TenTen wasn't bad looking.

It wasn't that Neji had ever thought that she was ugly or anything. He'd just never looked at her as anything other than his teammate. That was inappropriate and he never intended to look at any teammate of his in any sort of romantic way. That wasn't even a question with the green morons, and up until this moment had been fairly simple with TenTen. Neji was the epitome of self restraint after all and he'd never had any problem viewing her as just another one of the guys.

After they'd been on the same team for so long, he never even had to think about it. Whether they were all sweaty from training or sharing a tent during a mission so that neither of them would have to share with Gai or Lee, she was just a friend to him. His best friend actually. He didn't know when that happened. They'd only started training together because the other two members of their team were so completely insane. But somehow over the years she'd found an irreplaceable spot in his life.

And his feelings regarding her might have stayed that way forever, if something hadn't happened to change them. It had been an accident really. They were training like they did every day and he'd sent one of her many sharp weapons flying back towards her with his kaiten. He didn't notice anything strange at first. It was difficult to see from within that spinning half sphere of chakra, but once he stopped rotating his Byakugan activated eyes caught a glimpse of a sight that made him take a second look.

It was apparent that TenTen hadn't seen what he did or she wouldn't have continued training. No way. She definitely didn't see the large rip in her shirt, clearly created by one of her overly sharp weapons that took a bad bounce off his kaiten. If she had she would have stopped training immediately. She probably thought she avoided whatever weapon it was completely. But no, there was a large hole in her shirt now. It wouldn't have been so bad if the rip hadn't been right across her chest, leaving her bra almost fully visible.

And that brought him back to his original conclusion, TenTen was not bad looking. It wasn't obvious since she didn't put that much effort into her appearance since she was almost always training and getting all dirty and disgusting. But he could see that underneath the dirt that covered most of her as a result of their strenuous training there was a pretty girl. He didn't want to see that. She was his teammate, he reminded himself. He couldn't think of a teammate that way.

Neji reached out and caught the kodachi that she had thrown at him, deactivating his Byakugan as he purposely looked at her face rather than elsewhere.

"Training's over."

His blunt statement was met with a look of confusion from the brown eyed girl.

"But-"she started to protest but stopped, her eyes following his as his as they trailed down from her face to her shirt in the type of nonverbal communication that both had grown accustomed to.

And then Neji heard the loudest shriek he'd ever detected from his long time sparring partner, even louder than the time she'd learned just what Lee wears under the spandex jumpsuit of his in order to avoid underwear lines. It was kind of amusing really, watching TenTen turn bright red and cover her chest with her arms.

"Don't get upset. No one else saw," he said with his usual cool attitude.

He had meant that to be reassuring, but that simple statement seemed to have the opposite effect on his teammate. He peered curiously at her as she sent him a death glare very unlike herself then bolted from the training field without even bothering to attempt to clean up all of her weapons, which were still scattered all around the area.

She may have been his best friend but he would never understand her completely. It was fascinating and annoying at the same time. Neji had no idea what had caused her to glare at him in a such a way. Sure, he was a total and complete ass a good percentage of the time, but this time he'd been trying to do his teammate a favor. He'd thought she would want to know what had happened. Clearly he'd done something wrong.

Oh well. He wasn't going to worry about it too much. If she wanted to tell him why she was mad at him then she would. If not then he would forget it. Until then he would go home, maybe get some training in with Hinata. But first he had to clean up the mess TenTen had left in her wake. All those mostly metal weapons would rust if left outside, so Neji gathered them up before heading home with them.

ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

Neji was asexual.

He had to be. There was no other explanation for it. In all the time TenTen had known him, she'd never seen him look at a girl with the same look that other guys possessed. Sure, he'd looked at her with some semblance of respect on a few occasions and he'd grown protective of his cousin over the years, but he still seemed unbelievably disgusted by any girl who'd shown romantic interest in him.

And she would be one to know. She was his best friend and they spent more time together than with anyone else, even if quite a bit of that was training. And even though Neji wasn't as obvious about how he felt as certain other members of their team she knew how to read him better than anyone else. She could tell when he was sulking about his family, when he was mocking someone he considered beneath him, and when he was so frustrated that he just needed to train until he exhausted himself.

But even with all the things she knew about Neji, there were still times that he surprised her. Like today, when he effortlessly caught a kodachi with a strange look on his face. He was staring at her face, but she couldn't tell what was going through his mind.

"Training's over."

That simple statement confused her to no end. They hadn't been training for very long and Neji never cut training short, not even when it was pouring down rain. So why would he want to end training now?

"But-" was the only word she managed to get out of her mouth.

There was definitely something wrong. The way he was looking at her was weird. She'd never seen him get that look on his face before. She didn't even know what to call it. He wasn't annoyed, nor was he mocking the futility of their match. And then she noticed his gaze change. He started to look down. She followed his eyes until she found what had his attention. Her shirt was torn, and not just a normal tear. It was torn right across her chest.

And then she screamed, loudly. Neji had just seen her bra. Her bra! And it wasn't even a cute one. It was a plain white bra that she only wore when she trained. This was by far the most humiliating moment of her life. It didn't seem to help that Neji seemed to find her predicament to be hilarious. As she desperately tried to cover herself she could tell that he wanted to laugh at her. She knew he never would. He was far too refined, but there was a distinct upturn of his lips that made it clear to her that he was amused.

"Don't get upset. No one else saw," were the only words that came from his mouth.

And it made her want to smack him. She nearly flashed her male teammate and he was telling her not to be upset. It was ridiculous. And that jerk just steard at her, as if he wasn't the biggest ass in the entire world. She wanted to tell him to go to hell, among other things, but right now she was completely focused on not showing any more than she already had. So instead she glared at him, and evil death glare that was her best impression of what he looked like when he was mad at Lee.

Then she ran. She got away from there as fast as she possibly could. She just kept running until she was out of range of his byakugan, and then stopped and looked back. He wasn't following her. But why would he? He didn't seem to care that he'd just caught a full view of her bra. The only emotion that she'd seen on his face was amusement. Well that and that one she hadn't been able to identify right before he stopped their training. He was probably just trying to figure out how to tell her that she had a huge hole in her shirt right in front of her bra.

And that was why TenTen came to the conclusion that Neji was asexual. He had seen almost her entire bra, albeit on accident, but he still had no signs of being a typical teenage boy. Even Lee, who she was sure thought of her like a sister, would have blushed at the sight. But Neji was ice cold. Damn bastard.

TenTen hurried home, jumping across rooftops as fast as she could in order to avoid anyone seeing her holding her torn shirt across her chest. She was lucky. No one noticed. She was able to get home without any more embarrassing moments. But it wasn't until she arrived at her apartment that she realized she forgot her weapons at the training field.

She changed into a shirt that wasn't torn open then quickly headed back to the training field, finding both them and her teammate gone upon her arrival. He must have taken them with him. It was the only logical conclusion. Oh great. But there was no way she was going to go get them from him now. He was probably incredibly annoyed with her for screaming then running off like that. And she wasn't too happy with him either. No, she'd wait until she wasn't feeling quite so humiliated. Maybe tomorrow… or maybe a week. Instead she went home, determined to forget this day with a whole lot of chocolate ice cream. That always made her feel better.