Epilogue
by Ember
A/N: Two years. Two long years. Not my longest time taken with a fanfic- that would be Poisoned Hearts, which ran around five years from conception to completion, and finished up with about a hundred and five pages in WordPerfect, which dwarfs SAs measley little seventy-five. But it was certainly a journey, and I'm thrilled yall stuck with me throughout.
Having said that. I do hate Hinata, but she gets off nice in this story. I hope she appreciates it. :P And just a quick warning- this epilogue is sappy as a Canadian maple syrup farm. There's also enough fluff to stop a charging rhinocerous. Not recommended for diabetics.
Review Replies!
Shinegami7: Bwahah, thanks so much! Ino is roxxors...
Raven: Oh, dear. brings ice and asprin
Fairy Blue: Thanks so much! Glad you liked it.
Axel-fiery-gurl: hustles over with a pillow Thanks for the compliment!
QueenNarca: Thanks!
Egg: That review made me very happy. Especially the last sentence. Because its true! Thanks so much for the comment!
Turtle Kid: I never saw Superman Returns. I didnt like his cowlick. But thanks for the review; I can honestly admit to having an affinity for sappy-melty-fluff. I warn you now that this installment has a lot of it. x3
XoxokibaismyantidrugoxoX: Thank you! I actually was worried about how I'd written the dialogue, so thanks a bunch
Mou: Yaaay!
Makenzi: Fuck, that review made me happy. xD You just wrote out a good chunk of everything that I was trying to do with this fic, and I'm thrilled you think I did it all. Thanks so much!
Darcen: Thanks bunches! This is the last bit, unfortunately.
Cool-Hanyou: Not yet- I still have the Epilogue. This is the last installment, though! Thanks so much for your reviews!
Death by Squishy: Thank you:3
Shiva's Avatar: The cliché plot –is- Ino's fault! That's fantastic excuse and I'm keeping it.: P Sorry I swallowed your day, but thanks so much for stopping by and dropping a line!
--
Closing time
Time for you to go out
And find your place in the world
Closing time
Turn the lights up over
Every boy and every girl
Closing time
One last call for alcohol, so finish your whiskey or beer
Closing time
You dont have to go home but you cant stay here
I know who I want to take me home
I know who I want to take me home
I know who I want to take me home
Take me home...
--
Kiba tried to meditate twice a day- once, to calm down after training with his team, and once at the end of the day. He didnt always get both of them in and he knew that wasnt good for his training, because concentrating on yourself and your chakra is important to maintain a personal balance. But he tried to get it all in a day and personally relished in the feeling he got when he took an hour or two away from his schedule, centering himself, alone, in his living room, which Akamarus fur under his hand- just the two of them, breathing synchronized. Completely relaxed.
BANG.
Or not. Akamaru jumped a foot off Kibas lap, and the canine-ninja was on his feet before he realized hed moved.
BANG! Bang. AShit! Bopbopbopbop...
Akamaru whined and rolled his eyes, recognizing the sounds at last. Willing to pretend hed never been startled, he flopped over on his side and put his head down on his paws, glaring at the door to Kibas apartment as though he could sense the idiot making that noise behind it.
Kiba shot a quick glare at his terrier, then hurried over to the door to his apartment, wrenched it open, and yelled out with some surprise as a large, hastily-stuffed suitcase fell in on top of him. The next think he knew he was on his back on the floor.
"Sorry about that," Naruto quipped from somewhere above the toppled shinobi. "That thing is heavy!"
"Yeah," Kiba drawled, struggling to sit up and shoving it off his lap with a grunt. Akamaru watched, curious, from the other room. "I heard it chasing you down the stairs. Is this it?"
"Yep!" With a cheeky grin, Naruto plopped down to take the suitcase's place in his boyfriend's lap. "Everything worth saving from my apartment's cleaned out and shipped off. Tsunade says I could get thirty dollars for the place and not even have to clean it up."
Kiba absently wrapped his arms around the kitsune's shoulders, laughing a little into his hair. "You're so damn lazy." The kitsune, he knew, used orange cream shampoo and his hair smelled absolutely delicious; he lingered with his lips pressed against the blonde curls for another second.
"I am not!" The blonde slid his fingers over the broader hand resting on his stomach, and dropped his head onto Kiba's shoulder. "I just hate cleaning."
"And yet you're moving in with me." Kiba's slightly fatalistic tone both annoyed and amused his boyfriend, who wriggled a little in his arms.
"Hey, you invited me!" Naruto shrugged. "And I'm cleaner than the dog, at least."
"Somehow, I doubt that."
"Yeah, well, fuck you." The words weren't as sharp as they might have been a month ago. Naruto wiggled closer to the larger shinobi while Kiba mused over the suggestion.
"Maybe later," he decided, and rudely shoved Naruto off his lap. The blonde struggled upright and stuck his tongue out at Kiba, then danced out of the way when the larger ninja sprang to his feet. "Get your suitcase," the canine shinobi said.
Naruto pouted. "It's heavy," he pointed out, kicking it towards the other ninja. "You get it. I carried it all the way over here."
"You're as strong as I am."
