AN: I'm back hehe! Thank you so much for giving this story a chance and I hope you like this chapter.
Disclaimer: Characters are not mine, alright? Hehe if they were, then Neji and Jaraiya would still be alive huhu.
Anyway, off you go now. Enjoy!
The sweet smell of pineapple greeted them the minute they stepped inside the house. Kankuro and Gaara exchanged a confused look before walking further into the kitchen and what they saw made them stop.
Their sister stood there, hair even spikier than usual, wearing a purple apron and was chopping a big pineapple into chunks. On the table were trays of freshly baked pineapple shaped pastries.
Suddenly, she looked up and the brothers saw flour coating her right cheek.
"Hey! You guys are back early from the Kazekage meeting. What happened?"
"Shouldn't we be the ones asking you that?" Kankuro commented, taking a pastry from a tray.
"What's all this for, Temari?" Gaara asked.
Temari sighed. "Just got bored and I was craving some pineapple so I went to town this morning and got some pineapples. I also made these pineapple cakes. You guys like these, right?"
"I think this will last us till Christmas Eve."
Temari heard the teasing in Kankuro's voice and glared at him.
"Shut up."
"I think it all looks good, Temari. We can't wait to try them," Gaara smiled at her.
If she wasn't covered in flour and was busy mixing the filling, she would have gone over and hugged her brother. And maybe hit the other one.
"You two go on and rest for a bit. These will be done in a while."
She was shaping the dough into pineapples when she heard Kankuro.
"Geez. She should just go and visit her pineapple headed boyfriend if she misses him that much."
Suddenly, a strong wind blew toward the puppet master, hitting him on the back of the head.
"Kami! I was just kidding, Temari!" Kankuro grumbled, rubbing his head.
Gaara smiled while back in the kitchen, Temari smirked, holding up a pineapple cake with a smile on her face.
--
He was never fond of the fruit. His mom would buy it once in a while and would serve it in the table. He would eat a slide or two, but he still didn't like it. He felt attacked somehow whenever he sees that fruit.
Ino once joked thataybe it was the hair, but she was just being troublesome.
But now, as he walked around the marketplace, his hands holding different plastic bags filled with fruits and vegetables his mom had asked him to buy, he stared at the pineapples on the stand. They seemed to be calling out to him and he could'nt stop himself from walking over and purchasing the sweetest one it the lot.
The stall owner eyed his ponytail curiously as he apid for the pineapple. Shikamaru sighed and left, avoiding eye contact with other people on his way home.
"I'm home."
His mom emerged from the kitchen, apron in place.
"Oh, good thing you're home. I had just finished cooking lunch. I made curry."
"I got everything on the list."
She smiled and motioned for him to put it on the counter. As she was taking out the vegetables, she noticed him walking over to the sink with a plastic in hand. She watched as he took out a pineapple from the plastic and proceeded to rinse it. He then went over and grabbed a chopping board and a knife. He didn't even look up as he began peeling it and chopping it into chunks.
Afterwards, he placed it in a bowl and put in at the center of the table. Only then did he look up at his mom.
"I got a pineapple. You like this, right mom?"
She smiled and nodded. Even though he made it sound like he bought for her, she knew her son well enough to know that he bought because it reminded him of someone special.
Yoshino came over and patted his cheek.
"Thank you. Oh and by the way, a letter arrived this morning."
"Oh?" He took out the plates and started preparing the table.
"It's from Temari."
The spoon dropped from his hand and landed on the plate, the impact of the metal against the porcelain echoing in the kitchen. Shikamaru looked up and blushed because of the way his mom was looking at him knowingly.
"I get it, Shikamaru. Now, why don't you go and see what she wrote in that letter."
He nodded and went off to the living room.
Yoshino smiled as she scooped some curry into a bowl, and then a second later, she shouted.
"Oh and do tell her I miss her too."
She heard him groan but a second later, he was already rushing upstairs to his room, too excited to read the letter.
--
"I hate pineapples." Temari muttered, scrunching her nose when the sweet smell of the fruit reached her nose.
She was in the Yamanaka household, having brunch with Ino, Sakura, Hinata and Tenten. Ino laughed at her friend, while taking a bite of the fruit.
"How come?" Sakura asked.
"I thought you like pineapples," Tenten said as well.
"That was before. But now, I hate it."
The other girls waited for her to continue.
"It's because of that pineapple head I'm waddling like a penguin." She mumbled, her hands rubbing her round tummy.
The others looked at her in understanding, their own hands going to their bulging stomachs as well. Their quiet get together was suddenly disrupted when the front door opended, and Naruto came rushing over to Hinata to kiss her cheek. And the other guys went over to their respective wives.
Shikamaru stood by the entrance, taking that moment to admire his beautiful wife who was pregnant with his child. She hadn't seen him yet as she was busy munching on a toast, with a small pout.
He immediately got worried and rushed over to her.
"Hey, what's wrong?"
Temari glared at him.
"I can't see my feet and I hate pineapples."
Shikamaru was lost for whole second before he noticed the chopped fruit on the table. He chuckled before he wrapped his arms around her.
"And I love you, troublesome woman."
"Yeah, I know. Pineapple head."
AN: Hello! I'm back with another chapter wahahahaha! I'm just pretty stressed with graduate study and stuff and right now, Naruto is what helps me relieve my stress. Also, I was craving those pineapple cakes from Taiwan when I wrote this one so yeah haha. I guess you can already tell from the number of times I wrote pineapple in this chapter.
Anyway, I hope you enjoyed this one! Keep safe!