AN: I'm back. And I just read Forests of the Heart by Charles de Lint, which is a really good book. Not quite East of Eden (Steinbeck), but up there for sure if you like modern myth.

Beta & Fire Department: Kim and Madi

Review Response:

OspreyAnimeG: As much as I would like to answer that, I can't, because that would ruin the story for everyone. Remember: questions on the future will be answered by upcoming chapters.

Happy List: AnimeFan-Angel, disama, saturnova, OspreyAnimeG, and shikaruTo

Chapter 8 – Thunder Without Rain

This quote is directed especially to you, my beloved reader.

"There will be time to murder and create,

And time for all the works and days of hands,

That lift and drop a question on your plate;

Time for you and time for me,

And time yet for a hundred indecisions,

And for a hundred visions and revisions,

Before the taking of a toast and tea."

T.S. Eliot, The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock

"Omigod! Hinata-chan!" Akina squeaked when Hinata returned to her corner. Akina was grinning like the Cheshire cat, and grasped Hinata's hands with all of her fingers. "Guess who I saw!"

"Ummmm…" Hinata murmured, but there was no need to answer.

"I saw Naruto!" she gushed, blue eyes alight with an inner burn that suddenly swept over Hinata as well in a wave of joy. "He came up to me and told me the picture looked like him! And he has Naruto's smile!"

Hinata couldn't stop Akina's infectious grin from touching her own lips, but she had to ask.

"Are you sure it's him?" Hinata questioned.

"I…I can feel it…in here," Akina said, touching her chest and blushing.

"Good," Hinata smiled. "I'm happy for you."

They laughed together, and Akina pulled Hinata into a gleeful jig, in time to some rock song banging on the stereo. This was how Kanaye found them, returning after trying to chat up a couple of girls on the other side of the room.

"What is this?" he grumbled, gesturing at them after pushing the beret out of his eyes. Akina twirled out of Hinata's hands and gestured right back at him much more emphatically.

"There was this guy that we're sure is Naruto and he was really cute and he had blond hair and blue, no, bluish-green, eyes and a great smile!" Akina burst out.

Kanaye scooted away from Akina's flailing hands and replied, "I lost you at 'guy.'" But neither Akina nor Hinata was paying attention to him now, so he sighed and said, "I guess I'll just go get us some punch."

He was positive they hadn't heard, but he left anyway. This was obviously a ninja thing, way out of his league. He dodged and skidded around people and sculptures on their pedestals to the snack table, where a glistening bowl of cherry red punch awaited him. He eagerly poured himself a glass and brought it to his mouth, choking and spraying the stuff before it could go down his throat.

"This tastes like cow piss!"

Meanwhile, Akina and Hinata were deep in conversation.

"Think about it, Hinata-chan," she said. "If Naruto was here, then he probably goes to our school. That's good. He has an accent, blond hair, and blue eyes – so it's also safe to assume he's foreign."

"Your Japanese is flawless, Sakura-chan, and you have blond hair and, well, green eyes," Hinata noted quietly.

"Yeah, but my dad was half-Japanese and lived here most of his life," Akina explained. "I learned the language at home, though not enough writing."

Kanaye swished in at that moment with two plastic cups full of kool-aid-looking punch and passed one to Hinata. He took a swig out of the other one.

"That was rude, not to get me one," Akina informed him.

"You didn't deserve one."

"You can have mine. I don't want it anyway," Hinata said before the situation could escalate into a full-blown war.

Akina gladly received the plastic cup and sipped at its lip for a while. Kanaye downed his like a shot of tequila and went back for more. Akina and Hinata watched him sway unsteadily over to a surrealist-looking piece. A crowd began to gather around him as he started up a rousing, rambling critique of the painting. He hiccupped and stumbled around throughout his discussion, hands flinging wildly about in emphasis of whatever point he was trying to make.

