Wowzahs. This story is turning out to be a mountain climb. The plot is coming along, it's just getting to the juicy parts that is taking FOREVER. So this chapter is a slow one, but I'm hoping that the next one has 20% more plot. XD

Thanks to ALL those who have reviewed, subscribed and favourite even though there is little here to show for it. I really appreciate the time you take to read this!

So please, R&R, let me know what you think. Throw in some suggestions – I am open-minded with this story as it is my first multi-chap fic aimed to be a long one – and enjoy!

DISCLAIMER: I DO NOT OWN NARUTO OR ANY OF THE MENTIONED CHARACTERS NOR DO I MAKE ANY MONEY BY WRITING THIS. ^_^


Tables are turning and times are changing. That's what Hinata thought as she twirled a spoon around a glass of sundae-ice cream. Who knew her heart could be so easily swayed to another so quickly and so dramatically. It really wasn't that long ago that she was fawning over Naruto as she had been for so many years now. Was she really so easy to please that another could come along and take her just like that?

But no, Hinata thought, this was not something that just happened. It was something that had been developing over a very long period of time. Surely Neji knew that too. He must feel something similar because, if their last encounter was anything to go by, he sure acted like it.

She had always loved her cousin. It was a given. Her heart was too big and too fragile to encompass such a word as hate for someone so well-known to her. Even when they were younger and he despised her for his own reasons, she never hated him. She never entertained the thought of hate for her cousin, because he was so much more than she was. In power and strength and motivation, he outstripped her. Should she have hated him for that?

Instead she pitied him. She felt sorry that he could not learn to love and let go of what was the past. But he did get over it in the end, didn't he? He was enlightened by truth and by reality and he has moved forward from that dark and depressing past.

And it was all thanks to Naruto.

Most things were, it seemed. But Hinata knew that Neji could've continued in that dark place forever if he so wished. He may thank Naruto for the push, but really, everything came down to himself in that moment.

Her thoughts swam in circles like this, pondering Neji in this new light and Naruto in another. One that adorned him as something akin to a friend. She struggled to remember what he once meant to her – did she really liken it to breathing? Something that was inescapable? But that's not right because she chose to love Naruto like a girl choses a favourite colour. Once chosen, it's something that sticks.

But Hinata knew that love never chooses – not this love. Otherwise she wouldn't have chosen to love Neji. Why would she chose to love her cousin like this when Naruto was so much more an easier target. Sure, things that are chosen will stick, but things that aren't tend to be more permanent than the things that are. Hinata was beginning to realise that now.

Forgetting Naruto – that would never happen. But loving another – that was something else entirely.

Somewhere in her heart she still loved Naruto, but something else, something bigger was on the horizon.

It gave her cause to worry somewhat, knowing that she wasn't exactly prepared for what her heart was throwing at her so quickly. She lifted the vanilla ice cream –filled spoon to her mouth and closed her eyes in bliss.

She missed as two people walked past the window of the café – one being dragged rather forcefully, his dark hair billowing slightly in the breeze, and the other smiling viciously as she marched towards Ichraku's Ramen.


Lunch was proving more hassle than it was worth, thought Neji. Tenten seemed to be on some sort of a verbal mission as she enquired and wormed her way into Neji's personal mental space. Also not to mention the fact that despite his earlier request, they had wound up sitting at Ichiraku's Ramen bar. It was a deliberate attempt at his sanity and good-nature, he was sure of it.

Really, he just wanted to go home and crash on his bed. Let sweet, blissful sleep cloak his mind in solitudes' ignorance.

"Hey Neji," Tenten said over a mouth of ramen noodles, "so you didn't answer my question."

Neji supressed the want to sigh, "oh really," he said wearily, "which one?"

"Haha, funny guy. When are you going to take me on a date?"

The question was met with an audible choke as Neji tried to regain some semblance of composure.

"I'm not," he said, glaring venomously. Tenten shrugged, too occupied with her noodles to heed the death glare aimed her way.

