+Naruto - How the Prince Met the Girl, How He Lost Her, and How He Got Her Back
Title: How the Prince Met the Girl, How He Lost Her, and How He Got Her Back
Author: oh_dee
Fandom: Naruto.
Characters: Shikamaru/Temari.
Rating: T/PG-13.
Summary: Prince Shikamaru has never wanted to get married or take over the throne, but when certain circumstances arise and give him no choice, he comes up with a plan to make his future wife run for the hills.
Warnings: Shikamaru and Temari-ness abounds.
Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto, Shikamaru, Temari, or any other characters from the series. All are property of Masashi Kishimoto.
FFNET: here~
Chapter IV
In Which the Princess is Insulted
Please, Temari begged, let this nightmare end! Let it all be a terrible ploy to make her admit defeat; let it be a sick, twisted joke that wasn’t actually very funny at all. Anything, anything but this.
She closed her eyes and willed it all away. The stone walls, the beautiful gas-lit lamps, the expensive, gold framed mirror that made her look prettier than she ever imagined. But when she opened her eyes, everything was still there.
And so was the Queen of Konoha.
“It does not matter to me what you were taught in your home, but here in Konoha you will behave and act like a proper princess should, and if you should prove yourself unable to do so, I will teach you myself.”
Temari bit the inside of her mouth to keep from lashing out. Secretly, a tiny part of her admired the queen that stood before her, tall and graceful and extremely beautiful. But a rather large part of her wanted to drop kick Queen Yoshino in the face, and she had to dig her nails into the palm of her hands to keep from jumping into the air and putting the famed Green Beast of Konoha to shame (even if she didn’t really know about his amazing drop kicking techniques just yet).
“My son is turning twenty-one years old in a matter of two months. By Konohanese royalty standards, he is already bordering on old age. My husband has been consumed by a terrible disease that is purely fatal-”
At this, Temari could not keep quiet. She tried, very desperately, knowing that saying anything at all would only prolong the pain and torture of the speech, but her terribly rebel heart flared against the injustice at hand and her lips, so eager to spit poison, moved of their own accord-
“What is this incurable disease he has contracted?” Temari smirked at the twitch in the older woman’s eye. “I mean, of all the things I’ve studied, I’ve never heard or seen such a thing.”
“That is none of your business.”
“I’m supposed to be marrying into your family. By all means, he’s basically my father-in-law.”
“Don’t get ahead of yourself,” Queen Yoshino snapped. “As I was saying, it is only natural that Shikamaru get married before the death of his father. He must prove to his kingdom that he is worthy and stable enough to take over the throne. And to pull at the heartstrings of the kingdom, we need him to get married. You are the key to his success.”
“Well, if that weren’t putting any pressure on me.”
“Because you have behaved so inappropriately-”
“I only kissed him.”
Dead silence. The Queen seethed. Temari wondered vaguely if that was what she would look like when she hit rock bottom (also known as age forty). Would she breathe fire? Would smoke rise from her ears and crawl out her nose? Would her face turn red with anger and rival the heat of the burning sun?
“I will have you know, young lady, that you are here because your father begged. It was never my idea to marry off my only son to some foreign stranger from distant lands-I had always intended to get the idiot married to Ino. But your father begged, and begged, and begged. He proclaimed that you were intelligent, sophisticated, classy, beautiful. That every man of the Sands was completely and irrevocably in love with you. That Shikamaru would be blessed to have you on his arm and by his throne. And so I relented. I send for you before my husband dies and all I get is some nasty little critter who thinks so high and mighty of herself because she’s a princess, because she’s beautiful, because she’s a little more intelligent than the one-celled organism stagnant at the bottom of a lake.” Queen Yoshino narrowed her dark eyes and pointed at Temari. “But now I see why your father has sent you-he doesn’t want you, little girl. No one does. So I will be bold enough to suggest that you do exactly as I say or I will send you back to where you’re still as unwanted as you were before.”
