Christmas Chaos
Chapter 17: The Return Home
December 30th - 2:59 PM
Tenten stared mindlessly at her ceiling, noticing Sakura's grandmother's baroque moulding trims she had never paid much attention to.
She didn't even have it in herself to sigh. Back in her room in the home she shared with Sakura and the others, she felt the weight of her soul anchoring her to her bed.
She contemplated whether she would ever need to move from her bed. The last thing she wanted was to be out of the safety her covers provided her, back in the real world and the messiness it dragged her into.
Tenten looked over at her bedside clock, and the sigh finally escaped.
3:00 PM.
She was on call tonight, so she was technically supposed to be asleep. But, even if every fibre of her body felt the built-up exhaustion from the past few days, her mind was restless. It replayed the chaotic journey she shared with no other than the man she vowed never to let in.
Yet, not only had he breached all her safeguards, but he had also taken complete control over her every waking thought. Her spirit hadn't even put up a fight. Instead, it had surrendered entirely, offering him the keys to every hidden part of herself like one crowns a new king in a foreign land.
He had conquered her to the outright abdication of her crying fears. It would have revolted her if she didn't crave his footsteps claiming the soil of her dreamlands, like drylands called for monsoons.
Damn.
She had played with fire, which consumed depths of passion she didn't think she still had in herself. She didn't know she had it in her to fall in love so fiercely. To need someone so desperately that even when ravaged by their absence, you pitied the version of yourself that had peace of mind prior to meeting them.
Tenten let out the sigh she had been holding in, bringing her covers over her head as if they could act like a shield against the incessant memories of their last day torturing her.
December 28th - 10:03 AM
A mere two days ago, his skin was flush with hers. The distant waves hitting Suna's shoreline gently nudged her awake to a sun-filled room. The white linens of her curtains swayed idly in wide arcs with the morning breeze. She would have traded all that she was allowed to give and more for that moment to stretch a bit longer than it was forbidden to.
Her hair was undone, enveloping her in a bounty of curls, and through that mess of locks, his thumb stroked her bare shoulder like a lullaby. Her cheek pressed on the warm skin of his chest. She didn't know what swayed her more, the rhythm of his breaths or the harmonic push and pull of the ocean at their door.
Somehow there was this sort of unspoken understanding that silence was their salvation. This moment only existed outside the bounds of space, time, and everything else that held them back. Only with unspoken truth was this moment allowed to go unacknowledged and unchallenged.
His fingers found her hand lying on top of his stomach. After all these years of undue rage and hazy lust, she still only needed the most innocent of his touch to bring back the bubbly butterflies in her stomach, as if she was still fourteen and experiencing love for the first time.
But she felt the end when his breathing pattern changed. He inhaled a bit more deeply, like how one does when about to say something. Reflexively, her hand that was gently nesting in his gripped him tighter. She could feel his head instantly turning towards her, leaning in. His gaze set her cheeks ablaze, and she knew he was waiting for something she didn't think she could give.
She wanted to scream out: 'Neji, I think I love you. It may be selfish, and it may be one-sided, and it may go against every rule in the book and everything we agreed upon when starting this madness of a scheme, but I needed to tell you. I needed to tell you I am maddeningly in love with you, and the idea of returning to Konoha without seizing this chance of us kills me. It kills to think we could become strangers again when I.. I-"
When she what? Couldn't imagine her life without him again? Without his tender glances and his possessive touches? Without his uncharacteristic fiery outbursts and the cold calculations, he did by the second? His stupid gorgeous face and the perfectly balanced gravity of his voice?
It was unfair.
How could he?
How could he look at her like that if it wasn't because he loved just like she did? And what was his excuse for the chemistry they shared? And why did he search for her so relentlessly if it was bound to end? If he had set his mind to forget her? If she had never really mattered in the first place.
She started to squirm in place as her mind drove her body restless. Neji took it as his cue to break the moment finally.
"I should probably get up," Neji said, and Tenten didn't wait before rolling over on the other side of the bed, pulling the covers around herself in the process.
Neji licked his lip as her locks cascaded in waves on her naked back, enveloped in the delicate white fabric of her sheets. He wanted to sear this image of her in his mind for eternity. If he couldn't make her his, memories of hers would suffice. It had to.
"Yeah," Tenten mumbled, looking for her scattered bra. "He's going to be pretty upset."
Neji frowned. His father would be furious.
Hizashi Hyuga had a zero-tolerance policy for aggressive people. He had always raised his son with a deep reverence for gentleness. A gentle voice, gentle words, gentle acts. Cold, albeit gentle. It was the only non-negotiable in an otherwise very flexible father.
December 28th - 10:48 AM
"I am appalled on your behalf, Neji!" Hizashi glared at his son from his side of the backseat of the Hyuga black sedan parked outside the Maito's house.
Neji flinched ever so slightly at his father's raised voice, not because he was scared, but because it felt so out-worldly to see his always calm father figure so upset about something he did. The last time he had been this angry with him, Neji was fourteen and incredibly mean to Hinata as he went through his teenage crisis.
The young heir could see his uncle tense up in the front seat. Notwithstanding the brotherly badgering Hiashi often put his brother through, everybody knew the eldest twin cared for his little sibling with depths of affection that few could rival. Seeing Hizashi so grieved over last night's situation was difficult for the CEO, who sacrificed all he had, all his life, to protect and nurture his twin's softness and cheerful outlook on life.
