XII.

Marriage.

Marriage.

But not just any kind of marriage, no—it was a premeditated marriage with Shisui. Shisui!

The words kept repeating in my head, echoing, swirling around like some messed-up merry-go-round. Big, bold, blobby-shaped words in bright, neon colors.

Remember when I said I'd marry him in a heartbeat a while back if he wasn't that closely related to me? Yeah, well, it was a huge lie.

The whole idea was still gross.

Not to mention risky! I mean, there was never the issue of Shisui being married before, not in canon—or at least, it was never mentioned and likely not an occurrence because he was a busy shinobi who devoted his life and efforts to the village and clan—and... if I went through with this because of Emiko and Satoshi's meddling, what if everything just got totally wrecked?

I still wanted my possible ticket back home! If the massacre somehow got pushed back and derailed, there was no telling how much longer I'd have to wait to get off of this crazy train.

On the other hand, if this stupid marriage thing didn't have any weight on the timeline, it would never go through anyway since Shisui would die soon.

Yeah...he would die. Sacrifice himself at the Naka river for the greater good of the village, which Itachi would then do his best to carry on and...

I didn't want to think about that any more than I had to. It was easier to just pretend to be dumb and blind to what was to come instead of worrying and agonizing over the pain and loss that was destined to occur and had nothing to do with me.

So, for both of those reasons (the marriage and impending doom of the Uchihas), I did my best to avoid my family. Once my ribs were healed and I could move without aching, I stayed away from the district for as long as possible in daylight up until the clan closed the neighborhood's gates. If they looked for me, they never found me, either, because I knew about all of the little side-streets and detours that only mischievous kids or talented ninjas could navigate without losing their breath.

Because I lingered in the shadier, prankster-prone side of Konoha, it was only a matter of time before I ran into a familiar firecracker of a blond brat—Uzumaki Naruto himself.

It was a total accident, too, but somehow I got swept up into the mess anyway.

For Konoha, today was just like any other day—run-of-the-mill and boring, a little chilly with winter rolling in, but otherwise uneventful.

Well, aside from the four faces of the Hokage Monument which were all sporting vicious, bright-red nosebleeds, thanks to the resident troublemaker that could only be Konoha's Number One Most Unpredictable Ninja—pre-Ninja, that is.

Judging by the way the villagers reacted, muttering amongst themselves and wondering who defaced the monument so crudely, it was clearly his first attempt at an attention-catching masterpiece on such a large scale, and would have gone unattributed if not for the trademark spiral left on the Third's cheek.

I had to admit, I was pretty impressed. I mean, how many people could think to give nosebleeds to those four giant faces, much less a little kid?

The only problem with the whole incident was that I was somehow painted as one of the suspects because of my stupid track record.

"I swear it wasn't me!" I shouted over my shoulder, shoving past a group of shoppers as I darted through the main street, doing my best to create more distance between the Uchiha police tailing me so I could disappear into one of the back roads without being seen. "I know I do a lot of crap around here but this totally wasn't me!"

If they happened to catch me, I could deal with the yelling and the lectures and the possible smack on the back of the head courtesy Emiko. I could. But then they would go and force me to clean up the whole mess by dangling down from a few ropes as a makeshift harness and let me just say that, while spiders were definitely my biggest fear, heights came in at close second. I mean, with my luck, I'd be hanging there cleaning up the paint and then a spider would skitter across the stones right up to my face and I'd panic, lose my grip and go tumbling from the ropes to make another huge red mess on the ground below, which someone else would have to come clean up—and it would just turn into a giant inconvenience. It would be better if they caught that little fox brat and actually raised him with the proper love and care he needed so he didn't act out so blatantly.

But they wouldn't. And they wouldn't catch me, either, because Fugaku wasn't with them and he was the only one capable of ever really catching me and making me pay, to his credit.

