Trip to the Mall, gone bad

Let's go shopping!:

'How did I get into this?' Neji thought gloomily 'Oh yeah. Because I didn't want to train with Hanabi today.'

--

The morning was not the best for Neji, one might say. Firstly, because he was still with his old team and thanks to Gai's... unique way of training, he was awfully sore, and his stomach felt like it was doing fifty back flips a minute (he had to drink something like 15 raw eggs, orange juice, milk—and other things that together, are just to gross to mention).

Secondly; he woke up at noon, and by then all of the hot water for showering/bathing had gone. Unfortunately for him he didn't realize the time, and took a shower. If it were not for all those years of hiding his emotions he would have yelled and cursed about the freezing water that was pouring over him like rain.

And thirdly, he was in no mood to deal with Hanabi. That, of course, wasn't to his uncle's pleasure, and since he had consented for Hinata to go with her friends earlier, he sent Neji to go with them. He is after all her guardian. And he can still remember how the other branch member smiled when he had told him that he was going with the heiress. He can still remember the smile and how he happily and quickly he escaped.

--

Neji had to suppress the growl he felt coming when he heard Hinata and Sakura talking about what they were going to do that day, after all, listening to his younger cousin talk about clothes and who was cute wasn't his cup of tea.

"Hinata?" Sakura whispered.

"Yes Sakura?" Hinata said, looking at her friend

"Hinata, I don't think that Neji wants to be here." Sakura said while turning her head towards the male Hyuuga. Hinata looked back, nodding saying, "You're right Sakura, I hope we run into Lee or Tenten so we might have a chance of ditching him." Then Sakura said in an extremely happy tone, "I hope so, but personally I hope we run into Tenten because I don't want Lee annoying me." They looked at each other and started laughing.

"Hey lets go into that store everything is 50 per cent off!" Sakura stated after seeing a big yellow sign that had on it '50 PERCENT OFF EVERYTHING'

"Lets go." Hinata agreed and walked faster to keep up with the pace. And while they were walking to the shop they heard a voice calling them.

"Sakura! Hinata! Wait up!" They stopped and turn to see Ino running after them. After she caught up with them she ended up catching her breath while she asked, "Where are ya'll going?"

"To that shop," Hinata answered, and pointed to said shop. "They're having a sale and everything is 50 percent off."

"50 percent off?" Ino said, practically screaming. "Yes…" Sakura answered

"Then why are we still doing here? C'mon before they close!" Said Ino, grabbing Hinata with one hand and Sakura with the other, and sprinting towards the store.

They were all surprised that Ino could still run after such a short rest. After a few seconds of walking around, Sakura was thinking up a scheme in her head when she saw Ino talking to a boy that worked at the store, and decided to walk over there with Hinata to join them. Who knows she might need something to protect her from Ino's wrath. So she snatched Hinata, and strode over.

"Look, Hinata," Sakura stated, getting Ino's attention, "The sign said everything is 50 percent off and I guess Ino wants 50 percent of his clothes off. Poor boy, he'd better run."

Sakura leaned on Hinata for support because she was laughing and Ino could decide to attack when her defences were low; and this way Ino wouldn't want the Hyuuga Clan and the Hokage after her because she punched them both through a wall. Ino was so vexed that she didn't notice that boy they were laughing about had left.

Slowly the giggles stopped as they felt an immense killing intent somewhere close by and a hateful glare burning through their skulls. With the craftiness Hinata had acquired when she was young, she used a substitution and left Sakura by herself. She did feel bad, however. When Ino is like that, it is better not to get in the way, and she usually gets that way when Sakura is around her.

Surprisingly, the jutsu landed her in the book aisle; not that she minded in the least, she loved reading books - especially about romance. Something caught her eye, it was a ninja version of Romeo and Juliet and having read the summary on the back of the book, she began to read the first chapter.

Halfway through the ANBU's speech about the two families fruitless battles and how the people were afraid to leave their homes because of fear of being killed, someone knocked into her.

"Sorry." The guy said, ducking behind her and peeking round the corner every now and then until he was sure that what was after him was gone.

"Yeah... er, um, sorry 'bout that, but I needed to hide and you seemed to provide good cover." He said, standing his full height (he was as tall - if not taller than Neji) and she had to look up at him, and he gave her a sheepish grin and was rubbing the back of his head with one hand. The colour of his hair was weird too, even though it was blonde like Ino, it was a darker shade of it.

