Naruto 1. Chapter 1

A/N: Slight OOC – explanation in story. Jelp beta.

**Ne, Hinata**

**Chapter 1: Mission**

_Good thing Naruto-kun is such a heavy sleeper,_ Hinata thought as she quietly pulled herself out of her sleeping bag and smelled the result of her unconscious pleasures. Not even ten days ago, Godaime Hokage-sama had assigned her to go on several missions with Naruto (partially at her request), and this was the third night of their camping together that she had woken herself with a screaming orgasm. It was so embarrassing to wake up screaming, just barely able to keep herself from screaming Naruto's name along with the loud, "Ohhh!" that forced its way out of her throat. She wished she could control it, but how could she prevent herself from having naughty dreams? Further, how could she help how her body reacted to these dreams? She_was_ 17 years old, after all.

Hinata looked over at Naruto, and for just one fleeting second, she had the strongest urge to jump him and ravish him. Each time she had woken up this way she had had managed to get completely off as a result of her dreams, but even so she was still really horny. Naruto only slept in his boxers; it would be so easy to just put his penis in her mouth, get him nice and hard and then just sit on him. _Oh that would feel so good._ But when she realized exactly what she was thinking, she also realized that she was embarrassed about her situation, and the urge ceased. Mostly.

Hinata got up and left the tent as quietly as she could to go to the nearby river and wash herself. Naruto knew that she washed herself in the mornings (she did even if she didn't wake herself up with an orgasm), but even so, she wanted to let him sleep as long as possible. Not to mention she didn't want him to smell her wet pussy. Hinata hadn't_told _Naruto that she washed in the mornings; he had found out the hard way on their second day of doing missions together.

_Flashback_

"Hinataaa!" Naruto's voice called searchingly through the trees. Hinata froze. She had forgotten to tell Naruto that she usually bathed in the mornings. Now he was looking for her, and she was completely naked. What should she do? "_Hinataaa_!" he called again, this time sounding much closer. _Oh no!_

Hinata opened her mouth to shout back to him, to try to warn him that she was washing herself, but she couldn't seem to produce any sound. She couldn't even move. After what seemed to be no time at all, Naruto stepped out from behind a tree and scanned the river. His eyes swept up and down the river, and at first it appeared that Naruto hadn't seen her. But then Hinata saw the sudden jerk in his motions and the slow movement of Naruto's eyes to rest back on her. The only thing she could do was to cross her legs and cover her breasts with her arms and hope she covered everything. There _was_ the involuntary, "Eep!" but that was the least of her worries at the moment.

Naruto, having hesitated due to the shock at what he had seen, quickly covered his eyes and hastily hid behind a tree. Hinata unfroze and quickly gathered her things. She had all her clothes on in less than ten seconds – a new record for her if she had ever kept track. Naruto had just seen her completely naked. Her face was beyond red now; it was purple. _What a way to start off our mission._

As that particular thought struck her, she realized that something must be done about this situation. Otherwise, there would always be a distinct air of awkwardness around them. What else could she do but go across the water again and try to talk to Naruto about this? Just as she got her courage up and came out from the cover of her own tree, she saw that Naruto had apparently come to the same conclusion. Either that or he was trying to catch another glimpse. But that couldn't be the case; his demeanor was anything but mischievous as he cautiously walked across the water, already halfway from the tree he had hidden behind and where Hinata was now.

_End Flashback_

Naruto had tried to explain to her that he really hadn't seen her. He was just looking for her and when he found her in the river, he realized what she was doing and tried to hide quickly. He had said that he was really sorry and didn't mean to barge in on her like that. Hinata didn't really believe him, despite the fact that she secretly admired him and wanted to believe him, but the fact that he was trying to make her feel better about the situation made her happy. The shame of it was that she couldn't tell him that she didn't believe him because she didn't want to make it seem like she didn't trust him. And if she couldn't tell him that she didn't believe him, she couldn't cast aside her shyness just for a second and ask him if he liked what he saw or not.

Coming back to the present, Hinata sighed as she realized that she wouldn't ever have done that anyway. She proceeded to wash herself with her byakugan activated, just in case he decided to try to sneak another peek. It hadn't happened yet, but she couldn't just stop hoping now, could she?

But even though Naruto had a reputation for being slow to pick some things up, it hadn't taken him more than one time before he learned not to go looking for Hinata in the morning. He had asked her how long it usually took her to wash herself, just in case she ever took longer than that. Hinata was touched when he had asked her; if she took longer than usual he would look for her just in case something had happened to her. Every day since, she was tempted to take longer than she had said she would so he would come and accidentally see her again, but she never acted on it as a result of her shyness.

On this particular day, Hinata got back to the camp to find that Naruto hadn't even woken up yet. She peered in and saw his covers only half covering him, his legs spread wide, and of course, he was wearing nothing but his boxers. She wasn't horny anymore, so she was able to see it as cute instead of arousing. She could only partially manage to stifle her escaping giggle at the goofiness of the image in front of her. Just for a second she activated her byakugan for one little peek – she had done so on other occasions, just because she could.

Even though she was very shy in social situations, Hinata admitted to herself that she was rather naughty in her mind and also noted that she was quite confident in herself while she was alone or essentially alone. Once Naruto woke up she would revert to her shy, innocent, and bashful self, but that was okay.

She deactivated her byakugan and closed the flap of the tent. "Naruto-kuun!" she called, half sweetly and half shyly. She always tried so hard to offer Naruto a seductive, sexy wake-up voice, but every time she moved her throat muscles into the position she thought would cause such a sound, her shyness kicked in and her voice sounded as if she was trying to wake him gently while being sorry for interrupting his sleep. Not a _bad_ result, because at least it would convey a message that she cared for his well-being and happiness, but it wasn't quite the message she ultimately wanted to send to him.

Naruto's ears were getting used to the reception of Hinata's voice as an alarm clock; she only had to call once today before she heard the rustling of early-morning movement inside the tent. _Well, maybe just one more peek,_ she thought to herself – she was feeling a bit naughtier than usual today.

A few minutes passed by, and by the time Naruto emerged, Hinata had rations ready to go for him. She had known that he absolutely loved the soup that Ichiraku Ramen prepared for him (it was just common knowledge if you were a shinobi of Konoha). So, before Godaime Hokage-sama had activated them for these missions, she had gone to Ichiraku Ramen and ordered some miso ramen – his favorite flavor. She had used it to soak the rations ingredients, with the result that when she prepared the ingredients and made the rations, they tasted like his favorite meal. After that, she had eaten the ramen so it wouldn't go to waste and now quite understood why this was Naruto's favorite meal – it was good!

Naruto had been amazed that the rations Hinata made tasted just like ramen. He had praised her for making such great food without knowing what efforts Hinata had made in its preparation. That alone had sent Hinata on a trip to cloud nine. Oh how wonderful it was to be on a mission with only her Naruto-kun!

* * *

Naruto woke up to the sound of Hinata calling his voice. "Naruto-kuun," her voice rang sweetly in his ears, and as his mind switched from unconsciousness to full-alert mode a shiver ran down his back. _Well that's new._ Naruto didn't know what about Hinata's voice was so much different from the rest of the shinobi he'd been on missions with, but just the sound of her voice made him enthusiastic enough about the day to put his usual sleepy protests out of his mind. 

Maybe it had something to do with the fact that Hinata made such great rations. They tasted like miso ramen! But surely that couldn't have been the reason for the shiver running its way down his back just a few seconds ago. Ramen hadn't ever caused quite that kind of sensation before, so why should it do so now?

Naruto looked down and then realized the state of his penis was the reason for such an awakening. He had been dreaming right before Hinata had awoken him, dreaming about their encounter on the second day of their mission together. This was the second time he had happened to be dreaming of that particular event right as she had come to wake him up. He was thankful that Hinata always woke him up from outside the tent, and hoped that she wasn't using her byakugan to know he had been still asleep lest she see his erection.

Thinking about the breakfast rations provided enough of a distraction to lessen the amount of blood flowing to his penis, so he was presentable when he exited the tent to find that Hinata had already prepared them for him. She was such a nice friend to do that for him. "Ohayoo, Hinata!" he said brightly. Even though he sometimes had embarrassingly dirty dreams about Hinata, he refused to think he was perverted like Ero-sennin, so he didn't find it hard to act like he always did around people.

Secretly, even from himself, he was hopeful he would get to see her like that again – she was…_attractive_. But since he had told Hinata that he hadn't seen her – and he had no reason to think she wouldn't slap him if he tried to see her again – he kept all kinds of naughty thoughts like that to his subconscious mind.

"Good morning, Naruto-kun," Hinata responded, a pleasant smile gracing her lips. She always had been nice to Naruto, even after he had obviously seen her naked. Naruto wondered if she had believed him when he told her he hadn't seen her. Ah well, no reason to think about that now.

"Thanks, Hinata. Itadakimasu!" Naruto ate his rations quickly, not missing a single crumb's worth of miso ramen flavor. When he was done, Naruto asked, "Sleep well?" Ever since he had been out on the mission to bring Sasuke back to Konoha he had really bought into the whole teamwork thing, and even though they were into the second week of being paired together for missions, he still didn't know Hinata nearly as well as he knew Sakura or even Sai. This kind of small talk led to other conversations, and they were always good, especially when they were with a girl as nice as Hinata.

Hinata blushed a little bit, and her voice came out shy when she replied, "Hai, arigatoo. Did you, Naruto-kun?"

"Heh-heh, yeah I sure did," Naruto said, recalling the dream he had been having just before she woke him up. "Thanks for always wakin' me up, Hinata. We wouldn't get anything done if it weren't for you." It was sort of true. Naruto would take forever just to get himself motivated enough to get out of bed by himself, and by the time that happened, they wouldn't have nearly enough time to get done this mission on time.

Hinata's blush brightened, but so did her smile. "That's not true," she protested. "I'm sure you could do all of this without me."

Naruto put his hand behind his head and scratched the back of it. "Heh-heh. I guess we make a good team huh?"

"H-hai. We should do more missions together," Hinata said with an almost untraceable amount of hope in her voice. Naruto's subconscious picked it up because secretly he was hoping too, but consciously he was completely oblivious to it.

"Hey, yeah, that sounds like fun Hinata! But speaking of how we make a good team, maybe we should try to come up with a strategy for this mission."

"Oh...well I guess so..." Hinata said quietly.

"How do you think we should go about getting the information?" Naruto was with Hinata on a mission of information gathering. It wasn't a really big mission; nothing that was vitally important, but it was of interest to Tsunade-baa-chan. It was also something that interested Naruto, considering it dealt with Wind Country and the Kazekage.

"Umm...well, I thought that if we run into any Sand shinobi along the way we could try to get the information from them. Of course, we'll have to do it secretly; Godaime Hokage-sama wants it to be a surprise for the Kazekage."

"Hmm. That's true. So how would we do it then?" Naruto had a few ideas as to how they might go about it, but teamwork _was_ the name of the game, so he listened to what Hinata had to say.

He was pleased to hear that Hinata had thought of the same thing that he had in order to complete their mission. They would use Hinata's byakugan to figure out if there were any Sand shinobi in the area, then Naruto would use one of his kage bunshins to collect the data while trying not to be seen.

"Do you think I should transform my kage bunshin into something that they might not think is something watching them?" Naruto asked. He had gotten quite good at transforming his kage bunshins over the years. Now he could practically replicate and transform at the same time. It was a handy ability to have because most of the time it would seem to others that shuriken had just magically appeared in his hand without requiring Naruto to reach for them.

Hinata smiled and said, "Sure, that would probably be good."

"Hmm. What could I transform into to make my clone less noticeable?" Naruto was talking to himself, contemplating on what he could transform into that would fit in with their surroundings. They were in a forest, so some kind of animal would do. He started thinking along those lines, unaware that Hinata had taken his question as a question directed for her.

Apparently Hinata was thinking along the same lines as he was when he was considering what animals he could transform into. Hinata started giggling, and then she shyly asked, "Can you turn into a bunny?" She giggled some more.

Naruto had taken the question seriously. Apparently Hinata had been joking, but when he replicated and transformed his clone into a bunny, she started laughing harder. "Aww, it's so cute!" She said as she stooped down to pet it on the head.

Naruto didn't think anything about it until he canceled the jutsu, then when he gained his bunshin's experience of having Hinata pet him, he almost instantly got a boner. If Ero-sennin had been there, he would have teased Naruto for being such a virgin. _Not again!_ Before Hinata noticed he quickly said, "Oh, man, I have to pee. I'll be right back Hinata!" Then he was cursing at himself all the way to a tree to try to force himself to take a piss. "Kuso, kuso, kuso!"

* * *

Hinata had only been joking about having Naruto transform one of his clones into a bunny. She hadn't expected him to do it – much less mere seconds after she had jokingly suggested it. All she had really intended was to make a joke and possibly make it easier for Naruto to flirt with her. But when he had turned into a bunny, she just couldn't resist stooping down to pet Naruto in bunny-form. He made a really cute bunny. 

Another thing she couldn't help was noticing what happened to make Naruto claim he had to pee, and that was certainly spirit-lifting. She couldn't possibly suspect that Naruto would have romantic feelings for her, but she did suspect that Naruto had seen her naked. That plus the fact that the cancellation of his kage bunshin gained him the experience of having the back of his ears scratched by a girl he had seen completely naked apparently turned Naruto on. Hinata blushed slightly as she put the tips of her index fingers together.

At any rate, there was a mission to carry out, and Naruto was returning from his pretense at relieving himself. "Shall we get going, Naruto-kun?" Even though she was shy about conversing casually with Naruto, she had a relatively easy time talking with him about the mission.

"Sure!" Naruto said, apparently having been able to calm down his hormones._What a shame,_ thought Hinata regretfully. It would have been cute to see Naruto try to run with a banana in his pocket.

About an hour into their run towards Wind Country, Naruto broke their silence. They didn't talk much while they ran. It was rather nice, actually. It wasn't an awkward silence – just a mutual silence that was upheld while they ran alongside each other. It wasn't bad when it was broken, however. After an hour of not talking, it was refreshing to move the throat muscles. "Ne, Hinata…"

It was especially refreshing when Naruto broke the silence with these two particular words. Since they had started working on missions together, this was the most common way for Naruto to start a conversation. In her experience, he used these words to start conversations when he was curious about something, and most of the conversations that had started this way had caused some kind of laughter from tangents and spin-off conversations.

"Hai, Naruto-kun?" Hinata completed her part of the conversation initiator. A usual thing for somebody to do when exposed to a recurring event is to develop a usual response to the event, whatever it may be. In this case, Hinata developed a tendency to respond with the same three words every time Naruto initiated a conversation as he just had. This predictability was something that Hinata had found both comforting and extremely cute, not to mention just one more reason to admire Naruto.

"What if we don't run into any Sand ninja on our way? I mean...I know we have an alliance with them now, and they're allowed in our borders, but...what if they aren't here?"

Naruto had a point. It wasn't common enough for Sand ninja to be in Fire Country that Hinata should have assumed they would happen to run into a group of them along their way. Luckily, she had thought a little bit about that. "Well, I guess we could go to one of the other towns in Wind Country. We don't have to go to Suna."

"That's true. Do you think we should change direction and head for one of those other towns now?"

"Well...I dunno. I still think we should look for Sand ninja for a little while, just in case." It would be the easiest way to get the information they needed.

"Hmm. Yeah, I guess so. But...don't you think the people in the town will think it weird that we're there?"

"Why?" Hinata asked innocently. She had just thought of this too, but she had already realized that it wouldn't be entirely weird. "You just said that it's legal for Sand ninja to be in Fire Country. It's legal for us to be in Wind Country too. If we just go and act like we aren't paying attention to anybody, people there will probably pay little attention to us."

"Hey! You're smart, Hinata! You're right!" Naruto complimented her. "And in reality, we will be paying attention, trying to get the information."

Hinata nodded, feeling quite happy about Naruto's compliment. She was unable to let her concentration slip from where she was running (they were bounding limb-to-limb through the trees of Fire Country); so she couldn't allow her heart to flutter. But oh, it sure wanted to.

Hinata noticed they were coming up on a clearing of trees, so she said, "Chotto matte, Naruto-kun." They stopped in unison on a large branch of a tree twenty feet above the ground. Hinata activated her byakugan and scanned the area around them. To her mild surprise, there were people in its range. She couldn't zoom in quite as well as she knew Neji could, so she couldn't quite tell if they were Leaf ninja or Sand ninja. "Hmm. Naruto-kun, there are shinobi close by, but I can't tell if they're from Fire Country."

Naruto scratched his chin. Hinata could almost see the bubble above his head that said, "Hmm," and she almost giggled as a result. Naruto said, "Do you think I should get close to them with one of my kage bunshins?"

Hinata nodded.

Naruto hesitated then added tentatively, "Should I make it a bunny?"

"Hehe," Hinata couldn't subdue the giggle any longer. "Yes, you probably should."

Naruto moved his hands into a cross-shaped seal and created a shadow clone – away from Hinata she noticed – and instantly transformed it into a bunny. Naruto jumped down with his bunny clone in his hand and let it down onto the ground so it could scamper towards the shinobi that Hinata's byakugan had detected. Hopefully the ninja she saw were Sand ninja, and if they were, hopefully they would verbalize the information that she and Naruto needed to complete the mission.

* * *

Being a bunny wasn't difficult. Sure, it took a bit of thinking to figure out what a bunny would act like, but once Naruto's clone got used to it, it was pretty easy. Of course, it would be a completely different story when he was in the latter stages of sneaking up on the two shinobi in Hinata's byakugan vision. Right now though he was just making the journey. It was a bit under half a mile. 

Naruto had originally thought that half a mile would be time-consuming for a bunny. He was surprised to find that bunnies were quite speedy when they wanted to be, especially when they had the training of a jounin shinobi. Naruto's clone imagined a scenario of bunny-size scaled trees and then imagined a bunny jumping from limb to limb, occasionally grabbing one of the branches and swinging up and flipping to rest for a moment. It was an amusing thought, but even more amusing was the sound a bunny made when it laughed.

Pushing these amusing thoughts aside, the thoughts necessary for the mission made room for themselves inside the mind of Naruto's bunny clone. Suddenly, the clone knew that he was getting close to the shinobi.

Hinata had been watching Naruto's bunny in her byakugan and when it got within a hundred meter radius of the shinobi they would soon be tracking closely, she told Naruto. Naruto, not having thought ahead as to how to notify the bunny about this, thought for a second, then just made and cancelled another shadow clone quickly. The shadow clone knew that the bunny was in range, and so when it poofed itself out of existence, the bunny clone gained the knowledge as well.

The bunny slowed down and started to wander, rather than run directly, in the direction of these potential unsuspecting informers. To the clone's surprise, when the bunny got in range of the two shinobi, he found that there were both Fire and Wind Country shinobi present. Even more surprising was the fact that Naruto knew both of these shinobi. Then Naruto remembered Shikamaru saying something about being a diplomatic shinobi to Suna on behalf of Konoha, and subsequently became less surprised.

_Flashback_

"Sorry, Naruto, but I can't go on any missions with you for a little while," Shikamaru explained. It was always Naruto's luck that when he was trying to find a team for a mission, Shikamaru wasn't available. When Naruto had realized the extent of Shikamaru's genius, he had developed a profound respect for his style of fighting. He wouldn't have ever minded working with Shikamaru again, but it seemed that he was always busy with orders from Tsunade-baa-chan.

"How come?" Naruto asked, disappointed.

"Godaime Hokage-sama has asked me to be a diplomat to Suna for Konoha. She says that I've battled against and even worked with the shinobi who's going to be Suna's diplomat to Konoha, so I guess it'll be okay. It's still troublesome, but at least it'll be somebody familiar."

"Oh. Well, thanks anyway."

"Sure thing. Sorry about that Naruto. I'd be willing to come with you if Godaime Hokage-sama didn't keep giving me all these things to do." Shikamaru sighed. "Oh well. Later."

_End Flashback_

Naruto hadn't given any thought as to who might have been the shinobi from Suna that Shikamaru had talked about, but now that he saw who she was, he should have known. It was Temari, Gaara's sister. Hey, maybe they'd get this information after all!

Shikamaru and Temari were walking in the direction of Konoha, so they must have finished whatever business they had in Suna. Maybe Shikamaru had already gotten the information about Gaara.

But if that was the case, why had Tsunade-baa-chan asked Naruto and Hinata to retrieve the information? Couldn't Shikamaru just as easily ask Temari about it and cause less suspicion? Maybe Tsunade had forgotten to tell Shikamaru before he left to meet up with Temari. It was obvious that Shikamaru had already been to Suna, so he must have left Konoha at least 5 days ago. Yes, that had to be it.

The bunny clone was close enough now to hear their conversation. It stopped completely, lest it crinkle some leaves and alert them to the presence of a bunny.

"You should come to the celebration, Shikamaru. It'll be a good time," Temari was saying persuasively.

"I'm not a big fan of parties. They're too troublesome," Shikamaru said predictably. _Everything's troublesome to you, Shikamaru,_ Naruto thought at him.

"But I'll be there," Temari persisted. "I'm sure I could make it a bit less _troublesome_ for you."

What was this? There was no mistaking the seductive tones in Temari's voice. Were Shikamaru and Temari dating now? His question was answered when Shikamaru smiled, said, "Hmm," and kissed her lips quickly. _Somebody _familiar_, all right._ "Well, I guess I could come," Shikamaru said. "But I should get back to Konoha and give my report to the Hokage. We'll have time to do that right?"

"Sure. The party isn't until his birthday, and that's January 19th. We've got a whole week."

_Ah-hah!_ So it was January 19th. That was the exact information that Naruto was looking for. _All right!_ Naruto was about to cancel the bunny clone when he heard Shikamaru say, "Okay, well let's get going then. Is there anybody else you want to invite?"

"Hmm. Well, maybe that kid…um…Uzumaki Naruto is his name I think. I know Gaara wouldn't mind seeing him again."

"Oh, why's that...?" Shikamaru's voice trailed off as they jumped up into the trees and started jogging lightly in the direction of Konoha. Apparently he hadn't heard the details of Naruto's first serious encounter with Akatsuki and how Naruto had helped in the saving of the Kazekage's life.

Naruto cancelled the kage bunshin and immediately gained the information that they needed to complete the mission. "It's January 19th, Hinata."

"Oh, really? That's a week from today! We should get back to Konoha and tell the Hokage right away so we can get everyone ready."

"Yeah, let's go." Hinata and Naruto jumped up into the trees and sped back towards Konoha.

* * *

"Ne, Hinata," Naruto spoke up halfway back to Konoha, his voice sounding slightly nervous for some reason. Hinata had just lit the fire they would be using to cook their meal for the night. 

"Hai, Naruto-kun?" She responded. She was growing so very used to starting their conversations this way. It was one of those things that she found especially cute about her Naruto-kun.

"Umm...about the party we're throwing for Gaara..." Naruto began, and then hesitated. Hinata knew the reason they had gone halfway across Fire Country to get the information about the Kazekage's birthday. The fifth had prepared a special surprise party for him with the intentions of improving the already solid relations they had with Wind Country. Hinata knew that it was something that was pretty important to Naruto because he knew the Kazekage personally.

Naruto seemed to be on the verge of asking something, and Hinata was anxious as to what it was going to be. Luckily, she didn't have to wait too long. He spoke up, still sounding slightly nervous, "I was wondering...if maybe you might want to come to the party...like I mean I know you're going too, but I mean kinda like maybe do you think you'd like to come with me? I mean, you know, not as like a date or anything...well I mean kind of like a date but I mean like just as friends...ya know?" Naruto was slightly red.

Hinata was speechless. Naruto was asking her out on a date! The way he asked it seemed to make it seem like he actually _did_ want to ask her out on a romantic date, but didn't think that she would want to go out on a romantic date with him. Of course she did want to go out on a romantic date with Naruto, but in her shock and with the suddenness of the question, she couldn't find her voice to tell him all that. All she could do was widen her eyes and open and close her mouth a few times. And turn red; she definitely turned red.

Naruto seemed to take her silence as a negative answer, and he said, "Oh...I guess not," in a rather defeated tone. "Well…that's okay," Naruto's gaze shifted to the ground slightly to the right of Hinata's feet.

With the window of possibility for going on a date with Naruto closing rapidly, Hinata found her voice again, "Yes!" Maybe she had said that a little too enthusiastically. Now Naruto was sure to realize that she liked him. But wait a minute, wasn't that the point of having asked the Hokage if she could be paired up with Naruto on some easy missions?

