Chapter Three: Love is for Sick Fools

Tenten had trained herself for the next few weeks alone, seeing she hadn't wanted to bother Neji, seeing he was now training more and more with his Uncle as of lately. Neji had told her and Lee this the day he was allowed to train with them after recuperating from his severe injuries.

He would spend some of the time though when not training with his Uncle, with her and Lee, but most of his time was spent there. This made her slightly upset, seeing she wanted to confess to him so badly right then and there her feelings, but there was never any time to do that, not when the Hyuuga Boy was always staying only for 2 hours, to train with the rest of his team before being summoned by his Uncle.

Tenten pulled out three kunai blades and flung them directly at her targets that she had painted on the tree, never once missing the bullseye. She had always been proud of her abilities to never miss a target when it came to throwing from shuriken to naginata at her targets.

Tenten began thinking to herself as she finished her practice, having been waiting for the rest of her team to show up, 'I wonder how Neji's doing, I miss him a lot, and he's certainly changed since that Rescue Mission.' Suddenly Tenten heard quiet footsteps approach and turned quickly to see Neji had appeared, early as he always was.

Tenten smiled, "Good morning Neji-Kun…" She said in her usual sing song like voice. The white eyed boy looked at her and replied with an 'Hn'. At least his attitude hadn't changed.

Tenten was glad for that.

Neji walked over to a tree and leaned against the tree as he then crossed his arms, and closed his eyes for a moment, before speaking at last to her,

"Tenten, seeing the others are not here at the moment, and I have some time on my hands, would you care to spar and help me with some of my training?"

Tenten was more then happier to help him; she had done this during the Chuunin exams. Tenten then spoke up, "Of course Neji-Kun…I'd be happy to help you." She attempted to give him a small smile. Neji though just smirked at her, she knew he wasn't good at showing his emotions, but she knew Neji was appreciating her acceptance.

Without even another pause, Tenten took off into the trees; Neji activated Byakugan with a fast handseal or two. Tenten grabbed her scroll and waited for the perfect moment to strike, she was in a very good hiding place, just slightly outside of his range of sight, but not out of range of her throwing.

Neji strolled into her line of view, and heard him speak out, "Come out and fight Tenten…" Suddenly a wave of kunai, shuriken and any other possible weapon you could think of was flung directly at him.

Neji's eyes widened and quickly he began spinning, releasing his chakra as he called out, "Hakkesho Kaiten! (Eight Trigrams Palms Heavenly Spin)" Tenten watched amazingly as her weapons were flung away from the barrier of swirling chakra, or laid around Neji in a halo.

This was one of her reasons she loved Neji, sometimes, he was a genius in every way possible perhaps.

Tenten then attempted to use her special jutsu on him; quickly she drew her special scrolls from out of her pouch, as a means to end the training session of course. Quickly placing the scrolls into position, each beside her, she made the handseals, and called out, "Soshoryu! (Rising Twin Dragons)"

This brought Neji to look in her direction, when he suddenly heard the poofing sound of smoke in a direction. Neji gasped a little and quickly, did another Hakkesho Kaiten as the waves of weapons came at him. As soon as Tenten was done, he quickly made his move.

As soon as she was crouched over, he quickly rushed up the tree, by bringing chakra to his feet, of course, and once he was up the tree enough, he then jumped up onto the branch that she was on and immediately attempted to attack her, with just normal taijutsu, knowing it would be over kill to use Jyuuken.

He was feeling better at least, thought a tired Tenten, suddenly she saw him in the corner of her eye and quickly got to her feet, and attempted to block some of his punches that came at her, managing to get hit in the cheek with one of them, but she blocked the others.

"You're getting better at this Tenten…" She heard him say, as he attempted to side sweep her to the tree branch. Tenten quickly dodged by flipping into the air and landing crouched, trying to trip him with her foot as she moved her head when she felt the lightest of touches from his palm.

Tenten was getting slightly thrilled at being so close to Neji for some reason, even if they were training at this moment, she then said, "I see your feeling better now Neji-Kun."

Neji nodded, he could sense a slight difference in Tenten for some reason, was she trying to impress him? He also noticed she was getting tired, he would have to end this quickly enough, so as not to over exhaust her, and himself as well. He was still not fully up to par. Neji decided to attempt to get behind her and grab her.

