Author's Note: So here we are again. Since I have one week of college left, I decided to celebrate and write another chapter. Sure, I should be cramming for final exams, but I am sure that no one (as in the readers of this story) will complain if I take some time to update. Thank you to *Flaming Beauty* and *TheMissMalave* for the reviews. They made me smile. In my head, I am thinking about how to write this next chapter. I want to add a little bit of Shikamarus' POV into it. I am thinking about having some of Shikamarus' POV in the past part of the story or maybe switching from Ino to Shikamaru throughout the entire chapter, both past and present sections. Right now, I am not sure if this chapter will be as long as the last one. I guess we will all find out…Okay on to chapter 13!

P.S. - I don't own Naruto. If I did, you could just watch this in the anime or manga. I am just writing this story. =)

What a Life

Ino POV

My eyes darted to the clock, on the wall, for the hundredth time this morning. My finger tapped to the rhythm of the headache pounding in my head; thump, thump, thump. I ripped my eyes away from the clock and stared at the man sitting across from me.

'How can he be so calm at a time like this?' I thought angrily. I watched his fingers pick up a piece on the shoji board and move it to a different spot.

I felt steam start to rise from my ears as I narrowed my eyes and cut them to look out the window.

'Damn him.' Feeling the urge to move, and distance myself from him, I tried to maneuver myself to get up from the floor, with no avail. I grabbed the side of the table and pulled, trying to push my weight at the side time. In my head, this worked; but since this was the real world, it only succeeded in scraping the table along the wood floor with a 'screeeeech'.

Shikamarus' head whipped up and without a word he was already up and walking over to help me. His hands moved to my arm and back, to pull me up, and the corner of his mouth turned up; then he laughed. He actually laughed.

After standing up right, I swatted his hands away; this only succeeded in making his smirk bigger.

"If you do not get that smirk off of your face I am going to remove it for you." I said as I gritted my teeth. "I am serious Shikamaru." The smirk disappeared as he tilted his head and leaned back against the wall behind him. He was doing the one this that seemed to piss me off more than anything lately, looking at me; studying me.

I felt the words come to the top of my throat. I wanted to yell, scream, at him. Instead, I turned on my heel and waddled toward the door. After ripping the door open, I slowly moved into the yard. 'He is behind me.'

Quickly, I turned back around, ending up nose to nose with Shikamaru. "Damn you would you just leave me alone?" I pleaded.

"Why don't you tell me what is bothering you. I originally though it may have been the hormones, but this seems to be a little deeper then one of your mood swings."

I saw red. 'Mood swings. He thought this was a freaking mood swing. I will show him a damn mood swing! I can't believe him.' Without warning, I threw my fist toward his face; he easily caught it. "Damn you Shikamaru. This is not a mood swing. How can you be so smart and so dumb at the same time? This baby, this thing that is making me look like a freaking blimp, was due exactly one week ago. Do you see a freaking baby?"

He started to answer, but I cut him off "It was a rhetorical question. No, Shikamaru there is not a baby because it has your genes. Damn you and your Nara genes! It is probably too lazy to move around. I am going to be fat for the rest of my life. I am going to crave insane amounts and combos of food and waddle for the rest of my life. I am never going to see my feet again. Ever!" Tears started running down my cheeks. 'Damn hormones.'

Shikamaru seemed to let out a sign of relief and wrapped his arms around me. "Troublesome women, it has only been one week. You will have the baby and be able to see your feet very soon. Remember, Tsunade and Sakura said that if you did not go into labor soon, they would induce birth. Everything will be fine, you'll see." He stopped and then started speaking again.

"Come on Ino; let's go sit on the porch. I don't want you to tire yourself out."

I laughed, with tears still streaming down my face "You just want to watch the clouds." He smiled at me, but said nothing.

After we were seated on the porch swing, I rested my head on his shoulder and closed my eyes. A distance away a bird chirped, singing happily. The light breeze I failed to notice earlier swished through the grass. Shika's hand moved over my belly and rested there.

It seemed like we sat there for hours. When we finally moved it was time for lunch. Shikamaru, lazy as he is, offered to make lunch; but I declined. 'I have to do something to take my mind off of the baby, or I am going to go crazy.

He helped me up from the swing and looked up at the sky. I make my way to the kitchen, wondering what I should make for lunch. I grabbed a small pot and started to fill it with water. As I carried it to the stove, a sharp pain moved through me and the pot fell to the ground.

"Damn!" I yelled. My clothes were soaking wet and water was all over the floor. Shikamaru all but flew into the kitchen. When he saw the floor, he leaned against the doorframe and laughed.

Pushing past him, I waddled towards our room. "If you are so amused Shikamaru, you can clean up the water.

Once I made it to our room, I started stripping off the wet clothes. Being practical, I rung them out and threw them into the laundry basket, before putting new clothes on. As I pulled a clean shirt over my head, the sharp pain hit again. I sunk to the floor, clutching my stomach.

