Chapter Text
Today her hair is as straight as she can manage, because normally at work it's done up and iron-curled to all hell.
Today she couldn't decide whether to keep it up or down.
If it's up, she imagines him pulling the scrunchie loose to watch her hair fall about her shoulders like silk.
Well, it's not that silky anymore, but it sure would be ideal if he thought is was.
Her work clothes are every bit unlike herself; ostentatious, shimmering, quite on the revealing side.
Today, despite the intentions of their plans, she would like to go as herself.
To feel like herself.
She gets way too much drunken validation as is. She'd like something honest today. Honest in a way much like him and the conversations they've had online these past eight months.
And yet, she can't figure out if they're genuinely friends. She can't imagine they could stay friends after today. It would be too weird.
Somewhere along the way, he had mentioned his dislike of being a virgin at twenty years young. And somewhere along the way he got her to admit that she too was still a virgin.
No, actually, he didn't 'get' her to admit it at all. She simply wanted to be nice. He was the first person she truly spoke to so very, very long. In a way, she has this habit, this belief that she ought to soothe someone else's concerns, to bring herself down to their level or lower so that they can see they are not alone. She is this way with new people.
He had told her something so personal that she absolutely had to pay it forward.
But she may have oversold herself a little.
She didn't feel nearly as badly as he did about being a virgin. She always thought she'd die one. Neither happily nor unhappily.
But he didn't want to be one anymore, and she was all too available.
However, did she over-commit? Was this somehow wrong of her? Was she actually manipulating someone into bed? Being in the position of giving, neither wanting nor needing, that made her more powerful than him, didn't it?
But these days they say that's how it should be. That she has all the power to choose and refuse.
But what makes him deserve the cruelty of her whims?
Was she not in fact disrespecting the only friend she had left by secretly providing pity sex?
Kaguya-sama, give me a sign. Between the two of us, who is being undermined more?
The only thing that answers back is her own nagging guilt, baseless or otherwise.
"How do I keep doing this to myself?" Her thoughts hiss through her teeth. Her feet began to drag with the weight of it all.
She always came from a place of kindness. She thought she was kind, anyhow, and that that's all that mattered.
But even so, things never turned out the way she wanted.
She could only fear how this would end.
And that 'this' was their pact. That as two loveless losers, they would shed their virgin status together and rejoin the world as less of the losers they once were.
When they had the same days free, they would meet up at the red overpass in Akamori Ward, just five blocks from Love Hotel Hill.
And they were going to...
Hinata slaps her burning cheeks. Even in her own mind, she can't complete that sentence. This curse of hers, of her own dysfunctional traits, has stolen every bit of patience she has left for herself.
She's tired of the way her body jumps and shrinks at the slightest of scrutiny. Tired of the way she had felt heavy and dizzy at the same time, all the time. How she would just rather sleep her life away pretending she had lived it well. She knows she had been feeding herself sweet, sweet lies.
Because she's tired of the overthinking, the score-keeping, the way her mind blanks out around those she craves respect, the negative feedback loop reminding her she should have been born a spirit of seran wrap. At least then, she'd represent something useful, while being every bit as flimsy and invisible as she already is.
But this isn't how she wants to start their day together.
If he picks up on her negativity, he might change his mind. And if he's too nice, he'll go home disappointed.
Stop it! Stop it!
Hinata abruptly halts to take a moment to breathe. Then she gives herself another assessment.
She's still not quite good at fashion, though her mother has tried her best on her over the years. This time, Hinata tried on her own.
Her hair is pulled to the side so it drapes behind her right ear. She left the ends curled, afraid of damaging it further had she finished it off with her straightener.
She's wearing a black pinafore jumper. The straps are pushing the breasts she used to hate so much together even more than her push-up bra is, and the buttoned front stops just beneath their swell. Her white top is simple, a ribbed high-neck style.
Hopefully she looked cute enough to hide all of her 'dark weirdness'.
Her kitten heel mules clap a slow, despondent beat as she nears the red bridge.
She's an hour early because she needs the extra time to pull herself together.
And because she's the type of idiot who visibly waffles.
One second, she's about to flake and then disappear.
The next second, she's balling her fists and huffing with the hot steam of fresh determination.
And then she's off to flake, because status quo is her god and everything else is a danger to her mental health.
No, I'm worth it! Therefore I'm staying!
Oh, but why would I ever think that?
Because-- Because I'm also a female!
No, no, that's not a good enough reason...
Hinata approaches the crimson rail and drapes herself across it, idly scratching at the paint.
