hi yall! okay i deleted chapter six because i wanted to start posting interludes every five chapters. specifically every five because five is a nice number for intervals. this chapter might feel lighter than normal bc tbh i really started shipping like hardcore and also because, in case you haven't noticed, this fic is depressing as fuck man. it's so sad. i worry for myself. so the interlude (this one, anyway) is like, ya know. lighter. love you guys
i: boy, one day you'll be a man
There's a girl at school and he really liked her and her name was Haruno Sakura.
They weren't anything alike. She's smart and he's not; she took notes and he didn't; she got amazing grades and he's just barely passing. But they had something in common. Neither of them had friends, and Naruto would love to be her friend. And if he could just be brave, he would be.
"Crying again, Forehead?" Sakura-chan flinched when Ami flicked her forehead. A red mark blossomed on Sakura's skin, unfurling. Naruto ducked further into his little hiding place behind one of the stone benches. Another thing they had in common. People didn't just not want to be friends with them. Other kids were actively mean. He couldn't think of a reason for anyone to be mean to Sakura-chan. She was always nice to everyone and she was so smart and so cute and her hair was shiny.
(This made him feel a little better. There was no reason to be mean to Sakura-chan. Maybe that meant there was no reason to be mean to him, either.)
He just had to be brave, just had to get up the courage to go stand up to her, to tell Ami she was wrong and Sakura-chan was great and to just go away and then Sakura-chan would say thank you and he would have a friend and he didn't like reading but she read a lot and he could sit in the library with her and watch her read and she always had such nice lunch boxes and maybe she would even read aloud for him it was gonna be so fun, like seriously, really fun, and all he had to do was be brave this one time—
"Shut up, Ami," a new voice said and he peeked around the bench. Some blond girl—she was in his class but he never talked to her—was standing in front of Sakura-chan, one hand on her hip, eyes narrowed. She was wearing a pale orange sweater. She wore colorful stuff like that a lot. Naruto looked down at his black tee-shirt. "Just because Sakura's prettier and smarter than you doesn't mean you get to be mean."
Ami and the blond girl were facing each other, in each other's space. Ami's long hair that Naruto had always thought looked so shiny, like her mother brushed it each morning and each night, was lackluster compared to the fine hair the other girl had. He could imagine it knotting like strands of silk. "You go away, Ino-pig." Ami sneered defensively. "Who do you think you are?"
The blond girl—Ino-pig?—considered this question. She punched Ami in the mouth without answering. Ami squealed, landing on her butt on the sidewalk. The girls who'd been standing behind her squeaked. Ino-pig watched the three scamper off. She looked satisfied.
She turned back to Sakura-chan. Sakura was still crying. Naruto felt like he should look away, like the moment wasn't meant for him, but nothing was meant for him and he kept watching. He was always on the outside, watching. "So they make fun of your forehead," the blond girl said to herself. She made a contemplative noise. "I'm Ino," she said. Sakura flinched from her. The blond girl's voice wasn't gentle or soft. "What's your name?"
"I'm Sakura," Sakura whispered. Then, a bit louder, looking anywhere but Ino's eyes, "Haruno Sakura!"
Ino laughed and smiled and used her hand to push back Sakura-chan's bangs. "You look so much cuter without your hair in your face," she decided and Sakura blushed and Naruto should have been happy for them. Sakura had made a friend, and Ino had stopped Ami from being mean to her. He should have been happy.
(He knew if it was him no one would have stopped the other kids from being mean. It it was him Ami would've been able to say cruel things forever. No one would care if he cried. If it was him no one would've helped and he knew that because no one ever did.)
Sakura-chan had a friend now, and Ino seemed really nice. She looked like she was. She was smiling. "Let's get you something to tie your hair back," Ino suggested and Sakura looked like she'd won the lottery. He should be happy for them.
Naruto ducked back behind the bench. He should be happy for them. All he felt was lonely.
