◊ (Weddings Equal Busy) ◊
∆ (Konohagakure, Hyuuga Mansion, Neji's Room Finally) ∆ - VP: Neji - ¤ (3 Days Later) ¤
A/N: Christmas chapter is not going to happen if you want to see what happens during their Christmas go to my other story Uchiha Problems, go to chapter 26, entitled "Christmas Completeness", it's the chapter you might enjoy more but it's too cliché to have a Christmas chapter. There will be a good one later, I promise. This one was just too hard to work in with the rest of the plot line.
I awoke and I reached across the bed to find it surprisingly empty. I sighed; she wasn't there. I missed her. There was a knock at the door. Without a thought, I walked over to the door just to be hugged by whoever was there at the door. I inhaled the scent. It was Tenten. I hugged her tightly.
"I missed you." Tenten said hugging me.
"It's only been a few hours Ten, but I missed you too." She was surprised that I gave her nickname, but it just came naturally to me sometimes, when I was alone with her.
"Nii-san, Tenten has to go. She's just here to say morning." Hinata said standing behind Tenten along with a bunch of giggling girls. I wanted to smack myself, I blushed but showed no other signs of them even fazing me.
"Alright." I announced to them. I looked into Tenten's eyes. "I'll see you later." I said. She nodded and I watched her walk off.
After a few steps, Tenten turned around looked at me. "Oh and Neji, next time get dressed before you answer the door. I won't be able to cover for you next time." I smacked myself. I was just wearing ninja netting pants and a light undershirt. She smiled and walked off.
I sighed and slipped on my normal outfit, I'd find someone to spend the day with, wouldn't I? I thought to myself. Suddenly my phone rang. I answered. "Neji speaking." I said.
"Yo. It's me… Sasuke. All the guys are meeting at Shikamaru's house. Then we'll go home. The girls are planning something so they'll drag us around and we'll go to Tenten's place. She needs to talk to everyone."
"Alright, be there in a sec." I did the hand signs for the Body Flicker Jutsu, (commonly known as the teleporting jutsu. I finally realized the name.) I appeared on his couch.
"Hello Neji." Sasuke said. I nodded.
"You guys are boring." Naruto said walking into the living room.
"Don't eat my food." Shikamaru complained.
"Snatchy." Naruto yelled.
"Shut it." Sasuke said quieting everything.
"Why are we here?"
"Would you rather train alone?" Shikamaru asked.
"I guess." I said.
"Yes." Sasuke answered.
"No! I want a day off." Naruto yelled.
"We're here to discuss everything." Sasuke said.
"Oh right." Naruto said.
"Yeah." Shikamaru said.
"As in what everything?" I asked.
"Alright, I just called use here to do nothing." Shikamaru said. Everyone sighed.
"We have to get their rings." Sasuke said.
"Oh yeah." Shikamaru said.
I nodded. "Rings? I thought we were going to do that later."
"No, now while they're gone thinking we're bored." Sasuke argued.
"Fine, Fine, let's go." I said.
We arrived at the jewelry store. "Hello Mr.'s. How may I help you?" The lady asked with a evil looking smile.
"Marriage Rings. All of us." I stated. She looked surprised.
"I'll get our entire selection." She said, as if she was disappointed.
Six or seven girls came out caring large cases in their arms and set them on the counter. "This will work." Sasuke said.
"So how to start."
"Colors." A girl said walking into the store.
"Huh, aren't diamonds usually… like… diamond colored." Naruto said. The girl sighed.
"Yes, the main diamond is quite important but you can't buy the candle without a candle holder, can you?"
"No." Naruto said. "Then you'd burn your hand."
"Exactly. I'm…"
"Diana?" I asked.
"Neji-sama." She bowed on the ground. Everyone looked to me. (She's from The Reasons Why. I needed a character. She came to mind.)
"Diana, please, gets up." She got up.
"It's good to see you again."
"You look like… like… Tenten!" Naruto screamed.
"Yes, I'm her far relative. I saw Neji-s…" I stared at her. "san… and um… I wanted to know what's going on."
"You're supposed to be helping out the Hoshikage." I said.