Down below the bridge is the freeway. It's roaring with speeding cars and freighters and vans, and she imagines instead of this urban artery it is in fact a lush, green valley between two steep mountains. Her gaze is drawn to the shrub-lined walkway levelled above the noise below, and there is a group of middle schoolers walking together. Three girls and five boys. They're all smiling. They're all joking. They've got that glow of youth that she's never truly known.
Not personally, anyhow.
Hinata sighs with a sort of reluctant lament.
There was a time when she was a part of something.
Sort of.
Junior High at Konoha South.
The second years and the third years all referred to them as the Rookie Nine. She doesn't know how she ended up grouped with them. At most she had been something like an honorary member, merely because she happened to float in their periphery often enough.
But it didn't mean anything.
With another sigh, she noted the translucent amoeba-like shape flit away from her vision.
Periphery floaters. Which means she really is getting older.
They run away the moment she spots them, and it's something she can empathize with. A bit too strongly, actually.
Hinata edges away from the rail. She turns to leave because anxiety has taken the wheel again, and she feels herself slowly shriveling up. The thought of not meeting his expectations was growing thick inside her mind and she hadn't the tools to scrape it all off. If she weren't being perfectly honest with herself, she still did not have the tools to deal with things properly.
It was better for her to run. Hide. Never exist.
"Hey!"
Hinata stiffens. His voice is startingly. Loud. Like a bomb had gone off behind her. Turning around only means facing inevitable destruction.
"Are you 'chiisai_tori'?"
Hinata doesn't cuss. But right now she kind of wants to.
She nods, though she's stiff.
There's a scratchy quality to her friend's voice. It's kind of sweet actually, as if they still haven't fully exited their boyhood.
But it's deep enough, too. He's definitely her age.
"Were you about to leave?"
Just say it. Just say you changed your mind. You have all the control in this situation! Just run! He has to respect your feelings no matter what, so just don't hold back! Opening her mouth, she couldn't follow through. She croaked out her weakness, her wretched weakness that she tired of so. And he's waiting on her. She has to be honest with him.
So she turns around.
Apprehension thumps in her chest.
First thing she sees are his black basketball shoes. Then his black joggers. Then his white A-shirt encasing a tight, slim waist, encased by a faded orange cotton jacket. His skin is tan, almost ruddy. His eyes are blue, his hair is blond--
"Oh my god..." She locks up. Not because he looks better than she could've possibly imagined, but because-- "You moved."
Five years ago, in fact.
When there junior high days were behind them and it was time to choose: Stay and finish up at Konoha North. Or move onto a private education.
Uzumaki Naruto didn't have either of those choices.
Wait... She no longer sees the immense confusion on his face as she dives deep into her memories.
Exactly eight months ago.
Post: WELCOME HOME ME! Posted by u/Swirlyboi
So I just got back in town. I've been in Uzushio for the past four years and I'm feeling like an outsider all over again! D: Anyone cool wanna show me around? Preferably a hot babe. And by 'hot', I mean H-cup. ;)
How did she not entertain the possibility? Just how?
On the other hand, his post had only stuck out in her mind due to its sheer audacity and energy. (Another thing that maybe should have tipped her off), other than that, she hadn't considered responding to him initially.
And when she had an exceptionally bad day. When it seemed like his own loneliness wouldn't leave her alone, like a lost soul pounding on the glass box that was her imprisonment, insisting that they were alike and needed each other, she had suddenly gone back to check on his thread.
It'd been two weeks and it was empty.
No one had responded to him.
The post had locked by then. She couldn't reply to him there.
But luckily (was it luck?), he hadn't deleted his account.
So she had reached out and PM-ed him.
And it had started from there.
chiisai_tori: I've lived here my whole life. I could show you around.
Flames emerged from the pit of her stomach and crawled up her face.
She craned her head down slowly in increments, as each and every conversation piled atop one another, until it was too much for her to hold her head up high.
She had told him so many, many, many humiliating and lurid things!
Hinata turned round on her heel, ready to run, but his big warm hand clamped down around her wrist.
For her, it was like a red hot iron brand searing her skin open.
"Whoa, Hinata?! What's your problem?!"
Some primitive error code goes off in her brain: 'You're rejecting Naruto. You're hurting him. Stop it. Do better.' But in the end it's really just the disgust that she has for herself getting triggered. The commandment of never hurting Naruto was not necessarily something that informed her decisions anymore.
And yet, it hurt so much to even consider telling him so.
