Twisted

Spider

Sarada had been watching the large brown spider with interest for quite some time now. It'd been resting on the branch she climbed onto, likely disturbed by her sudden appearance, and so it crawled downward. And then it just kept going until it made it above Boruto's head.

She would've said something to him, but she knew he'd probably gotten a decent look up her dress. And so, she decided to say nothing and distract him with conversation as the spider slowly descended, interested in the prospect of fluffy blonde hair.

Sarada just so happened to know that this particular spider was a wolf spider: large in size, but not particularly dangerous to humans. And so, she let it crawl onto his head. Just to see what happened.

"Y-You're kidding, right?"

"Like I said," she mused, watching it use all eight of its harry legs to make itself at home. "You may wish I was kidding. But sadly, I'm not."

Boruto's hand came slowly up to his head.

Oh? He's going to touch it.

And very hesitantly. With a single index finger. He reached out and poked it. And the moment he felt the hairy body and the sudden startlement of the eight-legged arachnid, Sarada learned another new phrase she never quite understood. The term, 'screaming like a little girl.'

Boruto's chin shot down as he nearly fell from the tree, sweeping his hand over his stiffened head repeatedly, fingers combing through his hair even after the spider was long gone. His low pitched voice was suddenly higher than Sarada's as he repeated the words: "get it off me get it off me get it off me get it off me!"

She felt her lips twitch. A puff of air escaped her nose. And then something bubbled up from within her stomach and crawled up her throat, finally erupting into... A fit of giggles. The sound of her own laughter startled Boruto just about as much as the spider did. Her head tilted back and her shoulders shook slightly, feet swinging happily.

She covered her mouth with the back of one hand, watching as he slowly stood upright, his face turning as red as a tomato all the way to his ears, eyes searching the ground to make sure it was really gone.

"You really don't like bugs, do you," she sighed, wiping a tear from her eye.

"I-I just did that to make you laugh! I'm not actually scared of bugs ya know!"

"Mmhmm," she hummed, her cheeks hurting from using muscles she wasn't accustomed to. She was about to say something, but she leaned a little too far back and lost her grip on the tree. She didn't exactly know what was happening, just that she was falling now. A tiny squeal escaped her mouth as her stomach tried to escape her throat.

Just before she could tip all the way upside down, her back fell against something... Similar to a tree branch.

When she squinted open her eyes, Boruto was staring straight down at her, pink still heavily dusting his cheeks.

Sarada froze for a moment before somehow saying a simple, "...Thanks."

To her surprise, he blinked and tucked his chin further into his vest in attempt to hide behind his rather short bangs, although because she was positioned below him, it wasn't very effective. And so all that Sarada saw were his averted blue eyes as he mumbled, "Don't tell anyone I'm scared of spiders."

The corner of Sarada's mouth tightened into a half smile. "Ah yes. I'll make sure not to tell any of my imaginary friends about your inherent arachnophobia."

Boruto pulled her closer, giving her enough support to remove her legs from the branch above provided she was still gripping it. But the second she got one foot safely down, she realized the other would be a bit of a struggle, and her skirt was not doing much to cover her legs.