The moment I threw myself around a building at the corner of the intersecting streets, I snuck into one of the alleyways on the other side of it that looped back around to a convenient, hidden side-street—but the moment I dove towards the area, I crashed right into someone else who was already hiding away there.

"Ow! Who do ya think—who the heck're you?"

Surprise, surprise. It was a little Naruto, splattered nearly head-to-toe with flecks of red paint—his hands were covered in it, too. I'd literally caught him red-handed. He sat there in the dirt where I'd knocked him over and squinted up at me with a ridiculous half-pout, half-sneer while rubbing his head, which he'd butted me right in the torso with when we collided (thank god my ribs were fully repaired but it still hurt).

He still had those ridiculous, weird-looking goggles. And he was adorable, in a bratty sort of way.

Any other time I might have wanted to pinch his cheeks or something because he was Naruto, a pint-sized, mini main character himself, but since this whole mess was his fault, I wasn't feeling too kindly towards him. So, I scoffed and set my hands on my hips in what I was certain was as very Emiko-esque manner.

"I'm your scapegoat, apparently. Nice job, by the way, that paint is real eye-catching!"

His mean scowl became a bright, sunny grin as he jumped to his feet and waved his arms around. "I know! Right? People'll be talkin' about it for weeks, 'ttebayo!"

Kid couldn't register sarcasm. "Yeah, if they even know who did it."

"Huh? Ain't it obvious? It was me, nee-chan! Uzumaki Naruto!" he said with gusto, pointing back at himself with his thumb.

"Well, I know that, 'cause you're as red as a tomato with all that paint on you—and just how did you not get caught yet?"

"'Cuz I'm just that good. Gotta be, if I wanna be the Hokage!"

"Such noble intentions. But did you ever stop to think maybe someone else would be blamed for it? What happens then, when your reputation is taken away?" I sighed, slapping a hand to my face.

"I never thought about it like that... Should I write my name real big on it, too, next time? Whaddya think of that, nee-chan?"

I was not acting as a criminal-mischief consultant for Naruto.

"I, uh, just—"

"Hey! There she is! Rika, don't you move!"

Ah. They'd caught on to my escape route pretty fast. At the entrance to the narrow alleyway were three Uchiha police, heading straight for us.

So I did the first thing that came to mind, which turned out to be pretty stupid.

I ran.

But I also grabbed onto Naruto's arm and pulled him along after me on reflex.

"No way!" He shouted, grinning wide. "Are you like me, too? What'd you do?"

"Didn't I tell you?! They think I'm the one who gave the Hokage Monument nosebleeds!" I dodged another group of pedestrians on the main street, cutting through on our way to another alleyway that led to an empty lot that was more-or-less hidden and out of the way. I was totally ditching this kid first chance I got.

"Are you kiddin' me, 'ttebayo? That was me! Me! You—you plagiarizer!"

I was totally ditching this kid first chance I got.

When I didn't answer, he jerked his arm out of my grasp. "H-hey, wait—" Sure, I wanted to get rid of him, but I couldn't just leave him there, either. He could get lost, or worse, caught. I could still hear the police yelling after us, even if they weren't right in our sights at the moment.

"No way! I'm gonna go back and draw my name across 'em all so people know for sure who did it! Dattebayo!" And then, he did the worst thing he could do. He stopped. Right in the middle of the alleyway.

"Come on, that's a terrible idea! Everyone's eyes are focused on that thing—if you go back, you'll be caught for sure. They'll make you clean the whole thing up. Use your head a little!"

"I am. I'm gonna do it, stupid nee-chan!"

"Hey, that's not—" a hand smacked over my face and dragged me backwards into another side-street before I could yell at the little brat for his attitude. Seriously, Naruto was so much more tolerable when he was older! About ten times more adorable then, too. If I had any scissors on me, I would've given him a proper haircut, because those spikes were out of control—

Hold it. Just who'd grabbed me? I latched onto the person's arm with both of my hands and bit down on their fingers hard, not appreciating the gesture of being cut off mid-sentence and muzzled one single bit. I mean, I would have yelled, really loudly, so it was a good idea on their part. Just not so convenient or pleasant for me.

