Chapter 13

It was dark, and Ino was walking home alone. She asked chouji not to walk her. She needed time to think. After the events that took place at the Nara household earlier that evening, she had absolutely no desire to go home. After all, home was where her father was waiting. Her father—who would probably never look at his precious little girl the same way again.

As she walked home, she had this horrible feeling in the pit of her stomach, similar to that of a pirate ready to walk the plank. She just couldn’t understand…She was able to have a stare down with death, and go head on into the most dangerous missions with barely even a fear. And yet, she couldn’t look at her father and explain herself.

She slowly put her hand on the doorknob to her house and froze. “Turn, dam it!” It’s like her hand wouldn’t listen to her, due to the battle going on in her mind. “You’re a shinobi of the hidden leaf! You’re strong and brave and can do anything. Get in there now, Ino Yamanaka, and get this crap over with!” she thought, and finally turned the knob. She also pushed herself to go in.

“Dad?” she asked “….Dad?” she asked again, until she finally saw him sitting at the kitchen table. “There you are.” She remarked. “About earlier…”

“…I have never been so disappointed in my entire life.”

“Dad…I’m so sorry.”

“Save it, Ino!” He yelled. “Do you have any Idea how embarrassed I am? Thanks’ for announcing that in front of my friends. What were you thinking? Oh maybe if you tell me at the same time their responsible MARRIED children made the announcement, that it wouldn’t be so bad?”

“….yea….”

“Well, you thought wrong.”

“I’m sorry!”

“I had so much hope for you…that you’d be become a jounin….someday take over the flower shop….Get married, and someday, YEARS from now, make me a grandfather…..”

Ino felt her heart breaking. She knew he was right, she was hoping he wouldn’t say anything else, but unfortunately, he went on.

“But now….You’re life’s getting put on hold. You’ll probably stay a chunin. You’ll stay behind and watch your friends move on and live very successful lives….while you’re at home taking care of a kid all by yourself.”

“I don’t know how many times I can say it…I’m Sorry!”

“Don’t apologize to me!” he snapped. “Yea, you broke my heart, but the only person you really let down here is yourself.”

“…you’re right” she whispered, pushing her tear stained blonde bangs out of her face.

“I thought you were smarter than this…” He sighed. “Please, just get out of my sight….I can’t look at you right now…”

Ino trudged up the stairs to her room; a feeling of shame overtook her, one so powerful that it couldn’t be described in words.

~*~*~*~

“Hey Sakura.” Greeted Ino as she sat down next to her friend at Ichiraku.

“Hey Ino. How did it go last night?”

“Hello Miss gorgeous! You’re bloated stomach and greasy face is glowing today! Child development sure is fascinating.” Greeted Sai. “Want to see what your Fetus looks like now? It’s kind of like a bloody peanut!” he exclaimed, holding up a book on child development.

“Sakura! You told?!?!?!?” spazzed Ino.

“It’s not what you think! He was spying on us last night” She assured her. “I warned him that if he values his life, He’ll keep his mouth shut!” She said, waving a first in his face.

“Ugly here has made her point.” Remarked Sai.

There was this strange silence between them.

“Well….Aren’t you going to hit him?” asked Ino.

“Normally I would, but I don’t want to draw any attention over to here, for your sake.”

“Oh, I see” Replied Ino.

“Now Sai, sit here and read your book. And don’t but in!”

“I hear you loud and clear, miss ugly”

Sakura was fuming, but grumbled, took a deep breath, and pretended that her clueless, inappropriate teammate wasn’t there. “So Ino, how did it go?”

“It was bad……My Dad was really upset.”

“Was he yelling?”

“Not that much…He was really calm, but didn’t really have anything nice to say. I think his tone was fairly low because he felt so destroyed. I really let him down.”

“Well, he’s your father, he cant be mad at you forever.”

“The ova, or eggs, are stored in the ovaries.” Sai read aloud. “Fertilization takes place in the Fah-looop-ee-an tubes.”

“SAI! Don’t read out loud!!!!!” Sakura seethed through clenched teeth as she grabbed the collar of his shirt. “SOMONE COULD HEAR YOU!” She yelled, releasing him.

“continue.” Urged sakura, regaining her composure after flipping out on Sai.

“I can’t even look at him…I feel so ashamed!” She groaned, slumping back as far as she could in her bar stool. “You know how close my dad and I are, he’s practically my best friend!”

“I know...” sighed Sakura. Her and Ino often didn’t get along, and she often wanted to make her suffer for that, but in this situation, she really wanted to be there for her and help out in any way she could….but she really didn’t know what to say. “What happened this morning? Did he seem any better?”

