Chapter Six: Stumbling
One week later, Neji unpacked the last of his clothing and wondered if his problem might possible be solved.
He and Naruto had been moved from their small room, shifted into the dorms where most of the candidates lived.
The shift had come about because a worldwide request for candidates that had come from the newly founded Grand Line Weyr, asking for volunteers from each established Weyr. Six had chosen to be transferred from Konoha, but even with only a few from every Weyr, Grand Line would have enough to ensure a good choice for their first clutch at hatching time.
For Konoha, this mainly meant that Neji and Naruto and some other overflow candidates could now be placed in the dorms to free up the rooms they'd been using for guests and other temporary visitors.
Neji had never slept in a dormitory, even back at Hyuuga, but in the wake of Naruto's night-time ordeal, and his own, he thought it was for the best that they were here. It had been odd enough learning to sleep with one other person in the room, though, and he wasn't sure how long it would take to get accustomed to fifteen more.
Naruto's would be sleeping across from his, now, both of them in the last beds in their row, snugly up against the wall with the door to the hallway. There was a heavy curtain that could be drawn around each bed for privacy and slight noise muffling, and to keep out the glowbasket light from the hall, but that was still a far cry from a two-bed room.
As long as Neji didn't have to endure lying awake, alone with Naruto, it was enough. Hopefully enough to defuse the tension that Neji was starting to feel during the day as well.
Now he wouldn't hear Naruto breathing and shifting in the next bed anymore. Ever since Naruto had grabbed him, held on, ever since Neji had mistakenly thought Naruto had been… touching himself… just being alone with him was getting difficult.
A burst of raucous laughter made Neji frown. No, he certainly wasn't alone with Naruto anymore, not with Kiba and Chouji and the rest to make their rackets and bother him in nice, safely annoying ways.
Neji didn't like the noise here, he didn't like sharing the room with everyone else. He did regret that they no longer had their small shared space, but the comforts of it had been lost well before this move. For the past week, in the wake of Naruto clutching at him upon waking from his nightmare, Neji had lain in uncomfortable, inescapable awareness every night, until exhaustion pulled him into sleep.
Daylight, at least, had been tolerable, but only at first. Neji wasn't on the same chore group as Naruto, but they did share lesson and meals. There were plenty of distractions, and Neji had years of practice with concealing his feelings, and so it had felt almost normal, until lights out.
But after today, he knew that this was better.
It had been a day of shared chore shifts. A great four-times-yearly Weyr cleaning effort that candidates were an integral part of, and Neji had been shoulder-to-shoulder with Naruto, or so it felt like, for the entire time. Far too many physical contacts—hands covering hands while passing items to be un-shelved or re-shelved, shoulders bumping through narrow doorways, Naruto leaning right over him to reach for another scrubbing brush or empty bucket or a new rag, so close Neji could feel the heat of him, smell his sweat—Neji was almost certain, he made himself believe, that no longer sharing quarters would diminish the impact of all those shameful stimuli.
Now, Neji was nearly done stowing his things. As he tucked the last shirt into the clothes chest at the foot of his bed, mostly tuned out the chatter around him. Naruto was talking and laughing with Kiba and Chouji at the foot of Chouji's bed.
"Green boys? It doesn't really look like too many for this go-round, does it? There are a lot of girls," Naruto said, and Neji was suddenly paying full attention, unable not to, despite not wanting to hear anything about green boys. "And none of the new guys look green."
"Never know," came a laconic voice, and Neji knew Shikamaru had joined the little gathering. A glance over confirmed that, the top-knotted boy sprawled idly on Chouji's cot.
"Yeah, but we're talking holdbred," Chouji answered, "Not many of those turn out green 'less it's obvious. Like, we got Kiba—"
"Not green!" Kiba guffawed, and Neji glanced over to see him balancing on his toes, eyeing Shikamaru, "I like girls too much. But I've never…" he trailed off with an honestly speculative look, then smirked and pinched Shikamaru's calf as if testing the quality, grinning at the acerbic look he got. "Guess I'll have to try a few things. Maybe even catch a few. I'm not green, but I'm… flexible."
Neji gritted his teeth at the hooting and crude innuendo that adjective triggered. He didn't want to listen to this conversation, he didn't want to know if Kiba cared to "catch" a male dragonrider. Hanging about outside a mating weyr as a potential bedmate for the dragonlust-crazed riders whose dragons had fallen out of the flight wasn't something they were supposed to be discussing anyway.
