Disclaimer: I own three pairs of boxers, but own no Naruto to fill them. Which is sad, because one pair is orange checkered. He'd look so cute.

The Morning After

Severe pain. Severe pain and darkness. These were the things Kiba woke up to.

And then he realized that it was only dark because his eyes were closed. He opened them and was treated to a nice bout of shock as he registered his surroundings to be completely alien.

Where the hell am I?

He stood up, ready to sneak away, and was completely at fault for the renewed bolt of pain that arrowed through the base of his skull. How had he managed to forget such pain so quickly? Especially since it hadn't really gone away in the first place.

He considered fighting through it until he was hit with a wave of nausea so strong that it knocked him back onto the couch he'd been sprawled on.

"Ugh… I kind of wish I could die right now…" He mumbled uselessly into the crook of his arm.

"And I kind of want to kill you, so maybe we could work something out."

A too-loud voice approached his ears and proceeded to box them inside out. The nausea increased.

A sigh. "If you're going to be sick again, raise a hand."

Kiba's hand shot up in the air. It was grasped firmly, and he found himself yanked up and dragged down a hallway. His knees gave out relatively quickly, as his concentration favored keeping his stomach under control rather than his joints, but they hit cool tile. He managed to crawl the two steps left to the toilet, and then proceeded to empty the contents of his stomach in as dignified a manner as he could.

After all, the someone that had dragged him in there was still standing behind him. Bugger if he knew why he cared.

Finally, his stomach calmed, and he was able to stand up (by himself) to look at the person who had helped him.

A somewhat peeved Haruno Sakura was leaning in the doorway. The pain in Kiba's head counteracted her glare, allowing him to avoid flinching and other sorts of submissive facial expressions. Rather than show on his face, all the dread he was feeling decided to pool coldly in his stomach.

Shit.

Sakura cleared her throat pointedly, eyes tired and ever so slightly malicious. Kiba quickly turned to the sink and rinsed his mouth out.

Sakura leaned more heavily on her shoulder, letting out an attention-getting huff. Kiba rinsed his mouth a second and third time.

Sakura gave a very irked sigh. Kiba ran his fingers through his hair a few times, watching himself in the mirror.

Sakura began to growl.

Kiba knew he was pushing it, but he was frantically trying to come up with a plan. The most logical thing to do would be to stop being an asshole and simply apologize for whatever other grief he'd put her through in the night. He remembered well the many times he'd seen her extreme strength demonstrated, not to mention all the displays of her temper on Naruto and Sai, the boys who made up the new Team 7. Unfortunately, her growling was sending fear crawling up his spine, effectively blocking logic of any sort from his mind.

It was also kinda hot, he realized.

Hmm. Make note to find a girl who growls…

"You're going to have to explain yourself eventually, dog boy, and isn't sooner always better than later?"

Kiba turned halfway around, watching her from under his strategically finger-combed bangs. Her eyes softened the slightest bit at the pout he was giving her.

"Oh, come on. I'm pissed, but I won't really kill you. Could you just explain why exactly I was called downstairs at 3:00 AM to find your sorry ass passed out in the entry hall?"

Kiba rubbed the back of his head sheepishly, injecting as much charm into his grin as he could. "Ah, that's a pretty long story, really. I wouldn't want to bore you too much with the details, so if we could just forget all this happened, that'd…"

The look she was giving him indicated that, unless he managed to explain himself convincingly in ten minutes, he wasn't going anywhere anytime soon.

"It just so happens I'm free for most of the day. How about you enlighten me, Kiba dear?"

Goddamn it.

Kiba turned his teacup in his hands, frowning slightly. As promised, he'd told Sakura his troubles from the very beginning. She hadn't said anything the whole time he was speaking, just nodded occasionally, and now that he was done, she was just rummaging through her cabinets. He wondered at the silence, but didn't really want to ask; her mood didn't seem to have lifted.

Understandably so, I guess… Man, she's making me feel like a real jerk. All I did was wake her up at an abnormal time. He thought back over the few things she'd said to him. …I think…

Kiba swallowed nervously. "Uh, I wasn't too much trouble, was I? I mean, I'm still really sorry about waking you up, but if I broke anything or made a mess you haven't pointed out to me yet, I'll gladly pay you back or clean up or whatever."

Sakura turned away from what looked like potential breakfast. "What? Oh, you didn't break anything. You were sick, but luckily that was on the steps going up to the third floor."

Kiba winced. "Oh. Well, that's good."

"Definitely. The landlady is going to love it."