"I'm sorry, father-"
"Sorry is not enough!" Hizashi shot back. "I am not even talking about the bad press this could have brought us if your uncle and A-san weren't in the room to deal with the aftermath of your recklessness!"
Hizashi shook his head, and Neji's heart sank a bit. It was not an easy feat to disappoint someone as benevolent as his father, which made letting him down soul-wrenching for his son.
"And the horror it was to have the mayor having to handle the press away from your shameless behaviour during the celebrations of his daughter's proposal, no less!" Hizashi hissed. "I didn't know where to put myself. He had to excuse himself from this family moment because of your impudence. I'm-"
Hizashi was about to have a fit as words failed him to express his utter embarrassment at his usually well-behaved son. He took it as a personal failure of his upbringing that something like this could ever happen. He realised he was pretty smug all those years, thinking he had done such a fantastic job with his irreproachable son.
Hizashi sighed loudly.
"You should have heard what he said, Father," Neji said in an even albeit low tone.
"It doesn't matter to me what he said, son." Hizashi shook his head. "It matters to me how you react."
Neji bit the inside of his cheek. The deception in his father's voice felt like a cold shower.
"It was very careless of you, nephew," Hiashi decided to speak for the first time.
"You would have done the same," Neji mumbled. He wasn't often insolent this way, but his uncle butting in while his father was already having a feast with him somehow rubbed him the wrong way. Even if Neji had to admit, his uncle was just as much another father figure and had spent just as much time raising him. Thus, he also had his say in this.
Neji felt worse when Hiashi's glare pierced him through the rearview mirror.
"No, Neji." Hiashi's hardened voice was not lost on his nephew. "I would have done worse." His lips set in a thin line. "Physical violence is too soft a punishment for his kind, and now, he gets to play the victim."
His uncle fully turned around. "You're lucky his father has been trying to supply us with textiles for quite some time now." His lips pursed in disgust. "We'll have to use their cheap cotton linens in our new condos' hall." He shook his head, visibly upset.
"I feel you are all gravely missing the point." Hizashi intervened, appalled at how mundane their conversation had turned. "You did something wrong, Neji." He insisted.
"I think," Hiashi chose his words carefully. "That Neji seldom acts out in such a way, and he must be regretting his recklessness as of now." The eldest Hyuga advanced prudently, urging the impudent heir to show some contriteness.
"Yes," Neji looked down in his repentant expression. "I do not condone my actions; I have learned from this…" Neji sighed in resignation. "I've learned from this mistake."
"And?" Hizashi raised an expectant brow.
Neji frowned, then realised what his father wanted him to do. But before he could strongly counterargument, Hiashi exclaimed:
"You can't be serious!" He shouted from his seat.
Hizashi glared at his older brother, who instantly fell silent and decided to turn around, relinquishing half-heartedly to his sibling's wishes.
"But father-" Neji began.
"Neji," Hizashi started in a careful tone, signalling this was not negotiable.
"Fine," Neji gritted before looking through the window, sulking like a child. "I'll-" His jaw tightened. "I'll present my excuses to Deidara." He said through clenched teeth.
"Perfect," Hizashi beamed, his natural good cheerfulness back.
Neji, on the other end, left the car in his sourest mood. He couldn't believe he would have to apologise to that wanker. He watched their car drive down the road, already returning to Konoha so the Hyuga patriarchs could get in a couple days of work before New Year's Eve.
Neji sighed for the second time this morning, and his heart suddenly squeezed as he realised this was his last day with Tenten. He shoved his hands in his pockets as he returned home, and now he couldn't even decide why his mood was so sour.
December 30th - 4:16PM
Tenten switched sides yet again.
She flipped her pillow, rearranged her covers, went to open her windows and indulged in two more melatonin gummies than usual.
She was about to scream in frustration when Ino slammed her bedroom door wide open, entering like a hurricane sporting her oversized sunglasses and dramatic hat with an extravagantly large rim.
"One week," The exuberant blonde shouted, her carry-on rolling behind her. "I'm gone for one week, and the three of you end up in existential crises!"
Tenten would have rolled her eyes if she wasn't so relieved by the distraction Ino was procuring her from her alienating lack of sleep.
But she did frown. "What do you mean?"
"Naruto speed-eating his 15th box of ramen while watching Friends?" Ino raised a brow, and Tenten winced. She hadn't yet seen Naruto as she worked evening shifts, and he worked the day ones. Though, ramen-bingeing was Naruto's maladaptive coping mechanism, which means something probably happened when he was with Hinata.
"And Sakura is back on her binders again," Ino shivered before continuing in a whisper. "And I think she has a new one," She bent over Tenten in secrecy. "Like a baby one."
Ino mimicked a baby bump on her own flat stomach.
Tenten's eyebrows shot up as her mind went straight to calculating days. "That's impossible, though. It'd be too early to tell even if it were the case." Her frown deepened.
Ino waved it off. "She's just overplanning like she always does." Her Aegean eyes zeroed in on the bags underneath her eyes and her dishevelled state. "And you're not having it much easier, are you?"
Tenten opened her mouth to protest, but Ino cut her off quickly. "I saw your workout weights in the living room. Don't try."
Tenten closed her mouth immediately. Ino sighed, removing her hat and moving her sunglasses on her head.
She sat down as gracefully as one could, crossing her legs like royalty would on a televised show, but in contrast, yelled like a fishmonger's wife at Sakura and Naruto to come join them.
Sakura was the first to pop her head in Tenten's doorframe.
"Oh," Her eyes lit up. "Is it cuddling time in Tenten's bed?"