Hinata squeezes her eyes shut before allowing her wrist to go limp. She swallows and side-eyes him.
He's more than a head taller than her now. He looks sinewy and strong, not quite like his father but close. He used to be all bruises and baby fat, and she feels herself shrinking, because this Naruto is new to her. This Naruto will be the death of her.
Even his long shaggy locks are gone! She always knew he might sport a crew cut someday, but she never imagined how well it would suit him. The juxtaposition that was a clean cut punk, it wasn't fair. She could feel her resolve melt away. Her inhibitions were nothing against the might of his good looks.
And yet, his good looks were strained with hurt.
Hinata swallows. She doesn't know how to feel right now. Happy that she caused such a reaction? That she matters somehow? Awful that she was making him feel even more like an outsider?
Awful. Her mind and her heart choose to feel awful. As always.
Her gaze drops to the side. "W,Welcome home... Naruto-kun..."
He lets go of her wrist, his hurt changing over to insulted.
She knew it. These things never go the way she wants.
"Was it something I did? Cuz, y'know, I had nearly five years to wonder."
How could he...? The lament hits back and she feels so close to crying right in front of him. So flimsy she was that even the smallest of disapproval upsets her. But coming from him, his disapproval was often asteroid-sized.
"You sh,shouldn't have to worry about th,that..."
"What?!"
Hinata flinched. God, this was so hard. "You didn't... really... do anything."
"I really didn't, huh?" His eyes narrowed, like she were lying. "Then why you never showed up to my Goodbye Party?"
She hesitated to answer. That hesitation grew into a heavy silence waiting to burst if it didn't suffocate them first. I don't know. It was all she could come up with. Somewhere between not feeling like it and not wanting to say goodbye, she couldn't really figure out why she didn't go. Nothing in her mind seemed good enough. Instead she mumbled something of an excuse. "I'm an eye floater..."
Naruto's frown twisted and deepened, his brows scrunching harder. "What?"
Hinata knew no one should kiss her, because all they would taste was foot.
Still, she doubled down on her awkward admission, even if it was somewhat incongruous to the reality of how things were between them. "I,I'm an eye floater... You don't notice m,me most of the time. A,And when you do, I float away..." That wasn't to say she never felt this way before, because she had, and she never got to tell him back then.
His incredulity softens, but he's still unhappy. He considers her for a minute or two, looking more pensive now. "Well, then maybe that makes me a solar eclipse, what with the way you're never able to look at me directly," Naruto took a step closer. He bent forward at the waist and he looked her dead in the eye. "Even though you want to."
Her mouth drops open. Her eyes burn with hot tears as her stomach aches with cold realization.
She remembers this feeling.
It's almost like they've slipped back into an old routine.
That old routine now felt like a trap.
His intense gaze went from smoldering to sharp in an instant, the look he was giving her a rare one.
'Let's cut the bullshit', it said.
Yes, she could read him so well, even after all this time.
"Can we go to a cafe and talk?"
Her tongue was useless and her mind went blank. But her motor skills were still intact.
So she nodded.
This was one of those things they had shared with each other online: a love of red bean soup. And at the cafe they had both ordered their own.
Granted, she preferred zenzai, but that as for its mouthfeel. Flavor was the same.
Finding out they had such a tiny thing in common, it would have never come out normally between them.
It never had.
Naruto seems like he doesn't have an appetite though. He's leaning so far back in his chair, fingers laced over his lap and his tempered glare boring into the side of her face. Whether the flaming of her skin was from his scrutiny, this sense of interrogation, or whether it was from her guilt, she isn't sure.
She'd rather not do this.
It's just too much.
But it feels impossible. She feels somehow imprisoned and she needs to be on her best behavior if she is to earn the right to leave.
Hinata distracts herself, dragging her spoon through the burgundy mush but never taking a mouthful herself.
It might not taste as sweet as it should.
"Everyone says you fell off the map."
Her lips pursed together with the faintest chagrin. 'Everyone', he says. As if they had been her friends too, and not mere acquaintances. He always was a dreamer, including others without their input.
Like with her.
Hinata nodded, enduring his disapproval like a true masochist.
"Where did you go?" He continued.
Resignation eked out in a ghostly sigh. "Our Lady Kaguya-sama's."
"The All-Girls School?"
She nodded. She observed how the creases in his features smoothed, though not fully. He still carried this air of betrayal about him.
"Any particular reason?"
