Current mood:	confused
Current music:	"End of the Sky" by Shotaro Morikubo

Why the fuck am I here sometimes?
One thing needs to be said. Women are damn confusing. Once you think you have them figured out, they do something to shock the hell out of you. Or slap the hell out of you. *Grumbles* Which is exactly what the shrew did this afternoon getting home from school. Gave this whole tirade on bad habits again, how I never pick up, clean, cook....bitching from one end down the other. I told her it was her job, not mine. She hauled out and slapped me. Now I have this welt on my cheek that burns like hell. Next thing I know she's crying her eyes out and hugging me, telling me I'll never make it in college....and all this other shit. What. The. Fucking. Hell? What could I do but stand there mentally thinking dad what the hell did you marry? I think the air was squeezed out of my lungs. I'm having this trouble breathing again. It's like this gapping for air...that or they are clogged up with smoke. *Puffs away on cigarette* She's been holed up crying in her room the rest of the night. I went in to ask when she was going to make dinner and she threw a lamp at me. I ducked. It missed and smashed against the wall. Old man is she on some kind of drugs? Do something, this shit is scaring me. She won't come out of her room. Miss me you say? I feel like she's going to be booting me out the door any minute. Damn that woman. That said can I continue? I feel like I haven't even broken the tip of the iceberg with how confusing they are. I think I will wait a while before I come home after school lets out, unless I need to work. Which is exactly what I did today. I didn't expect the phonecall I got. I haven't talked to her in quite a while. Not since....not since all that shit happened. I wish I were a damn cloud so I could just float away from all this. Carefree. Traveling at my own pace and not worried about anything that comes my way. Hopefully, the tornados would keep at a distance, because they do a world on my head.



Shikamaru sat on the top of his car, looking out to the sky above him. School had already let out, and many people were long gone. He'd been sitting there for an hour just looking up and thinking.

Temari went through her phonebook and entered his name, dialing his cell number. She'd never call his house phone. If she did, she'd have to speak with his mother. He probably wasn't there, anyway.

Hearing his ringtone go off he sighed. The phone was in the car. He didn't feel like getting up. When the irritating noise continued to play over and over again, he hopped down off the hood of his car and opened the door finding his phone. He flipped it open and held it to his ear. "Hello?" He said in his usual lazy drawl. He half expected his mother to start screaming at him wondering where he was. He squinted his eyes ready.

Temari almost hung up when he answered. He didn't want to talk to her. Not after...she should just hang up first and save him the trouble. But she wasn't that kind of person. She was stronger than that. His friendship meant too much to her. "...Hi."

When he didn't hear the loud screaming on the other end, he was shocked. That voice....it was Temari. He didn't speak for a few long moments. "Uh....hey"

She laughed a little, quietly. How awkward. She coughed, clearing her voice. Raising it to a normal volume. Putting on the 'okay' voice. "How are you? I haven't seen you in a while." Not since...

"Yeah...." he said nodding, voice low. "Been okay I suppose...."

She smiled slightly. "That's good." She paused, feeling awkward again, before barreling onward. "Naruto do anything else stupid to the school? I don't see Gaara much anymore."

"Besides getting me to help him with chemistry and trying not to blow up the school...yeah maybe he's okay...." he said wondering why she was so interested in Naruto. She could just call him if she wanted to know. He grumbled slightly.

"I was just curious. No need to get snippy," she told him, hoping the pout wasn't evident in her voice as she tugged on one of her sweatshirt strings.

"I'm not snippy....." he said closing the car door and sitting back on the roof of his car.

"Bullshit you're not," she commented dryly. "You pretty much always are."

"Feh, whatever...." he said with a sigh. His one big question was wondering why she was calling him. It had been quite a while....what could she want? Did she.....miss him?

"Yeah, well...whatever," she replied, not really knowing what else to say. Goddamn he was hard to talk to over the phone. Usually they didn't need to, but then again usually their silences were more comfortable than this.

He tapped his foot against the bumper of the car. "So....." he said not knowing what to say. Damn this was weird. "How's life?" he said, his voice coming out more harsh than usual.

She closed her eyes, rolling them beneath her lids. Not snippy. Right. "Fine," she replied, sounding put-off suddenly by the tone in his voice. Why did he have to be like this? Why couldn't he just...

"Been busy seems like eh?" he asked. Even if things had slowed down for him, it was hard to do. Hard to talk to her after the last time. He kept tapping his foot, his rear slowly sliding off the car at such a slow pace he didn't notice.

"How would you know?" she asked him, shoving the string into her mouth, chewing on it in nervous habit. She crossed her arms against her chest defensively.

"I asumed. You haven't bee around online much either." He was kidding himself. He'd purposefully stayed away from talking to her too.

"I haven't felt like getting online," she replied. "I've been working on school stuff."

"Exactly. Meaning busy." He felt like being argumentative today. He tapped his foot some more, which concluded in him sliding even further down the hood of the car. Before he could catch his balance he slid off with a thud. "Fuck" he said staring up, irritated and in a annoyed voice.

"What the hell are you doing over there?" Temari asked. "Intensive hard labor?"

"I fell off the car" he said in a bored, still rather irritated tone.

Temari covered her mouth, hopefully smothering her laughter before he heard her.

"Don't laugh at me....." he whined out.

"m'not," she replied, voice muffled by her hand.

He sat up slowely, hand on the concrete. His ass hurt. He laid back down on the pavement. Moving was too much effort right now. "So that snickering sound is the squirrel sitting beside me?"