Tenten rolled her eyes, for some particular reasons whenever a family reunion was needed they would choose her room to hold it in. Something about her bed being the comfiest.
The brunette nonetheless turned down her covers to invite the pink-haired girl, who almost hopped and jumped to cuddle beside her friend.
"Your sheets are so soft," She snuggled under the delicate linens and wrapped her arms around the older girl.
"Can I come too?" The pitiful face of Naruto appeared in the doorway.
Tenten groaned while Ino giggled.
"Of course, you can." Tenten finally allowed, turning down the covers on the other side of the bed.
"Your mattress is so fluffy!" Naruto almost dived in after shrugging off his frogs slippers.
"So," Ino began, interlacing her fingers on her crossed knees. "Let's begin with you, Forehead. Why are you binder-ing again?"
"Yes," Ino asserted to dumbfounded Naruto. "Not that you could notice walled-in by your dozen of empty ramen cups."
Ino discarded Naruto's protests and questioned Sakura instead. "I thought all was well with you and Sasuke?"
Sakura chewed her bottom lip. "Well, remember how we eloped in Kiri?" She said, almost inaudibly.
"What?" Naruto's head shot up. "You married Dobe!?"
"Well, yes, no. I-" Sakura let go of Tenten and started wringing her hands, not knowing how to answer this simple question.
"I guess?" She attempted to answer. "I just didn't think weddings in Kiri actually counted, you know?"
"What do you mean you didn't think they counted?" Tenten deadpanned. "Like you thought they were fake weddings, like a tourist trap?"
Sakura snapped her fingers. "That's exactly what I thought!"
Ino pinched the bridge of her nose in exasperation. "Forehead, you can't be serious." She looked up at her anxious friend. "So what now, are you like married, married? That is insane, Sakura! This is miles away from you and your obsessive-compulsive overplanning and over-analysing skills!"
"I know!" Sakura wailed, bringing Tenten's cover over her face.
"So what now?" Ino continued her interrogation session.
"What do you mean?" Sakura frowned.
Ino rolled her eyes. "What's the next step? Are you guys actually going through with it?"
Sakura shrugged and Ino gasped.
"Don't tell me you haven't talked since then?" Ino's astonished eyebrows rose so high Tenten was tempted to remind her friend of the usual speech she gave them about facial expressions and wrinkles.
"Oh my God, Sakura." Ino brought her delicate hand to cover her eyes in exasperation. Her friend's silence was enough of an answer.
"I can't bring myself to answer his calls." Sakura shrugged defenceless.
"Cause he called, and you ignored him?" Naruto looked even more surprised by this than their whole marriage fiasco. "Damn, liking this whole 'new year, new you' thing you got going on Sak."
Sakura groaned. "It's not like this," She bit her lip. "I'm too ashamed."
"I'm too ashamed of what he will probably say," The obstetrician continued under the expectant stares of her friends. "You know Sasuke, right? He was drunk. It didn't mean anything to him. Well, most likely," She shrugged helplessly. "Yet, here I am, again, stuck on this guy. I was madly in love with him and willing to throw all my binders' worth of carefully thought-out plans just for him. And for what? For him to wake up hungover and realise in horror what he did and how he now needs to undo everything and call me to remind me it was never that serious because I'm a silly little girl with silly little dreams who rush to conclusions like a hopeless romantic fool every single time? That it was just a fling and that I let my hopes up again and took things too seriously?"
Sakura sighed, blowing a strand of hair from her face. "I don't want to be made to feel like I'm fifteen again, feeling the ground shift beneath her feet at the idea of heartbreak, when I'm twenty-nine and should definitely know better."
"Sakura," Ino protested. "You do know better. You know that man inside out, and he wouldn't have gone to Kiri with you, let alone marry you - even if drunk- just for the fun of it. You're letting your fear of rejection make decisions for you again. And I get it, that guy hurt you. He hurt you pretty bad, and he was inconsistent and confusing, and he left you with a shit ton of trust issues. If you weren't so madly in love with him, I'd help you get over him, but clearly, you're not ready to let him go just yet."
Ino took a deep breath. "Sasuke changed, he learned, he healed, and this time he came ready for you. Except this time, you weren't. I'm not saying he is absolved of everything, but you can't let your fears dictate how your relationship evolves or how much love you're worth receiving. If you don't feel you could ever trust him again, don't. But if you want to take that leap of faith, do it and don't look back. You're not a fool for believing love is still worth a try."
Ino squeezed her friend's hand affectionately, looking at her with tenderness. "You don't want to end up like Neji and Tenten." She continued sweetly with a smile, still keeping her gaze on the bewildered emerald eyes of her friend.
"Hey!" Said brunette protested by kicking Ino's thigh with her under-the-cover foot.
Ino paid no mind to it, keeping her attention fixed on the ruminating expression of her anxious roommate.
Sakura fidgeted before bringing her hands to her face in defeat, to which Ino gasped again.
"He gave you this?" Ino took Sakura's hand adorned with a clear cut oval lap emerald circled by delicately crafted diamonds on a golden band.
Naruto whistled.
"Sakura," Naruto started, cutting what would have been another insightful speech from Ino about Sakura's internalised fears and insecurities. "You're dumb."
Well, he was no Ino, nor did he want to be.
"If someone knows Dobe, it's you and I." He looked at her intently.
"You and me…" Tenten mumbled under her breath but Naruto continued without paying her any mind.
