Disclamer: I don't own Naruto or any of it's characters.

Wow! this took a while to write, i was going to make it a one shot, but i got so enveloped in the story and i kept on adding things along the way. (haha) I put hard work into this. So i hope you guys enjoy it! This is my first NaruHina story. NaruHina is my OTP. Initially i found that writing about them is hard. I can't believe i started with SasuSaku first! (haha). I used to do ballet when i was little. I wish I kept up with a lot of things when i was little. :( This is AU. Contains minor SasuSaku & NejiTen.


"Neji! Tell me again, why do I have to go with you to this stupid recital?" said the complaining boy with piercing blue eyes.

Neji coolly responded in a low confirming tone. "Because you owe me, Naruto."

Konoha in the fall was a beautiful sight to be hold. It wasn't too hot or too cold and the breeze was very gentle. The fresh autumn air was calming; there was always something about the fall. Leaves fell to the ground with such grace, that it flowed, just like a delicate dance.

"And my cousin is performing tonight as the lead role."

"Geez! Couldn't Tenten go with you instead?! It's so weird for two guys to go to a ballet show together!"

Neji then sighed lightly at Naruto's complaining. He was not going to let Naruto bail at the last second. However, Neji slightly did agree with Naruto about two men going to a ballet recital together was kind of weird. Neji just shrugged it off.

To be honest, Neji didn't want to go alone. He did initially thought of Tenten- but she worked backstage. His second choice was his semi-rival, trustworthy, loud, highly enthusiastic friend, Rock Lee, but decided he didn't want to deal with his 'man tears' and was afraid that he may yell something about 'youth' and 'power' during his cousin's debut performance. Neji then decided he was just going to alone when he spotted his good friend at the convenience store. Knowing Naruto for his brash behavior, he thought he'd do his friend a favor by seeing a ballet dance performance at its most passionate peak. It was also convenient because Naruto owed him one.

"First, Tenten is working at the theater as part of the stage crew, and second, Naruto" -Neji said with much emphasis on his name- "you may just learn and appreciate the art of classical dancing such as ballet"

Naruto winced at the emphasis that Neji put on his name. The two friends continued their walk towards the theater. Neji was stepping on the dried leave where as Naruto was kicking the yellow and auburn leaves aside.

"But why ballet?! Its soooo boring! I might just fall asleep!" said the whining blond.

Neji just sighed and closed his eyes for a brief second. He didn't want to argue with Naruto. Sometimes he wondered how they became friends in the first place. He then adjusted his scarf in annoyance.


Naruto totally forgot about owing Neji. He had seen Neji at the convenience store one last Saturday and had approached him with his full basket of instant ramen hanging lazily on his fingers. How stupid he could have been! He had only wanted greet his dear friend only to say 'hi! It's been a while, what have you been up to?' But Naruto didn't even get a chance to say it; he merely opened his mouth and had quickly shut it. That face, he saw that face. He saw Neji's sly expression and had wished that he never approached him. There was no avoiding it.

The first thing Neji had said was, "Naruto, its good to see you. You seem to remember that you owe me… and therefore you are accompanying me to a ballet recital, no exceptions"

Before Naruto had got a chance to protest, Neji was already gone.

"Damn it!" was the only thing he exclaimed afterwards, knowing that the chances of getting out of it were slim.

He dreaded this! A man would rather be watching manly sports! Not ballet! He made fun of guys who wore tutus (and prancing around like fairies) –if that's what they wore…He wasn't sure.


The two friends continued to walk to the theater in silence, body languages different. Neji had his hands in his coat pocket while looking forward, thinking his thoughts on his dear cousin. Naruto on the other hand he kept his bright blue eyes kept on the ground and had a slight slouch in his posture in his walk. Naruto was not looking forward to this, and there was no way to get out of it.

Naruto spoke "I hope your cousin isn't a guy… because that would be disturbing."

Neji sighed.

"No, she is a female." Neji paused then continued "but the performance is going to include men."

