Caged

Caged

Persepolis130

Notes: Sorry for taking so long to post! Thanks for sticking with the story this long, and extra special thanks to people who posted reviews. I fangirl (yes, it's a verb now!) at your coolness. This is the last installment, hope you like!

CHAPTER 18

"Tenten! Tenten!"

Grabbing another pebble, Neji tossed it through her open second-story window. His Byakugan saw it plink gently off her cheek, and he hissed her name once more, as loudly as he dared at this time of night.

“Who is it?” she mumbled, blinking sleepy eyes at her empty room.

“It’s Neji,” he whispered, his hands cupped around his mouth to make the sound travel. “Come to your window!”

He watched her chakra output increase as she sat up and rubbed a patch of dried spit from the corner of her mouth. She smoothed her sleep-mussed hair back as she climbed to her feet, making her way to the window. “What do you want?" she asked, voice thick with sleep, "It’s the middle of the night...”

He deactivated the Byakugan when he saw her appear in the window. “We need to talk,” he told her, thinking offhandedly that she looked almost pretty, the soft moonlight shining against her skin. “Let me come up.”

She sighed and rubbed her forehead. “Neji... I can’t-- holy shit, what’re you wearing?”

“My clothes were wet,” he said in a low voice, determinedly not looking down at his current attire.

“So you decided to wear THAT?!” she squeaked.

“Shh! Tenten!” he hissed, not wanting to wake the whole street, “I didn’t have any choice!”

“But, but...” she squirmed uneasily, all traces of drowsiness gone, “Neji... have you LOOKED at yourself?”

Grimacing, Neji pulled at the uncomfortably clinging material that was currently rubbing unnervingly against his thighs, cramping his shoulder blades, and chafing at the bandage on his neck. “It’s not like you’ve never seen green spandex before!”

Tenten gaped.

“I’m coming up,” he announced, gathering his chakra for the leap.

When he landed on her sill, Tenten backed toward her futon, hands raised and a look of intense disbelief on her face. “PLEASE tell me you haven’t decided to wear that thing on a permanent basis. Because even if you don’t have the eyebrows, it’s--”

“I told you I didn’t have any choice,” he said, pulling her window shut behind him. “My clothes were wet, and Gai-sensei loaned it to me. He doesn’t own anything else!”

“How did your clothes get wet?” she asked, still looking highly apprehensive. “It hasn’t rained.”

Neji scowled. “I wore them in sensei's shower.”

Tenten blinked.

Too exhausted to come up with a plausible explanation (if such a thing were even possible given the circumstances), the best he could do was, "First it was really incredibly hot out, and then this woman made me terribly upset, and after that Gai-sensei hit me and took me to his place for medication, and--"

“Are you drunk?” Tenten asked.

Neji sighed, slumping down onto her bed mat, and wished he were.

“...because you’re acting really weird.” Tenten sat down lightly next to him, looking concerned. Neji shook his throbbing head as she fiddled with the hem of her bedclothes nervously. "Um, Neji? Gai-sensei didn't... ah... do anything... strange to you... did he?"

Neji stifled an overly-knowing groan. "He's not like that."

Tenten shrugged, looking unconvinced. "If you say so."

A small scroll hanging beside her window bore the kanji for “strength” drew Neji’s attention, and he took a deep breath, his lungs stiff at the effort. His entire being felt open and raw, as if his soul had been scraped to the core with a dull kunai. But he had to go on.

"Gai-sensei says the first step is admitting you have a problem," he mumbled to himself.

He felt Tenten shift beside him. "What?"

“Nothing," he said quietly. Swallowing heavily, he added, "But... I think there’s something... maybe... " he paused, his chest feeling unnaturally tight. "I might have a... problem...”

“Yeah," she answered, giving him an odd look, "you’re wearing a hideous green spandex bodysuit.”

Neji sighed sadly and shook his head, feeling grossly misunderstood. “Other than that.”

Tenten giggled.

“It's just that lately..." he sighed, turning his gaze down to his knees, "women keep throwing themselves at me,” he told her, too worn-out to explain. "And I... don't know what to do about it."

“Yeah, that must be awful, Neji,” she told him, sounding annoyed. "However do you cope?"

He frowned and yanked at his chafing neckline again, silently cursing Temari, himself, and the world in general. “No, you don't understand. I hate it. I wish I’d never had sex with anyone, ever. I never even wanted to in the first place, but--”

“Get out.”

Neji blinked up at her, feeling cruelly betrayed. “But I--”

“No. This is not happening," Tenten announced, hands on her hips as she glared across at him. "The Chuunin Exams start tomorrow, and I am not missing an entire night’s sleep because you want to make yourself feel better for publicly humiliating me, so--”

“That’s not what this is about!” he insisted.

“Then what IS it about?” she demanded, "Why did you even come here?!" She looked more tired than angry though.