Did she need one? No. Did he need one? Hinata shrugged. "It's what my father always wanted for me. My mother is an alumni..." She paused, suddenly overcome with a deafening self-consciousness. "A,And my sister will be graduating soon."
"'Kay," He stared, unsatisfied still, but also unsure what else to ask. Perhaps her father's expectations had tripped him up? She never shared her inner life with him. Had he stayed, they might still be in this same situation, with him being the last to know her life's trajectory. Perhaps that's the unsettling feeling he's still wrestling with. He attempted further to look less severe. "Those school's are strict, right? Can't hang out with boys anymore, or?"
Hinata held her hand parallel to the table and tipped it from side to side.
"'Kay, so what about the girls? Sakura-chan and Ino? What was wrong with them?"
That's a new way to ask 'what was wrong with me'. Of course there was nothing wrong with those two perfectly normal, attractive girls. "They hung out with boys. Often." And no matter public or private education, they would've always surrounded themselves in boys and she would have vehemently refused to. See? They would've been incompatible as friends. He still didn't see that?
Naruto sighed through his nose, relenting in light of her response. But he was stubborn still. He opened his mouth. He thought against whatever he was going to say, and he decided to distract himself with his dessert.
The way he jostled the table, like a lion pouncing on a weasel, he became the embodiment of 'stress eating'.
He finished his dessert in five spoonfuls. It wasn't very much to begin with. It looked like it had gone down bitterly, as if each spoonful had been the past five years; hollow and unsavored.
He glared at the shallow, red-stained bowl.
"... Am I... not even your last choice?"
Hinata stopped stirring her soup, her joints locked up. Were she a marionette, then she was silently pleading for whatever higher power to help her get out of this situation. The gods owed her as much, they know they did.
Naruto stared at her, waiting, and she met his gaze, but he didn't wait long.
"You'd sooner drop your panties for anyone until you find out it's me--"
No. Every fiber screamed and vibrated but she was frozen.
"You're lying to my face if you say I didn't do anything wrong. You know how I feel about that, Hinata."
"You m,misunderstand," She pleaded him with her eyes but he wanted more from her, more than she wanted to give. Tears well up as her throat closes around the words. The stress of full disclosure, she hates it. "I,I,It's embarrassing."
"What's embarrassing?"
She squirms. "Everything. I,I told you... things... I never wanted to." She watches for his reaction.
His jaw shifts to the side, his cheeks pull up a little into his eyes. It's a soggy grimace that's trying to be a smile. It's a smile that's not a smile at all.
It's the grin of disappointment.
"So what you're saying is... You never wanted me to get to know you."
Her throat's too tight. She can't hum, let alone breathe.
Naruto chuckles and it's a hollow sound. He shakes his head.
"This doesn't make sense..."
She levelled him with a funny look.
He continued. "I thought we were good. Even though..." He couldn't get the words out and he scratched at scalp as his aggravation built up inside of him. "I thought we were good. Shit."
"You didn't do anything wrong--"
"You used to be so fucking nice--"
"I--"
"But you're so cold. I just... I just dunno."
She doesn't know either. She swears she's always been this way. How he's seeing it now, well, it honestly makes her want to cry. Like a foretold prophecy she had long been ignoring, it's finally come to pass.
She's not 'normal'. Not bubbly or cute. She's not on an upward trajectory and she lacks any sort of drive.
And the only person she ever truly cared about, she can't even bring herself to be vulnerable with. Supposedly, a show of weakness is supposed to make everything better, just a hint of humanity ought to solve everything between them, but she hasn't exactly been herself for most of her life. That part of her that he keeps hoping exists, she's pretty sure it's been gone the whole time.
She fears when he comes to realize this himself.
That's she's just an invalid parading in the skin of his Hinata.
"Well..." His eyes pass over her form, settling over her chest, darkening like a storm, and it's suddenly like every part of her is fake but those. "Thanks for responding to the 'H-cup' bit, even though that was a joke. Glad to know you weren't lying about those," Naruto's eyes search the pedestrians passing by. One young man nears them, and Naruto hails him down. "Yo! I wanna talk to ya!"
Pulled by curiosity, the young man approaches their table. "Yeah?"
Naruto gets up and Hinata doesn't understand what he's doing.
"Sit here," Naruto's pushing the young stranger into his seat. He then gestures at her like she's some prized pony. "This here little scamp is giving away her V Card! and you're the lucky man she's giving it t--"
The stinging in her palm informed her before she knew what she had done.
The glaring red spread across his left face solidified her realization.
She just slapped the love of her life.