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Sakura-chan and Ino stopped being friends. He wouldn't have minded, except it seemed like it was 'cause of Sasuke, and Naruto fricking hatedSasuke. Naruto didn't talk to Ino a lot, but the few times he had, and the even fewer times it was about Sasuke, Ino didn't seem like she was a fan. "He's always bragging," Naruto had complained to himself during break, scuffing his feet on the grass.
Halfway up a tree and otherwise ignoring him, Ino had said, just a little bitterly, "He thinks he's just so cool." She blew her hair out of her face in one large breath. Ino sometimes talked about Sasuke like she was his rival or something, and even though Naruto was clearly Sasuke's rival, Ino was probably the coolest person Naruto knew, so he didn't argue it. But hearing her talk to him—and talk bad about Sasuke, too—made him feel real nervous. He didn't wanna say the wrong thing, didn't wanna mess it up.
"R-right!" he sputtered. "Exactly!"
While he was trying to think of something to say to get her to keep talking to him, Ino gave him a look probably intended to let him know her response had been a one time thing and wouldn't lead to a conversation, and then Sakura had run up and called Ino down. Ino jumped straight from her branch, high in the air, to the dirt. She did a little flip on the way down and Naruto tried not to make it too obvious he was gaping at her. Sakura-chan seemed to catch him, though, because she said something to Ino and then laughed. They'd gone off to do whatever friends did and Naruto was an outsider, an observer, watching moments not meant for him.
He was at least trying to, like. Not be a creep about it, though.
"Ino gets so weird whenever Sasuke comes up," one of Ino and Sakura-chan's friends murmured. Another one—Yuki? He thought her name was Yuki—nodded in agreement. "Did you hear what she said?"
"Wait," Yuki said. Then, "Do you think she likes him?"
A couple weeks after that Sakura-chan and Ino weren't friends anymore.
"Good morning, Sakura-chan," Naruto announced, as was routine. In line with routine, Sakura-chan's stare was withering when her eyes landed on him. She sniffed pointedly and looked away. He slid into a seat next to Shikamaru, who was asleep, and therefore usually a good person to sit next to when you wanted to take a nap. "Your hair's longer! It looks really nice." Shikamaru didn't even flinch. That made Shikamaru really one of the best people to sit next to; he didn't make any noises to disturb Naruto when he was sleeping and he didn't seem to care if Naruto made any noises or disruptions when it was the other way around.
Sakura paused. She reached up and touched her hair. The red ribbon she wore flopped over a little when she pushed her hair back. Sakura-chan turned to look at Ino, triumphant. "My hair's longer already," she said.
Ino didn't even look up from her notebook. "Don't listen to her," Yuki said. "Not like Naruto's a credible source on hair."
Sakura turned to give Naruto the same look again, like it was his fault his opinion wasn't trustworthy. She was only nine—and he was older, at ten, so she shouldn't really be scary—but he found her incredibly intimidating. Even if his opinion wasn't, uh, credible, he thought Sakura-chan's opinion was probably the most important in the world, and he really wanted her to like him.
(He could still picture Ino in her pale orange sweater, stepping in front of Sakura with her arms spread, like she was gonna take a hit to the jaw for her. He really, really wanted Sakura-chan to like him.)
"Naruto's not dumb, Yuki," Ino said, like she was speaking to a small child. One smaller than her, at least. Ino had a unique way of making other people feel small and stupid. It was kinda rude—but when not aimed at him, a little bit funny. "Sakura's hair got longer."
Sakura-chan stared at her and Naruto was pretty sure she could still see Ino in her pale orange sweater, too. He felt like what Ino said didn't actually have anything to do with him, that it was some kind of subtle message to Sakura and he'd accidentally become her mailman. "Ino," Sakura said quietly.
"Naruto's pretty dumb," Yuki said, unsure.
"Not any dumber than you," Ino said, still not looking up from her notebook. Yuki made a small, surprised noise. Ino kept her eyes on her notebook. Naruto wanted to know what she was writing in it. "And I'm friends with you. If I wasn't completely totally obviously super in love with Sasuke-kun, I'd definitely like Naruto."