"Yes," she replied very calmly.

"That's a lie because there is no fucking squirrel beside me," he said still laying on the pavement. It was uncomfortable. "My ass hurts..." he whined out.

"That's very homosexual of you to say, Nara," Temari announced, glancing down at her fingernails.

His eyes went wide. "Feh...sh....oh fuck whatever...." he grumbled out. He sighed. "So why did you call Temari?"

She shrugged. "No reason in particular," she replied. "I hadn't talked to you in a while."

"I thought you wanted that?" he said, his voice softer than it had been earlier.

"Maybe," she responded quietly. "For a while. I needed time to think."

"Oh" he said his voice trailing off. "I pretty much figured you'd not want to talk to me for much longer...."

"I didn't," she answered matter-of-factly.

"Oh?" he said raising an eyebrow. "What changed your mind?"

"My mind changed on a lot of things. It's hard to explain," she told him.

He sighed, finally sitting back up with a grunt to get off the pavement. Stretching his back cracked and he winced, reminding himself to not sit on the hood of his car again unless it was sturdy. "Hard to explain, eh? Care to try?" he asked, serious and curious.

"Not really."

"Not even the slightest bit?" he asked, a small grin on his face. Who would have thought a blow to his ass on the concreate would put him in a better mood?

"No," she said again, voice stern, feeling herself close in. She wasn't ready to tell him. Not now. She wasn't even sure if she could. Who in their right mind could entertain the idea of getting back together with someone who had treated them the way Temari had strung Shikamaru along? It was laughable.

He frowned. "Fine, fine. You damn women are confusing as hell...." he grumbled out.

"Whatever. Like you're not," she replied.

"Women are by far....the most confusing creatures on the planet" he said with a sturdy nod of his head.

"All men say that. Just because you're not clever enough to figure it out..."

"Oh? I shall write a book on the way this world would be better off without you women to confuse the shit out of it...."

"Greater people than you have tried," she replied smartly, looking in disgust at the chewed end of her string. She really needed to stop doing that.

"Oh but the difference...." he said in an assured tone, "I will succeed."

"Ever heard of Maureen Dowd?" she asked him casually.

"No" he said raising a brow.

"She wrote a book last year called 'Are Men Necessarry?' Ever heard of a book about women written by a man?"

He grumbled, feeling defeated but too tired to argue on the topic. "So what is your verdict? Are men necessarry miss I'm attached to my vibrator?"

"I've never been attached to it. I have a healthy sexual appetite," she replied. "Or so my therapist says."

"Oh I'm sure they do...." he said with a chuckle. The idea of talking to a stranger about problems unnerved him. How anyone did it, he didn't know.

"I only have one," she replied testily. "I'm not that fucked up."

"Keep telling yourself that baby...." he said with the slip of his tounge again. He mentally kicked himself. He hated when he did that.

Temari rolled her eyes. "I've gotta go."

He frowned feeling like he'd just killed this seemingly okay conversation they'd been having, no matter how weird it was. She could only hear the deep sigh in his voice. Truth be told he liked hearing her voice again. He kicked a nearby rock with his shoe.

"What?" she asked, trying not to snap but failing miserably. If he thought she was a fuckup, fine. It wasn't like it was a new concept to her. She'd just thought...well, that he was different, as stupid as it sounded. Apparently she was stupid enough to believe it.

His voice got quiet and back to its habit of being sweet when he wanted to calm down her frazzeled nerves. "I was only joking..." he said his voice tappering off.

"You never sound like you're joking, Shikamaru," she told him.

His brows furrowed. "You should know by now when I am joking and when I'm not....." he said, his voice still in that calming mode.

"Should I?" she asked him quietly.

"I believe so..." he said more sternly.

"It's a sensitive subject," she said. "You should figure out not to joke about it."

"Hmph" he said lightly, sighing again. What was with him and wanting to apologize to this girl so quickly? She had broken his heart hadn't she? So why did he want to try so hard to....to make her feel better when he crushed her feelings. He shook his head. "I'm sorry...." he said softly, almost not audible to be heard, but heard nonetheless.

"Sure," she replied, quietly accepting his apology. She knew he didn't mean it. It had just - like everything else in her life recently - rubbed her the wrong way. Her job was doing the same thing. So was school. Everything was fucking up and it all seemed her fault. Her apparently necessity to be alone. It was getting to her.

"Are you sure your okay?" he asked in a concerned tone. Something in her voice bothered him. He wanted to be sure.

"Yeah, I'm fine," she said, her voice tense. She didn't want to talk about it. Not with him.

Part of him hurt still. Part of him still wanted to reach out to her and comfort her. But what could he say? He shuffled his feet and looked down at his sandled feet. The weather had been nice and cool.

"Listen, I gotta go," she told him finally, voice quiet.

"Yeah....." he said sadly almost. As sad as Shikamaru could sound when trying to hide it.

"It was...it was good talking to you again," she told him honestly. "You should call me sometime."

He smiled slightly from the corner of his mouth, a small half laugh coming out. A warm and friendly one though. "Maybe..."

"Yeah, yeah..." she commented dryly, clicking her phone shut and sighing. Geez, for a casual conversation, that was damn difficult.

He clicked the phone and placed it in his pocket. He sighed. Damn that was strange. The soft breeze blew through, his now shoulder length hair moving. He closed his eyes. Maybe one day....just maybe one day.



It's a nice night. Cool evening breeze. I think I'll go watch the stars.