So this is the last chapter.
Thank you all for your patience and kind words and taking the time to review/fav/put an alert on my story. I appreciate your support more than I could ever express. Thank you.
Now onto the last run. ;)
-X-
Ino vibrates with the music. It is both suffocating and liberating; her two natures finally at ease on the dance floor. Her exposed skin, her hidden fears.
She lets her head bump, the rest of her body spread around her in slow movements beyond the purplish light sliding across her body. The beat of the drums snakes up her arms as she moves sharper, faster. She is loose and laughing. She wills herself to be happy, shine, dance and just be happy. Happy. Happy! Her girlfriends are around her, as loose, as defiant, as they jump and dance. Sakura turns toward her briskly, one shoulder already hunched, and her eyes sparkle with mischief. Playful, she mouths the lyrics of the song playing. Ino feels herself smiling back, moving in and out of their close knitted circle until Sakura's boyfriend whisks her away. Ino turns away, fast, in a calculated move. She passes a hand across her neck and it comes back wet with sweat. Tenten points at her drink and grabs her hand.
They erupted laughing, breaking from the crowd and being submerged by a new one around the bar. They pretend they left Sakura's side carelessly. And they elbow each other, Ino avoiding Tenten's gaze as they squeeze between other customers waiting for a refill. They wave at the barman then crash at a booth. They pant and Ino forces herself to giggle.
She is supposed to be happy, but happiness is a fluctuating state whenever she flies back home. Because Sakura has drifted away and girl's night is tangled with her new boyfriend and her recent engagement.
Before, they would find each other without attachment, with Sakura finishing her last year of residency and Tenten serving overseas, they didn't have time for relationships and girl's night was sacred. Yesterday, Ino arrived in the country, but she is already thinking of leaving again since she met Naruto and Tenten avoided questions about her own boyfriend. Ino has no one and she wishes she wouldn't feel lonely, or the emptiness her friends' happiness have dug inside her. She lives off a suitcase and rare plants calling her attention and scrupulous study. A nurse turned botanist, Ino floats between country and wilderness. Whenever she sees Tenten and Sakura, she realizes how much they have grown into women; fearless and poised and passionate. How little anchor them now, here. With her.
Ino feels too old, too cowardly to push forward and meet someone and settle down.
"Hey, isn't that the guy from the roof?" Tenten yells in her ear gesturing toward someone behind Ino.
Ino feels her heartbeat numbing her chest, reaching her fingertips until nothing else wraps her in her searing pain. When she turns around, she does so slowly, afraid, because if she has found herself again and again abroad, here. Everywhere and nowhere. She has never found him again. Briefly, she sees messy brown hair, broad shoulders and the crowd shallows him whole. She freezes. He was here, she keeps telling herself and she still searches for him, for pieces he may have forgotten.
Ino bits her lip because she needs to know if it's her, the piece he may have forgotten. Her adventures, her travels, they all made her step surer, her decisions, firmer, her self-love, stronger. However, they could never truly erase him. The root of their brushing by, lost kisses and promises of one day, never dried out. It never grew either.
She doesn't chase after him, too stunned and too tired. She turns back toward the bar, but her hand grips the bar, then her drink. Dizzy, she gulps it down until the sharp lines of the world around her curve slightly, rounded, misshapen.
Until he's the piece of herself she has once abandoned, and their roles are reversed.
-X-
The Elevator
by Clementive
-X-
Kiba is late.
He hurries past the pavement, brushing by and pushing back against compact bodies. When he reaches the elevator, he is muttering to himself, every gaze directed at his watch. The metallic doors slide open and he jumps ahead, shouting apologies after apologies in his path.
"Common, common," he growls, his finger still on the button of his floor. He overslept, he forgot his alarm clock and the events have rolled in one after the other until he was running, sweating through his suit. His mind races through the environmental case he holds in his hand. He didn't have time to review it and he can't feel like he should be more dedicated. Despite the charities, the work he has shovelled on his own desk until his partner, Neji, grew quiet, unsure on how to address the sudden change. How much it was unlike him. As Neji grew warmer with clients, Kiba grew colder. They had a successful law firm, but Neji has learnt to escape the routine, Kiba was seeking it. He works longer until his nights are dreamless. No gore, no ex-lover.