Kiba ducked his head to hide a sheepish little smile. Oops… But at least she's not angry.

Sakura grinned a little at his discomfort, busying herself with the food once more. "Don't feel so bad. This has been an interesting turn of events in my otherwise boring week. Sure, it isn't quite as welcome as a bunch of other happenings I could think of, but it's better than nothing, right?"

Her smile was unassuming and kind, if not a little weary. Kiba was surprised.

"And I can't really blame you. Those girls sounded…" Her face twisted as she tried to come up with a suitable adjective.

"Yeah…" Kiba smiled, finally able to relax, "I'm still a bit amazed that my crappy drunken acting was enough to throw them off."

"Well, they sounded just a tad more cognizant than your average two-year-old, so it really isn't that much of a shocker." Sakura returned to the table with a bowl of soup for each of them and a plate of buttered toast. "I haven't been able to resupply my pantry recently, so there are few edible things around. Hope you like tomato."

"Sweet." Kiba licked his lips, attacking his bowl as his regular beastly self came out of hiding. The threat of Sakura's temper had caused it to cower for a while, but now that her wrath was no more, the coast was clear for its reentry into the world.

And boy, was it hungry.

Sakura watched him, a look of slightly repulsed intrigue on her face. Kiba stopped slurping momentarily to look at her. "What?"

She shook her head. "Just wondering how you manage to eat in such a way that sounds awfully messy but isn't." She wiped her hand on the table around his bowl, shaking her head again. "Not a drop of soup astray. Astounding."

Kiba narrowed his eyes at her. "Are you making fun of me?"

Green eyes met his brown ones for a moment. "Huh? No."

Hmm. There was something funny about the way she broke his gaze. She was even blushing a little. Was she lying? His response was to narrow his eyes further, sitting a bit lower in his seat.

"So I disgust you, then?"

Her eyes found his again, but held their ground this time. Maybe it was the wry smirk that accompanied them that gave them courage.

"Disgusted? Please. Naruto's my teammate, for God's sake. It takes quite an effort to be on par with that boy." She propped her arms over the back of her chair. "And I'm sorry to inform you, but you aren't even close."

Then she frowned a little, thinking. "Though I have to say, that was some impressive projectile vomiting last night. You might have Naruto beat in that category."

Kiba blanched, staring at her in confusion. Since when did girls (that weren't his sister) talk like that? Sakura gave him a look right back, as if to say what the hell is your problem?

"What, did you forget I was the one taking care of you?"

"No. You just sounded like a guy, the way you said that." Maybe he was just too used to Hinata's quiet mannerisms. He needed to get out more.

She chuckled, watching him lazily. "Isn't it to be expected?" Kiba quirked an eyebrow at this.

"How so?"

She sat forward, counting the reasons on her fingers. "A, my teammates are all male. This is a relatively normal occurrence. B, however, is that Naruto is one of them, which is reason enough for me to be like this, given that he's the teammate I'm closest to."

She had a point. Kiba knew himself well enough to admit that he was somewhat of a dunderhead, not to mention lewd, rude, and full of testosterone. Naruto was very much like Kiba in this respect. This was why Kiba got along so well with Naruto. It was also why they beat each other up so much for no apparent reason.

"C, my other teammate is Sai, which is unconsciously making me into a man, given how often I have to beat him."

Ah yes, Sai. New guy. Not very talkative, but funny when he opened his mouth. Insulting, certainly, but funny.

"D, Sasuke was once a teammate of mine, and though you wouldn't have known it by looking at him, he was almost exactly like Naruto. He was just better at hiding it most of the time."

Sasuke. Kiba held back a hiss of displeasure. He'd almost died for that useless bastard. Hell, he'd almost died by his own damn hands, no thanks to those body-invading Sound ninjas. And they had failed in retrieving the boy in the end, to add insult to injury.

Dick.

Sakura was still thinking, kicking her legs up and down like a little kid.

"Aaaaaaaaand… I can't think of anything else. Oh! Well, I guess E could be that my most recent sensei is one of the most butch women around."

Such a loaded statement said so brightly. Nice.

Kiba chuckled quietly. She is such a guy.

"Okay, I surrender to your viewpoint. Are those balls between your legs or aren't they?" Kiba grinned widely at the pink-haired girl. He was only slightly taken aback when she gave him a playful flick on the nose.

"Anyway… how about we stop talking about what's not between my legs and focus on what's not on your chest?"

Mind still in the vein of his previous comment, Kiba answered without thinking. "Breasts?"

