Chapter 2
Summary: He felt annoyed. He finally had sex with Ino and he couldn't remember it.
Pairing: ShikaIno (Like it won't be obvious within seconds).
If you don't like this pairing then you'd be something of an idiot if you read this anyway. If you want to flame then I'll go ahead and copy/paste this warning in reply. Please don't be silly.
Warning: Gratuitious smexiness. Multi-chapter.
Disclaimer: Oh good heavens, if only I owned it. Then I could fix certain things...
Thanks to my beta: The Laughing Fool.
Chapter Dedication: Liltle.
Choji stopped laughing afterwards. Around Ino. But not around Shikamaru. He tried to explain his continued delight, "See, you… so rarely do something that I can really make fun of you for. Because you spend so much of your time sleeping, playing shogi, or being brilliant. So this… is kind of a truly great experience for me."
Shikamaru at the moment was actually trying his best to go to sleep. Ino had headed up to their room with them, grabbed her bag, and then rushed away saying something about shopping and being back later.
Choji was making Shikamaru's efforts to sleep kinda pointless. "Ino would kill you if she heard that you say that having sex with her is something to made fun of."
"Which is why I would- never- say something like that around her," Choji said in complete seriousness, before going on, "Besides I'm not saying that that is the stupid part. I'm saying that the situation is… brilliant. I'm proud of you. You are a human after all."
Shikamaru didn't bother answering that one.
Choji was silent for a moment as well. "Seriously though, I've never seen you drink that much before. What's up?"
Shikamaru scowled. "Ino kept saying to have more."
"Yeah, but since when do you listen to Ino?" Choji said.
"We're on vacation."
"Are you planning to get that smashed every night?"
Would it lead to a repeat? Maybe if he had a bit less then he would be able to remember it.
"No."
"Jeez, why are you so snappy at me?" Choji said.
"You've been bugging me all day."
It always kind of made Shikamaru happy that Choji was able to brush comments like that off with no problem whatsoever. Choji was confident enough in his friendships now.
"Well yeah," Choji said, "You slept with Ino. And acted like an ass all of last night." He couldn't help the slight grin of fondness at the memory. "Man, you were such an idiot."
Shikamaru didn't bother responding.
"If you tell me when you stopped remembering I'll fill you in on the rest," Choji offered.
"I'm going to sleep," Shikamaru said, readjusting his hands cushioning his hand, and firmly shutting his eyes.
He woke up awhile later as the slam of the door announced Choji's exit. He easily went back to sleep and when he woke up again it was to the smell of chocolate and the sound of the television. Choji had returned. Shikamaru's hangover was still in effect so he decided to fall asleep again.
He was finally forced awake when the door slammed spectacularly shut and the lights clicked on with an astounding brightness. Ino was back. There was the sound of a lot of bags hitting each other before the sound stopped altogether. "I can't believe that you two spent the day doing nothing."
"I'm happy," Choji said from in front of the television. He'd kept the volume down so that Shikamaru could sleep.
"This is what you do every day in Konoha!" Ino exploded, "We came all the way here and you haven't left the hotel room!"
Shikamaru groaned and covered his eyes with his palms, hiding from the intense light. "I've been sleeping off a hangover," he said, "since you decided that you wouldn't heal it."
Ino set the bags down and slipped off her shoes. "Well you were being a jerk," she said contemptuously, activating her chakra and touching his forehead as she walked by.
All residual pain instantly cleared. She'd already crossed the room to examine the candy that Choji had bought. "Are those filled with cherries or raspberries?" she asked, poking at the chocolates.
"Raspberries," he answered, leaning over to see around her.
"Gross," she commented, crossed the room again, and then yanked her numerous bags over to her bed. She smoothed out the comforter and then sat cross-legged on it, pulling up a bag and dumping its contents in front of her. The bag emptied with a loud clatter.
Shikamaru winced. Damn, she was loud.
"Naruto was right, this place has a great shopping district. They have everything, it's fantastic."
