"So what's so different about me?" Tenten asked straight out once they heard the front door close behind Sakura.
"Wow." Neji scoffed. "Obviously your directness is not affected."
They shared a familiar smile in the darkening room. Long shadows were starting to become their companions.
"I'm not sure - and, believe me, that doesn't happen often - but when you looked at me today - right after you called me on that road - I'd never quite seen you like that. The look on your face."
"What about it?"
"Will you just give me a minute?" He demanded. Then he took his sweet time while Tenten burrowed into the fresh sheets.
"You looked as though you saw a ghost…," he began carefully. "...that you have very conflicting feelings for."
"That's your big changing moment?" Tenten couldn't remember what she'd had for breakfast that morning but she could remember what Neji's poker face looked like. "Spill it," she said.
"You looked like you'd never wanted to see anyone as much as you wanted to see me. And ..." His mysterious eyes squinted as though he was contemplating whether to really tell her this. For once, his secretive side did not triumph and he shared. "...and it made me realize how much I want you to look at me like that. All the time."
He added the last bit just in case his words could have been mistaken. If anything, Neji was an all-or-nothing kind of guy. Tenten felt good that she remembered that about him. It made her feel secure, like her memories of him were her anchor when she had trouble remembering how old she was or when she'd been born.
"Hey," Tenten threw in randomly, ignoring his big confession. "Do you know when my birthday is?"
"May 5th. Why?" He looked bewildered. It was cute. It was a pity she'd hardly ever seen him like this before. Perhaps she should lose her memory more often. Who knew what kind of confessions it would shake out of him?
"Nothing. It just feels good."
"That I know you?"
"No, knowing something about myself."
"You still don't remember stuff?"
Tenten thought about the urgency and the certainty she had about his death. Perhaps she really had overheard what her attackers were planning. Too bad she could only remember what their goal was and not how they were planning to achieve it.
"Nope," Tenten shook her head.
"So… can I assume the reason you are not reacting more to my … feelings is because you don't remember that that is definitely not part of our dynamic?"
"Oh no, I kind of know that. I think. I … just got bigger things to worry about right now. And, really, you may think that was a big confession but, even though I got nothing to compare it to, you really barely confessed to anything at all."
"Are you teasing me? Because in case you don't remember, I don't take well to being teased."
"I also don't remember you being this cocky," Tenten retorted with a frown. Neji thought she was still teasing him but she wasn't. This cockiness was new. This really wasn't part of their normal interaction, she thought, even though she couldn't exactly at present remember any concrete instances of what their interaction would usually be like.
"Well, I can tell you, I don't usually tell you crap about my feelings."
"Swearing, too now? Oh my, one hour can really change a man."
This time Tenten had been joking but Neji stayed looking serious. He seemed a lot more familiar this way.
"I mean it," he said.
"Prove it," Tenten heard herself answer, all jokes gone.
It took him a second but then his demeanor changed, he propelled out of his chair and into her proximity. She found her head caged in by his elbows. He looked as though he might…
"Can't do it," he huffed and wrenched his face away. Tenten, who was still not entirely clear what was happening, just held still, thinking that the person without amnesia should probably do the explaining before she went and tried any kind of interpretation without hardly any concrete background knowledge.
"It's just… I still feel guilty about what happened after training today and then you've been tortured and sick and I haven't been helping and this is happening in a really strange, way-too-fast kind of way. And I just can't."
Tenten really didn't understand much of his babbling but she did remember something he had said earlier.
"Is it 'cause I look different? Wrinkly?" She hadn't had a chance to look into a mirror but nobody seemed to be treating her in such a way that she had to conclude she must look substantially different. This got him to look her in the eyes again. They were so empty and yet so full she could just fall right in and drown in all that whiteness.
"No, that's not it," he assured her in a husky whisper. His arms to either side of her head didn't feel like a cage but like a protective wall. Like nothing could hurt her now that he was close. One of his hands found its way over the pillow and onto her skin, tracing the faint crow's feet there and the almost imperceptible but definitely present lines framing her cheeks and flowing down to her mouth.
"The only way I would still notice these differences was if someone looking just like you before the attack came waltzing in here and stood right next to you. They're really not what I see when I look at you. I see everything I ever-"
There was a knock at the front door.
"That's probably Sakura," Neji muttered, in a bad mood from being interrupted during the second time he was sharing his feelings. All these years no one dared interrupt him but the same day that he had somehow found the courage to spit out something he had never been able to before, it's like the world stopped taking him seriously. Neji was about to get up and answer the door, albeit reluctantly, when Tenten grabbed a hold of his wrist. Remembering that he might be the target, she mouthed:
"Check through the window first."
First Neji frowned but then years of training kicked in and he picked up on some of the nuances. Now he knew something was going on and Tsunade had not told him the entire story. But he would just have to be as careful as he could with the intel he had been given. He nodded, then became one with the dark wall as he slid along it to peek out the window.
What he saw knocked the air out of him. Literally.
For the next three seconds he couldn't breathe, then he was gagging for air before his training kicked in again and years of meditation took over. He was breathing in for four seconds, holding for four seconds, and breathing out for four seconds. Unconsciously, he had also removed himself from the window so he was out of eyesight of anyone who was trying to peek in.
"Something's wrong here," he said. It eerily reflected something Tenten remembered vaguely saying earlier today.
"What? Who's out there?"
"It's you."
Tenten blinked.
"Me?"
Neji nodded.
"You mean someone who looks like me?"
"Affirmative," Neji acknowledged tentatively.
"Now you look like you've seen a ghost," Tenten remarked. "But not in a good way."
