It had been ten days, and Tenten was starting to worry.
It was not the injury that troubled her. In fact, her recovery had been progressing remarkably well; with the new therapies Shizune had suggested, she was slowly regaining feeling in her left foot. Earlier that morning, she had even managed to walk from her couch to the kitchen without the aid of a crutch, albeit still favoring her injured leg.
Lee had quickly bounced back from the shock of her sudden disappearance, and after a few profuse apologies for provoking "a terribly un-youthful dispute", he had fallen into the habit of visiting her every afternoon – when he didn't have a mission – to check in on her progress. Though he was occasionally more boisterous than Tenten preferred after a long day of recovery, she had to admit that it was nice to have someone to talk with.
But ten days had passed, and she was beyond the point of worry – if she was completely honest with herself, she was downright distraught.
It had been storming all day, and Lee was running late. While most shinobi would have opted to train some other time, Lee had never let something as insignificant as inclement weather preclude his training. When he dragged himself across her doorstep late that afternoon, he was soaked to the bone, his shiny bowl cut plastered to his scalp. After he had dried off sufficiently, he joined her in living room, recounting his day of training.
Tenten half-listened, but most of her attention was on the rain outside, and her thoughts were far away. As Lee droned on, she tapped her fingers absentmindedly on the sill, hoping that the nervous motion might distract her mind from the question that had been searing in her skull for the last nine and a half days.
"—which led me here! My youthful teammate, are you alright?"
The note of concern in Lee's voice was enough to distract Tenten from watching the rivulets racing down her window.
"Hmm?"
"Tenten-chan, forgive me for prying, but you seem distracted." Lee stared at her, his gaze probing.
Tenten blew her bangs out of her face, chuckling nervously. "Sorry, Lee. I didn't mean to zone out like that I just…"
The question hung on her tongue, suspended like a pendulum. If she just let it drop, maybe it would lift the weight from her chest.
"…I'm just really tired today. Therapy was exhausting."
"Of course!" Lee jumped out of his chair, nearly knocking it over in the process. "I ought not to bother my dear teammate after a day of such strenuous work! I shall—"
Tenten grabbed his arm, pulling him back into his seat.
"That's not what I meant, Lee." She gave him a reassuring smile. "I don't want you to go away. I just need to try to focus better."
Lee returned her smile, but then it faltered slightly, and his brow furrowed.
"Tenten-chan," he began more seriously, and she felt her stomach churn. "Are you sure that is all this is about?"
No, that's not what this is about at all!, a voice in her head screamed.
Fortunately, what came out of her mouth was a little more controlled.
"Not exactly."
Lee raised an arm in triumph.
"Aha! I knew something was troubling the youthful blossom of Team Gai."
Rather than letting Lee jump to more conclusions, Tenten cut straight to the chase.
"Have you heard from Neji?"
"Why, of course! I saw him just this morning!" Lee responded immediately.
It took him a few moments of staring at Tenten's valiant attempt not to look crestfallen to understand that something was not right. When he finally came to the realization, a slow look of confusion suffused his wide eyes.
"I had assumed my youthful rival had been visiting when I was not here…" The pieces were slowly coming together for him, and Tenten wished she could contradict his conclusions, but she would have been lying. "He has not been to see you?"
Tenten bit her lip unconsciously, trying to find the proper phrasing.
"He… hasn't stopped by recently, no." She fumbled, trying to recover ground in the discussion, but she wasn't hiding her disappointment very well. "I just assumed he'd been busy. After all, since you all had the new assignment…"
She trailed off, smiling weakly. Unsurprisingly, Lee was not fooled.
"I cannot believe my eternal rival would just abandon a teammate in such a manner!" For the second time, Lee jumped from his seat, and this time he succeeded in knocking the chair over.
Tenten cringed, and not just for the sake of the chair.
"I will seek him out and demand an explanation for this behavior! Such indifference is intolerable!"
"Lee, you really—"
Tenten's weak protests went unnoticed beneath the clamor of Lee's impassioned rant. Before she could so much as put out a hand to stop him, Lee was out in the storm, Tenten's door swinging closed behind him.
Tenten winced as it slammed.
This was not going to be good.
Neji had long ago tuned out the steady drum of rain on the roof; the thunder was merely a background noise, as easily ignored as the whisper of the wind.
The noise of a booming voice, however, was not one he could easily block out.
Cracking one eye slowly open, Neji was faced with a green spandex-clad figure. The figure was in the process of lunging at Neji, and was well on his way to the dragging the Hyuuga genius out of his meditative pose.
Skipping past the initial question of how Lee had even gotten into the compound, Neji fought to keep his cool as he stopped his teammate from dragging him out the door.
"Lee, what are you doing?"
Lee clamped a hand onto his arm and attempted to drag him toward the door once more.
"I have… a duty… to our teammate…" he huffed, pulling unsuccessfully at his immovable teammate.
Neji raised a questioning eyebrow. "Which involves dragging me out into the storm?"
"Yes!" Lee shouted. At the same moment, his grip slipped from Neji's arm, and he went hurtling across the room. He skidded across the wood floor, stopping just short of knocking into a plant in the corner.
From the floor, he stared at Neji, disgust plain on his face.