Naruto jerked his head back up to look at Hinata with a smile on his face. "Really? You want to go with me?" Naruto asked excitedly. "Are you sure? You're not just being nice and trying not to hurt my feelings?"

Hinata turned red again with this sudden change in Naruto's demeanor from defeat to enthusiasm, and she subsequently lost her voice once again. To keep Naruto from being suspicious of something that wasn't the case, she did the only thing she could do: shake her head.

"Oh wow! That's great, Hinata! I mean, cuz, I probably would have asked Sakura – I mean just as a friend with her too, ya know – but she's going out with Lee now and she's going with him, and, well, I don't really know any of the other kunoichi that well and we've been having a such good time on this mission – I mean I have at least – so I thought that maybe you might be okay with coming to the celebration with me," Naruto explained in a rush. Then he gasped for air, for he hadn't taken a breath through that whole thing.

Hinata giggled a little bit. At the beginning of his blurted explanation, she had felt a bit jealous because Naruto made her feel like second choice. Then she realized it would have been silly to think that way. First of all, Naruto explained rather fluidly (well, as fluidly consistent as a choppy speech like that could have permitted) that he would only have asked Sakura to the celebration as a friend. Second of all, Hinata hadn't really ever spent much time with Naruto, so she couldn't expect him to pick her first out of anybody. And thirdly, he was being so cute about it that to feel even a tiny bit of jealousy would just be absurd.

The way Naruto had explained himself relaxed Hinata to the point of being able to converse with Naruto once again, and she didn't even think about being abashed to speak when she said, "Hehe, it's okay Naruto. I'll go to Gaara's birthday party with you." She almost even winked at him, but her shyness kicked in before unconscious could even create the neural synapse required to make a wink. Even so, her voice didn't give out on her. She smiled as she said, "After we give our report to Godaime Hokage-sama do you want to come over to my house and match outfits?"

Naruto's eyes opened neutrally and his facial expression went blank. For a second, Hinata thought she had gone too far, but then Naruto asked, "Uhh...what for?"

That split second of doubt nearly gave her a heart attack, but the anti-climax she expected turned into an anti-anti-climax and calmed her heart back down. "For the dance, hehe. There will probably be dancing at Gaara's party, don't you think? We should match if we're going on a 'friendly date.'" she said matter of factly.

Naruto's expression remained blank for a second then he said, "Oh, yeah I guess we could do that. I forgot...you're from the Hyuuga clan huh? You would remember to think about the fancy stuff like dancing at a party. But...um...I don't really have any fancy stuff to wear." Naruto put his right hand behind his head and raised his elbow above his head in an expression of embarrassment.

Hinata was starting to become shy again, so it was difficult to tell him that it was all right to be casual at the celebration. It was also extremely difficult for her to suggest, "Why don't I come over to your apartment first and see what you have, and then I can find something that can match it instead."

Naruto dropped his elbow but kept his hand behind his head, indicating that the situation was better but he still felt a bit embarrassed, perhaps about not being very classy for Hinata. "That'd be great!"

After they made their plans to go to the Kazekage's birthday party together, they cooked their meals, finished setting up camp, and then went into the tent to sleep. "Good night, Naruto-kun."

"'Night Hinata!"

* * *

Naruto stayed up for a while after they put out the campfire and settled into their sleeping bags. Usually he fell asleep minutes after his head hit the pillow, but this time, he just lay there quietly, even long enough to hear the subtle change in Hinata's breathing pattern that indicated she had fallen asleep. Naruto was thinking about the plans he had made with Hinata before going to sleep. 

As a result of the several instances of becoming spontaneously horny due to something that Hinata did, he had been thinking about her all day. Particularly, he was thinking about why she had been causing her to get him horny. At first, he thought it was just because the things she did that caused him to get horny reminded him of when he had seen her naked. While he didn't completely discredit the idea now, he realized that there was more to it.

The fact of the matter was that since that encounter, he had been developing an attraction to Hinata. It wasn't _just _because he saw her naked, though he admitted that was probably the thing that had sparked it. Throughout the missions they carried out together, they had interesting conversations that usually contained laughter. Most of these conversations were very casual, unless they dealt with whatever mission they were on at the time. The fact that he could converse with her so easily definitely added to his attraction. He didn't even have to think about the fact that she was pretty anyway (she didn't have to be naked to pull that one off).

Up until he saw Shikamaru kiss Temari, Naruto had been content to wonder about this new attraction to Hinata. When he did see them kiss, however, something inside him turned the contemplation into a notion of what to do with the feelings he had developed. Naruto had never had a girlfriend before. There was a period of time slightly after Sasuke's return to Konoha that Naruto and Sakura had vainly chased after each other, but none of that had ended in an actual relationship.

Naruto didn't know why seeing the kiss had sparked an urge to have a relationship, but he knew that the more he thought about it, the more he desired it. Even so, wanting something to happen and actually causing something to happen were completely different things. He had built up the courage several times before he asked her at the camp, only to have it completely drain when he turned and looked at her to ask if she'd mind going to the party with him. This was different from the kind of desire he had to date Sakura, and the fear of rejection was much higher than it had ever been before.

Even so, he had to do it soon. There were many things waiting for him back in Konoha that he had to do before he went to Suna to celebrate Gaara's birthday, and just showing up at the Hyuuga complex to ask Hinata if she'd go with him didn't appeal at all to Naruto. To get rid of the romantic obligation he had added the part of just going as friends, with an intention of possibly revealing his feelings to her at the party or sometime after, depending on if she had fun.

Even though he had told her that it was a friendly date, he wanted to impress her when it was time for them to dance. And even though he had no clue as to how to dance and probably wouldn't have time to learn how to do it nicely, he could still go out and get something nice to wear. _But still casual!_ He told himself. He had almost forgotten that he was going to a birthday celebration, and that not many people there would probably be in formal wear. But there were shops in Konoha that could deal with that kind of thing. And maybe he would ask Sakura for help. They were good friends now instead of awkward admirers stupidly chasing after a lost cause. She would help him if she knew he was interested in a girl.

And so he drifted off to sleep thinking about the ways he could try to communicate that he was interested in Hinata while on a 'friendly' date and do it in a way that impressed her enough to give him a chance.


	2. Chapter 2

A/N: Okay just to clear my conscience, for chapter 1 I didn't just happen to know that Gaara's birthday was January 19th, so I took that information from narutofan's webwite. That being said, please enjoy

In other news, I don't own Naruto.

**Ne, Hinata**

**Chapter 2: Suna**

The week since Naruto had asked Hinata to come with him to Gaara's surprise birthday party had somehow passed both quickly and slowly at the same time. On the one hand, doing all of the things he had to get done before leaving Konoha made the week seem to fly by at breakneck speed. On the other hand, the anticipation of going on a "friendly" date with Hinata made the week appear to pass excruciatingly slowly. Feeling as if he had just lived an entire year in the time span of only a second (and visa versa) gave Naruto a headache.

But the waiting was all over. Well, almost. There were still about 20 minutes before midnight of January 19. Naruto was standing beside Hinata waiting to light the fireworks that would kick off their surprise with a bang. Everyone present (about a hundred shinobi from Konoha) was currently wearing their ninja gear – traveling all the way to Suna from Konoha without it would drive any shinobi crazy. But Naruto and his date had brought their fancy wear with them in their travel pouches, and they would change once they set up their camp outside the village.

For now, Naruto was content to wait quietly – and he had to be quiet because there were so many shinobi waiting outside Suna. Even whispering would give it away that they were here, and that was something they didn't want until they were ready to shoot off the specially-made fireworks.

Naruto was going to be participating in the lighting of the fireworks, but he had mixed feelings about it. He had volunteered to do it, and he was enthusiastic about it because it was for Gaara's celebration; he wouldn't pass up that opportunity for anything. There was a connection between the two of them because of the jinchuuriki status they had shared, and he wanted to be a prominent figure of the celebration. At the same time, he almost regretted having to mind the direction of the fireworks he launched, because while he was doing that, he couldn't consider it at all date-like or romantic for Hinata. He would have liked to sit and watch fireworks for a minute or two with her.

He could easily have done it by having a kage bunshin light and direct the cannon, and even though Gaara would have had no idea that it wasn't Naruto's real body that had done the aiming, Naruto would have felt guilty about it. Seeing as how he was technically here with Hinata only as a friend, he decided not to use the kage bunshin no jutsu and to just light the cannon himself. Besides, there would always be other fireworks displays he could take Hinata to if their date here went as well as he hoped it would.

Something else that had happened in the last week was that his desire to connect himself with Hinata had grown. He was now quite comfortable with the fact – internally – that he was attracted to her. Externally was a different story entirely.

In the past, when Naruto grew comfortable with something, he generally didn't have any problems with being social about it. With this, however, the rising fear of rejection accompanied the increased comfort with his attraction, and he hadn't mustered up the courage to ask Hinata if he could possibly change the status of the date to_romantic_.

What his increased attraction to her _didn't_ change was the fact that he wanted to impress Hinata at this celebration. Even if he had asked Hinata about her interest in calling this a romantic date, he still would have wanted to impress her. After Hinata had come over to his house to see what he had to wear, she had taken him over to her place and shown him what she was going to wear to match it. She had even gotten into it for him and showed him what it looked like (not while he was in the room, regretfully). Naruto had paid close attention to what she looked like in the dress, and after she went through all that trouble, he had gone and done something sneaky.

_Flashback_

_Man, there's got to be _one_ shop in Konoha that has what I need_, Naruto thought as he entered what felt like the hundredth clothing store of the day. The woman behind the counter immediately perked up and said, "Uzumaki Naruto?" His name was apparently more widely known than he had thought. Not a single one of the store owners had failed to recognize him, even though he had never met any of them before.

Naruto nodded and smiled, forgetting his displeasure at not having found what he was looking for yet (just as he had done each_ other_ time he had been so recognized today). "Uh-huh. Umm...I'm looking for something specific, but before I ask you about it...I'd like to try to keep it a secret if at all possible. Heh-heh. You'll probably get it after I tell you about it."

"Hmm. Okay, what is it then?" The store clerk looked extremely curious and faintly amused.

"Well, I'm going on a date – I mean not really a date – we're going just as friends...and well I'd like to try to impress her, ya know?"

The woman definitely looked amused now, but she didn't laugh. She merely smiled a knowing smile and said, "I see. What specifically would you like me to help you with?"

Without exception, Naruto had struggled through his initial explanation to every one of the people who tried to help him find what he was looking for that day. Explaining that he liked somebody and wanted to impress her was so much more difficult than actually explaining how he wanted to go about impressing her. "There's going to be a dance at the thing we're going to – well, _she_ said there was probably going to be anyway – and so she came over to my apartment yesterday to see what stuff I had to wear...and – well, I don't have much. She picked something for me and then took me over to her place to pick something for herself that would match mine. I like what she picked out, but I've been looking all over Konoha to find something nicer for me that would still go with what she showed me she was going to wear." Naruto explained it all calmly, so there was no need to take a breath after this long speech. He wasn't even tired of saying it, even though he had spoken it more than a dozen times already.

The store clerk blinked once, taking in all the information, and then said, "Do you have the outfit she's going to wear?"

"No, but I can do better than that," and Naruto transformed into Hinata, complete with the particular outfit she had picked out for him.

"Oh!" the store clerk was startled. It was impossible to live in Konoha and not see ninjutsu techniques performed on a regular basis, but apparently she was unused to people actually performing them in her store. She was fine with it in this particular instance because it didn't damage anything in her store, so she recovered quickly and said, "Well isn't that cute. I've got just the thing! Come with me!"

_End Flashback_

As he was thinking about this, time inevitably passed by and after what seemed like no time at all, the gathering of leaf shinobi was silently counting down together. Naruto saw baa-chan's hand spring five fingers, then rhythmically reduce the number of exposed fingers until one was left...—And up they went! Twenty silver streaks of flame shot up into the sky directly above Suna and exploded to create a perfect halo ring of bright white splendor. Half a second later (as it was planned) the firework that Naruto shot exploded in the center of the halo and took on the shape of the Wind Country emblem that was carved into the forehead protector of every Sand shinobi.

They hadn't planned on giving a huge fireworks display; they had just wanted to start their part of the celebration with some excitement. The 21 fireworks were quite enough to accomplish that task, so after the light from the explosions dissipated the leaf shinobi started jogging towards the entrance to Suna. They didn't run, lest they falsely alert the guards to a threat; jogging got them there quickly enough.

Baki, the Jounin ninja who had led Gaara's team way back when Naruto's classmates were all still Genin, greeted them with a fair amount of surprise showing on his face at the entrance of the corridor that led to Suna. His surprise increased when he saw the Hokage leading the group of ninja. "What is the meaning of this?" he asked in a tone that lacked any kind of hostility whatsoever.

"We of Fire Country wish to join those of Wind Country in the celebration the birthday of the Kazekage, if you will have us," Tsunade said humbly as she bowed slightly.

The sand ninja's eyes softened without losing any of the surprise they still contained. "We were not aware that you knew the date of his birth. This is quite a nice surprise."

"As it was intended. We wish to offer congratulations, as well as improve the relations between our countries."

Baki signaled benignly to shinobi apparently high above them along the graduated steps of the high-rise rock structure that served as the walls to the corridor they would soon be walking through. He then turned to face the village and said, "Come with me. Let us inform the Kazekage of your presence. I am sure he will be pleased. Especially with your presence, Naruto and Sakura-san.

Beside him out of the corner of his eye, Naruto saw Hinata smile and felt a bit of pride. It was nice to be remembered by Baki after nearly two years, even for something as memorable as helping to save Gaara's life; Naruto hoped it was impressive to Hinata to have been singled out of a crowd of so many when Baki had only taken a single glance at the group. Things were already going well, and the 'date' part of the date hadn't even started yet!

* * *

On the outside, Hinata appeared to be calm and comfortable. On the inside, she felt like she had a Chouji-sized butterfly in her stomach. It was a strange sensation, because it was usually the other way around for her. For this occasion she had been absolutely determined to show confidence in herself. It was her first date (of hopefully many) with her Naruto-kun! She had to at least _seem _like she felt like she belonged in this kind of situation – she just had to. 

At this particular moment it was substantially easier to appear confident because she was participating in some games that were common at shinobi parties. Some of these games she played were with Naruto specifically; some were group games that Naruto also participated in; and some were group games that Naruto did not participate in (mostly because of gender issues). One particular game she had played had involved Naruto, Sasuke, and her cousin Neji. It was a serious game (otherwise the two other guys probably would have declined to participate), but it could be enjoyed by those who weren't quite as serious as Sasuke or Neji.

Apparently Naruto had told Sasuke that he was coming to the party with Hinata, and as a result, Sasuke didn't ask any questions while they were playing their game. Hinata, on the other hand, hadn't thought to tell Neji that she was coming to the celebration with Naruto. He was therefore curious as to the occasion, considering he was good friends with Naruto and his relationship with Hinata had improved drastically over the years.

"Hinata, I didn't know you were coming with Naruto. Are you two dating now?" Neji asked bluntly. The game they were playing required physical activity, and as a result of the spontaneity of the question, Hinata nearly fell flat on her face. Even if she hadn't, her face still probably would have turned the deep shade of scarlet that she could feel radiating heat waves into the air around her. She didn't even look at Naruto, so she couldn't see that he had turned a similar shade of red. She did hear a sarcastic-sounding murmur issued from Naruto's direction and out of the corner of her eye she thought she saw Naruto swing a fist.

"I...I...we...I," Hinata stuttered, silently cursing herself. She had been doing so well with the whole confidence thing, too!

"We're just here as friends, Neji," Naruto saved her, seeing that Hinata was having trouble with the suddenness of the question. This time Hinata definitely heard a sarcastic murmur with Sasuke's distinct voice pattern, but she couldn't tell what he had said. She was also more certain that Naruto subsequently aimed a punch at Sasuke's head.

"I see," said Neji, though it was clear in his tone that he did not actually _see_.

Their game was ended prematurely as Naruto's attention turned elsewhere. "Hey, Hinata, it's Gaara! I haven't said 'happy birthday' yet; come on, let's go!" Naruto grabbed her wrist firmly but gently and pulled along her as he sped towards Gaara. "Gaara!"

Not at all able to pay attention to the shinobi she was being dragged towards, Hinata could only concentrate on the presence of Naruto's hand on her wrist. During their missions together, they had talked frequently enough so that Hinata was comfortable when conversing with Naruto. While this was the case, throughout their week and a half of scampering all over Fire Country together they had not had very much physical contact with each other – it was unnecessary for them to have done so for _any_ part of their missions. This experience was essentially a new one for her, and if she hadn't so recently been unintentionally forced back to stuttering in Naruto's presence, she might have found the sensation somewhat erotic. As it was, however, she could merely enjoy it for what it was and try not to faint like she often used to while she was around Naruto.

Luckily, Naruto snapped her out of it when he stopped tugging at her wrist. Hinata wondered as to the sudden lack of tactile contact between Naruto's hand and her wrist, but only for half a second before Naruto said to her, "Hinata, this is Gaara! You remember Gaara from the Chuunin exams right?"

"H-hai. Konbanwa, –" Hinata faltered at what exactly she should refer to him as. Naruto was introducing him to her as Gaara, but he was the Kazekage, after all, so she should at least show a bit of respect for such a great shinobi.

Before she had the chance to decide on how to respond, however, Gaara said, "'Gaara' will do. And you are...Hyuuga..." Gaara paused for a moment, and then very unquestioningly finished, "Hinata."

Hinata was stunned. Surely Gaara hadn't remembered her name from the preliminary to the 3rd round of Chuunin exams, had he? At that point he had a reputation for being a very skilled shinobi, but he also had a reputation for not really caring about anyone at all, whether he saw them as strong or not. Apparently he had quite a remarkable memory, for _she_ certainly hadn't done anything remarkable in that stage of the exam.

Apparently, her surprise was evident on her face. Gaara explained, "I happen to remember that Naruto made a vow on your blood after your battle with the _other_ Hyuuga that he would defeat that shinobi. He fulfilled the vow, as I recall. Is that right, Naruto?"

Naruto put his hand behind his head and his elbow up above his head familiarly, but this time his facial expression was a twisted, goofy smile that both brought Hinata out of her state of temporary confusion and nearly made her giggle. Hinata had come to recognize this particular posture as Naruto's version of the 'aw shucks' demeanor. "Heh-heh, yeah I guess I did. But me and Neji are friends now."

Gaara nodded as though he wasn't surprised, then displayed the first hint of curiosity Hinata could ever recall seeing on his face. She realized as he began speaking that the curiosity was directed at her. "Is she your girlfriend, Naruto?" At least the _question_wasn't directed at her this time.

Naruto seemed to have been expecting it too, thankfully, so he responded much the same he had to Neji, only a little bit more calmly. This time, Hinata was also much more in control of her own self, and she only went slightly pink. Even so, as she heard the words come out of Naruto's mouth, she listened to them regretfully. She wanted so much to be here with Naruto as more than a friend, and she disliked the explanation of her presence so much that she thought the reason she heard a distinct tone of disappointment in Naruto's voice was because of her own imagination.

Hinata sighed as she realized that this kind of thing might happen several additional times before the night was through. Suddenly she longed for the part of the celebration that would include dancing so she could finally tell Naruto how she felt about him...and maybe, just maybe, she could spend the end of the celebration with Naruto as something more than his friend.

* * *

Naruto hoped desperately that Hinata could hear the disappointment in his voice as he explained for the fourth time this evening that they came to the celebration together merely as friends. He hoped that he wasn't saying it too casually or matter-of-factly in Hinata's presence, because each time he explained it to others, it got harder and harder in his mind to justify suddenly telling her he liked her while they were dancing. Why did everyone have to be so damn curious?! 

This time, he was responding to Shikamaru and Temari's inquiry as to their relationship status. After he was done explaining that he and Hinata weren't together romantically, Temari spoke up and said, "Aww, that's a shame; you two look so cute together!" after which, Temari put her arm around Hinata's shoulder and said, "Come with me; let's have some girl talk."

This turn of events got Naruto's hopes up. Maybe Temari would suggest to Hinata that she consider being Naruto's girlfriend. That would be great! While Naruto had had every intention of asking Hinata out himself, he didn't object at all to a little one-on-one female advice designed to get Hinata to look in Naruto's direction. Beside him, Naruto heard Shikamaru 'hunh' a small chuckle to himself. This got Naruto's attention. "What?" he asked innocently.

"Haha, Naruto, it's not even troublesome to read you. You like Hinata, don't you?" Shikamaru said in a manner that communicated a silent, 'don't even try to deny it, either.'

Naruto found that even though he had trouble socially communicating the fact that he liked Hinata, and had even taken measures to prevent her from finding out from someone other than himself, he found that when asked directly like this he had no problem whatsoever spilling the truth. "Heh-heh, yeah, I guess I do." His hand went behind his head and he made the classic proudly-embarrassed face, complete with the sweat drop.

"Hunh," Shikamaru chuckled again. Then he said seriously, "You should ask her out."

"I...I want to, but I don't know if she likes me. I was going to do it at the dance thing...how did you ask Temari out?" Naruto asked, hoping that he might get some help as to how to make it go more smoothly.

"Uhh...well to tell the truth, I didn't really. We just kinda – happened. I guess after she saved me in my fight against flute-lady of Orochimaru's 'Sound 4' it was something that was just going to happen. Used to think that kunoichi weren't strong at that point...hunh, she sure changed _my _mind. Nothin' against Hinata, of course."

"Oh," Naruto said, disappointed. He didn't want to ask out right for tips on how to ask Hinata about dating him – that would just be pathetic. But it seemed that he was going to have to come up with a way to do it all on his own. Well, if that's how it was going to be, then that's how he would do it.

"Don't sweat it," Shikamaru said, reading into Naruto's expression once more. "She seems to like you too, if ya know what I mean?"

"Huh? What do you mean? How can you tell?" Naruto hadn't thought about the possibility that Hinata might already like him. The thought that the heiress of the Hyuuga clan falling for an orphan kid like him who just happened to have the Kyuubi monster stuck inside him hadn't even dared to occur to him. Shikamaru's suggestion that she would do that all by herself sounded completely absurd to him.

"Well think about it, Naruto. I don't know how it happened, but at the very least _she_ agreed to come with you to this troublesome party in the first place. You were the one who asked her right?"

"Yeah...but I asked her if she'd like to come as friends. This isn't like a date or anything. I kinda wanted it to be, but so far it hasn't been working out to be really anything like a date," Naruto explained, verging on sounding sulky.

"Uh-huh. Well let me just give you a little something I've observed since I've been going out with Temari. Girls _always_ read into things and try to find the meaning behind what you say. Hinata's smart, so she probably saw through your little, 'let's go as friends,' charade. I'd bet Asuma sensei's last cigarette on it. Ask her out, go on. Besides, it feels _good_ to have a girlfriend."

"Huh? What do you mean?" Naruto asked, clueless.

"What do you think I mean, _idiot_ – shopping? Exactly _what_ about having a girlfriend do you _think_ I could possibly find nothing 'troublesome' about?" Shikamaru said more animatedly than Naruto had seen him in a long time. Even so, it was clear that Naruto still didn't get it, but the fact of the matter was that Temari was leading Hinata back towards them. "Maybe you need something a bit more tangible then," Shikamaru chuckled again, and as Hinata approached Naruto, Shikamaru caught him in a shadow-mimic jutsu, turned so that Naruto was facing Hinata, and slightly bowed at the waist so that Naruto did the same.

Shikamaru stopped so that Naruto's reddening face was about two inches from Hinata's breasts. Shikamaru released Naruto from the shadow-mimic, and Naruto immediately straightened up and said, "I'm sorry Hinata! I don't know what Shikamaru was doing that for." Naruto was thoroughly embarrassed, especially because there wasn't anywhere convenient to run in the pretense of having to take a leak.

"It-it's...it's okay N-naruto-kun," Hinata told him, sporting the same exact shade of scarlet on her face. The next several minutes consisted of a very awkward silence between them.

* * *

Hinata had actually enjoyed her conversation with Temari. _That_ was quite unexpected, considering how the original conversation in their group had borne the frustrating topic of Hinata and Naruto's relationship status. While the subject of interest hadn't changed when Temari had taken her off into the crowd, away from 'the boys' as she had put it, it was relieving that she didn't have to talk about it while Naruto was in earshot. 

Hinata had even received a bit of a confidence-booster from the conversation, and was ready to walk around with Naruto with her head held just slightly higher; that was, until Shikamaru had caused Naruto to nearly turn her breasts into a face pillow. Her conversation with Temari and her own heightened confidence felt like they had happened a week ago, even though they had just less than a minute before finished their private conversation.