"Too bad," she said, "but I guess Hinata doesn't like competition…"

"What are you-"

"It's okay," Tenten continued, still intent on her meal than Neji's reaction, "I saw her on the way here, by the way."

Neji wasn't sure what Tenten was trying to achieve, but he had a feeling that he was being staged. Judging from the innocent look that she was now giving him accompanied by a knowing smile, Neji knew that he was dealing with a potential hazard to his personal life.

Tenten always was like that though, always the bridge between the problem and the peaceful solution. Neji was always the problem. From his earliest days of being lost in arrogance and hate, Tenten would brush it aside with a careless wave and promote the peace. Even when his distaste for Lee was dominant in their team affairs, Tenten was always the one to step in and force cooperation. Why wouldn't she do the same now? Why wouldn't she try and ease his troubles, solve his problems and set up the better life for him? That's what she's always done.

She cared too much. That was her problem. But over the years, Neji was able to discern that, really, it wasn't so much of a problem as it was more something she had that he didn't. He was working on it, though. His stoic, unfeeling days had ended when he lost to Naruto at the chuunin exams. It was now just a matter of building to that something that Tenten abounded in.

Tenten, Naruto, Lee, Hinata – all of them abounded in it.

But this afternoon her excessive caring ability was becoming a hindrance to his sanity.

He swirled his chopsticks around the full bowl of ramen rather aggressively causing the soup to slosh against the sides, "and what of it, Tenten?" he almost growled.

Her feigned ignorance to Neji's short-temper continued as she hummed softly, "Oh, nothing. I just thought that maybe you'd want to go see her again and - I don't know - talk… "

"What would we talk about, do you think?"

"Well," Tenten drawled, "you could talk about how you can't stop thinking about her. Or what about if she talks about how her eyes are all over you whenever you're within seeing distance. I'm actually surprised she didn't see us walking past the ice cream parlour today, your presense is like a new drug or something –"

"You are blowing things way out of proportion, Tenten," Neji interrupted. He got up from his seat, discarding his noodles but leaving the payment. The truth was that Tenten was not so far from the truth as he liked to believe. He didn't know when the line between friendship and love and begun to blur when it came to Hinata, but he knew that his new attachment to her was undeniable. But at least Neji could pretend he couldn't see it for a little while longer. That was okay, right?

He left the bar with a quick farewell to Tenten who, unsurprised by his sudden departure, had taken up attacking his full bowl of ramen noodles with glee.


Tenten watched Neji leave with a triumphant smile on her face. This was definitely going to plan, she thought deviously. Unlike some certain people with pale eyes and reserved demeanours, Tenten had seen this coming for some time now. Watching Neji progress from the cold-shoulder person he used to be to the man that was beyond a doubt the most over-protective cousin in the history of mankind was entertaining and, at the same time, very informative.

She watched and discerned that as Hinata helped Neji over his personality defaults he became more and more attached to her. Not in the clingy way, but rather in a gravitational pull sort of way. The kind of attachment that had Neji pulled to Hinata's general direction as if she were his anchor in a sea of endless chaos. Tenten understood that, in a way, she was. Hinata was the someone who loved him even as his hate threatened to consume, not just him, but everyone around him. Such a gentle soul with such a gentle heart, capable of loving even the most brutal person.

Tenten knew that this was something Neji valued in Hinata. She knew it better than he did and, with the knowledge that fate had its' hand in this relationship, she readily pursued anything in favour of it. Even if it meant pissing Neji off for a few minutes.

Plus, she thought as Neji's back disappeared in the sea of people and the untouched bowl of ramen still sat in front of her, she got a free meal out of this very fulfilling day.

Very fulfilling indeed.


If Hinata was shocked to find Neji sitting across her table for the second time in three days she did little to show it. Her ice cream – the bowl empty save for the cherries she always saved for last – was now forgotten and balancing precariously on the edge of the table. She did wonder at the randomness of this impromptu meeting, but she didn't dare object to it; far from it, in fact. She marvelled at the light feeling in her chest and at the same time tried to see if anything she felt for Naruto measured to this.

