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Shikadai was woken by loud, aggressive knocking on his bedroom door.
He groaned and buried himself deeper into the covers.
“Shikadai! Why are you still in bed?”
Shikadai uncovered his head just long enough to yell in return, “Because I don’t have a mission today, Mom!”
“You still have training!”
“Only after lunch!” He retreated under the covers once more, trying to recapture sleep. It wasn’t an easy task – Temari moved to yell at Shikamaru next, but that was, luckily, muffled by Shikadai’s pillow. Unfortunately, he couldn’t fall asleep again and he ended up dragging himself into the kitchen on the off chance that Temari had felt nice enough to make him breakfast.
She had not.
She was too busy apparently arguing with Shikamaru over something – Shikadai didn’t stop to figure out what it was – so he made a swift exit of the kitchen and back to his room, intending to play some games or nap until he had to leave to meet his team.
A typical day, really.
Shikamaru was nodding along to Temari’s ranting. She wasn’t, contrary to Shikadai’s assumption, mad at him. She was ripping her last mission apart, nitpicking every single mistake made by the inexperienced genin.
Shikamaru liked when she went off like that. She was a delight to watch, all riled up and passionate, and there was something satisfying about her directing her ire at someone other than him.
“Tem,” he put in, hiding a smile behind his coffee mug. “It was a simple delivery of a scroll. Not an A-rank, life-or-death situation. The kids are allowed to mess up.”
“Konoha raises dumbass kids,” Temari grumbled. “Completely incompetent fools. I’m going to throw Shikadai into the desert for a week to make sure he never gets soft like that.”
“Okay,” Shikamaru nodded. Temari’s scorn over Konoha’s more gentle training methods never failed to amuse him. “Do you have to put up with those genin again today?”
“No,” Temari shrugged one shoulder. “I’m off today. I was going to train this morning, and then meet Ino and Karui for tea.”
“Ah.” Shikamaru paused. “Please don’t destroy my forest.”
“I’ll do what I want,” Temari replied instantly.
Shikamaru sighed in defeat. There would come a day, and he hoped it wouldn’t be soon, when he returned home to a completely levelled forest. So far he had been able to redirect Temari’s brutal destruction to areas he didn’t have an emotional and familial attachment to.
He stood up, taking his mug to the sink. “Well . . . remember, this is a leaf village. Please make sure there are still leaves around it.”
“Yeah, yeah,” Temari waved off his concerns. “Go to work and stop worrying.”
“You give me a lot of reasons to worry,” Shikamaru pointed out. “Troublesome woman.”
That earned him a bright, toothy grin, and she held her head up proudly. “You knew I was trouble from the beginning.”
“I did,” he agreed. He leaned over to give her a quick goodbye kiss. “But life is better with a little bit of trouble.”
Temari had finished training, showered, changed, and retied her hair and was musing over what to make for lunch when there was a knock at the front door. That immediately roused her suspicion since she wasn’t expecting anyone. When Shikadai didn’t clatter around the house, she assumed he wasn’t expecting anyone either.
She was surprised when, upon opening the door, she was faced with a large bouquet of flowers in a pretty blue pot held by a fresh-faced delivery boy.
“Good morning, Temari-san,” he said brightly. “Flower delivery for you, from Shikamaru.”
“Why?” she asked.
The boy paused, clearly not expecting that as her first question. He carefully reconsidered his words, and tried, “Um . . . I just got told to deliver them . . . I dunno what they’re for . . .”
He hesitantly held out the pot, wildly confused at the interaction.
Temari decided there wasn’t much point in interrogating him further, so she took the flowers and thanked him, and he scuttled off looking very relieved.
For a moment, Temari remained standing in the doorway, quizzically turning the flowers this way and that, wracking her brains for the source of the sudden gift. She and Shikamaru hadn’t had any interesting arguments lately – at least, none that she could remember. Her birthday had been a couple of months prior.
Unable to come up with a reason for the flowers, she stalked indoors, her irritation bubbling up. What was Shikamaru trying to pull? Was this some kind of strange strategy on his part, and if it was, what was it for?
There was no note with it, no explanation beyond the one provided by the poor delivery boy.
Temari plunked the flowers down on the kitchen table and stared at them.
Shikadai came into the kitchen, threw a glance at the flowers, and went straight to the fridge to see if there was anything to grab on his way out to meet his team, since he had skipped breakfast. An unsettling silence fell over the room as Shikadai assembled a sandwich and did his best to pretend he hadn’t seen Temari, while she glared at the flowers.
Shikadai eventually came to stand beside her, chewing thoughtfully. “What’s the matter?”
“Why did he send flowers?” Temari looked briefly at Shikadai.
“I dunno. I had nothing to do with it.”
“There must be a reason for it,” Temari pointed out.
“Yeah, probably.” Shikadai didn’t see what the issue was. Temari could just wait until Shikamaru came home to ask him. He finished his sandwich, wandering about to gather his things before he needed to leave.
His jacket was discarded on the porch outside, and he went to retrieve it.
