I was having a hard time writing this one and I'm not sure if I'm still satisfied with how this chapter turned out. I almost lost the whole chapter and I had to write it again but thankfully I found the old one.

Thank you to everyone who left a review.

Here's the new chapter. Let me know what you think.

Enjoy!

Sasuke frowned at the fact that he had to be the one to contact first between the two after their first date. Women had always been much eager than him whenever he started dating them so he never had to worry about being the one to reach out or communicate with his dates. They would always be the ones who would contact him and tried to set up dates in hopes that he wouldn't lose interest in them. This was the first time he had to actually try to get someone's attention.

After the date he had told her that he would tell her when they could set up their next date. He had done that to make sure that they were going to set it up according to his liking but he had thought that she would still be eager to contact him. Don't women usually get so excited after the first date that they can't help but text or call the guy back? Sure there were exceptions to the rule but that still didn't mean that they would completely forget about the date.

He had thought that Hinata would contact him the next day like most of his dates usually did, but she hadn't and that was a good thing because it meant that she wasn't clingy like some of the other women he had been with. He had thought that maybe she was just shy and waited another day, but she still hadn't contacted him. On the third day he thought that maybe she was playing some kind of game where she was going to make him be the one to contact first so he decided to wait throughout the day. When he didn't receive any notification from her, he began to wonder if she wasn't interested. No, that couldn't be it, he thought arrogantly.

Hinata felt her cellphone vibrate in her purse as she walked beside Naruto with Natsumi in the middle. She was tempted to take it out and see who had texted her but she didn't want to seem rude especially when Natsumi was telling a story with so much enthusiasm even if Hinata wasn't paying much attention to it. Little did she know that on the other side of the city, Sasuke was irritated at the fact that he had to be the one to wait for her response. What game is she playing? thought Sasuke as he went back to his work, silently waiting for her response.

"What do you want to order?" Naruto asked as they stood by the counter at Ichiraku to order their food.

"I want three bowls of miso!" Natsumi went on as she said her order.

Hinata tried to focus on the menu in front of her instead of her rapid heart beat. What was she thinking when she agreed to this? Didn't it say somewhere in those corner excerpts of a magazine designed for love-obsessed teenage girls that going with your ex was a bad idea unless you decided to get back with them. Was she sending the wrong message to Naruto? She hoped not. Ugh -why was this making her so nervous?

"Hinata, what do you want?" Naruto asked her directly this time, and his tone of familiarity didn't go unnoticed by Natsumi.

"Uh...I'll...I'll take the same as Natsumi."

"You want three bowls?" Naruto raised an eyebrow while a smile of amusement played on his lip.

"N-no, just one is fine for me." Hinata blushed as she looked away trying to take out her wallet but before she could get her money, Naruto had already paid for everything, her order included. "You didn't have to pay for me." Hinata pursed her lips knowing that Naruto thought this was not a big deal but to her it was. She didn't want to feel like she was his responsibility. She hadn't even let Sasuke pay for her on their first date.

"Ah, it was no big deal." He waved as if trying to dispel her worries. He knew how polite Hinata was and she probably would have thought that she was intruding here, but in his jovial demeanor Naruto missed how Hinata didn't appreciate his actions. He was too happy on just the fact that she was there with them.

"Let's sit there!" Natsumi pointed at a table and walked in its direction as she pulled Hinata's hand.

Soon they were seated on the table, each sitting on a separate side, but the table was small enough to let each of them sit equally close to one another. They waited for their food to arrive and during that time both adults stayed quiet most of the time while Natsumi spoke. Naruto, sitting right across from Hinata, kept sneaking a glance at her. He noticed that she wasn't looking at him and not once had she even turned in his direction as if she was trying to keep her eyes away from him. Is she regretting her decision to come? thought Naruto.

When the food arrived, neither of the two adults spoke to each other directly which disappointed Natsumi who was hoping to see them interact. Most of the time she had been the one to speak about random things or else it would get really quiet, and whenever she tried to engage either one in a conversation, they would turn it back to her. It wasn't like they weren't paying her any attention, but it was just that they were avoiding having to talk to each other.