“No…” Ino Replied, playing with her long ponytail. “I sat down next to him for breakfast, and he was reading the newspaper as usual. He didn’t even say good morning to me, or glace up when I sat down. Other than making a comment about lower funding for the ninja academy to himself, he said absolutely nothing.”

“well Ino….” Sakura searched for something to say. “How are you feeling?”

“How am I feeling?” She repeated. “How the hell do you think I feel? I feel horrible! I ruined my relationship with my dad and I doubt he’ll ever see me the same way again. I messed up so badly!”

“Stop being so hard on yourself…” urged Sakura.

“No.” she replied. “I deserve to feel this way. I guess it’s payback for being so stupid….I still can’t believe this is happening! My Life is pretty much over!” she said, as tears started filling her light blue eyes.

Sakura didn’t know what to say yet again…but she did give her friend a shoulder to cry on.

“Soo…This book says that you and fatty had coitus relations to get in the predicament that you’re currently in.” Stated Sai.

“ALRIGHT! THAT’S IT MISTER!” Screamed Sakura as she wacked him in the head. “WHAT ABOUT THIS SITUATION MAKES YOU THINK SHE WANTS TO HEAR THAT, HUH?”

“I thought I would intrigue gorgeous with an interesting fact.”

“INTERESTING? I THINK SHE ALREADY KNOWS THAT!” she screamed, punching him in the softball sized bump that formed on the top of his head.

“Excuse me, ugly, I do believe you are hurting me.”

“THAT’S IT MISTER! YOU’RE OUT OF HERE!” She screamed, picking him up and throwing him a considerably far distance.

“THAT SONUVAH BITCH!” She yelled. “And that damn nickname! You think after beating the crap out of him, he’d understand that it’s not nice! Anyway….Where was I...? oh yea, you were letting out your emotions in a constructive way, by crying…Anyway! Please continue, if you want.”

Ino was completely puzzled, disturbed, and slightly jealous of how well her fiend could change emotions as if they were controlled by a switch.

“Ino, there you are!” yelled chouji, as he came running up to her.

“Chou, I’m so happy to see you!”

“So am I”

“How did you know I’d be here?”

“Well, I was looking for you, and then thought that you were most likely with sakura, So then I was looking for her. Then I heard this strange high pitched screaming and looked up, only to find that Sai was flying above me. So then, I figured that sakura was the cause of that, and backtracked to where he was thrown, and bam, now I’m here.”

“Ha, about that…” sakura said awkwardly.

“Listen, Ino! There’s something I need to tell you.”

“yea…?”

“Well, I’ll explain this over lunch at the Korean BBQ restaurant. Shikamaru and Temari are there too. I’m starving!”

“Me too, this noodle crap doesn’t fill me!”

“Not full? You just ate!” exclaimed Sakura

“Sakura,Have you forgotten? I’m EATING FOR TWO!”

~*~*~*~

Ino took off her shoes and entered the small, room that Temari, shikamaru, and Chouji were seated in. She sat down next to chouji, ready to hear what he had to say. She had this bad feeling that it wasn’t going to be good.

“So chouji, what did you want to tell me?”

“I didn’t want to say anything last night, because I saw how upset you were…but after you left…” he found himself frozen as he was gazing in her sad eyes. He just couldn’t bring himself to say it. “Shikamaru, you tell her.”

Shikamaru froze, then yawned. “ummmm…..” he turned his head to face temari, and he gave her this awkward look.

“Fine! I’ll tell her, ya big baby!” she said in a peeved tone. Che was emotionally stronger than chouji and Shikamaru combined.

“Last night after you left….Your dad and Chouji’s dad got into a bad fight, that almost turned physical, but of course my psycho mother in law wouldn’t have that in her house! God forbid someone broke her ugly as hell deer antler coffee table!”

“I know she’s a drag, but can you seriously stop talking bad about my mom? Only I can do that.”

Temari shrugged it off. “Anyway, after shikamaru’s dad decided to not take sides and stay neutral, they both got extremely mad at him, and now, none of them are talking.”

“Oh no…” Ino whined.

“Chouji, are you going to tell her the rest, or am I?”

“There’s more?” she complained.

“No, you.” He replied. “I can’t tell her…”

“This morning, your father went over to chouji’s house, confronted him, and told him that he never wanted him to see you again, saying that Chouji ruined your life. Also, that if he ever caught Chouji with you again, He’d quote on quote “make sure that chouji would regret the day he was born””

A/N

Lol, how long has it been since I updated this story? Way too long…Anyway, I hope you all liked this. It isn’t my best work, but I really needed to get another chapter of this up, it was bugging me.

Please review. I love to hear feedback, and predictions ^-^