Each footstep echoed against the tiled floor. Every time a nurse passed down the hall, they jumped, heads cranning to see who it could be and what news they might have. Their faces were pinched; nervous and guilty. The overhead hospital lights made them look green and yellow, like they were getting jaundice from sitting in the fluffy waiting-room chairs.
When Tenten entered the hospital waiting room after yet another talk with Naruto's father (this time about speaking with a detective), the boys had seated themselves in separate corners of the room, all staring at their hands, acting as if they weren't shaking. Tenten was about to have a seat herself, when Kiba sprang up.
His eyes were bloodshot red and full of tears. He'd pulled his hair back from his face and into a tiny bun, making his face look more gaunt than she had ever seen it. The first drop off water fell onto his triangle face tattoo when he said, "I'm sorry I was such a dick to you earlier."
Tenten was at a loss for words. She thought of Kiba spitting at her those awful and classist things and could barely make the connection between the Kiba from hours-ago, and the Kiba standing in front of her. Those hours now felt like years now that an injured boy lay between them, connecting their fate.
She was about to stumble out an acceptance maybe, perhaps forgiveness, or comforting words, she didn't know, because Neji interrupted any thought she had, saying, "That's enough, Kiba."
These boy, she sighed as Kiba suddenly turned into sharp corners, ready to fight. They will never learn.
"Since when do you tell me what to do Hyuga? You assholes are just sitting here like Tenten didn't just do what we were too afraid to! I can admit when I'm wrong––"
"You're so fucking loud and self-righteous," This time, it was Sasuke who spoke. He had been quietly staring at his watch before all this. Tenten sighed.
"Say it to my face, Uchiha!"
"I...did," Sasuke began to stand up, but Shikamaru cut in with a long made eye contact, and Sasuke settled down again.
Tenten began to feel invisible again. All these egos, not a shred of self-awareness. She quietly took a seat in her own corner to watch the drama unfold.
"I understand you want to get this off your chest, Kiba," Shikamary said patiently, "but you never know who might be listening," he inclined his head towards the nurses' station that sat only a few yards. "This story is minutes from bursting open, and we don't need anyone knowing anything, especially when we don't know all the facts ourselves. Sit down."
"He has a point, you know," suddenly a girl with pink hair stepped into the room. She had piercings running up and down her ears, and tight form-fitting black clothes that made her look like a jewelry-thief. Tenten wondered how a cool-looking person like her knew these assholes. "I could hear your entire conversation from the elevator and you never know who's lurking."
"How'd you get in here?" Neji questioned. "This floor is blocked off. Only family can enter."
The pink-haired girl rolled her eyes, and Tenten agreed with her. Good to know that Neji was an asshole to everyone. "I think you forget that my guardian is Head of Medicine here. Plus," she gestured to someone just out of their line of sight. "Hyugas can get in anywhere, you should know better than me."
"What do you me––"
Behind her, two other girls and a guy in a hoodie entered a room. Everyone except Tenten held their breath. They were all staring at the girl with bangs like she was fucking Mary, Mother of Christ. And sure, she was cute, with her weird Neji-like eyes and round face, but she was no supermoder, Queen of England, and honestly the pink-haired girl was hotter. Clearly, Tenten was missing something here.
"Hinata," Neji stared open-mouth. This is was the first time Tenten had heard an emotion in the guy's voice that wasn't annoyance. He looked like he'd just seen a ghost. He looked close to tears. All the other guys were dead-silent. Just what the hell was going on here?
Hinata just shook her head. She swallowed and said, "I want to see Naruto."
-:-
Sasuke was silently impressed.
He barely moved an inch as Ino and Sakura explained how they had broken Hinata out of rehab and planned for her seamless reentry into society. Sure, he knew about the plan and had offered some help, but he didn't actually expect them to go through with it. He just figured this would be one of their crazy yet unfulfilled plans they often hatched.
As the excitement slowly waned, Neji led Hinata to Naruto's room, and Sasuke silently slipped away to return his mother's excited phone calls. She had called eleven times in the last three hours, and Sasuke had not responded to a single one, hadn't answered a text, hadn't even opened his phone.
Around the corner, he diald. She answered on the first ring, screaming, "Sasuke!"
Sasuke winced. "Hello, mother."
"Don't 'Hello, mother,' me! I've been worried sick! Kushina sent me a text after they found Naruto and I was already worried sick after you didn't show up for Itachi's engagement party––"
"C'mon, you weren't worried," Sasuke drawled. There were plenty of events Sasuke skipped out on, plenty of times where he had simply disappeared without warning. His parents were used to this.
"Don't you tell me how I felt! Itachi told me you had disappeared after you both were having such a good time together! I was worried sick and just hearing about what happened to Kushina's boy, I couldn't enjoy the party at all, and of course people started talking! Then one of the Aunties started asking about you and I almost lost it over my scalloped risotto."
Sasuke sighed into his hand. How his stoic father had married such a worrisome woman as his mother, he did not know. "All this and you haven't once asked how Naruto is."
"I know how Naruto is! His mother actually answers her phone! What's the point of giving you a phone when you don't even answer?"
"Then his mother should've told you that I'm here with the rest of the guys, and we're all fine."