"Do you really think Sasuke does anything he doesn't think of ten times beforehand and plans even more times in advance?" Naruto rolled his eyes. "Come on. Sure he can be reckless and impulsive, but I mean… in love? No." He made a final motion with his hands. "That's the one area he will overthink and walk backward in. Like it's one step forward, three steps back with him. And you should know that better than anyone." He gave her a pointed look, referring to their short-lived if not extremely intense teenage romance.
"You've always been the one for him; even his thick mind understood that." Naruto shrugged. "If anything, I bet he's scared that you returned to your senses and decided to call off this whole thing. But," He looked insistent at the ring still nested comfortably on her finger. "By the look of it, you don't seem so against it."
"You think?" Sakura looked at her best friend wistfully, anxiously turning her ring around her finger. "You think he's scared?"
Naruto nodded adamantly. "He's probably trying to come up with a speech to convince you to stay his wife." He snorted. "Hell, he probably told his brother and then remembered Uchihas have all these crazy wedding traditions that y'all need to go through, and he's desperate to reach you so he can smooth it over your flight-risk ass."
Sakura chuckled. "You really think so?" Her smile was shy but hopeful.
Ino opened her mouth to give the carefully curated speech she was about to say before she was rudely cut off by the other blonde, exuberant kid of the house but closed her mouth in defeat and shrugged.
"Yeah," She ended up saying. "Naruto is right."
"So I should call him?" Sakura asked hopefully.
"Yes!" Her other three friends exclaimed in unison.
"But first, Naruto," Ino redirected her attention to the man in the room. "What happened with Hinata? I saw your stories and how you looked so cosy in the matching sweaters, your mom usually knits you and your father. How did she even manage to knit one for Hinata so fast?"
Naruto cringed and rubbed his right arm remembering the outraged screeches from her mother when she learned Naruto had a girlfriend and didn't give her enough time so she could prepare for their new guest.
After his parents joined them at Haepo, the Uzumakis and Hyugas bonded so fast, that Naruto found it comical. The soft-spoken Minato and Hizashi quickly found common grounds on their fascination with mid-century war history and the scheming Hiashi and Kushina were delightfully chatting about Konoha's Next Top Model finale - that Hiashi somehow was able to watch amid the storm?
Until now, this storm had felt like a fever dream, but he had been so happy to know he would spend extra days with Hinata that he didn't question it much. And it was lovely how his mother had adopted the shy Hyuga so quickly.
Kushina had always wanted a daughter and just couldn't get over the sweetness of Hinata. She kept pinching, squeezing, and kissing her cheeks so much that Naruto and Minato had to interfere to keep Kushina's over-affectionate ways from overwhelming the madly blushing Hinata.
She became so fond of the doll-like girl she just had to insist that Hinata spend the rest of the holidays with them. Hanabi was impressed to see Kushina persuade her father to let one of his kids slip away for the holidays, but the youngest sibling also suspected that was because he had his eyes set on a more significant challenge. A challenge that had just escaped south against his wildest efforts.
As his mother knitted the nights away in the fury-like manner she addressed all things, she entertained hours-long conversations with Hinata, half of them depicting situations of Naruto's childhood and teenagehood he would have preferred the love of his life to not know, like the fact he had wet his bed until he was eleven.
"It was spotting, barely real wetting the bed!" An outraged Naruto would refute, trying to defend his younger self in an attempt that only dug his grave deeper.
But Hinata never seemed to mind; her eyes had kept that glimmer since the first time she had entered their modest house. She found everything in it fascinating, the marks on the wall showing Naruto's growing height through the years, the crocheted coasters on the coffee table, the mismatched frames with so many pictures of the Uzumaki family that you could barely see the wall in the entry hall. She had idly run her fingers along the stitches on the quilt Kushina made with Naruto's baby clothes, then gazed for a couple of minutes at the hand-painted mugs each family member made during a ski trip when Naruto was a teenager.
Naruto was fascinated by Hinata's fascination with the mundane objects of their daily life. She had even indulged in his mother's rant on some family recipes as Hinata flipped through the recipe cards his mother and grandmother had written over the years, holding each tomato sauce or chocolate-stained paper card like a precious museum artifact.
"This one was Naruto's favourite ramen recipe," Kushina said fondly, pinching her boy's cheeks, who protested with his usual "Mom!".
"You see," The red-haired mother leaned in secrecy towards Hinata. "The secret is in the broth. I add a secret blend of habanero spices to the miso paste, and I let it ferment a bit more." She winked at the enthralled girl before adding. "I can show you all my secret family recipes to keep this glutton happy once you're officially part of the family."
"MOM!" Naruto choked on his saliva.
"What?" Kushina glared at him before turning enamoured towards Hinata, her hands squeezed in front of her heart. "When you know, you know and if we start now, we can manage to plan for a May wedding at the church your father and I got married to!" She said dreamily. "Oh! The wisterias growing in their backyard would be so lovely for an intimate ceremony! It's a very requested church, but I'm sure they would accommodate you. They love us there. We have been doing pro bono work for the constituents for the past twenty years and…"
Naruto was mortified as his mother went on, his eyes drifting to the scarlet face of Hinata, who couldn't meet his eyes. Thankfully Minato intervened early, laughing nervously at his wife's enthusiasm.
"You have to excuse my overzealous wife, Hinata." He smiled awkwardly as he pressed his hands on his wife's shoulders to affectionately impede her from protesting. "It's the first time Naruto ever brings a girlfriend home so we may be too excited-"
Naruto choked again. "Dad!"
But Hinata only chuckled with his parents which somehow put him at ease. The rest of the day and dinner went on more smoothly, minus the intimate and overbearing questions his mother would spring out of the blue.