Hinata felt uncomfortable talking to Naruto in such a relaxed environment outside her work, especially in front of Natsumi who only thought of them as nothing more than the roles they had in her life. She didn't know about the history behind the two, and Hinata was worried about how Naruto would make everything seem normal even if it wasn't. Naruto on the other hand felt nervous to bring up any conversation with Hinata. He was afraid that she was regretting coming out with them and he feared that if he said anything, he would mess up causing her to completely shut him off.

After Natsumi had gone quiet for a while Naruto couldn't stop himself from looking at Hinata. He noticed something and spoke directly to her even if he was too afraid to earlier.

"You have something..." Naruto pointed at his chin as he looked at Hinata eye to eye for the first time throughout the dinner.

"Huh?" She blankly stared at him, worried that it might have been unprofessional of her to even go out to dinner with them.

"You have..." Naruto kept pointing to his chin, all the while Natsumi just stared at the two adults on the table. She stayed quiet as she observed how the two finally interacted without paying any attention to her.

Hinata finally understood what he meant and tried to wipe her chin with the back of her hand.

"No, it's...still there."

"Is it gone now?" she asked after she wiped her chin with a napkin.

"No," Naruto shook his head, and without thinking he reached out with his hand to get rid of the piece that was stuck to her chin.

"T-thanks..." Hinata lowered her gaze at her bowl when Naruto retreated his hand.

Both of them averted their gaze and blushed slightly at the contact. It got quiet for a few seconds before Natsumi decided to break the awkward silence with something random as if she didn't see anything unusual between the two, but she had. They're blushing...doesn't that mean that they have...crushes on each other? They have a crush on each other!? Natsumi thought as she remembered what her father had told her when she was blushing at the mention of her classmate's name.

"Thank you for letting me join you two for dinner," Hinata said politely as they stood outside the restaurant, ready to part their ways.

"You have to come again Ms. Hinata! It was so much fun since it can be boring to hangout just with dad." Natsumi tried to roll her eyes like she had seen so many adults do. In reality, she really wanted Hinata to join them again because she wanted to see whether her theory was right. It felt weird thinking that her teacher and her father might have crushes on each other.

Natsumi was very observant for her age. She seemed carefree all the time but she noticed things in people, like their shift in mood or they way they spoke. She saw that change in her dad when her teacher agreed to go to the restaurant with them. She also noticed that change in Hinata on the way from school and all throughout dinner. Natusmi knew that her teacher's behavior always changed with her father around, and it seemed normal at the time, but today she was a bit guarded.

Hinata smiled at Natsumi as Naruto scratched the back of his head sheepishly not knowing how to retort back to Natsumi for the jab.

"Yeah, it was nice to have you," he finally decided to say after gaining enough courage to speak to her.

"Yes, it was nice," was Hinata's terse reply. "Naruto..." He waited for her to finish, "It was a nice gesture but it isn't like...before, so don't take liberties like that again." Hinata looked straight at him trying not to seem too harsh or nervous when she said that.

"What?" Naruto was confused since he couldn't recall what she was talking about.

"The bill," Hinata replied.

Natsumi scrunched her face in confusion. What was wrong with the bill?

"Oh...S-sorry." He smiled nervously realizing his mistake. He hadn't considered the fact of what it might implicate if he did that. He just paid for her as if they were together. He mentally slapped his forehead at his blunt mistake. He probably seemed like an ass for assuming that she would be okay with it.

"It's okay...Here, this is for the cost for my bowl" Hinata sighed, feeling the weariness from the entire day weighing in on her as Naruto reluctantly accepted the money from. He knew better than to argue with her and Hinata felt better. "I'll see you in school tomorrow," she said to Natsumi who gave her a bright smile in return. "Goodnight." She glanced towards Naruto and gave him a small smile hoping to dispel any uncomfortable feeling around them.

"Goodnight," Naruto replied with a smile of his own and with a nod he grabbed his daughter's hand before walking away from Hinata.

