"It's not meant to be like this, right?" I ask, my voice wavering. "I'm not going to be killed at the rise of the sun?"

There isn't an immediate response. My eyes shift downward as I sit in silence, waiting, hoping, that I won't get the future that was spoken of. Then: "I don't know. I'd save you if I could, but..."

"Oh. Okay."

The sound of footsteps fills my ears. Or is it my heartbeat? Thud, thud. Thud, thud.

I woke up on the floor.

I wince as I pull myself up off of the ground. No wonder my dream was so weird, I think to myself. I always have the weirdest dreams when I sleep anywhere other than a nice bed. And I must have fallen off pretty early, because there was a pillow and a blanked down there for me.

"Ugh, why didn't someone tell me I was on the floor," I asked, knowing an answer is highly unlikely.

But my assumption is wrong. "That's where I found you when I got home this morning. Decided you deserved your sleep, so I left you there."

My heart nearly skipped a beat. "Neji!" I squealed. He rolled over on the bed and looked down at me, as I had fallen again and was laying flat on the floor. Our eyes met and I noticed the normal shine in his pearl ones was gone.

"Hello there, beautiful," he whispered, and I scrambled to sit up just so I could cover his face in kisses. "What's going on?"

"You know, the usual..." I didn't want to tell him about the talk Hiashi and I had had the week before. It was the one thing on my mind all the time, and seeing my wonderful husband made me think about it even more.

He pulled away from me. "There's something there. Spill it."

"I've been stuck in this crazy barn without you. Of course there'd be something there," I said as seriously as I could. "I just don't want to talk about it."

"Why not? Mentally scarring to remember it?"

"Oh no, I haven't forgotten it. It's all I think about, beside you, of course." My eyes shifted toward the ground, and I finally stood up, stretching. "Would have rather heard it from you, though."

A surprised laugh came out of his mouth. "He gave you that talk, didn't he?"

I nodded before jumping on the bed and laying down, my body resting next to his. "Scared me half to death. Why are all of his talks so scary?"

"Well, he has had to put up with teaching us the rules of the family. He likes putting people into a state of shock to get his point across..."

"You really are a wonderful husband. You can get me from being excited, to scaring me again, to making me wish I didn't actually marry you."

He rolled over so that he was on top of me. "But you still love me," he said, ignoring the fact that I had just insulted him. "And that's all that matters."

"Yeah, yeah." I pulled him into a deep kiss, because, even though he was slightly making me mad, I couldn't not love him.

There was a banging noise coming from across the hall, about three days after my little family was reunited. I was sitting on the bed, like normal, because what else was I going to do, other than go out and visit people who probably hated my guts? My closet was too full for me to go hide in at the moment, anyway.

But the banging noise was bothering me, as it was disturbing my alone time. I didn't mind all that much when there was noise coming from in the room, but when it was from across the hall, it was slightly odd. "Can you keep it down?" I asked, shouting as loud as I could, but I knew my voice didn't overpower the noise.

Hanabi poked her head into my room. "Oh, you're in here? Thought you'd be working."

"Working on what?"

"You didn't hear?" She seemed surprised. "Well, last night, Father decided that he was going to allow you two to build on to this side of the house, so that whenever you guys actually become a real family, you have your own space where he can watch you."

I groaned. "Not that shit again. Please no."

"I'm not going to talk about it anymore. But you know what? If you help, you can get it done faster."

"Erm, do you forget who you're talking to?"

She smiled her sweet smile. "Tenten, I know you're capable of a lot of stuff. After all, you are a ninja. You are part of this family."

"And I'm not very good at anything." I couldn't believe I was telling this to Hanabi, of all people. "I just don't do too good with work or any task that isn't sitting, writing, or fighting."

"You'd make a horrible mother."

"Thank you, you."

Once again, she put the smile on her lips. "You know, I really do appreciate you. I just don't always like you."

"How sweet." I went to add more, but I was rudely interrupted by the noises from across the hall. When there was a break in them, I said, "Come in, so we can close that door." She nodded and came in, just to run over to my closet like a starstruck little girl.

"You really do have a lot of cool stuff," she said in a hurried way, "and I'm jealous. Father would never spoil me like this."

I gasped. "Spoiled? I bought almost all of that stuff myself, and only a few things in there are from after I moved here." My hand waved towards a few pairs of shoes sitting near the front. "But, I guess, since you're small, you can get in there and look around."

Never before had I seen Hanabi get so excited as I did when I said that. Her eyes opened wide, her jaw dropped, and she squeezed in between my boxes and stuff, just to actually look at everything I owned. There were some things in there that I didn't particularly want her to see, but she was being nice for the moment.

And I guessed I could just play along.