Tenten was indeed getting tired, and she could tell Neji was not up to his full strength; normally their practices lasted for at least an hour to two hours. Tenten attempted to dodge another Palm strike coming at her, and suddenly she realized he was behind her. She almost cried out as he grabbed her then shoved her against the tree trunk pretty damn hard.

Wincing she heard his voice against her ear; softly speak into it, "I won…again…Tenten." Tenten shivered slightly when she felt his breath so close to her. She began to blush slightly, but quickly hid her blush. She then grumbled,

"Hai Neji…you won this…time." She said softly.

Neji looked at her for a moment, why did her face suddenly go red when he was close to her like that? Neji let her go, and asked her,

"Tenten…are you feeling well? Your face was flushed for a moment there." He was just being slightly concerned for her; it wasn't like he cared much about her. (A/N: which we all know he will sooner or later –grins-)

Tenten blinked and said, "Yeah I'm okay Neji-Kun just tired that's all." She attempted to give him a smile to prove she was okay. Though at the moment, teenaged hormones were acting up in a certain Panda-Chan right now.

Neji nodded and crossed his arms as he leapt down from the tree branch and sat down and crossed his legs, attempting to what looked to be slipping into a meditative stance, but before he did this he said, "You can join me if you want Tenten."

Tenten was a little taken a back, no way was she going to refuse to meditate with her Childhood crush now. Tenten then quickly jumped down off the tree and landed in a crouch in front of him before settling to sit beside him. She always enjoyed these sorts of moments; at least Lee hadn't shown up yet to ruin their perfect moment.

Neji spoke to her as she closed her eyes to attempt to meditate beside him,

"You seemed slightly distracted during our spar today Tenten…" He left the rest for her to fill in.

"I apologize if I was Neji-Kun; there's been a lot on my mind as of late." Tenten tried to explain but suddenly felt his bandaged hand on her cheek as a pair of ivory eyes stared into her own chocolate brown ones.

"You should be more careful, you are lucky we weren't on a mission, even the slightest distraction can prove to be a fatal mistake in the end." Said Neji softly.

Tenten blinked when she saw something in his eyes, something warm almost, did he really care for her? She wanted to feel his caress on her face more often, this was indeed rare for him to be doing this to her no doubt. She then nodded and said as he moved his hand back to his lap,

"Hai Neji, I'll try harder next time to not be distracted."

Neji had no idea what he had just done, by touching her cheek like that. What was wrong with him? Was he starting to care more about his teammates? Especially Tenten? He couldn't allow that to happen, caring for Tenten would just distract him more, and could prove to be a weakness as well. 'Love is for Sick Fools' thought Neji to himself, 'I have no time for love, and I have to get as strong as possible before I can even think about something like that…' 'Although…' Neji quickly shook the thought out of his mind before he could finish the thought.

Neji had to keep up his cold exterior which was the way he had always been. He then turned to Tenten as he spoke, after thinking about things in his head, when suddenly he realized something as well, "Tenten…are you…the one that said those words to me while I was unconscious?" He had been attempting to find out for the past few weeks, who said them, he had drawn to the conclusion it must be his teammate.

Tenten was taken a back at his cold bluntness, how did he know? She frowned a little to herself before quickly looking away, "What do you mean Neji?" She was trying to hide the fact from him, that she did love him, she knew he would not return the feelings she felt, probably not now not ever.

"Do not look surprised Tenten, I've come to this conclusion that, the reason you have been acting so strange as of lately, is because it was you in my hospital room, who confessed those words to me, even though I was asleep yes, but I could still hear you." Neji said in a cold, deadly quiet voice. "And let me say this so that I am clear, I have no time for love, nor anything else. Love is for sick fools who have time to waste, I have no time at all in this path of life I have now chosen."

"It is a waste of time, time that could be spent more on training your Shinobi skills. So in other words, you are wasting your emotions and time on someone that can not possibly feel the same way back." Neji finished coldly, closing his eyes and crossing his arms against his chest. He then heard a gasping sob like sound coming from his partner beside him. He had no regrets in rejecting her; he didn't even realize nor did he care that he had caused her pain by his harsh words.