"And miss the wedding, no way." She pouted. "I'm only here for the day to check on Tenten, secretly of course, but I wanted to know why you guys are in a jewelry store. Then I heard, sorry."
"It alright, but help would be appreciated." I said.
"Like I said, the candle holder is the true beauty behind the simple candle; they come in different sizes of metal and colors of the smaller stones so think about it." I nodded.
"So what do we do exactly?" Shikamaru asked.
"Pick out a metal ring and complimentary accent stones as well as a diamond."
"This is easy." Shikamaru said. We all watched him. It wasn't as easy as he thought it was. He walked over to the counter. He looked for a second and picked out a typical ring. He went to the stone collection and picked out two beautiful blue stones and the main diamond was the typical diamond, circular. It looked wonderful.
"How'd you do that?" Naruto asked amazed.
"I thought about Ino and that's how I think of her."
"Like shiny rocks."
"No…too troublesome but easy to handle, and two blue eyes." Shikamaru said. He held out the ring, it was just like he said. It was too troublesome to do more then was expected of him but he did just enough to make an impression. He thought about her and matched the ring to that. He walked up to the counter. "Also can I have it inscribed also, Shikamaru and Ino Nara." The girl who was putting everything together nodded and took the stone to the back room.
"It's hard!" Naruto yelled. He sat down on the ground and smacked his head against the glass 24 times in a row before I grabbed him and pulled him away from it. "It's too hard. I need help."
"You're fine, it's just more difficult for some then others." Diana said.
"So I don't know much about everyone, very little. Talk." She said sitting down next to him.
"Talk about what?"
"Your wife?"
"Hina-chan?"
"Yes." I answered for Diana who didn't know what was going on in his life.
"Well Hina-chan is really pretty, amazing, helpful, kind and caring toward everyone. Even though most people even her family hate her, well used to hate her, she still was nice to them and forgave them. She's always been there for me and no matter what I entrust in her, it doesn't change the fact that she loves me. She's amazing and she's like the head of her clan and stuff but she knows that she has to give up on her dream of that in order to be my side when I become Hokage. I feel bad about it but she assures me I'm fine and she's more then happy to agree to it. She also is freeing Neji, her cousin, you know him, well yeah, she's freeing him of his curse seal and making him head since she thinks he'd be better at it then her." Naruto said.
"I've met her, and Neji both, yes."
"Right… well yeah… that's a summary of who she is." Naruto finished.
"So what are some things about her personality that reminds you of parts of the ring."
"Her eyes, they remind me of diamonds. If you look in her eyes, they're like sparkly and shiny at the same time, like… I know like diamonds in the silver band. That would be amazing. Can we do that?" He asked.
"Sure we can. I want a silver band and lots of small diamonds around it and then one in the center of it all." He said. "Naruto and Hinata Uzumaki for the engraving." Diana nodded and explained how to make it.
"What about you?" Sasuke asked.
"I'm not sure." I looked at the showcase.
"Would you like to make something totally different?" The lady asked.
"I am but I'm not sure, not yet." I leaned against the wall.
Sasuke went over to the desk and explained what he wanted, he had been thinking it over the entire time, he asked for a heart shaped diamond and two pink stones on either side. Sakura loved pink, as was obvious so she'd love it. He got it inscribed and they all had their rings now that his had been made simply.
"Now?" Sasuke asked.
"Yes actually." I had been thinking and then it hit me. I would make the ring as individualistic, colorful and beautiful as she was. "This may take quite a long time." Everyone nodded and watched as I went up to the person and asked for a large peace of silver. They were weary of my craftsmanship but I knew what I was doing. I took it over to the metal floor and put my finger on the metal, the metal was quite thin and I curved curls lightly into the metal, instead of being straight, it curved in patterns along in the metal. However, unlike normal rings this one's metal was going to have stones and indentations made by chakra making it beyond unique. I handed it back to the girl. "Carve further where I have indented into the metal." She nodded. I looked at the stones; I picked out a few teeny tiny star shaped ones in various colors.
"It's done, it looks weak." I smiled.
