Title: Shy Grins, Cheerful Smiles, and Wry Smirks
Author: Miss Le
Rating: PG-13 ( T )
Challenge: Fearless Hearts
Pairing: ItaHina

We ask that you PLEASE refrain from reviewing this story here. If you would like to do so, the original is posted right here on ff. net in Miss Le's (aka, lemonfishy on DA) personal profile.

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He glanced around the crowded office filled with some insanely drunk people, moderately drunk people and the occasional sober person. This wasn't exactly how he had been planning to spend his Friday night. Not at all.

"Itachi."

He turned around at the call of his name and was irritated to find his brother looking around at every direction, seemingly in search of something. Itachi deepened his frown when he realized what he was looking for; little brothers always had a way to piss the hell out of you.

"Have you seen Hinata?" Sasuke scratched his head and scowled at a passing woman dressed up as a cat who purred and wiggled her fingers at him.

Itachi had no problem lying to Sasuke who did nothing but bring him annoyance and irritation, but he was disappointed to find that the answer he gave him was honest. "I haven't. Not since you tried getting her to drink some of that spiked punch earlier. What are you, back in high school?" Itachi snorted, "Do you really need to get a girl drunk in order to get laid?"

Further to his aggravation, Sasuke smirked and leaned against the wall next to him. "Hardly." To prove his point, he flashed a half smile to another passing co-worker who turned a furious red and gave him a shy smile back. He turned away from her, ignoring her again and shrugged. "I figure an incredibly drunk Hyuuga would be incredibly hilarious."

Itachi merely grunted and walked away, his eye giving away to a twitch. He was pleased to see Sasuke from the corner of his eye fuming at being so easily dismissed and ignored. It irritated him that Sasuke didn't understand why he acted like this to him, he brought it upon himself, after all; playing the poor, neglected younger brother card was getting old.

He wandered around his office for a moment, dodging flirting and drunk women and wondering why he agreed to let this Halloween office party happen in the first place. Not only was it a waste of money and his time, it was going to be a pain in his ass to clean up.

Finally, he found a secluded corner away from the rowdy crowd next to a closet and leaned against it, ignoring the urge to crawl into it and sleep. He eyed it behind half lidded eyes and wondered why he shouldn't. Normally, the answer would be because it would be at the expense of his dignity…but with the choice of brainless drunks who probably wouldn't even notice him do it and the choice of peace…

Without giving it a second thought, he opened the closet and stepped in.

"Don't close--!"

Click.

There was an audible sigh in the dimly lit closet as Itachi finished closing the door behind him. Who the in the hell was in his closet with him?

"O-oh, hello, Itachi."

Itachi's eyes finally flickered their way to the petite woman who leaned against the tight corners of the wall uncomfortably and widened them minimally in surprise. She pulled at the hem of her bright yellow green skirt and adjusted the antennae headband in her hair before meeting his gaze with an uneasy smile. Itachi suddenly was reminded of why she was his favourite employee as she did this; she never threw herself at him, she was an incredibly hard worker, and she was so fucking cute.

"Why are you in here, Hinata?" Itachi asked and tried to figure out what she was wearing. Several dangly things came out of the sides of her low cut shirt in a symmetrical pattern and neon green fishnets held onto her legs. He nearly laughed at the bright red converse she was sporting that clashed terribly with the rest of her outfit.

She blushed bright enough that even in the dim light Itachi could tell and coughed. "Um…I-I was h-hiding from your…y-your brother."

He really should have known.

"I-I don't mean a-any disrespect, Itachi!" She insisted quickly at the look on his face. "I-it's just th-that…I-I don't know. He's so m-mean to me…and I think h-he tried to get me to drink sp-spiked punch."

Itachi definitely knew all of this already. Normally, he would've killed Sasuke for tormenting his favourite employee…but he enjoyed comforting her whenever he did. Like now, it was one of those times when he got a good excuse to stare at her to make it look like he was paying attention (which he was, of course).

She was so cute and she didn't even know it, a factor that was part of her appeal, of course.

"I'm sorry to hear that, Hinata." He lifted his hand and held one of the dangly things along her ribs. "But…what are you supposed to be?"

She chuckled uneasily and blushed more from the closeness brought about from his examination of her Halloween costume. Already as it was, he could hold his arms out in front of him and touch the back of the wall behind Hinata all while having his back pressed against the door. "Um…m-my friend got me the costume. She said I'd be a c-caterpillar, which I th-thought was cute. U-until….until I saw how…t-tight and…stuff it w-was."

He raised an eyebrow and actually let out a smirk. She was…was…

"What's so f-funny?" She asked, consciously pulling at a strand of her hair.

"You came to my office Halloween party as…a sexy caterpillar?" He asked, the mirth becoming evident in his voice.

Hinata blushed a deep red and gave him an nervous smile and clutched at one of her dangling caterpillar arms (at least, that's what Itachi supposed the dangling things were). "Um…"

Itachi froze and slowly let go of the cloth appendage he had been holding. Did he…did he just inadvertently call Hinata sexy? Oh, Itachi Uchiha did not make these types of inarticulate mistakes. Quickly, he covered up by asking, "Why are you still in here? I'm sure that if my fool of a brother searched hard enough, he would've found you here before long."

