Naruto does not belong to me.

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CHAPTER TWO: MONDAY [name then verb]

Naruto awoke on Monday morning with aching limbs, nothing was new there. After the fiasco of losing the ring the day before, he wanted the remaining days leading up to the wedding to be as peaceful as possible. However, today, he and Hinata were to meet with the Fire Country Daimyo for cake and tea. As he pulled himself away from the comfort of his bed, he heard the stray cat that sometimes visited his apartment calling for him.

He put on an old t-shirt that was long enough to cover over his blue boxer shorts that he liked to sleep in, and made his way over to the small window in his bedroom, opened it to allow his furry friend in. The cat jumped down from the window, stretched and then jumped up onto Naruto's bed. He started to roll around in Naruto's bed sheets and began purring before urinating on the sheets.

"Shit!" Naruto shouted a shade too loudly (bearing in mind that his bedroom window was open and the kids were out walking to school) as he picked up the cat and took him to the front door and let him out. "Surely this could be the only bad thing to happen to me today," Naruto thought as he gathered up the sheets and dumped them in his laundry hamper.

He was meeting with the Daimyo and Hinata's family for tea and cakes in the Hokage Building at noon. He hadn't met the Daimyo before; he had met his wife though. She was one of Team Seven's first clients, Naruto could remember fondly how many hours they'd wasted looking for her cat that clearly did not reciprocate her affections. When Naruto left his apartment, the rain was only light, so he hadn't thought to bring an umbrella—or rain coat. He decided to walk through the main shopping district of the Hidden Village. He loved market day. He could remember as a child looking at all the different products on sale and marvelling at them—but all he could ever do was window shop.

When he arrived at the Hokage Building, he was greeted by one of the in-house Chuunin and was told to go to the meeting room. He was escorted through the narrow hallways of the building with a Chuunin, who opened the door for Naruto and introduced him to the Daimyo, "Uzumaki Naruto-san," he said simply and left.

After the Chuunin had left his side, he wasn't sure of the proper etiquette that should be used in this particular situation. Should he bow before such an important figure? Shake his hand? Or simply do nothing at all? He could feel a piercing gaze coming from Hinata's Father and under the circumstances went with the most formal approach—a small bow of the head.

The Daimyo simply laughed, stood up and extended at hand towards Naruto, "Nice to meet you, Uzumaki-san."

Naruto smiled back at him feebly and sat down with the rest of the party as one of the Daimyo's assistants poured out some Green Tea. A deathly silence lingered in the room as they sipped their tea. The Daimyo, sensing tension amongst his guests, (in particular between Naruto and Hiashi) said in possibly the most carefree way possible, "Not long until the big day, is it now?"

Naruto (who was mid-way through a sip of his tea) put down his cup and replied, "No, sir. No it is not."

"No need to be so formal here, Naruto-kun," the Daimyo said with a smile.

As the rain outside began to pick up, the Daimyo began slicing an untouched cake that laid on a sliver cake stand in the middle of the table. His guests remained silent, they either had nothing to talk about with the man who had been protected by so many ninja during the war, or they were simply stunned by his nonchalant demeanour. He put a sliver of the cake onto a white china plate and passed it to Hinata.

Unsure of how to proceed in this situation, she delicately picked up her silver dessert fork, and broke away some of the white icing, "Mmm," she said quietly with a smile.

"Do you like it?" the Daimyo asked. Hinata nodded.

He then proceeded to cut pieces of the cake for the rest of his guests when something happened to Hinata. She started to cough violently, Naruto rushed over to his fiancée to check if she was alright.

"Are you okay?" he asked as he hit her back to get the rest of the cake out of her system.

"Hinata, you are embarrassing me," Hiashi said through gritted teeth.

"Hiashi, please," Mayu pleaded calmly as Hinata continued to struggle for air.

"What's in the cake?" Naruto asked after Hinata's outburst.

"Eggs, flour, sugar, vanilla essence, marzipan—" the Daiymo replied.

"O my God! Hinata's allergic to almonds!" Mayu cried.

Naruto looked out of the window, it was still raining pretty heavily but after all of the horror stories Sakura had told him about allergic reactions, he knew that he would have to get Hinata to the hospital for treatment—and fast.

Naruto scooped up Hinata into his arms and was now charging through the village, straight to Konoha Hospital. The air was thick, grey and humid and the rain came down mercilessly. After he passed the first junction, he decided to slow down as the rain had compromised the state of the paths, and a fall could only cause further injury to Hinata. Hinata had fallen asleep after their quick exit from the Hokage Building; a loud rumble of thunder from the angry sky above suddenly roused her.