Hinata sighed as she saw Naruto's retreating form and turned to head home herself in the opposite direction. Even though the dinner was not eventful, Hinata would think that she did the right thing in accepting Naruto's offer. It didn't mean anything but she felt like this was a step towards fixing the broken bond between them. She knew it would never go back to the way things were but that was okay. She had to first accept that they could never go back to how they used to be all those years ago because without this acceptance she could never move on to the next stage of her life, no matter what it was. If it turned that they could never be together even after moving past what happened between them, then that was okay. But if it turned out that they could somehow work things out then that would be okay too. Now all Hinata had to do was to let things run its course without giving much thought to what could happen in the future. She kept bashing herself for holding onto any hope even after all this time because that would only hurt her in the end. Sometimes old habits die hard, and it was hard for her to stop feeling this way for her first and only love.

"Oh! My phone..." Hinata looked through her purse as she realized that her phone was vibrating again, but with a phone call this time. It had vibrated once more during dinner and she was hoping to get back to whoever it was afterwards but it had almost been three hours since the first text.

"Hello?" Hinata answered her phone with a question when she couldn't recognize the name on her contact ID. It was only the initials 'SU'. Who could that be?

"Now is that how you greet someone when you've rudely ignored their texts for three hours?" Sasuke spoke sarcastically on the other end of the line.

"Sasuke?" She was surprised that he had called her. She never really thought about contacting each other after the date but the idea of Sasuke being the first one to call seemed weird to her.

"Were you expecting someone else?" Hinata could feel his expression without having to see his face. She knew he had an eyebrow raised while his teasing tone displayed the small smirk that was sure to be on his lips.

"No, I wasn't...I'm sorry for not replying. I was...busy with some stuff."

"Hn." Sasuke was surprised at not hearing her nervous stutter. It was kind of her trademark, at least that was what he thought from the first date. But it seemed that Hinata became much more comfortable when she didn't have to face someone when dealing with pressured situations. Maybe he could see if he still could have an effect on her even through the phone. "Well, I thought that maybe you didn't want to go on a second date anymore."

"No, I...Wait, I mean...I do want to go on a second date," she said firmly.

"Tomorrow there's an event at the club near my apartment," Sasuke spoke after some silence. "We'll go there."

"Tomorrow?"

"Yes."

"But that's in the middle of the week," she said worriedly.

"So?"

"I...I can't. It's a school night and I can't go out on a school night."

"Do you have a curfew?" Sasuke got up for his chair and walked to the window in his office to stare at the lights outside. He could see the headlights shining on the cars as they drove, looking like ants in a line from far away.

"N-no...I meant that I'll have work the next day...at the elementary school. You remember I told you where I worked, right?" Sasuke smirked at her stutter in the beginning. "I can't go tomorrow." She was about to apologize but held back.

"Hm...But I'm free tomorrow. I changed my schedule so that I could go out with you," he lied.

"How...How can you decide that without even asking me?...Look...This date, we can't just do it whenever you like...You have to accommodate me too. Or else we shouldn't do this anymore." Hinata didn't know where she got this new ability to speak whatever was on her mind but it seemed like today she didn't care about what anyone thought.

Usually she would've felt guilty at denying someone and would've went along if they said something like what Sasuke said, but Hinata wasn't taking that anymore. Not from him anyway. It was the fact that she knew he wasn't really serious about it unlike her previous dates who had been ready for commitment. After finding out his name, she knew immediately what kind of a guy he was, and at first it intimated her. But now she felt like she wasn't bound by any expectation to a commitment to him. It was something fleeting, as if they would do this without the pressure of a full out relationship and then if they didn't want to continue, she wouldn't be hurt because none of them were serious about it. Maybe that was why Tenten had thought that this was a perfect date for her. Maybe she thought that Hinata needed this because she would always shy away from a relationship or a commitment. This would be something lighthearted and not serious, that was what Hinata thought at least.

"Hn...Maybe you're right." Sasuke couldn't help but smirk at how smoothly she had spoken. He would've thought that he could guilt trip her into doing anything, but he was wrong. He was used to having his way. But maybe it was time for a change.

"Yes." She was surprised at how easily he agreed. "We can...meet on Saturday...?"