Sasuke's face got all twisted and Sakura-chan's face did, too. "Shut up, Ino-pig! You lay off Sasuke-kun!"
"You gonna make me?" Ino asked, abandoning her notebook and slamming her hands on the desk, voice louder and a bit more like singing and Naruto wiggled in his seat, face and ears uncomfortably hot. Naruto watched with rapt attention as Reo-sensei walked up to the podium at the front of the room, silencing the argument with a quick glance. When Naruto's eyes dashed back down at his desk and he started to desperately search for a pencil, for a notebook, for anything to look at other than his classmates, he caught Shikamaru's eye.
Shikamaru looked at him, unimpressed, and then turned his head to the side and went back to sleep.
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After Sasuke left the village Naruto saw Ino and Sakura together at the hospital. They'd visited everyone—Ino cried over Chouji and Sakura brought flowers for Lee. After Sakura came to see him, Ino stopped in, probably on her way out. He wiped his tears away. She looked away while he did it, which was nice, at least.
"I'm glad you're okay," Ino said. He tried his best to smile at her.
"Ino, you coming?" Sakura-chan called. He listened to her footsteps come closer, and then she poked her head in the room. "Sorry, Naruto," she fretted apologetically. Then, to Ino, a bit pointedly, "It's getting sort of late. We were going to walk back together, right?"
Ino nodded absently. "It's good you're friends again!" Naruto chirped, congratulatory. Sakura-chan and Ino both raised their noses in unison, making tiny discontent noises.
"Don't make any mistakes on this, Naruto!" Sakura put her hands on her hips. "Ino-pig and I aren't friends!"
"Yeah..." Naruto looked down at his hands. His smile hurt. "You're...rivals, right?"
Ino rolled her eyes. "Basically friends," she said, tone implying she'd discussed it with Sakura previously. Still, she gave Sakura a look, one eyebrow raised, and Sakura's face went red.
"Hmph!" Sakura-chan turned away pointedly. It was endearing. Would've been kinda funny. "I'm gonna wait for you outside!"
"I'll be right out, Forehead," Ino promised. Naruto listened to Sakura's footsteps get further and further away as she walked down the hallway. Ino reached forward, as if to hug him, but then she ruffled his hair and laughed. "Sakura was right. You do look like a mummy!"
"Yeah," Naruto agreed. Talking made the bandages on his face stretch uncomfortably. "Yeah, I—"
I couldn't bring him back, Naruto thought. I promised on my life to bring him back! A part of him ached at the thought. Sasuke was his friend. He would bring him back—for Sakura, for Sasuke.
"I'll see you later," Ino said and she brushed his hair out of his face a bit before stepping away. "Get well soon, okay?"
He nodded and looked at his hands and Ino walked away. But then she stopped. "It wasn't your fault, you know," she said, abruptly, in the doorway just as she'd stepped out to leave.
"What?"
Ino looked back at him. "It wasn't your fault. Sasuke..."
"You don't know anything about it," Naruto said. Sasuke was his first friend. Ino wasn't team seven. She didn't know the promises he'd made or the fights he and Sasuke had fought together. She didn't know the way Naruto had screamed and hurt and failed. She didn't know the way Sakura was crying when he promised to bring Sasuke home. She didn't know what it felt like—to finally have friendship and affection and warmth, to finally feel it with his own hands, and then have it slip away. Ino said she loved Sasuke, but she didn't know anything about it. I won't be a failure forever, he'd said to Sasuke. I'll be your equal! "I failed. I promised Sakura I would bring him back." He clenched his fists. "I promised, and I'll never go back on my word."
For a second she took a breath, her shoulders shaking just a little. He thought she was gonna either cry or yell at him—you idiot! let it go! save yourself, loser! you're recovering! look at all the hurt Sasuke did to you!—but Ino just turned around fully, looked him in the face. "Sakura can take care of herself," she said. And then she left.
.
.
.
