Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

xXx

With peace comes chances for new opportunities, or the reemergence of old ones. The first year after the war flew by on hyperspeed, but now that they were coming up on the second-year anniversary. Most people were more settled into the peaceful times, and they could spare the time to think about frivolous things. 

Kakashi doesn’t remember signing off on it, but he went through about three hundred pieces of paper a day and he couldn’t be bothered to remember most of them. It’s about three months after he signed his name on some random document when he’s asked for a meeting to discuss his ‘generous donation’. Apparently, the contest creators thought it would be wonderful for him to be a guest judge at the ‘How Well Do You Know Your Partner’ event. It would run over the first three days of the festival created to celebrate the end of the war and beginning of peace among five nations. They named it The Festival of Bonds, and he had to stop himself at least fourteen separate times from making a dirty joke about the title.

It was low hanging fruit. 

Still, it would be unfair for him to be a guest judge, first and foremost because he couldn’t be bothered and would half-ass it. Secondly, because he planned to spend the time with his husband. It’s the one week a year when all he’s expected to do is say a quick speech and then disappear into the large crowd and be a normal citizen. He was not about to give that up to watch lovesick idiots swoon and make fools of each other. Third, and most importantly, if he participated they were absolutely going to ask his husband to join him on the panel. Gai would very likely slip up gushing about their unbreakable bond and reveal how he and Kakashi had disguised themselves and won one of the last ones.

In his defence, not that there was one, Gai had technically asked Sukea. He knew all along it was Kakashi, but that was a story for another day, and insisted that he disguise himself so people didn’t know it was him. One wig and half-henge later, they flew through the competition and won the grand prize, which was not that great back then given the funding for frivolous things was low. 

Still, they got a nice three-day stay at a hotel and a few dinner vouchers out of it. Kakashi admitted the first night who he was, heart in his throat and palms clammy with sweat, and Gai patted his hand in a way that would be condescending if it were anyone else but Maito Gai. He said that was why he disguised himself as well. He didn’t want anyone to think he was ‘pursuing’ other men that were not his rival. He loved him in every facet, and he could understand why Kakashi would want to be someone else, if even for a little bit.  

So, accounting for all of that, he did the only logical thing a man in his position would do. 

He volunteered Sasuke. 

xXx

“I should have burned this village to cinders.” Sasuke told him without a hint of humour in his tone when Kakashi explained to him that he was going to have to take his place on the panel of evaluators for the competition. Naruto would be out of the village for the first day of the celebrations due to ‘hokage-apprenticeship’ training. Otherwise, Kakashi would have volun-told him to do it. He’s not stupid enough to tell Sakura to do anything , and Sasuke…?

Sasuke was a glorified house-husband. In all technicalities his job title was ANBU Operative, but given the fact that they were at peace and no one had tried to murder him in the last sixteen months, ANBU had all but amalgamated into the village guards. Sasuke did his shifts twice a week, and then he went home and baked cookies or whatever it was that house-husbands did. Kakashi wouldn’t know. Gai was just as busy as him, so no one was at home all day looking after the house except for his ninken sometimes.

The joys of being married to the hokage and hailed as the local legend. Kakashi tried to talk him out of it, but that led down the path of heartfelt speeches involving the words ‘man of destiny’ and ‘eternal means through all space and time’. In the end, Kakashi just didn’t have the energy to argue with him. The only stipulation was that they got married before Kakashi took the hat and they only had their students there. It was a rushed event with very little time to get proper clothes fitted, but between the ten of them, Yamato and Sai included, they managed. Lee cried during the entirety of their vows, but Kakashi found it to be a personal victory in their rival’s score that he made Gai cry harder.

He was in the lead by two points. 

“Wasn’t much to burn, back then.” Kakashi returned to reading the current plans for village restructuring. 

The rokudaime picked up his pen and put a big strikethrough on a few spots, knowing just how much that would piss off the current head of urban development. The two of them had been at each other’s throats since the day he took the title, and it wasn’t about to end anytime soon. Kakashi came from a traumatic shinobi and orphan background, and the head of urban development was a civilian from the non-shinobi branch of the Tsubasa Clan, who had no idea what it was like to live on a meagre stipend. Still, he appreciated how passionate about the job Tsubasa-san was, and that he spoke his mind instead of the typical bureaucratic bullshit. 

He was stuck behind a desk all day so he had to get his kicks in somewhere. If the biggest villain in his life was a middle-aged, balding, father of five annoying children, he’d count his blessings. 

“What if I say no?” Sasuke challenged. 

Kakashi raised a brow at him, calling his bluff. “What, you going to run away from the village in defiance, again? You do realise I’m your boss.” 

Sasuke scoffed from behind his Hawk ANBU mask. “That means nothing to me, you and I both know this position is for show.”

“Fair.” Kakashi conceded and then gave his most troublesome student a disarming smile. “Then I just tattle on you to Naruto and Sakura.” Kakashi paused here for dramatic effect. “Just think of the disappointed look on their faces when you say you don’t want to participate in the festival that is honouring the dawn of a new era. The era that Naruto fought so hard for . You’d rather stay at home gardening or sewing or wood-carving or whatever solitary fixation you currently have. 

“It’s crocheting, actually.” Sasuke corrected him with a long-suffering deep sigh, and then took off the mask and gave him a heterochromic glare. “I’m not about to be guilted into participating in this farce. What kind of idiots would willingly do something this embarrassing?”

xXx

“Please!” 

“No.”

“ Please ?”

“No.”

“I beg of you! It is only one hour on each of the first three days of the festival! Three hours! Then we can experience for ourselves the World’s Greatest Curry!”

“Lee, it’s a marketing ploy. Anyone can say they have the world’s greatest curry.” Neji pinched the bridge of his nose and tried to reign in his frustration. Lee was stubborn, as equally stubborn as he was, and they had been arguing about this for the past week. It was a stone wall meeting an immovable force, and it was giving him a stress headache. 

“How will we know if we have not tried it?” Lee countered; he was fired up passionately about this, fists clenched in front of him as if he was going to somehow subdue Neji to get him to participate. Either that, or he was about to launch into a heartfelt speech about enjoying their youth and strengthening their bond as friends and teammates. 

“Ask Tenten.” Neji warily sank into a sparring stance, he could see where this was going. 

“Tenten said no.” Lee took the cue and started the match with a roundhouse kick. 

“Why are you accepting her ‘no’ and not mine?” Neji demanded, blocking the kick and retaliating with his own palm strike, cursing the third of their trio viciously in his head.

“She said you and I would have a better chance of winning!” Lee explained, meeting his teammate hit for hit. 

Long past were the days when Neji would easily wipe the floor with him in order to get out of a conversation. At this point in their lives, they were completely equal so long as Lee didn’t pull out the gates. It was not needed, and considered cheating, unless Neji requested it for some special training he wanted to try. Lee won just as many of their sparring matches without them as the Hyuuga. Yes, he had been counting. So it had only been a matter of time before they settled this the old fashioned way; a no-holds-bar match.  

“Lee, it’s a partners competition!” Neji tried to reason with him, but as per usual, it fell on deaf ears. 

“Friends may participate! I asked! This way we can show everyone the strength of our-” He cut himself off to back-flip and avoid the trigram rotation. Neji waited until Lee was just close enough to think he’d land a hit. “-camaraderie. Besides, we have been partners on many missions!”

“That is not what they mean and you know it.” The long-haired teen accused, an edge to his voice. “Don’t play nieve; I know you’re smarter than that.”

“See! And that is why we should enter! You know me and I know you! I also know you want an excuse to get away so your uncle cannot arrange marriage candidates. There are many high-ranking clans coming into Konoha to participate in the festival. Two whole weeks! We could do so many things in two weeks! Hiking, canoeing, shopping, eating… They have a tea leaf farm that sells their own blends! And a pottery place! You can make your own cups and teapot! They are also famous for their designs!”

Neji would not give in to temptation so easily, but his teammate had really done his homework. He knew exactly how to entice him into thinking this was just some vacation where he could leisurely enjoy his stay with no repercussions. The only problem was that the other man didn’t view the competition as a spectacle wherein they’d have to horrifically embarrass themselves. What if they didn’t win? Lee would be devastated and think they needed to ‘bond’ more, or worse, think it was his fault and fall into some sort of depression about the state of their friendship. 

Between the two options, Neji wasn’t sure which one would be worse. 

The truth was he was more than happy to go to an onsen with Lee for two weeks. Even one that was a part of some high-end brand new resort-town on an island that boasted about its romantic scenery and activities for all types of interests. They were quite content in each other’s company, and if he’d just asked to go on a vacation, Neji would have agreed near-instantly. 

No, he just wanted to humiliate him first. 

Neji knew that Lee did not view him as a romantic interest, or if he did he hid so deep down that even he didn’t know it. That was entirely possible, given how clueless Lee could be in certain cases, but it didn’t bother him as much as it should have. Lee was his best friend, and he’d watched him pine over other people for years. He’d rather be what they were now than nothing at all; their relationship ruined because Neji vied for something unrealistic.   

He didn’t care what his sensei or his stupid smug husband thought about it, either.

Still, If he did enter the competition with Lee, that could be seen as a reason for his uncle to back off with the whole ‘finding him a spouse’ tirade. He knew it came from a place of caring, and it had nothing to do with lineage or pedigree. He wanted the best for his nephew, and he was downright determined to find it. It probably originated from his desire to atone to his brother, satisfy his own boredom, spoil his nephew, or a combination of the three. 

He was also in a bit of a strange not-competition with Maito Gai, wherein he understood that Gai was a huge and important part of his nephew’s life, but he disliked the father-son dynamic they had with each other. So this may also be his way of ‘one-upping’ him. 

It was difficult to navigate, because he had learned to really rely on his sensei for all things one would normally turn to their parents for. All three of them had. When it came to his uncle, Neji always felt like the carpet was going to be ripped out from under his feet at any moment, and things would go back to the oppressive regime they had once been in his youth. Even without the previous seal on his forehead, he still half-expected the new one to go off randomly when someone from the head family wanted to put him in his place. That had happened a lot after his first chuunin exam, when he’d aired the Hyuuga clan’s dirty laundry for all to hear, but never while his uncle or cousins were around to witness it.

It was Gai who had insisted that he stay in the spare room of his two-bedroom jounin apartment and let him sleep off the severe, debilitating migraine each time. He went out to buy black-out drapes immediately and would force him to take small sips of water and ginger tea, put an ice pack at the back of his neck, and relocate a garbage can to Neji’s side in case he needed to vomit. No medication helped, but they’d tried nearly everything. To this day, he was pretty sure that Gai moved into a two-bedroom only a year into being their sensei just in case one of them needed to move in. He said it was for the spare exercise room, but work-out areas didn’t need a twin bed with turtles on the comforter. 

His uncle was too busy to notice the first few dozen times Neji disappeared for a week or two. Eventually he realised that his nephew wasn’t staying in the Hyuuga compound when he did try to find him for training or tea. He unapologetically invaded his privacy by using the byakugan to find him, expecting something nefarious. Instead he watched while Neji calmly made himself some tea at his sensei’s apartment and settled in to read on the couch. Maito Gai, meanwhile, was at a different apartment altogether and would likely not be coming home anytime soon. 

He realised that Neji was more comfortable not living with the rest of his family, and that made him sour. He’d not been the least bit delicate when he demanded to know what had happened to make Neji forsake his own family. When the sullen teen didn’t answer or spun white-lies, he tried to take his ire out on his nephew’s sensei, instead. That backfired spectacularly in his face, and he was met with the full force of a well-spoken, altruistic, child-advocate who read him to filth on his attempts at getting Neji to ‘confide’ in him.

So, now he was waging some sort of cold war with Maito Gai that the taijutsu master wasn’t even participating in.  

And Neji was caught in the middle. 

Since the Hyuuga had bridged the gap between head and branch families, people from his side had begun to venture out into their freedom cautiously. Some immediately divorced and went to marry their real lovers, others left Konoha entirely with a new seal on their heads that would only activate upon death. Yet, for many it didn’t change their day to day lives much at all.  

Neji was too pessimistic for all the positive change, or rather, he felt too unnerved by it. His only act of rebellion would be to never marry or produce children that would be born into the branch family servitude. Now he felt restless, and that made him prone to fits of overworking himself; as a member of the intelligence division and an innovator who attempted to create and master new jutsu. A distracted and paranoid genius was a dangerous thing. 

Proven, once again, by the moment that Neji did something he hadn’t done in a long time. 

He fell back on muscle memory, forgetting that wouldn’t work on a nineteen year old Lee. 

Lee clocked the exact moment his opponent lost himself in his thoughts. He’d be offended if he wasn’t so worried about his teammate. He’d noticed that Neji was listless, especially since the Hyuuga clan dissolved the division between branch and head families. The first year after the war was spent just getting everyone back on their feet, and the real change began the moment Neji’s uncle stepped into the Hokage’s office to discuss the branch seal removal. 

It felt like the true rebirth of their village, and yet, Neji looked more and more unnerved as the months went on. Instead of celebrating the moment, knowing he was an integral part of the movement, he’d just painted on a stoic face and acted like they were on the cusp of some sort of civil war. 

It worried him and it worried Tenten, but every time they tried to breach it, Neji would shut the topic down. 

He waited to see if Neji would resurface back into the match, but he decided it was time to end it when he started to see that pinched look between his brows. That indicated he was thinking something unhealthy that would end up with him in the hospital for chakra and physical fatigue. 

Lee had at least four ways to incapacitate him, but he chose the one that would give him a chance to talk to his friend without the other running off. Neji didn’t even realise he had lost until he was looking up at Lee from the ground, eyes clearing, and mouth pulling into a frown. Lee sat across Neji’s thighs cross-legged, like he had all the time in the world, and gave the other jounin an expectant look. 

“Will you talk to me about it?” Lee always hoped that the branch-family genius would finally confide in him without the need to work himself to the edge, but he prepared for him to dig in his heels.

“You won.” Neji sighed and went to sit up, tapping Lee’s knee twice to signal he was giving in. 

Except Lee didn’t move, he just crossed his arms too, and then raised his brows. 

“I will do the dumb competition, now let me up.” Neji was leaning back on his elbows, tone shifting into one of irritation. 

“Firstly, it is not dumb; it is meant to be a fun way to strengthen bonds. Secondly, I know you are worried about something else. I could have ended the match twenty moves ago, but I did not want to hurt you.”

Neji ground his teeth and contemplated physically upending his teammate. 

“Do not even think about it,” Lee warned him when he shifted his weight onto one hip ever so slightly, “I have known you since we were children, that will not work on me. Either you talk to me or I will completely incapacitate you.”

Neji never chose the easy path. 

xXx

“Seriously!?” Tenten scolded them from the door of the hospital room. 

Lee and Neji were not looking at each other, a strained silence suffocating the room. Both of them were covered in bruises and bandages; Neji’s arm was in a brace and Lee had a pressure dressing on his chest. They had, quite clearly, beaten the daylights out of each other.  

She looked at Sakura expectantly; the only other person in the room who seemed just as irritated as she did. She was writing on the clipboard so furiously it was a surprise that she didn’t tear through the paper. The healer was standing between the two beds like she didn’t trust them to not lunge at each other again as soon as they had a clear shot. Her lips were pursed and she waited to finish her sentence before she addressed Tenten. 

She sounded so tired . 

“They demolished two training fields, Sasuke and I had to step in. Neither of them will talk about it, but Lee will burst into tears every once and a while.” She informed her, placing the clipboard across her thighs and then turning to give both men exasperated looks. “Before you try, know that Gai-sensei and Kakashi-sensei both took turns yelling at them and they still won’t say what they were fighting about.” 

“I know.” Tenten scratched at the back of her head and then stepped out of the way of the exit. “Go on, I’ll watch these two idiots.”

Sakura turned to Neji, her tone low and dangerous. “If you start a fight in my hospital you will wish you were never born.” 

Neji just scoffed. 

She turned to Lee and pointed at him threateningly. “Do not let him goad you.”

Lee sniffed and continued staring out the window. 

She patted Tenten on the shoulder and then left the room. The third of their trio wasted no time, she pierced the tip of her finger with a kunai and then created a familiar series of seals. 

“Kuchiyose no Jutsu.” 

Once the smoke cleared, the eight-foot tall bear took in the sight and gave out an irritated sigh. “Again?”

“Again.” Tenten confirmed. “You take Neji, I’ve got Lee.”

Kyoka was a large brown bear-summon with lines and patches of fur missing where large wounds had healed naturally. The largest scar bisected an eye, nose, and diagonally down her chest, where it disappeared under heavy bronze armour. With claws bigger than a grown man’s head, everyone knew that the summon meant business and had no problem tearing through flesh to get a point across.

The bear sat down at the end of Neji’s bed, knee drawn up and elbow resting on it to get comfortable. Even sitting, Kyoka looked just as formidable. 

Tenten pulled up a chair between the two of them and turned her attention to the chattier of her two teammates. When he didn’t immediately start talking, she diverted her attention to the Hyuuga, who just glared in defiance. 

“This is getting ridiculous, guys.” Tenten was at the edge of her patience and she’d only been there for less than five minutes. “Lee, you can’t just beat Neji into talking about his problems, and Neji, you know damn well that he won’t stop asking even if you try to deter him with challenges or punishments.”

“I do not understand why he refuses to talk to us!” Lee was the first to break the sullen quiet. 

“I don’t have to share everything about my life with you, Lee!” Neji retorted sharply. 

“For the love of all that is good, Neji, no one is asking you to spill every thought that crosses your mind!” The weapon’s master raised her voice to drown out anything Lee could have retorted with. “Clearly you are acting in a way that makes us concerned, or we wouldn’t mention it at all!”

“No one asked you to-”

“-Fuck off with that.” Tenten demanded with a dismissive wave of her hand. “You don’t get to decide to turn our friendship off and on when it’s convenient for you. You’ll lecture us- and, yes, we know that’s how you show you care- but then get defensive when we try to do the same. No one is calling you a liability for having feelings and no one is looking for a weak point to exploit. We love you. You are our best friend. Why do we have to fight tooth and nail to get you to rely on us emotionally? I know you trust us to have your back in battle, why is this so different?”

Neji clenched his fists in the sheets and looked away from his teammates. He was ashamed of his behaviour, but he couldn’t open his mouth or find the words to explain why. It was easier to express himself when he was pushing his body beyond its physical limits, but even then, he could only open up so far. 

Perhaps he was scared that once he started, he would be unable to stop until every drop of truth was wrung from his lips, leaving him empty and irrevocably alone.

“You view having feelings as a weakness,” Kyoka spoke up with a terse growl to her tone, “but that is a false narrative. Every animal has emotions, from the biggest predator to the smallest prey.  Not expressing them will cause them to erupt at the worst times; damaging you and everyone else around you. I have raised and lost enough cubs to such foolishness.”

“I know I am a liability.” Neji conceded, “but I can’t just… talk on demand.”

The tension in the room eased a bit. 

“So, you will talk to us?” Lee’s voice was so full of hope that it made his chest ache. 

“Just… not right now. Can we make it past this competition, first?” 

It was an olive branch, and Lee was so full of patience and kindness that he immediately took it. Tenten was a little more reluctant to agree, but it didn’t take long for the others in the room to convince her. They changed the topic to the other glaringly obvious thing; the competition that Neji had agreed to participate in. Tenten knew he wasn’t happy about it, but he was at least trying to not be a total sourpuss about it. 

Lee was ecstatic.  

Chapter Text

xXx

Neji didn’t understand Lee and Sakura’s friendship. 

She was probably the closest person to him outside of his team, and yet, they had such a strange dynamic. Starting out as the object of Lee’s massively awkward crush would normally make any girl run in the opposite direction. Yet, Sakura brought flowers to his hospital bed when he’d been gravely injured in the chuunin exams and stood by his side while he recovered. Now, several years later, it was some sort of inside joke between them. Lee would wax poetic about her beauty and bravery, and Sakura would pretend to be flattered, and then the two of them would laugh it off. 

It was clear that the two of them had met each other while looking at fruit, and it naturally turned into the two of them shopping and hanging out together. Lee was currently holding a peach up to her hair to try to find the perfect shade to match. Sakura was handing him new ones to compare, and he was taking the task with a grave seriousness that made it hard for her to stop snickering. 

Neji watched from afar, already done his meagre shopping. For some reason, the decision to go over and greet them or just walk away was a difficult one. In the wake of his and Lee’s disagreement, the healer had been cool towards him when he was released from the hospital. Although it was water under the bridge for Lee, the pink-haired kunoichi was taking more time to forgive him- if at all.  

She disapproved- it was as clear as day. She only tolerated him because she didn’t want to upset Lee and Tenten. After all, she had been the one to stand by his teammate when he was at his worst, and Neji had been nowhere. Too wrapped up in his own problems, and too blinded by his pride. Perhaps she’d never thought he was good enough for Lee; his inadequacies as a friend were glaringly obvious. 

He couldn’t blame her, but he also couldn’t stay away, either. 

“Hyuuga.” 

Neji turned to the sound of that voice and greeted in kind, “Uchiha.”

Sasuke was wearing plain black clothes, but the t-shirt looked a little big on him, and slightly wrinkled. Neji didn’t even need to ask; his face said it all. 

“I grabbed Naruto’s shirt by accident.” The Uchiha didn’t look even remotely ashamed of that, just shrugged a shoulder nonchalantly. He then turned to nod in the direction of Lee and Sakura. “You two done trying to kill each other?” 

The gentle-fist user’s expression soured. “We have never tried to do that. We aren’t you and Uzumaki.” 

Sasuke raised a perfect eyebrow, and now it was his turn to look judgemental. “You sure about that?” 

“I won’t deign that with a response,” Neji replied flatly.

“Took her a while to forgive me, too.” Sasuke readjusted the bag that was slung across his shoulders, as if speaking about the weather and not his apprehension to interact with Haruno Sakura. “She never said it, but she didn’t have to.”

“I don’t need her forgiveness.” 

Sasuke made a noncommittal hum, the fact that Neji thought he didn’t deserve forgiveness went unspoken between them. 

“I hear you’re participating in that competition.” The sharingan owner changed the subject, but there was amusement in his tone now.

Neji crossed his arms across his chest. “Lee wanted to.”

Sasuke let out a small scoff, “it clearly wasn’t your idea, Hyuuga.” The other man assured him. “Either way, see you around.”

Neji watched him leave, confused as to what was the point of that whole exchange. Was Uchiha Sasuke making small talk? Were they friends or did they just have some things in common? Regardless of Sasuke’s previous betrayal of the village, Neji wasn’t sure he felt any sort of way towards the ANBU. They were both quiet, smart, and had loud teammates. Perhaps the common ground made it easy to talk to him. They didn’t need to insult each other’s intelligence by pretending they didn’t know what the other man was talking about. 

Neji never thought he’d see a day when he was on the same page as an ex-bingo book criminal. 

xXx

The day of the competition came far too soon for Neji’s liking. 

He stuck out like a sore thumb in the crowd of romantic couples, so he stood off to the side and tried to appear as menacing as possible so people wouldn’t talk to him. There were civilian couples, shinobi couples, and a few that were half and half. All of them were chatting animatedly with each other; an undercurrent of excitement rippled in their group and the crowd of spectators in front of the large stage. 

Lee was late. 

He probably had no idea what to wear; the rules of the competition stated that they had to wear civilian clothing and no uniforms were allowed. Neji cycled through the three or so outfits that Lee had that didn’t involve his jumpsuit or training clothing, and decided he’d likely pick out a green turtleneck t-shirt and his black capris. The Hyuuga felt a little uncomfortable, himself. He’d forgone his usual training and mission attire for a fitted button up shirt and straight-legged slacks. He was used to clothing that didn’t restrict his movement. 

“Sorry we’re late!” 

He recognised the voice, and turned to the left, surprised to see Sakura speaking to Yamanaka Ino, who was also in civilian clothing. If someone didn’t know any better, they’d assume Lee was her partner; the way she had her arm wrapped around his. Lee looked a bit red in the face as the two of them spoke to Ino, and he could tell that the flower-shop attendant was praising his outfit a bit too exuberantly. 

Haruno had picked out his clothing. Lee didn’t own a no-sleeved tunic like that. It was draped across his body with an open neck and did up on his right shoulder, and instead of green, it was a rusty red that complimented his complexion more than Neji thought it would. He had no wrappings on his arms or legs, and the trousers he wore were as tight as a second skin. His scars were on full display, even the one across the top of his collarbone was peeking out of the scoop neck. 