When dinner was over, the wine bottle almost empty, and after losing all his fortune at Monopoly before defending his title of less likely to ever win Scrabble - what the hell does 'zinky' mean anyway- Hinata and he were left alone in the living room while his parents had started dancing a bit drunkenly around the house.
They were finishing Kushina's famous banana pudding-
"Wait, your mom made banana pudding?" Ino cut into Naruto's retelling of their Christmas dinner at his parents' house.
"Not the point, Ino." Naruto rolled his eyes.
"I feel it's a very relevant point." Tenten frowned, highly invested in the banana pudding affair.
Kushina made the most scrumptious banana cream dessert, and sometimes, Tenten would lie awake thinking about it. It was phenomenal.
Sakura nodded eagerly, licking her lips.
Naruto grunted. "Fine," He shook his head in defeat. "My mom made some for you guys too. It's in the fridge."
The three girls gasped and straightened, ready to dash to the kitchen, but controlled the urge at the last minute out of respect, looking expectantly at the blonde boy.
"We'll wait for you to finish your story, I guess." Ino graciously offered and the other two nodded unsure.
"Wow, so kind of you," Naruto said sarcastically, rolling his eyes. "Let's just go to the kitchen, I'll continue my story-"
Naruto sighed as the girls rushed out of the room. "-there." He finished his sentence in the empty room.
Ino exhaled in happiness at her first spoonful of the creamy bliss.
"Wow, this hits the spot." Sakura agreed, licking her spoon.
"Your mother is a saint," Tenten said with her mouth full. "Please," She swallowed the pudding. "Continue."
Naruto took a deep breath before diving in where he left off.
As per tradition after banana pudding, Minato always remembered to put a scratched vinyl of It Might As Well Be Swing on the record player the lovers had owned since their college years. It had definitely seen better days, but whenever the first note of Sinatra's Take Me To The Moon enraptured them, neither Minato nor Kushina could tell of the slight acoustic imperfections their antique equipment produced. They were all eyes for each other, giggling like teenagers and spinning around in the improvised ballroom their living room made.
Kushina always ended up spilling a drop or two of the red wine that swayed dangerously as Minato twirled her to her better amusement, and their crystalline laughter seemed to envelop them in a way that made them utterly oblivious to their surroundings, continuing their waltz in other rooms of the house until they were right back in the living room by the end of the song.
That's what Naruto had explained to Hinata, showing her the almost invisible spots that previous years of dancing had inflicted on the defenceless cream-coloured carpet. Hinata looked at it with a mix of yearning and awe, letting her black tights-covered toes dig into the faded spots she wouldn't have noticed if Naruto hadn't pointed them out.
She took another sip of wine, and she suddenly swayed from the holidays-induced euphoria to an impossible urge to cry. She wanted this; she wanted all this with a burning need that made her suddenly so sad it wasn't hers yet, nor was she sure it ever would be.
But damn, did she want it, the love, the kids, the marks on the wall and the homemade memorabilia testifying to years of family souvenirs. She wanted the sauce-stained family recipe cards in a sunflowers-embossed tin box, and she wanted to make a quilt out of baby clothes she had nurtured.
And she wanted all of that with Naruto. It could only be him; it was like a quiet truth she had known for years, that she had loved him like she couldn't have loved any other man. Being the hopeless romantic she was, she couldn't imagine committing to anyone else when her heart desired someone so fiercely.
As Hinata kept staring at the spots on the carpet, Naruto suddenly became very self-conscious of his house. It was small and not the well-designed, decorated houses you'd see in a magazine. He knew it was clean, comfy and lovely, but it was still a far cry from everything Hinata must have been used to.
Her facial expression changed; it became unreadable to Naruto, but there was a sort of discomfort to it. Was it something he did?
He was about to say something as if to apologise for his quaint home but Hinata raised her head, stumbled a bit towards the chimney where homemade Christmas socks were hanging on the mantel. She touched idly the one Kushina had knitted in a hurry this afternoon after ushering her out the living room so they could fill it with whatever Minato found at the only pharmacy open on Christmas Day.
She couldn't help it, her eyes started stinging and she could feel them welling up under all the array of emotions she's been chaotically navigating for the past few days. She had gotten so close to Naruto in the car ride during their improvised skating sessions, playing around on her lands and engaging with their families. Trust Neji and Tenten's chaos to overspill in her life.
It all happened fast and in that bubble of holiday craze. Therefore, Hinata felt it would all crumble when they regained the normalcy of their day-to-day lives.
Naruto looked at Hinata helplessly; he kept going over everything that had happened in the last few hours that could explain the sudden change of emotions on Hinata's features. He was not the most emotionally aware of his friends, but even he could sense something had shifted.
"Our parents are really something aren't they?" Naruto tried feebly. It was his problem, he just couldn't leave a silence to perdure, he had to fill it with something. And one day, he'll learn to be comfortable with the quiet pauses and not rush to say the first thing that came to mind just because the atmosphere became awkward.
Hinata gave him a puzzled look, and his heart beat faster, feeling the rush to add:
"You know all their comments about us getting married and having kids." He spoke fast as if trying to get to the end of this conversation as quickly as possible, but he kept digging instead of seeing his way out. "I mean, as if, right?" He puffed in disbelief.
Hinata's heart constricted, and she nodded hesitantly as Naruto chuckled nervously, scratching his head.
She could feel the familiar sensation of the prickling tears urging her to make their way out.
