A Secluded Area of the Preserve, Friday Early Morning

It didn’t seem to matter that, when they’d woken up in a tangled grouping of hands and legs and eyes and smiles that touched their eyes until they’d woken up enough that the smiles stopped hitting their eyes, that they hadn’t really spoken at all as they’d gotten dressed.

As they’d headed down into town to pick up something for breakfast—they hadn’t really even glanced at the kitchen in the cabin—they still kept mostly to their silence, though he held her hand as they walked.

Or she held his. Ino wasn’t really sure if that distinction mattered. Either way, neither of them was letting go of the other.

It wasn’t a conscious decision either to head out to the preserve once food in neat brown bags had been obtained.

It wasn’t conscious, but she wasn’t going to complain as they walked deeper and deeper into the trees. Ino liked trees, she liked Zack, and she liked breakfast. The silence was just something that had happened. They’d work it out.

She glanced sidelong and up at him, blue eyes worried. Her smile had faded into something more serious. Last night had been only part of it. He’d needed last night. (He’d scared her last night.)

Ino didn’t know what this would bring, out here, with breakfast and him. Just that it happening was the only thing that made sense to her. A weird and twisted snarl of emotions curled in her mind and Ino thought it couldn’t be anything as bad as how he felt. That wasn’t comforting.

[For the one whose hand she won’t let go of.]