He had finished his unpacking. But there was no point in leaving the dormitory. Master Hayate would be along soon to lead a class on manners and protocol for when the first tithe train festival event began in two weeks. Neji pulled a shirt with a torn seam from the clothes chest, and retrieved his needle and thread from the nightstand drawer. Make-work was make-work, but at least he could try to ignore them.
"And who else? Shino?" That was directed at Kiba as well, as his near-constant companion was not back from chores yet. Kiba shrugged.
"He doesn't talk about that," Kiba said, "you know how he is. I wouldn't guess green, but…"
"He doesn't talk about anything," Naruto put in with a snort, "weird guy."
"He's alright." Kiba said, and Neji could hear a slightly aggressive edge to his voice. "Didn't help the way people looked at him when he got here. His family breeds those bugs to make medicine, but they all just think it's gross."
"Yeah, yeah," Naruto placated. It sounded casual but everyone knew the understanding ran deeper than that. "Yeah. Well, mystery should help with the girls. Guys. Whatever he wants. I could use some of that."
"You couldn't be mysterious for sex or even your own hide," Chouji chuckled, "all you do is get in everyone's face."
"It's a skill!" Naruto protested in predictable overreaction. They laughed at him and Neji looked up to see Naruto with his arms crossed proudly, expression bright with good humour. Naruto met Neji's gaze, and he returned the infectious look with a smile of his own, despite his discomfiture. Naruto's grin widened.
"And you, yet another imported holdbrat!" Naruto crowed, and bounded to Neji's bed. His eyes sparkled with amusement, but Neji had to fight immediate misgivings and the sudden urge to move back. He knew he wasn't at ease enough to participate so casually in this conversation, but he didn't want that to show.
Unfortunately, it looked like Naruto was fully caught up in the joking, because he leaned far too close, and waggled his eyebrows. "Green?" he asked, running a finger playfully along Neji's jaw. Neji inhaled slightly and held himself still. Naruto's eyes narrowed in an exaggerated leer, and he flattened his hands on his own chest, moving them suggestively. Neji felt that terrible warmth beginning in him again, and wished he could get away. "Think you could ever lust after this fine specimen?" Naruto ended with a chuckle.
Difficulty with the green and blue weyrfolk was a running gag at the expense of holdbred candidates, whether it was true of them or not. Most weyrfolk were tolerant as newer arrivals learned some tolerance of their own, but being gently mocked was part of the acclimation. And so Naruto plainly expected Neji to refute him, as had happened before, with some appropriately biting sarcastic quip. This was teasing, and not malicious, and certainly not meant as an insult.
And had it been Kiba or Shikamaru, or had Naruto kept his hands to himself, Neji might have mustered some correct reply. Had this been another day, one less plagued with inadvertent contacts and awful reactions, he might even have answered as Naruto expected. He'd stayed at the Weyr long enough to be able to react appropriately in this type of casually jesting situation. Or he ought to have been.
But that light stroke down his jaw was like a match to a fuse, and the memories of the sensations that Neji had accumulated over their time together thus far exploded and cascaded over him, from Naruto's first rough grip on his tunic, way back at Hyuuga, to the gentle hands on his infected back to the hot, sweaty, nightmare-shocked shoulder under his palm and strong, frightened grip on his waist. The curl of heat in his belly that had smouldered all day long flared up, and with it his fear and disgust at himself.
Then he was awash in panicked fury, unable to keep the anger and insult off his face.
Naruto's grin vanished, replaced with realization, and then dread.
Neji sucked in a deep breath. It was too much. He could be normal again, but the problem here was Naruto, wasn't it? Neji could ignore it otherwise, but Naruto, whenever he was near, was always causing this reaction, and it was only getting worse.
"Move back, Kyuubi," he bit off, too quietly for the other boys to hear, and cursing the tremor in his voice. "Do not touch me," the next words came without thought, but were spat with a vehemence that came right from the panicked dread in his gut, "and stay away."
Hurt, grief and apology all washed across Naruto's features. Anger flashed across next, and then vanished, leaving a stunned regret that made something sharp twist in Neji's chest, deep beneath the self-disgust.
After the sharp, shocked pain and twitch of anger, stunned disappointment and a heavy, cold weight settled in the wide blue eyes. None of that calmed the heat in Neji's body, however. Or the hostility that had flooded in over it.
And that, Naruto seemed to realize. After another frozen moment, the corners of his eyes tensed slightly. Then all the emotion faded. The last to go was angry hurt, and then he finally moved back. He was already grinning again as he turned back to the other boys. "Still a mystery, guys!" Neji, too, composed himself before Naruto stood up straight, meeting the good-humored laughter with a blank-faced head-shake they seemed to take for jesting holdbred green-fear. His Hyuuga training served him perfectly.
