To the fantastic people who have reviewed...

InuBecka: thx for the reviews:)
Crimson Tida: gd for u to point it out. actually I wrote it a little like this because she looks up to Neji who's always talking abt fate. hm.. maybe i overdid it abit :)
happykid: thx for your support! i will continue all the way to the end!
amazed by angel: don't cry! i'm glad that you like it. it'll all work out in the end. :)

Disclaimer: I'm not smart enough to own Naruto

You and Me
Chap 2: To Hyuuga Hinata

It's all because of you that I am like this.

Your existence ensured that mine was neglected.

You don't deserve all that you have.

It should rightfully have been mine.

I hate you.

I am Hyuuga Neji. The prodigy of the Hyuuga clan, the tensai Genin of my year. I was born a falcon meant to fly, but because of the curse, I will forever remain a falcon tethered to the cage.

You deceived me.

The very first time I set my eyes on you, you deceived me with your innocence, your compassion, the shyness in your eyes as I looked at you face to face.

Heaven forbid, but I thought you were adorable.

That would be the only time when we ever played together, sparring with each other and sharing secrets and thoughts.

I didn't know you could be so devious. To entice your prey, lure him in, before shutting the cage down. That day I realized what that curse seal meant, I knew that I would never fly free. That fate had decreed that I will always be tethered to you.

But how would you know anyway? You're a member of the main house, the heir to the Clan. What will you know of the misery that I suffered?

None. You knew none at all.

Whenever I look into your eyes, eyes the exact replica of mine, I see that damn innocence that you're trying to deceive with me.

You don't seem to understand that I hate you, do you?

But then again, it doesn't matter. I had more than enough to do then bother with the likes of you. From the day your "clan" took my father away, I had silently declared war on the Main House.

From that day, whatever compassion and feeling I ever had of you evaporated.

Why am I the one that is cursed? Why is it that I, I who is the eldest child in the Clan, a male, should be chosen over a younger, less capable female?

It must be fate.

Cruel fate.

Fate that led to my Father's death. Fate that decreed that I would never be more powerful then anyone from the Main House evenwhenIam much morecapable. Fate that decreed that someone, a weakling will one day take over as head of the Clan.

Yes, cruel fate.

Especially when fate had chosen to grant me tensai abilities.

What's the use of being a prodigy when you'll forever remain a servant? What's the use of having such powerful wings when you can never soar in the sky?

But fate had made me a tensai, and I accept it. Just as I accepted it that fate had made you so much weaker then me.

Yes, you.

You who took away everything that should have rightfully belonged to me.

You who pretended to be the innocent party of the struggle between the Main and the Branch House.

You who always tried so hard but never meet the standard.

You who are so much weaker then me.

You who never had the courage to look at me in the eye. A guilty conscience?

You who hang out with the likes of losers

You who would rather run away then stand ground and fight.

In front of the elders I was civil to you. Civil, but barely. When there was no need to be civil, I didn't pretend to be.

You never retaliated when I shot you looks of scorn. You merely accepted them with troubled looks. Gods know I tried to get a reaction out from you. I wanted to make you angry, I wanted you to hurl back the insults that I battered you with.

You didn't do either. You just stood there meekly, eyes welling up with tears. You made me feel like a scoundrel.

It's another of your little tricks isn't it? Making me the guilty party now.

Forget it. I will never fall prey to the tricks from the Main House. Not ever again.

Since I couldn't make you angry, I could ignore you. So I spent the better part of the times I saw you ignoring you. Yet you remain staring at me with your doleful eyes.

I couldn't take it. You didn't have a single backbone in your body! No matter what I do, I couldn't get you to hate me. Not with the intensity that I hated you.

The more you smiled at me and treated me with respect, the more I hated you.

You were the cause of all my troubles. You arethe Main House, theMain House that I hated!

Then I heard you were going to take part in the Chuuin exam.

I laughed then.

A short, cold laugh of disbelief.

YOU? Take the Chuuin exam.

And then I realized. It's all for your teammates isn't it? You never had a backbone. You could never have decided for yourself. You were dragged along.

But I realize also that you would never make it through. I knew you too well. You're a weakling that will run away at the first sign of trouble. The Chuuin exam is too dangerous for a coward like you.

And I knew then that I had to warn you.

Do not be mistaken. It is not out of any compassion for you. It is merely out of duty as a Branch House member will have on a Main House member. It is my duty to warn you of the dangers.

When I walked away from the brief "meeting" I had with you, I knew I was right. I saw despair in your eyes. I saw fear. I knew then that you would not participate.

You lied to me again.

You came for the Chuuin exam.

I warned you didn't I.

There was a slim chance that I would face you in battle.

