Part Three

"WHY DID YOU DO THAT FOR DATTEBAYO?!"

But before Shino could respond, that was, if he ever planned to, one could say by his livid face that anger had muted him; Kurenai appeared from Hinata's room, her baby on her hip.

"What is going on here?" She looked at Shino who just looked away, and then she turned to Naruto, completely ignoring the bruise forming on his chin. "Do you realize this is a hospital, Hokage-sama?"

"But he punched me!" Why the political head of her village still argued like a child?

Her lids fluttered and she took a long breath as someone who is on their limit would.

"Shino, Hinata is calling for you. Hokage-sama, we need to talk. Let's go to the cafeteria"

"What? But I came all the way here to see Hinata!"

"You will be able to see her later. Please, it's important."

He looked conflicted from Kurenai to the door, almost if he was considering the possibility of pushing the woman and her baby from his way to get to Hinata.

But he didn't, and if he was honest to himself he would know that was more because he was afraid of what he would find out in that room than had reserves regarding women and children. After all, he knew what ninja women and ninja children could do.

But he stayed nonetheless, even when Shino passed across him to enter Hinata's bedroom, and he followed Kurenai to the cafeteria without more protests.

At the exact moment they reached the busy hospital cafeteria, the baby started to cry. Well, she should be almost two, more of a toddler, and when Kurenai freed a breast to feed her as if it was the most normal thing in the whole universe – to her it must have been – he couldn't remember a moment in which he felt more uncomfortable in his entire life.

"What uh... What do you wanted to talk to me'ttebayo?"

She gave him a look like she wasn't expecting to see him there despite been her the one to invite him.

Then she sighed, but still said nothing. That was really getting on Naruto's nerves, he wanted to see Hinata so bad, his face really hurt and it didn't help that the child sometimes stopped suckling and looked directly at him in a really creepy way.

Then, out of the blue she said.

"Hinata likes you."

That was why she called him?

"I hope so."

She looked like he had grown another head.

"You do?"

"Well, I consider her a dear friend."

She let out a groan and looked up to the celling as if she was fifteen years younger.

"I meant, she has feelings for you." And then she murmured something that sounded a lot like "what Kakashi was even thinking?"

But he had no will to defend himself as he let the words sink in.

"I know I had no right to tell you that. Hinata will feel betrayed by me and I don't take her right to be, but I can't keep just seeing this happen and do nothing."

He swallowed hard.

"Do you... Do you know about us?"

She stared at him with a really hard look on her face, a droplet of sweat started growing on his temple despite the air-conditioner.

"Yes, I do. But she didn't tell me herself, if that's what you're worried about. I know Hinata, she has been so much happier in the last few weeks. And, after everything she has been through, I was happy for her. I was so wrong. I should have pressed her to know what was really happening between you two, and made her stop before she hurt herself even more."

He didn't know what to say after that, and his silence seemed to just make her more angry. After a long while, he finally spoke again, asking the question that brought him to that place.

"Kurenai-sensei..." He started in a low meek voice. "Why is Hinata here? Did I make her sick?"

"Do you even care?" She snapped.

"Of course I care'ttebayo!" He felt a sting of anger, he knew he messed up, but he was no unfeeling monster.

She sagged on the chair and covered herself, Mirai now slept in her arms.

"You should ask her yourself then. But..." She hesitated, her brow furrowed hard. "No, I've already said too much."

"Please, tell me."

She took a long look at him, and it was after a while when she finally said:

"It's just... Those feelings she has for you, they are the most beautiful feelings one person can have for another. Remember that."

oOo

"Naruto-kun!"

She smiled so beautifully and looked so adorable for someone who had just woke up, he felt the bubbles feel his insides again and he welcomed them, for they felt so good.

"Did I wake you?" He asked guiltily noticing how the golden sunset rays illuminated her pale face. He didn't go to see Hinata after talking to Kurenai, he went back to work. He had so much on his head and needed a distraction. But it didn't help much. Hinata's ghost was everywhere in his office. Behind the curtains where she had to hide once when Shikamaru once almost busted them in the middle of a heated make out session. On his table, where he discovered there were so many possible interesting positions, even thought their favourite improper place to have sex was on the chair. With her falling over him like summer rain, sometimes hard, sometimes sweet and torturing gentle, his hands on her hips helping her to move, the cadence of her breasts pressing against his chest, and the way she looked at him, like there was no one else in the world.

He couldn't run away from her, from them, there in his office. So, he told Konoe – the old woman from the first floor that was covering for Hinata – to cancel again his appointments and left for the hospital.