_Flashback_

"All right, I think that'll do for now," Temari said as they reached a distance where neither Naruto nor Shikamaru could possibly hear them through the noise of the crowd. "Even so, let's just keep walking around a little bit; I've been standing still for too long – gotta work the leg muscles, you know."

Hinata was confused. "W-why did you take me away from N-naruto-kun?" she asked, and as the words came out Hinata heard how pathetic they had sounded.

Ignoring Hinata's question, Temari asked her own, "All right, you say you're here with Naruto on a date, but you're both still _just friends_ – is that what you two just said?"

"H-hai, that's—"

"All right, well that's all fine and dandy," said Temari, cutting her off, "but let's just establish the fact that I know you want to be here as more than _just friends_ with Naruto."

"Wha-how do you know that?" Hinata demanded, though it was clear even to herself that she was in no position to be demanding anything.

Nevertheless, Temari obliged her and explained, "Shikamaru pointed out that you two have been hanging around each other a lot at the party – he saw you come in together and saw that when you were playing games, you played most of them with Naruto. He had assumed that you had finally gotten around to telling Naruto that you've liked him since your Academy days."

Hinata's mind was screaming. Experiencing so many right-angle turns of conversation in one minute was hard to handle. "How...why...what..?"

"Oh, cut it out," Temari said briefly, though she didn't exactly sound irritated. "I'll just remind you that you've probably at least _heard_ about Shikamaru's genius and observation skills if you haven't witnessed them yourself, so we'll leave it at that. That's not the point of the conversation. Want to know what is?"

Hinata, finally giving up her attempt to keep up with the conversation, just nodded in agreement. At least if she knew what this was all about she would have an idea as to the kinds of things Temari would be asking her.

"Well that's good because I was going to tell you anyway," Temari said quite matter-of-factly. "Now we already know that you like that crazy kid over there so now all we have to do is get you to realize that _he_ likes _you_ too." (Hinata almost took exception to the word _crazy_ but then realized that Temari hadn't said it with any kind of negative tone, and then realized that_crazy_ happened to be an accurate description of her Naruto-kun).

Hinata took the rest of Temari's words in and subsequently blinked. "But, but, how do you know that he likes me? Did N-naruto-kun tell Shikamaru?" Hinata asked hopefully.

"No, but he didn't need to," Temari said nearly sarcastically, and Hinata's spirits fell. Temari had said that Naruto liked her so matter-of-factly that it made her sound as if she had personally heard Naruto speak the words herself. "Hey, chin-up," said Temari, noticing Hinata's state of displeasure. "Let me tell you why I know, okay?"

At this point, Hinata gave up every attempt to understand what was going on, so she merely sighed, blushed, and said, "O-okay."

"All right then. Let me tell it to you from a girl's point of view, huh? It'll probably make it easier for you to understand, especially because that's how you're going to be looking at it from now on. I don't know everything, especially about how you two wound up coming to this thing together but not _**two**_gether," as Temari held up two fingers and then crossed them for emphasis, "but I have some hunches and you'll need to let me know if I'm right or if I'm wrong.

"First off," Temari said before giving Hinata a chance to agree or disagree, "I'm going to assume that since you've liked Naruto for the last five years and still haven't managed to let him know how you feel that _he_ was the one to suggest you come here together in the first place. Am I right?"

"H-hai." Hinata had somehow gotten the message that Temari was only interested in short, simple, yes or no answers. She certainly wanted to explain more about it, but even as she choked down the automatic slight pause and the word, 'but..,' she realized that she didn't really have anything to add after the 'but...'

"All right, so far so good. Second off, it makes sense to me that before he asked you out here, you two spent a fair amount of time together – either alone with each other or around other people. But you spent the time together, right?"

"Yes," Hinata managed to squeak out without stuttering. She thought that she could almost see where Temari was going with all this.

"Okay, so it wasn't just out of the blue that Naruto asked you, then, was it? It was _after _you two spent a bunch of time together right?"

"Well, yes, but—" Hinata was growing less confused now, and before she could subdue the urge to rebut it, she had accidentally let the contradictory word escape.

"Good," said Temari who was not interested in any argument Hinata had for her, "because if he had done that you should have punched him in the face, because all he'd have been after was this," and Temari clutched both of her own breasts and bounced them up and down twice. Hinata was appalled that she would do such a thing in such a public place, but Temari didn't even seem to give it a second thought as she went right on in saying, "But since he _didn't_ ask you right out of the blue, it means he's after something else. Did you happen to notice any strange behavior from Naruto while he was around you?"

"Um...well..," to be completely honest, Naruto's _normal _behavior could be considered strange for most people. He was constantly enthusiastic, confident in himself, almost egotistical (well, maybe more than 'almost'), whereas other Jounin ninja were always calm, quietly confident, and subdued. "When he asked me he did seem kind of nervous, and that's not like Naruto-kun," Hinata said thoughtfully, wondering if that was the kind of information Temari wanted.

"Perfect! What more could you need? Let's start on back now."

"But wait! What do you mean? What else do I need for _what_?" Hinata had just been getting used to being able to talk with Temari in this conversation, and now it seemed like it was over.

"For_what_? For knowing that Naruto likes you back, of course. Come, now, surely with all the things that you just told me you can't be doubtful of it any longer. I didn't even tell you anything – you knew everything you needed to know already. Look," Temari said as she steered them back around to walk in Naruto and Shikamaru's direction and started counting off the points on her fingers, "Naruto came to you and asked you on this 'friendly date' in the first place, and he did it after he had spent a considerable amount of time with you." Temari further summarized that while Naruto had suggested it, he had a nervous demeanor about him. These were the tell-tale signs that even though he suggested they come as friends, that he really wanted something more than friendly to happen at the party. "He was probably just suggesting the _friendly_ part because he wasn't sure if you liked him too, and didn't want to frighten you away with a too-soon request for romance. It's kind of cute, actually."

Hinata had listened closely to Temari's speech and realized that she had thought of all these things before, but had quieted these thoughts in her mind in fear of getting her hopes up too high. Temari, however, had heard only the main highlights of a week's worth of events that had led up to Naruto asking Hinata to accompany him to this celebration. If she could put all that information together to come to a conclusion that Hinata had desperately wanted to believe, then the conclusion must at least have a possibility of being true. Once Hinata realized this, she thought about Temari's assessment of Naruto, and giggled shyly. "Hehe, yeah, he is cute."

"There ya go. All right, Cutie, there ya have it. He's right there waiting for you. Go get him." Temari gave Hinata a gentle nudge in Naruto's direction, and Hinata stopped a few feet shy of colliding with Naruto, only to have Naruto's body move rigidly into a bow that nearly planted his face right into the crease between her breasts.

_End Flashback_

As Hinata reflected on her conversation with Temari, she realized that even though Shikamaru had managed to upset the mood that Temari had been kind enough to work her into, the message that Temari had been trying to get across to Hinata was still valid. In fact, it was more than valid, because even though Hinata had just a moment before agreed that Naruto was so cute, Hinata had purposely left out anything concerning her observations of Naruto's lack of control over his hormones during the time they had spent together. Even though Naruto had just been in an extremely embarrassing situation, he had once again lost control of his hormones (not to the point of acting on that lack of control though) and Hinata had once again not failed to witness the protruding bulge in his pants directly in front of his groin.

_Hehe_, Hinata silently giggled to himself. Gaining a fair amount of the confidence she had just lost as a result of Shikamaru's joke (she couldn't really see it as anything but a joke now that she looked back on it), Hinata attempted to raise Naruto's spirits. She was nervous about it, but she thought it was the least she could do for him after Temari had just raised her own spirits. "Ne, Naruto-kun?" Hinata said in an attempt at a sweet voice, feeling simultaneously weird and cute for being the one to initiate a conversation this way.

Naruto had a slower reaction time than usual, probably because he was unused to being responsible for the second line in the beginning of the conversation. His surprise showed on his face for a split second then he quickly caught on and responded, "Hai, Hinata?" This alone seemed to raise his spirits a few notches, but Hinata wanted to make him feel even better. She also didn't want to leave him hanging after starting a conversation without anything to talk about.

"It-it's not your f-fault that you got s-so close to me, Naruto-kun," Hinata began, silently cursing herself for stuttering. _No more stuttering!_ "I'm not upset."

Naruto, whose eyes had been wincing in embarrassment until then, let his eyes soften when he heard that she wasn't upset with him. "Thanks, Hinata-chan. That asshole was just playing a joke, but it made me feel like _I_ was the one being an asshole. I'm glad you're not mad at me."

Hinata wanted to tell him that he was too cute for her to ever get mad at him, but instead she just tilted her head slightly downward, shook her head slightly and smiled as sweetly as she could without making her smile look artificial. She even added a little tiny bit of intentional blush, just to see if she could get him to react at all. She was rewarded with a small bit of color flushing Naruto's cheeks.

Hinata continued to talk to Naruto to try to get his spirits back up where they belonged, and while they were talking, they were pretty much wandering aimlessly through the crowd. Unexpectedly, a bit of glare shone on her face from an unanticipated direction. Not wanting to take her attention off Naruto, she let her shoulder-length, dark blue hair down and used it to cover her right eye from the source of the light.

Naruto, on the other hand, didn't have the advantage of long hair she did, and was therefore more distracted by the light. "Hey, the sun's rising. Wow, we've been up for a while, haven't we?" Naruto asked, yawning.

Come to think of it, they had gotten up nearly a whole 24 hours ago. Hinata suddenly realized that she too was tired. Before she could suggest going back to the tent, Naruto piped up, "Ne, Hinata, want to get back to the tent and get some sleep? It doesn't look like there's going to be any dancing tonight, huh?"

Hinata could only agree, but she was feeling happy enough with herself that she didn't want to break what she hoped was a cute but still communicative silence. So she merely smiled like she had before and nodded her head slightly in agreement.

They left the building that had served as the setting for the party and found that she couldn't contain her words any longer. It was their good luck that this particular time of the year the sun rose directly dead-center of the rock-walled passage that was Suna's only entrance. She gasped and whispered, "It's _beautiful_."

The scene in front of them was completely dark except for the tiniest sliver of color escaping from the corridor. The sun was peeking the tiniest bit of itself over the horizon, and directly above it was a myriad of red, orange, yellow, blue and purple sky arranged respectively in five layers, each layer about half the size of the one below it. The colors extended themselves halfway up the rise of the corridor walls, and the extra fuzzy-gray light illuminated the two near corners of the walls just enough to make it look like the edges of a scroll somebody was holding vertically for them.

Beside her, Hinata heard Naruto mumble something nearly inaudible. "Gomen, Naruto-kun, what did you say?"

"Huh? Oh, nothing, I was just saying I think it looks beautiful too. Heh-heh," Naruto said with only a tiny trace of untruthfulness in his tone. Naruto put his hand behind his head and raised his elbow familiarly. And then Hinata's ears belatedly deciphered what they had actually heard into, "It's not quite as beautiful as you."

Hinata's heart skipped a beat, but somehow everything else kept functioning the way it was supposed to; her step never faltered, she never gasped, and her eyelids retained a comfortable separation, instead of widening in surprise.

Neither of them said anything else on their short walk back to their tent; they just watched the sun rise slowly in front of them. With each step they took toward their tent, she replayed the words exactly as she had just heard Naruto say them, and each time she did she felt more and more of her heart slowly melt away. _You're so sweet, Naruto-kun._


	3. Chapter 3

A/N: Some more OOC, I hope not too much though. Otherwise, please enjoy (smiley face).

I don't own Naruto.

**Ne, Hinata**

**Chapter 3: Confession**

_What was I waiting for?_ Hinata asked herself as the pleasant tingling took over her entire body. _Why did I take so long?_ She was in Naruto's apartment, and Naruto was behind her, gently stroking her bare back, his strong but surprisingly soft fingers following the streams of water sliding down along her smooth skin.

They were taking a shower together; just that fact alone was more than enough to send Hinata into a state of sexual euphoria. She was somehow not embarrassed or shy about her situation in the least; all she knew was that this was exactly what she had been waiting for over the past few years.

"N-naruto-kuun," she said in a mixture between a whisper and a moan, stuttering because she felt so good. She was horny, naturally, and she didn't need her byakugan to tell that Naruto was horny as well. Even so, Naruto was being patient with her to make sure she was lubricated enough with her own juices, making sure they would both enjoy their first time.

Naruto's strong hands worked their way up her spine and separated themselves to land on her shoulders. Her state of pleasure skyrocketed as he brought his naked body closer to hers and started massaging the muscular tension out of her shoulders. Naruto gently kissed the skin on her neck directly above her collarbone, further heightening her sense of sensual stimulation.

Naruto then proceeded to wrap his left arm around in front of her and hold it in place so that it slightly propped up her breasts. He then slid his right hand down and around to her front and delicately positioned his index and middle fingers on top of her clitoris. This action required Naruto's body to be as close to hers as possible, with the result that the bottom of his penis was pressed firmly in between the crack of her butt cheeks. All the while his lips never lost contact with the back of her neck.

As Naruto began adding constant gentle pressure with the first knuckle of the two right-handed fingers of _most_ interest to her, Hinata just couldn't contain herself any longer. She started moaning and groaning, "Ohh, ohh," and gasping and breathing heavily. _How could I have been afraid long enough to pass this up?_ Hinata complained to herself before totally succumbing to the pleasure.

Apparently, Naruto couldn't remain totally inactive while she was moaning, so he started slowly rubbing his penis along the crack of her butt. It was very subtle movement, but it felt good, especially because some of the natural lubrication of her juices had already dripped their way onto his penis. It served to help him slide along her ass quite nicely, and it must have also felt good to Naruto because he started making soft noises of pleasure and breathing deeper as well.

After a minute or two, Hinata's sexual desire told her that it was now time, and she knew that she would have to let Naruto know. "Naruto…take…me…" she panted neither commandingly nor pleadingly; anything she said right now would not be due to anything except for _passion_. She knew that for their first time Naruto would wait for her until she said it was okay.

She felt the head of Naruto's penis slide down past the hole of her butt and realized that they would have to explore that option at some point later on. Further down he went, positioning himself so that his head just barely pushed apart the lips of her vagina; he hesitated just long enough for Hinata's anticipation to increase her desire to make love to Naruto to the maximum, and in one swift, fluid movement he thrust into her.

Hinata allowed another involuntary gasp of pleasure escape from her throat as her folds parted to make room for his thick cock. Her cherry burst with only the slightest pinch of pain before allowing the pleasure-sensors take back over. In and out he moved, swift and smooth along the inside of her vagina. Through her closed eyes she nearly involuntarily activated her byakugan so she could take in everything that was happening to her.

Naruto's right hand had removed itself from her clit and was now firmly rubbing her right breast, perfectly mirroring the movement of his left hand. Naruto's lips were still gently kissing her, his head moving around to include her upper back with his kisses. His eyes were closed and his face displayed an expression of controlled relaxed pleasure. Naruto's powerful abdomen slid smoothly along her rear and lower back.

The water gushed from the showerhead, landing softly on her head, arms, and back. It dripped steadily from the locks of her hair that were hanging down in front of her face. The air around them steamed as a result of the temperature of the water pouring from the spigot, and the water that the showerhead shot past Naruto's back flowed past their feet towards the drain. The last droplet of blood expelled from when Naruto broke her hymen was now dripping from the bottom of Naruto's penis, symbolizing the end of her virginity.

Slowly but suddenly, a different kind of sexual sensation began to intensify within her lower regions. With each thrust of Naruto's perfectly-sized cock it increased the level of pleasure inside her a hundred times and threatened to send her spilling over the edge. She realized that she was gripping a support bar installed in the shower, and she gripped it harder as she fought against this feeling; she wanted this to last as long as she could make it last.

Hinata managed to keep herself from coming until she heard Naruto start to grunt louder. This was it – they were going to cum together! She heard Naruto start moaning, "Unhh, Hinata! Hinata! –"

"Hinata!" Naruto practically yelped as he shook her awake. "Hinata, wake up!" Hinata jolted upright, going from deep REM sleep to full-alert mode in a tenth of a second. It took her exactly that much additional time to realize what had just been happening, and another two seconds on top of that for her face to go from Hyuuga-eye white to deep scarlet red. Two more seconds of startled, open-mouthed stalling later, she issued the inevitable screech of her embarrassment.

She was extremely hot and uncomfortable, her hair was dripping sweat, and her vagina was wet and she smelled like sex. She hoped earnestly that the smell was confined to the space immediately around her. Even so, Naruto hadn't even allowed her to get off in her dream, and she had a very empty feeling inside her from the interruption of her dream.

"Hinata, are you okay?" Naruto repeated, showing no signs that he smelled anything unusual. "You looked like you were having a bad dream – I'm really sorry to wake you up! Are you okay?" he asked, persistently.

For a split second, Hinata once more felt the urge to tackle him, strip of his clothes, and relieve her sexual frustration, even though her dream-activated byakugan told her that at least fifteen people had been startled by her scream. She could only imagine how hungry her glare must have looked to Naruto, who jerked back startled. For just that one split second, she considered amending her silent assessment that she could never be angry with him. It had been such a good dream!

Then she again remembered exactly who she was and who was looking at her with such deep concern filling his eyes and she immediately shrank back into herself to take on a second look of horror at her situation. The only reason she retained her consciousness was sheer willpower. On top of everything else that had just happened, fainting here would have been the absolute worst thing she could have done.

* * *

"H-hai, I'm okay, Naruto-kun," Hinata said shakily after a few moments of silence, and even though Naruto was still concerned for her, his anxiety decreased a few levels. Her face still looked like she was deathly afraid of something, but at least she had _said_ she was okay. 

Naruto breathed a sigh of relief and said, "Are you sure? You were scaring me there, Hinata. You kept rolling around and making weird noises. It looked like you were having a nightmare."

"Uh...well...hai, I'm sure I'm okay. Arigatoo, Naruto-kun." Hinata nodded, and Naruto realized that she might not really want to talk about what had been going on just yet. That was perfectly fine with him; he respected her privacy to stuff like that.

Since she was probably still a bit shaken up, Naruto decided that if she didn't want to talk about it, that maybe he could try to take her mind of her dream instead. He had some news to tell her anyway. "Well, since you're up now, I guess I'll tell you that the dancing starts around 4:00 today," Naruto grinned enthusiastically.

When Naruto told her about the dance, she immediately lost her look of displeasure and perked up curiously. "Four o'clock? How do you know?"

"Heh-heh, well to tell the truth, I woke up earlier and went back into Suna for about half an hour. Even though it was Gaara's party I wanted to see if I could ask him a favor."

"What favor?" Hinata asked, even more curiously.

"Well, I know that you like washing yourself in the mornings, and out here in the desert there aren't many streams and all...so I asked Gaara if you could use one of the shower rooms they have here. He said that would be fine and he arranged it right there. So you can go into Suna whenever you're ready to take a shower. From what I hear Gaara said it was one of the nicer rooms, too, so take advantage – but not too much, ya know?"

Hinata blushed slightly. "You didn't have to do that for me, Naruto-kun."

_All right! She's happy with me!_ Naruto thought excitedly.

_Flashback_

Naruto was once again having trouble nodding right off to sleep. He kept replaying the night's events in his mind, and though the night had ended with such a beautiful sunrise, a lot of the things went against his plans to impress her. He almost hoped that Hinata had heard what he had said about her in relation to that sunrise – well not almost; he did hope that.

At some point during his thoughts, Naruto realized that he hadn't thought for a second about how exactly to impress Hinata throughout the date. Sure, he had gone through the effort to pick out a matching new outfit to wear for her at the dance, but other than that, he had not made any plans whatsoever, and that realization verged on depressing Naruto. Determined to turn a partial failure of a first night into a total success by the end of their date, Naruto had thought for nearly an hour as to what he could do to make the experience more enjoyable for Hinata.

He knew that she liked to get clean in the mornings, and he assumed that would hold true even if she didn't happen to wake up until it was technically after the morning had passed. So _that_ was one of the things that he had decided to try to arrange for her. In addition, he wanted to find out when the dance would start, because he remembered that almost immediately after he had asked her to accompany him to this celebration, she had mentioned the dance. Since this was the case, he figured that she was looking forward to that part of their time here together, so he wanted to find out when she could look forward to that starting.

Additionally, he changed his plans about confessing his attraction to her just a little bit. Even though Shikamaru had played that awful joke on him and embarrassed the hell out of Naruto and Hinata, Naruto gave serious thought to the idea that Hinata might like him already. While he didn't understand why she would possibly like him, he did realize that if Shikamaru could see it, then it stood a good chance of being true. He was rather embarrassed by the fact that he couldn't exactly see it himself, but he had to give the idea some credit if Shikamaru came up with it.

Not only that, but Naruto ran through his conversations with Hinata over the past couple of weeks. He found that nowhere in any of their conversations had she ever disagreed with him drastically, nor had she ever said anything to him rudely, condescendingly, or even as if she was annoyed with him. Even after he had clearly caused her embarrassment, she never once snapped or complained or anything like that. Even last night, when Naruto nearly smashed his face into her breasts, instead of becoming angry with him, she tried – and succeeded – to lift his spirits.

In light of all this, he figured that confessing to her before the dance would be much better, because if the possibility that she liked him was true – and he was definitely hoping that it was – then they could start dancing and they could say that they _were_ at the party _together_.

So he slipped out of the tent as quietly as he could and gone to take care of the things he had planned. Now that he wasn't physically with Hinata, he could explain to Gaara that it was true that they weren't together, but it was also true that Naruto didn't want it to stay that way. Gaara had smiled at him (if you could really call it a smile) and asked, "What can I do?"

Naruto felt bad about asking for anything on Gaara's birthday, but he really wanted to do everything he could for Hinata, so he asked Gaara about the shower possibility. Naruto explained that he was sorry to be so rude on his birthday, but Gaara shook his head and explained that he still had not done anything to repay Naruto for saving his life. Naruto argued that he didn't need to do anything like that, but Gaara insisted that it was something he wanted to do, and that offering Hinata some time in the fine shower facilities was the least he could do.

"Will you be joining her?" Gaara had asked with a serious voice, but with another of his almost-smiles tugging at his lips.

"Of course I won't!" Naruto exclaimed, but then realized that Gaara had not actually been serious, and started laughing at his joke. Before he left he remembered to get the time of the start of the dance. Naruto thanked Gaara for everything, which Gaara waved off, and then left to explore the village for a nearby, somewhat secluded rooftop.

The rooftop he searched for was where Naruto planned on asking Hinata about her feelings for him. It had a nice edge to it, and it was good for hanging feet over it. Yes, that would do very nicely.

Naruto returned to the tent and crept back in quietly. Having eased his mind a good deal, he finally drifted off to sleep for a few hours, before a rolling Hinata accidentally smacked him in the belly and woke him up with a muffled, "Oof."

_End Flashback_

"Heh-heh, yeah…I know I didn't _have _to, but I figured you'd probably want to feel fresh for the dance tonight, and you know Gaara's a friend of mine, so…" Naruto explained around the real reason for his actions, not at all feeling as if he had done a good enough job.

Hinata smiled and thanked him for doing such a thing for her, and it made Naruto feel good. Before they went into Suna, Naruto had an idea. He didn't think it would work in the least, because it might be too embarrassing for Hinata, but at least he wanted to offer it to her in case she was interested.

* * *

Hinata expressed her thanks once more to Naruto for setting up her use of the shower room, and opened the door to the facility. She took one step inside before blinking in surprise. She remembered that Naruto had said it would be among the more luxurious shower rooms of Suna, but she hadn't expected _this_. 

Her imagination of a "shower room" had been simply a very fancy and expensive shower. While the room she had just entered did not disappoint her imagination, he didn't stop at being merely fancy and expensive either. It was also quite – _helpful_.

Hinata had been reluctant to take advantage of the opportunity that Naruto had arranged for her because she felt like she had very little to give him in return for his thoughtfulness.

_Flashback_

"Naruto-kun, you really didn't have to do that for me," Hinata persisted once more before getting dressed for the walk into the village. She felt almost ashamed of herself for being in such a receiving position. It made her immensely happy that Naruto would go to such trouble for her, but she felt bad that she had little if anything to offer him in return.

While she was eager to accept the permission to use the shower room and was looking forward to the opportunity, she realized that she couldn't really use it as well as she would like to. Packing for her trip to Suna had been a hassle because of the need to include the dress that she had picked out for the dance. It was not an annoying hassle because of the nature of the necessity, but it made packing all her other supplies more difficult. Seeing as how they were going to a party that was located in a city surrounded by desert, she decided that packing soap and shampoo was unnecessary. There weren't going to be any natural water bodies around, so washing herself would probably not be an option. On the trip there she would just splash herself in a nearby stream to keep herself from becoming too odorous.

