.

Christmas Chaos

Chapter 2 : The Deal

December 15th

It's not that Neji hated Tenten, it's that she annoyed the fuck out of him.

For such a small and delicate frame, Tenten Maito held in a colossal amount of reasons to make him go blind in white rage.

Fine, his outburst on her during their first year residency was not necessarily warranted. Sure, he could have been nicer to her. But she was also at fault and didn't need to retaliate with gross rumours about his genitals, or lack thereof.

They were alright, more than alright, for anyone wondering, thank you very much.

And truth be told, Neji was not one to succomb to such childish endeavours which might explain his thorough rage whenever a certain brunette was involved. Because if anyone in this godforsaken place could bring out the worst in him, it had to be that evil minx. She just knew how to crawl under his skin and press every sore spot of his ego and maybe he just wanted her all over his skin in other pretenses…

No.

No, no, no, no, no.

Neji had to physically shake his head as he tied his surgical cap, giving himself an admonishing stare through the changing room's mirror.

Keep it together.

She really drove him mad. Yet, images of her flushed out cheeks, the diaphane smoothness of her skin, her ragged breath against the nook of his neck when he had pushed her against that wall…

That still haunted him, much to his annoyance. He had played it cool, but truth is, much to his utmost rage, he had wanted to kiss her senseless. To swallow her tongue so she'd swallow her words back, to drink her in completely and run his hands under her the top of scrubs, drag her in their on-call room to unfasten the tie of her scrub pants and take her hips with both hands to press her firmly against him-

But this would never happen.

Never. In this timeline or any other potential alternate universe.

Hell, no.

Forget that she was one of the most beautiful woman he had ever met, he would never, ever, ever give Tenten Maito the satisfaction of knowing the underlying attraction behind his fulminating hatred towards her.

Because as tantalizingly beautiful as she was, she was just as much an unbearable, sassy, exasperating brat.

"Thinking about the brunette from emergency?"

Neji looked up to see the wolfish grin of Kiba Inuzuka, a good friend he had trained with during his surgical residency and who embodied every stereotype of the douche orthopedics surgeon that people mocked in med school.

"No." He replied acidly much to Kiba's amusement.

"She's tight." He commented, check his flexed biceps in the mirror, and Neji rolled his eyes. "I guess that's not a problem for you, you get them like bees with honey." He winked at his friend who was famously known for his popularity with women and men alike whenever they went out for a drink with other surgeons.

Neji grunted, not caring to indulge the discussion any further.

"So, you're taking days off to spend the holidays with your folk?" Kiba asked him again as they walked to the elevator down the hallway.

Neji nodded, pressing the elevator's button to go down, sighing in frustration knowing his shift already started with a possible cholecystectomy consult at the emergency. And he was about to bet anything that he'd end up seeing her. It was uncanny how many calls they ended up working together.

Too uncanny.

And he blamed Naruto Uzumaki for that since he was then the emergency residents' chief and now the chief's assistant and had managed their schedules both during their residency and now they were attendings. The energetic blonde resident always plastered his angelic grin on whenever he got confronted on these "coincidences" by both Neji, and his favourite emergency colleague, Tenten.

Neji's and Tenten's antics were comic relief for everyone that got to work the night shift with them and God knows they all needed a bit of entertainment with the difficulty that came with the job.

Tenten could never get mad at Naruto for that, even thought she always punched his arm in retaliation. They were like work wife and husband, they had each other's back all the time, but she sure wished he stopped concerting with surgery residents' chief Sakura to match their on-call schedule just so everyone else could get a kick out of it.

"Hinata told me you were both driving to your lands for Christmas. So you took Christmas off and you'll work New Year's Eve?"

Neji nodded again, eying suspiciously Kiba before shrugging his worry away. He knew full well the Inuzuka kid was no threat concerning Hinata. Not only because they have been platonic friends since pre-med, but also because his cousin had only eyes for one very blind Naruto.

"Yes," Neji finally replied as he scanned his card to access the emergency department. "My uncle insisted we all be present this year because my little cousin is getting married."

"What, Hanabi?" Kiba raised his eyebrows high. "With Konohamaru? They've been dating since high school so I guess it must be him."