"Men actually enjoy doing and practicing ballet?!"

Neji sighed again. "Yes."

Neji then tried to compare it to Naruto's favorite sport, soccer. "Naruto, it's like this every sport is an art. Take soccer for example, do you think it's a form of art?"

"Yeah, of course it is! It involves strategy and training and hard work!" Naruto had no idea why Neji was comparing this to soccer. Ballet and soccer were not the same!

"Well, same with ballet it takes much required skill and training just like any other sport. It involves fluid movements of precision to the human body. Same with soccer, it involves accuracy and precision and endurance."

Naruto still stared at his feet, one always walking in front of the other. Right, left, right, left. He was listening. He didn't think about it in that way. Neji continued –

"Both arts (or sports) risk injury due to the intensity of training alone, being a ballet dancer requires more than just twirling and jumping, and soccer involves more than just kicking the ball around the field. Both involve foot work."

"…" Naruto was lost in thought, listening to Neji's words while mind framing the image of soccer players and ballet dancers working hard. He wasn't successful. He imagined soccer players on the field twirling and jumping around in tutus. He mentally shuddered.

Neji hoped his little speech helped, but it was Naruto. His blue eyed friend was probably imagining soccer players dancing around in a soccer field.

"Naruto, just go in this with an open mind and you may just enjoy it"

Naruto just let out a low 'hmph'

Naruto was always mysterious about Neji. Neji had a calm collective nature about him.

To this day he still doesn't know why they are friends. Naruto was loud and brash. Total opposites. He had met Neji through Rock Lee, while they were having lunch together at a popular ramen stand downtown. Naruto had compared himself to his other good friend, Lee and they were about on the same level. Yeah of course, Rock Lee had his moments of strangeness, but he was still his friend and surprisingly Neji's too. Maybe Neji had a fetish for loud friends? He didn't know, but he cherished his friendships no matter what kind of person he or she was.

Naruto snapped out of his thoughts when Neji spoke.

"Were here"

"This is the line?! B-but it's so long! We won't get in! I never thought ballet shows were this popular!"

"Naruto, don't worry about the line. I've got front row tickets and its only 7:15. The show starts at 8" Neji then pulled out two front row tickets from his inside coat pocket. Naruto tried to grab one, but Neji held on to those tickets with a vice tight grip. He knew that the minute Naruto grabbed on to one of those tickets, he would run and would run very very far. He didn't want to risk it. Naruto was going to make it inside with him.

Naruto then was about to say something when Neji interjected.

The brown haired man resumed "It takes time for everyone to get seated, and that's why were just on time." He shot his friend a sharp look. Seriously, his friend was starting to get on his last nerve.

Both waited in the agonizing slow moving line to the front of the theater. Just when they were getting closer to the front, Naruto, noticed a pink blob of hair at the ticket booth with the guy on her arm. She was recognizable because he'd been crushing on her all though high school, but it deemed hopeless. He hadn't seen her in a few years. Naruto happened to notice that she was linking arms with Sasuke – who was on the same soccer team with himself and Lee.

"!" Neji saw the blond's sudden expression of surprise.

"What's wrong?"

"I just saw Sasuke with Sakura! And, and they were linking arms! –that bastard, that bastard! He said he wasn't seeing anyone!"

Neji slightly smirked, "Why are you so concerned? Do you have a thing for him?"

"NO! God NO Neji! We were just talking about our 'statuses' the other day and he lied! He said he was single"

Neji just nodded his head side to side, his friend was an idiot.

"I don't see why you are into other people's relationships, Naruto. Maybe it could be that you are feeling a bit lonely, so you would feel better if your friends were also single."

Well damn. Neji hit it on the spot. Neji had a thing for reading people and being very blunt when he spoke of his thoughts. It was a unique gift; sometimes bad, sometimes good. In this case: bad. Naruto was now silent and suddenly wanted to see the show. He hated Neji for a minute for seeing right through him, he didn't want anyone to know that he was feeling a bit lonely.