He never really liked Ino. She was really loud and said mean things to Sakura-chan and had a thing for Sasuke, which was unforgivable in anyone other than Sakura. Everyone was allowed to have their flaws, but Sakura's only flaw was the little Sasuke hitch. Ino had the Sasuke hitch, but, like, a lot of other stuff, too.
(Even now, with Sasuke missing for years and feeling forever out of reach, Naruto could still say that and laugh about it. She had a thing for Sasuke. Ha!
Sasuke was gone and it wasn't funny anymore.)
Still. He, like. Really needed a plant.
Naruto allowed himself a few seconds of lingering in the doorway, counting the moments after the little bell jingled. "Welcome to—" Ino did a double take when she saw him. She was in a burnt orange short-sleeved shirt. He wished he was wearing his usual orange. It would've made him feel better. "Oh," she said. Her smile shrank away. Her hair was down around her shoulders, long and shiny. He could imagine it tangling like fishing line. "Hey, Naruto. You need anything?"
He scowled a little. Pissed him off that everyone was being so-so-so nice to him now that Jiraiya was dead.
"You don't gotta baby me," he said. "I just want a plant."
Ino raised an eyebrow. She didn't look impressed. Good. That was good. That felt more normal. That felt less like his teacher was, you know. Dead. "A plant," she repeated. "Anything more specific?"
He shrugged, leaned his elbows on the counter. Ino crossed her arms. "I don't know." Naruto scanned the shelves of plants, the fleshy aloe and soft spikes of fern. "A friendly plant. Stonecrop, or Allium, or something? A nice plant. Something fluffy."
She was smiling now, like he'd said something funny. He just wanted someone to say goodnight to and morning to and, you know, that kind of thing. The closest he had to family was gone, and Jiraiya hadn't been much for that sort of domestic stuff anyway. Sometimes he used to try to get Jiraiya to do family stuff with him—"Let's brush our teeth together, Ero-sennin! Can we buy these matching slippers? We should make curry rice! Please, Ero-sennin, please? Please, please?"—but he hadn't been much for it. It wasn't that Jiraiya didn't want to do...family stuff. You know. The perv had wanted to like, bond, when he wasn't out being a perv. Naruto was just starved and begging and he wanted to do everything he'd seen in movies, everything he'd overheard people mention. He was so freaked about doing something wrong, about messing up, and so freaked out about not being able to do all that fun bonding stuff right.
Didn't matter anymore, anyway.
"A nice plant?" Ino asked. The expression she'd put on made him feel stupid. That was good. Normal. His face felt hot. The was normal, too, even if not preferred. "What, do you want a plant that'll kiss you goodnight?"
Maybe, Naruto thought rebelliously. "No," he said petulantly. She laughed. It made him feel a little bit less shitty.
"I'll show you a secret," Ino said and he's already suspicious. His eyes followed her from the counter to the door. He watched her brush her hands off and pull her hair up into a ponytail. She hung up her apron and flipped around the sign on the door so that it said closed and not open. The bell jingled when she opened the door. Ino glanced back at him. "Are you coming?"
They walked down the street together, her in that burnt orange shirt and him in a green shirt so pale it really looked beige. "Do you really like plants?"
"Yeah!" He's smiling before he remembered to be cautious. She caught the expression, though, even when it paled.
"You'll love this, then," she said, and pulled open the gate to the Yamanaka Compound.
"Your house?" Naruto asked, doubtful. A part of him preemptively built himself up for the embarrassment of her parents seeing him. The first time he met Sakura-chan's family, it had been really awkward for everyone involved. He'd only passed Ino's mother in passing, but, in passing, she'd looked extremely uncomfortable.
"No, the compound's too small for that," Ino said, pushing her bangs out of her eyes. Phew. "No one really lives here anymore. It's more...symbolic, now. It's been here since the village founding, though." She looked at him over her shoulder, grinning. "And so has this!"
