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There's flowers on his windowsill. It's such a small, pointless little detail that anyone else walking by wouldn't even notice. But Ino isn't just anyone. She prides herself on knowing the nuances of her friends; she doesn't care about knowing everything about everyone in the world, just the people who matter. She's always been reliable on that front. Maybe that's why Asuma asked her to watch over her teammates— to take care of them— because he knew she would do anything for them and their happiness.
She raises a hand over her eyes to block the lamplight, and squints up at his window to revel a bit in the color of the petals. Purple. Flowers look natural on her window, but his is so often bare and blank with the drapes drawn tightly shut... It's so out of place in her sky blue eyes that laughter bubbles in her chest and escapes into the silence of the evening. Her hand falls from shielding her eyes to cover her mouth to silence herself.
It's more endearing than a smoke signal has any right to be.
She contemplates climbing up to his window, and knocking on the cold pane keeping her from those little flowers, but she decides against it. There's a plethora of plants outside his house (one's she's all to guilty of planting whenever he leaves on a mission), and she'd rather not disturb them. He groans when he discovers a new one, but it's worth it. Each little sprout represents another time he came home safely to chide her.
There's a key clinking around in one of her pouches somewhere, but she doesn't bother. When she reaches his front door she gives it a push and it opens, unlocked. Unguarded. The lights are all off downstairs, so she knows his mother is off somewhere. She always makes sure to leave at least one little lamp on, but Shikamaru is comfortable in the dark.
She makes quick work of the stairs, even in the pitch black, and finds the door to his room open. Moonlight pours into his room through the open drapes, and casts a faint blue haze across all his belongings. It suits him, she thinks. He suits the night— dark skies, cool breezes under the moon, falling stars— they all reminded her of him.
He looks perfectly at peace when she steps in to find him. He's laying back with his arms behind his head, one knee bent and the other outstretched. He looks perfectly relaxed. Except for the imperceptible way his jaw is locked, his teeth clenching like its the only thing keeping something inside him from spilling out. He only shifts when she enters his room fully, tilting his head to get a view of her around the leg that's bent. When their eyes meet, she waves her hand a little as a greeting. He exhales audibly through his nose.
"You're breaking into people's houses now?" His voice his gravelly, like he hasn't slept in days, but it's soft around the edges and she finds that same softness in the way he looks at her.
"Says the one who left the door unlocked." She snarks back, and tosses her hair over her shoulder before heading for the windowsill. He turns over on the bed, rolling onto his side to face away from the light. She lets her fingertips run over the petals, and admires the way they look in the blue evening haze. There's a whole vase full of blossoms, so she takes one for herself. She cuts it down to size with a spare kunai, and tucks it behind her right ear.
Satisfied, she hops on over to his bed and climbs on. It dips under her weight, and Shikamaru glances over his shoulder to look at her shine in the moonlight. His gaze roams over her face, lingering over her eyes and the way they crinkle softly as she smiles down over him. He thinks she looks like she belongs up there, alongside the moon and the stars and all the beautiful things humans have no right to touch. He reaches for her anyway.
One hand comes out from behind his head to let his fingers brush over the side of her face, and caress the flowers blooming there.
"So you did come here to steal something after all, huh?" He says, wishing he only meant the flower. But the longer she sits like that, smiling and bright and alive— the more he can feel the weight of the sorrow he's been carrying on his back get lighter. It's like his demons can't help but wilt in her presence. She's a force to be reckoned with, something beyond human understanding.
"Oh, please. These were from my shop, they were mine first." She sticks her tongue out at him for good measure. "Besides, they look better on me than on that dusty windowsill."
He furrows his brows because he hates that it's true. His hand falls away from her, and drops to the side of the mattress as he rolls over onto his back. If Ino were the flowers, he would surely be that dusty windowsill. They were mismatched, always were. Anyone could see that. His knit brows relax when he hears her voice intruding in his thoughts, remembering her babbling something about opposites attracting each other or some other nonsense when they were younger.
She's still sitting there, looking at him, concern in her eyes and radiating sunshine even in the dark. He shuts his eyes.
"Yeah." He says. "They do."
