Disclaimer: Naruto and it's characters belong to Kishimoto Masashi. I make no profit of writing this.

A/N: Hinata is starting to get cold feet. Which will win: her reluctant nature or will to make Naruto her own?

Just a Dream

The night was falling quickly. Cold, dark and without a single star in the sky.

Hinata didn't feel like sleeping. She sat on the windowsill and let the cold breeze blow into the room, wiping her hair off her face and behind her shoulders.

The clothing she had bought earlier that day had been neatly folded into her drawer, away from her sister's prying eyes. They lived together with their cousin, Neji, who also attended to Konoha college. Hanabi was still too young, she should have still have lived with their parents. Or just Hiashi, as the case was. For reasons Hinata understood very well, she had wanted to try a different kind of life. Being their father's favourite, she had more or less easily gotten what she wanted.

Neji's reasons being ther were not so different from Hanabi's, even though it didn't always seem like it. For a long time he had lived only by grudgingly doing what others wanted from him. He was very talented person, the genius of their family. From that Hinata didn't envy him one bit. Their family still had great expectations of him. It was inevitable that he would end up being a doctor, lawyer or some other highly paid and fancy profession, so he could bring honour and money to the Hyuuga name.

Neji wanted to join the military. It wasn't out of question, even if it wasn't a path that their family would have preferred. If he could climb high enough, Hyuuga would have nothing to say in the matter. Strong willed as he was, he would get through it. Hinata was sure of it.

Both of them had been trapped birds, who had recently found a way to break out of their cages and were now testing out their wings.

Hinata didn't think she had wings at all. If she was a bird, then she was a handicapped one. Why fight a long, seemingly an endless fight if you weren't able to claim the prize? When the doors of her cage were opened, she couldn't fly away. She would fall down and get stumped on, because she wasn't strong enough to fight for her dreams, the future she wanted for herself.

And even if Hinata wouldn't ever have dared to admit it, she had a dream, a clear vision of what she would like her future to be. In that vision, she was Naruto's wife. They had three children, all loud miniature copies of their father. Hinata played volleyball in the women's national team, and when it wasn't competing season she worked as a couch for children's team.

A woman can dream.

"What are you thinking, Hinata-san?"

A surprised girl almost fell down. With a high pitched squeak and well reflexes she managed to adjust herself before embarrassingly thudding on the floor. More than a bit startled and flustered she looked up at the person sneaking up at her is such a mean way.

Her cousin Neji was standing in the doorway, smirking. In the time they had lived together, he had caught some bad habits from Hanabi. At the moment he was apparently on his way to his own room to sleep, judging by the fact that he also was wearing his pajamas. "I apologize, Hinata-san, but your door was open. I thought you were already sleeping, my intention was not to startle you." Yeah, right.

With a sigh, Hinata faced the view outside once more. Tomorrow she would go to Naruto's apartment again, to help him with the cleaning and cooking. And according to Sakura's plan, also with something else.

But deep inside Hinata knew that it wouldn't be happening. She would back out at the last moment, too scared of loosing anything to pull it through. She would go home without saying or doing anything, and things would go back to normal. Meaning that she would go to that coffeehouse every morning, drinking coffee she didn't like and dreaming about the man who she could never have.

"You really look troubled, Hinata. I wish to repeat my earlier question."

Hinata glanced back. Neji was still there, looking at her with his expressionless, pale eyes very much alike to her own ones. His posture was straight and calm, and even at this hour and in white pajamas he looked proper and sure of himself, as taking the control of the space he was in. He was a natural born leader.

"Say, Neji", she whispered, not daring to look at his eyes. This topic was almost too intimate for her to handle. Their relationship hadn't always been the best there was, actually Neji had hated her when they were children. Even if Neji was different now and Hinata had forgiven all of it, they could never reach the comfortable closeness that so many siblings had. "You want to go to the military, right?"

"Yes." Even without looking back, she heard how Neji stepped closer, looking out of the window as well. "I feel very strongly that my future is there."

"What if you can't do it?" Hinata didn't want to say that. It sounded like an accusation, like Hinata wanted to say that he couldn't do it, which was not true. She thought that there was no one as suitable for being a general or captain or whatever the leaders in army were called.

"I have thought that as well", Neji admitted quietly, staring intently at the horizon. He was no more at ease of talking about these kinds of matters than Hinata was.

"Future is not as far away as people seem to think it is. Being able to grasp one's dreams is not about what we can do then, it's about what we can do right now. I believe that he who works for his goals persistently will have nothing to regret in the end." He paused, as if thinking. "On the other hand, those who are to caged by their fear of failure will never have anything. They will become the victims of fate. I'm sure that such thing exists. It is a path in the middle of a forest. Those who take their chances and stray from it may get lost... or find a better, more beautiful place that they have only seen in their dreams."

Neji looked uncomfortable. He rarely ever talked about his inner thoughts like this. "So, that is what I think." he finished awkwardly and stormed away from her cousins room, to get his much needed sleep.

"Thank you, Neji-niisan!" Hinata shouted after him. She felt a lot better and more sure of herself now. Even if she wouldn't succeed, she would give everything for it. In order to have nothing to regret.

She yawned. It was already late, and she would need her sleep to be able to function properly tomorrow.

Find a better, more beautiful place that the have only seen in their dreams.

Tomorrow.

A/N: AND OF COURSE... just because we have to get our fluffs.

We still don't know which kind of seducing equipment she bought together with Sakura, but we shall learn it in the next chapter. Which will rated M.