Disclaimer: I do not believe I do.

Author's Notes: So there is another.

And, while there is sadly no Naruto in this chapter, he does appear next time. (Yay!) Please enjoy.

oOo

When women are depressed, they eat or shop. Men invade another country. -Unknown

oOo

Hinata's apartment was warm and comforting by the time she got back to it that afternoon, and she slipped off her shoes with a huge sigh of relief. She had been such a patron saint of polity today with that—that—stuffy, bad-tempered, imbecilic, snot-nosed child of a half-demented penguin and fully demented goldfish, and she felt the simple pleasure of removing her shoes should also be accompanied by a piffling trifle of chocolatey goodness.

She ripped open her bag of caramel kisses (hidden from her late night munching on the top shelf behind the raisins. She despised raisins and the only reason she kept them was to deter herself from stuffing gold wrapped chocolate down her throat on an hourly basis) and plopped down on her couch, getting a good hold of the remote and switching on the TV. She balked at Jerry Springer, was mortified at Dr. Oz, and was very nearly forced to settle on something about the historical virtues of toilet paper when her phone rang.

Salvation, thy name is dum, dee, dum, dee, dum, dee.

She snatched it up and pressed it to her ear, muting the TV in an instant. She remembered just in time that she needed to swallow her current sugary confection before speaking could be allowed, which she did, and then managed a: "Hello, Hinata speaking."

"Hey, Sis!" Hanabi chirped from the other end. "How are you?"

"Oh, I'm fine," Hinata said, snuggling into her couch cushion and unwrapping another foil-covered kiss. "How about you?"

"You don't sound fine."

"Bit of a tough day is all. Really, how are you?"

"Tell me what happened!"

Hanabi was a sweet, wonderful sister, one that Hinata truly and sincerely adored. She was always ready to help and just be there when ever Hinata needed her.

But she couldn't take a hint to save her life.

Sure, her computer engineer skills came in handy when there was a crashed modem, or even a vending machine refusing to give nirvana to a starving soul, but she was much more likely to take a screwdriver to anything before she tried to figure out the why behind it.

"Hanabi, really," Hinata said. "I don't want to talk about it."

"Why?"

"Just because."

"Oh, come on, I grew out of that excuse at least last week!"

Hinata chuckled in spite of herself. "Oh, alright," she grabbed another kiss from the bag, and slowly unwrapped it so as not to tear the delicate foil. "It started out well enough. I was excited to see that client-"

"How'd that go?"

"Wait, I'm getting there. But I tripped on the subway steps and soaked my pants,"

"Oh no!"

"and then this guy,"

"Ooh…"

"just- actually he just kind of brushed past me, but he did ask if I was okay. Which was really nice, and sweet, and just made me feel better. And then I had to go to a department store and was stuck wearing unwashed department store pants-"

"Eww."

"—all day. And my client! You will have never met a more indecisive, bigoted man in your life. He only wanted to hire me because I was a girl and decorating was 'woman's work' that his wife was too good for."

"The cad!"

"You—okay, now you're just making fun of me," Hinata said, turning off the television just as a man whose glasses almost masked the size of his nose, impressive bulk just barely squished into the huge leather armchair, came on. She felt strange, ranting like this. When was the last time she had done it? A month? Two? Six? She couldn't remember.

"I wasn't!" Hanabi protested in her ear. "I just don't get to use the word cad very often is all. My quota is used, I swear."

Hinata smiled a little more, and stood to put the kisses anyway. Anymore of them and she'd start feeling guilty. All of the preserved wrappers went into the trashcan, and she was faced, very unhappily, with the dishes from her breakfast that morning. Yes, an omelet, what a brilliant idea that had been; a morning when the world was full of possibilities instead of wet pants and jerk-ish men.

"Hey, you still there?" Hanabi asked, annoyance already setting up to do war on her tongue.

"Yes," Hinata said, situating the phone between her shoulder and ear carefully. "Sorry. Tell me about your day."

"Oh, it was okay. One of Dad's friends sent over a dinosaur of a computer in the hopes that I could fix it. I'm still debating on whether I should just dump coffee in it or not."

"Oh," Hinata said, hands slipping in the soap and water as she filled the sink and started work on her cup. "And—and how is Dad?"

"He's good! I think he misses you."

Hinata swallowed, remembering their nearly-silent fight not two weeks ago, and shook her head. She just barely rescued the phone from taking an unpleasant swim in the suds. "Maybe."

"You two have got to stop fighting at some point."

"I don't think he's ever really going to forgive me," Hinata said, grabbing a towel to dry with. "Giving the company to Neji-nii and becoming an interior designer… I just don't know. It's what he's always wanted for me, and his throwing my lack of anything into my face with those pointed comments whenever I-"

She took a deep breath, stopped abusing her plate, and let it out slowly. "Sorry."

"It's okay," Hanabi said cheerfully. "Dad's a hard a-"

"Hanabi!"

"Dollar sign, dollar sign. He'll come around eventually."

Hinata put the plate away, chuckling. "I hope so."

"Listen, I've gotta go, a bag-of-bones if banging on the door asking for his stegosaurus. I've gotta go dump coffee on it so he'll stop bugging me. Talk to you later?"

"Won't you at least save his files?"

"Already did."

"Good job, dear. Yes, I'll talk to you later."

"Alright, ciao!"

"Ciao."

Hinata wiped her hands and unstuck her phone from her ear, laying it carelessly on the counter. She really needed to get out her sketchpad and start working on the layout for Mister Maier's sitting room if she was going to get paid. She sighed, put her dishes away, turned on some music, and plopped down on the couch with her sketch book and the pictures Mister Maier had given her spread on the cushion next to her.

Hmm, she thought, tapping her pencil against her chin. I wonder if putting a giant poster of Rosie the Riveter on the wall would be too blatant…

oOo

Author's Notes: Comments, questions, concerns? Excellent. Just praise then.

...I'm kidding.

Though, I would greatly appreciate it if you happened to review on your way out. For new time's sake.