"N—Naruto-kun?" she asked, her eyes and body not quite registering where she was and what had happened to her.

They'd just passed the second junction, the hospital would be on their next right, "It's okay, Hinata. I'm taking you to the hospital," he answered, and gave her a gentle kiss on the forehead.

"W—W—Why?" she asked.

"You're having an allergic reaction," Naruto bit his lip and started to run faster than ever, "And if I don't get you to the hospital soon, I don't know what'll happen…"

He looked down at Hinata again in his arms, she'd fallen unconscious. He prayed that either Sakura-chan or Tsunade-baa-chan were going to be on duty.

Naruto ran into the Hospital foyer sopping wet, with an equally wet Hinata in his arms. Just his luck, Sakura was in the foyer behind the main desk filling out some paperwork. She rushed over to them immediately.

"O my God!" Sakura exclaimed as Naruto laid Hinata down on one of the plastic chairs in the foyer.

"I got here as fast as I could," Naruto panted.

"What happened?" Sakura asked as she searched for a pulse and called a nurse over for assistance.

"She's had an allergic reaction. Almond I think?" Naruto replied as he helplessly watched Hinata get taken away into another room.

"What's gonna happen to her?" he asked.

"Well…Since you mentioned an allergic reaction to a nut, I think her throat has started to close up so we'll have to give her an antihistamine pill."

Naruto fell to his knees, "I can't believe this is happening to me—us."

Sakura offered Naruto her hand and took him to the room where Hinata was receiving treatment, "Don't worry, she'll be fine."

Naruto had stayed at Hinata's bedside until the drowsiness from her treatment kicked in. Sakura came into their room to check on her patient, she picked up her chart and looked at the heart monitor hooked up to the violet haired kunoichi.

"Her heart rate is slowing down," Sakura said as she filled in some paperwork.

"And that's good?" Naruto asked.

Sakura nodded, "We'll probably keep her in for the night though. Just to be on the safe side."

Naruto stood up and kissed Hinata's forehead, "I'll go back to the house and collect some things for her then."

Sakura put Hinata's chart back and smiled, "I'll tell her you'll be back soon if she wakes up."

Naruto had gathered a few of Hinata's belongings from her house to bring back to her at the Hospital: a change of underwear, a set of light white pyjamas to combat the night-time summer heat and various toiletries.

When he arrived back at the hospital, he noticed that all the lights were off. "The power must've been knocked out by the storm," he thought to himself as he traced his way back to Hinata's room. When he'd left Hinata, almost an hour ago, she'd still been asleep after taking the medication to control her allergy. With this in mind, Naruto knocked quietly on the door, "Hinata? Are you up?"

It was now raining so heavily outside that Naruto doubted that he would have even been able to hear her reply against the sound of the pouring rain. He decided to open the door. Clutching the bag with her belongings in he said, "Hinata?" But just as he said her name, she turned over to face him when a flash of lightning struck outside. Naturally, she screamed.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa. Hinata, it's me!" Naruto said as he tried to get Hinata to calm down.

Her face was white with fear, "D—Don't, h—hurt, me…" she cried.

Naruto placed the bag on the bedside table and put his hands on her shoulders , "It's okay, Hinata. It's me."

At first she couldn't look him in the eyes, but after a kiss she managed to regain her composure.

"Oh, Naruto-kun, I was so scared," she said quietly after the lights came back on.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to scare you. Didn't Sakura-chan tell you I was going back to your's to get some clothes?" Hinata shook her head slightly and held Naruto tightly.

"Thank you, Naruto-kun."

"For you, I'd do anything," Naruto said with a smile.

They held each other in an embrace for several minutes before Sakura returned, "Oh," she said with slightly flushed cheeks, embarrassed that she may have walked in on their 'alone' time, "We should be able to let you go tomorrow morning."

Sakura moved over towards Hinata and put a comforting hand on her shoulder, "Today was just one of those days, tomorrow will be a better day."

"Thank you, Sakura-chan," Hinata said with a smile.

After Sakura left, Naruto turned off the lights in the room and snuggled up in bed beside his fiancée. He couldn't—wouldn't even think about leaving her alone in a hospital after what had happened today. Having faith alone that Tuesday would be a better day for them both would not be enough.

A/N: Apologies for not updating much recently! I hope I've got my facts right about the type of medicine used to stop (?) an allergic reaction, so correct me if I'm wrong. Inspiration has been evading me, so, um, yeah… However, it has given me some pretty good ideas for coming chapters though (I've got big plans for Friday! :P)