One blonde eyebrow jumped up. "As strong? As in, equally strong?" He smirked, showing pointed eye-teeth. "That's a damn lie, and you know it."
Kiba snorted. "Well, maybe it is an exaggeration. I'll be gentle around you, but you still have to carry your own damn suitcase to your own damn room." Your own room. Naruto's room. Strange how that first bedroom had ceased to be the guest room and transformed into Naruto's Room the second the smaller shinobi moved in weeks ago, and how Kiba's room, once his alone and the place he went to be by himself, had made the same transformation just the moment the blonde had stumbled through the door today. The guest bedroom had settled back down to its original title without fanfare; the whole ordeal seemed so natural.
It just seemed like he had been around the blonde his whole life. He was already getting proficient at tuning him out- at the moment, he was rising out of his reverie and only just becoming aware of words thrown like shruiken at him. "…eight times as strong as you, which you should know 'cause you still have the bruises from the last time we-"
Kiba kissed him. Kiba kissed him like he'd never touched him before, amazed that he could still feel so amazingly overwhelmed, so pleasantly keelhauled. That even though they must have kissed like this twenty, thirty, forty times, he still got butterflies in his stomach the second their lips touched, and he still felt like he could stay like this- fingers tracing the fox's jawline, one arm wrapped around his shoulder, eyes half-closed so they could still drink each other in through sight, through the light that reflected off each other- for the rest of his life.
He has always assumed that love became natural, became steady, became predictable; that eventually the shine rubs off and all you're left with is the tool. That's why they only ever show the beginning of the relationship in the movies- because eventually all love becomes the same, worn-down but gentle fixture of life. But maybe it's always like this- always new, always exciting. Every day is just the refreshed beginning of the same sweet love story.
When he pulled away, it wasn't with regret, because he knew the next kiss would be just as perfect as the first.
Naruto stuck out his tongue. "Cheater."
Kiba smirked. "I'm not a cheater. I just know a better way to win than arguing."
"Oh, really?" Naruto's mouth twisted up in a deliciously evil grin, and Kiba's stomach twisted when soft, tan hands pressed against his chest. "I can win this game, too."
In the end, Kiba carried the suitcase upstairs.
Hinata was still awkward around them, until one day she wasn't, and then she started coming over on occasion, and then she started talking to Naruto. The blonde, who had never before heard her say an entire sentence to his face, was dumbfounded at the transformation- but, little by little, Hinata took heartbreak as a much-needed callous to her heart. She was a strong ninja, and, slowly, little by little, one word at a time, becoming a stronger person. So yes, she found love, and it was with the person she was slowly becoming. So it turned out alright for her, too.
Ino never did pay Kiba. It was a running joke at first, and she bought him lunch a couple times and then, later, a couple drinks, and they eventually called it even. Sasuke took longer to forgive her than Naruto or Kiba did because, in the end, he loved Naruto more than he would admit, and he hated her for hurting him. But it didn't bother Ino. She had more devious plans to capture Sasuke than the Atsuki could ever hope to concoct, and she knew exactly how to carry them out, with Shikamaru and Chouji in tow. In truth, she might have been disappointed if she had won him over too quickly, because it would truly be a waste of her devious intellect.
For his part, Akamaru was not happy to have Naruto come and live with him, and made this disapproval apparent by befouling everything of the fox's he could lift a leg at. Eventually, however, he got over himself, and admitted that sometimes his master's happiness was enough to tide him over in this hard time. And anyway, Naruto was willing to play with him sometimes, and he knew how happy it made Kiba when the two of them got along.
Closing time
Time for you to go out to the places you will be from
Closing time
This room won't be open till your brothers or your sisters come
Closing time
So gather up your jackets
And move out to the exits
I hope you have found a friend
Closing time
Every new beginning comes from some other beginning's end
Kiba turned over, careful not to pull the blankets off of Naruto. It was late and the fox was sleeping, lying sprawled out on his back, his chest rising and falling gently, his soft stomach with the swirling seal visible through the translucent sheets. And as for us, I think we turned out just fine in the end.
Maybe Konoha would never be the same. Maybe the two worst juvenile delinquents of the whole Hidden Leaf village were in sync, now, and completely unstoppable- maybe Tsunade was having trouble hiding the wrinkles and Asuka was drinking an awful lot more- he said he needed it and God, did he need it- and Iruka kept complaining that his hair was going grey. Konoha would remember them. And the two of them would remember this.
Naruto smiled in his sleep and shifted a little, and Kiba's heart clenched. Would it always be this intense, just looking at his fox? He hoped so.
Kiba propped himself up on his elbow and looked down at the sleep-smoothed face of his boyfriend, and, one hand absently twisting through blonde curls, he bent down to brush his lips against the kitsune's.
Blue eyes opened slightly, and Naruto kissed him back, and it was every bit as thrilling as the first, and every bit as sweet as the last, and every bit as perfect as every kiss in-between. Kiba wanted to hold his fox, stop time, and live in this love story for the rest of his life. But when you're in love, every story's a love story, and every old story has to end.
Everything has to come to an end sometime, and he couldn't think of a better ending than this.
I know who I want to take me home
I know who I want to take me home
I know who I want to take me home
Take me home
Take me home…
And they all lived happily ever after.