Laying back against Tenten’s bed mat, hands folded across his stomach, Neji stared uninterestedly at a water stain on her far wall. “I don't know. I just felt like I should.”

He felt her lay down beside him, her shoulder brushing his. After a few moments, she said, more calmly now, “I don’t get it.”

Neji sighed. This was miserable.

There was nothing he wouldn't give to be with Hinata right now. She'd understand what he meant. She'd soothe him and fall asleep curled in his arms, soft skin warm against him, and the world would be right again.

But he couldn't have that anymore, not with what he knew now. He'd never feel that calm comfort, that feeling of oneness, of peace. He couldn't turn back time. Fate had dictated another path, and he had no choice but to follow the road ahead of him.

And there was no way he could go home tonight.

Closing his eyes, Tenten's bed soft against his back, he told her, “There are just some things you can’t undo, no matter how much you want to."

"Like what?" she asked, turning onto her side and resting a hand on his shoulder.

Like falling in love with my own sister.

"I don't know.”

Tenten pondered this for some time, taking a strand of Neji’s slightly damp hair and twisting it gently between her fingers. “Yeah.”

They lay in silence for several long minutes, the sound of their breathing filling the room, Tenten’s callused fingers trailing slowly across his cheek. "Neji..."

He felt her lean toward him, breath on his cheek. "Don't," he whispered, closing his eyes.

"You don't know what it's like," she murmured, sliding her lips lightly across his jaw line. "Feeling like this..."

Cheeks flushed, Neji turned his head away from her, silently willing her to stop. "I wish that were true," he murmured.

He didn't know why he said it. After all he'd done to keep it a secret, he'd gone and said something like that. Maybe it was because, even with all he'd been through, he knew he wouldn't be able to resist her tonight.

As soon as the words left his tongue, he felt Tenten pause, lips inches away, fingers still but warm against his cheek, and he squeezed his eyes shut, inwardly begging her to silence. She hovered there for some time, her breathing slow. Eventually, he heard her take a deep breath before sliding down to lie beside him on the mattress.

Neji opened his mouth to somehow correct himself, but when nothing came out, he closed it again. He just couldn't deal with it right now, any of it. The only rational thought he could form was that he wished this spandex didn't chafe so damn much.

"Okay," Tenten finally whispered. Her fingers squeezed his shoulder in an oddly soothing way.

Neji sighed and relaxed back onto the mattress. Damn, he was tired.

"But..." Tenten began in a quiet voice, "Neji? Can you do me a favor? Just a little one?"

Neji took a deep breath and closed his eyes. He knew getting out of that had been far too easy. He was such an idiot. "I'll try."

"You can sleep here tonight if you want, but..." she sighed, "please, just..."

Oh god, thought Neji, here it comes...

"...just don't ever wear that outfit again. Okay? I mean, it just... really creeps me out. Alright?"

It was a testament to his level of fatigue that Neji heard himself laugh, quiet and low in the back of his throat, and when Tenten giggled and hugged him, he felt as though a weight had been lifted from him. He wondered briefly if this was what friendship was.

So with his head heavy, neck still throbbing, and teammate curled beside him, he finally drifted off to sleep in his clingy but warm green spandex. After the day he'd had, he could've hoped for no better.

XXXXX CHAPTER 19 XXXXX

All things considered, the next few days passed relatively uneventfully. Gai was too worried about Lee and Tenten's progress in the Exams to concern himself overly with Neji, and since he stayed well away from the exam site and anything relating to it, Neji managed to avoid Temari as well. He also saw little of his uncle, and when he did, their exchanges were nothing but formal and appropriate. Neji was left to assume that Hinata had, indeed, spoken to the man and couldn’t help but feel relieved and grateful to her.

Despite all this, or maybe because of it, the days seemed to stretch on endlessly. With nothing worthwhile to do, Neji’s mind ran in circles, one thought chasing another like an idiot dog chasing its tail.

He wished he knew what he wanted; such constant indecision was beginning to drive him mad. He knew it was wrong to want Hinata back, to want to be with someone who didn’t want him. And to love his own sister… it was unthinkable. But he couldn’t make himself stop. It wasn’t as if he could just flip a switch and suddenly not care anymore, as much as he wished he could.

So he trained, working himself to exhaustion and stumbling home with his eyes half-open to a night of restless tossing and turning. He requested yet another mission, any mission, even D-rank, he didn’t care. Anything to keep his mind off things, he’d do it. Hell, he even bought a girlie mag.

It sometimes worked.

Other times it left him feeling sick and empty, staring down incredulously with bleary eyes at his sticky fingers as if they belonged to someone else.

So on the third day as the preliminaries drew to a close, his heart beating hard in his chest and tongue thick in his mouth, Neji couldn't even pretend he was waiting outside the training complex to see how his own team had fared. When the doors were finally thrown open, he barely noticed the enormous grin on Tenten's sweaty face or Lee's tired but exuberant bouncing, hooting, and fist raising.

