Kisame flattened his hand on the suit jacket in the mirror. This still felt wrong. Maybe he should get a different haircut or… a whole different face to get this to work. It was part of the job. He needed to stop complaining about it.
He wasn't feeling at his best for his first day, but he was going to push through the early morning fatigue. He was too used to late-night gigs at bars and events, all those late nights cleaning up until the crack of dawn. He rubbed his face again before heading out to the hall to be ready for Hinata when she came out prim, perfectly made up, but with a blank look in her eyes as she sipped her coffee. She looked about as awake as he felt.
Neji met them in the lobby, giving Kisame a particularly unwelcoming look before going on to run through her schedule as he followed them to the parking garage. Hinata didn't seem to be listening. Kisame opened the passenger door to the car he would be driving her around in.
"You open the back door." Neji snapped.
Kisame blinked at the open passenger door. His jaw set as he had a strong urge to just keep it open and prove that Hinata would have just sat down without a word, but he wanted to do this correctly, so he closed it hard, not enough to get him scolded again, before opening the back door instead.
Hinata handed him her cup and reached up. Once Kisame realized what she was doing, he lowered himself, so she could fix his tie. She gave him a smile, took back her coffee, and got into the car before Neji was done talking. Kisame closed the door mid-sentence. Neji stared at him with frustration, but Kisame just gave him a stone face. She clearly wasn't awake enough to hear anything he was saying. Neji huffed and went to his own car as Kisame rounded to the driver seat.
Hinata held her coffee up to her lips. "My schedule is on my phone. I think he thinks if he doesn't tell me, I won't realize I have places to be." She hummed.
To the office. Out of the office. Back to the office. Kisame didn't think this was going to be so much travel. It wasn't even noon yet. He was feeling tired by noon, but they had been running around for several hours already. His internal body clock was confused as hell.
This isn't what he imagined the daughter of a company head did all day, but he would have expected a lot more shopping and a lot fewer corporate meetings.
Kisame stood shy of 'ear shot' as she finished another meeting. He could hear all he wanted, but he had no clue what they were talking about. Timelines, budgets, manpower, and other things he didn't have any frame reference for. He had never even been a low-level assistant manager in any job he had ever been in, and that was his own fault. He didn't have a great track record with patrons, and when it came to authority… it depended on the authority. Okay, maybe that was a problem too.
Authority that didn't deserve loyalty shouldn't have it, in his opinion, and that made him a shit employee sometimes. This job was giving him way too much time to think, and it was only halfway through his first day.
"No, thank you. I have a lunch arrangement already." Hinata bowed her head to the third person who asked her to join them for lunch.
Kisame trailed after her, and she turned her head behind her, checking if he was there again. Did she think he was going to run off?
What was he supposed to do when it came to lunch? He wasn't supposed to leave her, so if she was meant to have lunch with someone, did he just sit at a different table?
"Where to?" Kisame opened the car door for her.
Hinata slid in and poked her head out. "Do you have any food allergies?"
"Not that I know of." Kisame ducked his head down to continue in her eyeline.
Hinata titled her head. "Do you like fish?"
"Is that a joke?" Hinata's face fell, and he could see her worry that she had been offensive. Kisame waved his hand. "I like fish."
Hinata recovered, but her smile didn't return. "There is a nice place between here and our next stop that makes excellent fish." Wasn't she meeting someone? Why would it matter what he liked to eat?
"On it." Kisame closed the door and kicked himself. He needed to be careful with his usual jokes. She didn't find his self-deprecating humor.
Hinata waved at the owners of the shop as she came in. As usual, she could see Choji light up and wave his arms from the kitchen before holding up a finger to tell her that he would come out to see her in a minute.
Hinata settled at a table. Kisame looked around for a moment before she motioned for him to sit down with her. He did but continued to look around. Did he not like the look of the place? "Do you want to go somewhere else?"
"You said you had plans. I thought you were meeting someone." Kisame explained. Oh. With context, he was looking for a place to move if he needed to get up.
Hinata giggled. "I was planning to have lunch with you."
"Oh." Kisame face flattened. She could swear she could see the slightest tinge of purple come to his cheeks. Did he think that she wasn't going to have lunch with him on his first day?
"I will tell you if I need to have you have a separate lunch." Hinata opened the menu, though she knew what she was having. "How's your first day?"
Kisame followed suit. "It's a lot. I mean, I don't really do a lot, but… the running around seems like a lot for you." He was doing quite a lot, in her opinion. "I do have a question. What…?" He chewed on his question for a moment, trying to reformulate it. "What is it that you do?"
Hinata could understand that question. Their morning didn't reveal a lot of what her position was. "My official title is Director of Public Affairs, which is a very fancy-nothing name that means I am a figurehead for the Hyuga's public image." She folded her hands over her menu. "I manage public social events, charities, and educational functions for the community, and I keep investor happy by hearing out their complaints and doing anything I can to remedy any concerns." Even if there was nothing she could do for them, sometimes she could get very far by just making them believe she was trying. "My job is to be attentive, accommodating, and knowledgeable at all times as the public face of the Hyuga."
Kisame stared back at her for a moment. "That's a lot of words to say, shiny political mouthpiece."
He wasn't wrong.
Kisame immediately regretted what he said, but it was too late. Hinata snorted, and her hands shot over her face to cover her mouth. "Sorry." He grumbled.
Hinata waved her hands. "No. I like your honesty. That's an accurate description."
"I can see why I could taint your image." Kisame looked down at his menu.
Hinata was going to kill Neji. "You are not going to hurt my image. Please don't let Neji-san get into your head. He worries too much."
Choji finally freed himself to come to the table. Hinata gladly accepted his recommendation like she always did, then waited for Kisame, who really didn't look at the menu, to just take the suggestion as well. "I have something I want you to try." Choji pointed at Hinata as he disappeared.
Hinata smiled as he left. "I'm frequently his guinea pig for new sauces and sides." She explained.
"You come here a lot?" Kisame wondered.
Hinata nodded. "We went to school together. I like to support him, but I didn't want to bring you here if you didn't like fish since the main theme here is barbecued fish."
Kisame nose crinkled. "Yeah, sorry. I'm making an ass of myself by assuming what you meant."
Hinata waved her hands. "No. I just didn't think about it that way. I can see why you made that conclusion."
Kisame looked to the side. "I'm just used to it."
"That's sad." Hinata voiced. She didn't know what else to say.
She was saved from saying more by the table being loaded up with food and Choji settling some mystery sauces among the plates. "Dig in," Choji told them.
Hinata pointed to one of the sauces she recognized. "You have to try this one. It's my favorite."
Kisame picked up his chopsticks and did as she asked, and he coughed after a moment of chewing. Hinata covered her smile. Maybe she should have told him it was spicy.