A light blush started to cover her face and it only darken when she saw his eyes. Again like Ino's his eyes were blue - but the shade of blue...she couldn't describe it, it was something akin to the sky.

"Hey, um, do you have a fever? Your face is all red." He put his other hand that wasn't behind his head and put it to the girl cheek, that only caused the blush on her face to become a deep red and she was blinking to keep herself from fainting (she was failing) and the red started to creep down her neck. The boy (thinking the fever had gotten worse) lowered his head and their faces were but a few inches away.

Hinata had to will herself to look away because if she didn't, she knew she would give way and faint... right into the strangers chest. The man having dimly gotten the idea that she was perhaps uncomfortable with their position let go of her face and backed away. He flashed her a wolf grin and parted ways. Poor Hinata seemed in a daze for two more minutes before Sakura and Ino came, telling her that they were ready to go to another store, she acquiesced and they left.

Even after two hours of shopping she couldn't seem to get him out of her head, and sighed melancholy at the though of not seeing him again, only to have Sakura ask if she was alright and she gave her a speedy response, so as not to let her friend worry about her. She was happy not to have Neji there (they somehow managed to escape him; and for one reason or another Neji wasn't using his Byakuugan to find them) otherwise the first thing that would come to his mind was that she was sick, or her feet were tired and they needed to go home.

It was around three in the afternoon when Sakura suggested they did enough, and Ino agreed, because she had a mission in the morning and she still had to get ready for it. They came back to the first store they went to and Hinata hesitantly told them that she wanted to buy a book, the one that she had read before they left the first time.

The Hyuuga heir began to feel very uncomfortable at how some of men in the store (and those looking in the mirror) were leering at her and wished Ino hadn't ask (force) her to wear those clothes. Right now she was dressed in figure-hugging outfit that consisted of dark blue shorts, with a shallow light pink V-neck shirt and a dark blue jacket that buttoned up (too bad for her Ino used a kunai to cut off all of the buttons from her stomach up).

Walking fast, she made it to the book section in record speed, only to bump into someone. Slowly she opened her eyes (she had closed them instinctively on impact) and saw her face was buried in someone's chest; she could barely see over his shoulder. Warily, she looked up and the blush on her face intensified when she saw who it was... the man that bumped into her earlier.

"Oh... its you. I was hoping to see you again, but didn't think it'll be here," he said with a laugh and put his hands behind his head in an casual manner.

"I-I'm here to get s-something." she finished and hated herself for stuttering; at least it wasn't as frequent as when she was younger. Hinata quickly put some distance between them and searched for the book she was reading earlier, only not to find and she began to worry about someone else having gotten the book before her.

"Looking for this?" The man inquired after seeing her fruitless search for the book that was perhaps the one in his hand. Holding it up Hinata was delighted that the book wasn't bought - yet.

Her companion seeing her expression change at the sight of book insisted, "Here, take it. You were reading it earlier and it wouldn't be right to take something someone else wants."

Hinata seemed hesitant but after he told her that she should have the book she took it gratefully and bowed to him.

"You don't have to bow, um... Miss...?" he trailed off, waiting for her to finish.

"Hinata. Hyuuga Hinata."

"Hyuuga, eh?" he said more to himself than to her and a dark expression overtook his features.

"Kamikaze Naruto, Hinata." he extended his left hand, and the darken expression dissipated and she met his wither pale right one. He feigned a smile and left.

Sakura and Ino who saw almost everything, and immediately grilled Hinata for details, so much that she was immensely happy when Neji came. Babbling something about having to go and train with her father, she got away from her friends with a tell-tale blush.

"Dobe, finally I've find you. Didn't think I'd find you in a book store, though, I didn't know lower life forms could read." Naruto's companion stated bluntly.

"Shut it, teme. If I'm a 'lower life form' what are you since you are talking to one?" Naruto could only smirk in trimuph as his friend glared at him. A clever play on words from him. How odd. Usually with this pair it was the other way around.

Author Notes:

Yes I am revising this story cuz I didn't want my first to go as uncontinued and since people seemed to like it I am doing this over. Hopefully, this story will be 15 chapters. And also, this story is dedicated to Link Fangirl01. More about the changes I've made about this story will be explained later on and I'd like to thank my beta: pink phoenix for reading and improving this story. Also this story is AU. If you have any questions ask. Also I have the originall up so you can compare and contrast the chapters and the writing.