Just the work and the firm.
Today, he has slipped, crawled back to old habits, without reason, without even meaning to. He is terrified. Late. Too late for his deposition.
The elevator's door slides open and he already bounces out of the elevator. Out of the corner of his eye, he sees the secretary raising her head, nodding or shaking her head. He walks faster but it doesn't matter. The conference room is lit, but empty. Retreating on his steps, he walks toward his associate's office. Without knocking, he throws open the glass door. Hyuuga Neji points at the chair in front of his desk, still making uncommunicative noises in the receiver of his phone. Kiba drops his case file and briefcase on the chair, and bends over, his hands already grabbing the back of the chair. He feels like a famished lion in a cage, frustrated and his jaw snapping over nothing.
"Hn, yes. Can I call you back? I have an insistent client in my office right."
Kiba mouths 'liar' and mocks surprise. When Neji finally hangs up, he is professional and calm as always. Sitting straight, his pale eyes examining him without seeming to, and Kiba is disheveled and ready to pounce.
"I almost said I had a buffoon waiting in my office. A very late buffoon," Neji taps softly on the calendar in front of him. "This hasn't happened in a while..."
"But you took the deposition?"
"Of course," He says it slowly while narrowing his eyes. "Did you have to barge in here to ask me if I care about our clients? The botanic expert just left."
Neji hands him a file, his eyebrows furrowed.
"Everything is here. Now leave, I have work to do since you disturbed my whole morning."
"The name of the botanic expert..."
"Is in the file you are holding. Are you drunk?"
"Oh, fuck."
Kiba runs down the stairs, catching doors as they swing in and out. When he hits the street, he half-expects her waiting as he has once found her at the top of a mountain of snow. He should have never let her go. He spins on himself, looking for her blond hair wiping back at the wind. He turns on himself, panting, and the crowd hits him over and over again. He feels nothing. All he hears, all he wants to scream is her name.
"Kiba! What's your problem?" Neji's hiss doesn't seem to have crossed his lips. He stiffly holds the door of their building, his mouth is pressed in a thin line. He hesitates between placing a hand on his friend's shoulder or hurrying back inside. In college, Kiba was the one who taught him how to reach out, how to be a friend. Seeing the wildness in Kiba's eyes, the hectic way he paces, he wishes he knew what he should do now. Instead, Neji watches Kiba, as if he were 16 again, waiting for him to tell him the answer. How can he be a friend when Kiba is miles away?
"She's gone." Kiba says breathless. He needs to hear it, understand it. She's gone. Gone. Gone! Like at the hospital when she discharged herself and vanished without a trace.
"Yes, I told you that." He hears how Neji tries to be patient, contained, and he laughs dryly. There is nothing to be contained. He needs to chase her down. He needs to find her again and never let her go. There are too many cracks to his mask now, her name ripped it free from him. He caves in, gives in like snow under the sun, like he did in her embrace too long ago.
He is late. Perhaps too late.
"I need the day off."
"Kiba..."
"A favour, please."
Neji sighs, shakes his head, then pushes back his sleeve over his watch. Kiba knows he is masking his worry, slipping in and out of his role of the friend, the associate and the lawyer.
"Hn. Fix... whatever this is, Inuzuka. I'll see you tomorrow. 9 o'clock sharp."
-X-
Ino leaves his law firm, unsteadily.
His name seems to be imprinted on her retina and it follows her, a sullen echo, to the streets. Inside, everywhere she looked, there was his name and she swayed on her high heels as if drunk. The lawyer who took her deposition, kept scrutinizing her, half-expecting her to fall or sever or begin crying. Over and over again, Ino almost asked about Kiba, but she remained frozen.
He was avoiding her.
He was escaping her.