"D-don't concern yourself with that. I slept all day. Not much to do here after the boys and sensei left."

"Your sister haven't come yet?"

"Hanabi left the village with Chichi-ue yesterday, you gave them the authorisation yourself, don't you remember?"

He remembered her bringing a form yes, it was before she fell down on her knees and unzipped him with the hungriest look on her face.

"Oh, yes! Sorry, things happen so much."

She giggled. They said nothing for a while, and her smile turned into a concerned one.

"Are you okay, Naruto-kun? What is it on your face? Did you hurt yourself?"

He had to smile at that, and he couldn't resist that self-imposed distance any longer, he sat on her bed and cupped her hands between his.

"You always worry a lot about me. But I'm not important right now. Hinata, what happened to you?"

And he haven't seen her blush like that in ages, at least no since they started having sex.

"I hmm... I have a UTI."

She said it so low he almost didn't hear it.

"You have a what?"

"A UTI, Urinary Tractor Infection." And then she added fast "It's not a STD."

"So, I didn't give it to you."

"Well..."

"Hinata... I did, didn't I? Even my dick messes things up, I must be really cursed dattebayo."

"It isn't like that. You see, we have been very, hmm, active. And it's because the urethra is closer to the anus on the female body, when we have sex some bacteria can migrate and cause an infection."

It was so weird that all he got from that were the words "anus" and "sex" and that gave him the weirdest beginning of a boner he ever had in his life.

That was a hospital! He made a woman sick! What the fuck was wrong with him?! Men surely were bastards and he was no exception to the rule.

And noticing he said nothing and just stared awkwardly at her, Hinata continued.

"It isn't anything to worry about. It is my fault I'm here, really. If I had come to see a doctor sooner, I'd be on meds and at home. I shouldn't have let it get to this, passing out and scaring Kurenai-sensei like that. But there was that meeting with the Grass envoy, we were so busy with preparations. How was it?"

Now he felt even more ashamed.

"I cancelled it."

"What? Why?"

He felt even more ashamed than before plus really embarrassed.

"I had to see you."

"But wasn't he coming in the morning?"

"I came here in the morning."

"But-"

"I talked to your sensei, and Shino punched me on the face and now I see I bloody deserved it."

"Naruto-kun, what are you talking about? Shino-kun punched you, are you ok?"

"Yeah, I told Kurama heal it, and even though he needs to pay his rent, he said no, can you believe it? I am the Hokage and I have to go around looking like this. But that doesn't matter. Hinata..." he kissed her on the forehead, taking his time to breath in her scent. "Get better soon, I need you... I need you back in the office soon. I can't do anything without you and that old woman? She's really mean."

She smiled.

"Ok, boss."

"Please don't call me like that."

"You fought so much for be Hokage and now I can't even call you 'boss' or 'Hokage-sama'?

"Konohamaru calls me 'boss', that's why it sounds weird and, anyway" He gave her the look. she owned from him every time they met in the supply closet. "I like when you call my name."

oOo

He didn't go to se her the day after, nor the next. And he tried to do part of the work at home, but even that he didn't do because there were plenty Hinata memories there too. Lucky for him, soon he noticed that Konoe's presence crushed into pieces every improper vivid memory his brain stubbornly tried to conjure. So, he went back to office for the horror of his cranky replacement secretary that found really annoying how needy her young boss was, calling her all the time, some of which himself seemed to be confused why. As she would know.

But he liked to work late and Konoe usually made sure to stay at the Hokage Tower for the exact amount of time he payed her, and no more. And his nights, that had been including Hinata for the last weeks, felt terribly lonely, and even work couldn't distract him from the emptiness her absence caused. So, one night he went to the place that used to comfort him when he was still studying to ascend to the Hokage position: the zoo.

He always felt at home around the beasts and their cages, because, when you thought about it, he was a beast and a cage too, so they had a lot in common. Most of the animals had been brought from far away and never met their parents, just like him. Not the been brought from far away though, he was born in Konoha. But his mother was from another village, so, maybe that too, a little bit? See, when he was at the zoo, among the monkeys and the funny looking birds he didn't have to think about complicated stuff. And he even knew the guard there, Suzume, sometimes she even let him bottle feed a cub.

But those nights weren't going like they should. And as he explained the whole episode to his mate, Chouyaku, the Kangaroo, he finally realized that he missed Hinata like mad. Still, he couldn't put a finger in why exactly every time he tried to go to see her, something else always came up. Work he couldn't put out, training that had been neglected, white mould growing on his plants that he needed to take care of it. And the morning he got to work and instead of Kanoe's scorning face, waiting for him was Hinata's warm smile. His heart pounding so hard he felt out of breath he run to this office without answering her good morning wish.

