"Ino! If you're not down here in thirty seconds, I'm leaving without you."

Ignoring her father's agitated threats, she smoothed her dress down one more time. She had to admit as she looked at herself in the mirror, Billboard Brow had been right. The dress was perfect. Ino had gotten a few lilac blossoms from the garden earlier and pressed them to weave through her hair, which had otherwise been left loose, and the whole ensemble blended perfectly.

The actual wedding ceremony had occurred earlier in the day; most traditional weddings were small family affairs. The reception, however, was the real event. Practically all the people in Konoha –and some people from outside the village, Ino thought with ire – were invited to attend.

As the groom's teammate, she had a special place of honor at the table with Choji and Mai's family. Ino was picky about her appearance anyway, but with pressure like that, she took extra care to make sure everything was perfect.

Unfortunately, there was also a considerable downside to being asked to sit at the family table.

Ino frowned at her reflection as she noticed and quickly fixed a place where the makeup had smudged on her cheek. It had been almost a week since the last time she had spoken to Shikamaru. After she ran into him the previous Saturday and had been so rude, she hadn't been able to bring herself to apologize. Nor was she quite sure she wanted to. Stupid and rash as it had been, she still couldn't quite believe it. Shouldn't someone have told her that Temari was invited?

No, she considered. Really, it wasn't any of her business. Shikamaru did not have to consult her for his every action and she shouldn't be angry that he didn't.

Yet that didn't make it any less painful.

Well, Ino considered, looking thoughtfully at her appearance, this day isn't for me anyway. I will go to the reception and be happy for Choji, because he deserves it. And no troublesome genius is going to stand in the way of that.

Her confidence slightly bolstered, Ino set her comb and lip gloss down on the dresser.

"Ino! Now!"

She turned the light out in her room and rushed down the stairs. By the time she reached the bottom, her face was lit with a smile.

"Ready."

Her father sighed as he ushered her out the door. "Really, dear, I can't understand why it takes you so long."

Ino flashed a grin at him. "This doesn't happen every day, you know. Don't you remember what it was like back when your teammates got married?"

"Ha!" Inoichi let out a short bark of laughter, locking the door behind him before they began the short walk to the Akimichi residence.

"I couldn't forget those days if I tried. Choza was just like his son, a bundle of nerves at first, but calm as anything the day he took his vows. Shikaku, on the other hand…" Inoichi chuckled. "Shikaku was as twitchy as a wet cat. I swear, the man was fully convinced that Yoshino was just going to leave him at the altar. In all my years working with him, I have never seen that man as agitated as he was on the day of his wedding. It's a wonder he got through it without having a mental breakdown."

Ino giggled, her father's description calling forth the image of a young Shikaku and Yoshino; she had always imagined Shikaku as a reluctant groom under Yoshino's stern eye, but the image of him nervous was somewhat endearing.

"I can't imagine that." She admitted and her father raised an eyebrow, smiling nostalgically.

"It was certainly… uncharacteristic of him, to say the least. And I'd be willing to bet a good amount of money that the day that son of his gets married, he'll be the exact same way as his old man."

Ino wasn't sure what to say about that, so she avoided the subject entirely.

"Was Choza-san the first to get married?"

Inoichi shook his head. "Surprisingly enough, the first of us bachelors to get hitched was Shikaku. He'd had his life planned out ahead of him since he was a Genin."

Ino covered her mouth to suppress a laugh. For some reason, that struck a familiar chord.

"I guess it shouldn't have been a shock to any of us that when he met Yoshino, he knew. Knew absolutely at that moment that he had met the girl he wanted to marry. They couldn't have been dating more than six months when he proposed to her. After that, everything just fell into place."

Ino couldn't help but smile at the story, but at the same time, it left her feeling slightly bitter. Shikamaru had always had his life planned out ahead of him, but it had always included marrying some girl who wasn't too ugly and wasn't too beautiful. She vaguely wondered if he had found that girl yet. She smirked as she thought about how Temari might react to that knowledge.

"As for your old man," Inoichi continued, "I pined after your mother for longer than I should probably admit before she finally gave me the time of day. I swear, the day of my wedding, my teammates were celebrating my finally getting up the courage to ask her to marry me as much as they were celebrating the marriage itself."

Ino tilted her head to look at her father. "You, daddy? I would never expect that."

Inoichi chuckled as he reached for the latch that opened the back gate to the Akimichi grounds. The sight of it startled Ino a bit; caught up in their conversation as she had been, she hadn't even noticed their arrival.

"Well, no one else would really have expected it either. But if there's one thing to be said about us Yamanakas…" He swung the gate open, gesturing for Ino to walk through and putting a hand on her shoulder as they entered. "…we never give up when we have a goal in sight."

