and Sasuke's heads above water for as long as possible.
"Ōoji-san used to tell me it was okay if I never spoke again," Toshiko said, all eyes were on her. "After we moved here, he used to tell me he understood why I wasn't speaking and that if I never spoke again that was okay because you would all love me the same." Family first was the line Uchiha Madara abided by.
"He threatened me," Kakashi said.
"What?" Obito balked.
"Before our ceremony he caught up to me with that cane and I thought he was going to wish me well or luck-what Minato-sama had done." Obtio nodded, "He didn't. Madara-sama told me he'd poison me to death then die himself before he could get caught if I hurt you."
"That—" Obito paused. Obito nodded, "—Actually sounds like him."
Shisui then cleared his throat; Toshiko watched as her cousin brought his middle and index fingers to his lips before holding them up to the sky. "To Uchiha Madara, our ōoji-san."
Toshiko copied what her cousin had done, as did her brothers and Obito and Kakashi.
"To ōoji-san," they said. May he be at peace, Toshiko thought.
"What the hell is he doing here?" Sasuke's sharp voice rang out. Toshiko, who sat in the middle of Itachi's backseat, between her brother and Kakashi felt her heart drop into her stomach. In cremating her uncle she had forgotten all about Shikamaru.
He looked up from the paper in his hands and got to his feet. The tie around his neck was loose and undone and the hair he usually kept up like his uncle and father had been let down.
"Who?" Shisui asked from the back. There wasn't enough seats in the car and Shisui had offered to sit in the open trunk of the vehicle; where Masshu had sat only a few days prior.
"This piece of shit—"
"—The Nara boy Shisui," Both Itachi and Sasuke spoke over one another. Sasuke went to reach for the handle of his door only for Toshiko to dive for it as well so that she could stop him.
"He's here because I said we could talk." Never had Toshiko seen either Obito or Itachi whip around the front seat so fast.
"When the hell did you talk to him!"
"What the hell could you possibly have to say to him! That shithead broke your heart!"
"Fuck that!"
"Why!" Had been Itachi, and while his had been the shortest, it had been the loudest. Toshiko felt her shoulders rise.
"Maybe!" Kakashi said before Toshiko could say anything in her defense; he spoke just as loudly as everyone else in the car, but with more finality in his voice, "We shouldn't dog pile her." Kakashi turned to Toshiko with a dangerous glint in his eye.
"Why is your ex-boyfriend here and when did you say you could talk to him?" Toshiko imagined this was what having a father was; she could picture herself younger, and her father, Chief of Police, standing before her with his arms crossed and a stormy look sanding behind his eyes.
"I saw Shikamaru at Yakinku Q, when I went to the bathroom," Toshiko licked her lips. "He needed to talk to me—" Toshiko didn't like lying but she also wasn't going to tell her brothers and cousins, none of whom could stand Shikamaru after he had shattered her heart, she'd been late to the funeral partially because she'd been talking to Shikamaru. "—I told him after the cremation was fine."
"This is bullshit," Sasuke muttered.
"Look," Toshiko said sharply, "I—" she didn't need to do this. The world wouldn't end if she didn't. And she really didn't want to listen about his beautiful wife and children. "This is important to me." That wasn't a lie. At least not really. "You call can read me the riot act later, okay?"
"I don't like this," Itachi said, he had that doctor voice on. The kind that made you feel like he was being condescending. Sasuke's knee twitched at the very note of it. "You know how much he hurt you. You still refuse to date."
"I'm busy with work!" Toshiko shot back, only when Sasuke shot her a glare she instead tried, "Ōoji-san never married."
"Seriously?" Shisui laughed. "Ōoji-san is what you're using here."
"Just trust me me on this, okay? I've always trusted all of you, on everything. On leaving and life and everything. Trust I've learned enough okay? Now let me out Kashi."
"I'll let you—"
"—You stay in the car!" Toshiko snapped at her brother. "I don't trust you not to do some Call of Duty, gun for hire trick and not kill him with something nii-san has on the floor in here." Sasuke looked more put out then annoyed, especially when Shisui burst into snickers.
With a huffy kind of laugh aimed at her brother Kakashi let Toshiko out; and though he stood at the car, with the door open so that her brothers and cousins could glare out of it, no one else got out of the car as Toshiko walked up the drive way and to Shikamaru.
Who wasn't— still wasn't —wearing the ring on his finger.
He said he wasn't married but Toshiko could remember Temari. She couldn't get the glitter of the ring on his finger out of her mind. People lied. At one time Toshiko wouldn't have counted Shikamaru as one of those people.
But he had a ring.
"Hi," he breathed. Toshiko's eyes fluttered shut at the sound of his voice.
"Hi." Her heart beat so loud in her chest Toshiko could hear the blood rushing to her head. "You showed up."
"I wouldn't not," Shikamaru told, and Toshiko nodded. She hadn't expected him not to show up, not with how hard he had pressed for the meeting. He looked over Toshiko's shoulder, "You didn't tell them."
Ten years and still, "It slipped my mind with everything going on today." Ten years and he still knew her and them enough not to question certain things.