Shikamaru sat up and leaned against the back of the couch. There was no point in trying to sleep when Ino was feeling talkative.
"Yeah?" Choji said blandly while still watching the television.
"Yes. You have to go there with me tomorrow. Both of you."
"I don't like to shop," Shikamaru said.
"Liar," Ino returned instantly, "You're just cranky because I woke you up. You always are."
"Though it never stops you from waking me up," Shikamaru said darkly.
"Yeah, well, you don't mean it. You'll get over it in a few minutes."
Choji agreed with Ino, though he knew better than to say anything. Ino had just ensured an extended cranky-time from Shikamaru. Purely out of spite. But he knew that Shikamaru wouldn't keep it up too much longer, that kind of thing took too much energy.
"Oh, Choji, this is for you," Ino said. Choji got up and started heading towards her. Ino tossed it carelessly at him.
Choji's eyes widened. "To Possess the Evening," he read, staring at the DVD case. "You actually found it."
"I told you that they have a great shopping district. Far better than Konoha's pathetic offerings," Ino said.
Shikamaru sighed. "You shouldn't encourage that, Ino."
Choji had one habit that Shikamaru disapproved of. And that was his strange love of romantic books and movies.
Asuma had always found it interesting. "That'll be handy when you're older. Just think of it as advice."
Shikamaru had treated the entire thing with complete scorn. Girls were troublesome and annoying, and romance was even worse. It'd made Asuma grin which only served to further irritate Shikamaru. He knew that the man was thinking that he'd take it all back someday.
As though Shikamaru was the type to ever fall head-over-heels in love with someone. He was far too smart to act like such an idiot.
Except when he was drunk, obviously.
Ino ignored Shikamaru's comment. Choji's interest in romance had always been a commonality between them. They'd borrowed each other's books and movies. It had caused Shikamaru, when he was nine (after all they'd known each other since toddler-dom), to try and repress his gag-reflex long enough to ask Choji if he liked Ino.
"Nah," Choji had said, "Not as in, wanting to be all romancy and stuff. But she's got a lotta great movies and there's always a lot to talk about."
And he'd said it so casually too.
"I've been wanting this movie for-" Choji began.
"Like a year," Ino interrupted, nodding, "But it's not main-stream enough. I'm watching that with you later."
"Sure," Choji said, turning the case over to gaze at the back.
And Choji still wasn't interested in Ino in a 'romancy' way.
"Choji, don't watch that," Shikamaru said disapprovingly, though knowing that it was utterly useless.
Ino shuffled through her bags. "Don't get all jealous," she said, "I got you something too."
She located the thing and threw it at Shikamaru who caught it easily. It was a new set of exploding tags.
"You used up all of yours on that last mission when you went with Kiba, right?" she said, "And you never restock on your own. But check it out!" Ino said, her tone excited and then she was kneeling beside the couch, taking the package and turning it over. "With these you can actually make it meld into their skin, so they can't just tear it off. It's the coolest thing I've ever seen."
Shikamaru blinked at the package. "What's this doing in a civilian village?" he said, taking it out of her hands.
Ino propped herself up higher on the edge of the couch and pushed a lock of hair out of her face. "See, the vendor said that it had to be activated with a certain amount of chakra first. Not a lot, but a specific amount. And he was saying that no one here even has chakra, but even if they did, they have no way of activating such a specific level. He just sells it to people that want to pretend that they're dangerous ninjas."
"That doesn't sound like a good idea at all," Choji said.
"Yeah, I know, right?" Ino said, glancing over. "But don't worry," she said, looking back at Shikamaru, "I talked to the guy and he let me test them on some wooden poles and they're completely safe. Well, except for destroying what they meld with."
Ino was always really good at details. Shikamaru had never specifically mentioned that he'd run out exploding tags. She just had already known how much he had and then she must have pieced it together from what he'd told her and Choji after they'd bugged him about it and what Kiba had said in his boastful story-telling.