Lee hated showing off his body. He wasn’t like their sensei; who clearly put on a show of his muscles and scars sometimes, saying it made him look rugged and manly. Lee preferred to be covered, like a protective layer. 

Finally catching his gaze, Lee turned to his pink-haired friend and extracted himself from her grasp. 

“I see Haruno got to you,” Neji commented as soon as he was within hearing distance. 

“You look nice!” Lee’s voice was a bit strangled, and his cheeks were still pink as he glanced around. He was clearly self-conscious, rubbing up and down his left arm where the scars from the chuunin exam were on display. 

“You look fine, Lee. Stop worrying about it.” Neji reached up and gave his forehead a gentle flick. “Is Haruno participating as well?”

“Oh! Yes! When I told her we were participating as friends she said she would join with Yamanaka-san in solidarity.” A familiar fire came back to his eyes. “She has just issued us a challenge!”

“Has she?” He mused, glancing over at Ino and Sakura, who were clearly goading him now that they had his attention. He wondered if the display was for him, or if it was for Lee’s benefit alone. 

“Welcome!” 

Everyone’s attention was drawn towards the announcer. The man had a loud, charismatic voice, and was dressed in a rather formal-looking kimono. He must live on the resort-island where the winners would be staying, or perhaps he was the owner of the hot-springs inn. Above all else, it was clear that he was a well-spoken civilian , which made Neji’s hackles lower just a little bit.  

Travelling around and offering free vacations to a luxury island wasn’t a bad marketing ploy. Any competition would garner attention, and all they had to do was put up two people for a couple weeks and give them some free meals. The revenue they’d get by word of mouth after this would more than make up for the winner’s free stay.

Neji observed along with everyone else as the announcer, Soma, explained the general rules, what the grand prize was, and what they’d expect each day of the competition. Iro Island, the name of the resort island, was located in the Land of Tea, and was only accessible by boat. They projected pictures of the attractions up on the giant white screen, and it did look rather nice without being too gaudy. The Kintsugi Hot Springs was the name of the place where the winners would be staying, and Neji could see hearts in Lee’s eyes when they showed a brief picture of Mori Curry, the place that boasted the ‘best curry in the world’ on their gold-plated sign. 

It caused a commotion when they announced the judges, and Neji felt a little vindictive happiness when the ‘Hokage’s appointed stand-in’ ended up being a very disgruntled looking Uchiha Sasuke. Sakura and Ino were ecstatic, waving at him frantically and making him sink further down in his seat in embarrassment. At the very least, their crush on him seemed long gone, and in its place was a desire to rib him good-naturedly. 

Eventually, it came time to introduce the ‘partners’. The line was rather long, but Neji wasn’t in a hurry to stand uncomfortably on stage while people stared at him like a caged animal on display. He pulled Lee near the back of the line, making sure that Sakura and Ino were ahead of them so they wouldn’t be the first token ‘friend’ pairing. It turned out that there were a few more than anticipated, and so by the time that Lee dragged Neji across the stage, the novelty had worn off. 

“Rock Lee and Hyuuga Neji, correct?” The announcer glanced down at his card and then up at them with a cheerful smile. “How long have the two of you known each other?”

Lee was eager to answer. “We have been teammates since we were twelve!”

“Well! You certainly have a head start on most of the competition! So, what do you think your partner’s type is?”

It was one of the same recycled four questions that their host hopped between after they got the introductions of the couple out of the way. They had put on their card that they were entering as friends, but he barely spared it a look before he shoved the microphone in Neji’s face so he could answer. 

Most romantic pairs would say something that was blatantly obvious about themselves, or just a bland statement that could describe literally anyone. 

“People with vibrant hair colours and strong-willed personalities,” Neji answered with a dry tone and brutal honesty, even though it was clear from Lee’s reaction that he didn’t expect his teammate to have such a succinct answer.  

The announcer chuckled along with some of the crowd. “So you’re not his type, then?” Soma teased. 

“Absolutely not.” He confirmed before Lee could say anything to the contrary. “His last three crushes had bright pink, red, and blue hair.”

Lee was looking both gobsmacked and contemplative. “I never noticed that.” He muttered to himself, but the microphone picked it up and it made the audience laugh a little harder. 

“We’re all learning things, folks! Alright if the two of you would step off to the side-”

Sakura leaned forward between the pair separating her and Neji. “‘Strong-willed’?” She parroted with a hint of threat in her tone. 

“Tell me I’m wrong, Haruno.” He didn’t turn his head, but he said it just loud enough for her to hear over the next team being introduced. 

“Strong-willed is a nice way of putting it.” Ino snorted in amusement, earning her a smack from her ‘partner’. “Ow! Watch it, Dekorin!”

Lee’s gaze, meanwhile, was boring into the side of his face. Neji caved with a sigh: “What?” 

“I never knew you noticed such things!” He didn’t sound put out, if anything, he seemed genuinely happy that Neji was paying attention to his likes and dislikes. 

Neji crossed his arms across his chest and turned his head to look at his partner. “It’s hard not to when you won’t shut up about them.”

“I am not that bad!”

The announcer informed them that they’d be separated, and the first test was about to begin. Neji was brought to the left of the stage, and Lee was taken back behind the curtain to their right. This game was called ‘Silhouettes’, which was pretty self-explanatory but they still had to listen to the long-winded explanation. They were given numbers and split into groups, and they’d have to guess which of the ‘shadows’ was their partner without any hints. The lights behind the line up allowed their silhouette to be projected onto the drape in front, and the distortion of size and shape was minimal. 

Neji could feel himself losing brain cells with every ‘um’ or ‘ah’ of his fellow participants, and couldn’t hide his disbelief with each passing failure. Some guy actually thought that his long-haired girlfriend was a tall guy, and one of the partners had completely forgotten that their girlfriend had cut their hair to their shoulders. They cycled through the groups so each person would have to guess twice, just in case one was a fluke. 

Neji was never more disappointed in the human race, so he eventually just stopped paying attention. It was rather boring, to be honest, and although he saw Lee get thrown into a few line ups, he found himself wondering if he should just throw the competition so he didn’t have to endure this for another two days. Sakura put on a show of pretending she didn’t immediately know which one was Ino, but she was correct during both of her turns. 

There was a lull between switching the ‘guessing’ groups and when Neji’s pool got called up the announcer walked over to him first. 

“One of our judges says you have something called a ‘bakugam’?”

Neji turned to look at Sasuke directly. “You know damn well you can tell when I’m using it, Uchiha. Also, there were three other Hyuuga participating, why didn’t you mention this, then?”

Sasuke leaned in towards his microphone, face impassive and tone bored. “I forgot.”

“What does this thing do?” Soma prompted him curiously. 

“If activated , the Byakugan can see through almost any object.” Neji didn’t see the point in elaborating or calling Sasuke out on his blatant lie.  

“Oh, so you could cheat?” The man looked a little stunned, and his eyes darted over to where the other organisers were standing. They hadn’t anticipated this sort of thing. 

Neji tried to keep the sheer magnitude of his annoyance out of his tone. “I use the byakugan in serious situations such as self-defence, interrogation, or tracking. Even if I did want to tarnish my family’s reputation on a silly game show , anyone would be able to tell immediately unless they had significant vision loss or they’d long-since parted ways with their common sense.” He threw the second part of that statement towards the judge's panel. “Above all, I don’t need to cheat. This is a painfully simple exercise.”

The crowd thought this was hilarious. Which was all well and good, but Neji was about a thread away from snapping and calling this whole thing off.

“So you’re saying, even without the ability to see through walls, you’d be able to pick out your partner with no trouble?” One of the other judges had the audacity to sound doubtful. 

“ Yes ,” Neji stressed the answer.

Soma decided to stop delaying the inevitable and gestured to one of his other co-hosts who was helping with the hidden partner group. “Okay, well, if our lineup could-”

“Far left.” Neji interrupted him before the silhouettes could even get into the proper place and stop moving. 

“That fast?” The announcer whipped his head back towards Neji, clearly stunned. “And you didn’t-”

“No, I didn’t cheat.” Neji was starting to develop a twitch in his eye. 

The announcer looked up at Sasuke helplessly and, although he could have been an absolute ass about it, Sasuke shook his head to confirm Neji hadn’t used his ability.

“Okay, well, let’s try something a little harder.”  

It took them a moment, but they pulled about five other people with similar hair length to Lee and put them in the line-up. 

“Second from the right.” Neji looked at Soma the Host expectantly. “Happy?”

“Okay.” Soma gestured for Neji to step back. “We’ll see how well you do on the next task!” 

It ended up being the same damn thing, except this one was called ‘handshake’. It was at least a little challenging since they had to know based on their partner’s palm. There were more people in the line-ups, and they were sitting behind the blacked out set with only their lower right arm sticking through. The guessers were allowed to touch the hands and turn them to look for other distinguishing features. Once they were sure, they would sit in the chair opposite them and take their partner’s hand, hence the name ‘handshake’. It was a ‘race’ against the others in his pool, and the ones who got it wrong or who were the last to figure it out, would lose points. 

Even if he didn’t know exactly what Lee’s hands looked like, all he had to do was find the most scarred one. There wasn’t one part of his right arm that wasn’t covered in scar tissue, especially over his knuckles. It was part of the reason why he wore wrappings or long sleeves or both. 

The only reason why it took Neji as long as it did was because Lee’s hand was the furthest away from him, and he was still the first one to sit down. 

“Are you having fun?” Lee asked excitedly, once they confirmed that Neji was correct. 

“Sure.” He responded in what he hoped didn’t sound too sarcastic. He stared down at their rough hands, the two of them resting on the ledge in the middle. Lee was usually pretty meticulous about his skin routine, but he had a hangnail, and Neji tapped the finger in a silent question. 

“Ah, I was a bit rushed this morning,” Lee’s voice sounded sheepish. “I did not expect getting ready to take so long at Sakura-san’s.” 

“Well, you’ve worn a variation of the same outfit for years.” The gentle-fist user allowed. 

Lee’s calloused thumb rubbed back and forth over his knuckles idly while they sat there and waited. Despite the texture of the scars, the taijutsu user’s hands were warm and softer than expected from his specialised hand cream. Neji found himself lulled by the feeling, and without thinking, ended up flipping his hand so they could rest their palms side by side, face up. He traced the large scar from the heel of his teammate’s hand up to between his ring and middle finger. 

“Enemy kunai while protecting a civilian. We were fifteen.” The Hyuuga decided he may as well make this interesting.

“Yes,” Lee confirmed, and then it was his turn to find a scar of Neji’s, but this one was on the side of his hand. “Side of a mountain in Iwa, we were… fourteen? Well, you were fourteen. I was still thirteen.”

He made a humming noise of confirmation, and then he tapped the second knuckle of Lee’s index finger, voice lowering. “I broke your finger in two places. Twelve.”

Lee took his hand and squeezed it, a promise that he didn’t take it personally even if Neji still felt a bit guilty over how he’d treated his team when they were first formed. Then the well-worn hand released his and instead touched the tips of their thumbs together. 

“You cut the top of your thumb off trying to slice an uncooked pumpkin squash.”

Neji didn’t have to see it, but he knew they were both smiling as they recalled the way they’d argued over who would cut the pumpkin. Lee had tried to goad him into a competition of who could do their work quicker, and Neji had turned to tell him to stop getting distracted. 

And then cut the tip of his thumb off. Because he was distracted. 

“That was your fault.” Neji reminded him, and yet he sounded anything but upset. “I thought you were going to do so much worse to yourself.”

“Oh, my god .” Another voice came from beside Lee, one that he didn’t recognise. “Would you two stop? We get it, you’re in love.”

“We are participating as friends.” Lee corrected him with politeness that their eavesdropper probably didn’t deserve. “How have you liked the competition so far?”

A huff. “It’s stupid. My girlfriend wanted to do it.”

“It is very sweet of you to indulge her. I am sure she will appreciate it.” The sincerity in his tone took the wind out of his neighbour’s sails.

“Doubt it.” He grumbled. “I’m pretty sure she’s going to kill me if I don’t guess right when it’s my turn…”

The conversation was cut off when Soma’s voice informed them that they had finished the second test, and now the partners were going to switch places. 

xXx

“Your partner said he wouldn’t need to cheat to find you, do you feel just as confident?” Soma asked Lee when it was his turn to stand up and be the one to guess. 

“Yosh!” 

Lee waited. 

The crowd quieted.

Soma stared at Lee expectantly. 

“I am afraid there has been a mistake. None of these are Neji.” Lee informed him with a slight furrow between his brows. 

“Ouch! That’s one point down!” The announcer gave Lee a sympathetic pat on his shoulder. “Would your partner wave their hand please?”

The shadows all shifted and looked at each other until one of them leaned over towards the edge of the stage and appeared to be talking to someone. They heard muffled noises behind the curtain, and then one of the co-hosts stuck their head out and gave an apologetic smile. 

“Ah, um, sorry! We got the order mixed up. Who is this, again?”

Soma scratched his cheek sheepishly and glanced down at his card. “This is pairing thirty-three. Rock Lee and Hyuuga Neji.”

“Hold on!” 

The shadows were all shooed out of their spots, making the audience start murmuring to themselves while they waited. 

“So! Um, Rock Lee-san.” Soma tried to give the back organisers some extra time to fix things. “You said you were on the same team? Is it just the two of you?”

“No. There is Gai-sensei and Tenten. She is watching from the crowd right over there.” Lee pointed to where the third member of their trio was watching. “Hi, Tenten!”

Tenten waved back, but her voice was clear and loud enough for everyone to hear. “Hi, Lee! You guys are doing great!”

“Neji is actually participating!” Lee grinned at her with a thumbs up. 

“Probably the guilt-tripping I did! You’re welcome!” She shouted back with a return thumbs-up. “Or when they accused him of cheating!”

“Did that happen?” Lee turned to the announcer and looked offended on his friend’s behalf. “Neji would never cheat.”

“We just had to confirm.” Soma chuckled nervously, and then was saved from defending himself further when he noticed that the shadowed group was starting to get into place. 

Lee gave a delighted little clap of his hands. “He put his hair up!”

The announcer looked confused for a moment. “Um, what?”

“He is trying to make this more challenging for me, but Neji is most certainly the one in the middle.”

Soma waited for the confirmation from his earpiece and then cleared his throat awkwardly. “You know, I’ve never had someone purposefully try to make it harder for their partner before. This is a new one. You’re right, though.”

Lee looked pumped. “I hope he makes it more difficult next round!”

Chapter Text

xXx

Lee launched himself at Neji gleefully once the host read out the list of names moving on to the next round. His teammate did nothing but brace for impact, and let out a heavy sigh as the life was squeezed from his lungs in a bear hug. He really tried to trip the other man up, but Lee managed to figure out his disguises without batting an eye. Now he knew that he was in this for the long haul, because Lee would never forgive him if he lied in the second round to make them lose.  

They met up with Tenten after and walked around the festival, eventually finding their sensei and his husband waiting in line at the taiyaki stand. 

“Congrats.” Kakashi ruffled Lee’s hair before they could even tell him that they’d passed to the second round. 

“I knew the power of your bond would survive the test!” Gai clapped Neji on the shoulder.

“I wouldn’t count that as a test of anything except for eyesight.” Neji assured him dismissively. “Have the two of you eaten your way through the festival?”

“Almost!” Kakashi gave him a peace sign before handing the woman their money with a generous tip and then grabbing five taiyaki.

“Thank you very much, Kakashi-sensei!” Lee took his proffered treat with delight, holding it to his chest like something worth cherishing. He also seemed genuinely touched that he was given one in the first place, as if their sensei would actually allow his partner to not share. 

The silver-haired hokage turned to an expectant Tenten and Neji with an innocent look. “What? Gai and I get two each.”

Neji rolled his eyes and turned to look at the line. It really wasn’t that long, and he wasn’t about to give his sensei’s ridiculous husband the satisfaction. He could get his own taiyaki.

“Oh, Neji, did you want to share mine?” Lee held it out so the smell of cooked batter and custard waffed under his nose, making him salivate ever so slightly. 

“What about me?” Tenten put her hands on her hips, pretending to be offended. 

“But this is a custard one. You like the Anko ones.” Lee recalled. 

“Here, Tenten, you can have one of mine.” Gai immediately handed one of his over as soon as Kakashi relinquished them, giving his husband a chastising look. 

“What? You know you and I would have had at least two each had they not shown up.” Kakashi shrugged and then turned away to quickly pull down his mask and take a huge bite of a custard one. “Oh, there’s manju!”

“Have a bite.” Lee insisted, still waiting with the taiyaki held out. He could have grabbed it with his own hands, but it wasn’t the first time they’d shared a snack. He leaned in and bit off a decent-sized bite, savouring the perfectly cooked treat and muttering a soft thanks as he wiped a small dollop of custard that had dropped on his chin. 

They passed the taiyaki back and forth until it was finished, and only then did Kakashi ‘remember’ he had two. “Mah, I’m getting full, here Lee, you can have this one because Neji ate yours.”

“Thank you!” Lee said graciously, while Neji just rolled his eyes. “Now we technically ate one each.” He handed it over to Neji after he’d taken his bite. 

“Why didn’t you just rip it in half?” Tenten had long since devoured hers and was already eyeing up the stalls to get something savory. 

“All the filling would come out.” The two men responded in sync. 

She snorted in amusement. 

“Excuse me?” 

The timid voice came from behind them, and all three teammates turned to see a group of four younger girls. They were civilians, and the little ringleader looked like her head was about to explode from how red she was. 

“You two are participating in the contest right? The couples one?” 

“Yep. They are.” Tenten confirmed. 

“W-well we just wanted you to know we are cheering for you to win.” She barely made eye contact with them, but at least her voice was somewhat steady. “The two of you are really sweet together.” 

For probably what was the first time in his life, Neji was flabbergasted. There were no words to reply with, and he felt like her blush was some sort of alien contagion. When his brain did come back online, the first thought was to point out that there was nothing ‘sweet’ about them. If she knew even half of what they were like usually, she’d probably never say something like that. 

“Thank you for your support.” Lee, of course, thanked her graciously. “It is only the first day, but I have hopes we will make it to the end!” He pumped his fist and then got a faraway look in his eyes. “For the curry!”

“Oh, um. Yes!” The girls clearly had no idea what he was talking about, but they decided it was time to make their exit. They bowed a few times and apologised for interrupting them, and then scuttled away, giggling amongst themselves. 

“Aww.” Tenten put her arms around both of their shoulders and hugged them in towards her. “Your love has fangirls!”

“Friendship.” Neji corrected her automatically, and then elbowed her in the ribs and made her collapse onto Lee. 

“Friendship is a type of love!” Lee insisted. “I love you and Tenten a lot!”

Neji knew when to cut his losses with Lee, and instead vindictively took the last bite of taiyaki that was supposed to be his partner’s. The taijutsu master didn’t even notice, too busy hugging their weapon’s master back when she cooed at him for being the best teammate ever. The two of them were honestly so embarrassing sometimes, and so he walked away while they were distracted. 

If it was partially because he saw Sakura and Ino making a beeline for Tenten and Lee and he didn’t want to stick around for that, then that was between him and his conscience. 

xXx

Lee looked even nicer the second day, in Neji’s opinion. It was likely because he looked more like himself. He was wearing a pale green with grey accented tangzhuang top that had short sleeves with his pair of dark green running capris. This was Tenten’s influence, and she stood by them as they waited for the competition to continue. Neji had also decided to dress closer to his usual style, and was wearing a dark blue kimono-like tunic with charcoal pants. 

“Tenten, he essentially looks the same as usual!” Sakura whined when she got a look at Lee’s current outfit. “The whole point of this is to show him different styles and have him move out of his comfort zone!”

“I think he looks fine.” Neji found himself standing up for his teammates, which he immediately regretted when the four of them swiveled around to stare at him in varying levels of surprise. 

“Of course you would.” Ino gestured to his attire. “You look the same as usual, too! I liked the shirt yesterday better. At least you showed off your physique a bit more. All these loose clothes are so boring . The two of you are at opposite ends of the prude-scale from each other. Both of you are clothed from neck to toes while he shows his form and you show nothing at all!” 

“Says the kunoichi currently wearing glorified swimwear as clothes.” Neji shot back. 

“Hey, if you’ve got it, flaunt it.” She gave him a predatorily grin. “My boyfriend loves my clothes. He loves to take them off of me, too.” 

“I think I just threw up a little.” Sakura cut the tension, but Neji couldn’t deny he agreed wholeheartedly with her comment. “We get it, Inobuta-chan, no one wants to hear about your sex life.”

“I also think Neji’s clothing choices suit him.” Lee couldn’t let the conversation slide without defending his teammate in return. “They give him free range of motion.” 

“Okay, but you gotta admit he’s got a nice chest and it’s a shame he doesn’t show it more often.” Ino retorted. “Like, half the audience wanted to grope his pecs yesterday.” 

“He has well-developed upper-body muscles because of his fighting style. Of course they look good.” Lee put his hands on his hips. 

“Okay, but-”

“Welcome to our second day of the How Well You Know Your Partner Competition!” The magnified voice cut through any more of the argument, which made both Sakura and Neji breathe small sighs of relief. Neither of them wanted to hear anything else that Lee or Ino would think up while trying to prove their points. “You bore witness to them recognising each other’s bodies, but how well will they recognise each other’s hearts?”

The crowd cheered loudly in response, and Neji wasn’t sure if the sudden nerves were due to the competition becoming more difficult, or just being on stage again and having everyone scrutinise his friendship with his teammate.   

“As you know, my name is Soma, and I have the privilege of being your host! It’s time to welcome on stage our returning competitors!”

The attendant waved them all on, and so the remaining pairs pooled out onto the stage and lined up in a somewhat coordinated manner. There were maybe three-quarters of the couples left, including Neji, Lee, Sakura, and Ino. Much to his surprise, there were just as many civilians remaining as there were shinobi. What became even more apparent was the fact that all the others were holding hands and looking smitten with each other. 

“Now that we are down to thirteen pairs, it’s time to get to know them a bit better! Once we call your names please step forward and tell us in a few words why you think you should win!” He didn’t give them a moment’s pause before he called out: “Sakura-san and Ino-san! Today the two of you will be known as pair number one. Step forward!”

Sakura and Ino waved to the audience’s polite clapping, and then Ino took the microphone and threw a wink at Neji and Lee. It was game on. 

“Sakura is one of the most dedicated employees at our hospital. She’s always running herself ragged trying to fix everybody and I think she needs a well-deserved break.”

Despite Ino playing it up a bit, she did look sincere when she met Sakura’s gaze. 

The audience ate it up, cooing and aweing as Sakura thanked her partner with a hug and said she really appreciated her agreeing to participate in this. It was a nice change, and she was glad that they got to spend more time together. 

The girls walked off stage and then the next number was called forward. These two were civilians who were travelling to Konoha to enjoy the festival. They had been married for two years, and wanted to see the sights before they settled down to have children. 

Then Neji and Lee were called forward. 

The host handed Neji his microphone and he took a moment to collect himself before he spoke. “Lee had to convince me to join this competition. I don’t like these sorts of things, and I’m sure most people who know me think it’s because I’m a snob.” It was quiet enough to hear a pin drop, and for some reason he was very aware of his own heartbeat. He glanced beside him; Lee was waiting patiently for him to finish and his expression was open and without judgement. He hated that look, because it meant that Lee would selflessly forgive him if he hurt his feelings, just like all the other times. 

“And… maybe I am, but I also know he’s going to blame himself if we don’t do well. Even if I made us lose on purpose, he’d still twist it into being his fault.” It was as close to candid as Neji could get, and it made him feel jittery and uncomfortable. It was somehow easier to look out at the blurred faces of the crowd that the lights washed out almost completely. “So, although it would be nice to win, I just don’t want him to get upset and feel like he failed me somehow if we don’t.”

He quickly shoved the microphone into Lee’s hand and took a half-step back. 

Lee was staring at him with a conflicted look. 

Neji made an impatient gesture. “Say something?”

“Oh,” Lee snapped back to himself and went a little red, rubbing the back of his neck sheepishly. “I… originally told Neji I wanted to try Iro Island’s new cuisine…” A few people in the audience chuckled. “However, I must now admit to myself that I wanted proof that we were true friends rather than just two people who ended up on the same genin team.” He cleared his throat awkwardly and then his voice became cheerful again, quickly changing the subject. “I am not lying about the cuisine, though! I hear Iro Island has the World’s Best Curry!”

