Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto.

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Painful Sorrow

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She was desperate; she wanted to get out of the ceremony before she would faint. Even though this is her fourth time being in a funeral, she's still not used to the gloomy atmosphere engulfing her. In the end, she knew what she was going to do once she got back home to the Hyuuga manor.

Cry.

Cry her whole heart out since the person she admired and told all her secrets to was dead.

Kiba Inuzuka and Shino Aburame were side by side her; Team Ten, Team Gai, and Team Seven were two meters away from them ready to give support if it was needed.

Slowly, the coffin was scaled down six feet under. Akamaru whined as he lowered his head humbly to give respect to the dead body inside the coffin. Kiba glanced at his loyal friend and carefully raised his hand to pet him. He too was in despair and wished that this incident had never happaned. Kiba's mournful eyes glanced at Shino who casually shoved up his glasses while staring down at the descending coffin. Kiba heard a sudden sigh from Shino as he kept quiet to himself.

A loud and vigorous cry from a baby was heard not too far away.

Hinata turned her head to look at Hayate Kakashi who held the baby carefully. The stoic masked man's eyes (of course) looked emotionless. He now has four important people gone from this world, including his friend who died due to childbirth. It was a sad day for him. Kakashi rocked the baby gently as he tried to calm the crying baby down. Hinata noticed that Gai constantly looked at the crying baby while he tried his best to pay attention to the funeral. She wanted to blame the innocent child for killing her teacher, but she couldn't. It was immoral, wrong, and down right dirty; however, she wanted to blame someone, something, anything, just so she can release her anger and hatred. If she stayed in the funeral any longer she would loose her sanity.

When she turned her head back to the coffin it was almost half buried.

After taking a few deep breaths, she felt that she was going to cry anytime soon.

She looked down at the grassy ground and tried to resist the tears falling. Her hands gradually reached up to her aching chest and tried to clutch her dying heart. Her deep and long breaths were now hastened to shortened ones. She was evidently going to break down in any moment and look like a weakling in front of her respected teammates whom she love. She didn't want that; She didn't want that to happen at all. Hinata just had to leave and so she did.

Shino, Kiba, and Akamaru abruptly turned their heads as they saw the Hyuuga heiress quickly running away.

"Hinata-sama…!" cried Neji, almost stopping her but failed as she forcefully push him away while not caring even if it was her own cousin whom she looked up to. Neji blankly stared in shock at the Hyuuga heiress. Everybody watched the beautiful and serene growing girl run away from the dark and depressing aura that she didn't want to be in.

"Tch. Troublesome..." muttered by a person who already knew the pain she was going through. Shikamaru Nara glared at Hinata's faint figure disappearing.

"Poor Hinata..." whispered Ino to Sakura who was next to her.

Shikamaru noticed a nod from the bubblegum haired kunochi. "It must be really hard for her..."

'They have no idea...' thought Shikamaru as he entwine his arms. He was told by Asuma that Kuranai had a great bond with the older Hyuuga girl. He always wondered how great the bond was between the two kunochi and now he knew. He hated helping troublesome women, but he knew the pain that Hinata was going through. He also had a great bond with his teacher, Asuma Sarutobi, who just passed away not to long ago. His eyes now focused on Naruto, who looked more than pissed.

'Why?' Shikamaru asked himself with a puzzled look. Shikamaru knew he would regret this but decided to sucked it up and help the poor girl. Sighing, the Nara slowly approached the Kyuubi holder.

It was funny how everybody (or almost everybody) knew that Hinata always had a thing for the blond idiot. Of course Shikamaru could help Hinata by himself in going through the pain, but decided to be a lazy and let Naruto handle it. Maybe the young Hyuuga heiress would thank him.

Maybe...

"Oi, Naruto."

Naruto turned around to face a calm Shikamaru, who was not shocked by the current event. "What is it Shikamaru?" he said sounding a bit irritated.

'Jeez, why is he so pissed?' the pineapple head wondered. Maybe his plan would backfire. Maybe he also had to go help the Hyuuga girl. Well he was in a way...

'Crap...Kurenai...you really should have trained Hinata on how to handle emotional things... I mean usually isn't that what women do first?'

Scratching the back of his head, he glared at Naruto. "Go get Hinata back so that the funeral can continue."

Naruto stared at Shikamaru. "What?"

'You damn idiot...' thought Shikamaru as he grunted. "I said go get Hinata. You understand her pain don't you?"

He noticed Naruto's blue eyes staring down at the ground with a painful expression. Yes, his perverted teacher passed away with the battle against one of the Akatsuki members. It was something Naruto could relate to Hinata right now. He knew the pain. It wasn't a very happy emotion anybody would be proud of. Shaking his head and glancing back at the tired Nara, he nodded. "I'll get her back. Dattebayo!"

Shikamaru smirked. So his lazy ass wasn't going to go anywhere, good for him right?

Without thinking twice, Naruto left to catch up with Hinata who is probably half a mile away by now. As Shikamaru crossed his arms, he looked back at the astounded people due to Naruto's "heroic" action. 'Hurry up Naruto...'