Temari felt her heart splutter in response, and not in the romantic way she usually associated with heart spluttering. No, her heart faltered in the way hearts falter when the truth is laid out before them, the blaring, obvious, undeniable truth that hurts so much its unbearable. It caught her by such a surprise she raised a hand to where her heart was beneath all the skin and bones. She felt it beat furiously, an indecipherable rhythm of anger and pain. She had spent all her life knowing her father had never wanted her-he had made such a thing clear from the moment she was old enough to understand. It had always been painfully obvious that his only interest was Gaara, and when her redheaded brother proved to be far too much to handle, his interest went into everything but his children.
But to have some stranger who knew nothing about her or her family point out the truth was something she had never expected.
And it hurt more than Temari cared to accept.
The Queen took the silence with a smug smile. “You will be instructed in all there is to know about Konoha’s history, the Konohanese Royal Family, the rolls of a Konohanese princess, and the people you will soon come to govern. And you will not behave as atrociously as you did tonight.”
Temari wanted to say something. She had it sitting on the tip of her tongue, growing angrier and angrier for being kept away from hearing ears. But she couldn’t. She could barely move her tongue, let alone open her mouth to let the words fly into the air. Her skin crawled with unease and disgust, and her heart felt laden with the truth that the queen was right-she was here because she served only one purpose:
To be married.
“I feel as if I’m trying to train an idiot,” Ino mumbled darkly, glaring daggers at Shikamaru, who sat before her completely and utterly bored.
He had tried to explain what had happened at dinner. How he’d been positively charming in the most disgusting and condescending way he could manage. How he and the foreign princess had been at each other’s throats with compliments and false, sugary smiles dripping with poison. How he had almost pinned the girl down and had been about to win till she sprung that stupid, little conniving move.
And kissed him.
The memory still managed to paralyze him. He had never kissed a girl before; he’d had plenty of women throw themselves at him, purely because he was the next in line for the throne and he was the next fairly good-looking man after the Uchiha brothers and Neji Hyuuga. But the sensation of lips pressing against one another was completely foreign to him. He had been half-expecting his first kiss to be with someone he liked alright, someone shorter and nicer and not nearly as savage. But when the Sunan princess pressed her lips against his, so soft and invitingly warm yet fierce and dominating, all he could see was her brilliant eyes imprinted into the back of his eyelids.
Even now.
“You let her win!” Ino brought him out of his dark musings with her shrill voice. And although he was grateful, he couldn’t help the pang in his heart at the blurring image of Temari’s smug face as she leaned away from him after she finished stealing his first kiss.
“I didn’t let her win, Ino.” Shikamaru glared at her with all the malice of a turtle. “She stole my first kiss for goodness sake’s.”
Chouji tittered from his place at the foot of his bed. “Man, you’re never going to get that back, too. I mean, you should have saved it for someone special, someone you really liked.”
Shikamaru bowed his head in embarrassment. As much as he disliked the female sex, he really had been hoping his first kiss would be a girl that was everything Temari wasn’t.
Ino stared between the two before rolling her eyes and slamming her fist on the table. “Oh, stop being such little girls. A kiss is a kiss. In some places, like Ame, kissing means nothing but a greeting! In fact, the two of you should kiss as many girls as possible so the idiots that end up with you don’t have to teach you everything.”
The prince sighed, ignoring Chouji as he stuttered, “W-wait, does this mean you’ve kissed a lot of boys, Ino?”
Ino ignored the chubby boy completely and glared at the dark haired one sitting before her. “Really, I wouldn’t be surprised if your mother is doing all the work for you in getting rid of the girl. She’s probably giving her the biggest piece of her mind in her history of piece-of-mind-givings. The princess is probably already running for the hills.”
“I can only wish,” he muttered.
“Look, Shika, you’re doing a terrible job. I told you this was going to take time and that you would always have to be one step ahead of her. But look where you are now. I mean, I bet Her Highness is going to come in here and tell you you’re going to marry the princess in a month!”
At that exact moment, as if prompted by fate or something akin to it, the Queen rushed into his room, slamming the rather large door of his bedroom and rattling the bookcases that had been unfortunate enough to be placed near the entrance.
“Oh no,” he muttered, seeing the look in his mother’s eyes reflecting fire.
“Oh no is quite right, Shikamaru Nara.”