The host gingerly took the microphone back, giving the two of them the same searching look as half of the audience. They were just turning to walk off stage, when Neji responded to his partner. It was meant to be for Lee’s ears alone, but the host quickly turned up the volume on his microphone and held it out so they could all eavesdrop.  

“-a marketing ploy, Lee. There’s no way they have The World’s Best Curry.” He reiterated dryly. 

“You cannot know that until we try it!” Lee’s voice was loud enough that they didn’t even need the amplification for the crowd to hear him. 

The two of them didn’t notice that the crowd was laughing because of them, or that they’d made half of them swoon over the candidness of their answers. 

Ino and Sakura were waiting for them back stage, both looking a bit put out. 

“The first win goes to you.” Ino admitted sourly. 

“I… am not sure what you mean?” Lee tilted his head in confusion. 

“I’m going to drink some water.” Neji informed his teammate and then brushed past them to go hide in the corner near the refreshments table. He took a glass and downed half of it at once, feeling vaguely nauseated as he recalled what they’d admitted on stage.

Even after all this time, Lee thought he still didn’t think of him as a true friend. 

That was how terrible he’d been to him. Even eight years later , and there was still somehow room for doubt.  

He had to fix this. If there was a reason why they lost today, it would be because of him . He was the weak link, never Lee. 

“I think the two of you hit the nail on the head.” 

It wasn’t often that Neji was startled by someone, but he had let his guard down and assumed that no one would talk to him that wasn’t Sakura, Ino, or Lee. Yet, even they seemed to sense that he needed space. The person who was speaking was pouring themselves some juice, and then turned to him and held out their hand. “My name is Tara. My girlfriend and I are couple number five.”

He knew Lee would be upset with him if he was rude, so he quickly shook their hand and nodded. “Hyuuga Neji.”

“Do you mind if I call you Neji-san?” 

“That’s fine.” He wished someone would come save him from this conversation, but Lee was too absorbed in his weird competition with Ino and Sakura. 

“We all gave half-truths when they asked us, but… Really, we just want to prove that we mean something more to each other than your run of the mill partnership, and if we fail, we’ll feel it’s because our love isn’t strong enough. It’s a lot of pressure to put on a relationship.” Tara leaned against the wall beside him to sip their glass of juice. 

Neji looked down at his glass and wished for the fifth shinobi war so he didn’t have to participate in this conversation any longer. 

“My girlfriend is a lot like your teammate.” Tara nodded in Lee’s direction. “She hides everything behind a smile, but I know she’s terrified of what it will mean if we fail at this.”

The Hyuuga let out a sardonic chuckle under his breath, heart clenching when he looked over and saw the bright smile on Lee’s face as he chatted with the other competitors animatedly. “At least she doesn’t think you’re only tolerating her because you were placed on a team together eight years ago .”

“Yeah, that… Was rough. I mean why would you do this if you didn’t care about him? Seems like there’s a lot of misunderstandings there.” Tara agreed with a wince. “Maybe you’ll work them out after this is finished.” They stood up from their slouch when their name was called, and then lifted their cup towards Neji in solidarity. “Good luck.”

“You too.” He lifted his almost empty cup in response. 

Chapter Text

xXx

It wasn’t much longer until one of the staff members rounded them up once more, handing out large booklets of paper and a black marker to each of them. Today’s game was called Mind Reader; they would be asked a question and had to write down their answer within the allotted time, before they compared if their answer was the same as their partners, and then vice versa. A lot of the questions would be simple answers, so they were told to write as largely as possible. This way, when the camera turned to them, the crowd would be able to see clearly as it was projected on the screen behind them. 

Each pair sat across from each other at their desks with their own microphones. A divider between them so they couldn’t see each other’s answers, only their faces. Neji was facing the audience in the far lineup, and Lee had his back to the audience in the front lineup. Neji’s group would answer the question first, which meant Lee had to match his answer. They’d go through everyone’s response on one side before they switched. Then every couple of answers they’d change which side would answer first.  

The first answer was an easy one: ‘When is your partner’s birthday?’

When it was their turn, both of them held up ‘July 3’, and then did the same with ‘November 27’ when it switched Lee’s. Only one person out of the thirteen pairs got their answer wrong, and they complained that their mind went blank out of nerves. 

‘What is your partner’s favourite meal?’

Lee started writing before he did, and Neji wondered how specific he was supposed to be. In the end he just said ‘Tororo Soba’, and the audience laughed when Lee confidently held up ‘Cold Tororo Soba with Sesame Tsuyu’ and Neji admitted after prompting from the host that it was his exact order.

“Alright, we will switch sides! There’s two minutes on the clock, and go!” 

It was three words, so he finished quickly. He went to put his marker down and then reconsidered, writing something underneath in brackets for when it inevitably happened.

“Alright pair number three! Lee-san, what is your favourite meal?”

Lee launched into his explanation, sparing no detail, while Neji silently held up: 

‘Curry’

(Will proceed to talk about Curry of Life until someone stops him) 

The audience erupted into laughter. When Lee finally turned to see why they were amused and saw Neji’s answer on the big screen, he covered his mouth and laughed along with them bashfully.

‘What nickname or pet-name do you have for your partner?’

Neji leaned back in his seat and considered his options. They did have some code names they used on missions, but which one to pick? He cycled through them, time getting dangerously low before it occurred to him that there was one set that they’d technically picked for each other. He finished writing with seconds to spare, breathing out a sigh of relief when he held up ‘Usagi’ and then watched as Lee’s face morphed into excitement. 

-

The mission was one of their first with the radios, and they were not yet allies with Kirigakure. Their sensei had insisted on them deciding their own codenames as well as one for him. The stipulation was that all three of them had to agree, and so they debated back and forth while they travelled to the border of The Land of Water. They were undercover, and couldn’t wear anything that distinguished them as Konoha shinobi, which meant Lee and Gai had to put away their jumpsuits. 

Their sensei was out doing some light reconnaissance and gathering supplies, which left the three of them at the inn to discuss things. It was Tenten who suggested animals as the theme, which made it easy to choose Kame/Turtle for their teacher.

“What about Usagi, for Neji?” The younger taijutsu user suggested. “They have incredible hearing and a wide range of vision to detect predators, which can compare to how one would describe the byakugan. They are also fast, and adapt to their surroundings.”

Neji’s hackles immediately rose. “They’re prey animals.”

Lee frowned at him. “Why does that matter?” 

Tenten patted Lee on the back. “He’s offended that you wouldn’t choose something more ‘dangerous’ for him.” She gave Neji a shit-eating grin. “He’s cute like a rabbit, too! And he wears a lot of white.”

“See?” Lee insisted, as if Tenten was somehow helping his cause. 

“Fine.” Neji ran out of energy to argue with them. “Then Lee’s a lizard.”

“Oh! What kind?” Lee agreed to it far too eagerly. 

“You literally just went ‘what’s usually green’ and decided that way.” Tenten accused him, but her voice was very amused.  

Neji did not deny it, and then his eyes landed on the design at the bottom left of Lee’s top. “Fine, Tatsu/Dragon, then.” He corrected himself. He did not want to have to think of a type of lizard, knowing that Lee would make him explain every little detail as it pertained to him. 

“Wow, that’s… not bad.” Tenten allowed, and Neji held Lee back by his forehead as the younger teen went to hug him. He did not want tears and snot all over his new outfit, because Lee thought he was complimenting him instead of just genuinely not caring and wanting this conversation over with. 

“What am I?” Tenten asked once Neji bonked Lee on the head and succeeded in getting him to stop going in for a hug.

The two boys looked at each other and then at the buns on her head. “Kuma/Bear.” They concluded almost immediately. 

-

“That’s… kind of cute, actually.” Soma seemed genuinely surprised. “There’s an inside story to that one, I bet.”

“It’s from a mission.” Neji spoke up quickly before Lee could start explaining it. 

“Alright, then. Next couple?”

Aside from Ino and Sakura with their Dekorin and Inobuta-chan, most of the other nicknames were common pet names or cutesy versions of their first names. 

‘Does your partner prefer salty or sweet?’

Salty for Lee, and much to his embarrassment, sweet for Neji. Lee couldn’t help but comment that Neji tried to hide it, but he especially loved pastries. 

‘What is your partner’s favourite gift they received from you?’

This question stumped Neji for a bit on both of their answers. They gave them a half a point when he answered that Lee liked getting food as a gift and Lee said ‘snacks to share’, but Neji’s answer was a bit more concrete. Lee bought him a fountain pen for his birthday shortly after he made Jounin. Neji was sure he’d never mentioned how often he used it, but Lee must have somehow known, and answered it correctly. 

‘What is your partner’s weakness?’

The questions were progressively getting more personal and forcing them to show more transparency. The announcer was also making them explain the reasoning behind their answers, and some couples were getting half points based on what they said in response. 

“His ‘blindspot’?” Soma read Lee’s answer out to the crowd. “I thought you two would be a bit more original than that.” He seemed disappointed that they didn’t have something more thoughtful, like when Neji said that Lee’s heart got him into all sorts of trouble.  

“It is the most important thing to know as his teammate.” Lee argued with passion. “The Byakugan has near-perfect three-hundred-and-sixty degree vision. It is for that reason that he does not like anyone standing behind him, even if he can see most of them. He is most at ease when we fight back to back, and I always walk slightly behind him when we are on missions in crowded places.”

“Oh.” The announcer was taken aback by the rebuttal. “Then that does make the most sense.” 

‘What is your partner’s preferred love language?’

They were given a list of about ten or so examples, but Neji knew Lee’s answer immediately. He also knew that Soma was going to make him explain it.

“We got into a fight about this a few weeks ago.” Neji confessed with a bone-weary sigh. “I suck at it, as I’m sure everyone here has surmised.”

“Not so great at ‘talking about your feelings’, huh? Well, you’re not the only one. You two obviously reconciled since then.”

“It took them demolishing two training fields and getting lectures from five different people, but yes, they worked it out.” Tenten took this moment to yell the answer for him, which made Neji sink further into his seat in shame while the announcer repeated their teammate’s words to make sure everyone heard them. 

“Two training fields? So, when you said you had a fight you mean a literal one?” He paused here to turn back towards the crowd and tack on a disclaimer. “Just so everyone knows, we don’t condone violence to work out your problems!”

“We technically mutually agreed on sparring to decide if Neji would participate in the competition with me.” Lee assured their spectators. “He was distracted half-way through and would not tell me why… I have been told we are both very stubborn.” Lee laughed it off, but Neji could hear the strain in his tone. They still hadn’t discussed what, exactly, had made Neji lose the fight. Thankfully the audience took it as a cute anecdote and chuckled along with him. 

When it was Neji’s turn to answer, however, they were both slow to respond, and locked gazes with each other when the timer ran out. He loathed to admit his answer, and the pain on his face was as clear as day. When it came his turn to show his response, it was a vague ‘being considerate’. 

“I believe the term for that is ‘acts of service’.” Soma commented, and then turned to Lee. “And?”

Lee’s answer was a little closer to home when he simply put ‘pampering’. 

“Care to elaborate?” Soma nudged them to explain. 

“No.” Lee shook his head, forgoing any extra points to play dumb and protect his partner’s secrets. “I think it is self explanatory. Everyone likes when you do nice things for them, right?”

“Well, what kinds of things?” The announcer pressed. 

“Nice things?” Lee continued to look innocently confused.

Soma looked at the judges who said they’d give them a point, but they’d lost out on a chance for any extra. Neji was finding each question to be more and more uncomfortable, and he was genuinely apprehensive. This wasn’t just embarrassing anymore, it was painful. This was the most he’d ever talked about himself in his life. 

“Last question!” Soma finally announced, after they went through another two excruciating questions that made Neji’s insides feel like they wanted to twist their way out. “Does your partner want kids, and if so, how many?”

“Excuse me!” 

Lee’s hand shot into the air immediately, voice loud and assertive enough to make everyone freeze. 

“Um, yes, Lee-san?”

“My partner and I are uncomfortable answering this question. It is not a simple answer and is far more nuanced than yes or no. Can we please change the question, and if not, I would like to exclude us from answering.” 

Neji’s throat had already tightened and closed once they read the question, eyes darting around the blurry crowd in panic. He was suddenly five years old again, watching his father writhe on the ground with the bird cage seal glowing on his forehead. He was seven, listening to his nursemaid whisper that two women had been heavily reprimanded because they admitted they didn’t want to bear children into the branch family. He was ten, observing as a mother cradled her toddler to her chest and cried, the seal fresh on her daughter’s forehead. 

Now he was staring at Lee in horror, realising that the other man was going to throw the competition for him, all because he knew. It was a simple question. Most people would be able to answer it with complete nonchalance, or worse, excitement. It took him a few tries to find his voice, but he did eventually form a few words. 

“Lee, it’s fine… Just answer.” His voice wavered ever so slightly, but no one except those closest to him would know just how much that cost him. 

“No.” Lee said with grim determination. “No matter what answer we give, it would be a lie. I would rather not answer at all than lie.”

To the surprise of everyone, it was Sasuke’s voice that was heard next, leaning forward and speaking carefully into his microphone. 

“In one word, describe your first impression of your partner.”

It took ten or so seconds for the question to register, but Soma jumped on it. “A perfect substitution! In one word, tell us what your first impression was of your partner.”

Neji’s insides churned even worse. 

“Lee…”

Lee pointed at him with a fire in his eyes. “This is easy, Neji, just answer truthfully!”

Neji almost refused to write anything, but after Lee had finished his response on Neji’s behalf, he proceeded to stare him down until Neji gave in. The usually positive shinobi’s brows were drawn together in determination, lips pressed into a thin line, and eyes urging his teammate to just tell the truth and say what they both knew was the right answer. Neji hated him the most at that moment, but he still took the cap off his marker and wrote out the word in quick, messy, lines. He flipped the pad over once he finished and slammed it down on the desk, wishing he had fire nature so he could light it up until only cinders remained.

His head remained down, and he would not meet his partner’s gaze even when it came to his turn. 

“Neji-san?” Soma was probably starting to get a bit irritated with them for causing so much difficulty. 

“I don’t think like this any more.” Neji stressed out the words so that no one could deny their clarity. “I’m ashamed I ever did, and I was wrong.”

Then he flipped his pad over so the camera could zoom in on the word, looking down at his lap and refusing to comment on it. 

Lee then turned his over as well, giving his partner a triumphant little smirk even though he had no idea how much it was killing Neji from the inside out. 

Lee knew exactly what he’d thought of him, because he’d said it to his face, on repeat. 

He was the worst teammate.

‘Failure’

“Wow, that’s… intense.” Soma’s voice was trying not to sound judgemental, especially coming off of Ino’s ‘cute’ and pair two’s ‘charming’.  

“We had just graduated from the academy into being genin.” Lee explained with an even tone. “I know he does not feel that way anymore.” 

“I should hope so.” Soma cleared his throat awkwardly, and then turned his attention to the fourth pair. 

Greasy shame made bile rise up Neji’s throat as he stared unseeingly down at the word on his pad of paper. 

‘Failure’. 

Lee had to write that out with his own hand. 

-

“I have always thought you were lonely, Neji.” Lee was lying by his side, hand pressed over where Neji had bandaged his ribs, but tainted blood was still leaking through them sluggishly. “It was the first thing I thought when I saw you.”

The mission had gone sideways almost immediately, and they were neck deep in enemy territory with no way to safely contact Tenten and their sensei, or even confirm that they were alive. The mission rank was supposed to be B, but now it was likely considered a high A or even S. Their intel was useless, and the whole settlement was filled with people who would kill them on sight. Neji hadn’t turned off his byakugan in hours, and his head was pounding from the strain.

“Shut up, Lee. Save your strength.” Neji ordered him, voice quiet and terse as he watched their pursuers search for them through the walls of the crumbled watchtower where they were hiding.

“I really do think you should make more friends.” Lee continued, voice slightly slurred from the disorienting effects of the poison. “Everyone needs friends.”

“I have friends.” Neji hissed, angry at himself for not seeing the ambush in retrospect, and angry at Lee for suggesting that there was a reality where he’d die and leave Neji with one less of them. 

“You should be nicer to Sakura-san.” Lee pointed out, blinking slowly. “She is a good friend. She would look after you if I cannot.” 

“Lee. Shut. Up.” Neji growled. “I am trying to find a way to get us out of here in one piece.”

“Hmn… Okay… ’m pretty sleepy…”

The only reason why they made it out alive was because Tenten had immediately called for reinforcements when they were separated. Kakashi and Sakura showed up with seconds to spare, and once Lee and Neji were out of harm’s way, their sensei ripped up to the sixth gate open and single-handedly demolished the remainder of the enemy encampment, sending the rogue shinobi scrambling. 

xXx

Neji was the first one out of his seat when they announced the end of the second round. He all but stormed off, and he hadn’t met Lee’s eyes once since his partner stared him down and made him write that filthy word. They would need a few minutes to tally up the most points and see who was going to make it to the next stage. ‘Lonely’ was left behind on his desk, facing upwards and confirming Lee’s initial impression of him. 

He did not stop in the previous area where they were supposed to wait for the results. Instead he used his byakugan to exit the side door and find a place just outside where he could be alone. He hunkered down and focused on his breath, wishing that he could just cry or scream and expel the agitated emotions weighing him down. Instead they just made him feel like his throat was tight and he was going to physically choke on them. 

Clear the mind, slow the breath, follow the chakra. 

By the time the announcer called them back to the stage, he was a little more centered. Lee was trying to catch his eye, but he was just trying to make it through the next few minutes until they were free. Then he’d head to the Hyuuga training grounds and work off some steam. Perhaps if he was lucky enough, Hinata would be around and he could ask her to help him train. 

“The five pairs that have made it to our final round are… pair one, three, five, seven, and twelve.” 

“That is us.” Lee leaned over to whisper in his ear.

Neji turned his head in Lee’s direction and nodded, stepping out of Lee’s reach when his teammate went to grab his wrist. Instead he lifted it and waved as if that was his intention rather than purposefully avoiding his partner’s touch. The crowd cheered, and Neji played along and thanked everyone who congratulated the two of them. It wasn’t until Sakura distracted Lee with a hug that he made his escape. 

xXx

“Sasuke-kun.” 

Sasuke didn’t even try to hide his irritation when he addressed the person who was keeping him from meeting Naruto at the village gates. His teammate was due to arrive in the next hour, and he would rather be there than in the midst of all this ‘festival’ chaos. 

“What?” He shoved his hands in his pockets and glared at her. 

“Gai-sensei told me this morning that Naruto-kun won’t be back for at least another two hours.” Tenten crossed her arms across her chest and cocked a hip. “That means you’ve got nowhere to be.”

Sasuke gave an annoyed huff and stepped into the alleyway with her. “Well?”

“You did that on purpose.” Tenten called him out. “The question is; was that to punish Neji or was it to help them gain popularity? Because you succeeded in both.”

The Uchiha leaned against the wall leisurely. “Hyuuga will get over it. He’s a big boy.” 

Tenten’s eyes rolled into the back of her head at the typical behaviour. “Good gods, just call him Neji. You two are so ridiculous with your ‘we aren’t friends but really we are’ bullshit.” She pointed out in exasperation. 

“Is this conversation going anywhere?” Sasuke demanded. 

“Yeah, are you trying to be helpful? Because there were a million ways you could have helped our friends appeal to the audience that didn’t involve hurting them.” She pointed out. 

“None that would get the same result.” He replied cryptically, knowing that it would irritate her more. 

Tenten didn’t take the bait. “Then which lesson were you trying to teach?”

“You know the difference between when Naruto and I fight and when they do?” Sasuke tilted his head towards the sounds of the bustling festival.

“Seriously?” Tenten gave him a deadpan look. “We’re going there?”

“Answer the question or don’t, but I don’t have to indulge you anymore if I don’t want to.” He reminded her with an arrogant shrug.

“Okay, I’ll play.” She leaned against the wall beside him and considered it. “You and Naruto-kun fight to understand each other. Lee and Neji fight so they don’t have to.”

Sasuke was actually quite impressed, but she didn’t quite have the full picture. “In a way. Naruto and I fight because we already know what one another is thinking and we want to prove our convictions. Your teammates, meanwhile, fight so they can avoid the truth altogether.”

“Lee doesn’t.” She defended him automatically. 

“Yes, he does. He’s just better at lying to himself and others about it.” Sasuke assured her with a look that spoke volumes. His candidness made her seriously consider his words instead of dismissing them outright. 

“He knows the answer before he asks the question, but he wants Hyuuga to confirm it so he doesn’t have to say it first. That’s why he started the fight in the first place. It’s nothing but a distraction. It's easy to pretend you don’t know what’s really going on if you’re too busy beating the crap out of each other and you know your opponent won’t back down, either.” 

“Essentially what you’re telling me is that they’re playing the world’s most destructive game of chicken?” Tenten scoffed and let her head thunk against the wooden slats behind her. 

“Don’t believe me?” 

“No. That’s the problem. It makes perfect sense.” With everything she knew being painted in a new light, Tenten could do nothing but grimace. “That’s… frustrating.” She confessed, kicking at the dirt with her sandals. “That’s why you went after Neji. Lee would just play innocent or pick a fight, and he’s more likely to be honest if he’s defending someone else.”

“If it helps, I don’t think either of them consciously know what Rock Lee is doing.” Sasuke offered off-handedly, as if that were some sort of consolation to the third of their team that was hopelessly stuck in the middle. “It’s easier to see from afar.”

“No, that just means one of them has to get so close to the end of their rope that they make the other one snap.” Tenten rubbed at her temples. “Is tomorrow going to be worse?”

“Tomorrow will be easy.” Sasuke waved off her concern. “It’s whether or not they talk tonight that has the biggest chance of changing anything. If they both show up for the third round like nothing happened, then you know it wasn’t enough.”

“Aaand chances are they’ll both back down from that.” Tenten slapped her hands against the wall and straightened up. “Well, now I’m annoyed because I’m once again reminded that boys are stupid.” 

Sasuke had nothing to say to that. 

Chapter Text

xXx

Lee should have gone after Neji. 

He knew the moment his teammate left the venue, but he hesitated too long, waffling back and forth over whether or not he should pursue him. In the end, he told himself that Neji just needed a bit of space. This wasn’t enough to make him drop out of the competition, especially when they were so close to winning. 

Besides, if they did win, they’d have two whole weeks to talk. 

He put it in the back of his mind for a while; Sakura invited him to wait with her for Naruto to return. He swung by his house to pick up the small birthday gift for his friend, and then the two of them grabbed some takeaway and settled in on a bench. It was a small gathering area to the far left of the gates where they could see people coming and going. Naruto was hard to miss in his attire filled with orange accents, or his loud voice, and so the two of them were able to chat for a while. 

“Are you okay?” Sakura finally asked when there was a lull in the conversation. 

“What do you mean?” Lee picked up his paper cup of tea and took a careful sip. 

“Neji-san’s answer.” She prompted impatiently; she was well aware that Lee knew what she was talking about before she even asked. Sometimes he really did make things difficult. It reminded her a little of talking with Sasuke. 

“Oh, no.” He gave her a comforting smile. “Do not fret, Sakura-san, it is all water under the bridge.”

The pink-haired healer did not look convinced in the least, but she decided not to push it. They switched to lighter topics; like their guess on what the tasks would be on day three. Sakura confided in him that she was glad that her and Ino decided to do this; things had always been sort of different since they became kunoichi, and it was nice to get back to the roots of their friendship. It made her think they’d reset, in a way, and she was grateful for it. 

After she finished, she waited to see if Lee would talk about his relationship with Neji, but he was as tightlipped as ever. 

“That is wonderful, Sakura-san! I know you and Ino-san have had your differences, but now your bond is as strong as ever. Have you given any thought to what would happen if you won?”

Sakura chuckled, and the response surprised her friend. “Lee, Ino and I aren’t going to win.”

“Why would you say that?” Lee asked with genuine concern. 

“I just have a feeling.” It was her turn to be a little cryptic.

They didn’t have to look at the gate to know that Naruto had arrived. His scream of ‘Sasuke! You came to meet me!’ was loud enough to alert everyone in a five kilo radius. 

Naruto excitedly thanked Lee for his gift of a new ramen bowl with a cute little egg character on the side. The three of them were currently waiting outside the hokage-apprentice’s apartment while the blond showered and changed quickly. They would all be walking around the festival together; and even the ill-mannered one of their ensemble seemed okay with this. Rather, he liked Sakura and Naruto, and was willing to tolerate Lee because of them. 