Tenten was now crying, indeed. He hadn't even given her a chance to speak, or argue. He sounded so cold to her. She attempted to hold back her sobs but it was so difficult to do so. She got up to her feet and yelled,

"You're the biggest fucking jerk in this whole entire world Neji! How can you say something like that!? Oh wait that's right you're the awesome great Hyuuga Neji, the untouchable one." She was angry that much could be said, she wanted to very well slap some sense into her teammate, "The biggest cold hearted bastard…where the hell do you get off telling a girl that has probably loved you for the longest time, saying words like that? Hmm? Oh again that's right you're the great Neji, your allowed to do anything you feel like, including hurting people's feelings…"

She didn't get to finish because she was then suddenly slammed into a tree, by a now seethingly angry Hyuuga boy, who was now staring daggers at her, his hands left painful bruises on her shoulders. Tenten let out an almost strangled cry of pain, as she heard him growl at her,

"I can say anything I feel like saying, Tenten, I couldn't care less if you did love me, your nothing to me, just a teammate, that is all, you're the biggest fool for even thinking I could love you, I don't care about anything other then my training." "Besides I don't like tomboyish girls anyway."

Tenten closed her eyes to hide the pain she was undoubtedly showing off in them, her heart was now ripping into tiny pieces at his cruel words, especially the last ones he said to her. She attempted to break free of his death like grip on her shoulders, which she knew she would be bruised for awhile, by slipping out from under him, not wanting to see the anger in his eyes, nor hearing the pain wracking words that spit out of his mouth at her.

She knew he was dead wrong about some of the things he was saying at her, this had been a lot worse then when he used to ramble on about destiny, and in escapable fate, love was an emotion that people needed to have, to be able to feel. Tenten had always been caring of Neji, but after today, she knew her efforts to make him see clearly that she loved him, were slowly becoming disastrous.

She heard him talking to her, again, his grip not loosening as he felt her struggle to get free, "I'm not through talking to you Tenten…" Suddenly he felt something come at him, and immediately took action, she had tried to slap him with a hand, which he grabbed and twisted it slightly, glaring at her, and he then released her. He then said as he walked a way, cruelly,

"Fine…" He didn't look back at her as he walked away, brushing past Rock Lee as he was coming to train with his team, having just returned from a small mission with Gai-sensei.

Lee spoke up, "Neji? What's going on?" He saw Tenten in tears; he hadn't seen the whole incident, a slight worried look on the boy though appeared as he waited for Neji's answer.

Neji then said, "Nothing is going on, that should concern you, I merely was talking to Tenten that is all." He then continued walking away from the two of them now, not saying another word.

Tenten watched Lee show up and then Neji disappearing. The tears continued to fall down her face, shaking her head she quickly got up and took off running, not even caring to pick up her weapons or anything. She just ran, she heard Lee's voice shouting to her, "TENTEN?!"

She ignored him, just kept running until she managed to get to her home, and quickly opening the door, slamming it shut, she then collapsed on her couch, sobs began to wrack her body as she allowed the pain to take her full force.

She had never seen Neji be so angry at her, just for loving him. Never, she knew he had always attempted to hold back whenever he and she were training. But that, that wasn't like him at all what she had seen. Such cold deadly anger in those white eyes of his.

Tenten heard the door being banged on, and someone yelling for her to open it, she called out, "LEE GO AWAY I DON'T WANT ANY COMPANY RIGHT NOW!!"

She then allowed herself to continue to sob in grief, Neji had been so cruel, so very, very cruel to her, all she wanted to do was tell him she loved him, wanted to let him know that he wasn't alone in the world. And he had out right rejected her so rudely and cruelly at that.

Tenten just felt like crawling into a hole and dying now, her spirit had been broken after this, she probably never would be the same cheery Tenten again, who knew right? She listened as she heard Lee's voice at her door; she had thought he had left her door by now, speaking,

"Tenten…you forgot your weapon scrolls so I brought them back…if Neji is to blame for Konoha's Youthful Blossom's tears, I will gladly kick his ass for you."

Tenten waited until she heard his sigh and then heard him mumbling that he would return when she was feeling a little better, then his footsteps as he left. Tenten choked back another sob that wanted to escape as she quietly got up and went to her door; opening it she saw Lee was gone now, she quickly grabbed her scrolls and placed them on a table inside of her apartment and locked her door again.

Her heart and chest was aching now, all she had left were her fantasies, of being with the man that had hurt her. This would only make things worse instead of better for her. Tenten quietly went to her bedroom and allowed herself to fall onto her bed and began anew with fresh tears falling down her face, until she basically cried herself to sleep.

Read and Review Nicely please Thanks