She was frozen, because her old scars had reopened at the prospect of being ignored, of Kiba handing the file to his colleague once he saw her name. She was frozen, wounded, and still hoping that if she didn't move, he would find her and the chase, the uncertainty, would finally stop. Dread and hope intertwined, ripped through her at each question, because she could feel his work behind each of them. She could feel his concern, his need to make things better. Still, she hung on to the questions asked, to the work at hand. Yes, the chemical from the company under investigation could harm wildlife. Yes, there were more environmental avenues. She hung on to each word because she refused to sink within herself. She refused to think about her suitcase and leaving again as she had done at the hospital, as he had done after they found themselves on the roof.
After the fear, the hope, came the anger, and it boiled and expanded inside her until she stepped into the elevator. It drowned the surrounding noise, it damped the movements around her as she pushed through the crowd to get out of the building. When she reached the street, her skin felt both hot and cold. Ino is now in the present, the past buried, the anger still hot and poignant.
Shaking her head, she waves a taxi and climbs in without a glance back.
-X-
Kiba rings the door bell.
He tries to remain still, but his hands tremble, his fingers suddenly on his tie, then combing through his hair. Again and again, until he freezes with the sound of the door opening. His blood drains from his face. Out of reflex, his fists curl. Because he is lost and it's not her.
"What do you want, Inuzuka?"
Neji leaves the door open for him and Kiba steps in even if his mind is miles away, years apart, and he feels like his heart is hanging out of his chest cavity. The sunlight is golden and orange in the kitchen and it blinds him; how Neji moves easily between the steaming pot and the fridge and the kitchen island.
"You live here?"
"Oh my god! You're the roof guy!"
Kiba snaps into place when he sees the brunette perched on the stool in front of the kitchen island. Neji's shoulders stiffen, but he keeps cutting the vegetables in front of him. The blade slices and none of them talk for a moment. Kiba has trouble reconciling with the image of the woman staring at him and Neji cooking. He tries to think about when Neji moved from his other apartment, when he settled down and he is afraid to think about it implies about their friendship. He has not only given himself up to work, but their friendship and he never saw the gulf now separating them.
"Who are you?" He looks around him, shaken.
"This is Tenten." Neji answers without looking up and Kiba can hear the reproach in his tone. He can hear how her name lies frozen between them because it had been mentioned. It had been ignored. Then, he replays Neji opening the door, relaxing slightly when seeing him.
"We've already met!"
"No, we haven't."
"Yes!" Tenten says laughing to herself and Neji finally stops what he is doing to watch her. His expression is torn between soft and hesitant, and Kiba's jaw clenches when he sees it all. How much he has missed by dedicating himself to his files. He never noticed the change. He never acknowledged the change. Neji and him had been roommates in college and they trained together in law school. Kiba had once jokingly said he would train him in the ways of friendship and he had noticed it then, how Neji grew more approachable, less angry, less cold. He had acknowledged it then.
"Ino isn't here." Tenten adds and she reaches for Neji. Her voice is singsong and she vibrates with her laughter, but he can hear the cutting edge beneath it. Her eyes tickle with amusement, but she puts herself between Neji and him. There is no coincidence in the movement, she moves with supple grace and her body bends slightly, between attack and defence.
"Tenten," Neji whispers, gripping her hand on his bicep.
"She doesn't live here anymore."
Kiba feels himself nod, awkward and stiff.
"This Ino person..." Neji frowns, cocking his head to the side. "She was the botanist expert."
"This is awesome! I'm calling her."
Again, her voice is light, but it cuts through him. Her smile stiffens on her lips as she reaches for her phone in her back pocket. Tenten dares him to stop her. She dares him to run. Again.
"No, please. Just tell me where to find her."
The sunlight flickers around them and they are immobile, silent, staring at each other.
"Sit down, Inuzuka." Tenten finally breaks the silence and she doesn't hide her coldness anymore. She is nothing but sharp edges, her skin rippling with threats when she sets up another plate on the table. "You've blown off Neji long enough. You're staying for supper."
When Kiba gazes at Neji, he finds him already watching him with a blank expression. He glances away, when he understands Neji expects him to leave.
"I've tons of humiliating stories about Neji." He forces laughter out and its shaky echo makes him cringe.