The taijutsu user even considered him a friend, though sometimes he was reminded that Sasuke was just as abrupt as his teammates when it came to personal questions. Over the past few years, Lee had learned the difference between a mean-spirited and irritated Uchiha and one that was somehow antagonising and showing concern at the same time. That was why when the sharingan user turned his sights on him, he was able to remind himself it wasn’t out of malice. 

“Shouldn’t you be at the Hyuuga Compound?” Sasuke raised a brow at him, tone almost accusatory in nature. 

Lee’s heart gave a small squeeze, and a little rush of adrenaline in his veins made him scowl with more honesty than he wanted to admit at the Uchiha. “Why would I be there?”

Sasuke scoffed and shook his head, “why indeed…?”

Sakura, who would normally jump between them as a mediator, remained quiet. It was something that she was baffled about as well. For all that Lee waxed poetic about his family-like ties to his teammates, it seemed odd that he would not want to check on his friend. Neji had left in quite a huff, and then there was the weird aversion to discussing children. Sakura couldn’t even begin to understand the nuances of the Hyuuga prodigy’s mind, but even she would have wanted to comfort him after how gutted he looked. 

That seemed to be firmly in Tenten and Lee’s territory, and yet, neither of them went after the stoic one of their trio. If they didn’t, what place did Sakura have?

Naruto’s return put a permanent pin in the topic, and the four of them ended up enjoying a lap around the festival together. There may have been a time when Lee would feel like an outsider with their team, but the three of them had a way of making him feel like an extension of it rather than someone cutting in. They met Ino and Sai a little later in the evening, and the two of them joined their little ensemble as well. By the time Lee went home that night, he had almost convinced himself that leaving Neji alone was the correct choice. 

xXx

“Lee.” 

Neji was… better. Hinata had helped a lot, and he appreciated her more than he ever dared to admit. She didn’t ask questions, just gave him a searching look when he asked for a spar, and then walked over to the other end of the training area and fell into position. They trained for the remainder of the afternoon, and although Neji could have ended it multiple times with definitive strikes, that wasn’t the point. 

It was clear that his cousin also had some things to work through, but theirs was a relationship that worked better in actions rather than words. 

“Neji!” Lee smiled at him widely. Today he was wearing his own civilian clothing; a tank top and joggers combo. The sight of it made something in Neji’s chest ease; like things would be going back to normal. 

Even as he laid awake that night and ruminated about everything that happened the day before, Neji knew that he would never forgive himself if he didn’t say something.

“I wanted to apologise-”

Lee put a hand on his shoulder. “There is nothing for you to apologise about!” He assured him with a gentle squeeze, and then let his arm drop to his side. 

There it was. 

The rejection. Again. 

And Neji didn’t have the nerve or the time to push the topic. So they, once again, shelved the topic for another indiscriminate amount of time. 

They were called up to the stage, and the third round of the competition began. For all anyone knew, they had resolved everything and were back to their first-day camaraderie. It was a comfortable skin for Neji; to play the begrudging friend that Lee had dragged into this competition. They flew through the first round of charades, which only allowed them to use five words to try and get their partner to guess the word. Since he was working on auto-pilot and the rest of his brain had shut down into something numb, Neji accidentally said the word ‘sensei’ and lost them a point. 

The crowd thought it was endearing when he slapped a hand over his mouth a second too late and Lee started laughing.

The second round was silent acting, and that was obviously meant to be embarrassing. Thankfully Lee was the one acting things out, and all Neji had to do was guess, which allowed them to get a perfect score. Lee jumped excitedly and gave him a hi-five when the host told them that they’d gone through all their words before time ran out. They were back on track, and all too soon the five pairs were lined up on the stage as the points were tallied. 

This late in the game, there were very few mistakes, which made the competition a close one. The judges decided to take the crowd’s opinion into consideration.

“Now we will call each couple forward, and whoever gets the most cheers, wins!” Soma proclaimed, and then started at the opposite end to Neji and Lee, who had taken the far right spot on the stage. 

Lee rocked back and forth on his heels while they waited, practically vibrating in excitement. He had Neji’s sleeve clutched in one hand, but no part of their actual skin was touching. Neji watched him out of his periphery, but his eyes were scanning the crowd. He found Tenten almost immediately, and her face lit up on recognition when she noticed he was watching her. She smiled encouragingly and waved, and he nudged Lee and the two of them waved back. 

“And our last pair, number three!” 

The crowd erupted. 

xXx

It was all such a blur after that. He remembered Lee shaking him and repeating the word ‘curry!’ over and over again. He remembered smiling indulgently. They took a picture of the two of them, with Lee’s arm thrown around his shoulders, holding up the ridiculously large vouchers. They were given the blocks of dates of when they could potentially go for their vacation, and Lee immediately opted for them to leave right away. 

“ That would require you to leave first thing tomorrow morning .” Soma explained. 

“ That is fine. Right, Neji? ”

Neji nodded. That was always the plan, wasn’t it?

“Neji.”

His mind reconnected to the present with a lurch at the sound of that voice, and he spun around and bowed his head instinctually. 

“Oji-sama.” He greeted his uncle, thankful that the commotion around them had died down and Lee was too busy celebrating with Sakura and Tenten to realise he’d left his side. 

“Come.” His uncle gestured away from the crowd, and he followed obediently. His mind was whirling with possibilities, but it wasn’t like he could escape from any of them, so he had no choice but to suffer the consequences. If his guardian was irritated that he’d participated in a childish competition, then at least he hadn’t voiced his disapproval until after they’d won. It was an oversight on his part that he didn’t consider the news would get back to the head of his family. 

He’d been too busy compartmentalising. 

“You won,” Hiashi commented, “and you are leaving tomorrow.” 

“Yes.”

“I see.” His uncle nodded. “I suppose this has nothing to do with the marriage candidates that came into town for the festival?” 

Neji bowed a little lower. “We decided it was for the best that we leave earlier to avoid traffic. People will not be on the roads while the festival is in progress.”

Hiashi crossed his arms pensively. Neji waited for the scolding that never came, and when he did allow himself to stand up straight and risk a glance at his uncle’s chest, he was surprised to see how lax his posture was. 

“I should have never pushed marriage candidates at you.” 

Neji’s eyes snapped up to his uncle’s face before he could stop them; that was perhaps the last thing he expected to come out of his mouth. 

“I know that’s the reason why you’re leaving, Neji. I am sure it was also part of the reason why you agreed to all this in the first place.” He made a vague gesture towards the direction of the competition venue. “After all, you do not trust me enough to talk about these sorts of things candidly.” 

“I apologise, Oji-sama.” Neji inclined his head and clasped his hands to show formal humility. 

Hiashi just sighed, because his nephew didn’t deny anything of what his uncle had accused him of. Instead he just acted like he was expected to as a lowly branch member of the Hyuuga clan. Eyes downcast, posture proper, and responses demure and non-confrontational. 

Hiashi had released the branch family from their duties, removed their seals, and placed a new one on everyone in their clan that would only activate on death. The seal was now a small diamond shape over both temples, easily hidden by hair, and no longer a sign of servitude. People had immediately set out to test their boundaries; divorces, separations, even people showing outright scorn for him. He knew they’d hidden it deep down for decades under a polite fear that any show of anger would be met with deadly force.

He bore it all- it was the least he could do. 

Yet the one thing he had hoped his actions would accomplish, accumulated in the reverse.

Neji had reverted back to his pre-genin ways, acting like he was nothing to his uncle. They had made so much progress, to the point that his nephew had even gently scolded him at one point for his treatment of his daughters. Now he could barely get him to look him in the eye, and if he did, the prodigy didn’t dare tell him what he was truly thinking, even if his actions spoke volumes. 

He’d heard about the massive argument between Neji and his teammate, and he had bore witness personally to the fiasco in the competition the day before. What uncle wouldn’t be curious about his nephew participating in a couple’s competition? It was a morbid fascination, he could admit, and he’d hoped it would give him some sort of insight to his ward’s mindset. He had actually used a disguise jutsu for the first time in decades, and scrutinised each and every answer Neji gave. 

Hiashi learned some things. A lot of them broke his heart and made it painfully transparent that he knew nothing about his nephew at all. He only knew the perfectly cultivated mask Neji showed him. The intellectual genius and stoic soldier. 

No wonder he preferred his team over his blood family, and why Maito Gai would always mean more to him than that of a regular sensei. Yet, even they were having a hard time with Neji. He was spiraling into a dangerous darkness and it was apparent that there was only one person who could pull him out of it. Neji had spent the rest of the evening in the Hyuuga Compound training and keeping to himself yesterday, so he could only hope this vacation was the catalyst he needed.  

“You should enjoy yourself.” Hiashi gave his nephew the dismissal that he so clearly wanted. “I hope you talk to your teammate about what’s bothering you.”

“Thank you.” 

Hiashi could have left along the back roads to get home, but instead he found himself performing the henge jutsu once more and walking back into the throng of the crowd. People were still milling around the stage when he walked by, and he caught sight of the rest of Neji’s teammates off to the side. Maito Gai was standing on his specialised brace, wheelchair parked carefully behind him, as he took turns hugging his two present students. The weapon’s master and his mini-me were comfortable with his affection, even returning it and smiling as they chatted. 

He’d seen Neji hug him back, too. Something he would never do with his own flesh and blood. 

“Still won’t talk to you, huh?” 

He calmly turned to the current Hokage, who was now sitting on the bench that had been empty thirty seconds ago when he stepped off of the main walkway. 

“No. Are you having any luck?” 

By ‘you’, they both knew he was referring to the Hokage’s husband, but he was still sore over the chastising he’d received and refused to speak to the other sensei directly. If there was anything he and his nephew shared, it was the folly of their pride.   

“Not much, but I’ve got one just like him, so I’m used to it.” Kakashi leaned his elbows forward onto his knees, the epitome of calm and unbothered. “It’s driving Gai just as crazy, I promise.”

Hiashi grimaced. “I did not think the ‘teenage rebellion’ would start at the age of twenty.” He crossed his arms and looked up into the lanterns lighting up the afternoon sky. “Though we were in the middle of a war, and he has never been allowed to just be a child.”

“Yeah…” Kakashi agreed, but there was something else to his voice that made Hiashi wait for him to elaborate. “I think it’s more than that, though.”

“How so?”

Kakashi hauled himself to his feet, making a show of how stiff he was even though they both knew that Hiashi was at least a decade older. 

“Can’t say for sure, and I don’t want to speculate too much.”

“Which means you know, but you don’t want to tell me.” Hiashi let out a heavy exhale through his nose in frustration. 

“More so I think Neji needs to tell you himself.” Kakashi corrected him in an almost comforting manner. “I’ve got to get back to my husband, but I’ll see you Wednesday for the meeting.”

Hiashi scoffed. “And you’ll be on time?”

“Hmn? Didn’t hear that. Gotta go!” 

xXx

“Otou-sama.” 

Hiashi pulled his gaze away from the glass doors and turned it towards his daughter. “Hinata.”

She stepped beside him and glanced out at the picturesque scene. Their family’s bedrooms, as well as the Head of the Hyuuga family’s main office, all faced the same meticulous rock garden. In the early morning light, it was quite a lovely scene, but Hiashi observed it with a heavy heart. 

“Good morning,” Hinata greeted him softly, “have you been waiting long?” 

“Long enough.” He responded, and then turned to gesture at the teapot that had likely gone lukewarm. “Tea?”

She gave him a gentle smile, one so much like her mother’s, and nodded. They sat down at the low sofa and coffee table, and she poured them both a cup. It was polite of her not to react when she brought it to her lips and found it to be barely a degree above cold. Her form was impeccable, and only when she’d placed the cup back down did he breach the silence. 

“Hinata, do you forgive me?” He held the dark blue stoneware cup in between his palms, and waited for his eldest to formulate her response. 

“For what, specifically?” It was a fair question; he had failed her in many ways so there was no way to know what exactly he was referring to.

“The isolation.” 

She put her hands on her lap, folded neatly, but he could see the small nervous habit she made when she played with the family ring on her right hand. She didn’t wear it often, only when she expected to remain at home. Most shinobi didn’t wear jewellery, which meant that she only indulged in the small vanities when she was sure there was no chance for her to be called on a mission. When he saw that ring, more and more often lately, it reminded him that they were no longer on the knife’s edge of battle. 

“I think that the situation is very different for each person involved.” She responded delicately. “I think that, regardless of whether or not I forgive you for any slight, you cannot translate that to Niisan.”

“Do you forgive me for that, then?” Hiashi put his cup down and leaned towards her, posture relaxed and unbecoming of the Head of their clan. “That I favoured him?”

She didn’t crumple like her twelve year old self may have, because she had matured the most out of all of them. Her father even included himself in that assessment. He was still so stuck in his previous ways; a life of programming that caused friction with any hint of attachment, even to his own daughter. He had spent countless sleepless nights fighting between the demons within; the ones that told him he had done what was expected of him as the leader of their clan, and then the others that reminded him that he had systematically isolated every single one of his family members and they hated him for it. 

His family legacy that had been passed down was not one that meshed well with affectionate ties. Heirs were expected to be calculating, calm, and react without mercy. His father had beaten any doubts out of him, and he’d tried to do the same to Hinata. What had worked on him did not work on his eldest due to her immeasurable kindness. In the end, he watched her suffer from across a broken bridge that had been washed away by her tears. When it became apparent that Neji was more suited to be the typical heir, it only caused more friction in their immediate family.  

Resentment. 

Anger.

Isolation. 

Yet, Hinata considered his question with a fairness he didn’t deserve, because she was gracious and inherently good. Something she was born with, because he certainly hadn’t shown her either of those while she grew up. 

“I think you have made great strides towards forgiveness.” She allowed, taking another measured sip of her tea. “More than, what I am sure, anyone else expected.”

“Yet, it is not enough.” He finished for her.

“I think it is all connected.” She corrected him patiently. “That one forgiveness must lead back to another and another. There are things you cannot apologise for, Otousama, simply because they were put in place before you or I were born. To answer your question bluntly, I do not know.” 

She gazed out into the morning glow through the glass doors behind him, eyes lost as she considered her words. “I know that I was not what you wanted in an heir, and there were times that I wished more than anything that Neji had been your son, instead. If only so that I did not have to bear such pressure.” She looked contrite, glancing down at her hands and stilling her fidgeting. “In thinking that, I condemned him instead, and that drove more of a wedge between us. No matter what he did, no matter how strong or accomplished he became, he could not change his birth.”    

“And I did not start to change until he proved himself as a shinobi, one worthy to bear the techniques of the head family.” Hiashi voiced what she was too polite to say.

“I think that Niisan bears the anger of generations, and… That is not something we can erase from him, no matter how much we change. What we can do is make sure it dies with him, so that future generations will not have to know that suffering.” 

Hiashi could concede that, but it still cut deeply. “You are wise.” 

She gave him a ghost of a smile, lips curling up but the full effect not quite reaching her eyes. There was wisdom there, yes, but also her own demons that wouldn’t let her forget or forgive so easily. 

Demons he had placed in her, and Neji, too.

“Hinata, I want to tell you that I am proud of the woman you’ve become.” 

Her eyes widened in shock, and her voice shook when she automatically responded with a  ‘thank you’. 

“You may not be what the Hyuuga Family expected of its heir, but I believe you are what we need. We have lived in a state of war for so long that perhaps now we need some healing, so that we can reset the foundations into something stronger.”

He reached across the table and squeezed her wrist ever so slightly before he retracted it and cleared his throat awkwardly. “We should really throw out this tea. It is terrible-tasting cold.” 

She giggled and gave him one of the first genuine smiles that he’d ever seen directed at him. “I don’t mind this blend cold, but I know Neji would have liked it when it was warm.” Her smile dimmed and turned bittersweet. “I’m sorry that he left without saying goodbye.”

“Truly unbecoming,” Hiashi shook his head in disapproval and stood up, “leaving over the back wall like some sort of thief in the night. All so he didn’t have to spare a few moments to have tea with his uncle.”

Hinata giggled again. “Truly a dire act of rebellion.” 

Chapter Text

xXx

Neji took the long way around to Konoha’s front gates. Lee was likely already waiting, freshly showered from his morning workout that he woke up at some ungodly hour for. Neji remembered those days all too well; how he’d sneak out to the training grounds to get practice in so no one saw him working on his byakugan techniques. Those days were behind him, now he woke up at a humane hour, but Lee would never shake the habit of his strict training regimen.

It made him wonder how well he’d fare on vacation, where the whole point of being there was to relax.  

His foot hit the ground and scuffed off the pavement in the barest hint of hesitance. To an untrained eye it may have looked like he hit an uneven step, to a shinobi it meant that he’d clocked a presence and didn’t stop his body from reacting to it in time. It was a mistake he would have never made while on a mission, but he naturally let his guard down in his home village. He had to; being constantly on edge led to paranoia and those shinobi burnt out quickly. 

Unfortunately, it meant he could be ambushed for conversations he really didn’t want to have. 

“Relax, Neji, I’m not here on this fine morning to lecture you.” 

Neji turned around and inclined his head in greeting, a small smile curling up the side of his mouth at the sight of the older man. Regardless of how conflicted he had been these past few months, he did feel a sense of ease in his presence. Perhaps it was that defenselessness that made him want to stay away until he sorted himself out. 

“Good morning, Gai-sensei.”

“Good morning to you, too!” His sensei rolled a little closer, and he stepped forward to meet him at the halfway point. “Did you eat a hearty breakfast? You need to be well-nourished for the journey ahead!” 

“I thought there were no lectures?” He reminded him in wry amusement. His sensei could never resist preaching healthy habits to his students; if he didn’t then Neji would know it was an imposter. The second hint would be a lack of over-the-top affection or embarrassing compliments. 

Gai laughed good-naturedly at being called out. “I suppose you’re right,” he conceded, and then his smile turned a bit cheeky. “I haven’t been able to congratulate you on your victory. I was able to watch the last bit of the competition.”

“I’m surprised Kakashi-sensei managed to keep you away for as long as he did.” Neji confessed, “but thank you for your support.” 

At that moment, he was reminded of his genin days, when their teacher would sometimes give his students this Look. It meant that he was proud of them, but he also predicted so much more potential in them as well. That if they put their minds to it, they would accomplish what had previously seemed impossible. At first Neji had thought it was disingenuous and a type of coddling, but now he knew differently. Maito Gai was one of the most insightful and intuitive people he had ever met. His assessments were spot-on. 

“I am very proud of you, Neji, and I know you and Lee will have a wonderful time. I am so touched that the two of you are embracing your bond and taking some time to enjoy your youth.” 

Neji knew there was more he wanted to say along that vein, and he waited for him to elaborate. He was surprised when, instead, his sensei simply put the brakes on his wheelchair and stood up so he was at eye level. “May I ask for something?” 

The Hyuuga prodigy braced himself. He would probably end up answering anything he asked, even if he didn’t want to. Not only because he respected the hell out of him, but because the taijutsu master’s emotional intelligence would see through any white lies Neji tried. Hence why he’d been a bit sparse around the Hatake-Maito household lately.  

“Of course.” Neji squared his shoulders and gave the older man his full attention. 

“I would like a hug.” 

Neji huffed out a laugh and immediately relaxed. “Okay.” 

He readjusted his bag on his shoulder and let his sensei envelop him in a quick and hearty hug. 

When Gai pulled back he put his hands on his pupil’s shoulders and smiled down at him. “Neji, I have no doubts that you’ll talk to me when you’re ready, but if that day does not come, that is okay, too. You are my precious student, and I know you are busy enjoying what this life has to offer, but my door is always open. Even if all you want to do is drink some tea and talk about the weather.”

Neji’s heart clenched at the limitless kindness and patience, wishing that he was better at communicating so he could tell the older man how much he sincerely appreciated it. “I’ll keep that in mind… Now give me the bento box you made for Lee and I to take on our trip.”

“It’s hearty onigiri!” Gai turned around and reached for the pack strapped to the back of his wheelchair. He rummaged around in it for a moment and then pulled out a modestly sized container wrapped in a ridiculous cat-themed cloth. “My rival told me not to go overboard because you’d have to carry it with you.”

“He was right.” Neji took the proffered gift. “Thank you, again.”

“No thanks necessary! Now! We mustn’t keep Lee and Tenten waiting!”

Neji fell into step beside the other man as he wheeled his way towards the gates. “Did Lee drag Tenten out of bed for early morning training?”

“He hardly had to drag her, our weapon’s master is just as dedicated as my other pupils!”

“She is.” Neji reassured him. “She just may hold some resentment from being woken up at five am.”

xXx

Neji felt more centered when they left Konoha’s gates behind them in a blur of branches and leaves. One of Tenten’s buns was off-side, probably because Lee rushed her out of the house, but she seemed to be thankful that she could see them off. In some ways, it felt like they were leaving on a two-man mission instead of travelling to a luxury resort island. There had been times where they needed jounin who specialised in speed to carry sensitive documents, so Lee and Neji were often dispatched to deal with those situations. Neji may not be able to run as fast as his teammate, but he had the stamina to keep up with him, which was crucial. 

They chatted along the way, or rather, Lee struck up a conversation and proceeded to gush about what he’d been working on lately. The short-haired shinobi was trying to find a way to use the gates for more than just bolstering strength and speed. Although he didn’t have proficiency in moulding chakra, he wanted to be able to focus on where the most of the energy gathered in his body. Meanwhile, Neji was working on using his elemental jutsu to move from one spot to another. The wind element had the potential to help propel him forward, or even lift him higher, but it was finding the perfect balance of speed, amount, and type of chakra to control it.

It was easy to talk about training; throwing ideas back and forth and discussing logistics was second nature to their team. Neither of them realised how long they’d been moving for until Neji made a comment on the sun’s progress in the sky. They weren’t on a mission, this was supposed to be for leisure, and yet they had shaved hours of their journey already. 

“We may end up waiting in the border town for more than a night.” Neji pointed out as Lee came over to him with a cup of tea and a small plate of snacks from one of the many rest stops along their path. Neji was sitting under the canopy on the far side of the establishment, with his back to the building and body angled towards the path that would lead them towards the border of Fire and Tea.  

Neji took the barley tea with a small ‘thanks’, mentally calculating how long it would take them to get to the Land of Tea port where they’d catch the early morning ferry to Iro Island. 

“That is alright, if memory serves, the waves there are good for training, and you enjoyed the refreshment shop on the pier.” Lee took a sip of his own herbal tea, sitting on the other side of the table and in the perfect position to watch their six. It was instinctual, as easy as breathing, and Neji couldn’t help but feel amused by how predictable they were, sometimes. 

“Don’t scare the locals by causing a mini-tsunami, this time.” Neji warned him.        

“I shall endeavor not to.” Lee gave him a megawatt smile, and his travelling partner didn’t believe it for one second. 

“The Land of Tea doesn’t have an official shinobi army. Most of the people are civilians.” Neji mused. “Konoha was rarely dispatched on missions here.” 

“Yes. The last time we were here it was a simple escort mission.” Lee recalled with a smile. “One of our first missions as a team after my surgery.” 

That disastrous chuunin exam; the start of a lot of changes for their team. Tenten had been determined to train harder on her other skills, including taijutsu. More often than not, Neji arrived at their team’s meeting time to find the two of them already hours-deep into their own personal training. It had been awkward at first, especially considering the fact that Tenten had witnessed his humbling defeat, and Lee had nearly died with neither of his teammates by his side. 

Sometimes, the genius pondered on whether Lee had truly put the past behind them, or if he mentioned his surgery as a stark reminder of Neji’s failure that he’d never forgive him for. The three of them had grown closer in the years that followed; shared time and life-altering events would do that to anyone. The difference was that Lee would never let him bring up the past, and the gentle-fist user let his ego and shame get in the way of pushing the topic. 

A constant dance; close enough to know every little intimate thing about each other, and yet still feel like they were strangers. 

They started on their way again, but Lee’s cheerfulness and the beauty of the landscape was enough to lift his mood. The onigiri their teacher packed them was an afternoon snack, and they took a more leisurely pace afterwards. Thanks to their previous pace, they would officially enter the Land of Tea well before nightfall. 

After some time, the two shinobi slowed to a stop on a peak in the rolling landscape and just marvelled at the hills, farms, trees, and greenery in every direction. 

“Do you feel strange knowing there is no objective?” Lee asked after they’d been standing there in silence for a while. 

“The objective is to relax.” Neji pointed out sarcastically. 

“Technically, I believe it is to enjoy ourselves.” Lee corrected him with a knowing smile, and something about that look made a warmth spread across Neji’s face that had nothing to do with the sunshine above. Even when Lee turned his gaze back to the landscape, the Hyuuga found himself watching his soft expression. 