"Ouch—Rika! It's just me."

"Shisui?"

He let go and shook out his bitten hand gingerly, brow furrowed slightly, but he was smiling a bit, too, amused. "Sorry about that, but I knew you'd scream and catch their attention if I didn't."

I reached into my pocket and handed him a bandaid automatically—I kept a few of them on me at all times thanks to a habit I'd picked up at the hospital.

"Thanks."

"No problem." A grin forced its way onto my face as I spoke, and then I turned on my heel to run away again—because it was Shisui and I didn't think I could look him in the eye at the moment—only, a hand on my shoulder changed my mind and kept me in place. Well, so much for escaping. I sighed and glanced back at him with a frown. "How long were you following us? I thought you were still away on a mission."

"I got back a little while ago." He shrugged it off easily. "And long enough to know you weren't the one responsible for the graffiti. Thankfully. I'm not sure what the clan head would do if you were. And as for Aunt Emiko..." he trailed off. Cleared his throat a little awkwardly. "Rika, have you been avoiding everyone?"

Oh. She'd probably put him up to this—set him on my trail to go and talk some sense into me and bring me back, convince me to go along with the arranged marriage idea. But there was no way he would force me into something like that if I didn't want to. I knew that. I didn't know if Emiko and Satoshi knew that, though.

"Ha, no! Haha, I mean, why would I do that?" I raised my shoulders in such an exaggerated shrug that he was forced to pull his hand back.

"...Can you look me in the eye and say that?"

"Nope." I really wanted to run. But if I did, he'd catch up to me before I knew it anyway. He wasn't called Shunshin no Shisui for nothing.

"Rika," Shisui sighed, and with that tone, there was no doubt he had his hands on his hips and brought up his Mom Face. Egh, hadn't seen that in a while. "Aunt Emiko told me she told you... about the—um—the marriage prospect."

Even he had trouble saying it without hesitating. "Dunno what you're talking about."

"I think we need to talk about it."

"Maybe I don't want to."

"Rika—"

"Don't 'Rika' me like you're older and know better, Shisui."

"But I am older."

"Just by a year! A whole year, because your stupid birthday has to be on the same day as mine!"

"My birthday isn't stupid—no, wait. I'm not getting into an argument with you about this. Stop trying to get the topic off track. Are you just going to pretend this isn't happening? Like the last time I tried to talk to you about it and you pretended to be asleep?"

"I was sleeping."

"Well, you're not now." He sighed and shuffled forwards, stopping at my side and catching me in a half-hearted headlock. I didn't bother resisting even though he was a little sweaty and his green flak jacket sort of smelled like trees and musty, earthy dirt and boy—because he clearly hadn't gotten the chance to bathe and clean up from his mission yet. "If you won't talk about it, will you listen to what I have to say, then? I feel like you almost hate me here, and that's the last thing I want, Rika."

I sighed and elbowed him in the side weakly, noting that those shinobi vests were really padded. "I don't hate you, Shisui. I never could and you know that." He grinned—I caught the motion out of the corner of my eye and couldn't help but do the same. "But... Fine. Let's go to the park and you can say whatever you want, I guess. I'll listen."

Conversations like this just couldn't happen without some sort of pastry or sweets or something to soften the seriousness, so I stopped by a bakery on the way to the park and bought a bag full of chestnut manjū. To share, of course.

So there we sat, side-by-side, shoulders nearly touching, on one of the benches on the outskirts of one of the local parks, eating stupid pastries. It could have been a normal, peaceful moment of bonding if not for the current subject matter that was on both of our minds.

"She said you agreed." Damn. I didn't want to be the first to speak, but I blurted it out before I could stop myself. "Umm—Emiko said you agreed to the arrangement. The, uh, thing. The marriage. Thing." And the words just kept coming. I stuffed the rest of the pastry into my mouth to shut myself up.

