Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto.
Request by IkeSy: Neji visits Hinata after the Chunin exams.
The ICU seemed colder that day.
Neji attributed it to the late hour, but even he knew that the temperature outside had nothing to do with the one indoors. The hospital staff paid very careful attention to that sort of thing, so that none of their patients would be uncomfortable. They were efficient, he'd give them that. Even if their younger workers batted their eyelashes and made intolerable cooing noises whenever he passed them in the hall.
He stopped before a door.
Faintly, Neji heard the sound of Hinata breathing on the other side. It was accompanied by the steady beeps of whatever machines they had connected to her. He leaned closer when he heard a slight murmur—was someone inside with her? A quick activation of his Byakugan revealed that she was alone. Was she talking to herself? She'd grown to become stranger than he initially thought if that was the case. But, upon closer inspection, he realized that there was something in front of her. It sat atop her exposed calf. A dot of black amidst perfect white.
A bug, he saw after a moment. There was a moment of utter blankness in his mind, until he recalled who her teammate was. One of Aburame Shino's no doubt.
Hinata mumbled something that he could just barely make out. It wasn't anything he understood, considering the little he knew about her. An inside joke about tofu that made her smile. Neji was sure that the Aburame, wherever he was, smiled along with her. He didn't know they could communicate with others via their bugs like that, and for a distracted instant, he wished he'd been paired with ninjas from other clans. Even if just for a day. Because learning the intricacies of their techniques now would only serve him better in the future.
His eyes refocused, as Hinata rubbed over the place on her chest where he'd struck her not even a fortnight ago. She assured her distant companion that it didn't hurt, even as her face scrunched in pain. Hinata was a horrible liar. Always had been. He was glad, at least, that some things hadn't changed. His gaze shifted, so he could look at her face. It was round and pale—paler now that she'd been rotting away in a hospital for so long. She looked delicate. She'd always been that way. But he hadn't realized the extent of it until he examined her without the faceless veil of hatred clouding his senses.
Neji knocked twice.
He didn't miss the way she startled or how her Byakugan flashed in the next instant. She was stunned by his presence, and it showed. Distressed would be putting it mildly. Hinata drew into herself like a kitten before a predator that it desperately wanted to hide from. Neji knew that she unintentionally shared the wave of fear that rocked her with the Aburame the moment his bug zoomed out of the window with speed he didn't think beetles capable of.
"May I come in?" he asked.
Speaking to her with civility was hard after so many years, but he tried. Because if nothing else, it was a start. And if he was unable to fully mask the revulsion in his voice, then she didn't tell him. In fact, all she did was stutter out a high-pitched yes that made his ears ring with the sound. Her voice was like needles that pricked at the welled-up boil of guilt that had been stirring beneath his skin since the day he'd put her in here.
Neji was loathed to admit that it reminded him of his father.
Hizashi had been cold, but not unkind. And Hinata, he realized, had a way of making him feel small without raising her voice that was… just like him, he thought, half-stricken and half-irritated by their uncanny similarity. Who does that make me like then? Hiashi?
Even the name was uttered with disdain in his mind.
Old habits died hard, it seemed.
Once he finally mastered himself enough to enter, he looked reflexively around the room for the glint of moonlight on steel—still a guardian, despite the years he spent denying it. There were quite a few places someone could hide. A folding screen in one corner, a tall desk covered with flowers in another, and a narrow nook between a closet and the wall. He spared each spot a cursory glance, and was satisfied when he found that they were well and truly alone.
His eyes drifted back to Hinata, and the two of them stared at each other for a moment. There was a chair beside her bed with a plumped pillow resting against the back of it, but he made no move to sit down.
"N—Neji-san," she began, hesitant. Even the honorific sounded unsure. And yet, he couldn't bring himself to hate her for that because she was always, even now, the first to reach out. "C—Can I h—help you?"
She was stuttering so bad that he had to angle his head just to properly make out her words.
Every instinct he held inside of him, even those that were older than his short time on this planet, spurred on by his ancestors as they were, demanded that he submit. That he kneel before this tiny figure, barely a woman, and beg for forgiveness. But his pride wasn't something so easily crushed. So, cold defiance won out in the end. Neji raised his chin and met her gaze head-on, fully prepared to ask about her condition and then leave without another look back.
