#ato extras

Harry might’ve come back to find his room filled with gifts. and Gaara looking at him with suspiciously shiny eyes.    

"Why are you in my room?" Shikamaru frowned at him from the doorway.

Harry looked up from the magazine he had been reading but didn't get up from his sprawl across the bed. "Cacti."

Shikamaru looked appropriately confused.

"My room's been filled with cacti," Harry said. "And I'm allergic to one of them. Couldn't tell which because I kept sneezing so hard."

-=-=-=-

"Allergic to cactus? But aren't they hypoallergenic?" Temari asked with confusion.

"Maybe he touched the cactus spines?" Kankuro said.

"He sneezed because of that? Temari retorted with a sharp look.

Gaara slumped down further into his chair. "I'm just a terrible gift giver."

-=-=-=-

"Why are they both glaring at me like that?" Harry whispered to Shikamaru.

Kankuro and the blonde woman beside him watched them with narrowed eyes.

Shikamaru: We don't want an international incident if you got poisoned.

Harry: I'd create an international incident?

Even without checking my folders, I know I have nothing extra written up for this AU. Whatever I managed to add to the original blog drabble, I put up on ffnet and promptly proceeded to ignore this AU for much easier to write/likable ones.

So I can only give you some super rough writing.

Harry jumped up from the sofa in welcome relief as someone knocked on the main door. On the other side of his front door, Shikamaru raised an eyebrow with a questioning look.

Harry opened the door wider.

“Shikamaru!” the blonde girl who had come in before called out with glee.

“Ino?” Shikamaru glanced around as though searching for an escape route.

“Did they cancel your meeting?” Ino asked, a sly tone in her voice.

Shikamaru glanced at Harry and sighed as he slouched into the apartment. “What are you doing here, Ino?”

“Getting my fortune read,” Ino said with a breezy tone. “You?”

“Why do you need your fortune read?” Shikamaru countered.

Ino tilted her head to the side, her blonde locks fluttering aside to show soft blue eyes bright with delight. “Because I can. And I’ve never had it read before. It’ll be fun.”

Shikamaru frowned at her.

“I’ll go make some tea,” Harry said, rushing into the kitchen to give them some privacy to talk and maybe even leave him alone. But when he returned with a tray full of tea things, both teens were seated- Shikamaru with an unhappy slouch and Ino with a wide smile.

They drank their tea with thankfully little conversation.

As usual, the lump of tea at the bottom of the cup remained shapeless. But Harry said, “Flowers.”

“What kind?” Ino asked with perfect seriousness.

Harry glanced up in confusion.

Ino sighed and waved her hand in impatience. “Right, you probably don’t care enough to know about flowers. So what colour flower.”

Her purple outfit sparked an easy answer. “Pink.”

“Sakura,” Ino said with a sage like nod. “She’s going to need my help. I’ll be able to settle my debt to her by helping.”

“What do you owe her?” Shikamaru asked as he absently swirled his cup.

“Idiot!” Ino turned so that they were face to face. “You think Naruto is the only one we owe after that fight?”

Shikamaru looked almost sheepish as he said, “You’re right.”

Satisfied, Ino turned back to Harry, “What’s in Shikamaru’s cup?”

Shikamaru straightened. “I didn’t come here to have my fortune read.”

“Oh?” Ino said with a wide and pointed glance at Harry.

Harry grabbed Shikamaru’s cup. “Paperwork. Piles of it, it looks like.”

Shikamaru grimaced.

Ino laughed but stood. “I’ll go see if I can bring Sakura in for a reading. But with her hospital duties, it might be a while. Shikamaru can stay here and hold the spot for my session until I get back,” she said in a rush as she headed for the door, not allowing any sort of argument.  

“She didn’t come here for her fortune to be read, did she?"Shikamaru asked, the moment the main door closed. When Harry didn’t reply, he said, "I owe you a lot of tea, don’t I?”

Harry sighed. “It was the tea that brought all this trouble in the first place.”

Shikamaru glanced at him with a cautious look.

“I’m banning you,” Harry decided.

“What? Why? Just ban Ino for being annoying.”

Harry stared at him for a long moment. “You’re also annoying.”

Shikamaru face twisted as though he had swallowed a lemon. “You’ve already cursed me with paperwork. No need to be even more cruel.”

Any other time, Harry would have let the words go. But at the moment, he didn’t want to. “There’s another reason to ban you. You know this tea reading is nonsense and you still say stuff like that. That I’d curse someone…”

“I didn’t,” Shikamaru leaned forward. “I didn’t mean it like that. I wasn’t being serious. You know.”

“I don’t know,” Harry said. “So, get out.”

“Wait,” Harry said with dread. “When you say Hashirama, do you mean, Senju Hashirama?”

“You know him but not me?” Madara asked with a sliver of irritation in his voice.

“He's the First Hokage?” Harry ventured.

“That fool certainly took the position,” Madara said.