Hinata sighed and slumped against the wall. "I was actually kind of hoping he would…"

Itachi's eye twitched, a minute movement that Hinata caught and blushed again. "Not because… because…not because of what y-your probably thinking!" She cried out and shifted in her uncomfortable looking position, ending up in a pose that had her breast nearly touching his arm.

"And what am I thinking?" Honestly, he was trying not to think about earlier said part of anatomy that kept brushing his arm.

Hinata blushed again and sheepishly scratched her cheek. "Uh…n-never mind. But I was hoping he would be able to g-get me out of here…"

Itachi knitted his eyebrows together, "And why do you need that idiot brother of mine to do that?"

"Well, you could've too…" Hinata sighed and leaned forward, her forehead resting lightly on his shoulder. Itachi did nothing but lean back against the door. Hinata wasn't one to usually initiate physical contact, so he was guessing that maybe Sasuke did manage to slip her some of that spiked punch after all. But in this case, Itachi wasn't about to complain. "…but you stepped in and c-closed it instead o-of keeping it open so I could s-slip out."

"Can't you do it yourself?"

She looked up at him and gave a smile that was accompanied by a raised eyebrow that Itachi normally would've found annoying on anyone else, but found it almost endearing on her. "You t-try."

Returning her raised eyebrow with one of his own, he did just that and shook the knob a couple of times when it did not give way. Once more, he gave the door a strong shove with his shoulder as he continued to try and jiggle the knob. Finally, he let go of the knob and turned back to Hinata who was giving the door a forlorn look. "I suppose we are stuck for the time being then, Hinata."

"I f-figured." She looked up at the light bulb that was flickering dimly in the small closet and tentatively reached up to touch it. "I'm just g-glad that this hasn't given out ye--" As if on cue, the light bulb gave a dying flash and encased the entire closet with pitch dark. Hinata gave a terrified shriek that Itachi hoped would be heard by someone in the party, but was sorely disappointed and displeased to realize that the music had been turned up a few million decibels.

Thin arms suddenly launched themselves around his waist and a face was buried into his shoulder, gasping like a fish without its water supply. Awkwardly bringing a hand up to his frightened employee's head, he asked, "Are you…are you afraid of the dark?"

There was a sheepish and nervous laugh that sounded much too strangled as she raised her head up to his shyly. "S-sorry, Itachi." Yet she made no move to release herself from him. To Itachi's discomfort, he realised he enjoyed this all too much as she continued to breathe deep and unstable breaths against his chest and clutched as his back desperately.

Maybe he would someday find a way to repay Sasuke for this.

"You are childish, Hinata." Itachi chuckled and absentmindedly began to run fingers from the top of her head to the small of her back; much like he would a cat. "Being afraid of the dark is a ridiculous thing to have a phobia of."

"M-maybe…" She mumbled against his shirt. "But…but we all h-have our fears, don't we, Uchiha-san?"

Itachi scowled in the dark at the sudden formalities that she addressed him with and asked, "How do you sleep? With all the lights of you house on? Such a waste of electricity."

"It's…it's n-not the d-dark I'm afraid of, per say, but…" She trailed off for a second and found the tips of Itachi's ponytail to play with. "…I don't l-like the darkness that's so…consuming that you can't see. When I sleep, it's d-dark, y-yes, but I can st-still see from the natural lighting from the cl-clouds reflecting the city and the st-streetlights…this is d-different."

To Itachi, it made no difference; darkness was darkness. Instead of saying this, he shrugged and raised his head to the ceiling and just listened to the pounding music he could feel reverberate through his chest and Hinata's breathing that was slowly getting softer.

"A-are…are you a-afraid of anything, Itachi?" She glanced up at him and tilted her head.

The question momentarily threw him off guard. Hinata seemed to perceive this and continued in a softer voice, "I mean…you j-just are sometimes very…challenging to read. I can never t-tell what you're thinking of. And somehow, I can't s-see you being f-frightened of anything."

Was Itachi afraid of anything? Fear was a weakness…one that Itachi regrettably harboured in the deepest recesses of his heart; but no one was to know that, not even Hinata. At least, not yet. Maybe one day when he reached the strength of the gods he would confront it.

So instead of answering, he slid his hand from hair to her cheek, startling from what he could tell from the slight way she jumped. He wished he could see her. See the blush that he could feel hot against the palm of his hand, see her shining pale eyes that were a sheet of glass to peer into every thought and feeling she experienced, and see those moist lips that were undoubtedly parted with surprise.

Slowly, he lowered his head. He could feel her hand clutch the fabric of his shirt, he could feel her heart pump fast in her chest, he could feel her face that leaned into his touch, he could feel the breath of hers on his lips, he could feel--

"Itachi?"

Itachi turned his gaze around as Hinata scrambled back to the corner of the closet to stare fearfully at Sasuke who was glaring at them with confusion and misunderstanding. "I'm sorry, but was I interrupting something?" He asked, scathingly, staring at Hinata with a disappointed and put out look.

"Ihavetogo." Hinata squeaked and darted out of the closet past the two brothers who were mentally conveying their mutual hate between each other through the intense glaring contest they were having.

Sasuke. Was. Going. To. Die.

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Ahahahaaa….SO SUE ME. Do it. I DARE YOU.

I entered the, what…fourth? Maybe fifth? I've lost track. ANYWAYS. It's about (roughly) the fourth DateMe contest I've entered.

Yes…they were kind enough to let me enter my entry through this chapter of this drabble series. :D

Ciao