He could feel his jittery insides screaming at him to stop talking, but it was irremediable. His tongue had a mind of its own and lashed one more time in a skittish attempt to alleviate a tension he only worsened with each of his words.
"It's not like we're even dating or anything!" He blurted out and almost slapped his hands on his mouth.
"YOU SAID WHAT?" Ino barked at him, and Naruto shrank in the kitchen chair.
"I panicked!" Naruto shouted back in evident distress. "She looked so worried, and I thought it was because of all my mom's comments hinting at us getting married and having kids. She was uncomfortable, so I assumed it was going too fast or maybe that I had looked too eager, so I tried to show her it didn't need to be too serious and I would respect her rhythm."
Sakura looked at Naruto in a deadpan manner.
"So you thought it was a better idea instead than telling a girl like Hinata, who has had a crush on you for years, that the fact you kissed multiple times, shared a bed, spent the holidays together and met each other's family; that all that meant nothing?" Sakura asked incredulously.
"That's not what I said!" Naruto defended himself.
"Might as well have said that," Ino muttered.
"I didn't want Hinata to feel burdened by my parents and their insinuations." Naruto defended. "We barely started something; I didn't want her to run away the moment…"
He stopped, emotions building up inside him like an impending explosion. The girls waited in anticipation, watching the tiny movements of his lips for his declaration.
Naruto took a deep breath. "The moment she'd notice how desperately I want her, that I've always wanted her." He muttered, looking down.
"Oh, Naruto," Sakura said softly, gently touching her friend. "You are so stupid." She smiled at his confused expression.
"Yeah, other girls, maybe," Ino looked at Naruto like he was the dumbest human alive. "But not Hinata. I mean come on! She'd jump on the aisle tomorrow, with a white coat in the guise of a wedding dress and vomit-stained Crocs to say yes to you!"
"You think?" Naruto looked up, hopefully at Ino.
Ino rolled her eyes again. "Of course! Don't pull a Sakura; you can't possibly be that clueless! That girl is so madly in love with you and has been since the very first day we arrived at the Gen, and she saw you fail miserably to start the barbecue three times at the residents welcoming party."
Naruto blinked at Ino, still having a hard time believing this could ever be true.
"Trust us, Naruto," Tenten intervened before Ino could combust in a raging mass of exasperation. "Hinata loves you, Neji really likes you - well as much as he can like someone, really -, and the rest of her family adored you during the vacations. Hiashi is already talking baby rooms for the Haepo Manor, he was gushing about it with my mom as they went over his Pinterest boards." She shuddered, remembering he also had mood boards for her and Neji's offspring.
As if.
And yet, she couldn't help but feel her belly warm up at the idea of starting a family with that man.
"Talking of Neji," Naruto followed, wiggling her eyebrows at Tenten.
"Before that," Ino turned her sharp eyes on Naruto. "You need to promise to go talk to Hinata."
Naruto nodded. "I should call her right now, shouldn't I?"
"YES!" The three girls screamed in unison, which he took as his sign to bolt to his room with his phone.
When he was out of sight, Ino took her friend's hand. "Tenten?" She asked expectantly.
Tenten closed her eyes, a sigh escaping her lips.
"What happened?" Sakura whispered, softly wiping the precocious tear nestling on her friend's cheek.
Tenten fought through her trembling voice. "That's a very good question."
December 30th - 21:48 PM
Neji woke up, startled, clutching the silky ivory sheets pooling on his bed's empty side. He took a quick look around to reorient himself. The familiar bay windows in his minimalist room of the condo he shared with Hinata seared the pain of his loneliness once more.
He pulled the covers away, sitting on the edge of his bed. His calves, his thighs and all his back muscles tensed against the cold, crisp winter air that his opened window let through.
Elbows on his knees, he cradled his head in his hands, unbothered that the only thing protecting him from December's bitter frost was a flimsy pair of boxers and the slipping sheets around his legs.
He sighed again, the air in his room chill enough for puffs of vapour to form against the Persian blue sky undercut by the lights illuminating the bustling city beneath Neji's windows. His room, usually shades of whites and greys, was now cloaked in the monochrome midnight blue of the late evening.
It was unusual for Neji to linger so long before being completely awake. He'd typically get up, ask voice-controlled luminaries to light up and hop in a shower under a preselected playlist of his favourite surgical podcasts. Already, his razor-sharp mind was focused on his shift ahead.
But since he had been home three days ago, his mind had been distracted by the tiniest details he would have failed to notice before. A store selling qipaos, the new chilli place down the street, that is not so new per Hinata, how many Starbucks one could find in a simple five-minute walk downtown, and the worst was how many brunettes one could confuse for the right one.
Worst yet, for someone as precise, calculating, and shrewd as Neji, he felt disorganised and fiery. It was the fiery part that disconcerted him. The storm in his belly was the raging sea that couldn't find a port to call home. Willing him to sail to shores he didn't have a map to.
He passed a shaky hand through his long strands, leaning back on his hands. The city lights were dimming in the late hour. Yet again, his dreams had mingled with reality in his mind and he woke with a blow to his heart. In the arctic-like climate of his room, he still felt the remnants tentacles of his dream burning his skin everywhere he'd imagined she touched him.
He had wanted it so much to be true, he hadn't even questioned how she could have possibly made it to his bed in Konoha. Which would have been impossible after he had left her so suddenly on a Suna hardwood dancefloor, surrounded by the twirling couples attending Deidara's wedding.
