Disclaimer: Naruto isn't mine.

I am aware of my substantial lack of femininity, and that my chest can not appear any flatter, as well as the fact that my mere existence is very much a disgrace to the whole gender.

But I am definitely not a man.

Anybody who believes otherwise ought to be labeled delusional, mentally challenged, or plain insane.

The person before me seems to fit all three descriptions.

"Pardon?" I eventually manage to utter. I wasn't exactly expecting to engage in a conversation with a long-haired man exhibiting freakishly uncolored pupils this early on a Sunday morning, much less in the middle of my stroll to the supermarket. Couldn't a woman buy her eggs in peace?

"I request you to accompany me this evening as an intimately-involved male acquaintance," the monotonous voice repeats.

I struggle to make sense of even a fraction of the situation, and fail miserably. My thoughts feel more scrambled than the eggs I had for breakfast. "You want me to," I pause to select the most appropriate words, "be your boyfriend?"

The male acknowledges my question with a blank blink. "No."

I return the blink generously, and inwardly breathe a sigh of relief. It's probably the man's first attempt at a joke. And it's not exactly awful for a first try; he almost got me!

"I believe I said intimately-involved male acquaintance."

I blink three, four, five times in confusion. It's not a joke after all. This guy is seriously in search of a male lover. Unfortunately, he's asking the wrong gender. I burst his bubble, "I think you'd have better luck asking a man."

"Oh." After considering the suggestion for half a second more, he gives me a small nod in agreement. "That makes sense."

A cloud of empathy flies through my heart and I can barely resist embracing the man with words of sympathy. Here he is, having embarked on a search for forbidden, homosexual love—only to realize that he was pursuing the wrong gender the entire time! But now that I've awoken him from his disillusion, his eyes are able to bathe in the more luminous scene of romance. I silently wish him the best of luck and flash him two encouraging thumbs up. In response, the man gently breezes his eyes down to meet mine.

"Would you kindly accompany me this evening as an intimately-involved male acquaintance?"

And once again, I'm sent beyond the boundaries of confusion. A hundred or two precious brain cells disappear from my system as I make yet another fruitless attempt to understand the situation.

I somehow make it back. "What?"

"What?"

"What are you doing?"

"I asked this time." His blatant expression remains unwavering. "As you suggested."

"Yes. Well, no—not exactly, I told you to ask a man. Why are you—" A sudden revelation cuts my thought and finally, I understand. And I am very, very offended. "Sir, I'm a woman."

"A woman?" He repeats my words in a tone of mild disbelief, but as mild as it is, the words now sound foreign to my ears. I suppress the urge to begin doubting my gender myself. "Why don't you resemble one?"

I debate whether to feel insulted or extremely, hysterically, and outrageously insulted.

"…My apologies." He blinks twice to emphasize how remorseful he felt. "What I meant to say was—"

"Unforgiven!" I grunt with discontent, setting my hands defiantly on my hips. Almost immediately, his gaze travels to my waist and lingers for a moment in scrutiny.

"You are exactly what I need."

What in the world— Was he now making a pass at me? After all those insults? "What is that supposed to mean?"

"Ma'am, you're entirely devoid of womanly curves." The man's lavender gaze administers a head to toe observation of my body, silently taking note of my unattractively baggy attire, and the unkempt way my hair sleeps under an ancient baseball cap. "This is indeed the most unflattering body I have come across," he decides collectedly.

A volcano of anger blows up within me upon hearing the man's disparaging remark. "What? Unflattering?" I screech. "I'll have you know, many women envy this type of body!" My chest, despite its flatness, heaved resentfully as my voice escalates dispassionately in volume. "As a matter of fact, I—"

"You're perfect."

"Excuse me?" It's impossible to keep up with this man's unpredictability. "I mean…I am, but—"

"I wish to hire you for today."

"Huh?" I raise an eyebrow skeptically. "I don't recall ever asking for—"

"I will pay you a hundred thousand."

"You—" My insulting retort comes to a halt as I perform a mental rewind and process his words. "Wait, wait." Though I dislike admitting it, greed's quite an essential forte of mine. "A hundred…thousand?"

He confirms it with a silent nod. "In cash," he pauses, fetches a thick wallet from his pant pocket, and silently checks if it held enough bills. It appears to hold ten times more than necessary; I observe with starving eyes. He resumes once I recover from my traumatized overreaction, "That is, if you can successfully portray—"

"If I pretend to be your boyfriend?" I sputter eagerly, unable to conceal the childish exuberance blooming onto my face. "That's all there is to it?" I am 99% aware of the lack of further consideration on my part. The same way I am 100% aware of the hundred thousand yen just waiting to hop into my nearly empty wallet.

"Correct."

This is too good to be true. A hundred thousand yen. In my pocket. Tonight. Just like that? Indeed, this is too good to be true. I narrow my eyes with heavy cynicism. "What's the catch?"

"I don't know what you're talking about," he says flatly.

But I, as Tenten Insert-Surname-Here, know better: he's up to something. "Oh, playing innocent, are we now? Don't think I'll let you off the hook just because your daily income makes my monthly salary writhe and cry," I threatened with the most frightening glare I could manage.

"But I haven't caught anything," the man replies, completely unaffected by my menacing look. "And what exactly is this hook I'm on?"

I click my tongue in irritation. "So you're bringing out the literal language now, huh?"

He exhales with soft impatience. "I'm—"

"Two can play that game," I challenge rather immaturely, if I may say so myself.

Subsequently, a wire of irritation twists past his features, and he shoots a paralyzing scowl in my direction. Clearly, it's just a desperate attempt to shut me up. And clearly, it works. I willingly comply and let him have his damn spotlight.

"I'm scheduled to attend a formal dinner festivity this evening. Arrangements involving an extravagant ballroom dance will be made prior to my arrival, but I do not wish to participate." He directs his furrowed eyebrows at me. "Bringing a male escort will most certainly diminish the obligation of dancing—for two males dancing as a couple would be too unorthodox for this grandiose event. So if you would kindly discontinue your talk regarding fishing and other trivial matters," he recites evenly, and makes a show of folding his arms, "I would like you to agree to play the role of my partner."

I hang onto his every word, solely waiting for the numbers hundred and thousand to surface. Disappointingly, they don't turn up, and I allow the less valuable words to fill my brain. "Fishing?"

He gives me a bland look. "Your catches and hooks and whatnot." His expression grows exasperated. "But that's beside the point. Ma'am, I need you to do this."

I study the predicament for an instant longer but remain swallowed in indecisiveness. If only the offer were a tiny, tiny bit more—

"Ma'am, I'm willing to pay two hundred—"

"Deal!" My eyes sparkle in delirium as I smile widely. Two hundred thousand. All mine. "It's a pleasure doing business with you!"

I receive a blank blink in response.

"My name is Tenten." I outstretch a friendly hand. "What's yours?"

My abrupt actions seem to have successfully caught him off guard. However, he regains his state of apathy promptly. Apparently uninformed of what a handshake is, he doesn't bring his hand toward mine. I leave it hanging in the air anyway; I am way too happy to be brought back down. Imagine how many scrambled eggs I'd be able to afford with the payment. My attention is diverted back to my new partner in crime once the sound of a name intercepts my edible train of thoughts.

"Hyuuga Neji."