"Uh, no. Try a shirt."

Kiba looked down at his chest and saw bare skin in place of the t-shirt he'd had on earlier. He looked back up at Sakura in confusion. She was calmly clearing the table.

"Uh, did I remove it myself or what? Where is it?"

"It's in the wash, since you didn't quite manage to project all of your sick onto the wall as I carried you upstairs. Are there any objections to me running by your house to fetch you something else to wear for the time being? My dryer is old and slow. Besides, I have some errands I need to run. I can just add this to the list."

Kiba, ignoring most of her statement, stood and struck a manly pose. "Ha! But I am a MAN, and real men don't need shirts just to walk home. Frankly, I don't think I need a shirt at all, but common courtesy calls for it." He winked at her, sticking his tongue out for good measure.

She snorted in response. "Whatever, manly man. I'm going to put some proper clothes on, and then go find some for you. Shouldn't take me too long."

Kiba abruptly noticed that Sakura was wearing cutesy girl pajamas consisting of a tank and flannelly pants. They had pink rabbits on them. But this was all beside the point.

"What, you'd be ashamed if I walked out of your apartment building half-naked? I'm not that bad."

Sakura gave him a look. "It's not that I'd be ashamed, just that I'd rather avoid gossipmongers. I'm sure you could say the same."

"Well, actually," Kiba grumbled, "if Shino was walking by, it'd make things easier to rub in his face if I just happened to forget something at a girl's place where I spent the night. I never stay, so that'd really stick it to him good…" Belatedly, he realized that he'd kind of just proven everyone's speculations about him correct. He also realized that, as a girl herself, Sakura might not appreciate that kind of blatant womanizing. And Sakura's bad side was a scary place to be.

Sakura, however, took it in stride and grinned. "Yeah, that would get him, wouldn't it? Oh well. You can still tell him you spent the night here. I'll even back it up if you want."

Kiba looked at her strangely. "You won't let me leave in a falsely promiscuous way, but you have no problem halfway advertising your own false promiscuity?"

"Well, it wouldn't be a lie. It just wouldn't be the full truth either. Well, okay, those few who would take it the wrong way and spread it like butter would get the full truth. Ino, for example, would get all the details, but Shino can have the edited version. He's quiet."

Kiba still felt like he had somehow slipped the noose. He never would have imagined that Sakura could be about anything but girl power and rampant feminism; either she was too tired to understand his implication or she genuinely didn't care.

His answer came when she shrugged and gave a carefree little smile. "If you do go through with that plan of action, though, just let me know. It'd suck to outline a prank and then not actually be in on it."

"Prank?"

Sakura gave him a 'pity the idiot' look. "Um, yeah, since we're not actually together? Come on, Kiba, I know you're extremely hung over, but I didn't think you were that bad off."

Kiba chuckled half-heartedly. "Right. Not together. Lost track of the conversation for a minute there."

"…Like I said, what kind of booze were you drinking that could make you forget your usual nature?"

Ah. There it was. How could he forget that he just didn't do relationships? How could he forget that it was just his nature to love 'em and leave 'em very shortly after the loving was done? Even the people who called themselves his friends and family couldn't picture him any other way.

Am I really that much of a whore? I really need to start paying better attention.

Sakura had been watching him as he processed this suddenly hard-to-swallow concept, and was now leaning against the counter pursing her lips like a psychologist might behind the back of a particularly dense client. Kiba found himself glaring at her. He had some stuff to work on, yes, but it was extremely grating that everyone around him seemed to think he genuinely had a problem, as if no one else his age was having lots of casual sex.

"What's that look for? I'm not some kind of perverted fiend. Why is everyone so down on my enjoying life? It's not that serious."

Sakura tapped a finger against her mouth. "Kiba, outside of Hinata, Ino, myself, your sister, your mother, and Kurenai-sensei, how many girls do you interact with on a friendly basis?"

"Not that many, but I don't see what the big deal is about that. I'm just better at being friends with guys." He was glad he had left the unabashed ogling of Ino out of the telling of events. It really wouldn't have helped his case any.

Not that I still don't get what's wrong with just being a guy. I kind of hate society sometimes.

"Okay… so does that mean you find me unattractive?"

Kiba froze. He recognized a loaded question when he heard one. But before he could even try to back himself out of the metaphorical corner, Sakura removed the metaphor altogether.

"I'm not trying to trick you or anything. It's just that if you find me attractive, or rather, attractive enough to potentially have sex with, I don't understand why you're having issues."

