There are worse things than nightmares.

Yes, there are things that are much, much worse than nightmares. Take, for example, having an amazing dream. One so real, you actually think that it's happening. A dream so vivid and amazing that you're on cloud nine and you feel like the luckiest person on earth.

For Hyuuga Hinata, this was the state she was in.

In her dream, her long-time crush, Uzumaki Naruto, came up to her suddenly. Hinata had rarely ever talked to the blonde-haired, blue-eyed boy, but here he was: standing in front of her in all his amazingly developed glory. Some kind of God, no doubt. His perfect face, just thinning out from boyish roundness to a manly oval-ish shape. His lips were in their usual smile, showing a set of perfect teeth, gleaming white, highlighting his odd, whisker-like birthmarks across his cheeks.

"Hey, Hinata-chan!" He said. Chan was all Hinata could think about. Naruto didn't add an honorific onto a girl like her's name. He reserved that for the popular girls like Haruno Sakura or Yamanaka Ino. Never her.

"So I was wondering--" A slight blush crept across the boy's face, and he put his arm behind his head, looking away from her. "--if, maybe, sometime, we could grab a bite to eat or something?" Hinata almost blew a fuse, almost let something slip out of her usually normal façade.

For a moment, Hinata stared up at him, a large but sheepish smile coating her face. Her face was a bright crimson. This was her DREAM!! Of all the countless hours spent watching him, Naruto-kun, without the nerve to even speak to him - let alone confess her feelings - he just came right up to her and asked her out! The feeling that coursed through her was pure bliss. He was asking her out!

Wait.

He was asking her out?!

He was asking her out?!

But that didn't make sense! He like Sakura-san, not her! What was going on?

"Neh, Hinata-chan, are you okay?" His voice seemed a little distant, and it was being blocked out by a constant beeping in her head.

Beep, beep, beep!! "Hinata-chan?"

Beep, beep, beep!! "Hinata--..."

Hinata opened her eyes and stared up at darkness. The constant beeping was getting extremely annoying, so she reached over instinctively and shut her alarm clock off.

Her alarm clock.

She felt a lump in her throat. So it had all been a dream. Of course Naruto-kun hadn't asked her out. Of course she let her imagination run rampant through her head when she closed her eyes the previous night. Of course, nothing like that could ever happen to Hinata.

Of course...

She shook her head, willing her tears away before they could consume her. She didn't want to start and already ruined day worse off than it was.

Slowly she rose from her bed and made her way across the room to turn her light on, blinking at the sudden change.

She looked around her immaculate room, seeing the visions from her dream instead of her books and her bed. She couldn't take it anymore, so the tears came and flowed silently down her cheeks.

There are definitely worse things than a nightmare.

Like waking up from the perfect dream that you know will never come true.

XxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxX

Hinata sighed as she looked at herself in the mirror. The girl there, gazing back at her, had her pale lavender eyes and long, violet-blue hair, but it wasn't her. It was what everyone thought she was; the perfect student. She wore her school uniform - indicating that she went to one of the finest high schools in Konoha, Konoha Private High School - and a pair of white knee socks with the average school shoes.

But it wasn't her!

It was the top-of-the-class student. The one that the teachers admired for her brains. The one that got straight A's and the one that everyone asked for help on their homework with and the one that was extremely shy, but willing to help out a fellow classmate.

So who decided that these characteristics made up Hyuuga Hinata? Because they don't. They don't even begin to cover what goes on inside the young girl's head.

She sighed. Not that anyone would believe her if she told them that she wanted to be an artist. Or that, secretly, she liked to listen to punk music and she had an entire CD collection of nothing but that. Or that most of her casual clothes were rocker-style. No one would believe the last one if she showed them her entire wardrobe.

And why was that?

Because her father, mainly - not that she wanted to blame him, but it was true. Her father morphed her to be the perfect daughter when she was younger, teaching her things before kindergarten that no kids should know before third grade, and keeping that pace until she was a freshman in high school.

And she figured that no one would know the true Hinata - minus her cousin Neji, whom she told everything to - because she was too damn shy to say anything about it. She didn't have many friends, and the ones she did have were her cousin's, so they weren't really "friends." More like...people who said hi to her in the hallways at school because of her relationship with their friend.

She didn't really mind that, though. Nor did she mind the quiet of her home when her cousin wasn't there to keep her company. She enjoyed these things, actually. It was so much easier having one friend to trust and confide in than a bunch that she had to keep secrets from.

It didn't matter that her only friend was her cousin, either. She loved him like a brother, and being forced to move in with him her junior year only made their bond stronger.

She didn't really mind her life.

So why was she so empty inside?

She wasn't teased or taunted for her extremely smart mind. She had her friend, her cousin, to tell her secrets to. She had her life outside of school - not that she went anywhere, but you know.

So why the hell did she feel so empty all the time?

It made no sense! She had a spectacular life! Well...maybe not "spectacular," but it's not like she was dying for a dramastic change. It was fine the way it was.

"It makes no sense..." She muttered aloud without thinking.

"What makes no sense?" A voice, seemingly distant asked. Hinata was still so wrapped up in her thoughts that she answered.

"Why I'm so empty and hollow on the inside, though I have more than I could ask for," She said truthfully, sighing a bit.

"Could it be that maybe, subconsiously, you want more and you just don't realize it?" The voice asked her. It seemed oddly familiar, like she knew it very well, but she couldn't quite place it.

"What more could I want though?" She retorted, finally realizing that she was talking to Neji, but she could care less. "I'm educated and almost done with my senior year of high school, and I'm surely to get many honors. I have a person to confide in, and I have pretty limitless freedom. What is missing in that equation?"