Vivid images of her dreamed seduction still burned his mind no matter how much he shook his head to chase them away. The swift, fluid motion with which she took her shirt off, straddling him, pushing him against his pillows. Her breasts were overflowing the black lace of her bra, grazing his skin when she bent down, her breaths mingling with his, acting like his own personal inhaled ecstasy. The pearl teardrop hanging from her thin necklace chain cradled on his collarbone as her lips nested in his. He could feel her smile against his hungry mouth that was already opening to suck in her bottom lip.
Her whole body fit in ways telling him he was her home. To be anything that was hers, was a treacherous dream.
He hadn't even questioned the shifty surroundings, switching from his Konoha bedroom to the Haepo one, with anachronisms of snowy winds bringing in summer temperatures and spring-smelling flowers.
Or maybe it was just her warmth and her scent.
Now his arms could only wrap against emptiness instead of possessively bringing her frame flush to his, mesmerised by every inch of her bared skin, laid vulnerable to the grazing of his teeth. His pelvis couldn't feel the weight of her hips rolling against him like tides ready to engulf him.
The screeching hot water gushing out the showerhead did nothing to quench his anguish as it streamed down his back. He pressed his head against the cold tiles, tapping his fist against the smooth finish of black marble as he came to a gruesome realisation. Well, it was gruesome for him.
He, Neji Hyuga, had a crush. That was the conclusion of what three days of decrepit idle lounging around and obsessively mulling things over led to. He had a crush.
Which usually would be a funny topic shared with friends over drinks, felt like the end of the world for Neji, who had never thought he'd fall to the juvenile, ill-advised and ludicrous idea of a crush.
Which never made sense to him anyway. If he had ever liked someone, he would just tell them. And when he told them, they got together.
The idea of unrequited love was new to Neji, which he pained to admit, mostly showcased how foreign the idea of rejection had been until now.
Neji had an unrequited love interest.
No, he'd scoff. Not even an interest at this point. An infatuation, an obsession. It was all the more damning and ridiculous to want someone so desperately when they didn't want you, and sadly, Neji would come to learn since Suna, probably one of the most painful forms of heartbreak.
When it snowed in Konoha, it was always gentle. Or that's what Neji remarked behind his steering wheel on his way to The Gen. His hands tightened around the wheel.
He didn't want to leave her so abruptly under the hanging wisteria, dropping so whimsically around the gathered dancers at Deidara's wedding.
But all day, he had tried to fight the strength to end this nonsensical reverie he had let himself live in too long. That last day, most of all, he had indulged in all possible ways he could. Enlacing her from behind while she was pouring herself coffee, breathing in the sweet spot at the nape of her neck when her relatives were not looking, intertwining his fingers in hers, she was not suspecting it.
Neji sighed as he parked in the hospital parking lot. His keys jingled as he locked the doors, heading towards the elevators across the parking lot.
"Hey, Neji, wait up!" Shikamaru called from behind.
Great, that's all he needed. It's not that he didn't like Shikamaru's company, but he knew the anesthetist would have many questions for him, starting with-
December 30th - 21h50
"What happened?" Ino asked, always so straightforward.
The girls had regrouped in her bed after Ino and Sakura had coaxed out every detail of what had happened in the last days since she left their home in Neji's car under Ino and Sakura's conspiring shrieks.
Tenten shrugged. They had arrived at the part she pained to understand.
"Everything was going great." Tenten tried to recall every moment of their last day. "I woke up next to him. I guess I chickened out a bit.." She admitted.
"Chickened out? As in, you pretended all was cool and nothing much happened?" Sakura offered. "As in, you made it so believable your whirlwind romance didn't mean a thing to you, and now you're surprised he actually believed you and took a step back?"
"It was not a whirlwind romance…" Tenten mumbled.
"Oh Lord, give me a break." Ino sighed boisterously, raising her eyes at the ceiling. "You," She pointed to her friend, who started to change into her scrubs. "You wouldn't know whirlwind romance if it slapped you in the face with Christmas Magic, which it undoubtedly did these holidays. Your whole affair looks straight out of a Hallmark leaked screenplay."
"Is that even a compliment?" Tenten asked, astounded. "Were we that cringe?"
Sakura made a 'so-so' hand gesture.
"There must have been something…" Ino squinted, already past that discussion. "Something you didn't tell us…"
Tenten turned around after pulling her underscrub shirt down, but Ino's lynx eyes had seen her chew her lips before she could successfully give them her back.
"Girl," Ino threatened. "Spit it out."
The brunette pulled on her pants, playing with the drawstrings of her joggers longer than necessary, avoiding the scrutinising eyes of her friend.
"Deidara and I kissed," Tenten finally confessed before quickly turning around to grab the hairbrush on her vanity.
"EXCUSE YOU?" Ino and Sakura echoed, making Tenten wince.
"YOU KISSED DEIDARA?" Naruto slammed the door of her room open.
"I DIDN'T KISS HIM!" The older girl pivoted sharply at the newcomer who had been doing God knows what since he left them in the kitchen.
"What do you mean you didn't kiss him?" Sakura asked, before zeroing in on Naruto. "And what were you up to all this time?"
Naruto brushed her comment away. "Calling in a few favours, forget it."
Sakura gave him a look that made it clear she wouldn't but would wait to ask in due time.
Ino remained focused on the conflicting emotions dancing on her friend's unusually flustered face.
"Ok, no, this doesn't cut it." Sakura shook her head violently. "You need to return to the beginning of that last day you spent together."
Tenten exhaled loudly.