She pulled open a massive door and when he ducked his head to enter, went down the set of stairs—wow. As far as greenhouses went, this one was definitely impressive. Holy shit. "Holy shit," he said out loud. Ino looked smug. "You have Welwitschia? And Ephedra?" Ino shrugged, forcibly casual under her pleased expression. There was even a massive, monstrous looking Rafflesia Arnoldii near the back panel of windows. He spun in place, unable to look at anything for more than a few seconds before something else distracted him.
"What can I say? The Yamanaka love plants."
He touched everything, obviously, because the greenhouse didn't seem like a place random people got to visit very often, but he could still feel Ino watching him. "What?" he eventually demanded, confronting her.
"Nothing," Ino said. She looked like he'd surprised her, like he'd done something unexpectedly great and she was in awe. It wasn't reluctantly, though, not a bitter sort of impressed. She just seemed happily surprised. "You really like plants, huh? Never thought you would know all these names."
It wouldn't be fair to have a plant to take care of if you didn't know everything you could about it. "Of course I know," he said, indignant. He used to force himself to read botany texts until the words held meaning, until he could link the sentences together even though his mind never really wanted to do that. I'll take care of you, he'd vowed to them, to the sprouts of autumn fire and stalks of poppy. I promise!
"That's impressive," she said softly.
He looked at her, at the smile she held, full of secrets unknown to him. She was rubbing a delicate green leaf between two fingers, looking away from him to turn fond eyes on the pale stem as it poked out of the dirt. There was sunlight dancing over her mouth. He could feel the warmth from the flowers, the smell of them, of so much life all blending up in one small space.
Look. He was feeling emotionally vulnerable. He can't really be blamed. When she stepped towards him and leaned up and looked at him and then said, "I'm gonna kiss you," he kissed back.
(Konoha was still alive and he was kissing Yamanaka Ino? He said he loved Sakura for how many years, had been chasing Sasuke for almost as long, and he was kissing Yamanaka Ino? What? Why? Konoha was living and breathing and he picked Ino?
It's shameful. But he didn't decide that until later.)
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What he expected: He got to kiss a really pretty girl in a really pretty greenhouse, which didn't appear to be an engagement that would have any long-term consequences at all, and ended the day with Iruka-sensei managing to have some free time for him. That worked out really well, actually, because by the end of the day the weird churning in his stomach had stopped being butterflies and started to feel like a writhing mess of snakes, and he was crying on a bench at about two in the morning feeling absolutely completely alone, before Iruka-sensei showed up.
What he got: Everything listed above, in addition to Yamanaka Ino completely in his business.
"Oh, it's Miss Beautiful," Sai called. Naruto tensed immediately. Sai either didn't notice or didn't care—probably didn't care, the bastard—and waved at her with his chopsticks. Ino gifted him with a tiny smile. She sat down facing the street on the stool right next to Naruto, where he just kind of looked at her, wide eyed and feeling confused. He'd never even officially kissed anyone before. He didn't know the protocol. Was he supposed to bring it up? Ignore it?
At the thought—the word "kiss"—he felt his ears heat up. Naruto chose rapid consumption of the ramen bowl in front of him as the best way to hide this.
"Hey, Sai," Ino greeted. He watched her aim a winning grin at Teuchi. "Hi!" she chirped.
"What can I get for you today, Ino-san?" And that seemed to imply she'd been there before, which, for some reason, didn't sit right with Naruto at all.
"Nothing for me today," Ino said.
Naruto tried to make his eating as loud as possible.
Still, the inevitable: "Hey, Naruto."
She's being so casual. Did she kiss people a lot? For some reason the thought made him feel...weird. When he glanced over at her, Ino was looking at him. Freaked him out until he realized she was waiting for a response to her greeting. Naruto made a noise at her through his noodles. She leaned backwards on her stool, falling against the counter, hair spilling around her. Ino peered up at him. He noticed her hair wasn't up in a ponytail and felt weirdly uncomfortable with himself for noticing. His body felt too big. Awkward.
"Could I have some?" Ino asked, lolling her head towards him on the counter. Naruto really hoped Sai couldn't tell how tense his shoulders were. She lifted her head a little bit and opened her mouth in offering. For a second Naruto looked at her. It was a second too long.