Neji noticed this and just mumbled 'sorry' to the blond. Naruto didn't say anything.

Dispite his lack of interest for ballet, Naruto came to the conclusion that it was better to go and see the show, spend time with a friend, rather than do nothing at his home.

His head was hanging down; bright blue eyes were eyeballing the hard gray concrete of a sidewalk that was painted in used and chewed gum. He felt bad for the pieces of scrapped gum; they were bound to the hard concrete forever. He also noticed the pieces of gums were in pairs, which just made Naruto more melancholy. He then tried to shove the piece of gum with his brown dress shoes, but didn't succeed. They stayed glued.

-

Naruto and Neji were now the second ones in line. This was when Naruto noticed the poster beside the door. "Chujo-hime and the Spirit of her Wicked Stepmother*" So this was the name of the dance and story they would soon witness. He looked away and began to walk back to Neji. Suddenly, his head suddenly snapped back at the poster. It was the second time that he looked at the poster. It was in that moment that he caught eye of a girl, no a woman, who was absolutely beautiful. Her hair was a dark midnight blue and her eyes, her eyes displayed so much emotion. He couldn't put a finger on it, but those eyes seemed awfully familiar. She looked so sad yet so graceful. Just by looking at that poster he suddenly felt a ting of something like, like they were connected somehow; he didn't know what it was. He stared at the poster as if he were studying every detail whilst engraving her lovely solemn face in his mind. He didn't know how long he was staring at her milky white face but it seemed like it felt like an eternity, even if it was only a few seconds at the least. Was she the main character?

Neji had noticed that Naruto was staring at his cousins face on that poster for about a minute or two. Neji had observed Naruto's face, it was like he was in trance, or in deep concentration.

That's when Neji nudged at the blonds arm. "Come on, they already took our ticket stubs"

The two walked to their designated seats. Neji was in front of Naruto.

Naruto and Neji had passed Sasuke and Sakura on the way to their seats. Naruto and Sasuke met each others eyes for a split second, both giving each other a 'why are you here?!' look.

---

"This is it, these are our seats"

Naruto noticed where they were sitting, front and center.

"Neji, do you have connections or something? Looks like we got the best seats here"

Didn't he just say that Tenten worked backstage and his cousin was the lead character?
It was amazing how dense Naruto was.

Both stripped of their coats, it was now twenty 'til eight. Neji pulled out an orchid (with the transparent sheet that was carefully protecting the single orchid) from the inside of his coat. He Naruto noticed this – and knowing a bit about plants, the orchid meant –delicate beauty. But who was it for? He wondered. Putting the orchid and his coat aside, Naruto and Neji, sat down in their red cushiony seats.

Neji spoke "So you noticed the poster?"

Naruto nodded.

"That was my cousin on that poster; she's playing the main character."

No wonder those eyes looked so familiar! Why hadn't he seen it before! Was he that dense? Neji and his cousin had the same eyes, but Neji's eyes did seem a bit colder than hers.

"What's her name?" the blue eyed lad asked out of curiosity.

"Her name?"

"Yeah"

"Her name is Hinata"

After hearing her name for the first time, Naruto repeated her name. Her name rolled off his tongue in a slow and smooth matter. Surprisingly it was very easy the way her name came off his tongue, and he liked it.

"H i - n a - t a" softly spoken by the cerulean blue eyed man while staring at the stage.

Neji quirked his left eyebrow at him, but Naruto didn't seem to notice.

The clock hit eight, and the lights started to dim inside the theater, melting the red blood seats into a midnight black. The red curtain on stage began to shine as the lights in the back faded brighter.

When the main character, Chūjō-hime*, appeared onstage, Naruto was lost in amazement from beginning to end, keeping his bright blue eyes locked on Hinata the whole time.

"She's beautiful" he said in a mere whisper. Hinata's hair was up in a tight bun, her bangs hanging just a little below her eyebrows. She was wearing light make up. Her initial outfit was made of whites, blues, and purples. Her ballet shoes were a baby blue.

