It All Started With A Smell

Emotions Are Hard

Sai's POV:

He felt the muscles around his mouth pull as Ino ran past, chasing Shikamaru with a large grin on her face. He looked at Naruto for answers, only to get a shrug off the woman. She was watching Shikamaru with a soft smile on her face, though that was hardly uncommon. When he had first seen Naruto outside of Shikamaru's house he had sat and watched them. He had been tempted to move closer, to hear what they were saying. In that moment he had itched to sketch them.

That was the first time he had felt a want to know emotions. He had seen Naruto rushing to the house, chewing her lip, though at the time he had thought it was his lip, and was tugging at her clothing, as though that was the only way to release energy. However, when Shikamaru had come to the door, looking like he had only recently rolled out of bed the change was almost instantaneous. Naruto calmed, a small smile gracing her face. Although it was small it lit her face up, making her eyes sparkle. The two stood closer together than the ordinary comrades. There was more than a familiarity between the two, and Naruto was incredibly expressive. Sai had never seen such a person. The Foundation never really interacted with the village, so they only ever truly saw their fellow Foundation members and their enemies. Sai had wondered as he watched the two if it was common for ninjas in the village to be so open. It would make for poor ninjas.

He had been seized with a desire to push their buttons, especially when a third person had joined them, causing Naruto to retreat into herself. Sai had wanted to test his new teammate anyway, and see what type of person he was dealing with. He had had a hard time believing that this pup was the Nine-Tails. He had quickly realised that if he ever wanted to destroy the Nara heir he would simply have to target Naruto. The way he knocked her out of the way, hiding the fact that one of Sai's inked beasts had caught him on the shoulder, revealed to Sai that Naruto was worth Shikamaru's life. Sai filed that away to tell Danzo about that bit of information at the end of his mission with Naruto.

Oddly enough it turned out to be fortuitous that he hadn't reported straight to Danzo. He didn't want to tell him those secrets anymore. By the end of the mission he found Naruto to be fascinating. She was both easy and difficult to read and she never showed that same soft smile he had seen before. Even when she was talking about Sasuke, and lips turned up at the corners ever so slightly it hadn't been the same. Sai had tried to recreate that smile both in a painting and in the mirror with no success. He was able to understand what muscles to use but there was a missing component. He had tried everything to get Naruto to pull the expression as well, including standing close to Naruto and when that failed and instead she looked depressed he had tried to kiss her.

His confusion over Naruto pushing him away was only heightened when he had spotted Shikamaru and Naruto in an embrace as he came out of the hospital. He couldn't understand why Naruto readily accepted the other man's touch whilst when he tried to recreate the same interactions he was apparently overstepping a line. When Sakura had told Sai about Naruto running off with Shikamaru and leaving Sora in her hands he had decided to take Naruto as an example and simply voice his questions. When he spotted the woman walking towards the hospital with a smile on her face he had stepped in her way, asking if he could talk to her. He had learnt that people liked to be asked that. Naruto had shrugged and let Sai lead her to her training grounds.

"Why is your relationship with Shikamaru different to that of others?"

"Cause no two relationships are the same." Naruto shrugged again, turning away as though she was already done with the line of questioning.

"But the way you interact with the other two, the big one and the... pretty one, that's not the same as Shikamaru."

"Please tell me you didn't hesitate on the word pretty because you think Ino's ugly. I might have to hurt you for that." Naruto glared, obviously ignoring the rest of Sai's comment until he answered.