Kiba's brain could not keep up. It didn't help that she was attractive and had mentioned sex. "I, uh... um, yeah, you're pretty hot, but... what do you mean?"

"I mean that your problem is a non-problem. If you find me attractive enough to screw but are still able to converse with me like a normal human being, like you've been doing since you woke up, I don't see why you couldn't duplicate this atmosphere with another girl if you wanted."

Kiba's brain mercifully cottoned on to her point. It was a really good one.

"…Huh."

Because… Well, just because. It made perfect sense.

Sakura shook her head and moved towards her bedroom. Hopefully he didn't need any more help processing her words; she'd been kind of hoping to get to the market sometime that week.

Sakura riffled through her closet; a certain pair of pants she'd been looking for for weeks continued to elude her.

Shame… Those were some really great pants.

Humming tunelessly, she shrugged off the loss and pulled an old pair of shorts out, throwing them onto the mess of sheets that was her bed. Truthfully, she was grateful to Kiba for showing up when he did; he'd managed to rescue her from a horrible nightmare, and had kept her busy enough the rest of the night that she couldn't be bothered to think about it till now.

She didn't remember exactly what had been going on in her nightmare, though she did recall a humongous python. It had wrapped itself around her, squeezing so tight she could barely move. It had kept her still and forced her to sit through some torture…oh, what had it been? Nothing conventional, but terrible at the time.

Sakura twisted her lips into some variation of a frown while she struggled to remember. What was it? It had made her absolutely nuts, but that was all that came to her.

Getting dressed did not help her memory. Neither did her usual grooming regime.

Ugh, this is going to bother me all day. Great.

She walked into the kitchen to find a significantly less clothed Kiba stretched out across the table eating a…

"BANANA!" Sakura cried out triumphantly. She remembered now. There had been a banana on a stage in a top hat and spats. And it sang and danced. And danced and sang. And then danced some more. And shrilled its horrible little song. And then had continued to dance until she felt like screaming.

That would drive anyone crazy. Friggin' fruit. She shook the image forcibly from her head; the human brain was truly magnificent in its ability to be disturbed by just about anything, given the right inclination. Maybe I should ask Shishou to interpret my dreams. Maybe they're saying I need a vacation.

Satisfied, Sakura turned her full attention to the boy still lounging on her table in all his nearly naked glory, who had risen up on one elbow and was now staring at her strangely.

"Um, what the hell was that about? Spastic much?" Kiba took another bite of his snack, chewing suspiciously. Sakura's brain got itself up to speed with the details of the situation.

"I could ask the same of you. Where are your pants?"

"Oh. Well, uh, I tried to make coffee, but the contents of the pot kind of transported itself from the pot to my pants." Kiba grinned, sitting up gingerly. One boxer leg was hiked up, revealing a raw patch of skin. "Don't worry, though. I managed to keep the stain localized to my clothing. And right after it happened, your washing machine dinged, so I scrubbed my pants in the sink and stuck everything in the drier." Another contemplative bite. "Really the only unfortunate part of this for you is that I decided not to go commando yesterday."

Sakura immediately ran into her teeny laundry room to see if there were any survivors. Kiba was a very capable ninja, but she wasn't sure she could trust him with a task so domestic as working a drier.

"Oh, come on. I admit I'm no genius, but I'm smart enough to know how to properly use laundry machines." He had followed her.

"Just checking." Sakura smoothed her hair back. "I suppose you could have left without your shirt, but you're officially grounded now. Can you promise me I'll still have an apartment to come back to if I leave you alone for three hours?"

"Sort of. I mean, I can't promise what state it'll be in, but I can at least assure you that the building itself will be intact."

"Yeah, fine. Whatever. I'll be back soon. Oh, and if you got burned by the strategically placed coffee, there's some burn cream in the cabinet over the bathroom sink."

Kiba nodded and made his way back to the kitchen. Sakura forced herself to walk out the door. She couldn't consciously think of a reason why she should be worried, but…

"Wait! Sakura!" Kiba caught her at the top of the stairs. "I was just wondering…"

She looked at him expectantly.

A rascally grin spread across his face. "Am I allowed to use the microwave without supervision?"

"Yeah, sure." Sakura sighed, then glanced around at the sound of another door opening. It was the little old lady down the hall, Mrs. Shizuka, also on her way to the market no doubt. She got an eyeful of a nicely muscled boy in his skivvies who waved cheerily at her, then retreated into the apartment that just happened to be Miss Haruno Sakura's.

Sakura bit her tongue, gave a small wave of her own, and scurried off.