Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto.
Summary: Neji realizes that he loves Tenten. But how can he tell her before it's too late? Neji finds himself asking the others for advice. NejiTen, oneshot.
Five Steps to Her Heart
By: Kikushi
He could not deny it any longer. He was madly in love with his beautiful teammate, Tenten. For seven years, he had wasted his time denying that simple fact, (What a waste of denial, he thought sourly) his pride and ego refusing to succumb to acknowledge that he had lost to an emotion such as love.
But as he watched her pick up her weapons with such loving care, her hair wildly out place, her whole body shinning with sweat from today's sparring, Neji Hyuuga just could not deny it any longer.
"All right, Neji," Tenten called to him, interrupting his thoughts, "see you tomorrow!"
She always said that.
He watched, leaning against a tree casually, as she walked away merrily back to the village, as she always did, humming some sort of tune. When she was finally out of sight, the Hyuuga fell into a silent state of hysterics.
'I've got to do something!' He thought in a panic, 'What if I get to her too late? What if the day will come when she WON'T see me tomorrow?'
It was then that Neji finally noticed Lee standing a terrifyingly close distance in front of him, his hand waving rapidly in front of his face.
"What do you think you're doing?" he spat, irritated.
"Ah! My youthful rival, Neji! Have you finally woken up? That is great news! Now I can finally tell you about my extreme training session with Guy-sensei—!!" And so while Lee started to ramble on and on about his day of fun, Neji's mind wandered back to where it had previously been.
'What if Tenten doesn't come back tomorrow? What will I do?' Neji wondered, frowning in displeasure. His eyes fell on Lee, and his jaw dropped. 'What if Tenten ends up marrying Lee?!'
"I've got to save her!" he blurted out, speeding back to the village.
"—and that's when I arrived here to tell you about my day!" Lee finished, opening his eyes, "... Neji?"
--
Hurrying along the village without a destination in mind, he spotted Naruto at his usual eating place, seated next to his cousin. They had been going out for a week now, and Neji still found difficulty adjusting to the sight of it.
'Maybe Naruto can help me,' he thought desperately.
"Naruto!" he called, just right outside the ramen shop.
The couple emerged, Naruto grinning and Hinata blushing. "Neji! Whattta surprise!" the blond said.
"Naruto," Neji began, already regretting calling him, "can I talk to you for a minute?"
"Sure thing!" Naruto bellowed. Then, turning to Hinata, he gave her a sloppy grin (making Neji cringe slightly) and told her, "I'll be right back!"
After Neji dragged him across the street, Naruto asked, "What's up?"
"I- I don't exactly know how to say this…"
"What? What is it?" Naruto urged impatiently, oblivious to Neji's unease.
"I just found out, that I have feelings for a… a certain somebody."
"Oh! Tenten right?"
Shocked, Neji grabbed a hold of Naruto's shoulders, shaking him slightly. "How do you know this? Who told you?!"
"R-relax, Neji!" Naruto cried, backing away, "everyone knows how you look at Tenten!"
He waited for a while until the Hyuuga absorbed the information. "Except Tenten herself, of course," Naruto added hastily when the Hyuuga continued to stand motionlessly.
"So… Tenten doesn't know…?" Neji whispered, feeling his heart start beating again.
"No. At least, we don't think she does."
Neji sighed, relieved. "I was going to ask you," he began once again, "how you… how you, and er, Hinata-sama, got together."
Naruto grinned. "Oh, that's easy!"
Neji watched in fascination as Naruto pulled out a small, thin picture book from inside his jacket and handed it to him. It was titled, Five Steps to Her Heart, and flipping through it, Neji found that it had no more than five specific pages.
"This?" Neji asked incredulously.
"Yup!" the blond chirped, "You can have it, I got it all memorized. Well, good luck Neji! I have to get back to…" He gave Neji one more grin, before walking back to the ramen shop.
Reluctantly, Neji opened to the first page.
"Number one: Smile. Most women like it—"
He slammed the book shut angrily. There's got to be a better way.
Looking up, he spotted the arrogant Uchiha, hand in hand with his annoying pink-haired girlfriend. They had been fighting and on the verge of break-up before, but just a week ago, they had made up miraculously.
Fuming, Neji tossed the book away and walked up to the quickly disappearing couple.
"Uchiha!" he called, when he caught up to them, "How the hell did you get back together?!"
Sakura blushed, sputtering, "Excuse me?!"
Sasuke smirked, "Why?" he drawled, "is there… someone?"
Annoyed, Neji opened his mouth to respond when Sakura beat him to it. "Oooh! Are you finally going to ask out poor Tenten?"
So it's true, Neji thought. He glared at her, and Sakura found herself thinking, if looks could kill…
"Wait here," Sasuke told her, and he led Neji a few feet away, safe from the crowds.
"This has all you need to know," Sasuke said, pulling something out from his shirt that looked awfully like—
Neji's eyes widened, and he wordlessly accepted the item from Sasuke, who smirked at him one last time before walking back to his girlfriend. Slowly, Neji lowered his head to stare at the dreadful book in his hands. It was the exact same book that Naruto had given him a couple of minutes ago. The big, bold letters on the cover mocked him with, Five Steps to Her Heart.
Again, Neji tossed away the offending book. "Tenten isn't fazed by things like that."
"Come on already!"
The high-pitched yell directed Neji's attention to a certain blond girl dragging a helpless and unwilling Shikamaru with her.
"Troublesome," Shikamaru muttered as he let himself be dragged, "such a troublesome woman."