His friends sucked in their breaths, knowing that the worst was just about to occur. It always did when his full name was uttered by the terrifying hag.
“After the little display tonight, I’ve decided that there is no time to dawdle. Your father is gravely ill, and if more and more people find out about Princess Temari and her ill behavior, they will be opposed to your marriage and your coming to the throne. I have decided that the wedding will be rescheduled.”
“What?” Chouji and Ino said.
“When?” Shikamaru dared himself to ask.
“A month.”
Shikamaru knew the world was out to get him. Ever since the beautiful day he’d been given the worst combination of news. Now he was just sure that life was out to ridicule him, throwing just about everything into the pot and letting all run wild. All was fair game now, it seemed. Pretty soon, he suspected life was going to throw the curveball where he would find the love of his life-only she’d be trapped in a frog’s body, waiting for his first kiss to set her free, and then he’d have to disappoint her in revealing that his first kiss had been stolen by the one woman he never wanted to be with.
“A month?” Shikamaru shook his head. “That’s too soon. I’m only twenty! I want to do things with my life. Drink alcohol, smoke a cigar, have sex with a bunch of prostitutes!”
The Queen rolled her eyes. “A month. If you continue to speak, I will make it two weeks.” She turned to Ino, “In that month, I need you to teach Princess Temari all there is about Konoha, the Royal Family, and all the traditions and responsibilities she will need to learn to do her role as Queen well. You should also teach her how to be a lady, as she seems lacking in that department as well.”
“Mom!”
The Queen did not soften as she looked down at the man that looked so much like the King. “Do not ‘Mom’ me, Shikamaru. You will not disappoint me. I forbid you to send your father and me to an early grave.”
“Mom, you’re being overdramatic.”
“And you’re being selfish and inconsiderate. Your father is dying, Shikamaru. This is your responsibility as son and Prince of Konoha.”
Before Ino could ask the burning question, before Chouji could offer his chips in an effort to comfort, before Shikamaru could sit through resigning himself to fate, the door was thrown open once more.
Only a blonde stood behind it this time.
Temari saw red. Every servant she stormed past dove for cover and hoped that the blonde princess only murdered a few people on her way to her target. And her target wore an annoying ponytail that resembled the exotic, rare fruit her kingdom was famous for.
“You.”
She stood before his door, glaring at him with all the fury she could summon to her eyes and hoping he got the picture. His friends-a blonde girl far too pretty to be associating with people like Mr. I’m-the-Prince-with-a-Crazy-Ass-Mother and a chubbier boy with the kindest face she had ever seen-stared at her with wide eyes that probably reflected as much fear and confusion as hers did absolute and unadulterated anger.
Shikamaru, however, seemed to be unmoved, and glared right back at her with the most vacant look anyone in the world could possibly possess. According to Temari, of course.
The Queen observed the exchange detachedly. She waved a hand at the two of them, signaling for silence. “This is perfect,” she announced. “I will tell you both what I expect from now on.”
“Mom,” Shikamaru groaned quietly.
“What did you call me?”
He rolled his eyes. “Mother.”
“That’s what I thought.”
“I don’t think moving the wedding up is a good idea.”
Jackpot.
If Temari had just been accused of being completely worthless in all aspects of the word, then her attempts at convincing the Queen Mother of the Konoha Kingdom had gone down the drain the moment she had thrown propriety out the window. But Shikamaru was still her son, and he still had as much influence as a twenty-year-old-boy avoiding marriage could have on his marriage-forcing mother.
And if it was Shikamaru throwing in the towel, foregoing how angry and pissed she was, Temari would relish in the victory of knowing she had survived being told off by a bitchy queen and being shipped an immeasurable amount of leagues to a far better looking palace than her own.
Still, Temari did not allow herself to reveal the smugness that was making her warm all over. She kept her face as blank as possible, taking a page out of Shikamaru’s very short book. She carefully rearranged her features, only allowing herself to glare at the blonde beauty that observed her curiously.
“Of course you don’t. You’re a man. Anything that may suggest commitment is a terrible idea.”
Temari watched Shikamaru from underneath her eyelashes and watched him shake his head. “That isn’t it, Mom. The truth is… I want to marry her…when I love her.”