Ino was staring at him. "Say thank you," she said.
Shikamaru put the package down by the side of the couch. "Thank you."
She seemed pleased enough and headed back to her bed to continue going through her packages. Choji crossed over to examine her loot as well. "Wow, that's a lot of toys."
"Yeah, I kept finding things for Hotaru."
Shikamaru looked over with interest and finally got up to go see what all she'd gotten as well.
Hotaru was the daughter of Kurenai and Asuma. She was a pretty little thing and Ino, Choji, and Shikamaru would all visit her and Kurenai from time-to-time. It had somehow turned into a sort of sibling relationship and Hotaru was always excited to see them. Mostly because they gave her lots of attention and shamelessly spoiled her. Choji would take her out to enjoy barbeque, Ino would take her out shopping, and Shikamaru would hang out with her at parks letting her run wild while he lazily watched her.
Kurenai had given her such a sentimental name. Hotaru- lightening bug, envoy of spirits.
And also a reference for men who were forced to smoke outside of their homes.
As it turned out, the majority of Ino's purchases were aimed towards Hotaru and Kurenai. There was a ridiculous amount of clothing and hair accessories and colorful children's jewelry. Then there were toy kunai and toy blades. Stuffed animals. Picture books. Children's tools for 'gardening.'
"Oh, and here. Child friendly shogi set," Ino said, passing a box to Shikamaru. "It's really big so she can't accidentally choke on it or whatever."
"You know that Hotaru's four, right?" Choji said. "How can she play shogi?"
"You just let her move the pieces around and then pretend like she won," Ino said dismissively, "Don't you know anything about children? She'll love it."
"What's in those?" Choji asked, pointing at some bags that Ino had tucked close to the wall.
"Nothing for you to worry about," Ino said, shifting her eyes towards them and then back to the mound of children's stuff.
"Oh. Girly stuff," Choji said.
Ino nodded absently, "Uh-huh. They have a much better selection than in Konoha. I already told you."
"You realize that you have to carry all of this stuff back," Shikamaru said.
"You guys can carry the stuff for Hotaru and Kurenai. And your junk as well."
"Why would we carry that for you?"
"So then you can say that the stuff came from you guys as well. I don't think that you really have any money left, Shikamaru," Ino said, "That room was really expensive."
Shikamaru winced slightly at that. He'd figured that it'd been expensive, but preferably on the cheaper side of expensive. And while it was one thing to ask Ino to pay for something it was a different matter to ask her to pay him back for something that she hadn't asked him to get.
"Where'd you guys stay?" Choji asked.
"You remember that really tall building with the big windows and the large entryway?" Ino said.
Choji's eyes widened and he whistled. "Wow, the really fancy place?"
"Yeah. It was gorgeous inside," Ino said with a nod.
"What a waste though," Choji said thoughtfully, "Neither of you even remember it."
"Yeah," Ino said, "Hey, I saw a great-looking barbeque place downtown, Choji. We can all go eat there and you can pay for Shikamaru."
With his hangover gone, Shikamaru discovered that he was starving. He hadn't eaten yet that day and as far as he knew, he hadn't eaten much the night before, either. And it was handy that Choji was willing to pay for him so he could eat as much as he wanted. When it came to spending his teammates' money, Shikamaru never felt any hesitations or reservations. They had money and he didn't.
Ino kept up her tradition of lamenting over her diet and then eating whatever she felt like. Then partway through the meal, she looked towards the other side of the restaurant and suddenly choked.
Shikamaru and Choji kept eating completely unconcerned as Ino took a couple of minutes to regain her ability to breathe and she took a moment to give them a nasty look before staring across the room again.
Shikamaru looked up in time to see her lick her lips thoughtfully and shove her plate away from herself and towards Choji who automatically took it and added the leftover food to his own plate. Shikamaru sighed.
Stupid Ino.
There must be a good-looking guy across the room.