"I did." Damn him, he was able to reply so easily.

I swallowed harshly. "Why?" Damn me. He was the one who was supposed to talk while I just sat there and listened. So much for that. He probably knew I'd go and have my say, too, because I was a loudmouth who didn't know how to shut up sometimes. The jerk planned this. "Marriage is pretty serious business, you know? Damn near permanent 'til death, by the clan laws! There's no divorce option, you know—it's either you do get married or you don't get married. No take backs!" I stuck my hand into the brown paper bag with the sweets and pulled another one out before taking a huge bite, because if I didn't, I'd keep on and on.

"You're talking like I didn't think about this beforehand and just gave an answer on the fly." He snatched the bag away from me and took the remaining manjū for himself and the action came off as just mildly irritated. With my luck, this would end up as another argument. "I did think about it, Rika."

"Then you're fully aware if we're engaged to get married we're going to be pretty much exclusive?" Oh, god. The pastry wasn't helping me keep quiet. "As in, no more dating. No girlfriends or boyfriends."

"I don't have one anyway—wait, do you?"

"Well, no, but..."

"Then that's the least of our worries." He stared down at the empty paper bag in his lap and sighed before crumpling it up and tossing it towards the nearby trash bin—landing it in one throw, naturally. "I did think about it, okay? I figured that, as long as it's you, Rika, it wouldn't be a bad thing. It wouldn't even feel like an obligation. It would just be like almost any other day—I mean, we've been around each other practically forever."

I crossed my arms. "Shisui, I don't know what your definition of 'marriage' is like, but it's definitely not that. The clan pushes for the passing on of one's genes, especially since we both have Grandpa Kagami's," I gave a little shudder at the prospect of how screwed up that was, "so we would be obligated to have kids, which means we would have to have se—"

"Okay, maybe I didn't think it through that much!" Shisui held up his hands (sweaty) in surrender as he stopped me mid-sentence, speaking a bit louder than necessary to cover up that last word and then quickly looking away, tugging at his high collar. I was pretty sure his face turned tomato-red. Maybe he was a little prudish about things like sex and all that. I guess I was the same way, when I was that age.

"I'm just tryin' to cover all the bases, here. If it came to that, I don't think—no, I know—I wouldn't be able to. With you." Not only because we'd both be dead before I was sixteen and ready to be married off, but because I just couldn't shake the thought that he was more like a sibling, even if we weren't as closely related as I first thought and it was still pretty damn incestuous. That, and the whole age factor definitely played into it. "I mean, I think of you as a brother. And don't you see me as a younger sister? You said it before."

He grinned uneasily and shifted in his seat a little. "Actually, that's not really how I said it, Rika."

"I—" Oh. He was right. I pursed my lips and aimed a suspicious glare at him. "Don't tell me you like me, Shisui." That was just what this moment needed.

"Uh, well, you see..." He rubbed the back of his head, fidgeting with the knot at the back of his forehead protector, failing to meet my eyes.

My glare shifted into a curious frown. "You...like like me?"

"Yeah. I do."

"Oh." A heavy silence fell over us. Poor guy. I'd already put him in his place before he even had a chance to confess properly. "Since when?"

Shisui smiled—and it was very clearly a little hurt, because I'd, unwittingly, all but rejected him without saying the actual words—and reached out to tap the dragonfly hairpin. "Since I gave you that." His fingers lingered for a moment before he pulled his hand away and set his elbows on his knees, leaning forward and looking mildly defeated—resigned. "But I always knew how you felt. It's not like I'm surprised or anything. I'm just happy with you being here in my life. And when your parents brought up the marriage idea again, I thought, maybe, something could change. But I guess I didn't really take your feelings into consideration. Sorry, Rika."

He'd given me the hairpin three years ago.

Three years.