"Trust me, it's not." I said. I had used my chakra to blend into the metal, similar to the other ring I gave her, that way my chakra infused with hers I could sense my chakra and find her. The chakra was the hold and even that along with the strong metal I had selected would hold it. In the ends of the curls, I had them place the stones in there along with the large diamond I had selected. Then I had them inscribe 'Tenten and Neji Hyuuga Forever' on it.
They handed me the box with the ring on it and I smiled. It was perfect. "You overdid it, didn't you?"
"Don't I always?"
"Yeah, you do." Naruto said.
"So the ring sends of a chakra signal." Sasuke said.
"So you can find it?" Naruto asked.
"No, so I can find the person who's wearing the ring no matter what." I said with a smirk.
"Smart move." Sasuke said.
"I'd recommend you guys doing the same, I did it to Tenten's other ring too."
"Really?" Naruto asked.
"Yeah, it also works that I can tell her emotions. I set it to react with another percent of chakra with a stone, its works quite nicely." I said.
"That's smart."
"Thanks. Let's get back to our places or the girls will expect their presents." I said.
"True, bye." Sasuke said running off.
"See you later." Naruto said slowly walking back to his apartment which wasn't far.
"Ino's probably already home looking for me. I'll go to the forest and pretend to sleep so she thinks I'm sleeping. It will throw off their suspicion by a lot." Shikamaru said walking back into the forest.
"Bye." I went to the training field. If we all made it seem like we weren't doing anything then they wouldn't have a clue. I jumped from tree to tree and made several moves in between. I did this for about 20 minutes until I was pinned to a tree by my sleeve. It hit so hard that it could hold me from falling.
"Neji, come down." She yelled pouting.
"Tenten." I said annoyed, slightly. She pulled the chakra string that she had attacked to it and I came falling but I adjusted my angle and I landed on her.
"Nice." She said being pinned to the ground. I climbed off of her and helped her up. "Getting pinned to the ground is annoying."
"So is being pinned to a tree."
"Whatever. I was just making a point that you're too close to the tree, movements are too slow and not enough versatility in it all."
"It's all about movement."
"I'd like to see you do better." She smiled and handed me her bag which had many kunai in it. She jumped into the tree and flew through them like a bird was, a beautiful light movements, but fast enough to dodge a kunai, like birds being hunt down too.
She jumped down. "How was I?"
"Perfect." I said smiling.
"Why are you smiling, I beat you."
"So, I've already accepted that you're better at me at some things, like I am better than you at some. If we both hadn't already accepted that then we'd have a pretty horrible relationship."
"True because we have a wonderful one." She said wrapping her arms around me. I kissed her lips and she pulled herself toward me.
"So you enjoy shopping for whatever you were shopping for."
"Yes, surprisingly enough, I did. You know how I hate shopping well this time was better since I wasn't the entire focus; it was evenly focused between the four of us. I enjoyed it, a lot."
"I'm glad."
"So… how was your day? What did you do? Did you see the other guys?"
"Good. Not much, only two things, yeah, we talked a bit." It was easy to tell her the truth without telling her everything; she wasn't one for details.
"Ah, so you ready?"
"For what?"
"For shopping with everyone else."
"Why?" I asked.
"Ahem, the girls and I need a dress from the wedding and you guys need tuxes. After all, this is a wedding, not a normal day." I kissed her cheek.
"I'm well aware of that Tenten."
"Then let's go." Tenten pulled me over to the park where everyone was meeting us. We walked to the park where we were all meeting.
"I don't see the point of this, Tenten. Can't we shop in town?" I asked. There were surely some places in town that had nice dresses. I mean, there are many weddings every hear, all the 16 year old. You'd think they would.
"Of course not, they don't have bride and groom stores in Konoha; we have to go to the main stream to shop, it's always been that way to buy anything." Tenten answered. Of course, they don't. Whoever is wanting to make money should start a dress industry in Konoha, since we don't have one.
"Fine," I said. I knew of course that the gowns and tuxes for the wedding were quite important so if we need to out of Konoha to do it, so be it.