It was in the middle of autumn; the perfect time to travel when everything was doused in a golden hue and the heat wasn’t oppressive. Even the breeze was that perfect not too hot and not too cool, which gently tousled Lee’s hair around his face. It was moments like these that made the complicated emotions and history between them seem a little less daunting. 

Eventually Neji peeled his gaze off of his teammate’s face and turned to look in the opposite direction; back the way they’d come. “There’s more people travelling than I expected.” 

Lee made a sound of agreement. “Perhaps they, too, want to enjoy Iro Island?”

“Or they’re tired of the festival and want to go home.” Neji countered. “Three days of it and I was done.”

He regretted the words as soon as they left his mouth, wishing he could pull the callous remark back in. Thankfully, Lee was either used to accommodating his contrary attitude or took the words to mean he’d tapped out of his social meter. If he were talking to Tenten, she would have smacked him for insinuating that their shared time at the competition was exhausting. 

“Not everyone is as introverted as you!” He laughed, and then started on his way down the slope of their current hill. 

“Not everyone is as extroverted as you.” Neji shot back, and fell into step beside him. 

It would take two to three days to get to the harbour where they’d take the boat to Iro Island. Now well within the Land of Tea, Neji was starting to genuinely wish he’d been born here instead. Each new teahouse they encountered had their own personal blends of leaves they recommended, and he was tempted to buy at least one tin from each place they passed. Lee, of course, was a good sport about it; it wasn’t like they were in a time crunch. 

It was while Neji was seriously debating loading his pack down with souvenirs before their trip technically even started, that they met the Takahashi family. As if to prove both of their points about varying social personalities, the family entered the teahouse in a whirlwind of different emotions. 

The door chime tinkled briefly while they milled in and then fell into silence once more, not that the proprietors wouldn’t immediately see anyone that entered from where they sat. 

“I’m tired.” Was the initial greeting from one of their two daughters; a girl that appeared to be in her early teens let her shoulders roll back, her pack sliding off and hitting the ground with a soft thump. 

“I’m exhausted.” The father agreed, slumping into one of the few tables and chairs and rubbing at his sore shoulders.

The mother rolled her eyes and shared a private smile with their other daughter. The two girls were twins, or close enough in age that they could be mistaken for them. 

“Hello, everyone.” The woman who ran the teahouse greeted them with a warm familiarity. She turned to the mother with a knowing smile. “I see they lasted about as long as you figured they would.”

“Three whole days.” The woman put her hand to her heart and gazed back at her husband with a slightly mocking tone. “So proud of him.” 

The husband kept his head hung forward, and lifted his hand to weakly give her a thumbs up. 

Meanwhile, the fourth of their family had made an immediate beeline for where Neji and Lee were standing. 

“Hi!” She grinned up at them expectantly. “Are you guys shinobi?”

This was enough to make the father lift his head, so he could give her an exasperated chastising. “Atsuki, you can’t just ask strangers that!”

“Why not?” She shrugged off his words, disinterested in heeding anything the man had to say. “So are you?” She prompted once more.

Lee chuckled and leaned forward a bit so he didn’t tower over her as much. “We are, actually.”

Neji put the tin back on the shelf and gave his teammate an annoyed look. “Lee.”

“Ep!” The first daughter made a high-pitched noise in the back of her throat and covered up her face when her exclamation caught their attention. She immediately went to sit beside her father, and buried her face against his shoulder. 

“I mean, it’s obvious.” The second daughter pointed to Lee’s attire. “You’re wearing one of those vests, are you guys chuunin or jounin?” The words sounded a bit alien on her tongue, so she wasn’t used to saying them, but her genuine curiosity was enough to engage Lee. 

“Both of us are jounin.” He told her kindly. “Are you interested in becoming a kunoichi?”

“Yes!”

“No!” Both of her parents shouted.

“No offense.” Her mother tacked on. 

Neji shook his head, tone dry. “None taken, believe me.” 

“Neji! How could you say that! That is how we met!” Lee gasped and rounded on the Hyuuga.

“The war is still fresh in everyone’s minds, Lee. What civilian parent would want that for their child?” Neji pointed out calmly, “especially if they’re from a place with no active army?”

“Being a shinobi is a noble and worthwhile profession, especially for those burning with the passion of youth! We show our dedication to our country and aid people in need!” Lee argued ardently.

“That doesn’t change the fact that a lot of civilian parents lose their children if they choose to become shinobi.” Neji reminded him, getting a bit more techy for some reason. 

“Oh, don’t argue!” The other daughter squeaked, watching them from between her fingers. “Please!”

Both men realised how it could look to someone from the outside and shelved the conversation. It was Lee that turned to address the timid teen. “Do not worry, we have had many debates before!”

“Himari, you’re being weird.” Atsuki called her sister out with a grimace. “What’s with the blushing?”

“Oh. Oh.” The mother put two and two together. “I remember-”

“Mom!” Himari pleaded with her. 

Neji was starting to feel just as embarrassed as the quiet daughter. “Your family just came from Konoha, didn’t they?” He put his face into his hand and had the desperate urge to drag Lee out of there and flee. Or leave him behind and flee on his own. 

“Yeah! We went to the Festival of Bonds.” Atsuki chirped, rocking back and forth on her heels with glee. “It was so great! But my dad and sister got all ‘worn out’,” she paused to put parentheses on her words, “so we ended up coming home early.”

“Please excuse our daughters’ rudeness.” The mother bowed to them. “My name is Takahashi Mai. This is my husband Hashio, and our daughters Himari and Atsuki.”

“Pleased to meet you Takahashi-tachi!” Lee bowed back formally. “My name is Rock Lee, and this is Hyuuga Neji.”

“Ep.” Himari made the same noise again. 

“I swear she’s not normally like this.” Atsuki assured Lee and Neji. “I mean, she’s quiet and stuff, but not whatever is going on right now.” 

“Atsuki, you remember when your sister and I stopped to watch that show, and you and your father went to play games?” Her mother reminded her. “These two were in that competition.”

“Oh, cool. Did you win?” She didn’t seem very interested, but felt the need to ask anyway. 

“Yes, we did! The power of our bond triumphed!” Lee pumped his fist with a proud fire in his eyes. 

“Uh huh.” Atsuki looked a bit doubtful. “Well, congrats, I guess!”

“Thank you.” Lee responded graciously, and Neji just wished he had an excuse to leave. 

Quickly. 

“I was cheering for you.” Himari spoke up cautiously. “You looked like you were having a lot of fun on the last day.” 

“We were!” Lee assured her. “Thank you for your support.” 

“Bo-ring.” Atsuki sing-songed now that the topic was no longer on what she considered to be ‘cool’. “Can we get going now?” 

“We should take our leave as well.” Neji took that as a cue and politely thanked the woman behind the counter. 

“Oh, but I thought you wanted tea-?” Lee turned to gesture to the display, but by the time he’d finished, Neji was already outside. “Well, I suppose we shall head out, then. It was wonderful to meet you all!” 

Himari’s head hit the table with a ‘thunk’ once the door chime jingled to signal that the shinobi were gone with the door shut behind them. “Oh my gosh he’s even prettier up close.”

“The long-haired one? He seems a bit scowly to me.” Atsuki wrinkled up her nose. “If you like that sort of thing…”

“Eyelashes.” Was all her sister could say, voice muffled by the table, and blush reaching up to the tips of her ears. 

xXx

“You know, I never considered it.” Lee segued later that evening in their modest hotel room. 

To a layman, the accommodations for winners of a grand prize may find this lacking, but to two shinobi who were used to sleeping on the dirt while traveling, it was a luxury. It was a clean room with an attached bathroom and two fluffy futons; considering they were still what would normally be about a day’s journey away from being close to the capital, it was quite nice. 

“Hmn?” Neji indulged his musing, too busy looking in his pack for his pajamas. 

“That you would view being a shinobi in that light.” Lee was already in his, sitting cross-legged beside their laid out futons and giving his teammate an imploring look. 

Neji paused, his sleeping attire now resting on his lap, as he considered how he wanted to play this. 

“Lee, we are the only intact team from our graduating class.” Neji reminded him. “Every other team suffered a casualty, a career-ending injury, or quit altogether. We almost joined them more than once.” 

The taijutsu user considered this and changed his question. “Putting aside everything else, if, say, Hinata-san had a child, would you disapprove of them becoming a shinobi?”

“That wouldn’t be my choice.” Neji stood up to make his way to the bathroom to brush his teeth and change. He never met his partner’s eyes. 

“That is not answering the question.” Lee pointed out in disapproval.

“Lee… if I did… have children. I would want them to make their own decision, and have all the information before they dedicated their lives- no matter how long or short they may be- to the job.”

He closed the door shut behind himself and took a deep breath in and out. Even discussing something so hypothetical, without all other factors, was nerve wracking enough to make him feel a bit nauseated.   

When he did come back out, fully ready for sleep, he found Lee in the same position with a pensive look on his face. 

Neji sighed. “It’s different for you.”

The taijutsu user snapped from his reverie and tilted his head at the long-haired man. 

“You want to pass down Gai-sensei’s teachings. It’s your legacy.” He walked over to the light switch and turned it off, plunging them into dimly lit darkness. 

“That is not the only reason.” Lee admitted, voice naturally softening in the lack of light. 

“I know.” Neji assured him, and then they both slipped into their futons and pretended to fall asleep right away. 

Chapter Text

xXx

Neji wished he could say that the rest of their journey to the port was uneventful, but Lee managed to stop a mugging, help an old lady with her groceries, and interrupt a drug trade with some big-name cartel while on his sunrise jog. Neji, meanwhile, did some meditation and enjoyed the peace and quiet of his morning with a freshly made matcha tea. Lee didn’t need back up considering the few shinobi the cartel had on payroll were chuunin level at best; Neji checked on him only once. 

By the time Neji packed up their things and checked out of the hotel, the local authorities had caught up with Lee and started to transport the traffickers. Lee was mid-lecture about how they could turn their lives around, while the police listened on in amusement, when Neji dragged him away. 

For a place with no shinobi forces, the Land of Tea still had its mundane troubles. Criminals were bolder, but also dumber. The rest of the cartel tried to ‘exact revenge’ on Lee for getting their members arrested while they were on their way to the next city. Given that the leader of this gang just so happened to reside at the port they were heading to, it was easy for Lee to follow his self imposed mission to its completion. 

Neji wrote the long apologetic letter to Kakashi while Lee ran amok, systematically cutting off every loose thread once he annoyed the boss into surrendering. They were going to get an earful about this when they got home, but Neji concluded that a Syndicate Removal Busybody Lee was better than Terrorising Locals With Training Lee. The short haired jounin would never put people in real danger, but these citizens were not used to taijutsu users knocking down trees or punching through giant waves as a pass time. 

At least he was better at getting real answers and following leads now; a sixteen year old Lee would have punched the boss in the face and called it a day. 

Due to his interference, he made a lot of friends in a very short amount of time. That meant a lot of people trying to shower him with gifts in gratitude. He was very polite when he turned down the massage parlor girls’ offers to show him their thanks. Perhaps too polite, because one of them followed Lee to their new hotel and made it Neji's problem to get rid of her. 

“No, he really is that nice.” Neji assured her for the third time. “Yes, he knew what you meant when you offered him a ‘personal massage’ at a discount. He is just not interested.” 

The blonde pouted. “It's the ‘prostitution is illegal’ thing that's deterring him, isn’t it?” 

“Among other things, yes.” If being on the same team as his sensei and his stubborn teammate prepared him for anything, it was to have more patience. It did not stop him from looking severely annoyed about it, though. He gently turned her shoulders to face the hotel lobby doors and started walking her towards them.  

“I can give it to him for free?” She changed tactics, trying to stall. 

“Still a no.” 

“Is it that I'm not his type?” 

“It is still multifactorial, but that is also a part of it.” The byakugan user opened the door and shooed her back out onto the street. 

“Wait!” She grabbed the handle before he could close it behind himself. “What about you? You're kinda cute!” 

Neji stared her down with a very unimpressed look on his face. 

She let go of the door and held her hands up, giggling nervously. “Message received.” 

When Neji made it back to their room, Lee gave him a meek apology. 

“I was unsure what else to do. She was very… Persistent.” 

“It was only a matter of time before you’d get yourself into this kind of trouble.” Neji sighed. 

xXx

For all the ways that Lee was like their sensei, thankfully, he was not prone to seasickness. 

“It is beautiful.” The taijutsu user’s voice was full of awe as they stared out into the crystalline waters. 

Neji much preferred the view of a sandy beach, like the one back before they left the port. Still, there was something very majestic and humbling about being out on the open waters like this. They were standing on the port side of the ferry, leaning against the railing together. The smell of saltwater and bright sunlight on their faces was a sensation that Neji was unlikely to forget any time soon. Especially considering the fact that his usually exuberant company was lost in a reverie with a gentle smile on his face. 

Iro island was much bigger than either of them expected, and it looked less gaudy than what Neji expected. If anything it looked more traditional and historic. 

They docked and started to unload the passengers. A long line of deep red torii led them from the shallow port further in, with tropical trees and plants stretching in either direction. Once they retrieved their bags and followed the path, it led them to a large temple where many paid their respects to the ancient goddesses of the sun and moon, also known for their reign over peace and dreams respectively. 

Lee offered his prayers while Neji observed the statue of a fox and rabbit. The two, according to the plaque, worked in tandem to serve both goddesses. It was certainly unorthodox, especially since most people attributed foxes with being tricksters like the kitsune and rabbits as more moon-oriented. Though, now that he thought of it, both fox and rabbit were day animals; what had originally attributed rabbits with the moon?

“Are you ready?” 

Neji turned to his teammate and nodded. He didn’t believe in such things, but sometimes the origins of religions intrigued him. 

“Excuse me, are you two-” she paused to look down at her paper hesitantly, “-Hyuuga Neji and Rokku Lee?”

“Yes, that would be us.” Lee replied. “Pleased to meet you.”

“You as well. My name is Yorumi, and I am here to greet you and explain the contents of your vacation package.” She bowed and then gestured to the temple. “I see the two of you have already paid your respects to Mitsuki-hime and Haruhi-hime, this tends to be the first stop on our package. I apologise that I didn’t get here in time to greet you off the boat.” 

“That is quite alright.” Lee assured her. “We came earlier than expected, we wanted to look around.”

“I’d be glad to show you, or if you wanted to go on your own, I can meet you back here?” She glanced back and forth between the two of them expectantly. 

“We will follow you.” Neji gestured for her to lead on. 

“Perfect, then I will first bring you to your accommodations so you can drop off your bags. Your room isn’t quite ready yet, but this way you don’t have to lug them around.” 

Yorumi was wearing a very ornate kimono with iridescent threads of blue and silver. She truly did look like the night sky, which suited her name well. Even the clip in her hair was silver with bangles reminiscent of stars. 

“First and foremost, welcome to Iro Island. I hope you brought good shoes, because there is a lot of walking to get from place to place. It will take us about thirty minutes to get to Kintsugi Hot Springs from here.” She started pleasantly. “There are a lot of things to do here, but you will have to book a lot of it with the concierge, this way, they can make sure you’ll have a spot.” They were walking through what appeared to be an artisan district, filled with stalls of homemade and handmade goods. 

“Morning, Yorumi!” Called one of the men from the stalls, a basket of jars in one arm and the other waving at her. “Is this one of the winners of the vacation package?” 

“Morning, Sen. Yes, this is Hyuuga-san and Rokku-san.”

Neji opened up his mouth to correct her but Lee touched his wrist and shook his head minutely. It wasn’t like they’d be staying there long, and he’d gone by the second part of his name for his whole life. A lot of people would get confused. 

“Nice to meet you.” Sen gave Lee a hearty handshake, but when Neji didn’t step forward, he graciously took the refusal. “We moved here from Sunagakure. My family supplies jams and other canned goods to a lot of the establishments here.” 

He gestured to the top of their canopy above the stall, where a proud Suna insignia was stitched into the fabric. “A lot of us were scouted and immigrated here from other countries. I’d say there’s only a handful of families that lived here before this island was turned into a tourist area.”

“That is wonderful, do you go home often? Your Kazekage is a dear friend of mine.” Lee gushed. 

Neji turned to look at the other stalls while Lee and Sen began chatting about Sunagakure. He held no such sentiment towards the other country, and instead he preferred to look around quietly. His attention was drawn to a pottery stand, instead, that had glazes on their work that he’d never seen before. 

“Hello, Hyuuga-san, right?” The soft-spoken woman saw him out of the corner of her eye while she dusted. “I heard Yorumi-chan introduce you.”

Neji nodded towards her; she had her long silky hair in a braid and soft features that reminded him a little bit of his cousin. What differed were her deep crystal blue eyes, and slightly taller and slimmer physique. Neji noted that her stall didn’t have any country’s insignia attached to it, either. 

“My name is Yuran.” She bowed to him in greeting. “My family has lived in The Land of Tea for four generations. We use a special chakra technique to make all our pieces.” 

“Interesting.” He took a closer look at some of the more intricate designs. “Are there different chakra natures incorporated, as well?”

She gave him a sweet complimentary smile. “You have a very keen eye. Yes, there are many chakra natures in our family. Dating back to about a century ago, we split from our founding family and decided to relocate here, using our abilities for pottery and artisan work instead of fighting.”

There was something in her words that skirted along the edge of his intuition; she spoke with practised ease, yet he had the sense that she wanted him to ask her more. 

“We have a pottery class.” She took a small card from the pocket of her plain hanfu attire and handed it to him with a respectful bow. “I would be honoured if you and your partner would join us. I teach the Tuesday and Thursday morning class at ten am.”

“I see.” Neji looked down at the card. “Are there openings for tomorrow?”

She looked pleased. “I can make room for both of you, please come in clothes you don’t mind getting a bit dirty in. We supply the towels and aprons. If you do well in the initial class, I can teach you some basic chakra techniques for about an hour afterwards. It’s not often I get to meet someone else so proficient in chakra control.”

“Thank you.” Neji took the card. 

He could have asked how she knew that he had such good chakra control, but he bit the question back. He had the feeling that she’d give him some sort of cryptic answer, so he saved his inquiries for the next day. 

Lee and Sen were winding down their conversation when Neji walked back over, and Yorumi continued their tour. Neji informed them that he’d committed their Thursday morning to a pottery class and Lee beamed with excitement. 

“Are there any training grounds on the island?” Lee asked as they turned down the declining path towards Kintsugi Hot Springs. It made their host flounder for a bit before tentatively telling him no. Likely, no one had asked that before. 

Their accommodations were already well within sight, stretching out in front of them like some sort of palace instead of a hotel. They’d already passed a few themed hotels on their way there, but this one was clearly the most expensive and sought after. Neji had mistakenly thought that they’d give them one of the cheaper places to stay based on the fact that the island was footing the bill. Even after he saw the pictures they projected on their slideshow during the competition, he figured they’d be misleading. 

He was wrong. 

Though he did think the flower farm hotel was more suited for them; they made their own honey with the bees that pollinate their flowers. The hotel was more like a series of cottages that were sectioned off into four to six little suites, Yorumi explained. It was surrounded by gardens and fields full of flowers, and the bees were used to people and quite friendly. They also had deer, rabbits, and other small animals that lived in tandem with the settlement.

Each hotel had their own restaurant, and she urged them to book reservations to try them all. People could still walk the grounds even if they weren’t staying at the hotel themselves, and their lunch menu included a tasting tray of the finest jams, breads, fruits, and vegetables. 

“Taida-san.” Yorumi greeted the concierge at the desk. The man standing there was slightly older with early-greying dark hair dressed in an insignia-embroidered expensive yukata. It appeared that he was in good shape, and there was a small scar at the corner of his left eye. He greeted them with prim manners and well-practised greetings, but it didn’t seem disingenuous. 

“These are our winners of the Bonds Couple’s Package. This is Rokku Lee-san and Hyuuga Neji-san.” She introduced them, and then turned to the men to explain. “Taida-san will be looking after your schedule while you are here. Simply tell him what you are interested in and he will book accordingly. You have seven free pairs meal vouchers that you can use at any restaurant as a part of your stay. I recommend using these for the more expensive restaurants to save some money. Your breakfasts are provided free of charge, but you must submit your choices before nine pm the night before. Otherwise you will be served a general plate.”

She asked them if they had any questions, and when they both said no, she continued. 

“As another perk, four workshops or tours you wish to book are covered as well. When you are booking these things, let Taida-san know if you are using a voucher, or if you will be paying out of pocket. He has a booklet of the different things available and which dates they are running. A lot of events are free of charge to enjoy, such as our Friday Festival days at the shrine district. Each week is a different theme that includes free dancing lessons, theatre performances, and fireworks. There is also a reduced fee to rent kimono, hanbok, or hanfu at your hotel on these festival days.”

She turned to Taida and handed him the small clipboard she’d been carrying around with her. “I’ll let the two of you settle your things and then we can continue around the other side of the island.”

It felt strange to hand his bags over to someone who wore clothing that was clearly more expensive than his travel clothes, but Neji allowed the concierge to disappear into the back room with them. 

“Neji?” Lee called to him. 

He had the strangest urge to use the byakugan and make sure they weren’t robbing them blind, but Yorimi took a few steps back towards him and gave him a patient and knowing smile. “Don’t worry, you’re not the first to be nervous.”

He turned to her and raised a brow in silent question. 

“A lot of shinobi that come to this island are hypervigilant at first; they love the idea of a vacation, but once they’re here they feel very isolated. Someone once described it to me like they’ve been sent on a one-way suicide mission. They spent most of the time paranoid that we were all acting nice just so we could assassinate them once they let their guard down.” She clasped her hands in front of her politely. “You will be glad to hear that they made it safely back to Kirigakure.”

Taida came back out from the coat check area and walked over. “You tell him yet?”

Their guide sighed at the sudden lack of manners. 

Taida turned to Neji. “I am a retired chuunin. Kusagakure. Does that make you feel a bit better?”

“No.” Neji told him honestly, and the front-desk worker chuckled. 

“Listen, everyone here will be curious about you, but I promise, it’s got nothing to do with Konoha secrets or anything like that. A lot of citizens and retired shinobi immigrated here. You’ll see that there’s a security company that patrols the island that are chuunin and jounin level. They’re here to protect you as much as they’re here to protect everyone else.”

“Neji?” Lee touched his elbow. “Come on, we have not seen the other half of the island yet.”

Once they were outside, Lee settled into place closely pressed to his side. The gentle fist user tilted his head towards his companion. “When you took down that mob boss, did he say he had any ties to this island?”

“No.” Lee assured him quietly, carefully taking Neji’s hand and placing it at the crook of his elbow so they looked like they were just casually walking along. “He has been trying to cut off supplies to force a deal, but his attempts were all foiled. It seems as though a lot of the countries consider this to be a neutral ground that must be protected as such. They have been monitoring the shipments with highly-trained shinobi.”

“Imagine if the next summit is held here?” Neji took in the area around them with fresh eyes. “Kakashi-sensei would disappear immediately to find somewhere to nap.”

They spent the rest of their tour pointing out spots that Kakashi would nap in, and then it became a game of how to find the best vantage point in each district. 

Yorumi paused when they passed a small perfectly manicured orchard and Lee made a comment on how hard it would be to find a good hiding spot when all the trees were spaced the same distance apart. 

“Is this… a shinobi passtime?” She gave them both a slightly bewildered look. It was perhaps the closest they’d been to seeing her real personality. “To discuss where you’d ambush people from?”

“Hide,” Lee corrected her, and then gave his teammate a slightly smug look. “I think I am still up by one.”

“The tour isn’t over.” Neji was already assessing the next area they were walking into. 

“-Southwest roof-”

“-Southwest roof-”

They both blurted at the same time and then turned to Yorumi expectantly, momentarily forgetting that she was not their double-bunned teammate.  

“W…what?” Her professional facade starting to truly crack, because she was currently giving them a look that meant she thought they were both clinically insane. 

“Who said it first?” Lee urged. 

She pursed her lips and put her hands on her hips. “Why do I have the feeling that the two of you often need a mediator?” 

“I said it first.” Neji concluded, continuing their walk down the steps and towards a small housing area on their left. Lee, still attached to him by their interlocked elbows, got dragged for a few steps before he refound his footing. 

“You did not!”

Yorumi shared a pleading look with one of the other islanders, who simply shrugged their shoulders and mouthed ‘boys’ back to her. 