I told you I would not hesitate to kill you.

I wanted to shock you, to scare you to give up. You're no good being a shinobi. You should have been a nurse or something. Konoha needs shinobi who are powerful, confident, who will kill without hesitation. You are neither of them all.

I could tell you wanted to give up. It is meaningless pitting yourself against me. Fate had decreed that you will forever be the weakest of the Clan. Just had fate had bound me by this curse. You can't pit yourself against fate. You'll only be hurting yourself in the end.

Give up

Just give up

You can't fight me.

So give up.

Your biggest mistake is to listen to Naruto. If you had given up, I would have released you at once. I would not have attacked you anymore.

Yet you had to listen to that moron! Who is he to you anyway? What is he consorting with the likes of the Hyuuga Clan? Have you demeaned yourself so much that you would approach the company of people like Naruto?

Don't think I do not know what you and him are up to.

You like him, love him. He may be a moron but he knows you're from the Hyuuga Clan, he knows how much power and prestige there is to gain if he goes with you.

Damn him.

I've been watching you and him long enough. How you would always blush whenever he speaks to you. How he would always give you the ultra big spastic smile and then you would blush more. How you always seem so happy around him. How you sneaked around to look at him practice his jutsus. How you offered him medication after the fight with Kiba.

Hell, Kiba's your own teammate and you looked after Naruto before you went to find Kiba!

It irked me, angered me that Naruto could get a reaction out of you when I couldn't.

You should not be happy around him.

Why should you have happiness when I live inhatred and pain?

Perhaps that was why I had the urge to beat the senses out of you. Perhaps that was why I used my most powerful jutsu on you. Perhaps that was why I took my death threat seriously and really intended to kill you.

In the end, I really don't know.

I don't know why my heart ached with each blow I rained on you. I don't know why my heart screamed at me to stop when you fell and spitted blood. I don't know why you always seem to bring out the worst in me.

You just do.

And then,

it seemed

my life changed.

again.

Because of the moron called Uzumaki Naruto.

He's unlike any other genins I've ever known. He doesn't give a damn about fate. He doesn't understand that you can't defy fate. He sticks adamantly by his dreams and desires, not allowing anything to come against him. No matter how I tried to tell him that he would always be a worthless baka, he refuses to believe it.

He annoys me, he shocked me.

He defeated me.

And then I realize... he had defied fate. He had defied fate and defeated me, the tensai. The tensai defeated by a baka! Even when the odds were against him totally.

He defied fate.

Maybe, just maybe I can defy fate too...

Perhaps someday, the falcon in me will fly. Fly into the endless azure sky and dance with the clouds, tease the wind and play with the stars... perhaps.

When I was just sitting there, daydreaming, Hiashi-sama came.

And then I understood.

I suddenly understood why my father had been sacrificed.

It was not because of the curse.

It was his choice.

I had wasted my years hating you.

I had destroyed so many of your hopes, your dreams even before they had begun to materialize.

I had scorned you, ignored you.

I had burned with white anger hating you.

I didn't know hating someone could hurt too.

And suddenly, I realize hate and love were as opposite as poles and yet as similar as if they were the same thing.

I felt more then hate for you?

I loved you? Love you?

Ay... I realize I do, I love you with the intensity I hate you.

That realization scared the hell out of me.

I was glad to be assigned to the mission. It took my mind off thinking of my feelings for you.

Too raw, too out of control.

At least in battle, I was in control. I decide my own future.

I never expect to be defeated. But the enemy was skilled.

There was one moment where I thought I would die.

All that I could think of.

All that filled my mind.

Was pictures of you...

I knew you would come to visit me at the hospital.

Your compassionate nature demanded that of you.

What I did not expect was that you would visit Naruto too. Visit him everyday, cry at his bedside while you waited for him to wake.

I overheard the nurses saying that.

At that moment, I realized that you felt nothing but duty for me. My words, my deeds had cut you too deeply. I would never garner anything more then a normal response for you. For I had failed you as a cousin, an elder cousin who should have been there to guide you through.

I don't understand why you still visited me.

Why you sit through the time when I pretended to be asleep.

It hurt too much to have you there, loving you but knowing that my love will always be vain.

The only thing I could do is to throw you out, throw you out so that I would not be reminded of how much you would have cared for me had I not been such a beast in the past.

When you left, tears streaking past, my own eyes filled up too.

Give up Hyuuga Neji, give up and let her find happiness.

Author's note: What Neji did not realize is that Hinata cried for him too! Except he wasn't awake yet to know that.

Hope you enjoyed it! Reviews are welcomed :) There would be just one more chapter and I will end this fic :) Unfortunately since school and work is coming up, who knows when I'll be back to update. Till then!