Ino felt something warm inside of her. Her father was right. It wasn't like a Yamanaka just to give up.

With ever-growing confidence, Ino made her way to her seat.

Ino had to admit, it couldn't have been a more beautiful reception if she had decorated herself. The event was being held on the Akimichi grounds, but what she had known all her life as a simple clearing had been completely transformed. The whole area was lit with paper lanterns that glowed like miniscule stars as they hovered over the festivities. Each table was covered with a unique floral arrangement, most of which Ino had had some hand in, but the way they radiated light was certainly not her doing.

The whole area sat on a slope that looked down over a relatively small lake. She couldn't remember whether that had always been there or not; perhaps the Akimichi's had chosen to do some landscaping after Pain decimated the village.

Ino was still admiring the beauty of it all when Mai approached her, grinning broadly. Ino got up from her seat and hugged the glowing bride, who hadn't even had a chance to sit as she greeted all of her guests. Ino hadn't been exaggerating when she assumed that all of Konoha would be here.

"So how does it feel to be a newlywed?"

Mai gave a shy smile, turning for a moment to glance at where Choji stood not far down the table, talking to Shikamaru. In that smile, Ino saw everything she needed to answer that question for herself.

"It's sort of strange, I guess. It doesn't feel all that different, but at the same time, it feels like a whole new life has opened up in front of me." Mai blushed, lowering her voice slightly. "But it's wonderful. I'm so happy."

Ino grinned unabashedly. And to think Choji had been worried…

"But that wasn't why I came over here!" Mai looked up as if she had suddenly recalled something important. "First, I wanted to thank you and your family for the flowers. They're absolutely lovely."

"Which are your favorite arrangements?" It seemed like a diverting question, but it was always one Ino made sure to ask. She had arranged flowers for many a wedding working in her parent's shop, but it seemed that the bride always had a unique opinion about which ones were the prettiest.

"Oh, there's no question." Mai gestured at the arrangement at the center of the family's table. "I don't know how you got those orchids to look so lovely."

Ino beamed. She had picked those out specially. She'd been cultivating them for months before the wedding, going through hours of painstaking care to make sure they were at the peak of loveliness by the time they were ready to be arranged.

Apparently, her work had paid off. "Oh, it was no trouble at all. I'm so glad you like them!"

Mai nodded, then upon noticing that Choji had moved on to speak to some of their other guests, realized she'd lingered too long. "Oh, I'd probably better get going!"

"Congratulations, Mai. I couldn't be happier for the two of you." Ino prepared to take her seat again, but Mai caught her wrist and she stopped.

"Thank you, Ino, but I had one more thing I needed to ask you about. I don't know if Choji asked you about the speeches…"

"He did." Ino nodded, grabbing a folded sheet of paper from underneath her placemat.

"Good." Mai smiled. "But he also had another request for you, if it's not too much trouble."

"Of course not." Ino smiled, though she was beginning to grow slightly wary. Choji wasn't really the type to spring last minute requests on people; he had informed her of the speech weeks ago.

Unless, she thought, he happens to know it's something I won't want to do, but can't refuse on the day of his wedding…

"Well, since you and he and Shikamaru are so close, when we have our first dance, he'd sort of like you and Shikamaru to lead out halfway through, so the other couples know they can begin dancing as well."

Ino felt like all of the blood had just rushed out of her face.

Choji… teme!

That was what she thought, at least. What she said was quite different.

"Of course we will. It's no trouble at all."

Mai grinned and gave her another quick hug. "Thank you so much, Ino! I know he'll really appreciate it."

With that, the newlywed scampered off to join her new husband and Ino was left to sit back down, wondering what to do next.

True, it was Choji's day. True, as his teammate, Ino would do practically anything to make sure this day was perfect as it was within her power to make it. But this? She shook her head. This might be taking it just a bit…

"So, you care to air grievances before or after we dance? I'd prefer not to make a scene in the middle of it."

Ino didn't even have time to pretend that she had noticed him walk up beside her. She had been so lost in her thoughts that she hadn't even heard him coming, and she was certain she jumped about a foot off the ground when she realized he was standing that close. All the confidence that she had been building earlier seemed to disintegrate in an instant.

What is wrong with me?

"What?"

"Judging from the, uh…" Shikamaru stared into the distance as though he were searching for the right word. "…less-than-genial encounter we had last week, I'm guessing that something is wrong."

Ino bristled slightly. It was one thing to recognize her own faults; it was quite another to be accused of them outright. However, this was neither the time nor the place to be starting arguments. Swallowing her anger, she replied coolly:

"I think we ought to save that discussion. Now is… not the best time for it."