She didn't want to tell this to Naruto because it was rather embarrassing to have not brought soap now that she was being given this opportunity. But neither could she refuse the opportunity because the Kazekage had personally arranged it.

It took him a few moments, but Naruto was responding to her now, "Well, I know that last night wasn't exactly as fun as it could have been for you...everybody asking all kinds of questions about us, Shikamaru playing his joke, and all that. So I decided I wanted to try to make it up to you," Naruto explained, and even though she felt bad about accepting, her defense wilted against the efforts he was making on her behalf.

"A-arigatoo, Naruto-kun," Hinata said, "But I really did have a good time." It was true. No matter what had happened last night, she was on a date with her Naruto-kun; nothing could have spoiled her happiness – not embarrassing questions, practical jokes, or anything else. Ever since the moment after Naruto asked her to this celebration in the first place she had known that the previous night was going to be a wonderful time for her.

Naruto smiled a smile that looked distinctly relieved. "But you'll still take Gaara up on this, won't you?"

"I-I guess so," Hinata agreed. It was hard to argue with Naruto about anything.

"Great! Umm...I don't know how you'd feel about this, but if you wanted to wear something of mine into the village instead of your pajamas I wouldn't mind." Naruto sounded hopeful, but also sounded as if he didn't expect Hinata to take him up on his offer.

It was such a nice offer, and Hinata was very tempted to take him up on it. Wearing Naruto's clothes would send a message to everyone that marked her as Naruto's, girlfriend, and that was something that her heart wanted desperately, considering her heart had already been stamped as Naruto's long ago. Even so, if she wore Naruto's clothing into Suna, she would eventually have to give the clothing back to Naruto. It would be impossible for her to walk all the way back into the village with Naruto's clothes on and not rub any of the wetness of her pussy onto his pants. While she had every intention of confessing her love for Naruto this very day, it was pointless to intentionally cause herself embarrassment with regards to the shinobi of her dreams, so she politely and regretfully refused his offer. She would wear something of hers that was already dirty.

"Okay, that works too," said Naruto, not at all offended, but with a slight tone of disappointment in his voice. "I'll just let you change then," he said as he made his way out of the tent. "Take your time."

_End Flashback_

Everything that Naruto had done for her was so thoughtful, so sweet. And _now_ she realized that she _did _have a way to give some of that back to him. The shower room contained an extremely spacious shower that contained three showerheads positioned in a triangle around the center drain of the shower. The room also had nice soft, white, fluffy towels that could be thrown into a heated dryer that was also in the room for when she was done in the shower. The _helpful_ part of the shower roomcontained a very complete collection of hundreds of different soaps and shampoos on the wall opposite the shower.

Apparently this particular shower room was designed solely with ninja in mind. Instead of untidily arranging soaps and shampoo where all the bottles and bars would be right next to each other, there were closed cubby holes that had a name and picture of each product on the outside. All you needed to do to sample the smell was channel a tiny bit of chakra into a box and a small, short-lived spray that contained the scent of the product would appear. It was a very clean way of doing things.

Seeing as how there was plenty of time before the dance started, and her byakugan told her that Naruto had expected her to take a while (he was not outside the door any longer), she decided to choose a soap and shampoo that she hoped would be most pleasing to Naruto's nose. She giggled slightly as she wondered if there was a shampoo that smelled like ramen. She considered for a moment or two how much she would like Naruto smelling her and looking at her like he wanted to eat her up, then went back to seriously searching for a good fragrance for Naruto. She spent better than half an hour before finally deciding on a combination of shower materials, after which she threw two towels into the dryer hopped into the nice hot shower. She made certain to scrub every part of herself _very_ thoroughly.

Remembering Naruto's comment comparing her to a sunrise earlier that morning only increased her desire to smell absolutely wonderful to her Naruto-kun. It also prompted her to wash her hair as many times as it took to make it _shine_, and to leave it down after her shower; Naruto had given her that wonderful compliment after she had let it down in the morning, so down it would stay for the remainder of the party.

* * *

While Hinata was washing herself, Naruto was busy taking care of himself as well. A minute after Hinata had disappeared behind the shower room's door Naruto walked casually out of the building and then proceeded to dash back to their camp in order to get the outfit he had bought to surprise Hinata with. He then made his way back into the village to take advantage of another of Gaara's offers: a less luxurious but still quite as effective shower. Naruto was in and out, completely scrubbed, in fifteen minutes, and he took an additional fifteen minutes to decide on a particular manly-smelling deodorant. 

By the time he made his way back up to the shower room Hinata was using, he was dressed, hair dried, and fresh-smelling, and still had half an hour to spare before she emerged from her shower. He did not mind waiting in this particular instance, because the longer she took, in Naruto's mind, the more enjoyment she got out of the arrangement he had set up for her. Not only that, but the more time she took, the prettier she made herself smell for Naruto, which was definitely always a good thing.

Even so, he was not quite prepared for what Hinata looked or smelled like when she emerged from the room. She was wearing the casual blue dress she had picked out a week ago at her place; that was about the only thing he had been prepared for. Her hair was a fluid wall of dark blue that reflected the light coming in from the window; it resembled the shimmering of light on calm ocean water. Her skin, of which a fair but in no way inappropriate amount was showing because of the dress she was wearing, looked as soft as a baby's skin. Her white eyes had somehow gained a bit of healthy moisture to them, and they too contained an attractive reflection of light in her pupils.

As for how she smelled, it was even better (somehow) than how she looked. The hallway was filled with the strong smell of sweet-smelling, blooming flowers. While the scent was strong, it was the scent of a flower that was difficult to apply enough of to become overpowering. It was a perfect smell in that Naruto would neither grow tired of and shy away from nor grow accustomed to and tune out after any period of time being exposed to it.

Before Naruto could overcome his state of pleasant shock at Hinata's appearance, Hinata's expression took on a look of puzzlement. "Naruto-kun, what are you wearing?" she asked.

Naruto had nearly forgotten. "Oh!" He said enthusiastically. "This," he began, and he explained that he had felt bad that he hadn't had much to choose from in his apartment, and he wanted to find something that was a little better after what she had shown him.

"How did you get it to match?" Hinata asked further. "It goes really well with this," she commented in a surprised tone.

"Well...heh-heh...I paid close attention when you showed it to me when you put it on," Naruto told her, and subsequently transformed into a version of Hinata wearing the dress (though not quite as beautiful as the authentic standing in front of him). "I showed this to all the people who tried to help me. I'm sorry I don't really have much of a fashion sense...but I wanted to make sure it went with that dress there after you spent all that time picking it out."

For a few moments, Hinata was speechless. Then, she said excitedly, "You didn't have to do that, Naruto-kun!"

"Yeah, but—"

"Why did you do that for me?" Hinata added quietly, seemingly unintentionally cutting his argument off.

In some ways, Naruto's subconscious had planned for him that as soon as he showed himself in his surprise outfit it would be time for him to confess. It was therefore an extremely useful coincidence that the secluded rooftop he had chosen earlier that morning happened to be the rooftop of the building they were in. It didn't appear that he was going to get a chance to take her all the way up there to tell her about his attraction. That was okay, because the hallway they were in hadn't been used by anybody else as long as Naruto and Hinata had been up here. In the back of his mind, Naruto wondered idly if Gaara had had anything to do with that.

"Umm...well...umm..." Naruto began nervously. He swallowed visibly, and then thought to himself, _just say it, baka._ Naruto motioned to Hinata to come closer, and her eyes widened as she took three steps closer to him. She was now close enough for Naruto to whisper, and he did as he said, "Since we've been doing missions together...I've...I've kind of started to – I – I like you, Hinata." Naruto heard Hinata gasp shortly, but he kept speaking. "So I was kind of hoping, that you maybe liked me too, and," another swallow, "I wanted to know – would you like to go out with—"

"Yes!" Hinata exclaimed in a whisper that matched his own, cutting him off by suddenly leaping into his arms and wrapping her own tightly around him. "I want to be…to be your girlfriend, N-naruto-kun," she said, and Naruto felt the slightest bit of moisture touch his left shoulder.

All of his nervousness he had been feeling suddenly imploded, and immediately afterward an explosion of relief filled the vacuum left by his body's realization that the adrenaline surging through his veins wasn't needed anymore. Naruto wrapped his arms tightly around her body and held her tightly for a while before either of them spoke again. Naruto hadn't realized just how much he had wanted her to be his girlfriend until he saw Hinata's reaction to his confession.

After what seemed to Naruto to be an appropriate amount of time passed, Naruto spoke up in his usual curious voice, "Ne, Hinata?"

Hinata started giggling pleasantly. "H-hai, Naruto-kun?" she responded exactly as he had hoped she would.

"Do you want to maybe go somewhere we can sit and talk for a while? We've got another couple of hours before the dance starts."

Hinata looked up at him, still hugging him, and smiled. It was a smile that looked completely new to Naruto; one that he hadn't seen on her face before, and he liked it because it said wordlessly everything he wanted to hear from Hinata. She nodded her head twice, and reluctantly unlocked her fingers so that she could walk beside Naruto as he led her up to the roof. Naruto found that while his hand reached for hers, Hinata's hand was also searching for his hand. Both of them had taken the initiative to find each other's hand so that they could walk there holding hands. This was so much better than anything Naruto could have hoped for.

* * *

Hinata sat down on the edge of the roof next to Naruto, and shook her head. Instead of pinching herself, she created a juuken blade with her right hand and took aim at one of the more useless tenketsu in her left forearm. It was painful, but that was the intention. Something like a pinch simply wouldn't wake her up if her subconscious happened to be playing a cruel, cruel joke on her. Beside her, Naruto yelped. "Hinata! Why did you do that?" he asked concernedly. 

Hinata looked over to her right and blushed slightly. "G-gomen, Naruto-kun. Don't worry...it's just that after so many years…it's hard for me to...to believe that you asked me out."

Naruto's expression grew even more puzzled than it had been after she had attacked herself. "So many..._years_?" he repeated. "What do you mean, _years_?"

"W-well, I haven't _just_ started liking you, Naruto-kun. That's why I was so excited inside. I've been admiring you since we were in the Academy."

"Nani? You have?" Naruto's confusion was growing steadily with everything she explained. It was time to fix that by telling him everything.

Hinata nodded. "I'm sorry, Naruto-kun, for not saying anything for five years...but I tried a few times and each time I always got so nervous I ended up saying something stupid like 'good luck.' I always seemed to catch you when you were busy or it wasn't a good time to interrupt you or something, and you never looked comfortable when I did...and I always got so shy around you even when you weren't acting like that."

"Wait a second...you liked me back when I was an idiot?" Hinata's confession was catching up with him.

Naruto's sudden assessment of how he had acted during their Academy days amused Hinata, and before she could stop herself she let a small giggle escape. "Hehe. You weren't an idiot, Naruto-kun. You just acted like that because you were lonely." Hinata had suspected even in their Academy days that the reason behind Naruto's actions was that he didn't have any friends at all, and wanted some kind of attention just like any other kid would in a similar situation. Hinata had spotted this easily – partially with the help of the insight that naturally came with those who possessed the byakugan bloodline limit – but mostly because she herself was lonely and could relate to him easily.

"Wow, you knew about that?" Naruto was surprised. "What else did you see about me? Why did you like me in the first place?" It was obvious that Naruto was curious now.

"W-well...I never really looked at you with my byakugan, and I don't think I could have seen your…_prisoner_…back then anyway. It did always seem to me that you were holding back to get more attention. Like when you showed your…your s-sexy no jutsu to Iruka Sensei. It made me jealous that you had seen other women like that and not me like that, but it was a skilled transformation…and I thought that it was like that for the ninjutsu skills you seemed to not do as well with."

"Oh…heh-heh. Sorry for making that technique…" Naruto was blushing a fair amount. "I guess you could say I was an idiot after all...never thought that kind of thing would come back to hurt my chances of getting a girlfriend. But it wasn't just that – I used to not be able to mold my chakra that well." Then Naruto's voice dropped into a growl and he narrowed his eyes angrily and looked to the side as he added, "Sasuke says I still don't mold it well, but what does he know?"

"Hehe," Hinata giggled as she thought, _you're cute, Naruto-kun_, to herself. Then she realized that since they were close to if not already going out now, and Naruto might appreciate that kind of comment. She opened her mouth a little bit and attempted to say it. "Y-y-you're c-cute, Naruto-kun." The fact that she could say it – even if brokenly – without her shyness cutting her off, for her shyness was still very intact, was a huge confidence booster. She didn't even feel that much of a blush on her cheeks. It was even confined to her upper cheeks.

Naruto blinked and looked back at her. "Huh? I'm cute? Well…well you're cute too, Hinata." Naruto didn't seem to have quite as difficult as a time as she had. Before she could get a chance to respond to his compliment, he went on in saying, "I, uhh, really like your hair today. I mean, I always like it, but it looks like you spent a lot of time on it in your shower. It smells really nice too." Naruto grinned with his eyes shut.

"A-arigatoo, Naruto-kun," she said as she played unconsciously with a lock of hair with her right index finger. She noticed what she was doing and pulled it in front of her so she could look at it. It was really shiny, and the blue was more evident than usual today. Usually at first glance people thought her hair had turned black, but in reality it was still a very, very dark blue. She was glad that it was easier to see the blue today; she thought it was prettier than black. Out of curiosity, Hinata looked at Naruto's hair and noticed for the first time that it wasn't nearly as messy as it usually was.

"N-naruto-kun...did you take a shower too?" She asked, confused.

He nodded and chuckled his predictable 'heh-heh.' Then he explained what he had done while she was in the shower. "There was a lot of stuff to choose from, but I didn't want to keep you waiting if you were already done, so I just picked a deodorant I thought you might like and put it on real quick. I hope you like it...I know I didn't spend nearly as much time as you must have to make yourself smell nice."

In the excitement of being in her first romantic hug with Naruto, Hinata had missed completely that he smelled different than he normally did. So, she leaned closer to him and opened her nose – she didn't sniff out right, but she breathed through her nose and smelled the distinct manly-type deodorant that he was wearing. She had a vague sensation that she had smelled it before (as in not earlier today), and that whenever that had happened to be, she decided she liked that particular smell.

"Wow, Naruto-kun...you really did a lot for me today, huh?" Hinata asked, very pleased at all the things that Naruto had done on her behalf today.

"Yeah...well I shoulda planned on doing a lot yesterday, too. I mean, I had a great time walking around with you and playing all those games and stuff, but the only thing I planned was coming out of the tent today with a different outfit than you expected. It kept me up this morning, so I thought for a while because I wanted to make today better."

Hinata, who had still been leaning to smell Naruto's deodorant, let herself fall into him, her face landing softly on his chest and her right arm wrapping around behind him. Naruto caught her in his own arms and held her closely. "But…Naruto-kun…I _did _have fun with you yesterday. And…I also heard what you said about me this morning. It was so sweet."

Hinata felt Naruto grin. "You heard that? I was kinda hoping you would…I mean I was hoping you did. I mean…it was true, especially now."

Hinata found that she couldn't think of anything else to say. Naruto was saying all these nice things about her, and he was holding her gently in a somewhat private area. All she could really do was relax in his arms.

"So," began Naruto in a curious voice after a few minutes of silence, "aside from having to wake you up from a bad dream this morning, did you have a better day than yesterday?"

Hinata was glad that her face was buried into his chest, because she had no doubt that it had turned bright red with Naruto's mentioning of her 'bad dream.' But aside from Naruto waking her up before she could get off in her dream, she had indeed had quite a wonderful day so far, and could only see it getting better. She nodded into his chest and silently continued to hold him.

She realized that she had never answered his question about why she had started to like him in the first place, but she didn't need to tell him right now. He would remember to ask her again later, and when he did she would tell him. For now, though, it was time to just hold each other and be happy. Naruto began stroking her hair softly, which added tremendously to the already happy feelings Hinata had inside her, and after a while, she nearly fell asleep because it was so comforting.

A little while later, Naruto shifted a little bit and looked up at the sky. "Ne, Hinata?" he asked quietly, as though he was sorry to be the one to end the nice silence.

Hinata opened her eyes slowly and blinked at the light that her eyes had been deprived. "Hai, Naruto-kun?" She was glad that Naruto kept starting to talk like this.

"It's probably almost time for the dance to start. Want to get going?"

_No, not really, but I guess we should_, thought Hinata to herself. Instead of saying that, though, she nodded and said, "Hai, let's go."

Naruto let go of her and it took just another second longer for Hinata to do the same, and then Naruto stood up. He offered Hinata a hand, and she took it. With Naruto's help in providing most of the energy required to lift her body to a standing position, Hinata concentrated her energy into making her body's ascent as graceful as possible for her Naruto-kun. She was rewarded by a short-lived jaw-hanging on Naruto's face, a small blush immediately following.

Instead of holding hands on their way down to the room the dance would be held in, Hinata insisted (through actions only) that they walk side-by-side with Naruto's right arm draped around her shoulders.

* * *

Hinata was _not_ asleep; she checked several more times throughout the night using less violent methods than the one she employed earlier, and each time she convinced herself more thoroughly that this was indeed for real. Her smile never once faded that night. 


	4. Chapter 4

A/N: ...I usually put stuff here, but I found that this time, I got nothin.

I don't own Naruto.

Ne, Hinata

Chapter 4: Lovesickness

"Pay attention, dobe," Sasuke's annoyed voice growled at Naruto, causing him to snap out of a daydream and alerting him to a large tree branch rushing up at his head. Naruto quickly inverted himself, landed on the side of the branch with his hands, performed a front handspring which propelled himself forward and upward, and tumbled over the branch, barely in control of his body.

"I _am _paying attention!" Naruto lied through his teeth in a very unconvincing tone. In all reality, he had just been daydreaming about Hinata, and it wasn't the _first_ time today. It wasn't _his_ fault that he had grown used to seeing Hinata every day. This was actually the first day after ten straight that he hadn't awoken to the sight of her beautiful face. His thoughts kept wandering away from what he was doing. In fact, he got _so_ off track that he had just been imagining that he was actually looking at her; it had already happened twice today before this.

The first two times he had caught himself and managed to avoid an annoying reprimand from Sasuke. This time he was not so fortunate. It had been a close call, too; if Sasuke hadn't said something he would probably have been out cold right about now. Naruto shook his head in attempt to rid his mind of visions of Hinata. He admitted – rather proudly – to himself that he missed her, but hallucinations could very easily cause him to get hurt, and he knew that Hinata wouldn't like that at all.

"_Right_," replied Sasuke, sarcastically. "Next time, I'll just knock you out and carry you to the training sight," he said, his tone indicating that he was not joking and that he was faintly annoyed. Well, _that_ wasn't anything unusual; Sasuke was _always_ serious and slightly annoyed. Naruto had never quite figured out what it was that pissed him off so much.

"Whatever," Naruto said equally sarcastically, attempting to throw Sasuke off. Normally when Sasuke threatened to resort to violence when Naruto was annoying him, Naruto would bite back, challenging Sasuke to 'go ahead and try it,' or some such bickering. Over the last couple of years, Sasuke had grown rather used to it and had learned to ignore it, so every now and then Naruto would imitate Sasuke's usual mannerisms just to try to get a reaction.

In this particular instance, it worked, because after making a threat, Sasuke would usually ignore Naruto completely, not even acknowledging the fact that Naruto had responded whatsoever. This time, Naruto was rewarded with a small unemotional glance from his teammate's powerful sharingan. Immediately afterwards, Sasuke disappeared from sight. Naruto was quick enough to hold up his right hand to the side of his face, just in time to catch Sasuke's fist and keep it from striking him.

Naruto had known that he wouldn't need to apply that much force to keep Sasuke's fist from jamming his own hand into his face. Based on past experience, whenever Naruto would be random enough to cause Sasuke to react, Sasuke would always follow up whatever reaction he gave with a friendly punch to the chin. It was never painful, and it was something that after a few times Naruto had learned exactly when and where to throw a block.

Naruto looked over to his right, a small smirk showing on his face. He was not really that surprised to see Sasuke sporting a similar smirk. They _were_ best friends after all. Stuff like this was an almost daily occurrence. "All right, I'll pay more attention," he promised as they continued to jump from limb to limb. Sasuke removed his fist from Naruto's palm and went back to his left-flank position.

"Why don't you just tell us about it, Naruto?" Sakura's voice said from his right. "It seemed like what you and Hinata were doing at the dance was a bit more than _friendly_."

"Huh?" asked Naruto, and then he realized that he hadn't actually spoken to Sakura since the day before he started going out with Hinata. He hadn't gotten a chance to tell her that he was dating Hinata yet. "Oh, well yeah," Naruto explained. "Hinata's my girlfriend now."

Sakura's reaction was of complete surprise. "What? Why didn't you tell me? Did he tell you, Sasuke-kun?"

"At the dance," Sasuke affirmed, offering no further explanation.

_What _you_ were doing there I still have no idea_, thought Naruto as he remembered that Sasuke had indeed participated. Sasuke had not been with anybody there; he had refused every single kunoichi who had asked him to dance, sand or leaf; and he had stood unmoving in one place through the entire thing. "Heh-heh, sorry Sakura-chan. I guess I didn't get to see you at the dance or on the way back to Konoha. I was paying a lot of attention to Hinata. I guess Lee kept you kinda busy too, huh?"

Sakura blushed slightly as she looked away. "Uhh...yeah I guess so." What _that_ was all about Naruto had absolutely no idea. He wasn't particularly interested in it either. At any rate, he decided he better tell the details or else he was going to keep slipping into daydreams until he got to see his girlfriend again.

"Well, let's see..." he began, and he started going through the events of the second 'day' of their time in Suna. In reality it had only been one day that the leaf shinobi were there celebrating: January 19th. It had just _seemed _like two days to him because Naruto had experienced a period of sleep between the first six hours and the final twelve hours of the celebration.

Throughout his tale he was interrupted with things like, "You baka, you shouldn't have woken her up!" or, "Aww that was so sweet of you!" He had to defend himself by explaining that Hinata had looked like she was having a really bad dream, or go into further detail as to why he did the things that Sakura labeled as 'sweet.' It took him twice as long to tell the story as it originally would have if he hadn't been interrupted, but he found that he didn't mind at all because he was rather proud of the way the day had gone.

Sasuke didn't respond to Naruto's explanation at all, but Naruto could still tell that he was paying attention. When he was all done with his story, Sakura said, "Aww, well congratulations!"

"Thanks, Sakura-chan. What do you think, Sasuke?" All he got in response was a single nod of the head, as Naruto could have predicted. Well, that was good anyway; at least Sasuke approved. _As if there's anything about Hinata that he wouldn't approve of_, he thought defensively as he considered the possibility that Sasuke might have rejected his story.

In front of them, Kakashi-sensei hurtled out of the wooded area through which they were passing and landed in the field they would be using as their training grounds. The rest of Team 7 landed in a diamond formation behind him. Kakashi turned around, and the first thing he said was, "Let me congratulate you as well, Naruto-kun."

"Thanks, Kakashi-sensei," Naruto replied.

"Now, what we're going to be doing today is..." Kakashi began going through the itinerary of the day without wasting any more time on things that would distract from their training. Naruto paid attention enough to understand what they were going to be doing; it was nothing new. They would work on their teamwork and hone their training with a specific mission style in mind.

Even though they had been doing missions now for two years (not counting their missions together as rookie Genin), they still had to train together. Whenever baa-chan assigned really tough missions, she kept original Genin teams together because it was more efficient and easier to implement. This required the original Genin teams to continually train together, or else they would lose the subtleties of synchronized combat. Considering the fact that synchronized combat was often the difference-maker between the success and failure of a high-rank mission, training together on a regular basis was absolutely necessary.

This was the reason that Naruto couldn't see Hinata today. Or for most of tomorrow, for that matter. Team 7 was scheduled to spend the night at these training grounds, in order to reestablish and strengthen the subtle connections that may have been lost as a result of the recreation in Suna. While Naruto recognized that it was extremely important to maintain these connections, and honestly enjoyed training with his old Team 7, he would _really_ have liked to be able to see Hinata.

Forcing thoughts of his girlfriend out of his mind, he created three kage bunshins and transformed them into somewhat generic-looking shinobi that they would use as the goal of their training today. Naruto explained to them that they would be resisting the rest of Team 7. While he realized that if one of them was destroyed he would instantly learn the plan they had constructed, he was able to justify using his kage bunshins anyway with the fact that his clones would be able to work together to come up with a new strategy on the spot.