I could not think until the pain had subsided again. Once I started thinking, one through crossed my mind 'I am in labor!' I sat on the floor, breathing, until another pain came and went. This time when the pain subsided I yelled for help, "Shikamaru."

Shikamaru POV

I paced back and forth, avoiding the seats in the waiting room. I could not sit right not. "Shikamaru" she yelled from upstairs. I had taken my time getting to the room, convinced that she was still fed up with me.

When I walked through the door, my heart literally stopped beating. Ino was sitting on the floor, her arms were wrapped around her stomach, and she was wincing in pain.

I remember every second after that. It took two steps to get to her and gently pick her up from the floor. I remember how she gasped in pain when I moved down the stairs. I ended up using a transportation jutsu to get from the house to the hospital. I took twenty steps into the hospital lobby before Sakura noticed me. She called for a wheel chair and wheeled Ino away, saying that she would call for me in a bit. That was exactly one hour ago. What could they be doing for an hour? Why did labor take so long?

"Shikamaru" I cringed and looked over my shoulder. Ino's father was standing near the door of the waiting room. "Why don't you come and sit down with us? They will call you in when they are ready for you."

He seemed relatively calm, a complete contrast to me. Reluctantly, I walked into the room and sat across from my mom. She was rambling on to Ino's mother about something. Inoichi sat beside me and started talking.

"You did good Shikamaru. You got Ino here and now she is going to have the baby and everything will be fine." He sounded like he was reassuring himself as much as he was me. "Your father would have loved to be here to see his new grandchild. Too bad he is still away with a mission. Although who knows? When a woman is on labor, it can take hours upon hours, he may make it back."

I paled when I heard this. 'I cannot take hours and hours of waiting out here.'

My though was interrupted by a loud scream coming from the delivery room. I was out of my chair and halfway to the door before I felt a hand on my shoulder. I turned to see my mom staring at me.

"Shikamaru I have not seen you move that fast ever. I want you to sit back down. Sakura will send someone when it is time for you to go in."

I retorted with, "But mom" which was cut off with a glare. "Shikamaru, I will not have you getting in the middle of this when there is nothing you can do yet. Now listen to me. Sit down." Defeated I turned to sit.

Two agonizing hours later, Sakura came to the door. "Shikamaru, we need you in the room now."

Quickly, I jumped up and followed her to the delivery room. As the door opened, we were greeted with another scream from Ino. When the door closed, she looked at me. I moved over to her and reached for her hand, feeling like that was the logical thing to do. She ripped her hand away and started to yell at me.

"This is your fault you bastard. Don't you even try to argue that we were both there during the sexual experience because you are not the one going through this. I curse you Shikamaru Nara. I curse" She stopped midsentence to scream in pain.

"Damn it Forehead, isn't it over yet?" Sakura glared at her and said something about Ino not being dilated enough.

Inos' head turned to me again. "I curse you. I curse your parents for having you. I curse everyone in this room, because I still do not have ice chips!" She said making sure she was louder for the last part."

I pulled up a chair and sat by Ino. "Sakura" I said as I turned to her "If Ino still in having contractions, why am I in here now." She smiled sweetly at me. "Well Shikamaru, Ino has been at this for the last three hours and we figured that, since you are half responsible for this, you should join in the fun."

After four hours of 'fun' I was about ready to pull my hair out. Ino had gotten her ice chips. She walked around, yelled, sat down, yelled, threw a pillow at the nurse who tried to give her an epidural, and yelled again. Sakura ended up convincing Ino to get the epidural. That was in experience in itself.

After one contraction, that seemed particularly painful, Sakura announced to Ino that she should start pushing. I grabbed Inos' hand and she did not try to pull it away.

"Push" Sakura would say, followed by Ino putting an inhuman amount of pressure on my hand, and in turn, she pushed. This process repeated several times. I kept my eyes on Ino, telling her to keep pushing, that it was all okay. I murmured, "I love you" a few times, which I was not sure if Ino hears or not.

I took a rag with my free hand and wiped her face. Sweat beaded on her skin. She was getting tired. Sakura said, "Push" again, Ino replied with an "I can't". Sakuras' eyes met Inos' and she sat there, speechless.

"Ino" I said running my free hand over her upper back, "You have to push. I know that you are tired, but you have to."

Her big blue eyes turn to me, she whispered, "I can't" again.

I looked to Sakura, who shrugged her shoulders. We were both stumped. Ino was not the type of person to give up.

I racked my brain for ideas and went with the first one I could think of. The one that may get my killed.