Maybe he can help, Neji thought, even more desperate than before. Heck, he had been pretty desperate when he asked the Uchiha.
"Shikamaru!" Neji called.
The couple turned to him and they both smiled. "Neji!"
"Can I ask how you two got together?" he questioned bluntly.
Ino smiled even wider, "Yeah! I got Shika to read THIS!"
To Neji's horror, Ino pulled out the exact same book handed to him twice earlier.
"It was troublesome," Shikamaru told him lazily, "I already knew half the stuff."
Neji accepted the book, once again, and watched as the couple made their way through the crowds. Dejected, Neji walked back to the Hyuuga manor and shut himself in his room.
"All right, fine," Neji sighed, opening the book, "let's see what this says."
There were five steps in all: smile, sweet, stuff, strolls, and… Neji's eyes lingered on the last step on the last page. Sex. He wasn't about to deny the fact that he often dreamed about such things with Tenten, but then again… Neji stared doubtfully at the book. It seemed simple enough. He read through all the steps a second time.
Number one: Smile. Most women like it when they are greeted with a smile, often followed by a greeting such as, "Good Morning!" Do NOT be an ass and say, "Hn," or something similar when you are greeted by said girl.
Number two: Sweet. Be sweet to your girl. For example, if she needs help, be the first to help her. When she says something negative about herself, IMMEDIATELY counter her words with sweet ones.
Number three: Stuff. Buy her stuff. Preferably, shiny stuff. Every girl loves expensive shiny stuff. Don't ask why, the world just works that way.(Sweet stuff works too, preferably chocolate)
Number four: Strolls. Take her out on strolls and on dates. Girls like it when they know that they have a special spot on your schedule.
Neji shut the book. He did NOT want to read the last page. Yet. Sighing, Neji knew he had no choice.
"I'll try the first one…" Neji said to himself, "but if it doesn't work…"
About a half an hour later, Neji found himself staring at Tenten's front door. What the hell am I doing? Neji thought, I should just go.
Before he could even turn to leave, however, the door opened, and Neji found himself staring at a fresh-out-of-the-shower Tenten, her hair cascading down in wet, wavy clumps, her bath towel around her neck. She wore a large green T-shirt that stopped short in mid-thigh and nothing else. Neji found that he could not speak.
"Neji!" Tenten exclaimed, her face lighting up, "What are you doing here?"
Immediately, Neji ran the first step through his head, 'Number one, smile… Women like it when they are greeted with a smile, followed by a greeting such as "good morning!"…'
Grimacing into what he thought was a half-smile, Neji blurted out, "Good morning!"
Tenten blinked. "Um… Neji, it's noon, the moon is already out… and why is your face like that? Neji, are you hurt?"
Aware that he had made a fool of himself, Neji shook his head rapidly, and sped away, mumbling a quick, "I have to go," before doing so, and leaving a confused Tenten behind.
Back into his room, Neji replayed the humiliating event over and over in his mind. I can't believe I said that, Neji fumed. In his anger, he had ripped the book to shreds, which lay scattered about on the floor. He flung himself down on the bed, allowing himself to calm down.
She looks beautiful with her hair down, he thought vaguely. And her long legs…
He then looked down at the torn pieces of the book on the floor.
"Tenten doesn't like that stuff anyways," he muttered.
--
It was morning, and Neji was cranky. He had not gotten a decent sleep last night and he was willing to satisfy his anger on today's sparring.
As soon as Tenten arrived (Gods, he could NOT look at her in the face from what happened yesterday), they started to spar, and Neji felt his fury dissolve a few minutes into the battle. He was aware that he was being a little rougher than usual, but Tenten seemed to be taking it just fine.
Until, of course, after another blow of his attack hit her, she lay on the ground and told him to stop.
"Get up Tenten," he said, "we're not done yet."
"Neji, what is WRONG with you today?!" she screeched at him, "Are you TRYING to kill me?!"
And that's when he saw how badly hurt she was. Absorbed in his thoughts, he had not noticed the injuries he had inflicted on his teammate.
"Tenten, I'm sorry," he said, kneeling down next to her, ashamed of himself.
"Neji, what's wrong with you? Last night, I was worried about you. Did something happen?"
Neji swallowed a lump in his throat and said nothing. Tenten went on, "And this morning, I said good morning to you, but you didn't even hear me… there IS something wrong!"
Neji looked down at her. Now or never, he thought nervously.
"Tenten, I… I love you!"
Tenten's mouth fell open.
"That's why I—"
"My youthful teammates!!" a familiar voice yelled. Soon enough, the painful view of tight, green spandex came into view. "I have great news!"
Furious, both Neji and Tenten glared at him.
"What is IT, Lee?!" they both shouted in perfect unison.
"THIS!" He took out a familiar book, titled 'Five Steps to Her Heart', and beamed at them, "I will use this to finally win the affections of Sakura-chan!"
"That's great Lee—" Tenten started, but Neji cut her off.
"Lee, that book is a bunch of crap. Don't read it. It won't work."
They watched as Lee headed dejectedly back into the village.
Tenten stood suddenly, her face red. "For your information, Hyuuga, I think that's the book just for you."
Neji scoffed. "I read it already Tenten, there's nothing there that YOU would like."
"Well, that's WEIRD!" Tenten yelled, glaring at a confused Neji, and walking away, "considering that I wrote it!"
"WHAAAT?!"
... Review!
I enjoyed writing this. xD
I hope you enjoyed reading it!