"And why is that Kushina's responsibility when my own son has a working phone? The nerve of you, Sasuke, she's too busy worrying about her own injured boy to fret over mine. I simply want you to answer when I ca..."
Mikoto's voice slowly faded in his ear as Sasuke watched Hinata exit Naruto's hospital room. All the color had drained from her face as she stood for a moment, talking to Kushina. When Kushina closed the door, Hinata walked a few spaces, and dropped to the ground, her hand on her head.
"Mother, I've gotta let you go," Sasuke said, cutting Mikoto's rant in half.
"Go? Sasuke don't you dare hang up––"
Sasuke slipped his phone in his pocket. He walked the few steps up to Hinata, looked down at the top of her indigo head and said, "do you want to take a walk?"
-:-
Ino was buying an iced coffee from the vending machine when she heard arguing around the corner. She paused before she hit the buttons, not wanting the sound of the drink falling to alert them of heer presence.
The new girl, the one named Tenten, was pissed. She was saying, "You're a fucking joke Hyuga! You said you'd come with me now! You can't just change plans like this."
"I know," Neji said, genuinely sounding sorry. "I just didn't know my sister would be back, and after seeing Naruto, I don't feel comfortable leaving her alone."
"Well, take her fucking with us! I don't care what you have to do, but I have to see Danzo. Tonight. These were our terms."
There was a pause. Neji sighed deeply, "you're right, but I said I'd go with you when Naruto wakes. He's still down."
There was a sound of a slap, like Tenten had hit the flesh of her palm to her forehead. "Who knows when he's going to wake up?" she hissed. "He's safe, in a hospital, being cared for by the best doctors in the world! My fucking life is on the line and I can't even go home and sleep in my own bed, and it's your fault. When are you going to get that through your thick fucking skull, Hyuga? I. Don't. Give. Two. Fucks. About. Your. Addict. Sister."
Ino released a breath of air she didn't know she'd been holding. She didn't know if she should be pissed or worried or both. The silence stretched and stretched and she wondered if she should go over and say something to this rude Tenten person! Hinata was her friend and she wouldn't stand for this type of talk.
She started when she felt someone grab her shoulder. Turning, she saw Shikamaru standing with an eyebrow raised. Her heart began to pound against her ribs. What did he want?
"You're not the only one listening," he inclined his head. Down the hall, Gaara was nonchalantly leaning against the wall, stone-faced. "Let's go to the caf. There's a starbucks down there, and you can get some real coffee."
Ino really had no choice but to follow him down the hall, heart beating into her stomach, her two dollars and fifty cents lost to the machine and the voices down the hall. As they turned to enter the elevator, Gaara picked up his phone and grimaced at her.
She wouldn't see him when they came back up.
-:-
"How'd you know about this place?" Sasuke asked in muted awe as they stepped into a small indoor garden with glass ceilings. They were in the east wing of the hospital, on the 14th floor, watching the sky suggest pink. It was egging on five in the morning, and the sun was ready to greet them.
Hinata sat heavily on a bench. She was tired. She felt she'd been awake for years. But when she closed her eyes, she saw Naruto's body and the tubes that had been attached to his skin. She remembered her days in rehab, and why she had been put there, and she remembered her engagement, and how marriage was supposed to be based on trust. Her betrothed lay on a hospital bed with bated breath and she didn't know why. Her betrothed hated her and wanted to see her away. She had not even been home yet.
She had been in love with her betrothed, and had felt so lucky. No longer.
Behind her, a lily swayed against the fans, bent, and tickled her ankles. Sasuke watched her bend to touch the flower. When she rose, she gave him a sad smile. "M-my mother was sick a lot. My f-father never told us explicitly, b-but I think she w-was suicidal. I didn't have the l-language for it when I was a child, I o-only knew one day she got sad, and then she was sad all the time.
We came to t-this hospital a lot. Sometimes she would be here for months, sometimes just mere d-days. W-we did it for maybe three years," Hinata whispered.
Sasuke didn't say anything. He just watched as she pulled her sleeves down over her fingertips. The pink was becoming more aggressive outside as time moved ahead of them. Almost orange. Warm.
"I h-hated hospitals, still do. Sometimes our nannies left us a-alone to grab l-lunch, or take a phone call w-while we were visiting and I would run off and hide. The mental-health ward always freaked me out a little, so I liked to l-leave whenever I got the chance. One d-day I found this little g-garden and went there ever s-since."
Sasuke watched her eyes grow wet. He wasn't sure what to do, he had never heard of a Mrs. Hyuga. He assumed she died when Hinata and Neji were young, and he hadn't cared to look into it. Now, he saw the twins in a new light. "What happened to her?"
Hinata looked at Sasuke a moment, as if she didn't believe he was sitting next to her, asking about her mother. She shook her head, thinking of delirium, of hospitals, or her mother's fleeting figure. "I don't know," she said. "She left when I was young. We haven't heard from her since. We–we're not allowed to talk about her really. Father gets upset."
Sasuke was quiet. He wasn't sure why he invited Hinata on a walk with him, but he saw that she needed help, and didn't want her to be alone. Maybe some part of him also did not want to be alone. It was nice to sit, but he didn't much know what to say. He opened his mouth to respond but Hinata turned to him, curiosity swimming in her gaze. She was open in a way he hadn't seen her before.
"What about you? Are you close with your mom?"