Neji crossed his arms, seemingly unperturbed.
"Lee, what is this about?"
Lee sat up, smoothing a wrinkle out of his green jumpsuit.
"My eternal rival, our teammate has suffered a grievous injury, and yet you have not so much as stopped by to see her in a week."
More than a week. Ten days, in fact, his mind automatically corrected.
Though his outward demeanor remained calm, his eyes narrowed slightly.
"Whether or not I've visited is none of your concern, Lee." He turned away.
Neji had barely taken a step when a blow to the head almost knocked him over. He staggered forward, stars of red and white exploding across his vision. It took him several seconds before he was able to recover his balance sufficiently to turn around.
Normally, after such an occurrence, Neji would not have hesitated to Jyuuken the life out of his teammate for even daring to strike him from behind. But instead, he stayed his hand. Later, he would ascribe his hesitation to the daze caused by the blow to the head, but it might just as well have been something else entirely.
Lee stood in front of him, his face red, tears welling in his eyes.
"Our teammate is injured, Neji, and you act as though it is nothing. I…" He shook his head, tears leaking from the corners of his eyes. "I am ashamed to call you my eternal rival."
For a moment, Neji just stared at him. With tears streaming down his face and his nose running, Lee looked even more disturbing than usual, but his words might as well have been a kunai to the gut. And though he was sufficiently humbled, Neji was also slightly surprised. When had Lee's words begun to have this much impact?
"She didn't seem to care much for our help when she ran off to the Hokage monument on her own." He said as calmly as he could manage.
Lee's expression softened somewhat, though he was still crying.
"You ought to see her."
Neji glanced out the window. Outside, the storm was beginning to pick up.
He sighed.
He made it to the door before turning around to fix a flabbergasted Lee with an impassive stare.
"Well, are we going or not?"
Rain splashed against the window in an erratic pattern, whipped about by the wind. Tenten drew her blanket closer around her shoulders and readjusted her bound leg.
Lee had been gone for exactly twenty-seven minutes, and she was ready to throw something she was so nervous. If she'd had a kunai on hand, there would have been a hole the size of her fist in the wall opposite her.
When the knock sounded on the door, she nearly jumped out of her skin.
"Come in!"
"Tenten?" A surprisingly female voice called out, and Tenten felt her stomach slowly recede from where it had lodged itself in her esophagus.
"In here," she called weakly.
Shizune poked a bedraggled and very wet head around the corner, smiling faintly.
"Sorry to barge in on you like this." She held out a pouch as she approached, placing it in Tenten's outstretched hand. "But you forgot your new medication at your appointment this morning. I just thought I'd drop it off on my way home."
Tenten smiled. "Thank you. You really didn't have to come all this way in such bad weather."
Shizune shrugged. "It's no problem. And besides, it's best that you get started on that as soon as possible. Though I would suggest staying off the streets until this mess has cleared up.
She gave Tenten a tired smile and was about turn to head back out the door when she paused, her expression concerned.
"Are you feeling alright? You look a little pale."
Tenten waved it off, trying not to look as nervous as she felt. Trust it to Shizune to see right through her worry.
"I'm fine. I was just expecting someone else that's all."
"Oh." Shizune gave her a questioning look, but she wasn't one to pry, so she turned back to the door. "I'll see you in a few days. Keep resting and working on that leg!"
Tenten's heart rate was beginning to slow as she heard the door shut. She closed her eyes, willing her breathing to slow to an even flow.
She had almost gotten it back to normal when the door flew open for the second time.
Tenten fully expected Lee to come bursting through the door, proclaiming some admirable but obviously false excuse about how he couldn't find Neji, or Neji had been too busy with a mission, but he would stop in later.
She was not expecting the drenched figure that dragged himself into her living room, his normally perfect hair in complete disarray. Had this been any other day, she would have laughed hysterically.
For half a second, she held her breath, expecting Lee to come around the corner, but no, it was just Neji. Neji, who had been gone for ten days, Neji, here, in her living room, soaking wet, and staring at her with… She swallowed, guilt bubbling up in her throat.
If he had been angry, she might have been able to tolerate it. Even if he had been completely stoic, she might have been okay.
But instead, the man who had just run through a storm to come and see her, the man who was likely going to catch pneumonia if he didn't dry off soon, was staring at her, his gaze overflowing with concern.
Tenten thought – no… she knew she was going to be sick.
A/N: Maybe it's the sleep deprivation talking, but this chapter turned out surprisingly well, and was surprisingly easy to write. Hmm.
Thank you, thank you, thank you to all you lovely readers. Special thanks to bearhead, Ami1010, McKazekage, pusa-is-me, nejitenteji10sasu10, mhakhernandez and scarlet letters in the snow for reviewing. I apologize for not responding to each review individually, but I'd still like you all to know that it makes me smile every time I see a new review. You guys are awesome. Extra special thanks to scarlet, as it was her review that inspired me to get this chapter done today. Hope you enjoy it!
Fun fact of the day: the last half of this scene was written, ironically, while I was listening to the Song of Storms on repeat. This is what happens when Legend of Zelda shows up on my tumblr dash. Alas.
As usual, leave me your thoughts!
- Senka Hitomi