The Queen scoffed. The blonde girl gasped. The redheaded chubby guy choked. Temari did a number of things that, under normal circumstances, may have set the Queen off on another tirade of improper princess behavior.
“Love,” the Queen responded, “is not for royals. Love is a myth we cannot afford for ourselves.”
“You love Pops,” he contradicted.
Temari winced. This was not going to be pretty.
“Not by choice,” the Queen mumbled.
“Mother, I really want to do this on my own terms.”
“No.”
Shikamaru glared. Temari’s smile widened.
“Then…perhaps if we could spend time together. Alone.”
What?
Temari begged. She begged all the higher beings, holy powers; fate, luck, and all those in between for the ground beneath her feet to open up and swallow her completely, getting rid of the image before her and perhaps depositing her in the middle of an ocean, just to be safe. She offered all kinds of sacrifices in return-she swore on abandoning meat, eating seafood, leaving behind her one and only ability of intimidating just about everyone and instead focusing on being wholesome and kind. She offered up just about everything, even the pet ferret she didn’t own but one day hoped to.
And still, the ground did not open up and do as she asked. The heavens did not split and hail a storm on her. Not even a mere interruption, like a servant running in accidentally, or even the Aho Crow crashing into one of the windows and causing a moment of mayhem.
No. Instead, all Temari received in answer to her prayers was utter silence, where no one could even breathe. Where everyone’s eyes were fixed on the last person who spoke (Shikamaru) and wondering what on earth said person could be thinking (something obviously crazy).
His mother was the first to break the silence. She seemed to regain her composure, blinking so rapidly it made her stern appearance soften. “Did you… are you… did you just say what I think you just said?”
“He’s bluffing,” Temari muttered, watching him intently.
Shikamaru shook his head. “I am completely serious, Mother. I want to spend time with Temari. I want to fall in love with her.”
The Queen smiled triumphantly. The blonde girl sat in perfect awe. The fat boy made a noise akin to a hacking wheeze and a sob. And Temari, in all the conflicting emotions that whirled in the pit of her stomach, all she could think was,
Shikamaru 1, Temari 1.
Author: oh_dee
Fandom: Naruto.
Characters: Shikamaru/Temari.
Rating: T/PG-13.
Summary: Prince Shikamaru has never wanted to get married or take over the throne, but when certain circumstances arise and give him no choice, he comes up with a plan to make his future wife run for the hills.
Warnings: Shikamaru and Temari-ness abounds.
Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto, Shikamaru, Temari, or any other characters from the series. All are property of Masashi Kishimoto.
FFNET: here~
Chapter IV
In Which the Princess is Insulted
Please, Temari begged, let this nightmare end! Let it all be a terrible ploy to make her admit defeat; let it be a sick, twisted joke that wasn’t actually very funny at all. Anything, anything but this.
She closed her eyes and willed it all away. The stone walls, the beautiful gas-lit lamps, the expensive, gold framed mirror that made her look prettier than she ever imagined. But when she opened her eyes, everything was still there.
And so was the Queen of Konoha.
“It does not matter to me what you were taught in your home, but here in Konoha you will behave and act like a proper princess should, and if you should prove yourself unable to do so, I will teach you myself.”
Temari bit the inside of her mouth to keep from lashing out. Secretly, a tiny part of her admired the queen that stood before her, tall and graceful and extremely beautiful. But a rather large part of her wanted to drop kick Queen Yoshino in the face, and she had to dig her nails into the palm of her hands to keep from jumping into the air and putting the famed Green Beast of Konoha to shame (even if she didn’t really know about his amazing drop kicking techniques just yet).
“My son is turning twenty-one years old in a matter of two months. By Konohanese royalty standards, he is already bordering on old age. My husband has been consumed by a terrible disease that is purely fatal-”
At this, Temari could not keep quiet. She tried, very desperately, knowing that saying anything at all would only prolong the pain and torture of the speech, but her terribly rebel heart flared against the injustice at hand and her lips, so eager to spit poison, moved of their own accord-
“What is this incurable disease he has contracted?” Temari smirked at the twitch in the older woman’s eye. “I mean, of all the things I’ve studied, I’ve never heard or seen such a thing.”
