Room 504, Thursday Evening

[flowering_mind]

It was stupid, right?

That she was standing outside the door to her room, their room, and fidgeting and hadn’t yet found the bravery to go in. Stupid stupid stupid. It was her room, Zack was in there, and he was the one person who she was never uneasy about being in his presence

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[puppy_fair]

And squat, and squat, and-

"Hey, Ino! How was your d-whoa."

Guess who had just turned around!

"New look?"

It was a very good look on her, but a bit different from what he was used to, was the thing. And Zack wasn't entirely certain what to make of that. That was Turk uniform... right? Had she just decided she wanted to try one on? Or...

[flowering_mind]

In her own welter of emotions, Ino found that she couldn't figure out how he felt with his quick 'new look?' and it added to her worries, compounded them, because if he didn't like this then--

They would both have to live with it.

"I," Ino swallowed, ducked her head just slightly, which set tendrils of her hair falling forward over her shoulders. She still wasn't used to having her hair down all the time, but it left her face well enough alone. "I told you, before, that I was going with you after graduation."

Another second to draw in a quick breath, tell herself she wasn't allowed to think this was a bad idea, and then she went on, "I--I could do a lot of things, on Gaia," she said, her eyes seeking and holding his, unless he looked away, "but this--I'm good at this. And I'll be able to help make things right."

Did that... did he... was that okay? She waited, in a silence that seemed horribly stretched to her, being so caught up in her own conflicting emotions as she was.

[puppy_fair]

Zack was still caught up in staring, by the time she'd finished speaking. And it wasn't a bad sort of staring, really. It was certainly a curious one, though, looking over the way the uniform played over her curves, studying how she looked with her hair down.

And then he smiled a little bit.

"You did tell me that, didn't you?"

For what it was worth, that was a smile, on his lips. Not just him going through the motions. Something warmer, more real.

[flowering_mind]

He was smiling and though her hands were shaking slightly, she felt steadier. He was smiling, for real, and her world could keep on turning.

It hadn't been screwed up by her making a decision that was... life-altering, to say the least.

"I did," she said softly. "I meant it."