Neji was very still. An intensity radiated off his skin and Tenten became aware that he was much much stronger than she was. His chest was wider and thicker, his legs longer and stronger, he was at least a head taller and she remembered that, though essentially also her friend, he was a very dangerous man. And he looked it now.
"What's my birthday?" Neji asked quietly. Tenten sensed her answer was of utmost importance. She hoped her memory would cooperate but it didn't.
There was a second knock, a little more impatient.
But Neji just kept staring at her, waiting for her answer.
"I … I don't know," she stammered.
"This is why you played into my attraction. Where'd you get the intel?"
"No," Tenten stammered. This was wrong. This was even more wrong than all the other wrongs were before. Why couldn't she remember her best friend's birthday?
"I don't remember the date but I know… skinny dipping," Tenten burst out. Neji's brow furrowed.
"What?" His tone was menacing and disbelieving at the same time.
"We said we would never ever speak about it but on your eighteenth birthday we went skinny dipping. I made you turn around, so you wouldn't see anything and I kept my eyes shut until I heard you get into the water. We'd both had a drink that night and all we did was just swim around in the moonlight for just half an hour but we agreed we'd never drink again and that we'd never talk about that night."
There was a third knock that rattled the doorframe.
"Neji, I know you're in there. We need to talk," Tenten heard herself yell from outside the building. The sound sent shivers all through her body; it felt beyond wrong.
"I better go open that," Neji said carefully. "You..."
Tenten waited for his response. It was as though her whole existence was cradled in his look now. "... just stay here and don't make a sound."
Neji went out and opened the door but he must not have asked their visitor in because there was a hushed conversation. Then Tenten heard two pairs of feet shuffling on the floorboards. By the sound of it Neji was depositing his guest in the kitchen. He came back into the bedroom with a haunted look.
With a quick arm of support he aided Tenten in standing up and helped her peek through the door at their visitor. The visitor had slumped down on a kitchen chair barely visible from their vantage point with a cup of tea. They could only see her back until she shifted and then her profile was visible.
It was Tenten. Wearing the same haircut and damn clothes, pink top and everything.
"Ohhhhh …" Tenten couldn't believe she'd been this stupid. Or, actually, she could because it was a longshot but...
"I think everything makes sense now," she realized after shutting the door carefully so the other Tenten wouldn't see them staring at her.
"It does? Are you sure? Because it sure as hell doesn't make any sense to me," Neji whispered harshly.
"Seriously, when did you start swearing?" Tenten asked distractedly.
"How is that relevant now?"
"I'm just trying to keep my timeline straight."
"What in the world are you talking about?" he pressed out as silently as he could.
"Neji?", Tenten called. The one from the kitchen.
"Yes? I mean," Neji corrected himself just in time to switch gears. "… wait right there," he commanded in a stern voice that she remembered all too well from her training days. Then he turned towards the Tenten next to him and did all but shake her by the shoulders to get an answer out of her.
ttt
Neji wasn't having a good day. He was having the most confusing day of his life. There were two Tentens. Two completely identical Tentens. They moved the same way, sounded the same way, looked the same way. Hell, they felt the same way. Everything about them elicited the same feelings. Pretty much. Except one seemed to be a little easier to confess to than the other, which he found difficult to understand. Also, one had amnesia and was overall the more confusing one. But when he really looked her in the eyes, he couldn't deny this was the person he had known for most of his life. Plus, nobody but them knew the skinny dipping story. Enemies might have been able to figure out his birthday or his favorite food but they couldn't just access memories like that.
None of this changed the fact that there were two Tentens. One he suddenly realized was pressed up against a door with him in excruciating proximity and the other one sat in his kitchen and was mad at him for being 'one of the guys' earlier. There was no protocol for situations like these. Neji's mind was blank.
"Ok, I'll wait, but what are you doing? I won't tear off your head but did you have to encourage them to whistle at me like that? I'm a professional kunoichi, you're my team leader, it's just disrespectful and unprofessional. Now will you come back and write down my official complaint?" This was the other Tenten yelling from his kitchen chair. She did not sound happy and she had every right to be. She was correct about the situation but she couldn't possibly know that there was a second version of her right here next to him.
"What do I do?" he asked the Tenten closest to him. She had a very determined look on her face, like she finally knew what she was supposed to be doing. Unfortunately she hadn't bothered to clue him in.
"Put me back to bed. Send me home - the other me, of course - and then go get Tsunade as fast as you can."
What else could he do but obey? He wasn't used to taking orders from her but she was surprisingly good at giving them and he had always been good at following them. So, he quickly scooped her up and deposited her in bed, then snuck back out.
"You are absolutely right, Tenten," he began their conversation in the kitchen. It was difficult to see her sitting there in his kitchen chair when he knew she was right across the hallway in his bed.
"I am? You're not gonna tell me to calm down?"
"No. I will write up that complaint for you immediately and bring it by for you to check as soon as I can. Unfortunately, I have some work to do, so I suggest you go home, get some rest and we will talk about this when I… " he tried to think of a reasonable excuse for deferring their argument that didn't include 'as soon as I've figured out what to do with the second You' and came up with "... I have had time to think about what I've done wrong."
Tenten put down her teacup and stared suspiciously.
"You seem a lot more reasonable about this than I would've guessed. Usually you're such a hard-ass," she mused.
"Well, I… probably shouldn't be," he heard himself admit. Then she gave him a look that killed him; the look said she didn't believe him. It was true, he was sometimes a little harder on Tenten. And it wasn't for the right reasons. But he'd already confessed his innermost secret to one Tenten today and that was really his limit as far as he was concerned. So he couldn't do anything but wish her a curt good night and watch for a few seconds as she disappeared into the growing night.
Then he went back to his other Tenten and told her he would be back in 45 minutes and not to open the door for anyone.