“That is none of your business.”
“I’m supposed to be marrying into your family. By all means, he’s basically my father-in-law.”
“Don’t get ahead of yourself,” Queen Yoshino snapped. “As I was saying, it is only natural that Shikamaru get married before the death of his father. He must prove to his kingdom that he is worthy and stable enough to take over the throne. And to pull at the heartstrings of the kingdom, we need him to get married. You are the key to his success.”
“Well, if that weren’t putting any pressure on me.”
“Because you have behaved so inappropriately-”
“I only kissed him.”
Dead silence. The Queen seethed. Temari wondered vaguely if that was what she would look like when she hit rock bottom (also known as age forty). Would she breathe fire? Would smoke rise from her ears and crawl out her nose? Would her face turn red with anger and rival the heat of the burning sun?
“I will have you know, young lady, that you are here because your father begged. It was never my idea to marry off my only son to some foreign stranger from distant lands-I had always intended to get the idiot married to Ino. But your father begged, and begged, and begged. He proclaimed that you were intelligent, sophisticated, classy, beautiful. That every man of the Sands was completely and irrevocably in love with you. That Shikamaru would be blessed to have you on his arm and by his throne. And so I relented. I send for you before my husband dies and all I get is some nasty little critter who thinks so high and mighty of herself because she’s a princess, because she’s beautiful, because she’s a little more intelligent than the one-celled organism stagnant at the bottom of a lake.” Queen Yoshino narrowed her dark eyes and pointed at Temari. “But now I see why your father has sent you-he doesn’t want you, little girl. No one does. So I will be bold enough to suggest that you do exactly as I say or I will send you back to where you’re still as unwanted as you were before.”
Temari felt her heart splutter in response, and not in the romantic way she usually associated with heart spluttering. No, her heart faltered in the way hearts falter when the truth is laid out before them, the blaring, obvious, undeniable truth that hurts so much its unbearable. It caught her by such a surprise she raised a hand to where her heart was beneath all the skin and bones. She felt it beat furiously, an indecipherable rhythm of anger and pain. She had spent all her life knowing her father had never wanted her-he had made such a thing clear from the moment she was old enough to understand. It had always been painfully obvious that his only interest was Gaara, and when her redheaded brother proved to be far too much to handle, his interest went into everything but his children.
But to have some stranger who knew nothing about her or her family point out the truth was something she had never expected.
And it hurt more than Temari cared to accept.
The Queen took the silence with a smug smile. “You will be instructed in all there is to know about Konoha’s history, the Konohanese Royal Family, the rolls of a Konohanese princess, and the people you will soon come to govern. And you will not behave as atrociously as you did tonight.”
Temari wanted to say something. She had it sitting on the tip of her tongue, growing angrier and angrier for being kept away from hearing ears. But she couldn’t. She could barely move her tongue, let alone open her mouth to let the words fly into the air. Her skin crawled with unease and disgust, and her heart felt laden with the truth that the queen was right-she was here because she served only one purpose:
To be married.
“I feel as if I’m trying to train an idiot,” Ino mumbled darkly, glaring daggers at Shikamaru, who sat before her completely and utterly bored.
He had tried to explain what had happened at dinner. How he’d been positively charming in the most disgusting and condescending way he could manage. How he and the foreign princess had been at each other’s throats with compliments and false, sugary smiles dripping with poison. How he had almost pinned the girl down and had been about to win till she sprung that stupid, little conniving move.
And kissed him.
The memory still managed to paralyze him. He had never kissed a girl before; he’d had plenty of women throw themselves at him, purely because he was the next in line for the throne and he was the next fairly good-looking man after the Uchiha brothers and Neji Hyuuga. But the sensation of lips pressing against one another was completely foreign to him. He had been half-expecting his first kiss to be with someone he liked alright, someone shorter and nicer and not nearly as savage. But when the Sunan princess pressed her lips against his, so soft and invitingly warm yet fierce and dominating, all he could see was her brilliant eyes imprinted into the back of his eyelids.
Even now.