Three years?! Hell,I hadn't even noticed a shift in his behavior or any kind of tell—or did I just pretend not to see it? Maybe it was just hard to notice because we hadn't spent a great amount of time together over that short stretch of time since he had his ninja career—or maybe I was just an oblivious idiot. I was too busy with myself, too busy waiting for the future. I was the one who never stopped to consider other people's feelings, and somewhere along the way I'd picked up his.

Still didn't know what he saw in me since I was pretty obnoxious.

I reached up to adjust the dragonfly hairpin. It was one of the nicest gifts I'd ever been given, in regards to general thoughtfulness and intent. His intentions were always innocent and selfless, more often than not. It wasn't a token of his feelings, because he'd been genuine in giving it to me as an apology, and it wasn't meant to bind me to him, or anything—he'd made that clear. He was very understanding, even if it hurt him.

I didn't...want to hurt him. I couldn't.

"You know—" He glanced up when I spoke. "—I never said I was against the idea. Just that, y'know, it would be better if we didn't do certain things. Maybe it would be better to go with your definition of marriage after all."

His eyebrows drew together in slight confusion, with a bit of guilt mixed in. "Rika, you don't have to say that. I get it. Please don't feel like I'm trying to force you into it or anything with what I said."

"Isn't like that." I shook my head and leaned my elbows on my knees, too, before dropping my chin into my hands. How was I supposed to say this without sounding like a wishy-washy moron? "I just wanted to hear your feelings on the matter. To make sure Mom and Dad didn't push you into it. You're serious; I know. I get that."

It was what Emiko and Satoshi wanted. It was what Shisui wanted. And, probably, it was the best option for the clan. I wasn't completely sure it was free of political motives, necessitating unity and loyalty, but there wasn't...any harm in going along with it. Making everyone happy.

The marriage would never come to pass, anyway. In two years—a little less—everything would play out like it was supposed to and he would sacrifice himself for the sake of the village. Hell, I could put up an act until then! It was the least I could do, for everything they'd all done for me. All I had to do was pretend for a little longer. I wasn't who they thought I was and, really, I'd been acting all along. Trying to make the best of a bad situation.

No one would come out of it alive in the end, anyway. Only Itachi (for a while, at least) and Sasuke.

I forced a grin and knocked my shoulder against Shisui's. "As long as it's you, Shisui, I don't think marriage would be a bad thing. You aren't selfish for wanting that. So, if you're still up for it, I agree, too."

His smile—his happiness—made the terrible lie worth it.

"But—can I ask one thing, Shisui?" Even if I was gonna play this game, there was one thing that I just couldn't overlook.

"Sure, what?"

"Just what do you like so much about me?" It was an easy enough question to ask, but maybe not so much to answer. Maybe I was being nosy, but I couldn't understand it. Sure, I was a heartbreaker at work, but I was also Cootie Rika. Generally obnoxious and—this guy knew the worst of me. He didn't have his head on straight if he fell for me, of all people.

Shisui pressed his shoulder back against mine to keep from being knocked over and glanced at me from the side, smiling slightly. Fondly. And, for the first time, I finally saw it in his eyes—that tender, indescribable softness that tended to show up whenever someone was in love with someone else and thought they were the most amazing thing in the world. I'd seen it before, so I knew. But, seeing Shisui look at me that way... it caught me off guard. Like, maybe it had always been there and I'd just never stopped to notice and I wondered how that made him feel, me being so ignorant and just—oblivious.

Then, his hand dropped onto my head and he ruffled my hair a little roughly. "Everything." He said it without hesitation. With complete honesty. With that soft smile that almost made me take it all back and take my lying self as far away from him as possible.

Only almost, though. It was too late to stop it now, so I did what I always did and teased him a little...if only to make myself feel better.

"Everything? Even my mean-natured bullying and tendency to hit you?"

"Especially that. You're pretty cute when you act tough, Rika."

It was my turn to smile. Then I pushed him off of the bench to get a head start on running away. "Last one home has to tell the news to Emiko!"

Naturally, it was me.