Chapter Text

xXx

Coming back to the hot springs after they parted with Yorumi, who frankly seemed happy to be rid of them, was a stark reminder of what kind of ‘vacation’ they’d won. When they were shown to their luxury suite, the first thing Neji noticed was that there was one giant bed on a lifted level to their left. It was meant to look like a large, traditional, futon, but there was clearly a plush mattress underneath. They were also informed that the side tables were well stocked, but Neji didn’t dare ask any clarifying questions and elbowed Lee when he opened his mouth to do just that. The sliding doors could close off the room. For privacy and room darkening. 

Taida explained that, by opening the sliding doors directly across from their entrance, they had access to a small and completely private portion of the hot springs. Right before they entered the hot spring, there was a showering station that had some marbled glass, but they could definitely see shapes if there was a person inside. Their bathroom also contained some sort of whirlpool tub and shower combo, which made Neji eye the knobs with trepidation. 

What the hell were water jets, and why would he want to turn them on?

They had an eating area to the right where they would be served their meals, and the middle was a lounging space that had another kotatsu-like table and pillowed benches. It would be a nice place to read, especially with the large skylight above.

“Will the two of you be needing dinner?” Taida turned to them. 

“No, we ate at the food stalls before we returned.” Lee assured him with a grin, and then wandered off to do his own exploring. 

“I see. I have left you the workshop pamphlets as well as a map of the island you can use to plan your visit.” He gestured to the lounging area. 

“We will be attending a pottery workshop here tomorrow morning.” Neji pulled out the small card and showed it to him. 

“Very well, is this one of the three activities you’d like to use a voucher on?”

“No. We will pay out of pocket.”

“Very good, sir. Do either of you have any requests for breakfast?”

“Lee, did you tell him you don’t eat red meat?” Neji called to his teammate, who was currently admiring their small portion of the hot springs outside.

“Oh, yes! No red meat please! Fish and chicken are fine!” Lee called back. 

“I don’t care for natto.” Neji tacked on. “He also wants a reservation at the curry restaurant?” He paused to wrack his brain for the name, but Taida seemed to know what he was talking about. 

“Yes, Mori Curry. I will secure you a table for one of your nights here.” Taida paused. “You will want to use a voucher for that one, it is quite a meal.”

“If you say so.” Neji couldn’t imagine what could be so great about a curry place, but he figured the man who lived on the same island would know. 

“There are also six fresh yukatas in the wardrobe that are complementary for you to wear while you’re staying here. If you need any laundry done, put it in this basket by the door along with any towels or sheets you use, and we will deliver them to you clean by the next day. Our housekeeper comes by at around eleven am. Extra linens are in this closet here.”

“Thank you.” Neji walked him to the door. “We will have more picked out by tomorrow. What time is breakfast?”

“It will be brought to your room at eight and set up at your table. Have a wonderful evening.”

Taida bowed and left. 

xXx 

They’d decided to call it an early night after both of them had a chance to look over the potential activities and restaurants. They discussed the itinerary, throwing ideas back and forth until they’d ironed out a basic outline of the places they wanted to try. One quick shower later, and Neji was in bed with towel-dried hair and a weird knot in his stomach. Sleeping next to Lee wasn’t new, but he was horribly aware of the ‘well stocked’ bedside table until long after his teammate fell asleep. The bed was huge, the two of them didn’t even need to touch if they didn’t want to. 

He turned on his side, back to back, and stared at the wall for a long time. Asking Lee to help him with his hair seemed awkward to Neji now, even though he’d done it before without a whisper of complaint. In fact, he seemed to genuinely enjoy brushing it out and putting it in a light braid to sleep. The man even kept spare hair elastics for him and Tenten in his pack at all times. 

It was then that it truly sunk in. They’d been travelling to this place for the last couple of days, so it didn’t feel quite real. They were in a foreign country, sharing a bed, winners of a couple’s contest, and they were alone together for two weeks straight. The whole point of this was romance. People expected that they’d be having sex. Yet the ambiguousness of their friendship was even more questionable than before his teammate begged him to do the stupid competition. 

Lee slept blissfully through it all. He had no idea that Neji was trying to mentally steel himself for an entire fourteen days of uninterrupted time and nowhere to run off and hide.    

xXx

“Well, there were no attacks in our sleep!” Lee announced cheerfully the next morning when Neji crawled out of bed.

Only one sliding door was half-opened in the bedroom, letting some light in but not blinding Neji as he assessed the situation groggily. Lee was wearing one of the aforementioned yukata; this one was a light sage green and would go well with his black travel shoes. Sitting in the lounge area, he had clearly been up for a while, which meant he’d likely gone to do laps at sunrise. Neji stumbled over to the closet and pulled on a blue short-sleeved jinbei set before he ran a hand through his bed-tangled hair and stepped into the living area, squinting at the brighter light. 

He had a vague recollection of Lee leaving earlier, but he was so tired he fell back asleep almost immediately once he deduced the movement in the room wasn’t a threat.

“Did you find it hard to sleep in a different bed?” Lee asked him as the long-haired male padded over to the washroom, taking Neji’s nod as the only response he’d get out of him until he woke up a little bit more. 

Face washed and feeling more alive, when Neji left the bathroom he stopped to take in the sight of the outdoors. Lee had opened their room to the hot springs so they could enjoy the way the morning sun lit up the bamboo walls and stone formations of their sectioned off area. The view would be spectacular at sunset, and they’d be able to watch it from their room. 

“I asked for tea a little earlier if you want a cup. Breakfast will be here in twenty minutes if you would rather wait for something fresh.” Lee lifted the handle of the stone-wear teapot invitingly. 

“Green?” Neji sat down and slid the empty cup meant for him closer to Lee so he would pour it.

“Yes. It is most invigorating in the morning!” Lee assured him. “I think you will like this blend. It has a very earthy taste.”

Neji took a careful sip and it was like all his worries just melted out of him when the taste settled on his tongue. This was a very smooth green tea; there was something that offset the usual bitter aftertaste.

“It is good.” He agreed, savouring the cup in peaceful silence. 

“You are keeping your hair down?” Lee asked curiously. “I thought that would get in the way of pottery?” 

“I’m going to clip it back.” He assured him, and then there was a gentle knock at their door. 

“Excuse me.” A young woman slid their door open cautiously. “Are you alright if I bring in your breakfast?”

“Yes, thank you.” Lee sprung up to lend his aid, even though it was her job and she was clearly a little flustered that he was helping her. Neji had the feeling that not many people who stayed at such a high-end place were quite so gracious. 

Neji drank two cups of tea, both equally soothing, and the two of them picked their way through the breakfast. Lee immediately passed his partner his side dish of sweet-pickled vegetables, and the Hyuuga gave him his tamagoyaki in return. 

When the young woman came back to pick up their breakfast, she noted the change.

“Did you two not like something on your tray?”

“No.” Lee walked over to explain. “I just knew he would like them a lot so I gave him mine.”

“Oh.” She put a hand to her heart. “That is so sweet.” She turned back to her task, speaking as she cleared things up. “I recommend the shrine district for lunch; they have a lot of international cuisine stalls set up between eleven and one.”

“Yes! Our lovely tour guide told us yesterday! We will definitely check it out and it is much appreciated.” They thanked each other and their server left. 

 Neji emerged from the bathroom with his hair in a clamp. “Is that what you’re wearing for pottery? You know we’re going to get messy, right?”

“Right!” He zipped into the bedroom to change. 

xXx

The pottery workshop was held closer to the eastern side of the island, right before a small residential area. The place was very nostalgic of a more traditional time, and it was clear that it had been there long before the rest of the island was developed into a vacation spot. They strolled through an open area where a lot of beautiful pottery pieces were on display, and cutely drawn signs pointed them around the back of the building for their workshop. 

“It is stunning.” Lee marvelled at the building and its character. “It reminds me of your family’s home, Neji.” 

“It is reminiscent of it, yes.” Neji’s attention was momentarily captured by a sand and rock garden once the path opened up into a wide area. 

The workshop area was covered by a connected rooftop to the main house, but mostly an open-sided concept so several wheels could be placed in a circle. The centre one would be used by the teacher for demonstration. There were jars upon jars of different things, some that were meant to be glazes, and others for sculpting supplies. It was the perfect set up that gave optimal light during the day while also allowing them to feel at peace surrounded by the sand gardens. 

“You here for workshop, yes?” A heavily accented voice turned their awareness to an elderly woman who was carrying a tray with a few small water-filled jars. 

“We are a bit early, yes.” Neji bowed to her in greeting, but when he opened his eyes and lifted his head so he could meet her gaze, he received a very unexpected reaction. 

The woman let out a shriek, the tray slipping from her grip and causing the pots to upturn and smash shards of pottery and splotches of water at her feet. She said something in a horrified voice that Neji didn’t understand and began to back away from him like he was going to attack her. The strangest thing was the fact that she hid her eyes, stumbling for balance but refusing to lower the barrier to her sight. 

“ Halma ?” The woman that Neji recognised as Yuran came out from the main building’s back door with panic in her voice. Lee was already by the elder woman’s side, gently holding her back from the mess so she wouldn’t hurt herself. When Yuran saw the spectacle, she jumped into gear and turned the elder towards her, speaking in their language in gentle and familiar tones. 

“We did not mean to frighten her, we just came to look around before the class.” Lee apologised sincerely as, together, they herded her away from the mess. 

“Oh, it is no problem at all.” Yuran switched to the common tongue, and it was clear by her tone that she wasn’t upset and had at least somewhat resigned herself to this happening. Even as she cut off the line of sight between her elder and Neji, the woman still continued repeating her words and shaking like a leaf. “My grandmother has memory problems, so sometimes she gets lost in scary memories from her childhood. Please do not be offended.”

“Of course.” Neji warily stood back while the young woman comforted her grandmother, speaking in their native tongue back and forth. Eventually the elder stopped looking his way and focused solely on Yuran.

Once she was safely seated, Lee walked over to the scene and knelt down to begin to pick up the bigger pieces of the ruined jars. Neji moved automatically to help him. 

Lee was their language expert; he soaked up conversational skills like nothing. He could be thrown into the middle of a country where no one spoke common and leave a few weeks later decently fluent in their formal dialect. He was not perfect by any means, and he retained his accent, but if being a shinobi didn’t pan out, he would have made a decent living as a translator.    

“Chanen?” Neji questioned quietly, referring to the language that the two women were speaking. 

“Yes. Most people do not use Chanen nowadays. It was replaced by the common tongue a few decades ago to make trade easier.” Lee confirmed, brows furrowed either in concentration to not cut himself, or because he didn’t like what he’d heard. 

“What… did she say?” Neji’s eyes darted towards the grandmother, feeling strangely guilty about how he’d set her off even though he had no idea why. 

Lee looked like he didn’t want to answer. “I may not be able to translate it properly.”

“My grandmother and I apologise.” Yuran cut off the topic further and bowed courteously. “Please don’t worry about cleaning that up, I will get a broom.” 

“It is quite alright. We were the ones who scared her. It is the least we can do.” Lee stood up with a pile of pieces in his hands. “Is there somewhere we can put this?”

Between the three of them, they had the mess swept up in record time. A few family members came out to see what had happened, and one of the men led the grandmother back into the main building. All of them had strange reactions wherein they saw Neji, tried to hide their surprise, and then spoke to Yuran in their native tongue before disappearing back inside. He could feel them peeking at him through the windows, and Lee had a bit of a pout to his lips that meant Neji would have to grill him about it later.

Or he would have, if Yuran didn’t immediately come over and ask to speak to him privately. 

“Lee can hear.” He told her firmly. 

“Okay, then come and have a seat and we can talk before the others get here.” 

She gestured to the workshop set up. They picked two wheels to sit side by side and Yuran brought a stool over to sit in front of them. She was more laid-back looking for the workshop; her hair done into two braided buns and hair pulled back by a kerchief. 

“First of all, I am deeply sorry.” She bowed much more lowly this time, the remorse weighing on her heavily. “I had thought I could speak to you after the workshop, but my grandmother sometimes insists on helping to set it up. I didn’t realise she was already outside.”

“What was she calling me?” Neji glanced back and forth between his teammate and the potter, feeling the discomfort coming off of them in waves. 

“Do you remember when I told you that my family and I immigrated here a few generations ago?” Yuran gently redirected the topic. 

“Yes.” He confirmed with a terse nod. 

“My great-grandparents were very… strict.” She tried to find the right words. “They instilled many horror stories into my grandmother, and now that she is older, she has reverted back to that time in her youth when she was made to fear outsiders.”

“It’s my eyes.” Neji deduced. “They’re the eyes of an enemy nation’s kekkei genkai.” 

Yuran pursed her lips and then scratched at her cheek in clear dismay. “Yes… And no.” She took in a deep breath and reached across to gently touch the top of his hand in some sort of soothing motion. “We never expected to see a Hyuuga, ever . Unless granted leave for a mission, they would never come this far south, or leave Konohagakure. My mother and I were warned that a Hyuuga would likely be participating in the competition so we could adjust accordingly. To be honest, my mother wanted to close down our shops until you left, but I persuaded her to reconsider.”

“Why?” He knew, deep down, what she was about to say, but he needed to hear it out loud. She leaned back and began to fiddle with a plain silver band on her wrist, eyes downcast.

“Back when my great-grandparents were alive, there was a war that eventually led to the founding of several nations. One of which was Konohagakure. There was severe… discord amongst our clan. A group of families decided to use the chaos of the war as a means to fake their deaths and escape from the oppression. They ended up coming here to The Land of Tea; specifically Kemurigakure and this island. They waited to see if they would be discovered, but as the generations went on, my family’s lineage became diluted and integrated into many others. Now, everyone from that original resettlement is gone, and they passed on words of caution to their descendants.” 

She looked extremely ashamed when she met his gaze and recited:

“Never interact with the ghost-eyed or they will rip your eyes out and spirit your children away.”   

Neji’s veins felt like ice. “Your family descended from the Hyuuga Clan.” 

She nodded, biting her lip in discomfort. “It’s said that when my family relocated, they were very choosey over who their children married. They wanted strong features that would… overpower the Hyuuga genes and let them blend into the general masses. The people who lived on the main island had to be able to use henge jutsu to change their eyes every time they stepped out in public.” She paused to swallow thickly. “They knew if one person was discovered then everyone was at risk.”

Lee carefully put his fingers on Neji’s wrist, right over his radial pulse. It was meant to be grounding, to remind him that he was alive and someone was there with him, while also not being too intrusive. 

“Why risk a Hyuuga learning this?” He pressed the issue. “Why tell me ?”

Yuran looked a little more comfortable now, and smiled at him awkwardly. “Because I had heard of you. The boy from the branch family that defeated the heir to the head family during his chuunin exam. You told the world about the reality of your clan, and defied the rules to prove you would not let yourself be held back by the circumstances of your birth. At first I was so heartbroken for you; that you were still suffering after so many generations. Then I thought that you were an inspiration, and that if anyone could understand us, you could.” She took a moment to sweep her arms out around her. “You seemed so genuinely interested in our work; a use for our legacy that was not meant to harm, but to create something beautiful.”  

“It is beautiful.” Lee agreed softly. 

“Thank you.” She turned her attention back to Neji. “We no longer have the byakugan, and my grandmother is too scared and forgetful to know how to use it anymore, but we still have a sense for how the chakra flows through our pathways and into the clay. I wanted to see what you could do with that.” 

She slapped her hands to her thighs and stood up. “But first, you have to learn the basics! Come pick out an apron.” 

Neji was stunned for a lot of the initial introductions and explanations of the class, but eventually he put his consciousness back together so he could try and focus on making a bowl or a cup. He watched her demonstration one more time and then started on his own wheel. He did not expect how difficult it would be to centre the clay, but with some redirection from Yuran, he started to get the hang of it. 

Lee, of course, was very good with his hands so he took to it almost immediately. 

“Amazing! I have never seen someone so talented on their first try!” She praised him, stopping her rounds to watch him raise the walls of his cup to the perfect height and thickness.

“I am sure there have been others.” Lee humbly denied, face still drawn into one of determination as he focused on his work.

“No. Honestly. I’ve seen a lot of people try and none of them get this far in one go. Are you sure you haven’t done this before?” 

“I did not have the time.” He confessed, but there was a pinkish hue to his cheeks that Neji felt the vindictive desire to point out. 

After a while Neji just let his wheel slow to a stop and watched Lee. He managed to make two perfectly sized cups that Yuran proudly took to put into the kiln after she had him choose a complimentary glaze. When Lee went to start on his third, now given permission to try to do something different, he noticed that Neji was watching him. 

“It is fun, is it not?” He grinned. 

“Yeah.” Neji heard himself agreeing. 

“Your hair is falling out.” The warning came a little too late, because Lee was already leaning over and tucking a stray strand behind Neji’s ear. 

And smearing something cold and wet on his cheek and lobe. 

Neji closed his eyes and sighed in defeat as Lee tried and failed to stop himself from cracking up. “You just put clay on my face, didn’t you?”  

“I apologise! That was a mistake on my part!” Lee was caught between horrified and delighted.

Neji raised his shoulder and tried to wipe it off. “Did I get it?”

Lee covered his mouth with the back of his wrist that wasn’t covered in wet clay, but there was no hiding the endeared smile. “No. In fact, you made it worse.”

Neji gave up, feeling a little flushed, and returned his attention to his sad little glob of clay. At least he’d managed to centre it before he paused his work. 

“You are getting there, you just have to make the hole now.” Lee gave him an encouraging thumbs up. 

Neji got the wheel back up and running, but he was having a hard time concentrating when he could feel two big brown eyes watching him. “Stop staring!”

“I want to see how well you do!” Lee insisted earnestly.  

“It’s going to make me mess up.” He groused, but he was faintly starting to remember the instructions as he moved his hands. 

“You were staring at me first.” His teammate felt the need to remind him, and Neji had a mental image of picking up the clay off his wheel and just throwing it at Lee’s face. It would be satisfying. 

Yuran watched him struggle for a minute, clearly amused by their bickering, before she stepped in and reminded him of the hand motions. By the end he was somehow able to make a bowl and a decent cup out of the three attempts. The taijutsu master made some sort of vase with a wavy structure that their instructor cooed over, until the class was finally concluded and all the other participants started cleaning up to leave. 

“Did you want to stay and work on chakra control?” His newly-found distant relative looked excited at the prospect. 

“I didn’t do very well on the basics?” He pointed out. 

“You did very well, you are just comparing yourself to a natural.” She corrected, and then pulled her stool up beside his and started to explain her work in more detail. 

Lee, meanwhile, washed his hands off and pulled Neji’s hair back to readjust it all into the clamp. He even wiped off most of his face, not that the gentle fist user could do much about it as he concentrated on what Yuran was trying to teach him. His cup ended up looking very interesting. It was the right shape, but by infusing the clay with chakra he managed to pull off a swirled design that made the cup look like something had spiraled around it. 

“Air chakra.” Yuran guessed immediately, her voice taking on a wondrous lilt. “They make the most beautiful designs. I can’t wait to see what else you can do.” She took the cup away to get fired, and when she came back, she had washed her hands and started to take off her apron. “Do you want to come back another day? Perhaps on Saturday at eleven? We can work on it a bit more?”

“Are… you sure?” Neji did want to learn more, the perfectionist in him demanded it. 

“Absolutely!” She looked excited at the prospect. “Plus the workshop will be closed for the rest of that day so we can work without much interruption.”

Neji turned to his partner. “You okay with that?”

Lee looked honoured that he’d even ask. “I think that is a wonderful idea!” 

“Saturday it is!” Yuran clapped her hands together excitedly. “Perhaps I can get my auntie to come! She’s the best. Most of the pieces we put on display are hers.”

Neji thanked her and left, finding himself conflicted with the strangest mix of emotions that he had felt in years. What he could decipher, from all the confusion, was that he did want to come back on Saturday and try again. Lee filled the silence with excited chatter about what they would do for the rest of the day, and then wordlessly steered them towards the in-land lake that their guide had pointed out on their tour. It was nice, sometimes, to just remain quiet when he was overwhelmed and let Lee’s voice wash over him.

There were paddle boats out on a lake surrounded by the sweeping branches of willow trees, and they ended up on a decently sized pathway that wound around the area. 

Lee fell quiet as they followed the cobblestones, Neji was a million miles away; lost in that brilliant but tangled up brain of his. It was not a new situation by any means, but it always made the gokan-style fighter feel restless. When they were younger, Neji kept himself separated from the two of them. At first under the guise of his genius intellect and abilities, but then because it was painfully obvious that he didn’t know how to let someone in. It was a theme he continued to carry into his adulthood despite both of his teammate’s best efforts to get him to open up. 

Right before the competition, the Hyuuga prodigy had promised he would try to be more honest about his emotions, but Lee wanted to know now .

It was frustrating. No matter how many times he took a step towards his teammate, Neji would always move one back. It was never quite a chase, because sometimes the other man hesitated ever so slightly, like he wanted to be caught. Then they would hit an impasse and spiral off into an argument that felt like it was about something else entirely. 

There was nothing to distract them here. No missions, no other friends, no work, no training. Lee could push Neji into a corner easily, but it didn’t seem right.     

“Lee.” Neji stopped when they were crossing the small bridge; his pensive demeanour something that Lee was far too familiar with. 

“You wish to be left alone.” He finished for him as a matter of factly. 

“I’ll meet you back at the hotel for dinner. If there’s any reservations you want to make for us, go ahead.” He compromised, turning to rest his hand on the railing and stare out at the water’s surface. “I just need some time to wrap my head around things.”

“I understand.” Lee couldn’t help but feel a little dejected that, once again, his friend wasn’t relying on him. He hesitated, caught between two warring emotions, before he snapped himself out of it and committed. He took a step towards Neji, making his intentions obvious so that the Hyuuga could stop him if he was too overwhelmed to accept it, and then enveloped his teammate in a loose hug. Neji’s shoulders stiffened, but he allowed it to happen. It was only a few seconds, but the taijutsu user hoped it conveyed at least some sort of comfort. 

“I will see you later! I shall strive to find us the best place to eat this evening!” Lee gave him an exuberant thumbs up, and then took off to uphold his promise. There were a lot of places and they only had so many days to try them. If he didn’t, he would have to come up with a sufficient self-rule in recompense.   

Neji waited until Lee was out of sight before he found the shade and privacy of a willow tree, and then sat down to think.

Chapter Text

xXx

Neji walked back to their lodging slowly, watching the streetlamps and string-lights flicker on above as the sun began its descent. There was something calming about Iro Island, even filled with tourists that congested the main walkways. His partner was waiting for him to go for dinner, and he idly wondered what he was able to book with such short notice. The concierge got them a reservation for Mori Curry on Tuesday evening, but it was only Thursday. 

The shadow of the willow tree allowed him a reprieve from the sunlight, but also acted as a good meditation spot away from prying eyes. Once he had cleared his mind and did some breathing exercises, the intensity he’d experienced was eased down to something tolerable. He walked to the water’s edge and knelt down, tracing his fingers along the surface to distort the reflection. The image of Lee trying not to laugh after he smeared clay on his face came to mind, and he found himself smiling privately as he washed it off. 

Part of the reason why he cared so deeply for the taijutsu user was because of the way he made him feel when he wasn’t trying. The mundane things that people took for granted were the most precious to him. The fact that there was someone there to pull his hair back, or bring him tea, or just walk with him side by side, filling the silence with inane musings. The sense of being known as more than just a genius or a branch member or a jounin team lead. Things like weaknesses or faults were seen as a part of him, not something that took away from his accomplishments. 

Neji had fought for a place on the pedestal; but success had a hollowing effect. Now he couldn’t be anything but perfect, because he wasn’t born into perfection. He had to prove himself over and over again, constantly finding the ceiling and then moving past it. Yet, no matter how much he excelled, the desire to belong continued to grow a canyon within him, and standing on that precipice was terrifying. 

He’d once sworn that he would never need the casual kindness of loved ones.

That was a farce; it was a hunger that could never be satiated, a craving so deep that it felt like one drop would drown him. 

Telling Lee and getting rejected would shatter him. Telling Lee and having him reciprocate would crumble the foundation he built his whole life on. 

It was a familiar war, and he would likely fight it for the rest of his life. Sometimes he just needed time on his own to calm down and get his head back on straight. 

He stopped at the front desk and the attendant told him that they had about thirty minutes before their dinner reservations. Neji took that as his cue to change out of his clay-streaked clothes and into something more presentable. He opened the door to their suite and found the main areas empty, but the sliding doors to the hot springs were opened halfway. He wandered over, leaned forward to peer into the area with one hand braced on the handle, and found Lee immediately. 