-X-
Kiba's address is written in her father's neat handwriting. Ino balls the paper in her fist then spreads it neatly. Over and over again, until she can follow the curved shadow of herself on the surface of the elevator door. Then, she presses the button to call the elevator. She fidgets, trying to still herself. She is unsure why she came, why she seeks him. Maybe they are done being forced together, maybe she should have never hoped for a fifth meeting while letting go.
Ino inhales sharply when the elevator doors open. She quickly presses the button of the fifth floor before she can change her mind. She startles when an arm presses against the nearly closed doors. The machine whirls and whines faintly. Ino presses herself against the back of the elevator when a middle-aged man steps in the elevator. He pushes the third-floor button whistling to himself. A moment later, the doors open again and he gets off nodding in her direction.
Ino almost gets off too. She feels ridiculous coming here. She doesn't even know what she would say to him. How can she fight for someone she doesn't know anymore? How can she fight for someone who doesn't seek her the way she does him? Her anger is gone now. Shaking her head, her finger trembles as it presses on the ground floor button. She curses under her breath when the elevator goes up and then, stops on the fifth floor.
Her heart beats wildly against her rib cage for the few seconds the doors remain open on his floor. Identical doors and soft light in front of her. The Kiba she knew would have hated it. The back of her throat hurts with the lump that forms there. She closes her eyes, her head rolling back to hit the wall behind her.
Ragged, stretched thin, her breaths fill her ears. She can hear how strained, hopeless, she has grown. How hollow her bones creak under her skin. She has built her career around her, high and strong ramparts, and with time she stopped hearing how much she craves for other things. How desperately faint her voice has gotten.
The elevator doesn't move and she knows that even if she steps out the elevator even if she knocks on his door, she would remain the same woman; at once the happiest and the saddest she had ever been.
Ino opens her eyes and she presses the ground button, her purse falling off her shoulder.
She is tired.
"INO!"
She jolts away from the wall, her eyes widened. Then, his body crushes against hers and she is pushed back.
The fifth time they meet the world stops when the elevator did and they are draped in red, the alarm assaulting his senses. His finger keeps pressing the button that makes them trapped. They kept missing each other, but they keep running after each other, in a tight circle they have drawn themselves. For themselves. They panted like they have run days on end.
Her face is hot against his shoulder, her nails instinctively gripping his suit. Finally, she pushes him back.
"You tackled me..."
He laughs first, grabbing for her hand instead. They rest, side-by-side, their shoulders brushing against one another. Then, she can't fight the hilarity rising inside her because he is holding her. Because they dropped, left and missed each other too many times. Because they resisted, round and round, cat and mice chasing each other in an endless circle. And now every single moment is settling into place, building up to this night.
"I was wrong to run away."
He turns his head toward her and she inclined her head until she can rest her temple to the wall. She bit her below lip, watching him. There are beads of sweat gathered on his forehead, but she only stares at his warm eyes.
"I was just afraid I was too much of an animal, too much of the unloved boy from the ghetto, to even be near you. I never knew how to love and you... You deserve the world. I never expected you to pick me or even look at me twice. I was a coward, sorry."
"This morning..."
"I was late."
"And now..."
"Now, I just hope, I'm not too late. I just really thought I was never good enough for you."
"And now..."
"Now, I don't care because I've loved you before I ever knew what was love. I could find you atop any now mountain, any jail because you..." He squeezes her hand, facing her, and she waits and waits. Because she needs the end of the story. She needs more than a stopped elevator, more than dropped bullets and travels that are her our escape route. "Because you shine from miles on end. You're so loud and so caring... So beautiful." He clears her throat, embarrassed, but refusing to look away. "Ino Yamanaka, would you have supper with me sometime?"
"I missed you too, Kiba."
Tranquility. She feels nothing but tranquility when he rests his forehead against hers.
-X-
Thank you for following this fic, guys! :) As always reviews are very much appreciated. Please take the time to let me know what you thought. ^_^
This fic is over, but I'm very much considering writing an epilogue for more KibaIno goodies. So stay tuned! ;)