Desperation

Desperation

Chapter 2: Almost Back to Normal

Hinata awoke late the next morning, feeling sated from the wonderful dream that she had had. It had felt so real that she wished that she would go back to sleep, once again immersed in such a pleasant state of dreaming.

In her dream, she and Naruto had been getting married. She had been so happy as Naruto kept coming up to her at the reception, picking her up and twirling her around in his excitement that they were finally married. It was a dream that she often had whenever she had had a particularly good experience with Naruto the day before, like the time that they had talked before Naruto's chuunin exam, or like the time that Naruto had gotten back from his three-year training.

Hinata hugged her pillow, trying to remember the encounter that she had had with Naruto that would spark such a lovely dream. She stretched out, and suddenly she could feel the reason behind what had made her have that dream as the memories of the night before came back to her upon feeling the not quite soreness between her legs.

"Oh...oh... no..." Hinata whispered. Had she...? Had they...? Hinata began to gasp for breath as she slowly slid her hand down between her legs. She could still feel her wetness there, feel his wetness, as she hadn't bothered to clean up upon returning home.

Her entire body shook as she began to go into shock. She slowly rolled out of bed, still shaking, as she stripped the sheets from her bed, pulling them around her body (even though she had changed into a long nightshirt) and headed to her bathroom to shower.

She almost didn't want to let the sheets fall from around her body, nor did she want to take off her nightshirt. She thought about brining them into the shower with her, letting the water soak her body along with her sheets and shirt, but decided against it. As soon as she stripped she got into the shower as quickly as possible, feeling somehow all the more unsure of herself because of what she had done. She felt insecure in her own skin as though she had been raped (instead of the one doing the manipulating), as though her mental break down had been a self-rape. Last night she had lost her senses, and now that they had returned to her, she didn’t trust herself.

The water ran down her body as she tried to catch a grip on her breathing, but the more she tried to calm herself down, the worse it got. Tears began to flow from her eyes, and she decided to let them come. What had she done? What had she been thinking? What if Naruto realized that what had happened between them hadn't been a dream? But of course he would realize it hadn't been a dream! Naruto didn't exactly strike her as the type of guy that would dream about another girl while he was engaged with someone else. Then again, he hadn't seemed to mind so much last night. Part of her was actually disappointed in Naruto's lack of moral standards; even in his dreams he should try and be more faithful, but Hinata couldn't hold it against him. After all, she was the one that had seduced him.

Hinata couldn't help but let out a small, hysterical laugh at the irony of her seducing anyone, let alone her precious Naruto-kun. She had been after him for years, and when he was finally with someone else, Hinata had finally found the courage to be able to seduce him.

Then again, courage might not be the right word for what Hinata had done. First of all, it truly wasn’t courageous, more like stupid and selfish. Second, Hinata doubted she could do what she had done last night ever again. It had been a freak thing, a one-time thing: something that had happened spur of the moment due to her desperation. There were all sorts of stories of people doing incredible things when pushed to their limits. She knew an elderly woman who had had a dog that weighed almost as much as she had. When the dog got injured, the woman had been able to miraculously lift the dog in order to carry the dog to the vet down the street. Shinobi were always sharing incredible stories of civilians doing things when they were desperate against attacking shinobi. Hinata could now add her own story to the list.

But now what?

She'd had...goodness... sex...with Naruto. Her Naruto-kun. She almost wanted to giggle at the fact that she had fulfilled her dream of losing her virginity to Naruto. Yet another part of her wanted to sob as she had also always imagined it would be on their wedding night with Naruto knowing what was going on because they loved each other.

For a long time she stood in the shower without moving, letting the water fall around her. Finally she got a hold of herself. She was a shinobi, and she couldn't just lose it. If there were the odd chance that Naruto ended up believing that he had only been dreaming, she would have to pretend that nothing had happened. Even if he did remember, she couldn’t just drown herself in the shower. What kind of a shinobi was she? She had more mental will power than this. And even if she didn’t, she would pretend that she did – for Naruto’s sake.

If Naruto wanted to marry Ino, there was no way that Ino would be okay with the idea of the two of them having sex. So if Naruto told Ino, Hinata would beg for her forgiveness. And, while Hinata didn't truly want to see Naruto marry Ino, after her bout of insanity, she did realize that she wanted Naruto to be happy. If Ino made Naruto happy, then Hinata would do everything in her power to make sure that Naruto had everything he wanted.

She would make up for her desperation by making sure that Naruto and Ino were the happiest they could possibly be together. With a newfound determination, she began to wash in the shower, the numbness slowly fading. She ignored where she could see Naruto's finger marks along her hips where he had gripped her so tightly to enter her the night before, ignored the way her heart-constricted as she thought of his hands gripping Ino that way. Instead she set to work on formulating her plan at redemption.

- - - - - - - - - - - -

While anyone else might have put their plan into action right away, Hinata decided to wait a little bit before putting her plans into motion.

In other words, she waited two weeks until she actually ran into him, not even on purpose.