Their hot springs were clearly sloped, so Lee could sit cross-legged with his waist under the misty water. Instead of perching awkwardly on a step. The steam from the water meeting the cooler night air made it hazy enough that he wasn’t in perfect focus, but Neji recognised that he had also decided to meditate based on his posture. He walked past the bare stone flooring of the shower area and stopped right before his toes met the edge of the water. 

Being hand to hand combatants was never kind on the body; both of them were covered in ropes of scar tissue. What it did do was accentuate the natural lines and structure. There wasn’t one part of Lee that he hadn’t trained to perfection and his dedication showed by the tapering of strong shoulders down to his hips. Whereas Neji was a bit more ‘chesty’ given his abilities were focused on the gentle fist, Lee was well proportioned from head to toe, making his kicks just as lethal as his punches. 

Yet the thing that always drew Neji’s gaze, after he indulged the tiniest bit of admiration, was the surgery scars and remnants of his defeat from their first chuunin exams. Tsunade had opened his spine, and all the way down his left arm and leg. Any one of the medi-nin could have healed the scars to something barely visible and aesthetically pleasing, but Lee never sat still long enough for them to try. He would end up in the hospital, get a patch job, and then be out training the next day. 

Neji had let them heal him completely at first, thinking that the scars were a reminder of weakness, but something stopped him from asking them to completely close up the scars from the war. 

They would always be a part of him. A reminder that he’d survived against all odds. 

“Why is it that you are allowed to stare at me, and yet I get chastised for the reverse?” There was a calm happiness in his voice; only slightly poking fun at his teammate. He didn’t move an inch from his position, and likely still had his eyes closed to finish out the rest of his mental exercises.  

“We have about twenty minutes before your dinner plans.” Neji told him instead of answering.

“I bought you something. It is hanging in the bedroom closet.” 

Neji took that as his cue to wander into said room and open the wardrobe curiously. The garment was hanging apart from the others; a light hanbok-style set of clothes. The pants and billowing sleeved top were rather plain black and white respectively, it was the floor-length sleeveless vest that was the most impressive piece of the ensemble. The material was soft and metallic silver, with pale-indigo stitching designs along the bottom. 

The Hyuuga walked out with it just as Lee came in from the hot springs, thankfully clothed in a new sleeveless changshan where he was distracted with fastening the buttons on his chest. 

“Please tell me this wasn’t expensive.” Neji held the hanger out. 

“Then I will tell you it was not expensive.” Lee replied in what could almost be considered cheerful sarcasm. “I bought a cheongsam for Tenten, if that makes you feel more at ease?”

He ignored him and walked back into the room, feeling a bit embarrassed as he carefully stripped and put the new garment on. It fit him well, and the silver of the vest was stylish enough that he could appreciate it, without being too vibrant and gaudy. 

“Would you like help with your hair?” Lee offered from behind the half-closed door separating the two of them. 

“No.” He replied automatically. The idea of the other man doing anything else for him would plant him firmly in the overwhelmed territory. “I’ll wear it down.” 

They were nearly late for their reservation, but Lee’s fast walking and new-found shortcut had them there in record time. It was a teppanyaki grill that also served sushi, and was well known for their flair when it came to cooking. The restaurant was filled with laughter and clapping every time the chefs put on a show. Neji let out a breath he didn’t know he’d been holding; thankful that it was a more relaxed atmosphere compared to a table dinner. Their chef was a woman who immediately reminded them of a cross between Tenten and Ino; flirty but also impressive with her dexterity and skill with a knife.   

Lee was delighted, chatting away with the other guests beside him and their chef, which made it easy for Neji to sit back and watch the interactions calmly.

Another pair was seated beside Neji at the grill; this one an older man and woman who were likely visiting from Kumogakure based on their darker skin. The chef had given Lee one of her knives to hold out over the grill while she juggled a few eggs and then tossed one in the air; landing perfectly on the knife’s edge and cracking it in two. Everyone around them exploded into applause, and Lee told her he gave her five stars out of five for her showmanship which made her wink and promise him that he hadn’t seen anything yet.

The new woman clapped her hands along with the others and then leaned over to Neji. “You’d better watch your husband!” She chuckled. “I hear our chef is quite the flirt.”

He could have corrected her, but something told him there was no point in explaining the nuances of their relationship to a random stranger. “He is terrible at telling people no.” The memory of the ‘massage parlour’ worker was still fresh in his mind. 

Lee was surprised to hear his friend chatting with another patron, but when he turned to see who it was, he felt a little like a frightened deer. All three of them were giving him varying levels of piercing looks. “Did I do something?” He asked uneasily, scratching the back of his head sheepishly. 

“Just recalling our time in Kemurigakure with your biggest fan.” Neji replied cryptically, taking a triumphant sip of his water when Lee sputtered out a scandalised ‘ Neji! ’

“Oh, this is a story.” The woman’s partner leaned in, eager to hear the tale. 

“He made quite the impression when they met.” Neji informed them with nonchalance. He didn’t need to go into specifics of how they met; that would tell them more than what two citizens should know. “So much so that she would not believe his attempts at politely turning her down. She followed him all the way back to our hotel room and I had to escort her out while he cowered behind the door.”

“See? Sometimes there is such a thing as being too nice!” The man let out a deep belly laugh. 

“A curse he lives with every day.” Neji agreed as Lee gave him a betrayed look. 

“There is no such thing! The world could always use more kindness!” Lee argued passionately. 

“ Except when it creates misunderstandings and expectations.” Their neighbour corrected him while her partner ordered their meals with the chef. “I get it young man, I do, but I have the feeling your husband here is going to have to save you many more times in the future if you don’t learn how to be firm with the clingy types.”

She didn’t wait for Lee to respond, instead turning to Neji and needing to confirm: “All the way to the hotel room? Really? How did you not lose your mind?”

“To be honest, I’m surprised that’s the first time it happened.” He confided in her with a shocking amount of honesty. Perhaps it was the fact that they were strangers that made it easier to talk about these sorts of things. “He could turn a rabid honey-badger into a pet if given the opportunity.”

“One of those, huh? Yeah, I know the type.” She gave him a faux-sympathetic pat on his shoulder. “Be prepared to have upwards of about twenty animals show up at your house over the years. Once the seal is broken, it only goes downhill from there.” 

“That’s long since gone. He has two stray cats and a squirrel already.” Neji told her solemnly. 

She tilted her head back and laughed, and upon catching the tail-end of their conversation, her husband joined in as well. 

“Just like our daughter, she’d adopt anything as long as it’s furry and has four paws!”

Neji never thought himself to be outgoing enough to chat with strangers, but there was something so clandestine and novel about it. The couple introduced themselves as Kai and Rina, and then proceeded to tell Neji and Lee all about their daughter and her ‘not-boyfriend’, who lived on a farm in the Land of Lightning. They only had one child, and admitted that they had spoiled her a bit when she was younger with all sorts of pets; from rabbits, to cats, to even a bearded dragon that they had to get specialised equipment for. 

“It’s ridiculous how she keeps insisting that he’s not her boyfriend.” Rina said between bites of her food, then her husband shared an exasperated look. “I can’t tell if she thinks we’re that clueless or if she’s worried that we’ll judge her for shacking up before marriage.” 

She looked infinitely amused by that thought. “I mean, yes, her father and I got married and then gave birth to her, but I promise you- she was conceived at least a week before the wedding- if you know what I mean.” She winked at them. 

“Rina, these young men don’t want to hear about that!” Her husband chided her, but he was not embarrassed by any means. He wrapped an arm around her waist and chuckled along with her. The two of them were at least two glasses of wine deep, and it was obvious that even decades into their marriage, they were very much still infatuated with one another. 

“It must be so nice to have horses!” Lee admired that idea dreamily. “I think they are majestic creatures.”

Neji turned towards his teammate with a stern look on his face. “No.”

“-But just imagine-!”

“ No. ” He repeated. “Lee, you live in an apartment .”

“I can buy a house!” The taijutsu user insisted. “With a big backyard… and I can build a stable!”

“It’s not a matter of if you ‘can’ build a stable, Lee. It’s if you should . I am not looking after your horses when you’re travelling.” He had to correct himself from saying ‘on a mission’. “You already make me fill the bird feeder, and leave peanuts for the squirrels, and I still haven’t forgiven you for the incident involving that feral monster you call a cat and the vet.”

“Renta is not a monster! He just takes a while to get used to people!” Lee insisted with a heartfelt passion. “He has had a very troubled life, all he needs is a gentle approach.” 

“He scared the vet, Lee, a veterinarian . They wore oven mitts and padded vests just to hold onto him.”

Kai snorted in laughter as he listened to their conversation. “Reminds us of the bear, doesn’t it Darling?”

“Oh, goodness, I nearly fainted when she told me she pet one…” Rina fanned herself; her face was red from either the alcohol, the grill, or just in general. 

Neji turned to the couple incredulously. “Please stop giving him ideas !”

xXx

Despite the initial hiccough, things fell into a nice rhythm for the next few days. They would get up, go their separate ways for a little bit of training, go back to the hotel for breakfast, and then start on their way to whatever activity they’d decided for the day. 

Friday they spent the whole day enjoying the weekly festival, watching the performances and walking around to play the games and eat typical fair cuisine. Lee loved the fan dancing routine, and one of the dancers actually pulled him up on stage to teach him a few tricks. After that, Lee wanted to try everything , including dragging Neji into a traditional folk dance in the evening. Thankfully, it was not a romantic pair’s dance; a lot of children and elderly participated in it as well. It was embarrassing as hell, but the anonymity helped him feel significantly less skittish.

It was still a bit nerve-wracking, because the crowds forced them closer together. Neji had to remind his hammering heart that Lee’s hands on his shoulders or wrist or even the small of his back was just as a friend. He was a touchy person; that wasn’t new. Sometimes it just made his imagination run away with him for a bit. Like when his teammate grabbed his shoulders to steady him as a group of kids cut him off and nearly bowled him over, he had to avert his attention away from the lips that were only inches from his own. 

As per usual, and much to Neji’s constant relief, Lee never noticed.

Saturday Neji went back to the pottery place to work with Yuran and her aunt, and while he did that, Lee, somehow, found someone who was willing to teach him how to surf. Neji had to use the byakugan to find him, and then ended up watching from the shore in disbelief. Lee was dressed in his long skin-tight swimming shorts and waved at him excitedly as he easily kept his balance on the surfboard.

“Do you want to try, too?” A tall, tanned, man offered with an easygoing attitude. “I have an extra board?”

There was a huge part of him that wanted to say no, because it looked ridiculous, but it was a hot day and the water did look refreshing. He went back to the hotel to grab some things and then an hour later he was out in the ocean for a rudimentary surfing lesson. Thankfully, he took to it much easier than he had with the initial pottery debacle. Lee was out on the bigger waves and so Neji didn’t get as distracted as he could have while he got the basics down. 

He could also use his chakra to help him stick to the board so it didn’t shoot out from under him if he overbalanced. They rode the waves for hours, until Neji was sure he’d have a sunburn despite all the sunscreen he’d applied. Lee would just turn a nice dark brown, thanks to his genetics. Around sunset, they took a break to sit on their boards, letting the inland waves bob them along while they caught their breaths. 

“I am really glad we came here.” The taijutsu user looked so happy; his grin so bright it caused the beginning of crow’s feet to wrinkle at the corner of his eyes. 

He was gazing out at the ocean as the sun painted the sky hues of pinks and oranges, and Neji couldn’t peel his eyes away from the sight. He wished he had the sharingan for moments like this, so he could sear the image into his brain and never forget a detail. There would probably never be another day like this; Lee half-naked straddling a board, waterlogged, truly content, and his hair slicked back from his face while the sun set behind him. That stray thought made his heart clench; like he was already mourning it while still in the moment.

Neji swallowed around a dry throat and forced himself to pretend to admire the white-sanded beach. “Me too.” He agreed breathlessly. 

There were stragglers still enjoying the warm weather before they went for dinner, and the professional-level surfers were out on the bigger waves. It was serene out there on the water, and neither of them were in a hurry to break the moment.  

Eventually, the sun set enough that they decided to paddle back to shore. For the first time in the history of their time as teammates, Lee didn’t take the given opportunity to demand they race. There was a quiet reverence to him that made Neji wonder what he was thinking about. 

They were still damp despite their best efforts to dry off as the two made the leisurely trek back to their lodgings. Dinner was a quick and delicious take-out from a few food stalls that they decided to share as they ate at one of the benched wooden tables nearby. There was the typical discussion about their individual activities of the day, and then what they planned to do later. 

Lee wanted to enjoy their private hot springs after he had a quick shower to wash the sand and saltwater off. 

He looked at Neji expectantly.

“You can have the first shower, then.” The Hyuuga offered, wondering if Lee wanted him to join him or if he was just curious what Neji had planned. “I will probably read.”

There was a book somewhere buried in his pack, but he had no intention of actually trying to focus on it. There was something simmering under his skin, and he needed to take care of it before it became a problem . 

If there was one thing that Neji had learned while growing up in the Hyuuga compound, it was how to be quiet when he had to take care of his baser needs. There certainly wasn’t a lack of material either; so the combination of admiring a half-naked person he was attracted to, the amount of time since he’d last jerked off, and the white noise of the shower covering any small gasps made his release quick. He usually wasn’t the type of person who needed it all the time, but he could also usually go back to the privacy of his room if it all became too much and he needed more. 

He did not have that luxury. 

His heart nearly stopped when he left the bathroom, towel drying his hair with his robe half tied, and found Lee waiting for him. He was sitting idly in the lounge area instead of safely behind the double doors of the hot springs. His hair was still wet from the shower, but at least he was wearing a robe instead of a towel. It was only years of training that made Neji able to seem nonchalant when he found his voice to speak. 

“I thought you were going outside?”

“I was going to, but then I remembered you needed the after-sun cream!” He held the jar out as if in offering. “It was packed in my bag, and I can help you with your back and shoulders.”

“I can do it myself.” Neji was quick to dismiss the idea. “I am not injured.”

“True, but this way you can be absolutely sure you do not miss any spots.” He opened the jar and placed the lid upside down beside it, making it painfully clear that he was not going to take no for an answer. “Come sit.” He patted the seat beside him. 

Neji closed his eyes and counted to three, considering his options. If he argued further, it would just make Lee concerned. If he ignored him it would hurt his feelings. The only real option was to just let him play nursemaid for a second and try not to think about Lee’s hands on his bare skin. 

“Just the back.” Neji warned him, cautiously walking over and sitting down with his back turned to Lee. 

His throat felt dry as he pulled his hair over his shoulder and then loosened the tie and let the robe fall off his shoulders. 

“I brought one of your clamps.” Lee immediately pulled his hair back, the sudden, unexpected, contact with the nape of his neck and scalp made him repress a shudder. If it were anyone but Lee, he would be convinced that they were torturing him. Still, The martial artist twisted it up out of the way in professional proficiency.

Instead of the cold cream being the next sensation, there was a brush of contact on the top of his shoulder. “I think you are already burnt.” The prickle of over-sensitive skin being touched by rough fingertips was agonising. 

“We were out in the sun for a while.” Neji wished he had the mental capacity to make himself sound impatient and annoyed, but he knew that it was likely closer to being reserved and unsure. 

“Yes, that is true.” He then finally got to work and started to rub the medicinal cream into his skin. 

The first passes were light and clinical, but then Lee shifted and started to put pressure behind his movements. 

“Your left shoulder blade is very tight.” He observed, pushing his thumb onto a knot that Neji didn’t even know he had. 

“It’s fine.” He tried to assure him with an unsteady voice. Perhaps Lee would think that he was wincing and trying to hide the discomfort of a painful muscle knot instead of what was actually happening.

“It will be easy to work out while I am here.” Then both of Lee’s hands were spanning across the width of his shoulders, and pressing into his back.   

Neji had never felt more painfully human in his life. There was no distracting himself with anything else; his brain would not relinquish the information that this was Lee, and he had desired his touch for far too long. He shifted his thighs restlessly, and had to remind himself to breathe. His neck hung forward while skillful hands worked from his nape to his shoulder, and then pressed into the point between his shoulder blades where several muscles converged and found the knot there. 

“This would be easier if you were lying down.” 

The unbidden image of a naked Lee sitting on the back of his thighs, holding him down by his nape, was like a flashfire of heat through his pelvis, and he was half-hard in an instant. 

Then, real life Lee grabbed the back of his left elbow and maneuvered it forward so he could hold it against Neji’s chest and open up his back to get at the deep knot. He was close enough that his teammate could feel his body heat against his back, and the soft breaths ruffle the side of his head. He was essentially holding him from behind, thumb digging underneath his scapula. The spark of pain was intense and arousing in equal measure, making an unbidden gasp erupt from between his lips.

“Did I hurt you?” The taijutsu user eased off the pressure and Neji immediately grasped onto the lifeline like a sailor drowning at sea. 

“Yes!” He twisted out of his grasp and curled forward to hide the evidence of his arousal. “I think that’s enough.”

“I apologise.” Lee insisted quickly. “Are you alright? Is your arm numb?”

“It’ll be fine… I’m just sore and tired. You should go enjoy the hot spring.” He stood up and it took everything in him to walk casually to the bedroom rather than run and slam the sliding doors together behind him. Once he gently eased the barrier between them shut, he let out the shaky exhale he’d been holding in. 

His whole body felt unbearably hot, but there was no way he could do anything about it in there. He waited until he heard Lee get up from the lounge to have his soak before he stripped out of his robe and threw on his pajamas, careful not to touch anything that would amp up his arousal. He ripped the clamp from his head and threw it on the bedside table, trying to remember every meditation technique he’d ever used. 

Even the material against his skin felt too hot, but he refused to take them off. He flipped off the lights, except for the one on Lee’s side, and slid underneath one solitary sheet. He laid on his side, facing away from his partner’s side of the bed and the doorway with his legs curled up. 

Then he turned on his byakugan, pointedly ignoring the source of his desire, and focused on canvasing the island as if he were on a mission.

By the time the other man was finished, Neji was lightly dozing in a subspace that was much calmer. His consciousness acknowledged when Lee came into the room, the rustling of changing clothes, the room plunging into darkness, and then shuffling around in the bed. Despite his initial distress, the day did eventually catch up with him. There was something about being exhausted and the familiar presence that allowed him to slip further and further into a deeper calm.  

He wasn’t sure if it was a dream when a hand reached over and gently rested against his back, the voice speaking barely a whisper. “I am sorry if I made you uncomfortable.”

Neji shifted his cheek against the pillow, nuzzling in and letting out a low hum to acknowledge that Lee had spoken. He fell asleep immediately after. 

Lee didn’t.  

Chapter Text

xXx

When Neji’s slumber released him, it was sometime in the next morning. He was much warmer than he expected to be with just a sheet on, but when he turned on his back and looked down, he noted that Lee must have pulled the covers up over him at some point. 

“I did not mean to wake you.” Lee was just wrapping his hands for training, which meant he hadn’t left yet.

“S’fine.” Neji turned on his other side, not fully awake, and pulled the other pillow closer to bury his face and snuggle into it. He always took a few extra minutes to wake up unless startled, but once he did, he was wide awake. It was something that they’d learned about him early on into their work as a trio, and Tenten had thought it was adorable. 

The soothing scent of someone he cared about filled his lungs and he let out a content little sigh.

“I will be back for breakfast.” 

“Mmhmn.”  

“Do you want me to ask them to bring you some tea?”

“Black, please.” He slurred, taking lazy stock of his state and knowing he’d need the extra caffeine boost. 

“I will see you in two hours.” 

It wasn’t until about fifteen minutes later when there was a gentle knock at the front door to their suite that Neji actually came into full consciousness. He sat up and finger-combed his hair as he padded over to the door and answered it while suppressing a yawn. 

“Your partner said you’d like some tea, is this a bad time?” The same young woman who often brought their meals looked a little alarmed. She was clearly worried that she’d disturbed his rest. 

“It’s alright. Thank you for the tea.” He opened the door for her. “The centre table is fine.” 

She set it up quickly and then excused herself. As he was finishing his first cup, he took a look at the clock on the wall and realised it was only six fifteen. 

One hour and forty-five minutes.

He was alone for at least an hour and a half. 

He glanced at the dim bedroom, mind drawn to the short chest of drawers.

xXx

When Lee returned, he was ten minutes late for breakfast. He expected some sort of comment about it, but Neji simply glanced up at him and gestured to the other side of the table. 

“I should shower.” Lee’s eyes flickered to the bathroom sheepishly. 

“We have trained together since we were eleven, Lee. You’re fine.” Neji gave him a raised brow and a little smirk. He was clearly in a good mood. “Just wash your hands.”

Breakfast was a comfortable quiet, Neji picked at the remainder of his food out of politeness so Lee wouldn’t have to eat alone. They piled the plates for an easy clean up afterwards, and then Lee went for a quick shower. When he stepped out of the bathroom, Neji was already dressed in a heather grey yukata and braiding his hair over his right shoulder. The usually green-clad comrade felt his fingers twitch, wishing that the other man had asked him to do it instead. 

“I made plans for us.” Lee announced abruptly. “For the next two days.”

The Hyuuga tilted his head in a silent question, but he wasn’t given any sort of hint or explanation as to what was in store. 

The reason why Lee was late for breakfast was because he had spent the whole time oscillating between his morning jog and booking up the next forty eight hours. He didn’t involve Taida in any of them, trying to keep it a secret from his teammate. Though it became apparent by the end of the first day that his goal was to spoil the hell out of his friend. He found every single activity he knew that Neji would like, and then slotted them into an itinerary, including perfect rest spots, and food places that served his favourites. 

They spent an entire morning at the tea farm, learning how to make their own blends and picking their own ingredients. By the end, Neji had made four different kinds to bring home, two of which were for his sensei and cousin. Tenten didn’t mind the drink, but she wasn’t obsessed with it by any means. She just generally drank whatever Neji or Lee put into her hands. Whereas tea was one of the first things that Neji and Hinata tentatively bonded over after their rocky start, and Gai loved robust ones with lots of bursts of flavour. 

Then they had a small lunch where the teahouse picked out different snack-sized foods that would go with whichever one of their house blends they chose to share between them. From there it was a hike up the cliffside to a lighthouse that allowed them to climb the spiraling staircase to the top of it. The inside was filled from top to bottom with a series of sea glass mosaics that could only be fully enjoyed once the sun was overhead. Neji sat at the top of the lighthouse for a long time, admiring all the different artistic artifacts that they’d put on display as a mini-museum, and enjoying the sea breeze and view across the island. That night he finally got Neji to agree to try out the hot springs with him, but they ended up going into their hotel’s main ones that were open to the public. There were several different areas; cold baths, hot baths, and even the ones mixed with special herbs and oils to help their skin.

The next day was an underwater aquarium and deep diving, each place more stunning than the last. Neji barely remembered any of this from their tour, which made him wonder if Lee had made friends with some locals who gave him all the best tips. It seemed likely. 

“There is also a kimono-dyeing place that we can look into.” Lee told him over their dinner that evening, eyes alight with all the possibilities. He seemed to be having just as much fun, which was a relief. “They make the kimono here with hand stitching and natural dyes. They are very expensive to purchase, but I think it is a fascinating process.” 

“When do you want to do that?” Neji asked, placing his chopsticks down and giving his teammate a searching look. 

“Perhaps Wednesday?” Lee considered it. “I think tomorrow would be a nice rest day before we go out to dinner?”

Neji continued to stare at him. 

“... Yes?”

“What is this about?” The Hyuuga asked suspiciously. “I have the feeling you’re buttering me up for some reason.”

The energetic shinobi shook his head. “No. I simply… wished to thank you. Without you, I would have never been able to enjoy all of this.” He motioned all around them. 

“We don’t have to only pick from the things I’d like.” Neji pointed out. 

“Tomorrow we are going to try The World’s Best Curry!” Lee reminded him with a manic-like excitement. 

Neji chuckled and decided to leave the topic alone. It had been a really nice time, and there wasn’t a moment where things had become awkward between them. It made affection build in his chest, but this one was the same gentle and enduring one he’d lived with for years. It was a perfect occasion to simply let himself enjoy it. Just spending time with his favourite person; all complicated entanglements between them set aside.  

The next morning, the dawn of ‘Curry Day’, Neji awoke to the sound of someone rapping on their front door. He sat up and then stared down at the arm that fell from around his waist and blinked the sleep from his eyes for a moment. 