Ino continued to stare and her eyes widened for a moment before she looked down at the table and blushed prettily. If he hadn't seen this act before, Shikamaru would have thought that it was her natural reaction. The guy had made eye-contact.
He must be really good-looking.
Ino glanced over again and Shikamaru instinctively kicked her underneath the table. She jumped and winced. "Ow," she said angrily, turning a dark scowl to Shikamaru. Choji looked up in interest.
"You're a spectacle," Shikamaru said to her.
Ino leaned back against the booth wall and sharply returned his kick, slamming her foot flatly against his leg hard enough that the side of the booth that Shikamaru and Choji were sharing shook slightly.
"I'm never healing anything else for you ever again," Ino said.
"You're unreasonable," Shikamaru muttered.
"You kicked me!" Ino exclaimed.
Shikamaru moved his leg gingerly. If he weren't so used to pain he'd be walking with a limp after this. Ino was a strong little jerk.
"You kicked her?" Choji said, looking at Shikamaru.
Ino pulled her leg closer to her and rubbed her hands over her ankle. "What the hell? What's wrong with you?"
"You're always acting like an idiot," Shikamaru said, "Can't you give it a break for once?"
Ino's temper flared. "Jealous much?" she said nastily.
Shikamaru's eyes widened, but his retort was cut off by the arrival of an extremely good-looking guy. He smiled at Ino, whose demeanor changed instantly to that of a harmless pretty girl. The guy's smile broke for half a moment as he glanced at Choji and Shikamaru.
"Am I interrupting…?" he asked uncertainly.
"No, not at all," Ino said with a charming smile.
"Good," the guy said with a smile charming enough to match Ino's.
Shikamaru sighed loudly. Ino's smile tightened for half a second, but then she tuned out her two companions completely. "Are you here with anyone?" she asked.
"No one important," he said.
Shikamaru snorted derisively. What a nice guy.
"I haven't seen you before," the guy said, "I'd remember."
Ino laughed. "I'm not from around here. Unfortunately."
Her smile took on a seriously seductive edge.
Even Choji frowned at that.
"That figures," the guy said, "There's only so much time for me to show you around. How about you come with me and I'll show you the sights."
"I'd love to see the sights," Ino replied, standing up and smirking at the guy. She gave a spiteful look at Shikamaru and then flounced off, letting the guy take hold of her hand.
Ino didn't date wildly anymore, but she flourished under male attention. Especially from good-looking guys.
"She better be back tonight," Choji said, his eyes lingering at the door that the two had disappeared through.
Shikamaru moved to the place Ino had vacated. There was no point in he and Choji sitting side-by-side. "She didn't pay," he said.
Choji's gaze flew to Ino's side of the table, void of any cash.
"Dammit," Choji said with a scowl. "She owes me for this."
"She won't pay you back," Shikamaru said.
Choji looked at Shikamaru consideringly. "You are acting like a jealous jerk, though."
"No I'm not," Shikamaru said. He had a slight urge to hurt Choji as well.
Choji took a drink of his water. "And you made the first move last night," Choji said.
"No I didn't," Shikamaru said, his tone warningly irritated.
Choji watched Shikamaru for a moment. "Fine," he said, "Believe what you want."
Shikamaru used the advantage of Ino's non-presence in order to shower without having someone knocking at the bathroom door and whining about their turn. When he came out it was to see Choji cleaning the hotel room. Choji was kind of obsessive about that sort of thing, it bothered him if things went untreated for too long, which was handy because neither Shikamaru or Ino were into cleaning at all.
Shikamaru was still feeling kind of irritated, so he began preparing his bed in silence. There were two beds in the hotel room, Ino had claimed one and Choji the other. Choji would have been willing to share, but he was a pretty big guy and there wasn't a lot of room. Shikamaru was more than fine with the pull-out bed from the couch. Sleep was a good thing, he didn't care about where.
And thus he was pretty sure that it was Ino's fault they had ended up at such an expensive hotel last night.