"Y'see – hic – the stiffness of this figa – fi – person an' the texture of th' paint reminds me more a' Frida Kahlo than Dali – hic – although I suppose you could say Dali wasn't a surrealist 'cause he got kicked outta their group an' all, but anyways, the symbolism of the green vines is that whole growth an' fertility spiel, like Frida's stuff. But the person is waaaay too centere – hic – centered and upsets the balance, y'know, between that and them weird little thingies floating around on the sides of the painting. And that complemenene…complemen'ary red and green in the corners doesn't do much good, either 'cause the rest of the thing's colors are a lot more drab," Kanaye ranted, squishing the beret back over his charcoal-black hair when it fell off.

"I didn't know Kanaye knew anything about art…I mean, he was lamenting over coming here," Hinata pondered aloud. "So I didn't think he liked it at all."

Half of Akina's kool-aid punch was gone and she looked at her cup as she answered.

"Whoop-de-doo for him."

Kanaye finally came away from the artwork when he heard a new song start on the loudspeakers. With a cry of "It's the Macarena, everyone!" he leapt into the dance, dragging several others along with him. By the time the song ended, Kanaye had a quarter of the room dancing with him. He spun off at the end and snatched up a cup of punch, gracelessly careening towards one of the teachers with it in hand.

"Here's some punch, Hadaka-sensei," he proclaimed, gently propelling the cup into the startled woman's grasp. "It's delicious. Have some."

He flashed a pointed smile at her and made off before she could say anything.

By now, Hinata was thoroughly tired. She was tired of standing and waiting and tired of this party. It wasn't like she was here for the food and company anyway. Akina was off mingling again and who knew where Kanaye was, but he was probably enjoying himself. Parties like this were a reminder of others she had attended, more out of protocol then preference. They were different, but still, parties were parties, and that meant that Hinata was always in the same place – against the wall.

Hyuuga functions were always restrained. People talked in controlled, level tones and the only accompanying hum was from an imported mandolin player tucked away in a corner of the meeting hall. But Hinata had always been, and would always be, a wallflower. She watched her father make his rounds with the government officials and businessmen, the upper crusts new and old. She also watched Neji nii – no, he'd told her not to call him that anymore – Neji on the opposite side of the room from her, leaning against a wall, watching, like her. His eyes met hers for a sliver of a second, white on white. Hinata looked away first, just as he father stepped in front of her.

"Hinata," he said carefully, "I'd like you to meet our guest of honor, Harugawa-san. You have met him before, when you were a small child, but I doubt you remember."

But he was wrong, she did remember. Hinata gave the middle-aged man a formal bow, her kimono swishing and parting intimately, internally shrinking away from the appraising look he gave her, his eyes roaming up and down her covered chest and legs, then finally up to her face. Her father was already gone, pulled away by another guest to converse on a business interest of his.

"Pleased to meet you, Harugawa-san," Hinata intoned, cringing on the inside. The man chuckled.

"Indeed. I am pleased to make your acquaintance as well, Hyuuga Hinata-san."

She only saw a blur of motion for a half-second before there was someone standing in front of her, also bowing, but with a slight mocking accent in the way his body was held, perhaps in the way he met Harugawa-san's eyes while not bowing low enough at all.

"And I am Hyuuga Neji, her new husband," he said softly, in a tone that could easily be mistaken for indifference. "Pleased to meet you."

With the way he said it, it could have meant something else entirely.

You touch her, you die.

Of course, now wasn't anything like then, Hinata mused. Not really. And yet she felt a pang anyway, one of regret and loss.

But she still had to get out of here, still needed to get air, and still needed to rid herself of the claustrophobic feeling. On her way out, she stopped to see for a moment the Conga line Kanaye had started, and watched him lead his followers into a tuneless, shouted rendition of some song she'd never heard of. It really looked like Kanaye, despite his reservations coming here, was having a good time. So were the people dancing on the snack tables, apparently, and the people making out in the corner and against the walls, and Hadaka-sensei, who was having a conversation with a plastic and wood sculpture of a goldfish. A couple of people were even passed out on the floor.