"Yeah, it's him." Neji confirmed nonchalantly after scanning the chart of his patient. "My uncle wants me to bring someone too. My dad is coming with his girlfriend he's been dating for a few months and my uncle is going to present us his first boyfriend."

Kiba nodded, it was no secret the highly intimidating Hiashi Hyuga and CEO of Hyuga Enterprises had finally come out as as gay a few years back after coming to terms with his sexualty.

"So who are you bringing?" The brown-haired boy asked instead.

Neji shrugged. He wasn't much into long term relationships and every year during the Holidays his family spend a good amount of supper dissecting his love life, or lack thereof. So a few years back he'd started bringing dates just to shut them up but each one had always been more disastrous than the other. Either they were dumb to cry for, which was a big mistake when concerning someone as cultured as his uncle; or they proved to be shockingly problematic. He'll never forget the Tayuya girl he had brought home two years back and who ended getting shitfaced drunk, falling in their christmas tree and knocking off two of his uncle's most prized ceramic nutcrackers.

The offended gasp of Hiashi Hyuga when he put his hand over his heart in utter shock still rang in his ears to this day.

"What about that smoking hot redhead? Tayuya?" Kiba gave him knowing a knowing Cheshire smile. Everyone knew Tayuya was just as much a bombshell as she was psychotically deranged, many men and women got fooled by the redhead's charm, her bouncy curls and perfectly balanced curves until they ended up having to restrain her from starting a street fight or stealing a car.

Neji nearly choked on his saliva. "Last I heard of her, she got arrested for aggravated assault."

"Damn." Kiba whistled.

"Yeah, if anyone comes to mind…" Neji threw a last look to his friend before pulling the curtains of the patient moaning in pain he was just about to see.

Neji finished his consultation with a heavy sigh, just having called the OR so they could prep for an elective cholecystectomy.

"Ok, so I think I found you someone for your holiday plans." Kiba gave him his most animalistic grin and Neji could already tell it was a bad idea.

But he was desperate, holidays were in less than a week and he shivered at the idea of bringing another hook-up to meet his family. He was getting too old for all this tense awkwardness and truth be told, there were few things that Neji hated more than the disapproving glare of his uncle whenever he brought home a dunce or a mental bin case.

Plus, this time with Hanabi's engagement also at the Hyuga reunion's agenda, Neji couldn't just bring anyone that could ruin Christmas again.

"Who?" He finally asked, instantly regretting his very word the moment he saw his friend's lips stretching farther than he thought anatomically possible.

"Tenten." Kiba spit out with every ounce of tease he could muster. "Ok, just hear me out." He rushed to add to Neji's disbelieving gaze. "I just heard her talk with the nurse - you know the cute one with cats on her scrubs?- and she was saying she was dreading going back in her town for the holidays because her ex invited her to his Christmas wedding and she had no plus one."

Kiba raised his eyebrows, proud of his ingenuity, but quickly sighed in defeat at the impassive face of his friend. "You both need each other and you know Tenten is a safe bet for your uncle. Plus, she already knows Hinata and there is no risk for her to have any expectations out of you or develop any romantic ideals. It's the perfect short-term solution to both your dilemmas and you know it."

Neji seemed to think about it for a fraction of a second, raising the orthopaedics surgeon's hopes, until he flatly said : "No."

"Never. Over my dead body." The long-haired doctor clapped the chart he was holding, unceremoniously handed it back to the nurse and exited the emergency department before Kiba's foolish, ridiculous, unthinkable idea started slightly making sense in his mind.

Just as he was about to cross the sliding doors, he saw her. Laughing at something Naruto said and their eyes locked for a second. And for the miniature second when he got lost in rich cocoa, Kiba's most idiotic idea freed itself from the clutches of his rational mind and latched at the impulsive side of his brain, planting itself there and for a split second he actually contemplated the idea of Tenten being his holidate.

December 17th

Now, begrudgingly, Neji had to admit that Kiba wasn't wrong. He was actually very right. This plan could work, they could both benefit from one another, and the best in all of that was that they hated each other to much to complicate things further than keeping it a strictly business deal.