"Come on Shikamaru, we're going to be late." Ino yelled. Her voice was so obnoxious. I wonder sometimes if he must wear ear phones or something constantly or is he already deaf? I think not but he must have some sort of secret. I'm glad Tenten's calm and relaxed a majority of the time.
As everyone knew, clearly. Shikamaru was taking over Kaydin's spot as her fiancé. This was because Kaydin saw their love as blind it was to those two. He had talked to Shikamaru about it, as well as Ino and was fine. He had said they were like family, and he couldn't marry her. She was alright but it still hurts.
"Troublesome Woman," He complained, everything for them was as it had always been. He protected her, she was loved in return and they lived happily. Kaydin's death effected their relationship a lot, far more then expected but he helped heal her. She still constantly went to his grave, every two months he had limited her but during the holidays we visited also. We were going to Kaydin's grave tonight before we went home so that we could talk about a few things and better our lives.
"Hinata, what are we doing again?" Hinata smiled and kept walking down the street. Naruto was as clueless as people came, it still is pondering in my mind many times why she loves him. I know she does but how that came to be? I don't know.
"Naruto, we are going shopping for tuxes and gowns for the wedding. Remember?" He shook his head. He had eyes that wanted her to explain and forgive him for messing up, she of course, being Hinata, did.
"No." She smiled again. She forgave him for this.
"Well we are, so let's go. The others are waiting." Hinata said shyly pushing Naruto to move forward. I didn't appreciate tardiness and Hinata knew that but she tried and I understand her dilemma so she's excused.
(A/N: A little insight, this chapter is a cut and paste version of chapter 24 of Uchiha Problems. To see how far we have to go before the wedding and the rest of their life here's a hint. Chapter 31 is a look back on the marriage, no marriage scene is shown in Uchiha Problems but there is one in this one.)
Well eventually we arrived there. "So what now?" I asked Tenten.
"We go to the girls' department and you to the men's." She said with a smile. I sighed, we were being separated again, this was starting to get annoying.
"What colors are we looking for again?" I asked.
"Black, Blue and Green."
"I want orange!" Naruto yelled.
"No!" Sakura yelled angrily.
"Alright, no orange. Just calm down Sakura." He said.
"Let's go, bye Tenten."
"We're less than 10 feet away, I assure you. I won't die or anything."
"You better not." She nodded and left with the other girls.
It didn't take us more than a few minutes to decide that we would wear black pants, a white vest and a light blue underlay. It was simple, classic and did well for the situation. We then got fitted perfectly for them and checked out. We went outside the store and sat on benches.
"All suspicisions clear?" I asked.
"Yeah, Hinata figured I was getting ramen." Naruto said putting his hands behind his head.
"I was still asleep when she found me, she yelled at me for resting and not leaving a note telling her where I was." Shikamaru complained.
"I trained and then she pinned me a tree while I was practicing acrobatics between branches. I've been studying hers to create a way to counter her movements."
"So?" Sasuke asked.
"She pinned me to a tree, and I hung there, by one sleeve." The guys chuckled. "Obviously, id didn't work." I answered. "She expects that I did that all day seeing as I always train a lot, though usually not without her. It would have been useful to have her train me at that though."
"Yeah, moving with the agility and speed within the trees Tenten has is quite useful." Shikamaru said. "For ambushes, hiding, and escaping as well as attacking, it works great."
"How many times has she pinned you to something?" Sasuke asked curious.
I shrugged, a lot. "Quite a lot, not much lately though She did it everyday for 2 months when I just met her." (It's mentioned 5 times in this book but it happens a lot behind the scenes).
"Oh, why?" Sasuke asked.
"I creeped up on her and she sensed me and without thinking she pins me to things."
"Ah." Sasuke said.
"Hinata isn't easily surprised, not at all."
"Of course dobe, she has Byakugan and heightened normal senses also." Sasuke said.
"Yeah but sometimes she fakes being surprised." Naruto said.
"Does it make you happy, when she lets you think you've surprised her?" I asked.
"Yeah, it makes me really happy that I can do something for her that she doesn't expect."
"Then her pretending to be surprised has served its purpose of making you happy and that in term, makes her happy to see you happy. It's a mutual thing." Naruto smiled.