Then it came to her: a feeling, the rising of the hackles on her neck, the uncomfortable, squishy air. Someone had been watching her, maybe for a while. Her eyes darted around the room, trying to pick out anyone who would meet her gaze, but no one noticed her. She shook her head and fled to the relative safety of the hallway. Hinata spotted a water fountain a little ways away and took a long cool drink from it before slumping against a wall, vaguely wondering when Akina and Kanaye would want to leave – not that she would make them go before they were ready, though.

She heard the gallery door creak open but paid it no mind. The figure entering her periphery probably just wanted a drink from the water fountain anyway. She continued to believe this until he slammed a hand into the wall next to her head. Then she looked up, straight into shadowy, swirling brown eyes that stared down at her. Flaming red hair, obviously dyed, stuck out from his head in short spikes with natural black roots showing underneath. Probably the most startling things were the silver spike rammed through his eyebrow and the three safety pins jutting out from his ears.

Hinata was pressed against the wall and he loomed over her silently, foreboding and formidable in his black trench coat. Hinata's gaze moved down, away from his eyes, and found a white wife-beater, umber pants, and finally, black and white bowling shoes. When he spoke after the eternity of quiet that had lay between them, it was in a smooth middle tenor, dark and cool.

"The piece you were standing by. It was yours."

It wasn't a question. There was something vaguely threatening about him, Hinata decided. She nodded quickly.

"Who is in the portrait?" he demanded.

"Do…do you know him?" Hinata tried.

"I asked you first."

Hinata reluctantly answered, slowly, "An old friend of mine."

It was then that Kanaye slid up in between the two of them, which brought his face inches away from the other teen's. He regarded the red-haired boy, half a head taller than him, with a glazed-over glare.

"Leave my drinking buddy alone," he said firmly, and then looked at Hinata. Then he looked at the unknown intruder again. "Yeah, buddy, an' it won' just be me jumpin' you from a dark alley. She's…she'll Gentle Slap you into the world o' pain, an' then blast you inta oblivion wif her laser beam eyes."

The guy just looked at him blankly and arched a hand over Kanaye, slipping something into Hinata's jacket pocket. His icy expression wrinkled into a mild look of disgust, more for Kanaye than Hinata, and then he strode off down the hall before Kanaye could continue his tirade, his trench coat whipping out dramatically behind him with the pace he set.

"You saved me," Hinata smiled gently at Kanaye. "My hero."

Kanaye smiled back, and then hunched over and grimaced.

"I'm gonna puke," he moaned. There was no time to see what the tall stranger had given her. Hinata had to get Kanaye outside. Now.

Akina entered the scenario at that moment, poking her head out of the doorway.

"Oh, Hinata," she said sleepily. "I wondered where you went 'cause you weren' by your pic – pica – piece anymore."

"We have to go," Hinata replied urgently. "Kanaye's sick."

"It's only Akina," he mumbled. "It's fine if I puke on her."

Akina's reply was to stick out her tongue and slam the door shut again.

Hinata barely got Kanaye out of the school and into the early evening before he emptied the contents of his stomach into the nearest bush. Hinata kept his hair out of his face and rubbed small, comforting circles on his back.

Kanaye just wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and said cheerfully, "That was fun. Let's do that again sometime."

0000000000

Kanaye was asleep the moment Hinata pushed him into bed. This left her to sit alone at the kitchen table, excused by Hanako from making dinner tonight because she was going out with some friends. So Hinata fished in her jacket pocket to pull out a folded piece of paper with shaking fingers, and she carefully unfolded this gift from the tall stranger. As she stared at what was inside, she was struck by a memory.

She was in Sakura's kitchen once again, sipping jasmine tea, looking at the masked man from the Anbu who'd been sent to deliver a message to Naruto.

Neji removed the mask and faced Hinata. "A messenger arrived in the village, the fastest bird from the Sand. The Kazekage has been murdered."

There was a line drawing inside, a portrait of Gaara.