The entire two weeks had been nothing but a sort of numbing dream to Hinata. It wasn't bad but it wasn't good either. She constantly felt like people could see that she had lost her virginity (especially since there were so many byakugan users at her house, she honestly wasn't sure how many of them would look to see if she still had her hymen). There was also the constant guilt that made her feel as though someone would be able to tell with just once glance that she had seduced Naruto and made her lovable Naruto-kun cheat on his fiancé.

And the question as to whether or not Naruto and Ino were really engaged had been answered. Yes, they were engaged, and it was actually rather hot gossip amongst the shinobi. Ironically enough, no one talked to her about it, though she had even heard shinobi talking about it in the Hokage office. She wondered if people knew that she still cared about Naruto and were trying to be polite about not rubbing it in her face that he was now taken.

It had been Kurenai who had asked her, eight days after she had seduced Naruto if she had known that Naruto was engaged. Hinata had explained very calmly that yes, she had heard, and that she hoped Naruto was happy. Everyone seemed a bit shocked at her calm answer, and even Shino looked like he wanted to say something. (Kurenai had quietly told Shino to let her be.) Apparently Kurenai felt bad for her because she gave Hinata a lot more praise on the next few missions they went on.

It was back from a mission that Hinata finally saw Naruto for the first time since the night she had now come to think of as “the seduction.” Naruto was with Sasuke, the two of them looking a bit ruffled up, both of them clearly having just come from a training session.

"Using the replacement technique was not that funny," Sasuke muttered darkly.

"Oh come off it! It was hilarious! You should have seen your face when you realized I used the technique to replace my body with your sword. You flailed your arms around your back to see if it was really your sword!"

"Next time, I’ll kill you with my sword before you get the chance, and I did not flail," Sasuke growled darkly to himself.

"What did you say?" Naruto asked.

"Nothing," Sasuke clipped, though Naruto narrowed his eyes, knowing better than to believe it was nothing. Hinata had half a mind to tell Naruto what Sasuke had said, when Sasuke was far away from them and didn't know that she had been the one to say it of course. Sasuke was kind of scary in Hinata’s opinion.

Hinata had gotten so absorbed in watching Naruto interacting with Sasuke that she hadn't realized that her teammates had left her far behind, and she almost turned away from Sasuke and Naruto with a jolt when she didn't know what she was going to say to Naruto if he turned and saw her staring at him. At the moment, Naruto seemed a bit preoccupied with talking to Sasuke as he began to change the subject from their latest sparring match to Ino.

"Ino cooked me this amazing dish last night. It was one of the best I ever had! Whatever your favorite food is, I'll bet Ino could cook it to perfection," Naruto said. Sasuke arched an eyebrow.

"Well it's not ramen, so unless she knows how to cook anything other than noodles, I'm not impressed," Sasuke said airily. Naruto looked crestfallen.

"Come off it Sasuke! Why are you being such a prick about this? Why do you keep putting everything I say about Ino down?" Naruto asked. Sasuke sighed and shook his head.

"I'm not an idiot, Naruto. There’s something up with you just deciding to marry Ino. And whatever it is, I don’t think I like it."

Hinata was taken aback at what Sasuke said (not to mention the fact that she wasn't sure she had ever heard him talk that much in one breath before).

But Naruto didn't seem shocked about what Sasuke said. Instead, he seemed angry.

"How many times have I told you that you don’t know what you’re talking about? We love each other a lot," Naruto said, crossing his arms over his chest defensively.

"Naruto, stop lying to me, and damnit, stop lying to yourself. I still think you’re lying – even if you don’t know it. You’re not in love. You’re just excited that someone finally likes you. That’s not love. And those lies are hurting more people than you realize with this charade," Sasuke said, and as he said it, he glanced at Hinata for a brief moment, as though speaking to her before turning back to Naruto. Naruto saw how Sasuke's eyes seemed to get distracted for a moment, and he turned to see what Sasuke had looked at. Hinata looked around her to see if there was anything she could hide behind, and she quickly ducked behind a wall. She peeked back out to see if she had been detected.

Naruto's eyes met Hinata's, and he went still as his blue eyes widened. A blush crept up his cheeks and he turned to Sasuke muttering something quickly about how he needed to leave and wandered off.

All Hinata could think about was that Naruto knew. He knew it hadn’t been a dream.

A cold weight settled in her as she watched Naruto disappear in the crowd, wondering how she was ever going to face him again.

She also wondered how she could be so stupid as to peek back so quickly and let him see her. And why didn’t she just hide and activate her Byakugan? What kind of shinobi was she? Why did Naruto always see the worst side of her, yet was able to bring out her best side? Stupid stupid stupid! Naruto made her stupid.

Naruto also made her heart ache. She had cooked for Naruto before when they had gone on missions together, but that didn’t seem like a big deal to him now. It made her heart ache to know that Ino had captured Naruto’s attentions instead of her. Hinata took in a deep shuddering breath. She wanted Naruto happy, and she would make him happy as best she could, even if it made her feel so miserable.


Next Chapter: Guilty Conscience


Poor Hinata. (My fiancé/editor laughed at me when reading this and added “As you’re the one that’s causing her suffering.”) But – but – I do it out of love! There’d be no story if she didn’t have to work for it. (My poor, poor fiancé has to put up with me too.)

Hope you all enjoyed the chapter! ~ Jelp