As his clones went to the position they were instructed to start in, he directed one final thought towards his girlfriend. _See you soon, Hina-chan._

* * *

Hinata's eyes slowly worked their way open after a good 6 hours of sleep. She had sworn she had just heard Naruto call her, and she activated her byakugan long enough for her to scan her room for her Naruto-kun. She remembered halfway through her search that there was no chance of his presence; he had gone off with Team 7 for some intra-team training to hone their teamwork and real-time battle experience. 

Remembering this still didn't stop her from completing her fruitless search and it certainly didn't diminish in any way the disappointment she felt when she confirmed the absence of his presence. It was disappointing, but she had her own intra-team training scheduled for today as well.

Well, perhaps it didn't disappoint her as much as she first thought. Her search wasn't_entirely_ fruitless; there was the Naruto plushy doll that was sitting on the table next to the door to her closet. A few years ago, when Naruto brought Sasuke back to Leaf Village, he had started gaining popularity among the shinobi of the village. The businesspeople of the society, realizing that there was a hot new subject to transform into a marketable item, had started making all kinds of Uzumaki Naruto merchandise.

So, naturally, Hinata had bought one of these items. Even though he was back in the village and she could in theory see him whenever she wanted to, she didn't get to see him nearly as _much_ as she had wanted to. She had already been deprived of Naruto's presence for a whole three years and then some, so she had felt the need to have something physical that symbolized her Naruto-kun. As a result, she had bought the Naruto plushy and hid it in her room. Now that she was going out with Naruto, she had decided last night to take it out of its hiding place and put it in a noticeable spot in the room.

At any rate, waking up to an imagined, _See you soon, Hina-chan_, was a bit of a change. She slid a hand down to her panties and realized that she was completely dry. That was a relief. Including the day she and Naruto had started dating, each of the past four days had begun with wet panties for Hinata. None of the three days after the day of the dance had started nearly as dramatic, however. In fact, none of those three days had seen her wake up as the direct result of one of her wet dreams.

Hinata had concluded that the wetness must have come from slightly less vividly erotic dreams of earlier in the nights, for Naruto hadn't had to wake her up from any 'bad dreams' again. The smell was never very strong – she could hardly even smell herself for those mornings – but for today it was rather nice to wake up and not have to look for a stream to clean herself.

This particular morning, Hinata decided that she was not going to take a shower. She was going right from her room to Team 8 intra-team training and she was just going to get dirty and sweaty, so taking a shower now would be rather pointless. If she had woken up and found that she _had_had a wet dream however, she definitely would have showered. Kiba, with his dog-like olfactory senses, would undoubtedly have smelled her, and that would be extremely embarrassing.

Replaying the would-be wake-up call in her head once more, she got out of bed, walked over to her closet, and began to dress herself. All the while, she had a smile on her face that seemed to have stuck itself there since Naruto had asked her out, and her cheeks had a slight, proud blush to them. In the last three days Naruto had started using the 'chan' suffix at the end of her name, and sometimes when he used it, he shortened her name to 'Hina.' He had used the resulting 'Hina-chan' only a few times, but she was already quite fond of the nickname. It made her feel pretty.

On her way out of her room, she grabbed a ration bar for breakfast (the ramen-flavored rations were long gone now, sadly), and headed off toward the designated meeting point. Hinata normally had a much larger breakfast than a ration bar, but Kiba and Shino were very persistent about being on time. _They_ had been the ones to push back their usual meeting time to 8:00 in the morning, but somehow still insisted on being on time.

She knew that both the other teams of their year were already well into their intra-team training; they met at 5:00. Even so, it didn't bother her at all that they were the late team – she also knew that they worked 3 hours longer into the night than the other teams, so it all worked itself out.

Hinata showed up fifteen minutes early and decided that instead of sitting under the tree and meditating, she would warm herself up with some light cardio-vascular exercises and stretches. Kiba and Shino arrived five minutes later and interrupted her preparation.

Without any kind of greeting at all, Kiba started the flow of conversation with a blurted, "Saw you dancing with Naruto back at the party, Hinata."

Hinata smiled and blushed slightly, and nodded. Not being one to forget her own manners, she replied, "Ohayoo, Kiba. Good morning, Shino."

Shino nodded to her and saw that the spot under the tree she usually sat in to meditate was available. He proceeded to sit down where she usually did for the few moments before Kurenai-sensei arrived.

There had been other times that she had decided to start her mornings with exercise instead of meditation, and Shino had elected to sit in her usual spot on every such occasion. She had asked him about it, and had learned that the spot she always chose to sit in happened to be Shino's favorite spot. She had asked him if he ever wanted her to move, and he replied that he didn't mind; it was gentlemanly to give up his seat for a woman. She had also detected no trace of ulterior motives in his voice – Shino was just being nice.

Returning to the moment, Hinata noticed that Kiba was displaying signs of jealousy. She had known for quite a while now that Kiba had once had a huge crush on her. She was always embarrassed about it. It wasn't that he wasn't a strong shinobi and it wasn't that she didn't think Kiba had a strong sense of loyalty. She was perfectly sure that he would make an excellent boyfriend…but not for _her_.

Even if she had consented to one of his several approaches, she knew that it would be completely misleading of her. She might be able to learn after a while to be a nice girlfriend for Kiba, but the truth was that she would always want to be with Naruto and it would inevitably destroy any romantic relationship they could have had. On Kiba's most recent attempt to ask her out (more than a year ago) Hinata had finally explained the reason she kept turning him down was because she admired Naruto.

Kiba was speaking again: "Did you finally tell him you like him?" he asked, still seeming slightly jealous. Hinata could tell that he was keeping it under control. Even though he had been disappointed when she had told him about her crush on Naruto, he had not let it affect the friendship they had or the work they did while on missions together. He was obviously still interested in her, and Hinata could understand that and even felt a little sorry for not liking him back. Even so, she still wouldn't give up being with Naruto for anything.

Considering that Kiba had (as far as she knew) no knowledge of the development of Naruto's own crush, it was obvious to Hinata that Kiba was asking if she had finally asked Naruto out. It was true that after Naruto had told her that he liked her, that she had confessed her own attraction as well, so she could technically answer this question with both a 'yes' and a 'no.' Yes, she had indeed told Naruto that she liked him, but no, she certainly hadn't mustered the courage to ask him out herself.

_But I _would_ have if he hadn't done it first_, Hinata thought to herself, confidently. She had been determined to do so; all the effort she put into making herself look beautiful for Naruto was proof of that. Even so, she realized that she was taking a bit too long to answer Kiba's question, and as a result, she began to stutter in embarrassment for having drifted off into a daydream.

She was saved by Kurenai-sensei's arrival. "Hello, everyone," she greeted them kindly.

"Good morning, Kurenai-sensei," Hinata responded. Her two teammates merely nodded their heads as a return greeting.

"Shall we get going then?" She was referring to their usual run to the training grounds they normally used for their teamwork exercises. All three of the younger ninja nodded and they jumped off together.

Hinata thought that she would be free of explaining what had happened between her and Naruto, at least for the time being. It wasn't that she was embarrassed about it; she was extremely proud to be Naruto's girlfriend. But she didn't want Kiba to be upset. Kurenai-sensei, however, was also curious about the situation. "So, Hinata, what is this between you and Naruto-kun? I saw you having such a good time with him at the dance."

Even though she felt bad for Kiba, she rather enjoyed telling the story of what had transpired that day. She intentionally left some parts out (for obvious reasons), such as the details of her dream and the extent of the effort she made to make herself extremely attractive for Naruto. Somehow, telling the story seemed to strengthen the feelings of love for Naruto she had within her. Saying aloud all the things he had done for her that day made her feel so special – Naruto-kun had been so thoughtful!

It was for this reason that she was so enthusiastic to begin their training that morning. She was always eager to train and grow stronger for her Naruto-kun, but today, after voicing the things he had done for her, she was even more enthusiastic than ever. They arrived at their usual training grounds and Kurenai-sensei explained the kind of mission they would be practicing for today. Hinata understood exactly what her role was to be, and worked out in her mind how exactly to be of more help than usual.

She kept Naruto in the back of her mind all day long, and used his presence-in-spirit as motivation to do her best throughout the entire day of training.

* * *

The day's exercises had gone very well, and Team 7 was now settling down for the night. They had spent much of their energy in the day's training, but Naruto still had enough energy to use his mouth. He nearly _always_ had enough energy to do that. 

"Sasuke, you need to get a girlfriend now," he was saying. "You're the only one of us who isn't taken now."

"And just why should I do _that_, now?" Sasuke retorted, making it clear in his voice what he thought of the random assessment of what he 'needed.'

"Well...didn't you say that your other goal was to revive the Uchiha clan? Ya kinda need a girl to do that, don't you?" Well, maybe Ero-sennin _had_ influenced him a _little_ bit.

His comment prompted a quick thump on the head from Sakura. "I hope you don't talk like that around Hinata, you pervert!"

"Oww," Naruto complained belatedly as he put up his arms to defend possible further attacks. "But don't you think Sasuke should get a girlfriend too?" Maybe if he went back to his original question she would forget that his mind sometimes wasn't as innocent as it used to be.

Sakura considered for a moment, and then said, "Hmm. Yeah, I agree. Sasuke-kun, you should find a girlfriend. I know! Ino is still available."

This comment surprised Naruto. Sure, Sakura was dating Lee now, but Naruto never thought the day would come that Sakura would actively encourage Sasuke to go out with her old rival. He knew that Sakura and Ino were back on speaking and even friendly terms, but he had no idea they were so close again.

If Sasuke was also surprised, he didn't show it. He simply said, "No," and Naruto couldn't blame him. Ino was pretty – he had always thought that – but she was also _really_ annoying. She had gotten less crazy over the years, but there was the occasional outbreak of uncontrolled hormones that sent her flying and shamelessly trying to seduce Sasuke. Naruto had never really thought of Ino as attractive and that was largely the reason why.

Sakura was persistent. "Oh, but why? She's a good shinobi, and besides, you know she already likes you. It would be easy! You should at least think about it."

"No," came the maddeningly unelaborated response once again. Naruto just smiled and chuckled a bit to himself. It was typical of Sasuke to intentionally keep as many details as he could to himself, especially when he was already working on doing something that someone had suggested he do. Naruto realized that Sasuke might just be in the process of trying to find a kunoichi that would suit him best.

As a result, Naruto decided to let the matter drop, for now. He knew that when the time came, Sasuke would announce his intentions of finding a girlfriend. Knowing Sasuke, he would probably do it at some time _after_ he had already selected the particular kunoichi he wanted to have a relationship with. Sakura, on the other hand, was not as ready to give in as Naruto was.

She tried futilely for another five minutes, never getting more than the word 'no' as a response. Finally she gave up, flustered. Uninterested in having any of his teammates going to bed on a sour note, Naruto decided to try to lighten the mood by cracking a joke. "All right, but if you ever decide you want a girl, come to me. I'll give you some tips," he teased. Again, the only thing he was trying for here was a reaction.

Sasuke had, at the time, been taking a swig from his canteen. Upon hearing the comment, he coughed once, choking slightly on the water he was drinking. "Naruto, it took you _five years_ to realize that Hinata already liked you. You didn't even see it when _you _started to like her. I don't think I'll need your help."

Unabashed at his own ignorance, Naruto just laughed a good-natured, closed-eyes laugh. _A cough and three whole sentences this time; much better than a glare and a punch to the face_, he thought. Even as he was thinking this, he felt a light tap of a fist on his right cheek, which meant that Sasuke had not forgotten to aim another punch.

As Naruto opened his eyes back up, the four of them burst into laughter. Well, almost. All Sasuke ever did in terms of laughing was chuckle his infamous, 'Hn,' and smirk a little bit, but it still counted.

Afterwards, they settled back down, and as they did, Naruto allowed his thoughts to once again dwell on Hinata. He had thought he missed her earlier that morning – and he was right – but now the continued absence of her presence was verging on becoming painful. He could hardly wait until they got back to Konoha so he could see her again. As he was thinking of her, he made plans to go and see her as soon as he possibly could when he got back home.

_But wait!_ It shouldn't quite be immediately; he should get her something nice to bring back to her. But what was nice to get for girls? He was half-tempted to ask Sakura for tips or a list of ideas, but then he decided it would be better if he came up with an idea by himself.

Then it hit him._Flowers!_ Yes, girls liked to get flowers. That was convenient, because Naruto happened to like horticulture. He knew all about the different kinds of flowers that grew in this area. He could pick them as he and his teammates were getting ready to leave the training grounds. Even at a regular pace, they would make it back to Konoha in plenty of time for the flowers to remain alive so he could put them in a vase.

Naruto even had special home-made nutrient supplements to put in the water – they were even already made up. It wasn't like he had planned any of this at the beginning of the day; he just had the supplements because he liked plants. Who knew that one of his continuing childhood hobbies would actually come in handy when he finally got a girlfriend?

So yes, he would get her some flowers for when he returned to see her. It would keep him from seeing her for just a few extra minutes, but he was sure that Hinata wouldn't mind if flowers were the reason for it.

His consciousness lingered for a little while longer as he thought of a creative way to present the flowers to her. He chuckled in pleasure to himself as he came up with a plan to elicit a response from his girlfriend that marked him as 'sweet.' He had gotten it a few times before, and he had found that he really liked it.

His mind slowly shut itself down for the day, and as he drifted off to dreamland, he thought out once again to his girlfriend: _Good night, Hina-chan..._

* * *

Hinata had had a wonderful day of training. Having understood the tasks she was expected to do, she had performed them all brilliantly and even fulfilled her self-made promise to go above and beyond the expectations set on her at the beginning of the day. Kurenai-sensei commented that finally having a relationship with Naruto – instead of unhealthily pining over him in secrecy – was good for her. The relationship obviously gave her an improved level of self-confidence and desire to improve herself, and these recently-strengthened aspects of her personality were shockingly helpful in terms of her level of skill. 

"Keep it up, and you'll be able to rival Neji very soon," Kurenai-sensei had said. That was quite a compliment indeed, because Neji's skill was well-known throughout Fire Country and even in some neighboring countries. While Hinata had improved herself over the years and closed the gap between her and her cousin to a degree, to be compared so favorably to him was quite flattering indeed.

Hinata had beamed through Kurenai-sensei's praise, and even Kiba couldn't help but smile as she danced her way back to their usual campsite as if she was on top of the world.

While they were cooking dinner around the campsite, Kiba finally spoke up about Naruto. "You're pretty happy with Naruto, huh?" he asked.

Even though Hinata felt bad about it, she smiled an extremely happy no-tooth smile. "H-hai," she confirmed, nodding as well.

Kiba smiled sadly. "Well, that's good. I'm glad to hear it." Then, almost to himself, he added, "Still...I was kind of lonely at the dance..."

Hinata thought for a minute, and then realized that she might be able to help. "Kiba...would you like it if...if I helped you find a girlfriend?"

Kiba perked up. "Hmm? You don't have to do that, Hinata. I'll be okay..." and he smiled a smile that looked very forced.

He was behaving in a way that looked as if he wished to stop talking about it, but even so, Hinata decided that she would try to find a girlfriend for her teammate. She may even try to get Naruto to help. Kiba had been very respectful to her, even through his jealousy. She felt like she at least owed him some kind of effort to make him happy, even if she couldn't be the one providing the source of happiness. If he couldn't have a happy relationship with Hinata (and it really would not have been happy even if they _had_ ever gotten together), then she would make sure he could be happy with someone else.

With her decision, she realized that the matter was closed for now, and she didn't have much else to say before they all went to sleep. Eating her meal and then settling herself into her sleeping bag, she began to think more devotedly about her Naruto-kun. She missed him sorely. Secretly, she wished for a short night to pass and then for some light and easy morning exercises so she could get back to Konoha and see her boyfriend.

_Hehe_, she giggled to herself. It was still unusual for her to think of him as her boyfriend. Five years of being his secret admirer had nearly engrained in her a certain feeling of doubt that things would ever work out between herself and Naruto. Now, that seemingly unreachable distance between them had been almost effortlessly traversed, and she hardly knew what to do with herself.

It was strange to think that while she had been around Naruto enough over the past half month to sorely miss his presence when he was not around her, she still had trouble believing that he was finally hers. Every single day since she had been able to call herself his girlfriend, she had at least once expected to wake up from a wonderfully cruel dream.

She knew that it wasn't a dream, though. She also knew, somehow, that even if it _was_ a dream, that whenever she woke up from it, she would do everything in her power to make the events of this (not really) dream into a reality. Some things inside her had indeed changed – and definitely for the better. She felt so confident, so in control of her own destiny. Neji would be proud of her.

Then a thought struck her: she hadn't gotten to tell Neji that she and Naruto had started dating! Well then, she would have to do that first thing when she got back, before going to find Naruto. When she had first gone to Godaime Hokage-sama to try to arrange missions for herself paired exclusively with Naruto, she had consulted her older cousin. They had grown much closer over the years as a result of Naruto's life-changing battle against Neji.

Neji had been very supportive of her actions – in his own, Uchiha Sasuke-like, lack-of-emotion kind of way. She was sure that he had known for a while of her crush on Naruto, but for her sake, he had let Hinata handle it by herself. When she had told him of her plans, he not only supported her for taking her fate into her own hands, but he also seemed almost hopeful of the prospect of being indirectly related to Naruto. It would be wrong of her to selfishly satisfy her own desires to see Naruto and put off telling her cousin about her new relationship.

Hinata smiled. Yes, she would have to tell Neji as soon as she could. Knowing him, he probably already knew somehow. It was frustrating how omniscient he always seemed to be, and she had a feeling that he knew that too. But even if he did already know, he would still appreciate being told by the direct source.

As her thoughts moved back towards focusing solely on how cute her Naruto-kun was, her mind and her body slowly drifted off towards unconsciousness. The last thing she could remember was sending a wish of sweet dreams out to her beloved, hoping that somehow her thoughts would automatically aim themselves correctly. _Sleep well, Naruto-kun..._

* * *

Naruto threw open the door to his apartment and raced towards the kitchen. There it was: the exact vase he had been thinking about the entire run home. It was short and thin, but not too thin to hold a dozen flowers with medium-sized stems. He opened the refrigerator and grabbed the pitcher of cold water. He poured about a pint into the base of the vase and then set it all down. 

He knew he had the nutrient supplement here somewhere – oh where was it!? Naruto searched the entire kitchen – it wasn't in any of the cupboards; it wasn't on top of the fridge; it wasn't in any of the drawers. It was_nowhere_! Surely he hadn't used it all...no he remembered putting it down somewhere – but _where!?_ Hurriedly, he ran out into the living room in search of the supplement he knew he had.

After searching every room in his apartment, including the two hallway closets that held nothing at all, he finally went back to the kitchen, where he collapsed into a chair, exasperated. It was only supposed to take a couple of minutes to prepare the flowers for Hinata, but the time had stretched itself into nearly half an hour! He swung himself forward to sit more upright, more out of frustration than of a desire to improve his posture, and on his way up, his eye caught a glint of something under the fridge.

He took a closer look at it, and there it was – the nutrient supplement. _Why the hell would I put it there!?_ Naruto asked himself angrily as he quickly scooped up the concoction and lightly tapped a pinch of it into the water. It didn't take much of this nutrient stuff to keep plants alive, and too much of it would actually be bad for them, so he didn't dump the whole thing in, even though his frustration had tempted him to do so.

Oh well; it wasn't the first time being untidy had caused him to nearly lose his mind. Eh, he would clean up soon. Maybe.

After adding just the right amount of the powder to the water, he carefully arranged the flowers in the vase, making sure that no two flowers of the same color were next to each other. He had only gotten flowers of two different colors: blue and orange. Orange was Naruto's favorite color, and he had kind of assumed that blue was Hinata's favorite color. Even if it wasn't, Naruto liked Hinata's dark blue hair, so it would be good either way.

When he was done arranging the flowers, he was about to jump out the window and dash off toward the Hyuuga complex, when he realized that he hadn't bothered to stir the water after he had added his home-made plant-helper. _Shit! _At first, he thought he was going to have to take all the flowers back out, stir the water, and put them all back in again; the water needed to be stirred, or else the nutrient wouldn't work as well as it should.

Then Naruto realized that he didn't have to do any of that. He could use the first step towards mastering the Rasengan jutsu to stir the water! Quickly, he cupped the bottom of the vase with his hand and began swirling his chakra gently. It moved the water harmlessly past the stems of the flowers, but swirled the water easily and effectively. About thirty seconds of this, and the water was completely and uniformly mixed._All right! Hina-chan, here I come!_

He made sure the door to his apartment was locked, then proceeded to run to the other side of his apartment and jump out the window onto the nearest rooftop and dart off in the direction of his girlfriend.

* * *

"Neji-nii-saan!" Hinata called from outside the door to Neji's room before knocking three times. She had just gotten back from her intra-team training and was eager to finally tell her cousin the good news. 

"Hinata-sama," she heard the slightly muffled reply from behind the door. She took this as an invitation to enter his room and promptly opened the door. "What brings you here?"

"I-I wanted to tell you about – about Naruto-kun and me," Hinata said shyly. Even though she was very happy about the fact that she and Naruto were dating, and she was even comfortable speaking to Neji now, she was still rather shy about it. "We're d-dating now."

Neji smiled – an actual smile – for the first time in a very long time. It wasn't a big smile, and no teeth showed, but it was much more than the smirk he displayed whenever he was amused (which again, wasn't very often). This time, he was actually genuinely happy, or so it seemed. "Is that so? It rather looked like you were when I saw you two at the dance. I thought you had said that you weren't dating."

"Well...we weren't when you asked. Naruto-kun asked me a couple hours before the dance," Hinata explained.

Neji blinked in apparent surprise. "_Naruto_ asked? I was under the impression that _you_ were going to ask _him_," Neji said, remembering their conversation shortly after Hinata had requested to be assigned missions with Naruto.

"H-hai...well I was, and I mean I was going to that day...but he asked me first. I didn't know he already liked me..." Hinata proceeded to tell the story of how it had happened. She also explained what Naruto had told her about the development of his feelings for her.

"Well, it seems your decision to take fate into your own hands worked, Hinata-sama. Congratulations."

"Arigatoo, Neji-nii-san." As Hinata turned to leave to go find Naruto, a thought occurred to her. "Naruto-kun might be here at the complex later, if you want to see him."

Neji nodded behind her. "I might. Have you told Hiashi-sama about your new relationship?"

That thought hadn't even occurred to Hinata until Neji brought it up. She was just about to speed off to find her Naruto-kun, but then realized that it would probably be best tell her father about it as soon as she could, too. It wouldn't do for her father to catch them in a kiss without even knowing about their relationship.

"No, but—"

"You'll have your chance. He's coming."

"Here? Does he usually come to see you?"

"Not often, but it is not rare that he would do so. My guess in this particular case is that he is seeking you, Hinata-sama."

That would make sense. There was still a little bit of poor relationships between head and branch family members, but most of that was shed for this generation of the Hyuuga clan. Hinata's father most likely went to her room to find her, and when she wasn't there, activated his byakugan and found her here. What exactly her father wished to speak to her about she didn't have any notion, but her father interacted with her on a fairly daily basis, and she assumed it was much more likely that he would be seeking her rather than Neji.

Hinata bade Neji goodbye for now and left his room. "Hello, papa-sama," she said as her father rounded the corner and started walking in the direction of Neji's room.

"Hinata. I wished to speak with you."

"Hai?" Hinata had always been respectful of her father, even though he had often disregarded her feelings when she was younger.

"I have heard rumors recently that you fancy a certain Uzumaki Naruto. Is this correct?"

Hinata blushed. Telling Neji about her relationship with Naruto was slightly nerve-racking. Now to have to tell her father that yes, she had had feelings for him for a while, and that they had even started dating, was going to be quite difficult indeed. "Y-yes, that's right, papa-sama."

"Hmm. I seem to recall this Uzumaki. He defeated Neji some years back in their first attempt at passing the Chuunin Exams, did he not?"

Hinata was not surprised that her father remembered. First off, Naruto had defeated a Hyuuga even after his tenketsu had been closed. Not only that, but Naruto's popularity had increased drastically in the Konoha community, and the head of the Hyuuga clan always paid attention to popular ninja. Popular ninja generally tended to be strong ninja, and strong ninja were desirable for marriage, in order to keep the well of chakra deep in members of the Hyuuga clan.