His return through the kitchen found Temari leaning her elbows on the table and pouting at the flowers. It was a strangely bizarre image, and Shikadai cocked his head to one side, reflecting briefly on the fact that his family was completely insane.
Not him, of course. He was the normal one.
“What is he up to?” Temari wondered, frowning.
Shikadai shrugged, hoping not to get involved.
“He’s probably done something stupid,” Temari decided.
“He did that when he married you,” Shikadai muttered under his breath, shrugging his jacket on. He automatically ducked to avoid anything flying at his head, but Temari was ignoring him in favour of staring directly at the flowers with a pensive frown. Shikadai decided now was a good time to escape the house, in case he became embroiled in some sort of bizarre investigation.
He was still mentally recovering from the last time Temari had dragged him along on her self-appointed quest to unravel Shikamaru’s non-existent plot.
“Bye,” he said casually as he left, but he received no answer. As he exited the house, he chuckled to himself with the thought that if looks really could kill, Shikamaru was going to come home to a bouquet of wilted flowers.
While Ino and Karui were always willing to listen to Temari's complaints about her family, they were not particularly sympathetic. Temari might even describe them as disinterested.
"He got you flowers, oh no, the world is ending," Karui said flatly. It had been her turn to select a place for tea, and she had found a nice little cafe tucked into a small street.
The conversation had, almost immediately, turned to Shikamaru’s spontaneous gift and the frustration it was arousing within his wife.
“Did Shikamaru tell you why he bought flowers?” Temari asked Ino with narrowed eyes.
“I wasn’t in the shop today,” Ino replied breezily. “So, no.”
“Maybe he’s divorcing you,” Karui suggested, with a sharp smile.
Temari snorted. “He wouldn’t have the guts.”
“I’ll toast to that,” Ino added brightly. She held her teacup aloft, and Karui clinked her glass against it in solidarity. She sipped her tea, and mused, “Maybe he’s just being nice.”
“Shikamaru isn’t nice,” Temari scoffed.
“No, you aren’t nice,” Karui corrected. “Shikamaru can be.”
“I am perfectly nice,” Temari said indignantly.
“When?” Ino asked, arching an aristocratic eyebrow. She waited, patiently, for Temari’s defence but none came.
“You guys are sucky friends,” Temari grumbled.
“I’m an excellent friend,” Ino claimed regally. “You are the problem.”
“I agree with Ino,” Karui nodded sagely.
“You still suck,” Temari huffed.
“But we are honest and observant,” Karui said. “So, why does it even matter if Shikamaru buys you flowers?”
“Because he’s up to something,” Temari insisted. “He’s scheming something.”
“Has he missed any important dates lately?” Ino asked. “Anniversary, birthday, commemorating a big fight you two had?”
Temari levelled her with an unimpressed look. “He hasn’t missed anything important that I know about.”
“Perhaps he’s getting some favour in the bank for an upcoming transgression,” Karui suggested.
“I thought about that,” Temari admitted. “But then why didn’t he just give me the flowers when he came home, and tell me then, instead of making me wait?”
Karui sipped her tea, looking Temari straight in the eye. “Maybe he’s not coming home.”
After a useless tea that gave Temari no additional information as to what Shikamaru was up to, she decided to go home and stew over it some more. It was driving her insane, and she was too proud to storm into Naruto’s office and demand to know what was happening.
She started with searching through Shikamaru’s study, ruffling papers and looking for anything that might give her a clue. It was all work-related – boring mission reports, some alliance correspondence, a few old books from the Nara archives. Nothing to do with her, and no mention of flowers. There wasn’t anything in his personal notes either – his random pad of paper with notes about Shogi, the occasional list of things to add to Temari’s shopping list, and a crude doodle of a deer.
She stopped in the kitchen again to death stare the flowers and study them from every angle, as though they might be hiding some sort of clue.
Eventually, her annoyance manifested into cleaning the kitchen, and she washed the dishes muttering under her breath and throwing the occasional glare over her shoulder at the flowers.
They were gorgeous, and she could admit that. A lovely mix of colours and different sized blooms interspersed with sprigs of greenery. The sight of them made her smile, fractionally softening her irritation.
She didn’t start making dinner – she figured since Shikamaru was annoying her – whether he was aware of it or not - he could make it. Or go and get takeout for them; she wasn’t fussy about which option he would pick.
Shikadai had come home and entered the house through his bedroom window, trying his best to avoid being embroiled in another conversation about flowers. Temari let the behaviour go, since Shikadai knew no more information than she did and interrogating him wouldn’t help.
There was a different lazy, conflict-avoiding Nara man she needed.
When Shikamaru came home that evening, Temari immediately pounced.
“Why did you send me flowers?” she asked, instantly in his space and crowding him as he walked through the house.
“No reason.”
She scoffed, “Like I’m going to believe that.”
She trailed him into the kitchen.
“Did you do something stupid?” Temari demanded.
“Nope,” Shikamaru opened the fridge and looked inside.
“Are you going to do something stupid?” Temari asked, folding her arms across her chest.