“You let her win!” Ino brought him out of his dark musings with her shrill voice. And although he was grateful, he couldn’t help the pang in his heart at the blurring image of Temari’s smug face as she leaned away from him after she finished stealing his first kiss.
“I didn’t let her win, Ino.” Shikamaru glared at her with all the malice of a turtle. “She stole my first kiss for goodness sake’s.”
Chouji tittered from his place at the foot of his bed. “Man, you’re never going to get that back, too. I mean, you should have saved it for someone special, someone you really liked.”
Shikamaru bowed his head in embarrassment. As much as he disliked the female sex, he really had been hoping his first kiss would be a girl that was everything Temari wasn’t.
Ino stared between the two before rolling her eyes and slamming her fist on the table. “Oh, stop being such little girls. A kiss is a kiss. In some places, like Ame, kissing means nothing but a greeting! In fact, the two of you should kiss as many girls as possible so the idiots that end up with you don’t have to teach you everything.”
The prince sighed, ignoring Chouji as he stuttered, “W-wait, does this mean you’ve kissed a lot of boys, Ino?”
Ino ignored the chubby boy completely and glared at the dark haired one sitting before her. “Really, I wouldn’t be surprised if your mother is doing all the work for you in getting rid of the girl. She’s probably giving her the biggest piece of her mind in her history of piece-of-mind-givings. The princess is probably already running for the hills.”
“I can only wish,” he muttered.
“Look, Shika, you’re doing a terrible job. I told you this was going to take time and that you would always have to be one step ahead of her. But look where you are now. I mean, I bet Her Highness is going to come in here and tell you you’re going to marry the princess in a month!”
At that exact moment, as if prompted by fate or something akin to it, the Queen rushed into his room, slamming the rather large door of his bedroom and rattling the bookcases that had been unfortunate enough to be placed near the entrance.
“Oh no,” he muttered, seeing the look in his mother’s eyes reflecting fire.
“Oh no is quite right, Shikamaru Nara.”
His friends sucked in their breaths, knowing that the worst was just about to occur. It always did when his full name was uttered by the terrifying hag.
“After the little display tonight, I’ve decided that there is no time to dawdle. Your father is gravely ill, and if more and more people find out about Princess Temari and her ill behavior, they will be opposed to your marriage and your coming to the throne. I have decided that the wedding will be rescheduled.”
“What?” Chouji and Ino said.
“When?” Shikamaru dared himself to ask.
“A month.”
Shikamaru knew the world was out to get him. Ever since the beautiful day he’d been given the worst combination of news. Now he was just sure that life was out to ridicule him, throwing just about everything into the pot and letting all run wild. All was fair game now, it seemed. Pretty soon, he suspected life was going to throw the curveball where he would find the love of his life-only she’d be trapped in a frog’s body, waiting for his first kiss to set her free, and then he’d have to disappoint her in revealing that his first kiss had been stolen by the one woman he never wanted to be with.
“A month?” Shikamaru shook his head. “That’s too soon. I’m only twenty! I want to do things with my life. Drink alcohol, smoke a cigar, have sex with a bunch of prostitutes!”
The Queen rolled her eyes. “A month. If you continue to speak, I will make it two weeks.” She turned to Ino, “In that month, I need you to teach Princess Temari all there is about Konoha, the Royal Family, and all the traditions and responsibilities she will need to learn to do her role as Queen well. You should also teach her how to be a lady, as she seems lacking in that department as well.”
“Mom!”
The Queen did not soften as she looked down at the man that looked so much like the King. “Do not ‘Mom’ me, Shikamaru. You will not disappoint me. I forbid you to send your father and me to an early grave.”
“Mom, you’re being overdramatic.”
“And you’re being selfish and inconsiderate. Your father is dying, Shikamaru. This is your responsibility as son and Prince of Konoha.”
Before Ino could ask the burning question, before Chouji could offer his chips in an effort to comfort, before Shikamaru could sit through resigning himself to fate, the door was thrown open once more.
Only a blonde stood behind it this time.
Temari saw red. Every servant she stormed past dove for cover and hoped that the blonde princess only murdered a few people on her way to her target. And her target wore an annoying ponytail that resembled the exotic, rare fruit her kingdom was famous for.