"A personal life," Neji answered almost immediately.

"I have a personal life," She said, gesturing towards the stocked-full shelves of CDs along her wall, and then her drawings and paintings surrounding her desk.

"That isn't what I mean," He said, a small smile playing at the edges of his mouth. "I mean friends."

"I have you. I don't think I need any more friends."

"You didn't let me finish. Friends that are girls. And maybe a boyfriend." He smirked whens he blushed.

"I don't think I want to have this conversation with you, Neji-nii-san," She said quickly, looking away to hide her clearly visible blush. His smirk grew more pronounced, and she turned her back to him. "Besides, we're going to be late."

"I think we should skip today."

"What? Why?" Hyuuga Hinata had never, ever skipped a day of school. Surely today shouldn't be any different.

"Because I honestly don't feel like going, and all my friends wanted to meet up at this place downtown. Naruto will be there," He teased, letting his normally cold personality slip through the cracks. It was just Hinata, after all. They were close like siblings, and he didn't have to pretend around her.

"I don't know..." Of course good-girl Hinata was unsure to skip school.

"It doesn't matter: I already sent in your excuse form," He said, failing to hold back a chuckle at her horrified expression.

"N-Nii-san!! I can't believe you did that behind my back, without any type of confirmation from me! What if I had forced you to take me to school?" She said, and he had to laugh at her totally innocent personality.

"I would have said no and made you come with me," He said, smirking. "Now, what to wear..." He walked over to her closet to pick out her clothes, because she was clearly unable to do anything, she was so shocked.

Poor girl.

It was somewhat chilly outside, so he pulled out things to go along with the day. They'd be outside quite a bit, according to what his friends had planned.

"Put this on, then come downstairs for breakfast," He said, setting the clothes on her bed in a neat pile. He turned around to smile at her, and she was still glaring at him.

He headed out quickly to get dressed himself - because he was still wearing his tank-top-and-boxers combo for his pajamas still.

XxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxX

Hinata came downstairs dressed in what Neji had picked out for her about ten minutes after he did. He looked over her, satisfied with his selection: A plain black t-shirt with a black-and-purple striped tank top over that, a hoodie with random purple designs on it and "People should fall in love with their eyes closed" sewn into one of the pockets. She also had on black skinny jeans, her knee-high Converse, and lacy purple fingerless gloves.

"Since when do you pick out cute outifts?" She asked him, her previous anger all but completely dissapeared. She was a good person, not the kind to hold grudges longer than five minutes. Neji simply shrugged.

"I pick out my own outfits, don't I?" It was kind of a joke, because they wore a similar style. He himself had on a tightly-fitted black t-shirt with his favorite band and one of the designs on they're CD cover on it, dark blue straight-legs, and all-black Converse. His coffee-brown hair hung straight down, and any other girl would think he was a model.

"You didn't have to get quite so carried away," She said, sitting at one of the bar stools next to the island in their kitchen.

"You didn't have to wear everything I put out," He said, getting bowls out of the cupboard. She couldn't argue with that.

"So what exactly are we doing today?" She asked, slightly cringing. It was, after all, a school day. Her action didn't go unnoticed, and it made Neji smirk.

"Stuff," He answered simply, and she looked at the counter, most likely trying to control her anger. As previously said; Hinata was a good person. "We're probably just hanging out."

"What was the point in skipping, then, if we're just hanging out? Couldn't you and your friends do that this weekend? And why am I going, anyway?" She asked. She didn't really want to. She didn't fit in with his friends, and it was odd to be around them. "Plus, skipping high school isn't as bad as skipping college, Neji," She pointed out, dropping the usual honorific.

He shrugged. "My classes were cancelled today because a fire broke out in the science lab." He quickly read her worried expression. "No, no one was hurt. It wasn't anything bad. They just need to fix it up really quick before any of the students go back because some toxic gases were released." He heard her breath catch, but he didn't continue.

"And why am I going?" She asked again once she collected herself. He set a bowl of cereal in front of her, then sat across from her and took a big bite of his before answering. She copied, taking small and slow bites.

"You're going because I want you to be there," He said, smirking when she blushed. "You'll have fun, so don't worry. And Tenten will be there, so you might get a little bit of girl bonding done." Tenten was his girlfriend of two years, and Hinata had met her on multiple occasions.

"I told you that I'm fine with my life, nii-san," She said. He smirked again, but not teasingly this time. It was because she was completely comfortable around him, so she could be the normal Hinata. He rolled that around in his mind and didn't answer her.

The rest of their breakfast was spent in silence: Him thinking about his younger cousin and how she was so different around people and around him, her thinking about how much she didn't want to go to this "get-together."

Hinata pushed her cereal bowl away when she was only half-way done. As usual, Neji gave her way too much and she couldn't finish it all.

Neji got done the same time. He poured her mostly-mushed up cereal down the garbage disposal and set their bowls in the sink; the dishes could wait.

"Ready?" He asked. She nodded, ready as she'll ever get, and followed him out the front door and into his car.

Today was going to be a long day.

Okay, okay, I know. Very OOC Neji and Hinata. But they're close in this story, so they let their inner characters shine through when they're together. It won't be like that next chapter, because there will be more people. So please don't fret!!

And no, this is NOT a NejiHina story. They're cousin's, for Einstein's sake!! I don't like incest. It makes me shudder.

Next chapter will come as soon as I start typing it and then finish ;D

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--DarkAnimeAngel13