She went through several costumes during the performance, and she looked absolutely astonishing. At one point during the show, Hinata's hair had gone from a bun to being completely being set loose. Her hair glowed against the bright stage lights, and framed her face just perfectly.

Naruto was so engaged and into the performance that he was on the edge of his seat, literally. It amazed him the way ballet dancers moved, they looked so graceful. There was so much emotion during the recital, from sadness to anger to enlightenment; surprisingly he paid attention the whole time. He was afraid to blink, thinking that he might have missed something. By astonishment he didn't know how people could actually get that flexible.

Naruto was sitting at the edge of his seat, ridged and stiff as a board, busy trying to keep up with the storyline. His elbows were on his knees and his fingers on both hands were laced together in front of his mouth, chewing a nail.

Whilst watching Hinata perform with an intense gaze, Naruto swore that they made eye contact for a milli of a second. His heart swelled. What was this feeling?

Naruto threw out all his previous biased opinions about ballet. He was engulfed and completely enchanted by the performance. It truly was an art. Ballet was truly an art. He was beginning to have a new appreciation for dance.

Neji on the other hand, watched in silence completely enveloped by such elegance and grace that surrounded the story. He was really, really, sincerely proud of his cousin and his face showed it.

---

Two hours later, the performance had finally ended and the audience was left in awe. Surprisingly to Neji, Naruto was the last person he'd expect to give and initiate a standing ovation. People started to follow his actions and soon enough the whole theater was giving a standing ovation; cheering and clapping at the incredible performance.

An encore was made several minutes later. Hinata was located smack dab in the middle of the cast line, boasting a big smile. She had succeeded at her first debut performance as a lead character. Her and her fellow cast members bowed and said their 'thank yous' to the satisfied audience.

Hinata noticed her cousin in the front row. She smiled for him and she pointed to the back. Just when Neji nodded, Naruto let out a loud whistle, the kind that involved your thumb and index finger. This got Hinata's attention. They caught eyes, and she shifted her eyes to the left in embarrassment. A fellow cast member had caught what had happened and whispered in her ear about the blue eyed boy. Hinata giggled and brought up her right hand to her mouth covering it.

Naruto noticed this and just smiled at her, the smile was just for her. She was adorable.

Naruto did not mind staring at her beauty. She seemed so far away and yet so near. He was afraid that he may never get to see her again. The only way was to see her perform again and again. There was just something about this girl who he never officially met. At this point he forgot about Neji being with him. He also forgot that Neji and Hinata were related.

The cast was now walking off stage. Hinata was laughing the whole time. She truly looked happy in the moment.

Neji looked at the brief interaction between his cousin on stage and his friend standing next to him. He was quirking his eyebrow the whole time, looking at Naruto then to Hinata. Naruto didn't notice his existence at all. Neji called Naruto's name several times.

"Naruto… Naruto… NARUTO!" that snapped him out of it.

Reality was snapped back into place. Naruto just looked at Neji.

"Come on, follow me" Neji said while collecting his coat and flower. Naruto did the same but no flower in tow. He stood there dumbfounded for a second and proceeded to follow.

During the midst and clattering of people getting out of the theater, Naruto raised his voice –

"Where we going?"

"To the back"

"Why? Shoudn't we be going the other way, where we came in? The show is over with"

"I know that, were going to see Hinata"

Naruto whispered her name. As soon he realized he was going to see her, he smiled a smile that would please the Heavens. While Neji just rolled his eyes.


I hope you enjoyed this as much as i wrote it!please R&R let me know what you think!

*While trying to figure out what the recital should be i came across Cinderella. Cinderella was also made into a ballet. Surprisingly there are many forms of Cinderella. I came across a Japanese Cinderella type and thought it was interesting if that was made into a ballet. For more information you can look it up on Wikipedia. I just went off of what was on wikipedia (lol) Here is the address:

.org/wiki/Ch%C5%ABj%C5%8D-hime

just copy and paste into your web browser.