His leg ached. He'd examined it earlier to see that it was already a disgusting black color, swollen and edged in red. Ino hadn't been aiming to break his leg, but she'd been looking to hurt him pretty badly. And he hadn't bothered dodging even though he knew how hard she could hit.
"Hey guys," Ino said as she swung open the door and let it fall shut behind her.
"Hey," Choji replied, "How were the sights?"
"Boring. That guy was a loser."
"A good-looking loser," Choji offered.
"Yeah. But not good-looking enough to make up for being that stupid."
I'm smart.
Shikamaru frowned at himself. The timing of that particular thought was less than welcome.
"You're only ever interested in dumb guys," he said.
Ino hesitated, her temper teetering on the edge of a sharp and dangerous knife. She apparently decided to go ahead and employ her non-violent mood. "I'm interested in good-looking guys. Stupidity is a real turnoff."
"How bad was it?" Choji asked, wiping down the counter of the mini-kitchenette.
Ino rolled her eyes. "Bad. First of all, he was trying to act all tough and started doing tricks with a knife and he ended up cutting himself. And then he started going on and on about the proper way to treat wounds, but got the whole process of bleeding and clotting and coagulation and- just everything really, completely wrong. It was pathetic."
Even Shikamaru had to smile. It was the mean little smile of someone hearing bad news about someone they don't like.
"I try to give civilians a bit of break because they're… civilians. But he didn't even know the most basic of sciences, and civilians are taught science," Ino said with contempt.
Ino was actually particularly good at science and math. She had a very methodical mind and the factual concepts came to her easily. But Ino also had this strange habit of believing that her base level of knowledge was the common base level of knowledge. So she was always particularly harsh with people who didn't understand things like she did.
"So you ditched him?" Shikamaru said.
"Yeah. I wanted to come back and watch To Possess the Evening. You up for it Choji?"
"Hell yeah," he said.
Shikamaru sighed. "If you watch it here then I have to hear it."
"Perfect," Ino said, picking up the DVD case from Choji's bed and throwing it to him.
It was something of a mystery how Shikamaru ended up watching the movie with them. One moment he had been lounging on his bed, thinking about how stupid the movie sounded, and then he was somehow, magically, sitting on the floor and leaning against the couch, watching ridiculously beautiful people bemoan the romantic tragedies of their lives.
Choji was stuck on the floor with him since Ino had decided that she needed the entirety of the couch to sprawl out on. She'd shoved Shikamaru to the side at one point. "Move to the left or the right, I can't see," she hissed in his ear
He'd raised his shoulder defensively, frowning, but shifted right without looking away from the television screen.
What Choji and Ino both knew, and Shikamaru did not, was how long the movie was. It was outrageous to have a three-hour-long movie that seemed to be about nothing. Ino was distracting though.
To Shikamaru, at least.
She'd keep sitting up and then she'd hold onto his shoulder, using it to keep herself upright, while reaching for the pile of sweets by Choji. And then she'd startled the hell out of him, by sneaking an arm around him in order to grab a handful of popcorn from the bowl that had mysteriously appeared in his lap. Not to mention that, after awhile, he'd leaned all the way back against the couch and his head was level with the edge, which had made Ino readjust until she was lying near the edge as well, with her arm dangling off the side. Her arm remained in constant contact with his side and her long hair tickled his skin.
"Wow," Choji said as the credits finally rolled and the room went dark.
"Exactly," Ino sighed, her breath against Shikamaru's ear.
He shied away, resisting a shiver. Ino moved to sit up and her hand trailed up his side, her fingers seemingly lingering on his back before disappearing. "Get off of me," he muttered.
"I'm not on you," Ino said. She was sitting up then and searching fruitlessly for leftover food. "Really, Choji? All of it?"
"It was a three hour movie," Choji said flatly.
"We've still got the ice cream," Ino said.
Thus came the third step in the romantic-movie-watching tradition. After step one (getting comfy) and step two (pressing play) came step three, which was the procuring of ice cream followed by deep discussion of the movie.