Shikamaru shrugged, but out of the corner of her eye, she noted a tension to his posture. When she turned slightly more toward him, she could see just by the set of his jaw that he was less nonchalant about the state of things than he seemed to be.

Probably just wants it settled so he doesn't have anything "troublesome" to deal with. She thought bitterly, but a small part of her railed against that thought.

Maybe it's just gotten to him as much as it's gotten to me.

She shook her head, suppressing the urge to laugh at herself.

"Idiotic…" she mumbled.

Shikamaru half-turned, a look of bemusement on his face. "What?"

Did I say that out loud? Ino bit her lip.

"Nothing. Sorry."

Shikamaru raised an eyebrow, but didn't question further.

Any response he tried to make would have been silenced regardless. The first strains of music began to echo through the clearing.

Ino swallowed the lump rising in her throat.

Just one dance, and then it would all be over with.

How bad could it be?

Watching Choji and Mai, Ino could almost forget about the dread pooling in the pit of her stomach. Their dancing wasn't particularly graceful or smooth; poor Choji obviously had to concentrate not to step on her dress. But even with that, there was something… charming about it. Mai didn't even seem to notice if he missed a step and when she stumbled a little, Choji just smiled at her as though she had been graceful as a swan. Ino didn't even notice her grin until it faltered as Choji looked over at his two teammates and Shikamaru touched her arm.

"Looks like that's our cue."

Looping her arm delicately through his, Ino allowed herself to be led to the dance floor. As soon as they stopped, she found herself swept into the perfect position and Shikamaru led out.

They might as well have been dancing together all their lives.

It probably shouldn't have surprised her that Konoha's resident genius was a good dancer –he was good at practically everything, even if he was a lazy bum; why not this as well? — but it did nonetheless. For a moment, Ino felt almost self-conscious at being in his arms at the center of the room. That gave her a bit of a shock as well. Since when did she, Ino Yamanaka, feel self-conscious about being the center of attention? It was no wonder her father thought she was sick when she continued to act so strangely.

But the feeling gradually faded as other couples took the cue and came to the floor. Soon, Ino found her worry was solely concerned with the thoughts of one particular person.

Ironic that the person closest seems the one that's farthest away.

"Ino, we need to talk."

He spoke directly into her ear and the feeling of his breath ghosting over her skin made goose bumps rise on her arm.

"This really isn't the time." She mumbled back, trying to keep her voice low enough that only he could hear it.

"I'm aware." He drawled back sarcastically. "But this is going to get more troublesome the longer you put it off."

"Is anything ever less than troublesome for you?" She quipped, struggling to keep her voice barely above a whisper.

Shikamaru managed a shrug even as they were dancing. "Not generally."

Ino rolled her eyes, turning her head away from him.

Shikamaru stopped, one his hands still clasped around hers and the other at her waist. At first, Ino was surprised, but then she realized, in her annoyance, she had completely failed to notice that the music had stopped.

He looked in her squarely in the eye, his gaze piercing, then leaned forward and spoke directly into her ear.

"But this is more troublesome than most."

Ino took a reflexive step away from him, her hands falling limp at her sides.

"Wha—?"

"Shikamaru!" Choji grinned, clapping a hand on his best friend's shoulder. "Can I talk to you for just a second?"

Shikamaru blinked, and in a moment he was back to his typical slouching posture, all traces of grace gone. "Sure. Later, Ino."

Ino couldn't even bring her hand up to wave the two of them off. She remained there, stunned for a moment before finally getting her head organized enough to realize she needed to go back to her seat.

As she walked back, she caught a knowing look from Sakura, but she chose to ignore it. She wasn't sure she could even answer any questions Sakura had at the moment.

Even before she could make it back to her seat, Ino was stopped by Choji's mother, who seemed not to notice the daze she was in.

"About time for the toasts, dearie. Are you ready?"

Ino let out a nervous laugh that may or may not have had anything to do with the speech.

"Only if they're ready for me."

A/N: So first things first.

Yes, there was about a week's worth of time-skip between this chapter and the last. I honestly don't think it's going to detract from the plot, unless you really wanted to hear me ramble for five more days worth. Hope it didn't cause any confusion.

Secondly... two updates in one week! I'm on a roll, it seems. Have I mentioned how much I ADORE summer? I get so much more done.

Last note, for those who are wondering "Where's Temari? Did she just drop out of the plotline? Did the author seriously just bring up that whole incident, just to completely forget about it a chapter later? IS SHE REALLY THAT DENSE?" No. I'm not. It's coming, I promise. :) And at the rate I've been writing, hopefully soon.

Sorry for the ridiculously long author's note and thank you for reading! It makes the time I spend on this all the more worthwhile.