Red Is A Pretty Colour

132

Hiko's pov

I was at home, sprawled out on the floor sorting through photographs for the album. I didn't have to worry about Naruto seeing it anymore as he had moved out yesterday into a new appartment with Hinata.

"What are you doing?" Shikamaru asked curiously as he brought his head up from where it lay on my lap to look at the photos.

"Sorting out a photo album for Naruto and Hinata's wedding gift." I explained.

"You too huh?" Shikamaru asked as he reached up to play with a lock of my hair.

"You mean the whole you need a good gift or you can't attend thing?" I asked.

"Yeah." Shikamaru said.

"I'm exempt because I'm his sister. Kakashi~Sensei made it clear that the family of the bride and groom don't have to worry about this whole fiasco. I'm working on this because I'm his sister and want to get him something meaningful." I explained.

"Lucky you. This whole thing is such a drag, I can't think of anything." Shikamaru confessed.

"I could get you exempt too, Kakashi~Sensei said the rules for me applied go my date too." I said. "Would you like to be my date?"

Shikamaru sat up and captured my lips in a gentle kiss. Our relationship was still undefined even after months but I kind of liked it that way. There was no rush or pressure in this relationship it was just us expressing exactly what we felt as we felt it. We had our dates and our romantic moments and we kept things casual.

"I'd love to be your date." Shikamaru said with a smile. "I still need to come up with a gift though."

"Good luck with that." I said as I picked up a photograph of Naruto and I when we were 5 playing in a blanket Fort.

"That's cute, what was happening there?" Shikamaru asked as he looked at the photo.

"It was our birthday and we had nobody to spend it with. Teuchi had been nice enough to get us some bubbles and bouncy balls as a present, it was the only gift we got that year and we were so excited. The first thing we did when we got home was build a blanket Fort to play with our new toys in. The fort was so bad it fell apart almost immediately and we ended up just under one blanket held up by our heads playing with one of the balls. We didn't care though, we had a great time. We didn't even notice lord third had shown up to wish us happy birthday, or that he took this picture." I explained.

"You two used to be really close. I'm sure memories like that mean a lot to the both of you." Shikamaru said as he flopped back down on my lap.

"They do, when we became close again we would reminisce on this type of thing a lot." I said, running a hand through Shikamaru's hair.

"What did happen to make you two fall out? I remember it happened at the academy but I wasn't there for it, I just heard rumours." Shikamaru said.

"Naruto was so desperate to make friends that he didn't realise he was being used. The other kids would endanger him by sending him to retrieve enemy kunai or having him steal things for them and he did it because he wanted them to like him. I got mad at him for always falling for it and always being in detention as a result. He got mad at me for letting him fall for it and not helping him make friends. I blamed him for me always missing out and having to play the adult and he blamed me for him not having any friends and being ignored." I explained. "We were both just kids mad at everything and looking for something to blame. We had the whole fight in front of the kids in detention."

"Hey, sorry to interrupt you two but I have a delivery." Kiba said as he appeared in my window.

"What is it?" I asked.

"Two of your kids passed the chunin exams, Akira and Itona I think Lord Hokage said. I'm just dropping off their vests and certificates so that you can tell them yourself." Kiba said.

"Just drop them there." I said as I motioned towards the now vacant bed under the window.

"You got it, have fun you two." Kiba said before winking and hurrying away.

"We're never going to hear the end of that." Shikamaru said.

"He's the least of our problems, Ino is the real problem." I said.

"Troublesome woman can't just leave well enough alone." Shikamaru said.

"I told her to leave it alone but she never listens." I said.

"Of course not." Shikamaru said.