Okay. Look. It felt. Charged. For some reason.
By the time he'd finished blinking rapidly, Sai had already popped one of his mochi into her mouth. She muffled out a thanks and then fell back against the counter again. Ino kept looking at Naruto as she chewed and he definitely could not look at her so he made a half-built excuse and hurried off.
She just bounced right off the counter, though, shouting a goodbye at Sai and Teuchi and catching up to him so she was walking in time. "You're going to spend today with me," Ino said. Naruto had not given any input on this previously.
Ino and him have always crossed paths often in the village and she usually had something for him when she saw him—a sly, moderately funny, hintingly insulting comment or an equally sly smile that made him think she probably had a moderately funny but very insulting comment she'd chosen not to share. But the past week, ever since the incident in the greenhouse, every time she walked past him, she stopped to talk to him. If she saw him ducking into the library—and he never went to the library so it should have been a glaringly clear sign of him avoiding her—Ino would follow. If he walked by while she was having lunch with her teammates or some of the hospital staff she would abandon the table or call him over to join.
It wasn't particularly creepy. They passed each other by a lot. Only she wasn't passing him by anymore. She was talking to him.
"I'm—I'm busy today," Naruto blurted. His voice cracked. He wasn't a very good liar or very good at getting out of being uncomfortable. He'd always thought he was fantastic under pressure, but even that talent had fled him. He felt subdued and embarrassed and it wasn't a good look.
From the way she was looking at him, all smiley, Ino seemed to disagree. "I'm not," she said, like it was an announcement. He could imagine her on a stage, telling a crowd of people that. I'm not busy today, she would allow indulgently, the crowd fighting over themselves to be the first to reach her on her pedestal. "I'll come with."
"W-what?"
"Whatever you're doing," Ino said. "I'll come with. Can I?"
He searched desperately for an excuse. "It'll be boring," he got out, words tumbling over each other. "I'm just gonna be—researching!"
There's no way she couldn't tell he was digging for bullshit. But Ino just smiled wider. "Researching what?" she asked.
Um. That's a good question. What had he been doing? Other than dragging through the day, thinking about Jiraiya and trying not to feel sad and taking care of the couple of wildflowers he'd snatched when he hadn't managed to actually buy a nice plant and forcibly maintaining every relationship he'd ever had with anyone who had ever made eye contact with him—well, other than that, he'd been—
The guy who killed Jiraiya-sensei, Naruto thought. I'm researching that.
But he couldn't tell her that. It was depressing. Ino was the only one treating him kind of normal. Even if he knew something was hidden in Jiraiya's notes, something was hidden in the message he'd written on Fukasaku, he couldn't tell Ino about that. She stopped him, put a hand on his arm. He'd been walking so quickly trying to scatter that when he looked around he actually wasn't completely sure where he was. "Hey," she said. "I'm here, you know. If you need anything."
She might've meant emotional support or something but when she said it Naruto looked down at her mouth unintentionally. It was one of the most embarrassing moments of his life. It became slightly less embarrassing when he actually leaned down and kissed her and much, much less embarrassing when she kissed back and her tongue gave a lick on his bottom lip and he was definitely kissing Yamanaka Ino in the middle of the street with one hand tangled in her hair and all he could think of was the sunshine on her mouth in that greenhouse.
He pulled away from Ino—for a couple moments he couldn't really look away, though, and she's biting her lip and her eyes were so bright—but she just kind of smiled and leaned up to kiss him again. When Ino pulled away next, her eyes unfocused from his face to stare over his shoulder. He glanced back to see, and it was Ino's mother, staring at them, a bag of groceries scattered on the street in front of her as though she'd been so shocked she had dropped them.
Ino's put a hand to his cheek, gently turned his face back towards her. She was grinning.
She kissed him again.