The only problem was that meant he'd have to actually spend the holidays with Tenten fucking Maito.

But after a couple of days, the idea blossomed into a plan. Surely he could survive the most insufferable woman ever known to mankind for just a few days. She couldn't be worse than Tayuya, right?

God knows how he ended up tailing her during her lunch break when she headed at 4AM to the vending machine, but he did.

It was two days before their holidays break. At this moment in time, Neji Hyuga had to admit on something he seldom did : he was desperate and short on ideas. Heck, he was at a state where he depended on Maito to accept to be his fake girlfriend, there couldn't be a lower point in his life than this.

"Let's pretend-date for the holidays." He blurted out, keeping his legendary stoic features firmly planted on. Might as well skip the pleasantries and rip the band-aid.

She turned back startled, then confused, then shocked. "What?" She hissed, ready to spit back her venom at what she highly suspected was some kind of cruel joke.

But instead he started going into a very thorough argumentation of how this could both benefit them, having heard from some staff about her dilemma concerning her own Christmas plans.

Tenten nodded carefully, as if seriously considering his deranged idea until he was finished and she loudly blurted out:

"Are you fucking insane, Hyuga?"

She threw him a curious look. "No, really, are you out of your goddam mind? Did you fall and hit your head? Did you suddenly loss your vision? Any episodes of amnesia I should know of? Slurred speech, difficulty moving your arms or legs? Any neurofocal symptoms you have-"

Neji rolled his eyes. "Tenten, stop screening for a stroke." He cut her off.

"Mmh, no." She crossed her arms over her chest and scrutinized him. "You having a stoke is the only plausible explanation to you thinking we could actually pull this off. Or that it wouldn't end in the utter disaster it is meant to be. That it is not the perfect recipe for Christmas chaos nobody, nobody on God's green earth has asked for in this period of joy and peace. That-"

"Ok, ok. I get it, Tenten." He let out a frustrated groan. "It does not please me more than pleases you, but let's be honest. You don't have many options and neither do I." He gave her an assessing glance hoping this leap of faith wouldn't be for naught, because she would never let him live this down if she continued to categorically refused his proposal.

She bit her lip, there was nothing she wanted more than to tell him off, but, as much as it pained her to admit it, she knew he was right. She had resigned herself at the idea of going to her toxic ex's wedding alone but that would make that bastard way too happy and satisfied.

"You'll regret it, Tenten. You'll never find anyone as good for you as me, you'll see. You'll come back." That bastard had smirked at her after she had broken off things between them, catching him cheating on her with the woman he was now about to marry.

If there was one man she hated more than Neji, it had to be that oozing shit excuse of a man she had called her boyfriend before going to college. And walking in this narcissist's wedding with an eye-candy like Neji by her side would be the perfect revenge for this jerk's inflated ego. And maybe, cherry on top, her mother would stop pestering her on how "you see, now, Deidara is getting married. This could have been you. Why did you let go of such a sweet and successful boy?"

Maybe Neji could charm her mom just like he did all the staff interested in men at The Gen so she could have some respite during the holidays and resist the urge to put her head in the oven and hide with the turkey until the festivities ended.

Plus, there was always of...

"Angry sex."

Ino's voice resonated in her mind like a conjured up midnight demon that she quickly swatted to the back of her repressed thoughts.

No.

Plus, there was always the possibility of using this situation at her advantage. She threw a quick look at her friend and colleague, Naruto, who was rolling the echo machine across the pit and a mischievous light bulb lit up in her mind.

"Fine," Tenten finally said and Neji's heart leaped at the thought of his plan succeeding. "But only if you ask Naruto to be Hinata's plus one to your family's Christmas celebrations."

Neji gave her a confused look.

"Sure, fine, whatever." He agreed, not exactly understanding why this would be such a favour to her. Maybe she needed a friend with her through the ordeal? Who cared anyway, cause he certainly didn't.

"Deal, then." She extended her hand.

"Deal," He did the same.

A/N: I really needed a sexually tense Neji-Tenten dynamic and I hope you did too cause this is what this whole story is about. Share your thoughts with me!