It was disheartening to sit there and listen to the two people that he was closest to in the world, discuss a ridiculous movie as though it were a meaningful religion. In Shikamaru's opinion, anyway. But the one time that he said something to that effect, both Ino and Choji had glared at him and told him to shut up and back off.
Which led to him heading back over to his bed (pouting) and doing his best to tune them out.
It used to be that Choji and Ino would share a tub of ice cream, but as the years had passed, the discussions had gotten longer, and Choji had (very slightly) rebelled against Ino's choices, they now had two different tubs of ice cream. So Choji sat at the table savoring his choice of Peanut-Butter Delight (which made Ino gag) while Ino sat on her bed eating Strawberry Short-Cake Explosion.
There were two parts that were bothering Shikamaru. Number one was that, due to the fact that the kitchen and Ino's bed were not near each other at all, both Ino and Choji were speaking really loudly. Number two was that, due to the fact that the couch was in between the distance of those two, he was bombarded with a sickeningly combined scent of peanut butter and strawberry cake.
"I'm in two minds about the movie," Choji said, gathering a large amount of ice cream on his spoon, "I liked the main couple, but the other one wasn't that great."
"What, you mean Shisuke and Mizumi?" Ino said, "I don't know. It did kind of feel like something was off, but I couldn't really pinpoint it."
Shikamaru knew instantly what they were talking about.
"Yeah," Choji said, "I just… I just didn't like them. Maybe that's all there is to it."
Ino frowned. "I liked Shisuke. And he liked Mizumi. So it was good that he ended up with her."
"Did you like him enough that it covered for not liking Mizumi?" Choji asked.
Ino wiped a dot of ice cream off her lower lip with her finger and then sucked her finger clean. Shikamaru averted his eyes.
"I didn't dislike Mizumi. So Shisuke should have more than made up for it. Mizumi was completely harmless. And it wasn't the same as just not caring about them as a couple. I felt kind of…"
"Uncomfortable," Choji said with a nod. He was a much faster eater than Ino and was already scraping the bottom of his ice cream container. "Which is really weird."
"…yeah," Ino said, more interested in stirring the melting remains of her ice cream than eating it. "Do you think it's because they just didn't have chemistry? Major chemistry issues?"
"No. I've seen lots of movies with couples that have no chemistry. And then it's just boring."
Ino frowned. "Maybe-"
Shikamaru interrupted them with a sigh. "It's because Mizumi was a weak and helpless female character and Shisuke was this big masculine hero that helped her do every little thing. And the movie kept trying to sell this idea that Mizumi was a capable human, but she couldn't even run without falling down, which meant that the real idea they were selling was that even supposedly capable women are incompetent. And Shisuke acted like that was attractive. Shisuke was also a complete jackass most of the time. The storyline was lame and they didn't have any chemistry."
Ino and Choji were both quiet for a moment, digesting that analysis.
"So of course you liked Shisuke, Ino," Shikamaru said with disgust, "He's the type you usually go for, right?"
Choji choked. "Jeez," he managed after a moment.
Ino stared at Shikamaru in silence though he didn't return her gaze. She finally put her ice cream container down on the floor with methodical precision. Both boys tensed slightly, expecting a violent retaliation.
"I hope not," Ino said evenly. "Though it's no business of yours."
Shikamaru gave a half-shrug.
There was another silence which Choji finally broke.
"I really liked the main couple though. And when he found out that she'd had that accident while he was fighting in the war!"
Ino's contemplative expression lasted half a second more before she determinedly pushed whatever thoughts were behind it away. She picked up her ice cream again and took a bite. "I know!" she replied to Choji, "And so then he got injured on purpose so he could go back and join her!"
A/N.
You all spoiled me with those reviews. I was not expecting that kind of reaction, so thank you all very, VERY much. My return gift is this really fast update. I offer the same for the next.
Any questions/comments/concerns?
Requests?
Thanks for the feedback!
-CR