Hinata opened the door and rolled herself back out of Naruto's way as he stumbled in with Sasuke. Naruto dumped him on the couch and wobbled himself as he got up. "He's a bit drunk."

Hinata felt a smile creep at his downplay. "I see that. Are you okay?"

"Yup." Naruto hiccuped.

"Would you like some water?" Hinata pointed for him to sit down.

"Sure…" Naruto sat obediently while she rolled over to get him a glass of water. Honestly, he looked much better than Sasuke did. Sasuke was already out with his face smushed into the cushions. Hinata would check on him before she went to bed.

Naruto down the water and sat there with his eyebrows knit together at her. "You are really cute." Where was this coming from? "I mean…" He waved his hand at himself. "I've always thought you were really sweet, but…" He waved his hand back at Sasuke. "He really thinks you're cute, and I see it now."

Hinata tried not to laugh. Was this what they talked about when they went drinking? For some reason, she was picturing something more like war stories, but they probably would have covered all that at some point. "Really?"

"Yeah." Naruto nodded innocently. "He's a bastard, though."

"Is he?" Hinata rolled back and rested her hands on her lap to humor him.

"Yeah. He makes me track him all over the freak world and back, and now that he's here, he's still getting in his own damn way." Naruto whined, reaching over to shove him, but he just stuttered to the side, losing his balance and catching himself before he fell.

Hinata hoped that he could sober a little before leaving because she really couldn't drag him home herself. "Nothing changed?"

"Everything's changed." Naruto waved his arms out. "Everything."

Okay, he was beyond gone. "How about I get you a blanket, and you stay here tonight?"

"I don't need one." Naruto waved his hand a laid right down on the floor next to the couch.

Hinata sighed. What got into them?


"I didn't say… anything last night, did I?" Naruto cagily asked.

"Like?" Hinata sipped her coffee.

"Like about…" Naruto's eye slid down the hall, where the shower quietly echoed down the hall.

"Possibly." Hinata let a smile spread across her face behind her cup. This felt nice. After all this time, all these years. Naruto sitting at her table, hungover, in the clothes from the night before, eating lunch as her friend. It felt normal, like something that would happen to anyone. Normal that she never got as an heiress or in this chair before.

Naruto's face got red as he started to panic. "I didn't mean it."

"I mean, it was pretty compelling." Hinata teased.

Naruto shook his head. "He uh…"

"Likes me?" Hinata giggled.

Naruto melted in pain. "I really did say that, didn't I?"

Hinata shook her head. "No." Naruto blinked at her, trying to understand through his headache. "You did now, though."

Naruto whined, putting his utensils down. "That's not fair."

"Don't worry too much, I knew." Hinata giggled.

Naruto blinked at her. "What?"

Hinata sipped her coffee thoughtfully. "I've spent a lot of time with him, recently."

Naruto deflated. "So… do you…?" He was interrupted by the water turning off. "I said nothing." Naruto went back to shoveling food into his mouth.

Sasuke came out clothed and grumpy, with no clue why Hinata was giggling, or Naruto was refusing to look at him. He squinted at both of them and looked out the couch, considering going back to it but taking the offer of breakfast.

"Are you going to make this a regular thing?" Hinata asked in a low voice.

"Blame him." Sasuke nudged his head toward Naruto, who shrank. "He started it." Naruto shook his head with his head ducked into his food. Sasuke's eyes narrowed on him, knowing something was up.

Hinata sat back with a smile on her face and a secret in her heart.

"Drunk Naruto-sama is very talkative." Hinata teased. Naruto begged her not to out him with a shrunken puppy face.

"More than usual?" Sasuke rolled his eyes.

"Possibly." Hinata giggled as Naruto whined.


Sasuke laid flat on his back in the half-finished kitchen. He squinted at the ceiling and rubbed his face. He must have fallen asleep. He sat up and found Hinata's chair empty within arm's reach. His eye fell down beside him to Hinata curled on her side with her back to him, close enough that if he had an arm on that side, she would have been lying on it.

She found him asleep and decided to nap with him instead of waking him up. How did she get down from her chair without waking him up? Was he that tired?

Sasuke laid back down and rolled toward her, gently draping his arm over her side. When she didn't wake up, Sasuke pulled her to his chest and closed his eyes. He could just claim this was an accident, couldn't he?


Hinata closed another folder and put it aside. Her days ground to stop when Sasuke was away on a mission. She could finish building things, but she couldn't put them up on her own. Well, she could try, but Neji would throw a fit if he knew that she was pushing past her 'limits.'

Neji helped for a few days, but he was on regular rotation, so he was never around much as it was. That left her with a lot of time to stare at things she wanted to do and not do a whole lot of it. Her work days had a void where Sasuke would come for lunch and pick her up after work to complain about how he couldn't find the right piece of something at the hardware store.

"Knock, knock." Naruto knocked on her door frame. "I heard you might need cabinets put up."

Hinata blinked at him. "Who…?"

"Well, Sasuke complained before he left that his mission was inconvenient timing, and I just overheard your cousin worrying about you trying to do it alone on his way out." Naruto pointed his thumb out the door. "Need a hand?"

Hinata folded her hands on her desk. "I'd hate to put you to work without you getting something in return."

Naruto shrugged. "Apparently, seeing you use a saw is a gift in itself."


Naruto's hand flinched out as Hinata pulled herself up onto the new cabinet. "Geez." He breathed.

Hinata shifted on it. "It's solid. Just needs a proper countertop." She shifted back down into her chair.

Naruto put his hand on his hips. They were making a lot of progress. Sasuke was right. If Hinata thought she could do it, there wasn't anything that was going to stop her. Naruto got used to it, but he still wasn't used to watching her jerk out of her chair when she needed to.

Hinata brushed herself off. "I'll just have to put on some trim around the edges."

"Has Sasuke talked to you?" Naruto winced. Maybe he shouldn't have asked.

Hinata rolled herself back to face him and folded her hands in her lap. "About?"

Now he really regretted it. "You know… like…"

"No." Hinata looked up at the half-finished kitchen. "I'm not sure that we have to."

"So you like him?" Naruto leaned against the unfinished counter.

"I don't think I know what it feels like anymore," Hinata admitted. "I spent a lot of time idolizing you I don't think I took the time to wonder what love feels like."

Naruto was the one blushing. Hinata was talking about it like a food she used to enjoy. She was past it, but it was still a little fresh for him. He had only found out after she gave up. It made him ill to think about it because he never saw the signs, but would anything really have been different if he had known?

Would Naruto have learned to like her if he knew? It was too late to know now, but it was a question that was there when he thought about it.

"Maybe it's just enjoying spending time with someone to the point you're sad when they leave." Hinata hummed, looking out the door with a soft look of longing on her face.

Oh yeah, she was in love.


"Where have you been?" Sakura wondered as Naruto came in the door. "What are you covered in?"

"I was helping Hinata put up cabinets, then we started putting up studs for walls, and I made the mistake of standing in behind the saw." Naruto fought the urge to brush off the sawdust. He didn't want to get it all over the floor.

Sakura gapped at him. "You should have told me I would have helped."

Naruto paused his walk toward the bathroom to give her a kiss. "You were in the hospital all day I thought you would be tired."

Sakura pouted. "I want to see what they did."

"They'll need help painting soon," Naruto called over his shoulder.