Notes from the Authoress

I was randomly inspired, and this is what came out: a brooding Ino, an annoyed Shikamaru, a teasing Ino, a motivated Shikamaru, and some chips. How does it get much better than that? Have fun reading, and please review!

Disclaimer

Roses are red, violets are blue. I don't own Naruto, and neither do you.

Deceitful Kunoichi

One Shot

"You're smart, aren't you, Shikamaru?"

The question threw him off. It was strange that Ino had gone out of her way to sit beside him as he watched the clouds, but asking such a stupid question was beyond her. He looked at her for the first time since she arrived, annoyed and searching for a reason why she would ask.

Ino was staring up at the clouds herself, which she never did. She informed him quite often that cloud watching was a waste of time, but there she was. She sighed heavily and tore her gaze away from the clouds, looking to Shikamaru with an odd expression that he couldn't quite place. "Answer a question for me. Why can't people make up their minds?"

Shikamaru pushed himself up into a sitting position, a bit miffed at having to move at all. "What's bothering you?" He replied, not taking the time to answer her question because that wasn't what was really on her mind. Women were so troublesome; why couldn't they just say what they mean?

Ino started twirling several strands of her blonde hair around her finger, watching as she made a mess of it with bored eyes. Her hair was growing back since she cut it during the Chuunin exams, only just past her shoulders now. She kept it down more often when she wasn't training, but once it grew to its previous length it would be right back up in its ponytail. "People are stupid," She said softly. The short strands untwirled themselves, and instead of twirling them again she tugged hard at her own hair, flinching. "When we were in school, we were always told to be feminine. We had to be deceitful and good at it, make people believe that we were just normal girls to pass by. Then, once we became genin, everyone thinks that we're shallow pricks obsessed with appearance. They taught us our whole childhood, grow your hair, wear your dress, learn how to talk, walk, act like a normal woman, and now they want us to cut our hair and fight like men. Would they make up their damn minds? Do they want me to be a smart, deceitful kunoichi, or do they want me to be a strong, no-nonsense warrior?"

Shikamaru wasn't sure what brought around her thoughts on the topic, but it didn't really matter. Ino rarely divulged too deeply in her thoughts; that was more his thing. Unfortunately, when she did, she always wanted answers, and she was under the impression that Shikamaru knew everything. When she first started doing this, Shikamaru answered her straight and she would walk away even more confused than she had come. Now he knew better. She didn't want an answer at all; she thought she did, but all she wanted was some sort of assurance. How Shikamaru hated these times; how he hated being the genius. He wished that she would go to someone else over this troublesome habit of hers. It was too bad that he couldn't simply tell her to leave him alone, and not because she would probably kill him, but because he would almost feel like he had slapped her. Ino was twirling her hair again, glaring at the strands almost dangerously, looking as if she would like nothing better than for the strands to burst into flames. Shikamaru reached over, grabbed her wrist, and tugged her hand down hard. Ino flinched again as she tugged some of her hair, but she didn't yell at Shikamaru and when he let go of her wrist she didn't start playing with her hair again.

"Stop being dense," Shikamaru said bluntly. "You know that you don't care what anyone else thinks about you. You're the strongest kunoichi in our year, and the most beautiful one to top it. You're everything that they told you to be, so who cares if they look down on you now? Just keep proving yourself and they'll let it go. You know that. Now will you quit being so troublesome?"

Ino just sat there, staring where she had been twirling her hair a moment before, but after several moments of silence she directed her blue eyes to her teammate. A small smile crossed her face, and the contemplative look that had been there before faded. "You think I'm beautiful?"

Shikamaru almost snapped that he didn't say that, but he realized that he did. Ino's smile was slowly turning into a knowing smirk. He scoffed and crossed his arms over his chest. "Troublesome girl."

Ino's previous trouble seemed to fade away all at once, and now she was fully focused on torturing her lazy teammate. She scooted closer to him, smirking brightly. "Why, Shikamaru, I didn't know you felt that way about me."

"I was stating a fact, not feelings for you," Shikamaru snapped as he scooted away from her. This was why he disliked women. Did they have meetings to come up with all the ways they could be extremely troublesome and overbearing?

"Don't deny it, Shika-kun," Ino said in the sweetest voice she could muster. She moved in front of him and tried to make her smirk follow the sweetness, but she couldn't help but feel completely evil. "I guess you just couldn't resist me in the end. I won't think any less of you."

"Why do you come to me with your troublesome problems if you're just going to get over it yourself and use what was bothering you against me?" Shikamaru demanded, glaring at her. The next thing he knew Ino had thrown herself into his lap and her face was mere inches away from his own. He nearly choked. Apparently, she learned what they tried to teach her in the academy well. Deceitful woman, amazing kunoichi. "Ino. Get off of me," He said in what could have been a threatening tone. Ino decided that he was too lazy to actually threaten her.

Ino placed her hand lightly against his cheek, leaving just a ghost of a feeling. She loved teasing Shikamaru. "I know you want me to kiss you, Shika-kun. You're too obvious. Admit what you want, as simple as that. Stop playing coy."

"You have five seconds to get off of me, you troublesome woman."

"Or what?" Ino asked as an amused expression crossed her face.

As lazy as he may be, Shikamaru was still a shinobi, and he was suddenly feeling uncharacteristically motivated. He hit Ino's arm to knock her hand away from his face, then grabbed the girl by both her arms and threw her to the side, twisting along so he ended up pinning her to the ground by his body. Ino reacted on instinct, however, and in moments the two were rolling around on the ground trying to get the better of the other. Ino had pulled her arms away and was trying to kick and punch, while Shikamaru was simply trying to get out of the scuffle.

That was how Chouji found them nearly ten minutes later, rolling around in the grass together. He shoved some chips into his mouth and stared at them thoughtfully. Ino was laughing despite the fact that she was beating the crap out of Shikamaru, and Shikamaru was doing a bad job at getting away. The chubby boy swallowed the mouthful of food and, only doing so because that would make the unthought-of scene more of a reality, spoke aloud to himself: "I always figured Shikamaru liked Ino, but I never knew he was such a masochist…"

End.

Notes from the Authoress

Yay Chouji! We all know Shikamaru likes Ino. Well, you know, I hook Shikamaru up with just about everyone since he's such a pimp, but for this story…he likes Ino. Please review!