"That's understandable," Shikamaru said. He fidgeted and the paper in his hands crinkled.
"Work?" Toshiko asked, unable to take a full breath of air.
"N-no. No." He looked like he wanted to expand on that. Like he had so much more to say. His eyes flickered back to the car full of Toshiko's relatives and his cheeks heated up. "Can we talk somewhere more private?"
Toshiko's heart lodged itself in her throat so she nodded and lead Shikamaru around the house to the backyard. The sky was streaked with pink and yellow; the warm breeze blew threw the back part of the house and Toshiko pressed her palms flat against her stomach in hopes maybe that would settle the metaphorical hornets inside of her.
"You wanted to talk?"
"I did. Do," Shikamaru corrected. "I-I do." He sucked in a deep breathe of air.
Toshiko could heart her heart beating in her ears. She knew she had to prepare herself for just about anything; he was probably going to apologize for breaking her heart so carelessly. Shikamaru was anything but careless. He'd probably ask to be friends again as ten years had passed and he missed that; missed their friendship.
Toshiko knew she had to lock her knees and steady her breathing because he could say anything that might cut right through her.
"Uchiha Toshiko I love you," he said so reverently, so tenderly. "I never stopped, I tried. I'm sorry but I can't help it. I love you."
What?
Toshiko felt her mouth drop open at his declaration.
"I'm-say-what?" Toshiko blinked. Her head tilted as she tried to understand what had just been said. "What do you mean you love me?"
"I mean I love you," Shikamaru said again. He said it again the same way he had only a moment before. He said it the same way Toshiko had been dreaming of him saying it ever since he broke her heart. "I wake up thinking about you, wishing you have a good say and I go to sleep hoping you're okay and I'll see something in a shop and I'll think of you. You're never far from my mind and always on the tip of my tongue. Toshi it's been ten years—"
"—Exactly! Shikamaru it's been ten years since you broke up with me because what? You didn't want your girlfriend here getting in the way of all the girls out there? Over there in America?" Toshiko was a lot of things, she was a romantic and she could be fragile and she was so kind she'd give someone the shirt off her back if they needed it but she wasn't a fool.
Things like this— lost loves coming back —it didn't happen, not to her.
"You think that? You really think that's why I broke up with you?"
"Why else would you? You were happy-I mean, I thought you were."
"I was, I was so-so happy with you. I wanted-want," he corrected, "A future with you. A house, kids. A life." Sixteen year old Toshiko would have died hearing that; hearing the boy she wanted a life wanted one with her too.
"Then why did you break my heart?"
"Because it's a twelve hour time difference Toshi—"
"—It's Toshiko!" She shouted, her heart breaking all over again. "My name is Toshiko. Uchiha Toshiko, it's Uchiha-san or Toshiko."
"It's always been Toshi to me."
"It stopped being Toshi to you ten years ago," Toshiko's bottom lip wobbled. "This was a mistake." She didn't turn into the house; not when she knew her brothers and cousins and the kids and Mari would all have their faces pressed up against one of the windows on the upper floors.
Not when she knew one of them— knew that Sasuke —would tell her I told you so.
So she spun and ignoring Shikamaru's calls— "Toshi! Toshi please just hear me out!"—walked into the woods. Past the tree line and hoped with every speeding step he would leave her again. Once more, just like he had ten years ago.
"Leave me alone Shikamaru!" Toshiko snapped as she struggled up a steep hill in her flats. Though if it meant getting away from him Toshiko wasn't sure what she wouldn't cross.
It wasn't fair, to have something she hadn't stopped thinking about for years placed in front of her, knowing it wouldn't be real. That it wouldn't last; that it couldn't. Perhaps he loved her but he had a ring and Temari flashed through Toshiko's mind; he said he loved her but how could he? Maybe Toshiko could have what she so desperately wanted but how long would she have it before it was taken away?
How long would she have Shikamaru until he left.
Toshiko felt a hand— Shikamaru's hand —grab hold of hers at the told of the hill. He looked haggard but not defeated, "Please, just hear me out all the way."
"Why should I?" Toshiko asked, coolly. "You broke my heart, made a time of my life that is already agonizing so much worse because I can't help but think of you. Why, Shikamaru, should I listen to you tell me how you love me when you're married to someone else!"
"I'm not married!"
"You have a ring!" Their voices echoed in the darkening woods.
"For you Toshi! This ring—" Shikamaru ripped the ring out from the chain it was on around his neck, out from under his shirt, "—Is for you!"
Toshiko's mouth fell open. Her brows furrowed; she didn't though, rip her hand out of Shikamaru's. She kept it there. The air in her lungs dissipated as confusion racked her body.
"What do you mean the ring is for me?" Toshiko asked quietly unable to wrap her mind around how it could possibly be for her. "Shikamaru I saw you wearing it."
"I know. It's complicated and long so just let me explain it, okay?" He asked softly, his eyes never leaving hers. They were the same kind eyes she'd grown up loving, the same ones she fantasied about at night and woke up thinking of.
"Okay." He smiled at her, it wasn't a large bright smile but it was a small closed lip one that made Toshiko's cheeks sting pink. He didn't take his hand out of hers then either. His large warm hand and his slender fingers.