“Nope.” Shikamaru rummaged about.
“Are you begging forgiveness for something?”
“Nope.” He pulled a can of beer from the fridge, and made his way out to the back porch.
Temari huffed. “Are you going to work too much and ignore me?”
“Nope.” He went outside, throwing the comment casually over his shoulder, “Just being nice.”
Temari frowned. After musing on that for a moment, she followed him outside. “What do you mean ‘just being nice’?”
“That about sums it up,” Shikamaru shrugged. He was sitting on the edge of the wooden porch, leaning against one of the support pillars. He took a sip of his drink, before looking up at Temari. “Do you have a problem with that?”
“But why?” Temari growled. “There’s no reason to ‘be nice’. Is that even a thing people do? You must want something.”
“I’m starting to think you need therapy.” Shikamaru scanned the forest. When Temari gave him a firm kick in the back, he grumbled at her. “Woman, can’t you accept something for what it is?”
“Why the flowers?” she insisted, plopping down next to him.
“I told you – no reason. Just being nice.”
“There has to be a reason,” she pushed.
Shikamaru heaved a sigh, and looked at her. “Pick a reason – because I love you. Because I was thinking of you. Because I know you like those flowers. Because you’re always on my mind and I thought you would like them. Because you’re the reason for everything I do. Because you deserve to be treated well. Because you put up with all my shit and you haven’t killed me yet.” He took another sip of beer. “Are any of those reasons good enough for you?”
Temari fell quiet. She was looking at him with that slightly wondering gaze she got when she was off guard, when she wasn’t sure what was happening but she didn’t feel the need to stop it.
Satisfied that he had, finally, shut her up, Shikamaru relaxed against the pillar and prepared to let the evening while away. Before he could, Temari snatched the can from his hand. “Hey!”
She knocked half of it back in one gulp, before returning it to Shikamaru’s grasp. “Really?”
“Really what?” Shikamaru jiggled the can a bit, mouth turning downwards at the absence of weight. Was it too much to ask for a peaceful evening with a drink?
“Did you really mean all that?” Temari shifted slightly closer, tucking her legs under herself, and nudging one shoulder against Shikamaru.
“Yes,” Shikamaru glanced at her. With the evening light, he could see the little flecks of blue that dotted her eyes, that were only visible on occasion. “You know I meant it.”
“I know some of it,” she corrected, but the sharpness had left her tone. “I know you love me.”
“That’s all?” Shikamaru smiled. “You might know some of the other things, too, if you ever paid attention to me when I talked.”
She tossed her head with a slightly haughty snort, but there was a barely visible tint of pink rising across her cheeks. “You’re an idiot.”
Right on cue, Shikamaru thought with fond smile. Temari’s default reaction, always, to compliments and romancing was vicious verbal attacks.
“Why didn’t you just say so?” she demanded, nudging his shoulder again, slightly harder this time.
Shikamaru looked at her, raising an eyebrow. “Because you drive me crazy, every day, in every way possible. Especially the good ways. Couldn’t I get half a day of driving you crazy in return?”
Her eyes narrowed a bit as she stared back. After a long pause, she made a quick move to grab the remainder of Shikamaru’s beer from him, which he relinquished without protest. He watched her with a gentle smile, while she finished the beer and rolled her eyes.
“Nothing to say to that?” he enquired, secretly pleased to have rendered her speechless.
“I already said you’re an idiot,” she retorted. She plunked her head down on his shoulder with an indistinguishable mutter, shifting her glare towards the forest.
Long minutes passed in silence, and Shikamaru had closed his eyes and was staring to doze.
“Thanks for the flowers,” Temari mumbled.
“You’re welcome,” he replied, not opening his eyes. He felt her move, and press her lips to his cheek. He turned his head to the side, finding her mouth with his. When he pulled away, he said, “Why did you steal all my beer?”
Temari lifted her head off his shoulder, waiting until Shikamaru looked at her before grinning widely.
“No reason,” she said airily, getting smoothly to her feet and padding back indoors, satisfied that she had evened the score for now.
Shikamaru heaved a sigh, and slouched where he sat.
The evening was cooling rapidly, giving way to a darkened twilight sky and a crisp freshness to the air. It would have been a lovely evening to spend watching the deer and sipping a beer, but Shikamaru had a feeling Temari wasn’t going to let that happen.
He got to his feet with a groan, following Temari indoors. He could probably convince her to canoodle on the couch, maybe put a movie on as background noise that they would both ignore. Maybe warn Shikadai to put some headphones on; the usual.
“Hey, Tem,” he called as he entered the house. “Want to sit on the couch and do nothing? Maybe snuggle a bit? You can complain about the flowers as much as you want.”
He heard her amused snort from the next room. “Fine, you crybaby, if you want to.”
Shikamaru felt some of the tension melt from his shoulders. At least he never needed a reason to invite her into his arms, and she never needed one to agree to it. Those were things that merely happened, and existed, and required no explanation.
A bit like the two of them, he mused to himself.
The was no reason for them to get along. But they did, and he was forever grateful for that.