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When he wasn't with Ino, he was obsessively reading over Jiraiya's last notes or begging Iruka-sensei to take a day off and hang out with him or trying to worm the other rookie nine into having a meetup preferably at a ramen place as well as preferably without Sai invited or really begging Tsunade to let him go out and catch Jiraiya's killer or at least take some of his advice on the guy's last note to the world. All of those things were generally unsuccessful and, honestly, kind of depressing, so when Ino ditched eating lunch with some chuunin to walk next to him, he let her.
Even though he was pretty sure Ino's mom absolutely hated him, Ino didn't seem concerned about their close contact. "She's just old-fashioned," Ino said about it when prompted. She rolled her eyes. Naruto felt like there was a story there, but he didn't really think it was his to hear. He'd been following her after she'd run up beside him and grabbed his hand and he watched her slow to a stop, start flinging kunai in quick succession. Three targets. Hit, hit, hit. Center, center, center.
"Why do you even wanna kiss me?" he asked and as soon as the words came out he felt deeply awkward. Naruto wasn't used to feeling self-conscious. He leaned back against a tree, staring up through the leaves at the tiny slivers of sun glowing through the green. Ino paused—she was collecting her kunai, body twisted to try to keep looking at him while ripping the knives back out. She'd asked him to come train with her, help her practice her taijutsu forms.
Usually, he had learned, when she asked him something like that, it meant she wanted to kiss him. Just the thought made him squirm.
"What do you mean?" Ino asked. She stood up, tucked the last kunai away and starting a walk towards him. In his attempt to look cool, posed against the tree, he'd kind of trapped himself, and when she got in his face, he was caged against the bark.
"If you don't like me or anything," Naruto said. "Then how come?"
She leaned toward him and he fell back against the tree trunk in an unintentional retreat. Ino ran a hand through his hair. Her other hand traced down his arm before she linked her fingers with his. This felt entirely too close and he hated feeling so out of place, so nervous. He thought she was going to ignore the question entirely, that she was going to kiss him. His eyes slipped closed and he tried not to do anything embarrassing, like sigh helplessly or tell her she's beautiful or make any humiliating noises, but she pressed her lips to the corner of his mouth. Then she kissed his cheek, and pressed her forehead against his. His eyes went open and Ino was smiling at him. She rubbed their noses together.
Usually when Ino touched him it made him flush with embarrassment, turned him into a helpless mess, too busy trying not to swallow his own tongue to speak. That kept it fun, though. It kept a light mood. She hadn't promised him anything or told him she was in love with him or said half the things he's heard Sakura-chan say about Sasuke or even half the things he's heard Ino say about Sasuke. So it was good to just be fun. He got to kiss a pretty girl who for some unknowable reason wanted to kiss him and that was pretty amazing. But when she did stuff like that he kind of wanted to cry.
Naruto used to think he had poisonous skin and insects in his veins. Sometimes it struck how badly he just wanted someone to touch him. He wanted warmth from someone else's skin. Ino was still smiling at him and he'd wanted this for so long, had wanted to be standing this close to someone with his hand in theirs. Not a lot of people really wanted to touch him. Not a lot of people wanted to hold his hand or hug him or kiss his forehead or any shit like that so when Ino did stuff like that he kind of just sort of a little wanted to cry.
"Who said I don't like you?" Ino asked, like it was a serious question and she had plans to beat up the responsible party. When he only sputtered, she said, "You're pretty amazing," and it sounded like she meant it, like it was the first time she'd thought it and she was just as surprised as him.
He kissed her so hard when he pulled away her lips were swollen, her breathing erratic. He touched a finger to her mouth. It looked painful. He'd done that to her. Her cheeks were red and her lips looked bruised because of him.
Before he could apologize for it, she kissed him again.
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It lasted some time. And then it ended.
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Danzo became Hokage.
A few weeks after that, Danzo stopped being Hokage, because Sasuke killed him. Was real bloody, allegedly. Naruto wasn't there. A couple days after that Sasuke brought Uchiha Madara and Pain to Konoha.
That was bloody, too. Naruto was there.
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Konoha died. Naruto survived.