Toshiko couldn't help but partially focus— as Shikamaru took a deep breath, readying himself to explain his ring and how it was for her —on how warm his hand was.
"I'm not sure if you remember her but I had a girlfriend my second year at college, Temari." Toshiko nodded, it was impossible to forget her. "After we broke up because I wasn't over you and I moved back here, Choji and I would go out for drinks some nights after work and I'd get hit on. Flirted with."
Toshiko rose her left brow. How this had anything to do with the ring he wore being for her— a symbol of his love for her —was yet to be seen. All she heard, over the thumping over her own heart and rushing of her blood, was Shikamaru was attractive.
"Anyway," he continued slightly sheepishly at her look, "I got pretty tired pretty quickly explaining I was waiting for someone-for you. And one day I ran into your ōoji-san."
"What?" Toshiko stepped closer, "When?" He had never once mentioned running into Shikamaru; after Shikamaru had broken her heart unless Toshiko was the one to mention him all Nara-centric talk in the house stopped.
Which looking back had to be slightly frustrating for Obito as Shikamaru's father was his boss.
Shikamaru shrugged, "A few years ago. Anyway—" he continued again, "—Your ōoji-san and I spoke. I told him why I broke up with you and that I was waiting to make it right. To tell you how I still feel. How I'll always feel for you Toshi." Shikamaru breathed, his tongue peaked out to wet his lips and Toshiko took a step forward. She was higher on the hill than Shikamaru but Shikamaru was so much taller than her naturally, despite the uneven leveling, they were eye to eye.
"And?"
"He gave me his fathers ring."
"What?"
Shikamaru had a small smile on his face as he spun the ring in between the fingers of his other hand.
"Yeah. He said you and your brothers were going to get wedding sets anyway-Shisui and Obito had gotten their fathers and Itachi and Sasuke would get your grandfathers and fathers so if I was serious about this-about waiting for you then I could have the ring on the condition I did this when I did see you."
And he kneeled. With the ring and the string it was on, no longer around his neck and still, with Toshiko's hand in his other one, Nara Shikamaru, on one knee, presented Toshiko with her great-grandfathers ring.
What was air? Humans they didn't really need to breath because Toshiko wasn't and she was fine. Dizzy and lighthearted, heart thumping loud enough to be worrying but fine.
She'd have to say no, right? Even if part of her wanted to say yes the right and sensible thing was no. Her brothers would kill her if she said yes. Her cousins would kill Shikamaru. Could you marry someone you— probably —resented?
Did Toshiko resent Shikamaru? She didn't hate him; she loved him. Even after ten years of heartbreak.
"Uchiha Toshi, I'm not proposing."
"Oh thank god." Toshiko gapped, air flooded her lungs and Shikamaru chuckled. He nodded with his eyes closed only to open them and for Toshiko to see they were glossy.
"I'm sorry I hurt you and I'm sorry I destroyed the friendship we had. Something I coveted and still do. I love you though and I know it's wrong to ask this of you-you have your own life all the way across the country but maybe, um-I mean—" Shikamaru dropped Toshiko's hand in favor of fishing out the paper he'd been looking at when she and her brothers and cousins had arrived.
Shikamaru's eyes scanned the paper, "—Call me?"
"Excuse me?" Toshiko couldn't help but laugh; Shikamaru's smile got wider.
"Call me," he said again, holding the ring more out towards her, "It'd be crazy to jump right back into a relationship—"
"—And that's what you want with me?"
"I want anything you'll give me Toshi. Friendship, romance, the occasional text. Anything so long as you're in my life."
"You know if you leave me again you'd be destroying my heart."
"Good thing I don't plan to," Shikamaru breathed. Toshiko knelt down and took the ring from Shikamaru, he watched her as if he expected her to put the ring on her thumb or around her own neck. She didn't though.
On top of the hill they'd met at twenty years before Toshiko slipped the ring and it's chain back around Shikamaru's neck, her hand cupping his face all the while.
"We'll go slow," Toshiko said, "We'll get to know each other again."
"And then?"
"Hopefully?" Toshiko asked rhetorically, "We'll see. It's been ten years Shika, we've changed." But instead of nodding sagely and agreeing Shikamaru beamed. The years had been kind to him; he looked as handsome as ever as he smiled.
"You called me Shika."
"You've been calling me Toshi."
"Because you'll always be Toshi to me." And though she said they would be going slow only half a minute before, tenderly Toshiko pressed a kiss to Shikamaru's lips, to which he responded just as gently— his hands cradled her face, the tips of his fingers threaded themselves through her hair —but much more feverously.
When they pulled away from one another and their eyes fluttered open Shikamaru pressed his forehead against hers and as the sounds of the forest played out around them— a familiar sika deer's call rang out clearly —he told her, "I'm never leaving you again. I won't."
"I love you too. I still do," Toshiko said, and Shikamaru— just as gently —kissed her once more.
A/N: AND! NOW ONTO THE EPILOUGE! Before that though, I wanted to say thank you. Thank you for everyone who's read and left a kudos and thank you especially for those who have left comments.
