Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto or any of the characters in my story (though I wouldn't mind having Genma…) That seedy bar on the edge of Konoha is mine, though, and I'll be damned if any of you think you can have it!

Reasons

I like to evaluate my days every evening, to sort of give them a grade. A lot of factors play in – my immediate goals and whether or not they were accomplished, my long-term goals and any progress toward them, the quality of liquor I might have found with which to drown a few battle scars. I'm at my favorite hole-in-the wall pub on the outskirts of town and I have to say the sake is good tonight, the ladies are beautiful, and despite the fact that I spent most of the day nursing last night's hangover one could say that my "make it through another day" goal – I'd put this in the "immediate goals" category – has nearly been fulfilled. Today could be assessed as "pretty good," since the best cure for a hangover is more booze, and I've definitely found that.

But in the end, most days for Shiranui Genma are the same – I just keep living, even though I think it's about time to die.

Don't get me wrong, I'm far from depressive. Life is just tiring here in Konoha. Even in a time like this – a time of peace – the underlying currents of the quotidian are life and death. Each year I watch dozens of twelve-year-olds graduate from the academy, excited to become shinobi and to represent their village. Their faces shine with a promise that has forsaken them without their awareness of it. And every year I preside over the final round of the chuunin exams, where thirteen-year-olds – though hardened slightly by a year of training under special jounins, first experiences of loss on the battlefield, and the grueling second exam in the so-called "forest of death" – are still wide-eyed and determined to live lives brimming with success and happiness.

They're a bunch of idiots, though I can understand. I was there once. Some days I still am. But the dilemma is the fact that my family is dead, my childhood friends are dead, and most of my current comrades will die before they reach 50. You see why I question my breath.

The waitress comes by and I order another round of sake for me and my cohorts, Hatake Kakashi and Sarutobi Asuma. Both are bachelors, like myself, and both are smoking cigarettes, unlike myself, watching the smoke drift up and through the cones of yellow light that beam down from the ceiling barely illuminating the faces of the pub's patrons. We like it here. It's a nice joint for quasi-anonymity.

Asuma tried to settle down once, got married even, but he married a kunoichi. Poor Kurenai was taken out during the second war with the Sound. She went down fighting, though, and she has her name inscribed on that rock Kakashi's at every morning (he thinks we don't know). Neither of these guys has come to terms with the lives they lead, they smell death every day they wake up. Ultimately, they miss people too much.

And here's why I really like this bar – it's a man's bar. You don't find kunoichi in here. Mostly cheap women, women who will offer you a "massage" for the right amount of money. Or strange, lonely women who come here looking for a shinobi to go home with. Silly broads, they have no idea what they're getting into. Not to say that I haven't taken a few of these women to bed on occasion, we all have desires, but seriously, who dates death on purpose?

And this is the very reason I'm shocked when I see her come through the door. She's a wisp of a creature, tiny waisted and dressed all in black with dark violet hair running down her back, sucked away from her face by the door slamming behind her. Hinata's eyes shine – opaline, barely colored and yet strikingly vibrant – and as they are hit by the dim lights of the place they find their target, my buddy Asuma.

It strikes me as their glances cross – not meet mind you, they simply gaze past or even, perhaps, through each other – that she's not just stopping by for a drink and a smoke. She came here looking for him. Today marks two years since Kurenai's death and if there's one person as close to that woman as Asuma was, it's Hinata. Hinata was her student, and for the young girl, Kurenai become not only teacher, but mentor, and eventually older sister.

Hinata looks like she's about to break, and I can't take the silence anymore.

"Hinata-chan, come have a seat with us, eh?"

She sighs, and walks toward our corner booth. Her heels clicking on the floor announce her presence to the whole of the room and in the strange quietness I hear a few squeaky barstools swivel around to eye the young girl. I do some quick math, realizing that maybe she oughtn't be in here for legal reasons in addition to the list of other reasons i've collected on the blackboard of my brain. No, Hyuga Hinata is 22 now. She still looks so young ,though, despite the agèd gaze of those pearly eyes.