"Well Ino, your troublesome woman. I thought that you could do anything. I mean just this morning, you were complaining that you would be pregnant and fat forever; that you would never see your feet again. You were damning my Nara genes. Maybe you are the lazy one. I guess you will just continue to have all this extra weight. You can forget about ever being a ninja again. I will have to do everything. Make the money and cook. I will even have to help you move around the house, because you weigh too much to move yourself. I guess you can just waddle around."

I felt the, already tight, grip on my hand tighten even more and noticed that it started to turn a pale purple color. Ino pushed, and pushed, and pushed. After what felt like hours I cry filled the room.

Ino and I stopped breathing and stared at each other. "Are you ready for this?" we both asked silently.

An impossibly small thing wrapped in a pink blanket was handed to Ino. She released my hand and started to fix the blanket that was wrapped around the infant. Dark hair covered the top of the baby's head, and striking blue eyes looked up at Ino.

Inos' hand reached for mine again and put it on the blanket, where I could feel the light flutter of the baby's heart.

My gaze met Inos' when Sakura announced, "She is a girl."

"What do you want to name her Shikamaru?" Inos' tired voice hit my ears. I thought about it for a second. "I want to carry on the Ino-Shika-Cho tradition, so what do you think of Shikamae?" I asked.

Ino smiled. "Shikamae Nara, I like it."

The sun had long set as I made my way home. The moon lit the path to the house, and as I neared it, I could see Ino had left a light on for me.

The month long mission was draining. I had been given a relatively easy mission, to take a few scrolls to Suna, have the Kazekage sign them, attend a few meeting about peace and whatnot, then come home.

Of course, missions never go exactly as they should. On my way back to the village, I was attacked by enemy ninja, a lot of them. 'What a drag' I thought.

The sun was just setting when I walked through the village gates. I stopped into the Hokage's' tower, filed my mission report, explained how I was attacked, then explained how I defeated all of the enemy ninja, and left. The whole process took far too long for my liking.

I walked through the doorway, closing the door behind me, and removing my shoes. Ino was nowhere to be seen. "I know where she is," I said to no one in particular,

Quietly, I moved through the house and up the stairs. I rounded the doorway to the nursery and saw Ino leaning over the crib, with the arms resting on the railing for support. I walked to her and stood beside her; silently I looked over the side of the crib and saw our daughter sleeping peacefully. My eyes moved to Ino, who was in a world of her own; half-asleep and completely oblivious to the fact that I was standing there.

I gently rubbed my lips over her temple, then quickly avoiding her hand, as she lashed out at the 'intruder'.

Ino POV

My fingers narrowly missed his jaw. 'How could he have gotten in the house, walked up the stairs, and gotten this close to me, all without me noticing? I have gotten way to rusty over the pregnancy!'

Shikamaru smirked at me, making me almost forget to feel bad about lashing out at him. I looked back over the crib, making sure Shikamae was all right, and grabbed Shikamarus' arm; leading him out of the nursery.

Once we were in our room and the door was closed, I finally talked.

"How could you do that? If either of us would have made a noise, Shikamae would have woken up. Do you know how difficult it is to get her to sleep?" I questioned. 'Of course he knows he helped raise her for two months before the mission!' I silently scolded myself.

His smirk grew, "Ino, troublesome woman, we could stand here all night while you scold me, or we could crawl into bed and go to sleep. Personally, I would prefer to go with the second option; the first is too troublesome."

"Did you just use troublesome twice in under a minute?" I said in an agitated voice.

Deciding that sleeping sounded fantastic, I turned on my heel and pulled the covers away from the mattress. I slipped into bed, with my back to the rest of the mattress, and pulled the fabric back over me. As Shikamaru got into bed, the mattress shifted with the weight and the blankets started to pull away from me.

"Shikamaru Nara you will not take the blankets from me." I said in an almost menacing voice.

The weight on the mattress shifted again as the pull on the blankets was released. My husband's arm wrapped around my waist and I was pulled towards him.

I closed my eyes and sleep started to cloud my brain.

'I can finally sleep easy. Shikamae is safe in her room, Shikamaru is back from his mission, and I don't have anything to worry about.' I thought with a sigh of relief.

My eyes sprang back open when a cry pierced through the silence. Shikamae had woken up. I could have cried as well. I started to move toward the side of the bed when Shikamarus' arm untangled from my waist. When I looked, he was already up and walking to the door.

As he opened the door he looked over his shoulder, "I can get her this time, you sleep."

He disappeared into the dark hallway saying "I am coming you troublesome child, stop crying!"

I giggled quietly and rolled back over to my side. I sighed in relief once more when the crying stopped, "Best husband ever!"

With that I closed my eyes and let sleep take over.

Author's Note: Okay so the chapter was not written as fast as I would have liked. School is officially over, but I have been working almost nonstop… bad timing to try to write another chapter. Anyway, there was Chapter 13! Summer is here, so I will have more time to write! Until the next Chapter…

Blondegirl09

Oh P.S. Almost forgot… Please Review! I love reviews!