Gai affectionately ruffled Lee's hair, indulging in a display of emotion that had become more rare as time passed - not for lack of opportunity or desire. There didn't seem to be any particular reason - Gai and Lee were as close as ever.
Yet Neji noticed.
For the strangest minute of his life, Neji wished that perhaps, just, perhaps for a moment, he could be as open and expressive as Lee.
He frowned. It didn't make sense. He'd seen his mentor and peer engage in much more exuberant displays of affection before. Gai had only ruffled Lee's hair this time. There weren't even tears involved. No flames of youth, no burning passion. Just acknowledgment.
So what was this feeling in the pit of his stomach? Indigestion? Heart burn? No, everything had been agreeable going down.
Neji shoved the issue to the back of his mind, flexing his fingers and closing his eyes. He refused to examine thing he didn't want, or know, how to understand. His genius lay in his work as shinobi - the proof was undeniable - not in his understandings of human emotion. Naruto had been one of the first to throw a wrench into his cognition of being human, back those years ago. He'd come to a realization about fate, then, that had solidified when he'd almost died at the hands of Kidoumaru.
The genius shinobi, strongest of the Hyuuga clan, most blessed by talent and insight and everything but the main house, opened his ivory eyes and regarded the faces of those he was most familiar with in this world. Not Hinata, nor Hiashi - Gai, Lee, Tenten. As he stepped into the piercing gaze of Gai, feeling the flickering warmth of Lee's enthused silence and Tenten's perturbation, the feeling grew less acute, dissipating, until it was left as a glowing ember - hot to the touch but manageable.
From somewhere faint in Neji's mind, the word finally came to him.
What he'd been feeling.
What he denied.
Jealousy.
It was as simple, and convoluted, as that.
Then why did it feel as if his world had been shaken again?