She slides over my knees to sit between me and Asuma, bums a cigarette off of him and lets him light it for her. She takes a long drag before pulling the cigarette away from her lips, then purses them and arches her neck slightly to exhale toward the ceiling. I realize now that she already smells of alcohol.

"Oi, Hinata, what are you doing way out here?" Kakashi grins, stubbing out his cigarette and resting his left elbow on the round table.

Hinata turns to Kakashi, whose silvery hair has begun to fall into his face covering his only visible eye. She studies him for a moment – maybe it's the alcohol delaying her reaction, maybe she's just thinking up a good lie. "Went for a walk," she says, taking another drag, "wound up here." Hinata exhales again, extending her willowy arm away from her face where she flicks ash into its designated tray.

Well, she's a terrible liar. She obviously came here looking for comfort and I'm growing angry with Asuma who has barely even looked at the girl since she walked in. He hasn't seemed to notice my ire. Someone needs to do something.

I reach over and pull the cigarette from Hinata's fingers and crush it into the ashtray. She looks at me, none too happy, as if I've questioned her adulthood. "Let me take you home," I ask her. It's more of a demand, I'm not going to give her a choice, but if I give her the semblance of one, if I speak slowly with all the compassion a half-drunk middle-aged ninja can offer, maybe she'll let me help her out. I'll kick Asuma's ass later.

"I don't think so," she says, brow furrowed in defiance, "I didn't come here for nothing. I'll stay."

Can't say I didn't call this one. She'd probably visited every bar in Konoha before winding up out here. It's not like it's common knowledge that the Hatake, Sarutobi, and I like to sit here, drink, and not talk to each other. Like I said – it's about the anonymity of the place.

"Hinata," Kakashi says, leaning in, "go with Genma. He'll be good to you." I think I see Kakashi wink at me through that stupid hair of his and I'm slightly disgusted – as if taking advantage of the poor girl had even crossed my mind! I remind myself that Kakashi's a bit of a lightweight and might not even remember this tomorrow. Reaching to grab Hinata's hand I find that she's placed it on Asuma's chest.

"You want me to stay, right Asuma?" I can't see Hinata's eyes, but from the slight shake in her voice I can tell that my earlier prediction was in fact correct – the girl is about to break and I'd hate for that to go down in a place like this.

"Hinata-chan," Asuma begins, moving her hand away, "go home."

Hinata storms out, probably in tears, I – passing up a great opportunity to start a bar-fight with Asuma (he'll have to pick up my tab, and that punishment will suffice for now) – go after her.

By the time I've made my way past the crowd and through the doors into the fog I don't see the girl. But I can sense her. Hyuga chakra isn't exactly average. I find her a few blocks away, in an alley that a girl like Hinata just doesn't look right in, crouched low to the ground, leaning against a dumpster.

"Hinata…" Nope, no good words for a time like this, especially post-sake-intake.

"Asuma?"

"No. Sorry. Genma." The alcohol must have seriously fucked with her senses. She's a true lightweight if I ever saw one – most kunoichi are – or maybe it's just the dark alley and lack of moonlight and her desire to hear the voice of the one man who might understand her pain precisely. She could have used those eyes of hers to see me coming in any environment.

"Oh. Well, just back off then, I…" before she can finish her sentence I've slipped my arms behind her shoulders and knees and picked her up, cradling her slight figure against my body. I'm surprised to find that seconds later she has her arms wrapped around my neck, her girlish fingers tangled in my hair, and her heavy head rested on my shoulder. "Don't take me home, Genma," she says.

Conveniently the fog turns into a mist and the mist turns into a downpour and even if I'd had the heart to deny Hinata's request I realize that my residence is far closer to our current location than the Hyuga house and I want to get her inside. I bring her home – to my home – feeling the rise and fall of her shoulders as she weeps silently against my neck.

At my place I show her the guest room and give her a robe and a change of clothes to sleep in and tell her to get some sleep and that we'll talk in the morning. I look at the clock and find that it's 2:00 am, but call her cousin Neji anyway, since he must be worried about her. I tell him a few details, but not many, and that Hinata's fine and not to tell her that I called. He grunts groggily and obliges – though not happily, it seems – and thanks me for calling.