“You.”
She stood before his door, glaring at him with all the fury she could summon to her eyes and hoping he got the picture. His friends-a blonde girl far too pretty to be associating with people like Mr. I’m-the-Prince-with-a-Crazy-Ass-Mother and a chubbier boy with the kindest face she had ever seen-stared at her with wide eyes that probably reflected as much fear and confusion as hers did absolute and unadulterated anger.
Shikamaru, however, seemed to be unmoved, and glared right back at her with the most vacant look anyone in the world could possibly possess. According to Temari, of course.
The Queen observed the exchange detachedly. She waved a hand at the two of them, signaling for silence. “This is perfect,” she announced. “I will tell you both what I expect from now on.”
“Mom,” Shikamaru groaned quietly.
“What did you call me?”
He rolled his eyes. “Mother.”
“That’s what I thought.”
“I don’t think moving the wedding up is a good idea.”
Jackpot.
If Temari had just been accused of being completely worthless in all aspects of the word, then her attempts at convincing the Queen Mother of the Konoha Kingdom had gone down the drain the moment she had thrown propriety out the window. But Shikamaru was still her son, and he still had as much influence as a twenty-year-old-boy avoiding marriage could have on his marriage-forcing mother.
And if it was Shikamaru throwing in the towel, foregoing how angry and pissed she was, Temari would relish in the victory of knowing she had survived being told off by a bitchy queen and being shipped an immeasurable amount of leagues to a far better looking palace than her own.
Still, Temari did not allow herself to reveal the smugness that was making her warm all over. She kept her face as blank as possible, taking a page out of Shikamaru’s very short book. She carefully rearranged her features, only allowing herself to glare at the blonde beauty that observed her curiously.
“Of course you don’t. You’re a man. Anything that may suggest commitment is a terrible idea.”
Temari watched Shikamaru from underneath her eyelashes and watched him shake his head. “That isn’t it, Mom. The truth is… I want to marry her…when I love her.”
The Queen scoffed. The blonde girl gasped. The redheaded chubby guy choked. Temari did a number of things that, under normal circumstances, may have set the Queen off on another tirade of improper princess behavior.
“Love,” the Queen responded, “is not for royals. Love is a myth we cannot afford for ourselves.”
“You love Pops,” he contradicted.
Temari winced. This was not going to be pretty.
“Not by choice,” the Queen mumbled.
“Mother, I really want to do this on my own terms.”
“No.”
Shikamaru glared. Temari’s smile widened.
“Then…perhaps if we could spend time together. Alone.”
What?
Temari begged. She begged all the higher beings, holy powers; fate, luck, and all those in between for the ground beneath her feet to open up and swallow her completely, getting rid of the image before her and perhaps depositing her in the middle of an ocean, just to be safe. She offered all kinds of sacrifices in return-she swore on abandoning meat, eating seafood, leaving behind her one and only ability of intimidating just about everyone and instead focusing on being wholesome and kind. She offered up just about everything, even the pet ferret she didn’t own but one day hoped to.
And still, the ground did not open up and do as she asked. The heavens did not split and hail a storm on her. Not even a mere interruption, like a servant running in accidentally, or even the Aho Crow crashing into one of the windows and causing a moment of mayhem.
No. Instead, all Temari received in answer to her prayers was utter silence, where no one could even breathe. Where everyone’s eyes were fixed on the last person who spoke (Shikamaru) and wondering what on earth said person could be thinking (something obviously crazy).
His mother was the first to break the silence. She seemed to regain her composure, blinking so rapidly it made her stern appearance soften. “Did you… are you… did you just say what I think you just said?”
“He’s bluffing,” Temari muttered, watching him intently.
Shikamaru shook his head. “I am completely serious, Mother. I want to spend time with Temari. I want to fall in love with her.”
The Queen smiled triumphantly. The blonde girl sat in perfect awe. The fat boy made a noise akin to a hacking wheeze and a sob. And Temari, in all the conflicting emotions that whirled in the pit of her stomach, all she could think was,
Shikamaru 1, Temari 1.