Hinata nodded a reply to her father's question. She would not offer the information that she was dating Naruto unless he did not happen to ask about it by the time he was done asking questions. Hinata did not mind being interrogated by her father; he never went about it cruelly – he merely came to her for information from time to time about certain things to which she had more exposure than he did.

She was not forced to freely offer the information that they were dating, however, for it was her father's very next question: "Since you fancy Uzumaki Naruto, have you taken steps to indicate to him that you wish to enter a courtship?" If Hinata wasn't so nervous about the situation of telling her father that she had a boyfriend, she might have giggled slightly at his choice of words.

As it was, she merely smiled, nodded her head, and said, "I-I'm dating Naruto-kun now, papa-sama."

It took Hiashi a moment to answer. When he did, he merely said, "I see."

"We started dating while we were at the Kazekage's birthday celebration," Hinata explained. "I went with him, originally as his friend, but I didn't know that he liked me too..."

"Is that so? He requested courtship, then?" This time, Hinata was closer to giggling. She prepared to explain once more what Naruto had done for her throughout the day before finally asking her out. She was getting more comfortable with telling the story, and a result, her reactions to certain things before doing so were growing more and more natural.

"Hai," she said, and proceeded to explain everything about her 'friendly' date with Naruto – except for certain parts she knew he would not want to hear about. She was so proud of it that she hardly even blushed through telling it, even though she was divulging the information her father.

At first, her father had seemed ill at ease about the explanation, but as she continued with it, she saw him grow more comfortable. By the end of it, he was clearly impressed with the effort that Naruto had shown to make Hinata happy that day. "Interesting. Will you be seeing Uzumaki tonight?"

Hinata nodded her head again. "He might be here at the complex tonight, papa-sama."

"Very well. I will meet with him. For now, you have my approval. I will decide to uphold or repeal my approval upon meeting him."

His final words made Hinata freeze for a moment in fright. She allowed the thought to creep into her head that her father might actually disallow her to date her Naruto-kun. But then she remembered that Naruto had, since they had started dating at least, always been so sweet to her. She had no reason to think that he would not continue to be so nice, so any worry that she had of her father's disapproval dissolved to make room for her growing anticipation of finally getting to see her Naruto-kun after a whole day and a half of not seeing him.

She thought about him all the way back to her room, where she was going to collect her things and then go see Naruto. She closed her door, gathered her things, and was about to leave her room when she heard a strange knocking at her bedroom door. That was odd – nobody ever knocked at the Hyuuga complex. The doors were thin enough to talk through, and there were no special seals that blocked the byakugan vision, so knocking was unnecessary. Not only that, but the knock had seemed to come from the _bottom_ of the door.

Not bothering to activate her byakugan to see what was going on, she walked over to the door and opened it.

* * *

Upon arriving at the Hyuuga complex, Naruto had been struck with a thought. He should think of a way to present the flowers he had gotten her that would be creative, rather than just arriving and presenting them to her. He thought for just a minute, and then saw a single flower in the grass outside the complex. It was a white flower, but even so, it gave him an idea. He plucked it from the ground so that the flower ended up with a short, three-inch stem. He then created a shadow-clone, turned one into a bunny, and gave the bunny-clone the flower. 

The bunny went through the arch of the Hyuuga complex and began heading for Hinata's room. Meanwhile, he kept the vase and the flowers and headed around to the other side of the complex in order to come up on Hinata's room from the window side of the room. As silently as he could, he jumped up and landed on the roof to Hinata's bedroom. He created and cancelled a kage bunshin quickly to inform the bunny clone that he was ready, and instantly gained the knowledge that the bunny was ready to begin knocking on Hinata's door.

He heard the muffled thumping of the left hind-leg upon the door, and heard Hinata walk over to see who it was. As she did, he silently slid down the roof and into her window, stepping quietly into her room. He saw her open the door and look down to see a bunny, holding a white flower up to her with its teeth. Hinata gasped, she activated her byakugan, and as soon as she did, she whirled around and saw her Naruto-kun.

"Ne, Hinata!" Naruto greeted her, adding enthusiasm to his usual greeting and presenting the vase filled with flowers to her. "Look what I brought you!"


	5. Chapter 5

A/N: Okay, so first of all, I have edited Chapter 4 at the same time I'm posting this chapter. The part about Hiashi never coming to see Neji was wrong and I didn't know that because I haven't watched any of the filler episodes. Jelp alerted me to this fact, and I have adjusted the story accordingly.

In addition, I realize that in Chapter 4, my Hiashi-Hinata conversation was not written as well as it could have been and perhaps it was a pretty generic conversation that happens between these two concerning Naruto. For this, I am sorry, and I worked a lot on the dialogue between these two for this chapter. I hope it turned out better, but if it didn't, well I'm sorry again.

On a third note, I realize that I have PMed some of you telling you that I would probably be quick with these next couple of chapters, but spring break has been busier than I expected, so I may or may not live up to that. I'll certainly try, though, so bear with me please D.

And finally...I still don't own Naruto.

* * *

**Chapter 5**

**Chapter 5: Hiashi**

Hinata opened the door to her room and looked down. There, standing on its hind legs was a bunny that looked exactly like the bunny Naruto's shadow clone had transformed into. In between its teeth was a small white flower with a short stem. The bunny was holding his head in such a way that the flower part of the plant was as close to her as possible.

Hinata gasped and activated her byakugan out of reflex. Directly behind her, she saw Naruto standing exactly where she had just been standing. In his outstretched hands was a vase with orange and blue flowers in it.

"Ne, Hinata," Naruto greeted her with more enthusiasm than normal. "Look what I brought you!" Naruto's cheesy grin spread across his face as he kept his arms stretched out, waiting for Hinata to take the flowers he had gotten her.

"Naruto-kun!" Hinata exclaimed with an enthusiasm that matched his. She darted across the room, took the flowers from him, and set them on her bedside table. Before she admired them or smelled them at all, she turned back to Naruto and gave him a big hug. He hugged her back, wrapping her tightly in his strong arms and keeping her there for a few moments.

"I missed you, Hina-chan," he said after a little while.

"I missed you too, Naruto-kun," she replied, and when he released her from their hug, she turned back to the flowers he had gotten her. She bent down and smelled them and was surprised at how fresh they smelled; it was as if they had just been picked. "Where did you get these flowers, Naruto-kun?"

"At the training grounds. There's all types of flowers that grow there." As he was talking, his bunny clone hopped its way up onto her bed and once more presented the small white flower to her. She giggled and took the flower from the bunny clone, not forgetting to give it a short scratch behind the ears. She slid the stem of the white flower through her hair so that it rested lightly on her right ear, and so that only the flower appeared against her hair.

Naruto made a small noise of discomfort as she gave his bunny clone a scratch behind the ears. She didn't hear it, however, because she was realizing the implication of what Naruto had just told her. _Grow there?_ she repeated in her mind. "Did – did you _pick _these for me, Naruto-kun?"

Naruto cancelled the bunny clone after she was done petting it, and Hinata noticed that her question apparently provided enough of a distraction to prevent him from becoming aroused from the bunny's experience. Oh well. "Well, yeah..." he replied. "How else would I have gotten them for you?"

Hinata giggled. In his defense, Naruto had never had a girlfriend before, so he wouldn't necessarily have ever thought about _buying_ a girl flowers before. Even so, it was rather funny to hear that he hadn't ever thought about it considering Ino's family's flower store. "I thought you bought them for me at the Yamanaka flower shop."

"_Oh!_" he said in realization of what Hinata was referring to. "Heh-heh, I didn't know what you meant. I didn't even think of going to a store to buy them. I picked them out at the training grounds before we left, then I got the vase from my apartment."

Over the many years of admiring Naruto, Hinata had secretly watched him as much as she possibly could. Having witnessed his actions over such a long time, she learned things about him that many other people did not know; she suspected that she knew things about him that even his teammates had not known until just recently. She was therefore pleasantly surprised when he told her he had had a vase ready for flowers in his apartment. "From your apartment?"

"Yeah. Not many people know, but I like plants. I have all kinds of vases and pots and stuff. You probably didn't see any when you came over because I keep most of them in the kitchen," Naruto explained enthusiastically.

What a surprise! She was absolutely delighted to find out about one of the hobbies she hadn't known he had. She knew she couldn't possibly have known everything about him, and she loved it when she was able to learn something new when it came to Naruto. She began to ask him all about his horticultural hobby.

Naruto talked for a while about plants and what he had learned about them. It was obvious that he enjoyed talking about one of the things he liked to do, especially to somebody who was so intensely interested in it. Hinata didn't particularly have a horticultural hobby herself, but she was fascinated that Naruto did, and therefore was very interested in his hobby.

Not only did he become very enthusiastically animated while describing his hobby (only Naruto could use his body with as much energy as one would put into a game of charades in order to describe a plant), but Naruto perforated his own speeches with other things that made Hinata extremely happy. While in the middle of talking about one plant or other that he had studied, he would interrupt himself with comments like, "I really like the flower in your hair like that, by the way. It's really pretty." These comments always made Hinata feel like she was flying.

When he was done explaining mostly everything, like why he got into plants, when his interest in them had developed, and information like that, Hinata felt like she had to thank Naruto once more for getting her flowers. "Arigatoo, Naruto-kun. They're really beautiful."

"You're welcome, Hinata-chan, but you know you're much prettier."

Ever since Hinata had told him that she had heard him compare her to Suna's sunrise, she noticed that whenever she complimented something he did for her, he would compare her to whatever he had done for her in a very favorable way. Apparently, he had liked it when she called him, 'sweet' so she told him that he was, and then proceeded to give him a loving kiss on the lips.

In addition to the state of happiness his wonderful compliments had always put her in, kissing Naruto always made her experience euphoria. He always kissed her softly enough for the kiss to be considered passionate and loving, and firmly enough to completely take her breath away. In addition, the fact that she was comfortable enough to initiate a kiss made her extremely happy indeed (well,_almost _naturally – she _had _hesitated just the tiniest fraction of a second before committing to it).

While they kissed, Naruto's strong hands rubbed her shoulders and upper back, and it felt absolutely wonderful. She allowed him to gently suck her lower lip into his mouth and put it between his teeth so he could lick it softly with the tip of his tongue. As a trade, she pulled his upper lip into her mouth and mimicked his tongue's movement. Another thing she was not afraid to do was advance the kiss. She stopped licking his upper lip and pushed her tongue forward, against the seal created by her lower lip and his upper lip. He pulled slightly with the muscles in his upper lip and allowed her to slip her tongue into his mouth.

It was always so warm and nice and wet inside his mouth. She played with his tongue for a few seconds, moving it in circles around the inside of his own mouth, and then plunged her tongue further into his mouth to allow more surface contact between their tongues.

She remembered that before Naruto had asked her out, she had often wondered what it would be like to kiss him. She had dreams about it, and could even remember what it felt like in her dreams, but those had _only_ been dreams, and it was one of the things that made her wish fervently for a relationship with him.

Before she had ever kissed him, she had thought that he would have to be the one to make the kisses interesting. She knew that every part of her would want to make the kisses interesting for Naruto, but she knew that she would probably always be shy around him, even if she ever managed to become his girlfriend, and she probably wouldn't be able to initiate anything more than a simple kiss.

All of that had changed when she finally had received the first kiss from her Naruto-kun. For their first kiss, she had allowed Naruto to do anything he had wanted. In all reality, he hadn't done much (the kiss was _wonderful_ – just without any additions like tongues or back rubs). But after their first kiss, they had had a second, and a third, and a fourth. They weren't wild, passionate kisses that were the type that led to wild, passionate sex; they were the soft, slow, savor-the-moment type kisses that left her speechless for hours afterwards on that night of January 19th.

For each of these kisses after their first, she had found that she could not only initiate extra features to their kisses, but she could do it easily and without embarrassment. Well, almost without embarrassment. The way he kissed reminded her of her dreams sometimes, and it caused her to become the tiniest bit – _stimulated_. It wasn't anything close to how she was in the mornings after an erotic dream, but it was enough to make her want to do the same to Naruto.

As a result of this desire to stimulate Naruto, she had naturally been able to put her tongue in his mouth and play with his. She sometimes ran her short, smooth nails down his back. And it _worked_. Well, for the first night anyway. Maybe she overdid it, because not only was she able to sense that he was stimulated, but after they had finished their kisses that first night of their relationship, she had managed to sneak a peek of the bottom half of his outfit.

Ever since then, however, she hadn't been able to get him to become nearly as aroused. Disappointed and wondering why, she had activated her byakugan during one of their later kisses and taken a look at his chakra flow. In any ninja, chakra flowed through the chakra circulatory system and tended to naturally follow the flow of blood through the body's regular circulatory system.

What she saw in Naruto that day was an unnatural flow of chakra away from that particular area of his body. She had nearly giggled. Apparently, Naruto had been embarrassed about having become so aroused that night, though he certainly hadn't said anything. He obviously wanted to prevent her from thinking he was inappropriate, and she almost felt sorry for having stimulated him so much that night.

She had secretly tried her best to cause him to get another erection. She hadn't since used her byakugan to look at his chakra flow, but she hadn't yet witnessed the results of excessive blood flow to the groin area either. She hadn't ever resorted to making the kisses hot and wild; she wanted to see if she could do it with the soft, gentle kisses. Plus the fact that she didn't think she could start pushing him up against a wall or onto a bed or something of that nature. It did sound nice, though.

Naruto had generally let her do all of the interesting stuff. He had on occasion pushed his tongue back into her mouth, and he usually did rub her back or something along those lines. Today, towards the end of their kiss, he allowed his hands to gently press themselves flush against her back and slide down her back. They came to rest, ever so lightly, on the very lowest part of her back, just above her rear end.

Naruto's hands being so close to her behind did anything but offend Hinata, but because it was the first time he had done anything like _this_, she was startled. It felt good, but it was rather unexpected, and it caused her eyes to flutter open in (admittedly pleasant) surprise.

Hinata's eyelashes brushed against Naruto's cheeks ever so lightly, and it caused him to open his eyes too. He must have seen the surprise in her eyes, for he immediately removed his hands and broke away from the kiss. "I'm sorry, Hinata. I didn't mean to put my hands there!" he said in a tone that sounded as if he also had been surprised to find his hands where they had been.

Hinata was slightly disappointed that Naruto seemingly hadn't intended to have done anything less than innocent while they were kissing. She already knew that she sometimes caused him to lose control of his hormones, and it would have been...nice...if she could also cause him to act (in a respectful manner) because of his hormones. At the same time, she was glad that it was apparently the work of Naruto's subconscious that was behind where his hands had just been. At least she knew that he wanted less than innocent interactions on the subconscious level.

Even though she was slightly embarrassed about the situation, Hinata honestly didn't mind what Naruto had just done. Also, she certainly didn't want to discourage him from initiating intimate contact in the future. She decided that she had to do something so he wouldn't be afraid to touch her, so she said, "No...it's o-okay, Naruto-kun. I d-don't mind...you just surprised me."

Naruto's face showed relief. "Really? You're sure you didn't mind?"

Hinata nodded her head. "I'm sure, Naruto-kun," she said truthfully. In all reality, she had liked where his hands had been just now and had been disappointed when he had suddenly taken them away. The touch of his hands on her very lower back had caused her to think fleetingly of the vivid (and rather naughty) dreams she had recently been having of Naruto. She had to admit that even though the dreams embarrassed her, especially when she had them while she was sleeping next to Naruto, she did _like _them. With this admission, she realized that she also had to admit that she wished his hands were back where they had just been.

Such an admission caused her to realize that while she had said everything she needed to in order to make sure Naruto wasn't discouraged from putting his hands there, he might not translate that into an actual encouragement to do so. This, in turn, caused her to realize that if she didn't say something now, she might have to wait a while for another opportunity like this.

It was almost unconscious, as if her mind had already made itself up without consulting her thoughts, for almost before she could confirm the presence of the thoughts she had just been having, she was speaking again, "You can put your hands there again next time – if you want to, Naruto-kun." Her subconscious _did_ seem to take into account that she was Hyuuga Hinata and adjusted her voice accordingly; it came out as barely a squeak above a whisper – very tiny. At the same time, her subconscious had taken into account that she was serious about her desire for such intimate contact, and while her voice was small and practically whispered, it was _remarkably_ clear.

Hinata's conscious mind caught up to her subconscious and she realized exactly what had just transpired. Naruto had just almost groped her rear end and had become embarrassed about it; she had basically just told him that no, she didn't mind and in fact she would like him to do it in the future. Slightly more remarkable was the fact that she couldn't feel as much heat in her face as she normally would have. She stole a quick glance at her mirror next to the window, and out of the corner of her eye she noticed that her cheeks were indeed not as red as she would expect them to be in such a situation.

In front of her, Naruto's expression became confused. He had obviously heard her, because his eyes showed that he wasn't confused about_what _she had said, but rather the content of her message. Hinata eagerly awaited his response, secretly hoping he would choose to just wrap her up in his arms again and accept her offer, but hoping equally as much that he would simply smile his usual Uzumaki Naruto smile and accept it verbally. It was always so cute to watch him when he did that.

* * *

Naruto blinked in surprise. He wasn't quite sure that he had heard perfectly what Hinata had just said. He had just practically grabbed her butt, so surely she didn't just tell him that he could do it again, did she? He wanted to ask her if he had heard her correctly, but there were several things preventing him from doing so.

In the first place, even though she had said it very softly, she had said it extremely clearly. Nothing but a momentary loss of attention could have stopped Naruto from hearing everything she had said as clear as a bell, and he had been paying full attention to her.

In the second place, he was sure he didn't imagine her saying it, because he had expected either a slap in the face, a verbal scolding or even the oh-so-painful soft expression of disappointment; he had even been prepared for all three. Outright approval was nothing close to what he had expected, so the fact that he had heard it instead of any or all of the things he had imagined indicated that he had indeed heard correctly.

And in the third place, she had said it so softly, as if she would have said something to him before they had started going out. She had told him all about her shyness when it had come to himself, and even though he had never really thought about it at the times when it had happened, he could recall several instances that she had talked to him in such a manner. This time, she seemed to have just as much difficulty saying it as she used to have talking to him, but based on the other two things he had thought of, she seemed to have said everything she wanted to.

All this made Naruto blush again. In all honesty, he hadn't meant to touch her butt. He had meant to rub her back while he kissed her – he had found that she liked it when he did that. But when he was done rubbing her back, she didn't seem to want the kiss to end (and neither did he, really), so he had just forgotten about his hands completely in order to pay more attention to the kiss.

It was shortly thereafter that he noticed his inability to stop himself from becoming aroused. That had been odd, because except for their first night of kisses, he had been able to stop himself from having an erection, even though it was difficult at times. (Naruto had never kissed anyone – intentionally – but he figured she must be a_fantastic _kisser compared to other kunoichi, just based on how wonderful it felt).

Originally he thought that Hinata must have felt him starting to become erect; they had been rather close. He thought that was why she had opened her eyes so suddenly and had such surprise in her eyes. He hadn't had his eyes open the whole time, but her eyelashes brushing upwards against his cheekbone caused him to open his own eyes. It was at this moment that he regained awareness of where his hands were, and with an equal amount of surprise, he had pulled them away immediately.

But now she was telling him that it was okay, that he could even do it again. After sorting it all out, Naruto realized that he wasn't quite as embarrassed about it anymore. He was half-tempted to scoop her up in his arms, pick her up, whirl her around and give her another kiss, but he didn't know if she had meant he could do it again right away or not. Plus, he didn't want to pitch any more of a tent than he already had been. So instead, he merely put his hand behind his head, raised his elbow, offered her a closed-eyes grin and said enthusiastically, "Heh-heh, well I guess if you say so, Hinata."

_Wow, what a girl_, he thought. _Not only does she _never _get mad at me, she seems to like when I accidentally embarrass her_. As the next thought came to his mind, he realized that he shouldn't be comparing Hinata to anybody else (and he didn't usually). While his mind was on it though, he thought, _man, she's a _much_better girlfriend than Sakura-chan woulda been_.

His enthusiastic response awarded him a label of 'cute' from Hinata as she fell into his arms once more, this time just for a hug. He held her close for a minute or two, not quite ready to take her up on her offer, then opened his eyes and kissed her forehead. He then looked at her bed and saw – himself. "Ne, Hinata?" he said in a rather amused tone.

He felt the single shudder of her giggle before she responded, "Hai, Naruto-kun?" like she always did.

"What's that?" and he pointed to her bed. Apparently she was over her own embarrassment, for she practically danced (to his absolute enjoyment) over to her bed to scoop up what looked like a doll shaped like himself. She brought it back over and explained to him that it was an Uzumaki Naruto plushi doll.

"Did you just get that?" He asked, and she shook her head. This was interesting. She proceeded to tell him about when he had just gotten back from saving Sasuke that he had started to become popular. He had dealt with that first hand, so he knew what she was talking about. All kinds of people – sometimes people he didn't even know – would greet him in passing even if he was just walking down the street. He didn't know people had started making toys about him, though.

Hinata told him that she had wanted to see him more often after nearly three and a half years of his absence from Konoha, but he was always busy and she never got to see him as much as she liked. Naruto nodded his head. Those had been busy times for him, he recalled. "So you got a doll of me?" he asked, amused.

She nodded her head and sported a slight shade of pink on top of her cheekbones. Naruto smiled and said, "Heh-heh, and you say _I'm_cute," and he reached his right hand up and lightly tapped her nose once with his finger. She scrunched her nose and covered it briefly with her hand before smiling and allowing herself another small giggle.

At this point, Naruto realized that he hadn't really planned for anything after giving her the flowers. In all reality, they hadn't had much time to plan anything since they got back from Suna. They had both been pretty tired and had decided to go to bed rather than stay up too long and be tired for training with their teams. They had been reluctant to depart from each other's company, but it wouldn't have been good if they didn't get any sleep.

It wasn't as though there was nothing to do – there were tons of things he could do with Hinata. He could take her out to dinner on a kind of second first date; he could ask and see if she wanted to train with him for a little while; he could take her back to his apartment and show her all the things he liked about his plants. He could think of dozens of other things they could do, and knew that she could probably think of a bunch of things to do as well. It was just that they hadn't set anything up, and the trouble now was just choosing. "Did you have anything in mind for tonight, Hina-chan?"

This seemed to remind Hinata of something. It seemed as if she did indeed have something in mind. Naruto wondered what it could be. "My father said he would come meet you when you got here," replied Hinata. This wasn't something he had expected. He had forgotten completely about meeting Hinata's family, probably because he didn't have any of his own to introduce her to.

Naruto was a little nervous about it, but that was okay. He knew that it was something he needed to do, and he even vaguely remembered looking forward to it at some point or other. The reason he was nervous was because he wanted to make a good first impression. He knew from first-hand experience that it was typically difficult to impress a Hyuuga (except for Hinata, apparently). His battle with Neji had been his first time trying, and it had taken everything he had in him to pull it off. He hoped this time around it would be a lot less challenging. Keeping his chakra pores open would be a plus too. Shoving his anxiety aside, he let his usual enthusiasm out as he said, "Sure, let's do that!"

* * *

Hinata led the way out of her room and through the complex to her father's room. A little bit of the anxiety her father had caused when he had told her he would save his complete approval for after he met Naruto had returned to her. She hoped that her father wasn't looking for anything specific, and that he would just take into account Naruto's behavior around herself.

To her right, Naruto walked casually, as if he wasn't nervous at all. She wondered if he was just hiding his anxiety like she was, or if he really was so carefree. She rather hoped it was the latter; if he was so confident, then this first impression would probably go well. Plus the fact that she really didn't want to cause him any kind of anxiety at all.

They arrived at Hiashi's door and Hinata knocked three times. She always knocked three times, no matter whose door it was. She had adopted this habit out of a respect for privacy that she had inherently always possessed. She realized long ago that there were many people who enjoyed company in their rooms, and that a calling of a name was quite intrusive upon a conversation that might be going on. A knock on the door was a much less interruptive way of communicating that somebody was outside.

Knocking three times had come from a need to identify who was there. Activating a byakugan would eliminate any need to do this, but as a courtesy, a three-knock identification was more than enough to indicate that it was her, Hinata, waiting outside.

Hiashi was apparently not busy at the moment, for after the slightest pause, a small flash of blue emitted itself from the crack underneath the door, indicating that her father had decided to activate his byakugan anyway, and she heard her father say, "Come in, Hinata. Naruto may enter as well."

Hinata opened the door and strode into her father's room, followed shortly after by Naruto. "Hello again, Papa-sama."

Hiashi returned her greetings again, and then turned his gaze to Naruto. "I was under the impression that you were expecting him later. Otherwise, I would have stayed."