In the morning – or early afternoon, as it happens – when I wake, I find that Hinata is gone. There's a note on my kitchen counter thanking me for my hospitality. I chuckle to myself, thinking that this is just the sort of note I've been left after many a one-night stand that began at the very bar where I found Hinata last night.

But I'm still concerned about Hinata. You don't chase a girl into an alley and carry her home sobbing in the rain and then just hope for the best. So I shower and dress and wait outside the academy for her class to let out.

She's a teacher now, one of the best in Konoha. When Iruka died – defending a class full of students, no less – she took his place. I remember when she was barely out of the academy, when I found myself captivated by the preliminary battle between her and Neji at the chuunin exams. She had yet to grow into her own skin at that time, but she had one of the strongest hearts I'd seen come through those exams. She was carried off on a stretcher that year but it wasn't long before her determination made her a chuunin.

And here she is, following the flood of children from the doors of the academy, hair wound into a messy bun at the back of her head and held in place by a senbon needle, wisps falling away to be caught on the light breeze. I catch her by the arm before she can take the corner in the opposite direction. She totally saw me…used those eyes of hers.

"Genma!" She feigns shock…sneaky girl. "What are you doing here?"

"Came to see you," I tell her, though I'm pretty sure she already knows. "Let's go talk somewhere."

At this point I'm not really sure where this is going. I know she doesn't want to talk, and I'm pretty sure I'm going to make her, and I'm not coming to any conclusions as to why I care so much. I push self-questioning aside with the simple self-reminder that I don't like to see a dame in trouble, and Hinata's clearly going through a rough spot.

"No, I don't think that's a good idea," she replies, eyes still looking over my shoulder, instead of at me, and when I turn to see what might have captured her attention I'm not surprised to see that it's, in fact, nothing at all. The longer we stand there in the afternoon sun, the deeper the blush is that rises in her cheeks. She wants to be anywhere but with me, and having gone to all this trouble to make sure she's okay, I have to say that's a bit of a thorn in my pride.

I take the girl's hand, which seems to surprise her, but not to upset her, and walk a few blocks away, to a bench in the park closest to the edge of the forest. As the shade of the trees rushes over us I notice that Hinata is no longer able to hide her unrest behind the sunny weather.

"Why are you doing this?" she asks, and I don't have an answer. Tears come. "I'm sorry," she says. I put my arm around her. She leans into me. "I'm weak," she insists. She's wrong.

An hour passes. She mumbles a few things here and there, but doesn't have much to say. I comfort her the best way I know how – the way Asuma should have last night, the bastard – I hold her. Another hour falls away. "Do you want me to walk you home?" I ask her. She nods, brushing away a few straggling tears, and as we both stand it's Hinata that slips her delicate hand into mine. Who am I to spurn the warmth this timid young woman is suddenly extending to me?

Hinata is completely silent until we reach the Hyuga house. The sun is falling lower in the sky and I realize I've spent an entire day focused on a chick. I don't think I've done that in a while. "Genma," she begins, almost whispering, finally looking directly at me with those bizzarely beautiful eyes, "Why are you doing this?"

"I don't know," I tell her, and it's the truth, but I start fishing around in my brain for an answer that might quell her desire for a reason.

"No, Genma, tell me why," Hinata insists, stepping closer to me, slender hand still in my grasp.

"Because someone should," I tell her. And I think that's the truth, too, but before I have the chance to think it over her other hand is brushing my cheek and I'm not so sure that's the whole answer anymore.

She stands on her toes to wisper "Thank-you" in my ear, then moves that careful hand down to my neck, kissing my cheek, before retracting all touches and stepping inside the house.

I walk home alone and I keep smirking. I'm glad I don't run into Kakashi, because I'm sure he has questions, if his memory of last night's events isn't completely full of holes. And when I return to my place I find my favorite chair and evaluate my day. It was good, I think, and I conclude that maybe I can make it to see 65.

Thanks for reading, guys. SPECIAL thanks to InTheArmsOfUndertow for inspiring this fic and to Lauren for beta-reading.