That night he didn't stay late as usual, he left not a minute after closing hour and run to the zoo. He couldn't explain to Chouyaku what happened, he couldn't explain it to himself. But when he saw Hinata that morning, he felt like his heart would abandon his body, his bubbles were suffocating him, he felt sick.

The next day things went almost the same, but he managed to answer her good morning greet, and they worked normally as a Hokage and his assistant would, which, in fact, was nothing but very abnormal to them. Every time she threw him one of her coy smiles, instead of responding with a flirty remark or one of his own megawatt smiles, he just felt his throat run dry and his ears hot, and all the times he called her in to his office it was for actual work reasons, every single of them.

And to be fair, sometimes he even tried to apologize for not going to see her on the remaining days she spent in the hospital, he even rehearsed the conversation with his refection in the mirror of the office bathroom that had been used only for actual bathroom reasons and never from them both at the same time for days. He wondered if the sink was sad, missing the feeling of Hinata's weight of the softness of her thighs. He knew he missed it. God he did, and having her so close, but so out of reach was hard. So hard. But every time he thought of touching her again he remembered Kurenai's words and he just stopped. Because that wasn't right, that wasn't what he signed for. But what had him signed for really? At first, he thought it was just sex between two consenting adults that happened to be really good friends. It was convenient because they worked together and saw each other every day, and it was good, amazing, really hot, sexy sex. And yes, he had some issues to work with since his ex-lovers had decided to cut him out of their relationship and all, but who hadn't? Hinata surely had too, liking him and not bothering to say before she started to share him bed. Now he was being a dick, it wasn't her fault if she had amazing taste in men.

But, one evening the already crumbling new dynamics between them turned into dust. He went to the supply closet get some paper clips and found her there trying to reach for something. She was really short, it was cute.

"Hinata? Do you need help?"

She turned to him in a scared leap, throwing some boxes from the shelves.

"N-naruto-kun! I-I… I needed a new box of Staples. Someone put them in the highest shelf."

"Why didn't you ask me get them for you?"

"I didn't want to bother you."

He smiled, handing her the box.

"You never bother me."

But she didn't smiled back, she just looked at the floor.

"Naruto-kun… Did I.." She breathed and then looked up to him. "Did I do something wrong? Have I upset you in some way? Because if I did, I'm really sorry, but just tell me what it is so I'll do it again, please"

Those words hit him harder than Shino's punch, and what hurt the most was how familiar they were. In the first days after Sakura's and Sasuke's departure he blamed himself and wondered what he must have done wrong for them no to want him anymore. And he could see in Hinata's eyes that had been torturing herself with similar questions.

"No…" For the first day since the hospital he felt the ropes tying his limbs to his body every time he approached her fall down on his feet. He stepped into her personal space, his hands cupping her face. "Not you, never you."

And he saw the tip of her tong wet her lips, he couldn't hold any longer and bowed down to capture them.

That was really something. And he had no idea of how he had been capable of denying himself from feeling like that again. Kissing her was liking biting a piece of pure happiness, she was so soft and warm and moist. He walked her until she was pressed against the shelves, her hands were in his hair and she moaned deliciously when his tong caressed the roof of her mouth and again when he lowered a hand to feel her under the skirt. She was wearing one of those with the sexy elastic things, he could feel it as he grabbed her thigh up, locking her knee around his waist. He needed her now, he needed her so much.

"Hinata…"

He murmured her name and raised his head gasping for air.

And when she looked back at him and it was undeniable, staring at his face all the time. How could he haven't never noticed before?

No one in the world had even looked at him with such adoration.

Kurenai lied.

She didn't like him.

It was something bigger than like, it was something scarier.

And as he stopped touching her as if her skin burned his, he noticed that he couldn't deal with that, not now.

So, he left.

A/N: Sorry it took a little longer than I planned. I feel my Crazy Ex-Girlfriend high is starting to leave me (although I did use the UTI thing – I'm sorry for everyone who thought she was pregnant – and the zoo thing, and I also imagine Naturo singing Fit Hot Guys Have Problems Too a lot), that explain why my rhythm has been slower, also, I really had to work on my monography, yeah I'll finally get my so desired degree at the end of the year, yay me!

And I also want to thank you all for the sweet reviews and darling faves and follows, I can't believe so much people liked this story. Every notification really make my gloomy days a little brighter, thank you! Thank you so much!

Next chapter is sadly the last one and this time is for realzies, I'll try really hard not making you guys wait too much.