As Naruto ran through trees and bushes without halting, he constantly looked through all directions to find the dark blue haired girl. He somehow knew that she could have gotten lost because there's a chance that she wasn't paying attention to where she had ran off to. He didn't think anybody did when they just run off crying. She was already lost by the minute she had ran away.

"Chee..." he grunted. Minutes passed by and he's still jumping tree to tree. Just where did she ran off to? Naruto turned to look back, to find out that he was already far away from the ceremony, where's Hinata? Where would Hinata even go in this kind of situation?

He halted his tracks and stared at trees and bushes, he was trying to find any sign of the blue hair heiress. Slowly raising both hands, he had cupped them and shouted out: "HINATA!"

No response.

"HINATA!"

Naruto put back his hands at his sides. He was not going to give up! He clasped his palms together and rubbed them; he's ready to continue his search. He was pumped up and ready to go. "YOSHI!"

He was going to find her and bring her back even if she pleaded not to go. He planned to forcefully drag her to the ceremony.

Right when he was about ready to leave, he quickly stopped after hearing a few sobbing sounds not to far away from where he was. Like a hare, Naruto turned his head to where the sound was coming from. Jumping out of the tree he landed on the muddy ground. Trying hard not to make a sound the blond began to slow down his pace. The sound was getting closer as he continued walking for minutes. Finally, he stopped his tracks and just stared at the scenery in front of him.

There was Hinata, sitting on the ground with her regular mission clothes. Behind her was a redwood tree dripping water drops into her head and clothes. The air was giving moist to the surroundings. The area itself was a ghastly sight. Naruto could hear the sobbing that the Hyuuga heiress was making while she's just sitting on the ground. Sometimes she hiccuped while she was crying. The blond stared at her as she cried her eyes out. Although his mission from Shikamaru was to bring her back, he couldn't do it. She looked hopeless like a hopeless child. Even though he said to himself he would take her back no matter what, he still couldn't forcefully take her back . She was a mess, her hair was tangled and there were some leaves and small sticks hiding inside those dark blue locks. He couldn't see her face, but he knew in his mind that her eyes were puffy from all the crying she was making.

He heard her sob louder than before. Naruto frowned at the scene, Hinata was hurt and he could do nothing about it. There was a time he did help back at the chuunin exams where he saw Hinata this helpless. It was the battle between her cousin, Neji, and Hinata. At that time she was afraid and felt useless, but that time he hoped that whatever he said to her had encouraged her to become a powerful kunochi.

"Ku...nai...sei..."

Naruto clutched his hands into a fist. She was calling out for her teacher.

Correction: Her dead teacher.

He remembered well when he too was in denial. It was heartbreaking for him to hear that the person he consider a father figure was dead. To Hinata, Kurenai must have been like an older sister or maybe even a mother. Naruto once again watched closely at the crying girl. He heard her mumble the name once more, each time he heard it it became louder and louder. He couldn't take it. It was making him feel weak as he also remembered Ero-sennin passing away. Unlike her, he never cried one single tear at the death of his loved one. It felt that he was being rude to his teacher, Jiraiya, if he did so. Kurenai would be thinking the same thing. Probably...

"Kurenai-sensei...! Kurenai!" she screeched in top of her lungs; She was weak, lonely, and helpless.

Without thinking the blond boy ran up to the young girl in distress. Hinata suddenly stopped her cries, carefully glancing up she was astounded as she saw her crush, Naruto, staring down at her. Milky white eyes stared at enchanting azure ones. Her eyes immediately looked down to her hands that were laying on her thighs.

"Hinata..." she heard him say.

Hinata didn't look up at the Kyuubi holder who was just standing in front of her. She didn't want to meet the ocean blue eyes staring at her, looking at her in this weak condition. Both fifteen year olds stayed in their position for a few minutes. During that time Hinata was trying to suppress her tears, but needles to say they just kept rolling down her pale cheeks. She didn't noticed that the boy in front of her was kneeling down to her level, of course she wasn't even expecting a tight hug from Naruto Uzumaki. Being startled by the hug, Hinata's cheeks temperature began to rise. There was still tears rolling down her cheeks, meaning that she was still in the stake of shock but still depressed about the situation.

"N-Na...Naruto-kun...?" she breathed out.

The blond ninja stayed quiet and waited for the wails that wanted to come out. Realizing that her crush was holding her for comfort she mentally thanked him and began to cry on his chest.

Naruto's hug tightened as she cried. He didn't mind, he actually wanted her to cry herself to sleep. Maybe going back to the funeral was just too much for her.

He began to recall that Shikamaru also missed his teachers funeral. Naruto, himself, had missed half of Jiriaya funeral, but had decided to pay his respect later on.

She began to chant the words 'it's not fair' and whenever she would do that Naruto would just hold her. Tightly like he had never done before.

Unconscious of his movements, his lips were pressed on her forehead.

"Don't worry..."

Her cries turned into short sniffles.

"I'll help you..."

Hinata raised her head, just to see his azure eyes staring at her.

"...with this pain..."

This was actually written in early January, but I left it alone until recently I opened the folder and I just decided to finish it. It sucks doesn't it? Of course it does. There could have been more, but let's just leave it at that. I hate this. Bad one-shot I have EVER done. So go flame it! :\