As Naruto continued with the exchange of banter and joking insults, Neji felt his surge of emotions even out. He became calm, almost frozen with it; if Naruto stayed away, he wouldn't have a single problem. The sickening weight had gone from inside him, and if its absence left an vacant feeling in his relief, it would be worth it. It had to be.
Old habits came to his rescue before any regret could gain a dangerous foothold within him. Reasoning coolly laying itself out. He had ceased to need Naruto for help with his injuries months ago. Likewise, Naruto would now be in no danger of suffering bad nights. There was no need for Naruto to come anywhere near him, no need for either in the other's presence.
And if that angry look was any indication, he needn't worry at all, because he'd just broken whatever bond they'd built since his arrival.
Neji felt an ache growing in his stomach, and wondered if he'd eaten something bad at midday meal.
Naruto feigned careless humour with the guys without any trouble, but he was aware of Neji the entire time, not that far behind him, ignoring them all. Though he'd grasped right away what had happened, what he'd done, most of him was still reeling from the suddenness, and when Candidatemaster Hayate arrived some minutes later, he paid little attention to the lecture.
I fucked it up, he cursed at himself. He hadn't thought. He'd just ridden the momentum of his good humour into complete and total callous stupidity.
Part of him was angry at Neji, and still smarting from the 'Kyuubi' appellation. It wasn't Naruto's fault the stuck-up Hyuuga boy was so hidebound. They lived in a Weyr. Neji had to get off his prejudiced, close-minded high horse and put that stuff behind him.
But… Neji had. He'd done as well or better than any candidate brought in from a place with ideals similar to Hyuuga. He had never ever acted impolite towards any actual green folks. There had been visible difficulty with that in the beginning, obvious signs that Neji still held the Hyuuga tenets, but it had been equally obvious that he aware those tenets didn't belong here.
All that awkwardness had faded with time as he interacted with the green fellows and blue girls enough to realize they were just people like anyone else. He willingly spent time with Lee, now, and seemed to enjoy it.
Now Neji only became obviously uncomfortable when suggestive talk became less suggestive and more explicit. But he'd never snapped like that before. Of course, no one had ever pushed him like that before either.
Shame for the unthinking joke was settling into his stomach. Naruto had definitely gone much too far past Neji's slowly lowering boundaries. He'd cornered him.
Master Iruka had explained once that while most people could come to accept others being different from what they thought was normal, some people tended to have much more difficulty accepting that the difference could apply to them, even at a Weyr, where the average was very heavily skewed away from that of Hold life.
Which was why jokes could go to far if the joker didn't watch what he was doing. And Naruto had well and truly horrified Neji. There had been fear under that anger. Naruto felt sick.
He'd been too carried away, as usual. Naruto had shoved Neji right into it. Naruto could have stopped himself from teasing if he'd had the brains to think for once.
Naruto saw Sasuke in his mind's eye for a moment, the moment their friendship had broken. There'd been no fear then, but plenty of fury, cold and implacable, focused entirely on him, just as Neji's angry horror had been. And then he'd left. Neji won't leave. He's happy here, he belongs here, Naruto refuted his comparison. He knew Neji wasn't Sasuke. He wasn't so darkly obsessed, so dangerous... and he wasn't going to disappear.
Disappear? No. But Naruto driven him away nonetheless, and lost another person who was important to him.
"Remember," Hayate was saying, "you're all meant to be on your best behaviour. The visiting holders and traders are not weyrfolk, and—" he paused to cough, "—thus you will have to remember to keep an open mind and allow for the differences in the lives we lead."
Naruto hid the miserable feeling that Master Hayate's words gave him by studying the list hung on the wall of who would be coming. Tithe trains arrived in a rush when winter ended. Spring tithes were trade goods and crafted supplies. Trains arrived gradually when it was summer, and then there was a second large event in the fall, when harvests sent wagons of food to the Weyr.. Spring though, meant glasscraft hall, minercraft, the Rocky Coast caravan and the Sunriver traders… Naruto eyed the list halfheartedly.
He glanced over at Neji, who was studying it too, face a solemn, impenetrable mask, as if he was committing it to memory.
Probably was, at that, Naruto thought, an miserable wash of emotion sluicing through him when he remembered he couldn't go over and sit next to him and talk about it, tell him all about the different things the traders brought, the chances for shopping and trading, the sweets and clothing and trinkets that made the whole thing almost worthy of a Gather.
But Neji had told him to stay away, and Naruto was determined to prove he could, in fact, keep his idiot self under control.