"I like her being happy."
"I'm sure she just as much likes you to be too." I answered.
We talked for a while until the girls came out with large black bags, similar to the black ones we had. The purpose behind this is to make sure that we were surprised. Tenten walked over to me and sat on my lap. "How long?" She asked.
"Near two hours." I said.
"How long you look?"
"Half an Hour."
"You sure you're done." I kissed her neck.
"Yes, quite. You ready?" She nodded.
"We got shoes and other stuff as well." I nodded and took her hand after she climbed off my lap as we walked home carrying out outfits.
We arrived at town and went straight to Tenten's place. It was a large mansion but she was the only person who lived there giving it an empty feeling.
Sakura and Hinata had decided to use the break in our busy day to make everyone dinner before we went to Kaydin's grave. Tenten was resting on my shoulder and I had my arms around her holding her safe within my arms since I missed doing this since we returned.
"Naruto-kun…" Hinata paused, looking at her husband.
"Yeah Hinata-chan," He said.
"I was thinking, where are we all going to live?" Hinata called to Naruto. Her question was the most thought out thing that had been stated all day. She's been on her toes all the time with these questions and statements about our weddings, having them together and such. She's brilliant when it comes to strategies. It's a talent of hers, Hyuuga Training teaches this.
"I don't know. We'll talk it over at dinner. I need to think. Wait, thinking… all man." Hinata seemed satisfied with this answer, she seemed to like it when Naruto couldn't think, it made her happy, in some weird way.
"Alright Naruto-kun, we shall." She said finishing off that topic, at least until dinner.
In a few minutes, dinner was called by Sakura, rather loudly. Ino had been pacing around trying to keep calm about this visitation the entire time since every time it brought tears to her eyes, and saddened her; but visiting graves didn't only upset her, it would be sad for us also. Shikamaru talked to her calmly as she continued to pace. "Dinner." Sakura yelled again. Everyone noticed and sat down; after we began to eat Naruto started the conversation.
"Let's go around the table and say what we thought we were going to do." Naruto suggested. "Hinata, you start." Surely, she has something in mind, that's why she brought it up, right.
"I don't know, that is why I asked you." Hinata replied. Alright, she didn't. I figured she would. Yet again, most likely she would have planned to live either at the Hyuuga Complex or in his apartment but her humble nature needed to be further stopped, especially since she did have an idea in that head of hers.
"Hinata, answer him." I told her.
"You," She replied. It wasn't the tone that most would expect as if they were didn't feel like saying it, with a feel of coldness, hers was simply said to me. I respected her request.
"It is quite customary for anyone in relation to the Hyuuga Clan to live in the Complex but I don't really want to, seeing how hard it would be to change Tenten's way of life, Sasuke." I explained my thoughts and statements on this situation.
"I didn't think about it. I've been living with Sakura for a while now, I guess I thought things wouldn't change." He said also, quite simply.
"I hadn't planned at all, this is crazy!" Naruto yelled at the table, he was not frustrated.
"I hadn't thought about." Ino bowed her head as if it was the most disgraceful thing that she had ever done.
"I…I have an idea." Hinata said. I knew she was devising something, I could tell. It was as if in clear daylight.
"What is it, anything is better than nothing, plus you always have the answer." Naruto said jumping up, startling her. He got in her face and looked like he was begging her, but also scaring her.
"Tenten, Naruto, Sakura, Sasuke and Ino are all free of parental agreements. Neji and I are supposed to live at the home as he explained but I'd rather not anymore. I really don't know about Shikamaru, personally." She answered.
"My parents like Sakura's are leaving on far command for a while, they won't be back for years, and they're getting a small apartment, not a house." Hinata smiled. This she had figured was part of the plan; she was really just stating that we all had houses that wouldn't be used once we got married. It was useless, not really an idea.
"That was more of a statement, than an Idea." I corrected her. I did this so she'd feel compelled to prove me wrong and share her idea even though she thought it may have been stupid; my statement had made her feel pressured to share. Though Tenten smacking me didn't help my work.