"I'm sorry, Papa-sama. I didn't know when he would be returning from his training. He arrived just as I was preparing to see if he had gotten back yet."

"Naruhodo."

There were no real taboos regarding speech at the Hyuuga complex, other than the normal unwritten rules that the general society of Konoha accepted. As long as you weren't interrupting, you could speak at any time. Naruto apparently understood this, and decided to join the conversation with a belated greeting. "Hi, umm..." and then he faltered ever so slightly before regaining his composure, "Hyuuga-san."

Evidently, Naruto had not thought of how to go about addressing her father before initiating his greetings. She was relieved when he hadn't stalled long enough to prompt a fill-in-the-blank response from her father, and especially relieved when he elected to respectfully use the clan-name in his salutation. Since she had started liking him back at the Academy, she had noticed that he often disregarded manners (who could blame him, considering his childhood?). She was glad that he had learned them somewhere, and knew when it was most appropriate to use them.

In fact, the few times during their earlier childhood that she had ever witnessed him displaying nice manners was when he was around her. Not that he _always _had wonderful manners when talking to her, but he did sometimes. Allowing herself a moment of presumption, she labeled herself as being a good influence on her Naruto-kun, but then came back to the moment.

Hiashi seemed satisfied with the greetings as well, for he nodded and returned them, "Uzumaki Naruto." Then, without wasting much more time, he continued, "I understand that you are currently courting my daughter."

Again, Hinata may have giggled at the word, 'courting,' but instead she was hoping that Naruto had heard of the term before.

"Huh?" asked Naruto, and Hinata's heart sank until Naruto said, "Oh! Well, yeah. She told you that, didn't she?" And then Naruto turned to Hinata. "You _did _tell him we're going out, right?"

Hinata smiled and nodded. Apparently he was just confused about why her father would have been asking, and then had realized it was just a confirmation that her father was seeking. "Hai, I told him, Naruto-kun."

"Okay, that's good," Naruto said, then turned back to Hiashi. "Heh-heh, sorry. I guess I thought you didn't know yet for some reason, and I was a little confused."

"Indeed. Hinata has told me when and how it was that you began your courtship," he continued, and Hinata could tell that her father wanted a second rendition of the story. As she predicted, her father said, "I would like you to tell me about it from _your _point of view."

Hinata had originally dreaded the prospect of her father asking for something specific. Now, though, she rather liked the idea. Of course, her father would still probably take Naruto's behavior into account, but he was always so good to her and she wasn't worried at all about that.

She would even get to hear Naruto tell the story, even though he had told her everything about how he had been feeling all throughout the day before he had asked her out. It would be nice to hear it again.

Naruto grinned and said, "Okay, I can do that. Well, okay, I guess I better start when Hinata and I were finding out when Gaara's birthday was for ba—I mean the Hokage..." Naruto began, and proceeded to tell her father about how he had started to become interested in Hinata while they were on their mission together. He thankfully left out a few of the choice details (such as the whole bathing incident) as he worked his way up to the day of their first date.

Naruto took Hinata's father's words about point of view into account, and he filled his explanation with things he had been feeling throughout all of it. For his version of the part directly following the fireworks they set off for the Kazekage, he explained how he had felt that he hadn't provided a nice enough experience for Hinata.

This apparently intrigued Hiashi, for he asked, "What do you mean, 'not good enough'? Explain that."

"Oh," replied Naruto, realizing he needed more detail. "Well, at the party since we were walking around together and playing some games with all the people there, a lot of people thought that we were already going out, but we weren't yet. And I didn't think that she liked me...you know I had asked to come with me as a friend. And I thought that it was really embarrassing for her because I didn't know that she liked me and I thought all kinds of people asking if she was my girlfriend would annoy her."

"Why should it? She agreed to accompany you there."

"Well...I don't know...I guess I didn't think she would like me before I asked her out, and a lot of people kept asking us, and she looked embarrassed about it every time. I didn't realize she was embarrassed about it because she did like me and she had to say that we weren't dating at the time...oh, and then Shikamaru's prank really embarrassed us."

Hinata froze. _Oh no!_ She had decided to leave the prank that Shikamaru had pulled out of her explanation. After her own story to her father, she had forgotten about it until Naruto just brought it up. In front of her, she saw Naruto come to the realization that it might not have been a great idea to mention it, too.

"_Prank_?" asked Hinata's father, inevitably. "Hinata, you did not mention a prank. What is this?"

Hinata's face was beet red at this point. She opened her mouth, but she couldn't seem to say anything. It would be impossible to just make something up, but she couldn't seem to force herself to tell what actually happened.

Fortunately, Naruto was more in control of himself, and it was he that began explaining. "Well...uh...our friend Shikamaru – you know, the only one who became a Chuunin for our first time taking the Chuunin exams – is kinda dating a girl named Temari from Suna...and well Temari kinda took Hinata away for a few minutes to try to talk her into asking me out. I mean, I didn't know that's what she was doing, but Hinata told me about it later. Well…anyway, while they were walking around, Shikamaru said that he knew I liked Hinata, and I mean I don't know how he knew that, but he's Shikamaru so I guess I wasn't so surprised. And well..."

Despite the embarrassment it would undoubtedly cause, Hinata rather hoped that Naruto would tell the truth here. In all honesty, the prank wasn't nearly as bad as it would sound to them while they were trying to explain it to her father. Not only that, but she knew her father was analytical enough to recognize that it was by no means Naruto's fault. Plus, lying now would only delay her father finding out what really happened, and when he did, it would be worse than just telling him now.

Luckily, Naruto had decided truth was better too, for after a bit of a pause, he said, "Well, as Temari walked back to Shikamaru and me with Hinata, Shikamaru kinda put me in his shadow mimic and...well...um, he kinda did this..." and Naruto bent over about as much as he had been forced to at the party, "So Hinata was in front of me and it was really embarrassing. I mean, I didn't touch or anything, but I was really—" Naruto cut himself off, deciding not to say what he was going to and instead choosing to say, "—I don't know how to break out of Shikamaru's shadow binds...and I really didn't want to do any of that, honest."

Hiashi had been silent through the whole thing. His face had grown more and more serious and had started to take on a faint reddish color. Hinata had a feeling that it wasn't the kind of red associated with embarrassment. Even so, he remained silent for a few more moments, then said, "I see." his gaze directed itself at his daughter; "Hinata," a slight pause, through which Hinata's breath caught itself in her throat, then in a tone that wasn't at all the frosty one she had anticipated, "I understand why you would not tell me of this incident." His eyes did not lose any of their hardness, however his tone remained calm as he spoke now to Naruto. "I respect it that you told me such a truth, Uzumaki Naruto. Were there any..._other _incidents like this at the celebration?"

Naruto shook his head. "I mean, some more people asked us if she was my girlfriend...but nobody else played any jokes. I think I even heard Temari shouting at Shikamaru as we walked away from them," added Naruto, clearly trying unsuccessfully to lighten the mood just a little bit. Hinata was breathing more evenly now, relieved that her father had not been as upset about the incident as she thought he might have been.

Hiashi, seemingly convinced of Naruto's trustworthiness, allowed him to continue with the story with only a few more minor interruptions and questions of clarification. Despite the embarrassment, Hinata was quite able to enjoy the rest of the story as it progressed through Naruto's eyes, through the dance and up until the point when they left and headed back to Konoha.

At the end of it, Hinata's father said, "And what of your plans for my daughter now?"

"Hmm? Plans?" asked Naruto. "Uhh...well I dunno, she didn't say anything about after coming to meet you. I was thinking I was gonna see if she wanted to get dinner or maybe—"

"That is not what I meant," Hiashi interrupted, his voice edging on being stern. "What of the future? Since you are courting my daughter, you must intend to marry." Hinata's father said it with such a serious tone and so suddenly that Hinata's heart jumped again.

Hinata was indeed hopeful that Naruto had those intentions, but feared that the way her father had said it would be a little too much for Naruto. She didn't want to scare Naruto away with her father's level of seriousness. Hinata was therefore a little sad when Naruto exploded, "MARRY! We haven't even been dating for a week!" he said, surprise saturating his voice. "I mean – it's not like I don't want to – marry Hinata – I mean, that would be great..." Naruto turned to Hinata and broke his speech to say, "I mean I would like to, but – but not yet, ya know," which caused Hinata's heart to rebound into the sky. He continued his speech as he turned back to Hinata's father: "But I just haven't thought about that, uhh, Hyuuga-san," Naruto said, going from extremely surprised and excited to extremely embarrassed in the space of just a couple of broken sentences. He even remembered to try to add respect at the very end.

Hinata glanced over to her father, and was surprised to see him sporting facial expression that was similar to one of Neji's amused smirks. Hinata did a double-take, and by the time she returned her gaze to him, the smirk was gone, leaving her to wonder if she had imagined it. Shortly after, Hinata's father nodded and said, "It _is _a bit early to be thinking of marriage, so I'm glad you're not thinking of taking my daughter from me quite yet. However, it is good to know that you accept the idea enough to admit it to me. Now, if you will excuse me, I will speak to Hinata alone for a moment."

Naruto, who was very obviously confused in many more ways than one, simply nodded, walked to the door, and left the room. When Hinata turned back to face him, her father's expression was still somber, but his eyes showed that a smile hid behind his usually serious face. "Hinata," he began quickly, "do not worry; I intended to cause an outburst. I remember well stories of his short temper, and I wanted to see if he would accept the idea even if I provoked him into an outburst. Since he did, I can assure myself that he will not end up hurting you. Otherwise, I would not have allowed this relationship to endure."

Hinata took this as an admission of approval. "A-arigatoo, Papa-sama. Umm..." she said, trying to help Naruto's case even further, "Naruto-kun brought me flowers when he came, if you want to see them."

Hiashi smiled a very Hyuuga-like, unrecognizable-as-a-smile smile. "Perhaps."

"Umm…Naruto-kun and I will go see Neji-nii-san soon...then I might let him take me somewhere on another date." Hinata didn't normally tell her father what she was doing – she normally didn't really have to. Now, for some reason, she felt like she should. Maybe it was because she was relieved and thankful that her father had allowed her to keep dating Naruto.

Some of her believed that even if Naruto hadn't said anything like he thought it was a good idea to get married, her father would still have allowed it. Maybe it was because she realized that she was his daughter, and he probably had known about her crush since it began.

Hinata's father nodded once and motioned that she could leave. She activated her byakugan, and saw that Naruto was on the other side of the hallway outside the door, and he seemed to be a bit more aware of the situation. She went out to give him a hug and go figure out where he wanted to take her tonight.

She met him outside the door, and they started walking back in the direction of her room. When they were halfway down the next hallway, Naruto spoke up, "Ne, Hinata, was that your dad's idea of a joke?"

Hinata giggled. "Hehe. Maybe, Naruto-kun. He – he said we're still allowed to date, after you left."

"Well he better have!" Naruto exclaimed excitedly. "I mean, he just has to, right? Especially after all that."

Hinata blushed happily and nodded. He was so cute when he was excited. They continued to talk on the way back to her room. Naruto told her that he was sorry if he made it seem like he didn't want to marry her at first, and that her father had just surprised him with that kind of suggestion. He did ask her cautiously if she wanted to get married soon, obviously hoping that the answer was no. That didn't offend her at all – she would of course have no objection whatsoever if he proposed right now, but she would prefer to be just his girlfriend for a while. She told him he didn't have to worry about that, and then at some point suggested they go see Neji.

"Oh, yeah!" He had said, "I haven't seen him in a little bit, that sounds like fun." She led him to her older cousin's room, talking to him all the way. She was giggling for most of it, mostly because Naruto's reaction to such a mix-up of surprise and chagrin was to try to even it out by being his normal, funny self, but also because he was just so cute when he was trying to be more like the usual Naruto.

They arrived at Neji's room still talking. Standing once again outside her cousin's door, she knocked three times. Neji usually didn't have any company, so she usually didn't remain silent when identifying herself to him. "Neji-nii-saan!" she called happily, sighing a relieved sigh in realization that this would be _much_ more enjoyable than Naruto's interview with her father.


	6. Chapter 6

* * *

A/N: Okay, so it's been a LOOONG time since I updated...I'm really sorry about that. It was a combination of school needs, a mild case of writer's block, and a lack of motivation to do a lot of the things I should have been doing. Hopefully the writer's block is gone now; I have Chapter 7 started already.

At any rate, I hope you enjoy the chapter, I'll have another posted (hopefully) soon

I don't own Naruto.

* * *

**Ne, Hinata**

**Chapter 6: Family**

There was no flash of blue light from under the door after Hinata knocked outside Neji's room. Naruto wasn't surprised, however, to hear Neji greet both of them from inside his room. While his team training had taken a while, it was still just the beginning of the evening, and he and Hinata hadn't used any real effort to talk quietly through the halls of the Hyuuga complex. Hinata opened the door and preceded Naruto into the room.

"Yo, Neji!" Naruto greeted him excitedly. It had been a long time since he had seen Neji, and despite their original encounter, they had grown into good friends. Even so, Naruto had never actually 'hung out' with Neji, and had never before been in his room.

It wasn't anything spectacular. Hinata's room was decorated with a few things that made her room feel more comfortable. Neji's room was a little harsher on the eye in that there was nearly nothing to decorate it. There was a scroll hanging vertically on a wall in the opposite corner of where his bed was. Painted on it was a large rendition of the Caged Bird Seal that emblazoned itself on Neji's forehead whenever he was using his bloodline limit.

Naruto nearly asked why he had that hanging on his wall, but then remembered that Neji was still somewhat touchy when it came to the subject of head and branch families. Naruto did notice that it was somehow obvious that it was hung vertically on purpose, as if Neji was determined to display his defiance of any presumed destiny. Naruto then noticed that the design was slightly off.

Even though he had been just a kid back then, he had happened to pay close attention to the detail of Neji's story, for it was one of suffering, and he had always been very keen to that subject, considering the word 'suffering' was a good description of his first few years of life (at least in social terms). The seal on Neji's forehead, if you could 'read' it from right to left, started with the first horizontal line with a downward scoop nearest the X in the middle, making it look like a spoon being held so that it wouldn't spill anything. The line to the right of the X in the middle was the opposite: like that of a spoon being held as if to dump its contents. The design on Neji's wall was different in that the 'spoon' to the left was upside down, and the 'spoon' on the right was right side up.

At first Naruto wondered if this was just because it was looking at it upside down, but then he realized that the seal would look the same turned either way. He then realized that it must be on purpose that the seal was painted this way, and gathered that his early assumption that Neji was showing in every way possible his defiance to his destiny was right. He would ask Hinata about it later, and see if she knew anything more about it; he didn't want to offend Neji by asking about it.

Naruto's eyes didn't linger on the scroll; they kind of glanced at it along with everything else in the room. Naruto had developed a habit of becoming aware of his surroundings in the last couple of years. Even though he never felt in danger while he was inside the village limits of Konoha, it was practically a reflex now. He was rarely even conscious of it unless he happened to see something particularly outstanding, as he just had. Neji must have understood this, for he said nothing about Naruto's examination of the room after he returned Naruto's greetings with a nod of his head and a not-quite-emotionless, "Naruto."

Beside him, Hinata said, "Hello again, Neji-nii-san."

Neji nodded his head to her as well, and said to Naruto, "Hinata-sama told me you would be coming over. Will you be staying longer this time?"

Naruto was confused at this. _Longer this time?_, he repeated to himself. Then he remembered that he actually _had_ seen Neji fairly recently: at the party! He hadn't seen him for very long, though – right in the middle of their game he had just suddenly dashed off to introduce Hinata to Gaara. "Heh-heh, sorry about that, Neji. Yeah, I'll be staying for a little while."

Neji waved off Naruto's apology easily and offered mats from under his bed for his two guests to sit on. He himself sat on the mat that was already placed in the direct center of the floor. It was bigger than the two he offered to Naruto and Hinata, but that was because it was a different kind of mat. Even though Naruto couldn't see chakra, he could tell that there was chakra in the mat upon which Neji sat. Obviously Neji used it for meditating, and he used it a lot. Even though the only thing he did to it was sit on it, the mat was fairly worn in the middle.

Naruto started talking again, "So, Neji, did Hinata tell you, too?"

"I assume you are talking about your relationship with Hinata-sama?" he replied unnecessarily. Neji had a slightly annoying habit of establishing a context when it wasn't really necessary to do so. What _else_ could he be talking about now?

Even so, Naruto wasn't really that upset about it because talking about the fact that he was going out with Hinata made him happy. "Yeah! What do you think? Cool huh?" Naruto was expecting a cool congratulations and the small smile that he was known to sport from time to time. Thinking back to Hinata's dad's suggestion about marrying Hinata, Naruto realized that he would probably be Neji's cousin-in-law later on, and that was really cool.

Neji didn't disappoint him. "Indeed. Congratulations, Naruto, and to you again, Hinata-sama."

"Arigatoo, Neji-nii-san," Hinata replied sweetly, which made Naruto smile. Before they had started going out, he hadn't ever really noticed how pretty Hinata's voice was. Now he heard it every time she spoke, even when she was just whispering (she hadn't been just now, but he _could_ have heard it if she had been).

Naruto grinned like he usually did and thanked Neji as well. Neji nodded and smiled the exact smile Naruto had pictured he would: the flat-lipped smile with just the hint of an upward curve at the edges, only really recognizable as a smile because of the small smile in his white eyes. Neji then suddenly let his eyes harden and the corners of his lips flattened, giving him a rather stern look, "I am concerned, however."

This startled Naruto. "Concerned? About what?" he said defensively. This wasn't at all what he was expecting.

"Hinata-sama has clearly been admiring you for years, Naruto. Surely you didn't take all this time to notice, did you?" he asked with a clear tone of disappointment in his voice.

Naruto was at a loss for words. Hinata had told him that she had liked him for the last five years, but he hadn't even known that when he asked her out; she had told him after they had expressed their feelings for each other. Neji hadn't spoken coldly towards him in five years, and now he was reprimanding Naruto for not noticing the attention that Hinata had given him for the most recent third of their lives.

"I-I-I..." Naruto couldn't think of anything more to say. He wanted to defend himself aggressively, but he also felt like he should be sorry for not noticing sooner. He didn't actually decide upon anything, but his response came out as a compromise between the two: "S-sorry, Neji. I mean, I didn't mean to keep her waiting…but she was so shy around me and I didn't notice that it was 'cause she liked me…"

Naruto trailed off because he saw Neji's stern gaze fade into a facial expression of a smirk. He realized that Neji was just teasing him, and as a result he became slightly irritated, "_Teme._" he exclaimed rather weakly, as he was having trouble keeping himself from matching Neji's smirk. Still, it was kind of annoying. Everyone here was giving him a hard time about dating Hinata.

Hinata herself had seemed mortified that Neji would complain that Naruto had taken too long to notice she liked him. When she realized that it was a joke, however, Hinata seemed to enjoy it, for she was giggling a little bit. Naruto found that it was pointless to fight the laughter bubbling up inside him, so he just let it out in one of his short, "Heh-heh," chuckles.

Neji said, "I have no real concerns. In fact, before Hinata-sama came to tell me about it, I was meditating and I noticed that her chakra is flowing more quickly through her body than it usually does when she is not training or in combat. You seem to have brought out more of her Hyuuga strength with your relationship, Naruto."

Naruto looked at Hinata and said, "Really? You think so, Neji?"

"I have only looked at her chakra flow once since we returned from Suna, but it seems to me that you are the reason behind it," Neji confirmed his opinion on the matter.

Hinata added, "My training with Team 8 went really well, Naruto-kun. Kurenai-sensei said she thought it was good that we're finally dating because it was the best training session I've ever had with Team 8."

"Wow, that's great! What about me, Neji? Is my chakra flowing better?" Naruto was hopeful that Hinata caused the same kind of thing in him.

Neji activated his byakugan and looked for a moment. Then he said, "Naruto, I have not ever looked at how fast your chakra usually flows. I don't think I have ever had my byakugan active when you have been in a casual situation, either. Every time I've seen your chakra it has been either in a combat situation or while we were on a mission."

"Oh," Naruto said, slightly disappointed.

"However, your chakra is flowing quite rapidly. I would say that since you caused Hinata-sama's chakra to flow more quickly, that she has probably done the same for yours," Neji said fairly confidently.

This excited Naruto. "All right! That's pretty cool, huh, Hinata?"

Hinata giggled in front of him. "Hehe, hai Naruto-kun," she said as she nodded her head amusedly.

They all talked for a little while longer about various different topics. When they were ready to leave, they bade Neji goodbye and received another round of congratulations from him. They left his room and started walking back to Hinata's room. On the way, Hinata asked, "Naruto-kun, would you like to meet Hanabi too?"

Naruto recalled that Hinata did have a younger sister, though he couldn't remember where, when, or from whom he had learned that information. He figured he may as well meet all the important people today, but he still wanted to take her out on a date somewhere. He said, "Sure, that'd be cool. Would you like to go somewhere after that, or do you think I should meet more of your family?" Naruto honestly wouldn't have minded meeting any more of Hinata's family, so he didn't say it in any kind of way that suggested he would rather not.

Hinata smiled sweetly at him and blushed a tiny bit. Naruto always thought that was really cute, and it always made him want to hug her. They were walking, so instead he just reached his left arm around and let his hand hang near her left shoulder while they walked. She nodded and said, "I'd like that, Naruto-kun."

Naruto wasn't worried about where they would go yet – he didn't want to rush his meeting with Hinata's sister at all. He would ask her where she wanted to go after they were both ready to go.

Even before Naruto walked into Hinata's sister's room, he felt awkward. He knew why he felt awkward – it was for a few reasons, as a matter of fact.

First of all, he was going through the "meet the family" phase of his relationship with Hinata, and he was nervous. He wanted to make a good first impression on the closest members of Hinata's family. He wanted to do this because he was very proud of the fact that he was going out with Hinata, and he wanted to do his best to make sure her family liked him right off the bat. Poor first impressions took so much effort to turn back around and make people into friends. He had done it with anyone he'd tried to befriend, and even some he'd not tried to befriend, but it was always so hard.

Another reason he felt awkward was the fact that Hinata had told him she was twelve years old. While he wasn't bothered in the least by kids, he didn't know any that were that age. Starting with Konohamaru's age group, he had made a point of hanging out with future shinobi of Konoha, but he had missed Hanabi's year (he thought that's the name that Hinata had called her sister anyway). If he had known any kids Hanabi's age, they likely would have known Hinata's sister, and that would have been something he could talk about as an ice breaker. As it was, he didn't know anything about Hinata's sister, and it would be a guessing game from the start as to how to act towards her.

A third reason for his apprehension was the fact that Hinata's sister was (obviously) a Hyuuga. So far, he had only met one girl Hyuuga, and he wondered if most female Hyuugas were like Hinata or more like the rest of the Hyuuga clan – all serious and whatnot. He knew that if Hanabi was serious all the time, she might not appreciate how he usually acted around kids. He kinda hoped Hanabi was more like Hinata so it would be easy to talk to her, but as it was, he had no idea if acting like he usually did around kids was a good idea or not.

At any rate, he didn't have long to think about it because Hanabi's room, as it turned out, was right next to Hinata's. He was glad that he had remembered exactly where Hinata's room was, because knocking on and then barging into Hanabi's room would have been really embarrassing.

Hinata knocked three times (like she always seemed to do) on her sister's door and waited for a response. "Come in, Hinata," a slightly squeaky (but still not annoying) voice called from inside the room.

Hinata opened the door and walked into the room, and Naruto followed her. "Hanabi, this is Naruto," she said to Hanabi, who still hadn't turned up to look at Hinata. Hanabi seemingly wouldn't have moved from the position she was in if Hinata had said anything else – she looked like she had just sat down to meditate on a mat similar to the one in Neji's room. Naruto guessed that she wouldn't have moved originally because the movement seemed like a surprised movement. Hanabi jerked her head to the right so she could see Hinata out of her peripheral vision.

"_Uzumaki_ Naruto?" she asked in a voice that sounded slightly disbelieving.

"Hai, that's right," Hinata nodded, which caused Hanabi to get up out of her meditative position and turn around fully.

"Uh, hi Hanabi. It's, uh, good to meet you," Naruto said, not able to think of anything better to say. He held out his hand, but Hanabi just stood there looking at him.