He was talking now, his voice a steady, smooth tone that reminded her of thunder in summer. Such a contradictive voice – powerful and alluring but at the same time soothing and so damn addictive.

He said he had a mission coming up and needed a medic on his team. Wasn't she a medic? Maybe not as skilled as Sakura, but she was valued among medic-nins nonetheless. Of course, he was asking her to be on his team!

"Okay," she said, hoping her voice didn't sound too hopeful or excited. Just the thought of spending more time with him sent butterflies shooting through her stomach, "I will accompany your team,"

"Thank you, Hinata," Neji said. Was it just her imagination, or did she see a similar glint of something flash in his pale eyes?

She brushed the thought aside and set to the matter at hand.

"When will we be leaving and what are the details?"

"I'm not sure yet," Neji said, "we have a debriefing with Hokage-sama tomorrow morning."

Hinata nodded in understanding.

"When should I meet you?"

The question came out as if it were the most normal thing in the world to ask a person. Of course, it wasn't so unusual except for the fact that Neji seemed to be reading everything little thing Hinata did and said as a figruitive sign of affection.

"Meet me?" he asked, his eyes holding questions bespeaking hope,

Hinata, feeling her heart beat slightly faster than normal, swallowed then blinked.

"Y-yes. We can go to the meeting to-together, is that okay?" she said, dropping her gaze to the wooden table that was scratched from years of use.

"Yeah…that would be…okay." Neji hoped Hinata wasn't looking at this very moment, otherwise she might catch him blushing like some hormonal-driven school-boy. He wasn't a hormonal-driven school-boy, he was a shinobi of status who was realising that love was a picture of a pale-eyed, blue-haired kunoichi.

Damn the hormones that he definitely was not driven by.

The sun was sinking lower and lower into the red horizon and Neji still had yet to assemble the remainder of his team for the up and coming mission. "Should I escort you home, Hinata?" he asked as he rose from his seat. He tried to ignore that fact that, as she also moved to stand up, her skirt rode higher and higher against creamy-white legs. Hinata was a being of distraction.

"No, Neji, it's okay," she said, blushing as she pulled her rebellious skirt over her knees, "I'm sure you have things to do."

There was an awkward moment of silence that passed between the couple as Neji stuffed his hands in his pockets and Hinata fumbled with her thumbs and forefingers before Neji cleared his throat and turned towards the door.

Just as they were about to part ways Neji looked up at Hinata.

"Our team…" he started, trying, once again, not to be distracted with the way the afternoon sun set Hinata's skin glowing with a radiance of beauty, "will include Tenten…and Naruto also,"

He paused to gauge her reaction. He noted a small furrow between her eyes – a look she got when she was either uncomfortable or concentrating. He didn't quite know which one he preferred in this particular instance.

"Okay," she said, after a while. She lifted her gaze to meet Neji dead-on and smiled in a way that had Neji holding his breath, "it will be okay," she smiled again in that breath-taking way before continuing; "you'll be there for me."

Before Neji could bring himself out of stunned silence Hinata had turned and started walking towards the Hyuuga compound.

You'll be there for me...

...

Well, that turned out better than expected. He continued to watch the empty space she left behind as his mind mulled over what she could mean as opposed to what he could want it to mean. He didn't want to have high hopes dashed, but Neji swore he could feel something bigger coming on here. Something that, if he could read the signs right, was favorable by both parties.

If things went his way, Neji had a feeling that things might turn out okay. This mission would decide a lot of things, it seemed.


CHA! Third chapter COMPLETO! Fourth chapter? It's coming…some time…sorry if you hate waiting. I'm trying to get ahead of myself but it's actually really hard…=P

Anyways, PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE drop a line.\, R&R, even if it's only a couple of words. I love reviews and reviewers! XD And I love checking out my reviewers pages because I'm just nosey like that.

Oh, and does anybody know some good Beta's (prefereably NejiHina ones). I think I may need a little help with this one...just spotting plot holes and other minor mistakes...^_^

- Dazy