"I'll let you decide on this one, since I set up the location for the last date." She wanted to be accommodated, right?

"Oh...o-okay." Was this his way of payback?

"I look forward to what you plan...Bye." Sasuke hung up the phone with a chuckle .

Hinata couldn't believe he had just let her be in charge of their second date. How was she suppose to top the expensive restaurant they went to on their first date? Well it didn't matter right now anyway since she had the entire week to think about it because right now she was too tired to think.

The next day, Naruto sat at his desk, staring at his computer screen pretending to do his work, but in reality, he was just thinking back to yesterday. He used to be afraid at the thought of Hinata ever finding out that he had a child before he met her. He didn't want to see the look of betrayal and disappointment on her, but by now realized that he couldn't hide from her forever.

He had made a mistake in the past and now he was determined to make it up to her, but he had to be careful of how he did that, especially when it came to how he treated her. He had to stop making assumptions about her when it came to how she felt. He had made the mistake of assuming that she would be happier if he didn't involve her in his situation with Natsumi, but it was wrong of him to make a decision on his assumption without even giving her the option to decide for herself. He was afraid of what she might have thought of him, and that only bolstered his assumption that she was better off without him. He couldn't do that to her again if he wanted to make up for the pain he caused her.

Yesterday's blunder was a small one but even then he had done the same thing he wanted to avoid. He didn't consider what she would think or what her decision would be because he never let her decide. It was a minor issue but to Naruto it felt like a big hurdle. He really had to change the way he treated her.

"Naruto, the bastar- uhm...he wants to see you in his office." Shikamaru stood in front of Naruto's cubicle relaying his version of a message when he saw a coworker walk by giving him a stern look.

"Really?" Naruto groaned. "Fine, I'll go in a minute."

"No, he wants to see you right now."

"Okay, I guess death could wait for me on another day." Shikamaru rolled his eyes at his friend's dramatics. Neither of them liked their boss, but Naruto hated him the most.

"You wanted to see me," Naruto said as he knocked on the open door that led to a spacious office with the best view of the city, in his opinion. But it all had to go to this bastard who unfortunately happened to be his boss.

"Uzumaki, you finally decided to show up." Sasuke looked up at his employee. "Come in."

Naruto walked in and sat in one of the chairs in front of Sasuke's desk. He didn't know what led him to this situation but Naruto still couldn't believe he was working under his high school rival.

They had hated each other all throughout their time in school, always trying to one up the other. Sasuke was the most popular guy in school coming from a wealthy family, and with a seemingly natural talent for everything he always was the center of attention. Naruto on the other hand was the opposite of him, and this often led them to clash. Naruto always worked hard to succeed and be better than Sasuke, while Sasuke secretly always felt envious of Naruto's ability to persevere and catch up to him. But now Sasuke couldn't help but feel the smug satisfaction whenever he saw Naruto working in his company. They had gone separate ways for college but it was funny how circumstances brought them together again when Naruto needed a job and the only one to offer him a good one was the man he hated the most. It was like Sasuke was rubbing it in his face, but Naruto didn't have much of a choice than to begrudgingly accept his offer.

"What do you want?" Naruto got straight to the point, not wanting to exchange any fake pleasantries with the man.

"I'll be busy this Saturday so I want you to finish the write up for the proposal for the upcoming deal. I'll look over it when you're done but I can't work on it this weekend."

"Why not?" Naruto frowned. He didn't like the idea of having to bring work home on the weekend, especially when it wasn't even his own.

"I already told you that I'm busy," Sasuke growled.

"On Saturday but you could do it the next day." Naruto frowned.

"No, I can't. Now are you going to do it or should I call someone else."

"Okay, fine." Even though he hated the guy, Naruto didn't want to give him any reason to dock his pay or fire him because it was hard finding a job in this economy especially one that paid this well. He would just have to deal with this.

"Hn." Sasuke smirked.

"Is that it?" Naruto snapped.

"Yes.''

No, Sasuke doesn't know about Hinata and Naruto's history. He doesn't even know that they know each other. Not yet at least.