The only thing he truly saw was Hinata, limping, jacket torn, dirt smeared across her pale cheek, and eyes sparkling like the surface of sun-lit water. A sense of great pride welled up inside him, and Neji blinked as he felt his eyes begin to sting. And he realized he didn’t care.

It didn’t matter who she was, whether she thought she wanted to be with him or not, he had to have her. There was no way around it. His cousin, his sister, his own daughter, it made no difference.

“Hinata-sama.”

“Nii-san…” she seemed startled, and he suddenly realized how close he was to her, close enough to touch, though he hadn’t felt his feet move.

“You’ve done well,” he murmured, feeling his breath hitch when she looked up at him, catching his eyes with hers. He thought at that moment that she’d never looked so beautiful before. It was all he could do not to take her right there, onlookers be damned.

Hinata seemed not to notice this though, only nodding a respectful thank you and smiling in that soft way of hers. “Um… now that I made it, I was thinking… that you could maybe help with my training for the finals. If you have the time…”

And there he saw it. His chance, while it was still fresh in her memory, to convince her that she belonged with him. That he could be what she wanted. That their destinies were entwined. That she didn’t need Naruto and never would.

“Hinata-sama, I would be--”

And suddenly he felt Tenten’s arms around him, her sweaty cheek pressed to his. “Actually, he already promised to help me and Lee, so I’m sure he wouldn’t have time. Right, Neji?”

For a moment, he stood in open-mouthed shock at the statement. When had he ever promised such a thing? And why was she TOUCHING him? But then Tenten turned to face him, and he saw the look on her face. He felt something hard grind against the pit of his stomach.

“Really, Neji? You’re going to help us?!” Lee, who seemed to appear out of nowhere, turned fiery eyes and clenched fists to his teammate. “Is it true?”

Neji just stared, jaw slack, slowly turning his gaze from Lee, to Hinata, to Lee, and then back to Hinata again as he felt Tenten’s arms tighten around his chest.

This was not happening.

“It’s alright, nii-san. I’m sure father will help me,” Neji heard his cousin say quietly. And then he watched helplessly as the silver-eyed girl smiled, waved, and trotted off to catch up with Kiba. The boy grinned fiercely and put an arm around both her and Shino as they walked away.

"Come on, Neji," Tenten said quietly. When he didn’t respond, his feet stuck to the ground where he stood, Tenten took his hand and led him away. Looking back over his shoulder, Neji watched as Hinata disappeared behind him.

It was a strange feeling, walking away from the one person he loved on this earth besides himself while holding someone else's hand. Someone who’d just hurt him on purpose. He felt something harden inside of him, and he wanted to hate Tenten for it. But really, what did it even matter?

Hinata, his cousin, sister, lover, whoever she was, could never be his, and he knew it. He was walking away from her, and he would never have her again. He was alone now, back to how he’d always been, as if none of it had ever happened. The choice had been made for him, as had so many others in his life. It was fate. And it hurt like hell. But somehow, through the pain that wrenched his heart, he found that he really just felt…

Relieved.

Because it was over. It was fate, and despite what Naruto had said to him, what his father had written, what he’d always wanted desperately to believe, how could one really fight fate? Better to resign himself to it than worry about what could’ve been. After all, hadn’t it just been proven that it was the only real option?

“Tenten…” he said in a quiet voice as the sounds of the others faded behind them, “thank you.”

“Hey, no problem,” she smiled, maybe a little slyly, “What’re friends for?”

Neji frowned, glancing down at their joined hands. “Are we friends then?”

Tenten shrugged. “Don’t you want to be?”

Neji wasn’t quite sure how to answer. He’d never had a friend before, but what she'd just done didn't seem so friendly. Finally, he shrugged. “Alright.”

“Great!” Tenten pronounced and let go of his hand, turning to walk backwards in front of him with her hands clasped behind her. “Then we can go out sometimes, and if anyone says anything indecent about me, you can beat the crap out of them! That way, you can keep your promise to avenge my honor AND get some extra training in! It’ll be fun, right?”

Neji blinked several times before clearing his throat and admitting, “Yes. Very.” Why hadn’t HE thought of something like that? It was so simple…

“Good!” Tenten proclaimed. “Now buy me dinner-- I’m starved!-- and I’ll tell you all about the Exam. You won’t BELIEVE where Lee hid our Earth scroll...”

And just like that it was done. They were friends. It felt nice, calming somehow, to have someone who cared about him more than just on the battlefield, who expected only his friendship in return. A friend was someone important, to be protected, cherished. Walking beside Tenten, he saw her in a new light. And Neji couldn't help but wonder, as she chatted on and he ignored her, when it would be proper to ask about friends with benefits.

After all he’d been through, he damn well hoped it was soon.

XXXXX END XXXXX

What, you thought he'd changed? lol

Anyway that's it! Comments, requests, virgin sacrifices for the Neji god? Thanks for reading, and feedback is HOT.