She lets him stay like that for a moment and basks in the comfortable silence. She could probably get answers out of him if she tried. But that's not what she wants. She craves the honesty that leaks out of him when he's not looking. She puts all her weight onto one of her palms as she leans forward, and lets her free hand cup his face. He leans into her touch so faintly she's almost unsure it's even real.
He's not in the mood to talk about it, but she knows what's on his mind. It's the same thing that plagues her when she lets her guard down. It's the memories that creep in when they don't have enough strength to push them away. They don't need to talk about it, she thinks. There's no easy solution to working through loss. Sometimes it never really goes away. Ino and loss are old friends, and if there's one thing she's learned, it's that sometimes all you need is something to ground you. To anchor you to the real world, the present, so you don't get swept away in the pain of what's not here anymore.
She'll be that for him any time he needs it.
"That might be the first time you've complimented me." She teases, and watches the way his eyelashes flutter as his eyes open. He fixes her with a gaze she can't read, so she doesn't even try. She just relishes in the way he's looking at just her, at the fact that she's the only thing she can see reflected in his dark eyes. This close, she can see all the shades of brown in his irises. She thinks she should count them later.
"Not possible." He says, completely confident that he's right. The little voice in his head can't seem to ever stop singing her praises, noticing every endearing quality and virtue. There's just no way he hasn't let something slip in all the years they've known each other.
"No, really." She presses, because there's something in the tone of his voice that makes her want to chase after it.
He sits up then, all too quick, and suddenly they're face to face and her heart stumbles over its own beats. The fact that he doesn't seem phased by their closeness irritates her, so she leans closer as if to prove to herself she doesn't actually care all that much either.
"Not possible." He says firmly and softly at the same time. She hates the way it feels different when he speaks so close to her. There's something she can't place in his eyes and she wonders if its in hers too.
"What makes you so sure?" She all but whispers, tugging at a thread she doesn't understand, hoping he'll unravel for her just this once... Hoping he'll help her unravel her own tangled heart, too.
"Just trust me." He's a little too deep in the blue of her eyes, it's so safe and comfortable and all the alarms are sounding in his head to tell him just how dangerous this is. He feels himself faltering amidst the sirens. He still doesn't pull away.
"I trust you." She says, breathy and soft. She moves closer a fraction of an inch, and they're really on the cusp of something here; they're teetering on the edge of everything they've danced around these past few months since the war has been over. She can feel it. She wants to cross over into that, wants to know what the other side is like. Her eyes begin to flutter shut, and she remembers all the times she's left herself in the safety of his arms on the battlefield. She's trusted him from the beginning. She always would.
She feels his hand come up to her face, and a wave of electricity passes through her whole body. It takes all her strength to just wait. Then there's a faint rustling sound by her ear, and a soft thunk against the bed. Blue eyes snap open to find him laying against the pillows, purple flower in hand, holding it up to admire it.
"Wha—"
"Whether it looks nice on you or not," his gaze flicks up to her, "you have a shop full of flowers. This one's mine."
She's taken aback, stunned into silence. It's not often that she's speechless, but she feels like her heart just went on a rollercoaster and left her head whirling in the aftermath. When she comes back to herself, disappointment seeps into her skin at the loss of whatever was about to happen. Watching the way he holds the purple flower— with the same fondness and warmth that he touched her with— is only a small consolation. She straightens her back, clicks her tongue, and tries not to let whatever she's feeling leak out. "Stingy."
He smiles at that, and she hops off the bed satisfied that his mood has improved enough for him to manage through the night. She'd planned on sleeping over, but she suddenly doesn't trust her heart not to betray her if she hangs around any longer. She needs to get her heart and her head on the same page so her mouth doesn't say anything stupid. Once she reaches the doorway, she spins around on her heel and puts her hands on her hips in a huff. "Put it back in some water at least!"
He's sitting up now, propping his arm up on his knee so that the flower hangs just in front of his face. He waves her off with his other hand. "Yeah, yeah. I'll take good care of it."
The petals are so close she swears they brush over his lips. She feels her heart cause a ruckus in her chest, and darts out of the room like it were on fire.
"Goodnight!" She remembers to shout as she's all but tumbling down the stairs, and can't help the smile that takes over her face when she hears his almost inaudible chuckle.