All of a sudden, Hanabi turned to Hinata and said, "I know you said you _liked_ him…but I thought every kunoichi in your class did. Did you _actually_ ask him out?" When Hanabi had said she thought every kunoichi their age liked him he thought, _hey I like this kid already!_

Hinata said, "Well, no, but…I mean I almost did…but he asked first…"

Hanabi's eyes widened. She turned back to Naruto, but when she spoke, it wasn't to Naruto. "Naruto asked you out? _The_ Uzumaki Naruto asked you out? Wow, sis, I didn't know you were that popular!" She then focused her words on him, "Did you _really_ ask her out?"

"Heh-heh, yeah I did," he said, though he had to admit silently that it wasn't because he thought Hinata was popular. It wasn't that he thought she was unpopular – he had just never thought about that aspect of society before. Except when it came to male popularity and his competition with Sasuke.

Just after the first minute he could see what kind of personality Hanabi had. She was serious, all right – the meditation mat spoke enough to that truth. But she was also confident. Something he heard in the way she spoke made it sound like she had the utmost confidence in herself. Well, that wasn't unusual in a Hyuuga either, from what he could tell. All of the Hyuugas he had met were confident. He clearly remembered that Hinata hadn't always been as confident as she was now, but she was certainly confident enough at this point. Hanabi was also social. Her talk of Hinata's being popular or not was an obvious indicator of that. The only reason Hanabi would mention popularity was if she was interested in the popularity of her own group of ninja.

_Heh_, thought Naruto, _if she was older, she might make a good kunoichi for Sasuke_. The thought came to him spontaneously without any warning. He wondered why he would think of something like that. He vaguely remembered resolving himself to keeping an eye out for kunoichi who would suit Sasuke, just to give him a hand if he really was looking for a girlfriend. He had put the thought way in the back of his mind, and apparently something about Hanabi sparked the memory.

He winced a little as he thought of a lump forming on the top of his head if he dared mention this thought to Sasuke in Sakura's presence. He could practically hear Sakura shouting, "Pervert! What are you doing looking at 12-year-olds for Sasuke? He needs a mature woman!" Naruto mentally rolled his eyes as he told himself, as if responding defensively to Sakura, _Okay, okay, geeze, I wasn't _really_ serious._ Then, as an extra aside to himself, _though it would have been cool to be Sasuke's brother-in-law._

Naruto's imagination released control of his consciousness just in time for him to realize that Hanabi had just grasped his offered hand. "It's nice to meet you too, Naruto," she said as she shook a very girly (but somehow still powerful) shake, something he might expect from a girl Hyuuga.

Deciding to start off with something he knew about the Hyuuga clan in general, Naruto asked about how developed Hanabi's byakugan abilities were. Apparently, she could see a lot of the major tenketsu – the ones that always got used – but it was tough for her to see the lesser-used ones. He asked if there was anyone good at taijitsu in her class, and she surprised him by making him realize that he did know somebody in her age group.

He didn't _actually_ know the kid, but he knew of him because baa-chan and Shizune had mentioned his name a lot recently. Apparently he was some genius kid who rivaled even Sasuke's scores in the Academy. Naruto had been impressed, because now that it was five years in the past, he could admit that Sasuke was a much better student than he ever was.

"Oh, yeah, that guy," Naruto had said, interested, "what's he like? I've never met him, but I've heard about him."

Hanabi went into a lot of detail about how strong and powerful this kid was. Throughout the explanation, Naruto looked over at Hinata and saw that she was surprised. Apparently Hinata hadn't heard anything about this kid. Naruto raised his eyebrows, suggesting that maybe Hanabi liked the guy, at which Hinata covered her mouth and giggled a little bit.

"What's so funny?" Hanabi asked, seemingly annoyed that she was interrupted while describing the 'most popular ninja _ever_.' (Hanabi wasn't quite as fangirlish as Sakura or Ino had been towards Sasuke, but it was obvious that she at least liked the kid).

"Hehe, nothing, Hanabi. Just you sure seem to like this Enishi."

"So what if I _do_? _I'm_ the best kunoichi in the Academy, so I'm allowed to like him," she lifted her chin just a little bit, proudly.

Hinata giggled a little more, but nodded, "You're allowed – it's just cute."

Naruto had heard stories of brothers bantering good-naturedly, but he hadn't really thought that girls would do much in the way of bantering. What he witnessed between Hinata and Hanabi changed his mind about the relationship between sisters. After a little bit of heat in the conversation, it evaporated into something that soon caused all of them to laugh hard enough to make Naruto's stomach start to hurt.

After a few more minutes of Hinata's introduction of Hanabi to Naruto, they left Hanabi's room and started walking toward the main gate of the Hyuuga complex. On the way, Naruto commented favorably about Hinata's family. She said, "I'm glad you like them, Naruto-kun. Umm…where did you think you wanted to take me?"

"Hmm, that's a good question. Wanna grab something to eat?" To tell the truth, he hadn't really had anything to eat since the meal right before he had left the training grounds with Team 7.

Hinata seemed to think about it for a moment, then nodded and said, "Hai, that sounds good."

"All right, where would you like to go to eat?" He asked, happy to go anywhere with Hinata for a bite to eat.

* * *

Hinata thought about it for a minute. She would really like to go somewhere fancy with Naruto on a date, but seeing as how she was still in the uniform she used for training, and so was Naruto, she didn't want to go anywhere fancy and be in such dirty clothes. She didn't want to go back to her room and change either, because then she would look nice, but she might make Naruto feel underdressed.

She realized that Naruto might not care that much if he wasn't dressed properly for a fancy restaurant, and to be honest, it wouldn't matter much to her either because she would be with Naruto. Even so, she would feel bad about flat out asking Naruto to go somewhere fancy, and suggesting go there in their present state of cleanliness didn't seem like a good idea.

She thought about all the places she knew of that weren't very fancy, and then thought of the places at which Naruto would most likely enjoy eating, considering food and atmosphere. Then it hit her – Ichiraku Ramen!

She had been there without Naruto the time she had prepared the food for the rations. She liked the food there – at least she liked Naruto's favorite dish – and so she figured it would be a perfect place for a date with her boyfriend. So she suggested that they go there: "Ichiraku Ramen."

Naruto had already been looking at her, but if he hadn't been, Hinata imagined that he would have jerked his head to look at her. What he did do, considering the position of his head and the orientation of his eyes, was cock his head to the side and push his eyebrows closer together as someone would do when confused, but pleasantly surprised. "Hinata, you like Ichiraku Ramen?"

With the suggestion that they go to Naruto's favorite place to eat, Hinata now realized that Naruto would be curious that she liked to eat there too. She had only been there once, so he had obviously never seen her there while he was eating. Considering that he had probably been there more days than he hadn't in the past two years, he would naturally be curious as to why he hadn't ever seen her there.

Hinata blushed as she realized that she would probably end up telling him about how she prepared the rations for their two missions together. "Hai," she nodded, "I do. I've only eaten there once, but I liked it, and I know that you like eating there."

Naruto was again surprised, "Only once! Why didn't you go back, if you liked it?"

Hinata told him that it had been recently, and she hadn't had the time to go back and eat there, even though she had thought about it. It was true that she had, on occasion since eating that first meal from Ichiraku Ramen, had a craving for the soup. She continued to tell him about how she had gone there originally just to make the rations for their missions.

"Wow! So that's why they tasted like ramen! I wondered how you did that. I just thought you made them a special way and it just happened to taste like ramen. Heh-heh, you didn't have to do all that, Hina-chan."

Hinata smiled and blushed happily. It was nice to be able to impress Naruto, even with some of the simpler things she did. She found that she couldn't really find an appropriate response to what Naruto had just said. Sure, she hadn't needed to do it, but she had certainly wanted to. It had been the best opportunity for her to really impress Naruto enough to make him look at her, and she didn't want to miss it, despite her shy personality.

So, she just winked at him, which caused her to blush a little more, and fell into a happy silence as she rested her head on his left shoulder. She couldn't see his face, but somehow she felt him smile too, and then he tilted his head to rest on the top of hers as they walked slowly towards the ramen restaurant.

But, of course, since he was Naruto, and the distance to Ichiraku Ramen was even larger from Hinata's house than from Naruto's apartment, Naruto couldn't stay quiet for the whole remainder of their walk. Hinata didn't mind at all; she enjoyed both the silences they shared and the times they talked.

Naruto spoke up after about five minutes of just walking, as usual with, "Ne, Hinata."

Hinata lifted her head and looked at him. "Hai, Naruto-kun?"

"I was wondering…what's with the scroll in Neji's room?"

Hinata blinked. _Scroll?_, she asked herself, and then remembered the single wall decoration that was in Neji's room. She had seen it so many times by now she had nearly taken it for granted. Thinking of the scroll with the distorted version of the Caged Bird Seal on it made her think of when Neji had put it up.

_Flashback_

"Hinata-sama?" a voice said from outside Hinata's room. It had sounded like Neji-nii-san's voice. That was odd, considering he had never called upon her before. Just to make sure it was who she thought it was, she activated her byakugan and confirmed that it was indeed her older cousin.

"Hai? C-come in, Neji-nii-san," she called to him. Even though he had been very harsh with her during the Chuunin exams, she still had respect for her cousin.

This was something that was unusual in the Hyuuga clan: normally, head family members didn't show much respect to branch family members. Hinata honestly didn't like any of that; she believed that everyone deserved respect, regardless of when they happened to be born compared to their siblings.

Neji opened the door and came a couple of steps into her room. Hinata was curious as to why he would come to her like this. He seemed…not like himself. He began speaking: "Hinata-sama…I have a favor to ask of you."

More out of habit than out of actually consciously consenting to a favor, Hinata nodded and asked, "What favor, Neji-nii-san?" It wasn't that she wouldn't have agreed to do him a favor, but she startled herself when she just automatically agreed to it without thinking about what favor he could possibly ask of her.

"First, I wanted to apologize for my cruelty towards you during the Chuunin exams. I know that the duty of the branch family is to protect the head family…and I nearly killed you. Have you recovered from the wounds I inflicted?"

Hinata nodded, astounded. Ever since the day her father had used the brain-cell destroying technique on Neji's father, Neji had never shown kindness towards her. Now he was apologizing for something he did as a result of his hatred for the head family. He had never attempted to hide the fact that he hated his branch-family status, even to Hinata, who believed she had done her best to show that she didn't like the treatment of the branch family by the head family either.

Thinking of her wounds almost made her cough, as the illusion of the pain clutching at her chest returned. Thanks to the ANBU ninja, she had indeed recovered 100 percent, and she was more than willing to put the cause of the injury behind her if she could have a better relationship with her cousin. _Maybe_, she hoped, _we could even be friendly and train together_. That would definitely be good, because she would nearly certainly grow stronger for her Naruto-kun if she trained with the Hyuuga super-genius.

Neji smiled unemotionally, though his eyes did show a tiny bit of relief. "As for the favor I wish to ask…will you hear it?"

Hinata didn't know _what_ was going on. First, in terms of power, Neji was well above her. She could sometimes see tenketsu with her byakugan, and it was improving, but it was still something she needed a lot of work on. Second, for Neji to be asking a favor of any head family member was odd. She assumed, based on his personality, that he would just as soon (or perhaps even much sooner) do something himself. Third, he was speaking very respectfully, whereas before the Chuunin exams he would not be so respectful. She was curious as to what was going on that Neji would need her help for. "Hai, Neji-nii-can. How can I help?"

"You have always been fair to me; even when we were fighting you fought hard but without any malice. This is why I have come to ask this favor of you, specifically."

"I see," said Hinata, not really understanding yet, but realizing that an introduction like that meant this was probably a family issue he wanted help with. She hoped she could help.

"I heard that your injury kept you from witnessing some of my fight with Uzumaki Naruto," he said, adding unnecessarily that he was the boy that cheered her on during the end of the second Chuunin exam. Hinata had the urge to roll her eyes, but refrained because she couldn't expect Neji to know that she not only knew but secretly liked Naruto. Meanwhile, Neji was asking a question: "Did you happen to hear any of what he said regarding the Hyuuga clan?"

Hinata let her imagination return her to that particular day. She had tried her very best to ignore what felt like a huge ice pick that was jabbing itself into her heart. Naruto had just an hour previously said he wanted her to watch him fight Neji, and she wanted to be able to fulfill any desire he had of her, no matter what it was. She had meant everything she had said to comfort him after he had confessed his nervousness to her, and she wanted to see him fulfill his promise of defeating Neji. (Even though she bore no grudge against Neji, she would certainly root for Naruto over her cousin).

But she just couldn't keep the pain in her chest from bringing her to the ground. She couldn't keep her eyes open, and she could barely keep herself conscious. Even though she felt hands on her body carrying her to some safer place, she was determined to witness the fight however she could. In this state she couldn't summon enough chakra to use her byakugan, so she put everything she had into enhancing her hearing.

She heard Neji tell his story, and then, at the very end, she heard Naruto say, "I don't know about the Hyuuga's fate of hatred, but if you think it's impossible, then don't do anything! After I become Hokage…I'll change Hyuuga for you!"

Coming back to the moment, she nodded one more time and said, "Hai, he said he would change our clan for you when he becomes Hokage. He…meant changing the rules about the Caged Bird Seal didn't he?"

Neji nodded back, "I was under that impression, yes. The favor I have to ask is…if he does not become the Hokage, will you be the one to disallow the distinction between head and branch family members?"

Hinata allowed her imagination to take back over for a moment as she returned to lying on the deck of the stadium. If Hinata hadn't already liked Naruto, she would have started after hearing his promise. Her father hadn't told her of the story of Hyuuga Hizashi's death, and Hinata already had a dislike for the clan rules regarding the Caged Bird Seal and the technique passed down in the head family line. Hearing Neji's story, her dislike of the rules increased, and it was just before Naruto had made his promise that she had resolved herself to abolishing these rules.

To have heard Naruto say that he would do it too seemed to heal her heart much better and more effectively than this ANBU's jutsu was doing, even though it was feeling much better already. Naruto was obviously and openly concerned with the workings of the Hyuuga clan, and wanted to do what he could to improve its members' well-being. Not only this, but he was promising to do something Hinata was determined to do as well. Maybe…maybe if she told him she had heard him and liked what he said…he might start looking at her more affectionately…?

Hinata brought herself back to the moment again, and explained that she already planned to do that, and she would gladly help him carry out such a plan. She asked if he had already thought of a plan of action they could take in order to make the Hyuuga clan into a more closely-knit family and, hopefully, an even more powerful and useful force in Konoha.

"I have not thought about the method yet…" Neji replied. "I wished to first seek your approval. Would you work with me on such a plan?"

Hinata nodded. Neji opened his mouth to speak again, but closed it again in hesitation. Hinata didn't want him to feel uncomfortable at all, but if there was something he wanted to say or ask her, she didn't have any objection to hearing it. She asked, "What is it, Neji-nii-san?"

Neji seemed to convince himself to say whatever it was he was going to say, and it came out in the form of a question. "Hinata-sama…you know of my hatred for the Caged Bird Seal. Normally…I would show it by acting cold to a head family member, but I have recently thought of a different way to show it. I think it is less rude and more private…but could I ask you to come to my room to witness it?"

Hinata had no idea what he was talking about, but she decided if it was as he said it was, it couldn't hurt her to see whatever it was he wanted to show her. She agreed, and walked with him back to his room. When they entered the room, Hinata saw what it was that Neji was talking about: there was a scroll lying on the mat he used for meditation. On it was a painted version of the Caged Bird Seal.

Neji picked it up off the floor and then took it over to the corner of the room farthest from the door. It was still visible if you walked into the room, but it was far away. It was then that Hinata noticed that what Neji had painted wasn't quite correct; it was upside down.

She asked him about it, and he told her it was his way of symbolically showing his dislike for the seal. He would keep it up there as long as he had residence in the Hyuuga complex. He explained that he would continue to protect the head family members in order to make it so later on in life, he would be able to say that his duty was to protect all the members of the Hyuuga clan with equal priority.

Hinata admired such an aspiration, and definitely liked the idea of hanging this scroll in her room. She wouldn't put one in her own room because she didn't have the seal on her forehead, and Neji explained that it was something for him personally. Even so, she wanted to show in some way that she liked his idea, so she said, "Neji-nii-san, let me hang it for you."

Neji, who had just about done it already, turned and blinked slowly, a look of slight confusion settling on his face. "You…want to hang it?"

Hinata nodded, and explained that she had agreed to help him turn the Hyuuga clan around, and she believed that hanging it for him would show her commitment to such a promise. She took the scroll from him and hung it where he indicated. She created a very blunt juuken blade and slid the chakra along the paper, chemically fusing it to the wall instead of cutting the paper. She then sharpened the juuken blade and cut the scroll right above the fused portion it was hanging from.

She stepped away and looked at Neji, who nodded in approval. He said, "Arigatoo, Hinata-sama."

_End Flashback_

Coming back to the moment, Hinata decided that the best way to tell Naruto about the scroll in Neji's room was to tell him the exact story of how it had been put up. He was extremely attentive through the whole thing, smiling at some parts and making a reminiscent face for the parts about his battle with Neji. She then proceeded to say, "That's why I've really wanted to be your girlfriend for so long, Naruto-kun."

Naruto looked at her and smiled, and then Hinata quickly added, "I mean, that's not the only reason – I liked you before that too…" She hoped that she didn't make it just seem like she only liked him because she wanted to use him. That was certainly not the case at all.

"Oh yeah, you never did tell me why you liked me," said Naruto, remembering that she was going to in Suna but their conversation had drifted away from the subject and it would have been awkward to suddenly bring it back up.

For the past few minutes, Hinata had practically lived in the past. She let her imagination take over once again as she remembered the first time she had decided she liked Naruto. "It…was in the Academy. A few months before we graduated. You were being so cute, hehe," she paused to giggle a little bit, "Iruka-sensei was trying to get you to do something, but you were being stubborn."

"Heh-heh, yeah, I did that a lot back then didn't I?"

She giggled as she nodded. "I always thought you were really funny – I mean, I didn't like it when you didn't listen because you always seemed so uhhappy, but I didn't mind it for what it was. I knew that you were all alone…and that you couldn't help it and you were just looking for attention. It…always made me sad a little…but everything you did was so cute, it always made me giggle. The other people always got so annoyed…they talked about you…and well I got annoyed with them. I never spoke to them about it – I'm sorry – but I didn't like it.

"One day I realized that I was defending you in my mind to all the people who were talking about you. I – I still didn't say anything…I was still really shy…but I was thinking of the reasons why you acted that way. I guess I was making excuses for you, and I guess that might not be any better, but I was trying…and I didn't know why.

"After our training at the Academy that day, I followed you home. I think you might have noticed me once or twice, but I was really embarrassed and shy about it and I always hid when you turned back. But…I was thinking the whole time, and by the time you got back to your apartment, I…liked you.

"Every day after that, whenever you got stubborn or mad, I had trouble not laughing. You were so funny, and it was so cute."

"Heh-heh, at least somebody thought it was funny," Naruto said happily.

"And well, I guess I started liking you because you were so different. You didn't do a lot of the work Iruka-sensei told you to do, but you still managed to learn the ninjitsu. I mean, you did it strangely – I watched with my byakugan sometimes and looked at your chakra. But you were determined, and you always told everyone you were going to be the Hokage some day.

"I liked you because you were so confident, even though you knew everyone had a higher grade than you. I…wasn't confident at all, even though I did well. I wanted to tell you that I liked you, but I was so shy. I liked you because you were lonely too…and so was I, kind of. I knew that you were all alone…and I felt really bad for you because you didn't have anybody to go home to...but I just couldn't get any courage up to ask you…especially when it was obvious that you liked Sakura-chan."

"Sorry, Hina-chan. I guess I never saw how pretty you are because you were so quiet. I mean, you're really nice too – I don't like you just because you're pretty – but I didn't know that either."

Hinata nodded. "I…well I guess I was a little confident, because I always told myself that I would be a better girlfriend than Sakura-chan." Hinata blushed, then continued, "I thought that maybe if I could just tell you I liked you that maybe you'd start to like me too…I kind of wanted to help you with your chakra…but I was afraid that if I asked if you wanted help you'd get mad at me. You were always so proud – and I liked that too. Hehe, I liked everything about you, Naruto-kun."

Naruto shook his head. "I wish I'd have known. But…I was always off on some kind of tough mission with Team 7…I wouldn't have ever gotten to see you."

"I know, and I had missions with Team 8…it wasn't a good time to have a relationship unless it was within your own team…I was really jealous of Sakura-chan because she was on your team. I…I'm sorry, but I was really happy when you got placed with Sasuke-kun too, because every one of the girls…well except me…liked Sasuke-kun, and Sakura-chan was really competitive with Ino-chan…so I didn't think Sakura-chan would go out with you."

"Yeah, that always used to piss me off. But I'm glad nothing ever happened too. I know you're a much better girlfriend than Sakura would have been for me. Heh-heh, you never punch me in the head."

Hinata giggled. "No…I wouldn't do that, Naruto-kun. Even though it was sometimes kind of funny when I saw Sakura-chan do that. Gomen."

"That's okay, sometimes I deserved it," Naruto admitted unusually. "I was a real idiot most of the time back then."

Hinata sighed and rolled her eyes half-way. "You really _weren't_ an idiot, Naruto-kun. You were just lonely," she said, trying to stifle a giggle. Since they had started going out, Naruto had insisted upon his interpretation that he used to be an idiot. Each time, Hinata had persisted that he wasn't.

Every one of her friends who had relationships (either in the past or currently) had said that there were playful arguments, and she had never thought she would be able to have playful arguments with Naruto. She was glad that she was wrong because it was one of the things that she enjoyed most about her relationship with Naruto.

"Oh yes I _was_ an idiot," argued Naruto playfully, "even _if_ I was lonely."

"No you weren't!" Hinata said excitedly. "You were really smart – and still are," she added hastily before Naruto could make a point about the past-tense use of the verb.

"Haha, I might have been smart, but not when it came to fighting. You watched me all the time – couldn't you see that everything I did was dumb?"

"It was not dumb!" Hinata was having a lot of trouble keeping herself from laughing. She knew that Naruto was just joking with her and he didn't really believe all of this – at least, not completely. "You ended up winning the fights."

"Sure, some of them, but that was just because I had so much chakra stamina. I guess you'll—" He started in a tone that Hinata hadn't heard from Naruto before, then he interrupted himself and started saying something completely different, "—uhh – I mean that's the only reason I won most of those battles, because I could last longer than the other guys. Like with my fight against Neji. I didn't do anything right except at the very end…and then I was using the Kyuubi's chakra, so it wasn't like I did the winning. I had help."

Hinata blinked. She was just now realizing that the tone Naruto had started with after he mentioned stamina was unmistakably suggestive. Her mind followed through to the part that was about to be insinuated and realized what Naruto almost joked about without thinking.

Extremely embarrassing on one note, because she was just almost the object of a sexual joke from Naruto; slightly nerve-racking on another note because even though she knew Naruto hadn't had any partners before, the nature of the joke suggested that he had; pretty funny on yet another note because of the nature of the joke and the fact that Naruto was being so intentionally arrogant; and on a final note, a little bit stimulating, because the joke let her know that Naruto was at least thinking of doing naughty things with her.

Not knowing exactly how to react to that part of what he had just said, but at the same time acknowledging subconsciously that the unsaid comment was distinctly satisfying, she just let it slide and said, "But you had to learn how to take control of the Kyuubi's chakra, and you couldn't be an idiot if you knew how to do that. Besides, you had a good idea when you dug down and got him from below. That's not very idiotic."

"Heh-heh, well…I was still an idiot most of the time. Sometimes I got lucky and came up with something totally ridiculous that just happened to work."

"Because it was ridiculous. A lot of shinobi don't think of ridiculous things to do because most of the time it doesn't work. But you came up with ridiculous stuff that did work."

Naruto sighed. "I guess you win again," he conceded, and then before she could react in an intentionally cute way by celebrating the victory, Naruto reached his left hand for her nose and gently poked it. Involuntarily, she scrunched her nose and looked down at the tip of it.

A small "Eep," squeaked its way out of her mouth, and she covered her nose from further assault. Then she let her eyes soften and she gave into the giggling that was again threatening to burst from her lungs.

Naruto called her cute, after which another light-hearted argument over who was cuter ensued. They argued almost all the way to Ichiraku Ramen, Naruto ending the argument with another light poke to Hinata's nose. Hinata giggled some more, Naruto laughed, and the last hundred steps or so of their walk towards the ramen shop were spent shuddering slightly from their silent laughter. Naruto's left hand was clutching lightly Hinata's left shoulder, and Hinata's right arm wrapped all the way around Naruto's right side to press lightly on his torso. It was so wonderful to be with her Naruto-kun.


End file.