"I wasn't finished. Practically everyone here except from Neji-nii-san and I have been left a house that they wouldn't be able to use, if at all possible we could all move into a home together as friends and go on our lives from there, it would just have to be big enough for all of us." She said, now that was an idea.
"I have it, we all move into the Uchiha Palace. It has four wings, each with a master bedroom, bath and everything each couple would need, we could sell the other houses to have the house cleaned and prepared as well as anything else we'd need." Sakura said happily.
"That was along the lines of my idea, us all living together in a huge house." Hinata said eagerly.
"It reminds me of the Hyuuga Home except it would be better seeing as I'm with my friends not other family and such and much more space." Neji added with a genuine smile.
"I'm fine with everyone moving in there, it might take a lot of cleaning and furniture but it would work." Sasuke said. They all agreed to it.
Tenten and I sat down, she returned to resting on my shoulder, and Sakura did the same thing except with Sasuke. Ino tired from all the pacing and worrying about visiting Kaydin had worn herself out mentally and physically along with the hectic day. She was sleeping with her head on Shikamaru's lap.
"Hinata-chan, what is that book about, it looks really really interesting." She smiled nodding. She was reading while he was observing her read.
"It is very interesting, Naruto-kun. It's a book on the past hokages, I found something very interesting in here." She stated.
"What?"
"It seems that the Fourth Hokage was around the age of 30 some when he became hokage, it seems he had a wife and a kid before he died."
"What!"
"He's the only Hokage to ever be married and had a family during his time as Hokage. It's quite amusing because most Kages were afraid that that would endanger their family."
"What kind of weakling would think that, if they can't protect a family, how do they expect to protect a village, the fourth was a genius?" Hinata smiled and set her book down on her lap comfortably.
"You'd protect me?" She asked as though surprised.
"Of course I would Hinata, you're extremely important to me; I'd die before I let anyone hurt you. I may be stupid at some moments but my sense would always allow me to protect you if you were hurt or in trouble." Naruto answered.
"Thanks." She nuzzled herself into Naruto's arms nervously but Naruto was smiling and holding her and smiling goofily. They were quite hopeless; it seems they would have real problems in their relationships… of course unless the guys and I explained a few key factors to him before the marriage, which we would have to.
"You know something Naruto?" I asked him with a smirk.
"No, tell me."
"You're clueless."
"Maybe I am but I know what I feel now, and I plan to protect Hinata-chan no matter what, I love her. I never realized it but now I do and I'm glad I did." Naruto looked at Hinata and held her close to him. "She's mine." I pity her, a lot. However if she's happy then I guess I pity her less than I thought I would.
"Yeah, yeah, I know. You just better protect her or else you're facing me, and this time I'm not going easy on her or her." I warned him, this was a serious matter and I made sure he knew this.
"It's my nindo to never go back on my word, I promise to always love and protect her Neji, and you can hold me to that." He told me.
"Good to know it, I know I can trust you with her. I don't doubt you but just for safety cautions, I'm going to make sure you know this. I also mean this on an emotional level."
"What?"
"You have to provide Hinata with emotional support. She's very sensitive and delicate. You hurt her and you're dead; even if you don't know better." Naruto gulped then nodded. He didn't understand the entire job of being her husband. This is more difficult then expected.
"Girls are delicate things Naruto, you've never had anyone discuss this with you because you've never needed it but love is a very complex and unexplained thing. You could love someone for reason you don't know and not even know why but you fall in love because you are." I held Tenten close to me. She, like Hinata was to Naruto, was mine also.
"That's insane." Naruto answered.
"It can be, just meet at the Hyuuga Complex tomorrow." I told him. The other guys in the room understood what would be going on.
"And Hinata?" He asked.
"The girls are going to finish up preparations."
"Okay," Naruto finished.
The Reasons Why... Marriage Equal Busy.
Tenten's gone, doing something. many of the conversations consist of phrases meaning 'see you later' or 'bye' guys being dragged around fast pace movement everywhere buying rings decisions to make dresses and tuxes to buy money to spend time not to waste shopping constantly taking walks in the park making plans conversations about a family member's well being finishing up preparations