The look in her eyes stopped him, however.
No terror there. No hate… but no warmth either. Not exactly. There were a mix of feelings that implied it. But he wasn't so well-versed in her emotions that he could say for certain. Still, it wasn't anything like the black-rooted sentiments he saw inside of himself the moment he caught his reflection in her eyes. He looked so much older. So cold and so distant compared to her. He was hesitant to cross the space that separated them.
When did that happen? He wondered. When had he become too wary to approach her? When had he started turning his back whenever she called his name? When, Sage, when had the verbal barrage of abuse begun because he'd stopped seeing the tiny girl before him for what she was? A painfully shy girl with few friends and no talent because the rigid Hyuga style of teaching didn't suit her.
Neji knew the answer to those questions. But perhaps the one he was most concerned with was—when did she stop actively trying to get him to look at her? Did she ever stop?
No, he realized. The Chunin exams were evidence of that.
"Is everything alright?" she asked, cutting through his thoughts. Clean, like separating blood from water in a thin line. She gave him a once over, clearly mistaking the reason why he was in the hospital in the first place. "A—Are you still recovering from the fight with N—Naruto-kun?"
After all of this, was she really asking if he was okay?
Ancestors, help him.
His chest flooded with shame, confusion, joy, and the inexplicable urge to throttle some sense into her. How could she be a ninja when she was this soft?
"I am fine," he said through gritted teeth. His first words since entering. Every syllable seemed to drag out in thorns from his throat.
Neji swallowed thickly, trying to cool the tired, ancient fury he felt in his gut. He was so sick of hating. But after so long, it was difficult to leave behind. And even more difficult to try to live without it. The rotten emotion had grasped his heart like the fist of a demon over a heinous sacrifice. It didn't want to let go—and trying to force it suffocated him in ways he couldn't explain.
Before he could say more, he felt a vicious burst of threatening energy behind him.
Neji turned at the hostile presence that had intruded upon their reunion—if it could be called that—only to find Aburame Shino there with his arms crossed and his head cocked threateningly to the side.
"I suggest you leave," Shino said, all faux calm. Neji couldn't see his eyes behind his shades, but experience told him that they were just as dead as his voice. He was serious. "Why? Because Kiba is on his way, and he won't be pleased to see you." There was a pause, before he added, "And frankly, neither am I. Go away, Hyuga. You, of all people, do not belong here."
Neji knew that already. There was no need to remind him of the fact.
It wasn't as if he wanted to be standing here with his words locked in his throat and his pride rearing its ugly head in a place where it was clearly unwanted. Neji would've said something cutting in return to the Aburame's ruthless words if he didn't think that defending himself would be absolutely worthless now. He was the cause of this mess in the first place, so really, he should've expected this. A part of him did—though not from her teammates, but rather from Hinata herself.
Although he hadn't gotten to say anything substantial to her, Neji turned to leave. Because fighting in a hospital was never a good idea. More than that, he needed to cool off and think about what exactly it was he wanted to happen the next time he came inside of this sterile hospital room. He needed to better prepare himself for the light that was Hyuga Hinata. She was gentler than him. Too gentle to be spoken to when he was still trying to master himself enough to muster an even tone.
He took one step towards the door.
"Neji-san," Hinata called, effectively stopping him in his tracks. No stutter now. Only genuine sincerity. "Come back soon, okay?"
His heart shattered right then and there.
The vice-like grip of hate that had made its home in his chest squeezed air, and he forced himself to breathe. He would not castrate himself before her. He would not show another ninja outside of his clan the weakness bubbling in his chest like over boiled stew.
"I will," he promised. It was barely a whisper, but she heard it, and so did the Aburame if the deepening frown on his face was anything to go by.
"Maybe," she went on, wanting a solid time frame so he wouldn't avoid her, "for lunch?"
"I…" His fists clenched and unclenched in turn. "I will try."
He heard, rather than saw her smile.
"I'll see you then, Neji-san!"
A/N: I'm considering requests. Send them, and I'll do whatever I find interesting.
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