"Fine," She conceded. "So after… that night-"
"You mean when Neji made of Little Tenten a naughty little-"
"OH MY GOD, INO!" Tenten screeched at the wildly amused blonde.
"So, Neji went in his father and uncle's car to discuss what happened yesterday-"
"When he punched the bejeezus lights out of your ex." Sakura reminded her smugly.
"Yeah sure, whatever." Tenten shook her head at Ino's excitement. "Meanwhile, I was with my mother and aunts getting my qipao back, so-"
"So you wouldn't look like a cultural-appropriating hooker." Sakura grinned, self-satisfied.
"Sure." Tenten allowed through gritted teeth while parting her hair. "Then we met back around lunch and ate with my family." She stopped brushing her hair in reminiscence of their last day. "I don't know, every felt -"
"Chaotic like hell and tension-filled with the need for physical release?" Ino winked at her.
"Will you let the girl speak?" Naruto groaned, wedging himself between Ino and Sakura on Tenten's bed.
"It wasn't like that," Tenten whispered softly, combing her hair with an easy smile dancing on her lips. "It was just so… tender. And natural. It didn't feel like a deception anymore. It felt like he was someone I had presented to my family, and he had fit just right in…" She stopped, staring at her reflection in the mirror. "Or maybe we became so skilled in our deception that I managed to deceive myself."
"Who is this girl I see…" Naruto quietly hummed as Tenten kept frowning at herself. "...staring back, straight at me- ouch!"
The blonde glared at Sakura, rubbing the shoulder she had just punched.
"Jeez, let a guy have his Mulan moment, will you," Naruto mumbled in annoyance but Tenten was utterly oblivious to it.
The enamoured girl turned swiftly, leaning back on her vanity under three pairs of wide-eyed eyes.
"It can't be," Her eyebrows furrowed in deep thought. "I can't have imagined it all…" She swung her hand in a wide arc agitating her brush to punctuate each of the arguments of her self-debate. "He didn't have to do everything he did, or go this far for me, or care as much as he did, or treat my family, including my - God, I love them, I do- very annoying brother and father like they were his own. Or-"
"I think she's lost it," Naruto whispered to the two other girls, who nodded back, fixing the swiftly moving brush accompanying their friend's ramble like a maestro with his conduction baton.
"I can't have imagined it all," She halted abruptly, her tone softening as she brushed her lips pensively, remembering the memories they held.
"He'd hug me from behind while I was pouring coffee for dessert," She continued in whispers.
It was now clear to her friends that she wasn't talking to them anymore.
"He'd brush his fingers against mine every time I would pass by him or," she said, still idly brushing the tip of her over-combed strands, entranced by her remembrance. "He'd linger kisses down my neck when he helped me close my necklace clasp-"
"Damn, Tenten, keep it PG-rated." Naruto snickered but quickly swallowed back his mockery when Ino hit his other shoulder.
"For fuck's sake," Naruto growled at the unfair physical treatment.
"Mostly, keep it going," Sakura covered Naruto's protest, hastening her friend with a rolling motion of her hand. "You're leaving soon, and we haven't got to the why, how and in what world would you kiss freaking Deidara." She reminded her friend in urgency and horror.
Tenten snapped back to reality, quickly putting her brush down in embarrassment from her earlier digress. Foregoing the dreamlike state she had been in, she slipped instantly into a methodical and dispassionate mode, tying her buns with robot-like meticulousness. In vain, she was desperately trying to shake off the horrifying whimsy still lingering in the pit of her lovesick stomach.
"Oh, Tenten," Ino grinned jauntily. "Don't you even try, I can see you blushing through the mirror."
"Let her have it," Naruto smirked.
"Hellooo-oh!" Sakura brought everyone back to order. "She's leaving in less than five minutes. We haven't gotten to the good part yet, and I hate cliffhangers." She whined.
"Fine," Tenten took a deep breath. "What happened was -"
Ino jumped excitedly, a foot popping in delight as she clasped her hands in front of her heart at the sound of their doorbell ringing.
"Ooh! Pizza is here!" She ran out the room screaming. "I'm starving, I haven't eaten since we took the plane. You know how gassy I get if I eat before boarding and-"
Her voice slowly disappeared as she ran down the hallway. Sakura's deadpan expression met Naruto's gleeful one, greatly humoured by his friend's fulfilled worry.
"Ooh!" Naruto jumped out of the bed similarly. He imitated Ino's voice, and girlish posture, also popping his foot and clasping his hands in mimicked excitation while giggling at Sakura's expense.
"A cliffhanger!" He exclaimed in a high-pitched voice, rapidly dashing out of the room before Sakura could bestow him his third punch of the evening.
"I have to go," Tenten quickly took the opportunity to escape after swiftly grabbing her stethoscope against her friend's dismay. "But let's have breakfast together when I finish my shift." She called out from her shoulders, turning off the lights as she left.
Sakura fell down on Tenten's bed, groaning in defeat.
"But I hate cliffhangers." She wailed, kicking the air in the now dark empty room.
A/N: Almost a year later, but better late than never, right? I'll one day end this fic. Hopefully, this will be the year! I was this close to forego the last plot point of Deidara and Tenten side of the story cause I just wanted to finish this fic, but it was one of the very first element I thought of when starting this fic so I decided might as well include everything. It's not something that will have a major effect on the story but this was Tenten's first motivation into this deal.
I just want to say I read alllll your reviews throughout the years and they keep pushing me to finish the chapters to make sure you get a complete story! So thank you again for all your feedback it has been so encouraging!