He was firmly on Lee’s side of the bed, essentially kicking him off his own pillow, and somewhere in the middle of the night, his teammate’s arm had ended up wrapped around him. 

The knocking came again, and Neji sprung from the bed, opening the sliding doors and discovering it was much lighter in their room than he expected. He opened the front door and apologised to the server who was waiting to bring their breakfast in. 

“Do not worry, it is customary for people to sleep in on vacation.” She assured him when he apologised. Lee was moving around in the bedroom, and Neji stood by awkwardly while she set everything up, trying to discreetly fix his bed-tangled appearance.

Neither of them mentioned the sleeping arrangements, but Neji did point out how odd it was that Lee hadn’t woken up with the sun like usual. 

“We decided it was a rest day.” He was reminded cheerfully. “Though, I think we should go swimming at that place where we went surfing before! This time we will rent an umbrella and take extra towels.”

It wasn’t like Neji had any other ideas, and he had always loved beaches, so they got everything packed up and went out to find a place that would rent them an umbrella.

For a solid hour they had the place almost to themselves, or rather, Neji had the beach to himself and Lee had the water. Then more people began to move in around him and Neji decided that it was warm enough to get in the water and swim. Lee didn’t notice him at first; likely using this as an excuse to train even though it was supposed to be restful. The water was clear, and even as far out as he was, it still looked like he could easily touch the bottom even though he knew that was an illusion. 

There was something so soothing about floating just underneath the surface of the water. Everything was quiet; suspended in a limitless sense of space and time until his lungs screamed for air. Sometimes he wondered why his chakra nature ended up being wind, when he would gladly live in the ocean, if possible.  

The third time he went up for air and then sank back down, he opened his eyes and saw the slightly blurry image of Lee a few dozen feet away. He was also under the water, but it was clear that he was watching Neji curiously, while also trying not to interrupt him. He waved. Neji waved back. 

They both went up for air at the same time and his teammate moved close enough so that they could have a conversation. “How long can you hold your breath for?”

“I haven’t timed it in a while, why?”

Lee pointed below the water. “You were down there for quite a while. I could not find you.”

He hadn’t considered that. “Sorry.”

“No need to apologise! I did not mean to interrupt you. You looked very peaceful.” The other man assured him with a serene smile.

“It… is.” He admitted. 

“What do you think about while you are below the water?” His teammate asked. “Or is it a type of meditation?”

“Nothing… It’s just nice to not think at all.” Neji hadn’t thought about it too hard, but now he couldn’t quite find the words to describe it. 

“I can appreciate that.” Lee considered his words and then turned to look towards the shore. “Did you want me to leave?”

“No, it’s okay.” He didn’t know why, because normally by now he would be desperate to have some time to himself, but telling him to leave felt wrong. “Have you ever tried it?”

“Emptying my mind under water?” Lee considered it. “No, I have not.”

“Try.” Neji encouraged him. 

They both simultaneously took in a deep breath and then pushed themselves under water. It took Lee a while to figure out how to keep himself beneath the surface without struggling, but when he did, he closed his eyes and went still. Neji should have done the same, but for some reason he found himself watching. The other man was clearer now that he was so close; thick eyelashes with bubbles of air clinging to them, hair dancing around his face, and his darker skin tinged with the rays of sun distorting in the water. 

Lee’s eyes fluttered open, as if knowing Neji was staring at him, but his expression never changed. They watched each other for a suspended moment, quiet and still. It was strange, knowing that they had looked at each other a million times and in a million different scenarios, and yet this one felt held apart from the rest. It wasn’t until Lee had to breach the surface for air, that Neji broke from the spell.

He waited a few more seconds before he swam to the surface, and then they both wordlessly started towards the shore. 

xXx

Lee was practically bouncing from one step to another as they walked to Mori Curry that evening. There was a part of him that wanted to warn his excitable friend that there was a very real chance he could be disappointed, but in the end he just let him have his fun. This was the whole reason for their trip, after all. If they didn’t live up to Lee’s expectations, he’d just wait until no one was around and rip the slogan off their wall as a warning.

Admittedly, it was a nice looking place. Tasteful with a green and beige theme, and hand-painted walls that depicted a forest in each different season. Their host took them to a table that Lee immediately identified as sanded birchwood. Different areas of the restaurant had varying wood types, which made the two of them hypothesise over whether that was to mark server sections, or something else entirely. 

Their server came over to introduce himself and give them their menus. There were many different types of curry listed. Some were named for the country they originated from, and incorporated their local ingredients and components. Others were named based on the colour or the level of spiciness. 

“I assure you that everything on the menu is customisable directly to your tastes. If you would like to change or substitute something, please let me know. I will give you a few moments with the menu while I bring some water for the table.”

Neji was sort of surprised that he immediately found something he’d like off the menu; there was a root vegetable curry that was promised to be mild, with flavourful herbs and a rich gravy. He could also choose if he wanted it on rice, barley, or noodles, which was uncommon. He skimmed the rest of it and couldn’t decide if Lee would stick to the Sabaku Curry or the Kaminari Curry, both of which were known for their intense flavour and spiciness. 

“Do you have any questions?” Their waiter brought them both glasses and a jug of water for the table.

“He will want to know which is spicier; the Sabaku or the Kaminari.” Neji answered for his teammate without looking up from the menu. 

“If you are concerned about whether or not it will be too much, then I would suggest the Sabaku. Our head chef is from Kumogakure, and it can be quite intense.” 

“Do you know what you want, Neji?” Lee asked his partner. He was trying to be polite, but Neji was almost positive that he would vibrate off the seat if he had to wait any longer. 

“Yes.” Neji handed the server his menu and rattled off their order. “He will have the Kaminari and I promise you he wants it hot enough to burn your face off. I, however, wish to remain alive so I will have the exact opposite; Lotus Curry with barley instead of rice.”  

The server opened and closed his mouth and then turned to Lee with a concerned: “is he serious?”

“Yes!” Lee nodded emphatically.

“You want the Kaminari Curry?” He stressed the words. 

“Extra spicy, please!” 

The server straightened up and took a moment to compose himself before he conceded. “Of course, I will put your order in.” He went to leave and then paused and turned back around. “And you’re absolutely certain-”

“Yes.” Neji and Lee both assured him at the same time. 

“If that curry comes out and my eyes start burning from being in the same vicinity, I am moving tables.” Neji warned him. “I can only hope they make them on opposite sides of the kitchen.” 

“Variety is the spice of life! How else can we enjoy our youth to the fullest extent if we do not challenge ourselves?” Lee pouted at him, voice far too heated for a fancy restaurant like this. Thankfully, it was packed enough that the general chatter drowned it out a bit. 

“Your ‘curry of life’ almost killed me.” Neji reminded him. “I couldn’t taste anything for two weeks.” 

“Then you should increase your tolerance!” Lee debated with vigor, but the topic was an old and buried one; they’d had it close to a hundred times over the years and neither of them would budge on it. 

“Or they should do an autopsy on you after you die and see what the hell your stomach is made out of, because it is not normal.” Neji suggested sarcastically. 

“You are just envious!” 

“I am really not.”

The topic shifted to other things naturally; like what they thought the spice mix was made out of, or if Lee regretted not asking for chicken instead of the lamb. Neji assured him that this was not the thing that had destroyed his meal plan. They’d been eating rich foods for the past week already, and this was a vacation. He could work it all off when they got back to Konoha.

Lee excused himself to use the washroom, and Neji took a sip of his water while he waited. 

He clocked the big, burly, man the moment he left the kitchen. His chef’s smock barely fit over his bulging muscles, and his dreads were pulled into a tight bun at the back of his head. Neji watched as he came to the table and slid into the seat opposite to him, leaning on the table like he owned the place. It was probably not far off from the truth. 

“You the one who wants the Kaminari Curry?”    

“I ordered the Lotus Curry.” Neji corrected him. “My friend wants the Kaminari. Let me save both of us the trouble and tell you, whatever you’re thinking, he wants it spicier.” 

The man eyeballed Neji with narrowed chestnut eyes, as if sizing up if he was really telling the truth. “You sure you’re going to be able to put up with him after?”

Neji sighed. “Sometimes I wonder, but his stomach will be fine.”

The man broke out into abruptly loud laughter, slapping the table and then standing up. “Alright. I’ll take your word for it!”

When Lee got back to the table, Neji was shaking his head in amusement. 

“What?” He prompted. 

“Nothing.” 

Their food came out about fifteen minutes later, and Neji pointedly pulled his curry further away from Lee’s the moment it hit the table. 

They both picked up their spoons, locked eyes, and took a bite. 

“Oh.” Neji put his spoon down and stared at his plate. 

“Oh.” Lee parroted both the sound and the action. 

“This is…”

To say that it exceeded expectations was a bit of an understatement, and Neji was actually kind of dumbfounded about it. It was tender, well balanced, and even the barley somehow added to the overall experience. He took another bite to confirm, genuinely impressed and glad that they’d had the opportunity to try it. 

“This is amazing.” Lee looked like he was about to cry, but Neji knew better than to assume it was because of the heat. A lot of things moved him to tears, granted, but this was something special altogether. He was cupping his cheeks and staring down at his plate in wonder. “This is the World’s Best Curry!” He gasped. 

“Okay, I can admit I was wrong.” 

This time Lee really did cry. “This is the Best. Day. Ever.”

“You’re seriously crying because I said you were right?” Neji deadpanned. 

“Yes!” His teammate sobbed. 

“Heavens above.” Neji rolled his eyes and continued his meal. 

The chef walked over to their table, crossed his arms at the scene before him, and raised a brow at Lee. “You okay, there, kid?”

“Did you make this?” Lee turned to him with his ridiculous watery eyes, voice filled with reverence. 

“Listen, if it’s too much…”

“It is PERFECT!” Lee jumped to his feet and took the chef’s hands to shake them vigorously. “Can you give me the recipe? I have never been to Kumogakure, but I am determined to visit now and try their food. Is it all like this? Are there ingredients that we could import to Konoha?”

“Kid!” The chef managed to free himself from Lee’s grasp. “You’re something else.” He shook his hands out, trying to get the feeling back into them. When he did speak again, it was to Neji. “You weren’t kidding.”

“I don’t make jokes often.” Neji guaranteed him, taking another bite of his meal. “It really is delicious.” 

“Well, my name is Tetsu, and I like you boys.” The chef clapped the both of them on the back and then turned on his heel and strode back into the kitchen. The fact that they were shinobi, and also used to their sensei, was the reason they didn’t end up with their faces in their plates. 

The server came back over cautiously with a tray of something on it. He asked Lee how he liked his food and then had to listen to him gush over it for a solid two minutes before he could get a word in edgewise. 

“Chef Tetsu would like to offer the two of you a special plum wine on the house.” He placed it down on their table with two small cups. 

“Oh, that is so incredibly kind of him.” Lee put his hand to his heart, looking crestfallen. “But I cannot drink.”

“He’s allergic.” Neji was quick with the little white lie. 

“Neji, you should try it. Just because I cannot partake does not mean you should suffer.” Lee pushed it closer to him. “Please, it would be rude not to!”

It would be the first time he drank with someone who wasn’t his immediate family since he turned of age. Plus, Hyuuga family dinners didn’t allow them more than one glass each, as that was good manners. He eyed the bottle with a bit of trepidation, but he also didn’t want to offend the chef, either. He poured himself a glass, met Lee’s water glass with a small ‘cheers’ and then took a sip. 

It was smooth with a headyness that wasn’t too overwhelming. He wasn’t much of a ‘sommelier’, but it was fine with his curry, and so he drank a small cup of it. 

After they were finished with their meal, Chef Tetsu came out and brought a chair over to their table. He sat down in it backwards, arms resting across the back, and began asking Lee questions about where they were from and how he got into liking spicy foods. As expected, the two of them bonded over their love of heat, and Neji listened to them talk. He may have been a bit distracted by their antics, and ended up drinking two thirds of the bottle without realising it as a result. 

“You can’t have any alcohol?” Tetsu raised his brows in disbelief. 

“He would level half the island.” Neji cut in, tracing the rim of his cup with a light frown on his face. His cheeks were pink and there was a faint slur to his words. “It took all three of us to stop him the last time. I don’t think you wanna pick your restaurant out of the rubble.”

“Aaand your friend is a lightweight.” Tetsu moved the plum wine away from Neji and onto the empty table behind him. “Aren’t you two an interesting pair? Though they have a saying for that.”

“‘Birds of a feather’?” Lee offered. 

Tetsu chuckled, giving Lee a knowing look as he leaned over and lowered his voice so Neji wouldn’t hear. Normally he would have been able to decipher what the older man was saying, but the Hyuuga was too busy swaying and thanking the server who poured him another cup of water and put it in his hands. No one trusted him to get it himself. “No, ‘opposites attract’.”

“There is that saying, yes.” Lee scratched the back of his neck sheepishly.

“You two won the competition, didn’t you? The promotion?” Tetsu asked in a regular tone. “Takes a pretty strong bond to win that outright.”

“We’ve been through a lot together, and I’ve been on the same team as him since we were twelve.” Neji tuned back into the conversation in time to respond with his tried and true explanation. The cold water helped to dissipate some of the fuzziness in his brain. 

The two of them decided it was time to leave after Neji finished his large glass of water, insisting that he was fine and he’d only gotten mildly buzzed. Plus they had food in their stomachs, and he’d been able to finish missions half-delirious with blood loss before. 

“Well, you two are welcome back here anytime. You just tell the host that you’re my guests.” The chef had walked them to the door, giving them a farewell wave before he disappeared back into the kitchen. “You kids have fun!”

The taijutsu specialist was thrilled by the news, immediately turning to the gentle-fist user once they were outside and no longer in the way of the door. “Do you think he really means that?”

Neji’s lips curled up at the edges, hopelessly endeared by how excited he was. “Why would he say it otherwise? I think he’s your biggest fan-”

Lee let out a whoop of joy and then scooped Neji up with his arms wrapped around his waist and thighs to spin him around, laughing all the while. “I cannot believe we were able to try The World’s Best Curry and it actually was The World’s Best Curry! I could eat here every day.”

“Lee!” Neji put his hands onto Lee’s shoulders automatically to stabilize himself. “You shouldn’t spin someone who’s been drinking!” He chided him, but it was more so out of shock than actual concern that he’d get nauseated. In its place was a giddiness bubbling up, like Lee’s mood was contagious.  

Any other reprimand fell from his lips when he realised that Lee had stopped moving and was staring up at him with one of those smiles. The ones that showed off his perfect teeth, crinkled up the corner of his eyelids, and made his eyes seem like they were sparkling somehow. Neji relaxed into the hold, and realised that he was also smiling. He should be embarrassed that Lee was hugging him around his thighs and that he was suspended up in the air. It was just such an innocent show of joy, and Neji was learning that he was weak to that type of grin from his teammate. 

A strand of his hair that must have slipped out of the braid fell over his shoulder, and he immediately took his hand off Lee’s shoulder to push it behind his ear. The rest of the world came back in bits and pieces, and then the martial artist was loosening his grip and helping Neji slide carefully back to the ground. The longer-haired shinobi stepped out of his personal space and the gear seamlessly switched back to ‘friends’ mode. They fell into step beside each other as they wordlessly decided to head back to the hot springs. 

“I had a lot of fun today.” Lee told him sincerely. “Did you?”

“Yeah.” Neji agreed, and it was so easy to be honest for some reason. “I had a good time.”

“When you drink your cheeks get really pink.” Lee informed him, poking at said spot teasingly. 

“That happens to literally everyone.” Neji batted his hand away. “Besides, I barely feel it anymore.” 

“Are you certain?” The other man stressed the question with faux suspicion, peering into his face as if he didn’t believe him. 

The Hyuuga huffed out a laugh and pushed his face away. “You’re ridiculous.”

Chapter Text

xXx

The good mood followed them back, and after he took the first turn in the bathroom, Neji decided it was about time that he tried out their private hot spring that Lee had been constantly taking advantage of. As his teammate brushed his teeth, the byakugan owner stepped outside and shrugged off his yukata to hang it up on the hooks available, leaving a new change of underwear and a towel nearby. He submerged himself in the water to his hips immediately, twisting his hair up and securing it with the hair elastic. 

It was nice to be able to do this without worrying about strangers invading his space.   

Lee stepped out into the night air and watched the other man silently for a moment, eyes drawn to the remnants of two star-shaped wounds on his back. He would never forget almost losing him in the war, and the scars were a stark reminder of what could have been if Hinata hadn’t taken half of the attack meant for him. 

Neji half-turned to give him an inquisitive raise of his brow as he readjusted the bun at the base of his neck. 

“Is there room for one more?” Lee asked politely. 

The Hyuuga huffed out a laugh, and when he went to turn away he wobbled a bit unsteadily. “Wow.” He shook his head, hands going out to steady himself. “Sudden headrush.”

Lee was in the water, hands steadying him in seconds. “Are you alright?”

“I’m fine. You’re not supposed to wear those in here.” Neji tugged on the collar of Lee’s yukata pointedly. 

“Hot springs and alcohol do not mix.” Lee recalled, and then looked down at his waterlogged attire and frowned. “I hope it does not ruin the material.” 

He stepped away and started to undo the yukata when his foot caught a smooth stone underfoot. Neji reached for him just as he tried to correct his balance, which upturned both of them into the water.

They resurfaced sputtering and laughing, although it was more so chuckle on Neji's part. He pulled his hair back out of his face, undoing the waterlogged bun and trying to wring it out the ends.

“How many times am I going to have to do this today?” His voice was full of mirth. 

Lee looked ridiculous with the yukata half falling off and his hair in disarray. 

“You are certainly not supposed to swim in it.” Neji teased him, and his teammate could only laugh.

“I suppose you are correct.” Lee stripped out of the sopping wet clothing, the material clinging to him like a second skin, and then squeezed some of the water out before he threw it towards the tiled area. It hit the ground with a pathetic ‘plop’. 

They spent the next few minutes looking for his obi, which had fallen off when they submerged. Neji eventually discerned that it was trying to make an escape in the deepest part against the bamboo barrier and had to grab it with his toes. 

“Nothing like an unexpected dive to sober you up.” Neji held out the obi, “and hunting down a stray piece of clothing that was trying to float away.” 

Lee took it gratefully. “I apologise that I ruined your soak.”

“It's fine. I think the universe is telling me I'm done with water for today.” Neji stepped around him and exited the hot springs, immediately grabbing his own yukata and throwing it around his shoulders. He leaned down and picked up Lee's, hanging it up to drip dry. 

The darker skinned shinobi decided that was his cue to exit as well, thanking Neji when he offered him his towel. They separated when they got back inside: Lee to change his clothes in the bedroom, and Neji to the bathroom to grab another towel and fully dry himself off before he pulled on his underwear. 

His teammate came to the bathroom door just as he was about to start trying to brush out his hair for the third time that day, with Neji’s pajamas in hand. “Here.” 

The silver-eyed shinobi took the proffered clothing and pulled the bottoms on first, throwing a quiet ‘thanks’ as he did.  

Lee then gestured to the brush, “May I?” 

“You don't have to…” Neji trailed off with a small amount of trepidation. 

“I want to.” He held out his hand sincerely.

They ended up sitting in the lounge area, Neji with his back turned to Lee as the other man meticulously started from the bottom of his locks and moved his way up. Neji drew his knees to his chest, as both a comfort and a way to keep himself steady. His hair had always been a source of pride for him; as a part of his clan and because he took care of it. When someone else did it for him, it was always an appreciated experience because there were very few people he willingly exposed his back to like this. 

Lee, of course, knew that. He also knew that this was one of the situations wherein the Hyuuga would never willingly ask for it, at least not anymore. The first time had been out of necessity, but after that, something softened between them after every occurance. It was due to this simple task that the taijutsu user realised just how touch-starved and desperate his friend was to have people in his life that he felt safe enough around to accept these small acts of kindness. 

Their love languages: pampering and talking.

Apparently, Lee wasn't the only one who was thinking about that. 

Neji took in a shaky breath, knowing that this was one of those opportune moments where he should try to reciprocate. Lee would never do something expecting something in return, but he deserved some effort on Neji's part. It was always difficult to talk about himself, and even worse to express his innermost feelings. Still, he swallowed dryly and tried to find the words. 

“I’m… struggling with how to feel about my clan.” He forced himself to say it, even though each one made him feel more breathless than the last and increased that tightness in the back of his throat. “That was what I wouldn’t tell you when we sparred.”

Lee’s actions slowed, his own heart clenching in empathy. Sometimes it was difficult, when he knew that there were things his precious people were agonising over, and there was no way for him to fix it. “How so?” He prompted quietly. He’d had an inkling that was the reason, but he didn’t dare voice it. What Neji needed now was a sounding board; to feel safe enough to continue the topic. 

Neji was quiet for some time, to the point that Lee put down the brush and started doing something he’d never done; playing around with his hair. He tried out different braids, finishing one to then remove it and try another. 

“How do I move forward?” The other man’s voice asked carefully, but Lee knew it was rhetorical. “I spent my whole life trying to be better to prove to everyone that the circumstances of my birth didn’t matter.”

Lee shook out the waterfall braid and started on an inverted one. “Do you feel it was for nothing?” He prompted Neji to keep talking.   

“No… Yes…?” The Hyuuga hated the conflict within. Sometimes parts of him remained stuck; like when muscles locked up around an injury to protect it. Working it out hurt, and it made him feel so vulnerable that all he wanted to do was hide away or vomit from the pain. He would do anything to dull it until he didn’t have to feel anymore, but it was always there, lying in wait to resurface. 

“It doesn’t change what The Branch Family went through.” He concluded at last. “It’s all still there.”

“‘Nothing will ever make that go away’?” Lee finished the thought for him patiently. 

“Yes.” Neji curled up a little tighter into himself. “And I’m just expected to… carry on like it never happened. Why is it so easy for the other branch members?”

The taijutsu user considered the question. “Perhaps it is because of your position?”

Neji’s muscles tensed involuntarily, but he didn’t deny it. 

His teammate continued: “You are well respected on both sides, but you are also the clan head’s nephew. That is a difficult position to be in.”

Neji flinched his shoulders away from Lee’s touch, and the taijutsu master stopped his ministrations. The sensations were too much while they discussed something so triggering. Instead he simply put the palm of his hand against his back, right over his blind spot. The action made the silver-eyed man’s chest lurch; like a half aborted sob that he was trying desperately to hold it in.

“Are you angry…?” Lee gently suggested. 

“Sometimes so much it consumes me. I just don’t understand. Why now…?” In his words there was dismay and resentment represented in equal measure.  

He was angry, perhaps even furious. Yet at the core of him, the part that the rest of his shell had grown around, he was wounded and bleeding. That cut was there from the moment of his birth, and it continued to grow larger and larger over the years. With every injustice, every meaningless punishment, and every preferential unfairness. How he could be the best of his generation, better than the heir, and yet never change the one thing that was out of his control. 

“You were never allowed to be angry, before.” 

It was a risky move, because it could set Neji off into an explosive spiral, but Lee laid his head against the nape of his partner’s neck and snaked his arms into the tiny space between Neji's middle and his thighs. He stayed like that, holding him, and swore to himself that he wouldn’t let go as long as the other man allowed it. Neji tightened further into a ball, face pressing into his knees, he didn’t shove Lee away or tell him to let go. 

Even though it wasn’t happening to him, it was Lee that was the one who felt like crying. Neji would never shed tears for himself; perhaps he believed they had dried up a long time ago. What was more likely was that once The Hyuuga started, he was terrified that he wouldn’t be able to stop. That sort of cry came from a place where the light didn’t touch; the deepest injury that all of them carried around within. 

For people like Maito Gai, it was the fear of not being able to protect his most precious people, for Hatake Kakashi, it was the fear of causing harm to those he loved. Then there was Naruto; who just wanted to belong to something or someone. Tenten’s fear of being left behind. Hinata’s fear of not being good enough.   

Lee’s fear of being alone. 

“You terrify me.” Neji breathed.

The Inner Gates prodigy turned his head to the side and uncrossed his legs so he could enclose his body more securely around the quieter shinobi. They could both feel each other’s heavy heartbeats. “I know.” 

Two silver eyes squeezed shut, and Neji felt his whole body start to tremble. He was completely overwhelmed with so many different thoughts. It felt impossible to know which one was causing his body to betray him, or if they were all flooding up to be equally devastating. This was the crux of their problem; the thing that neither of them wanted to dare say aloud, and would rather come to blows over than discuss it.  

The fear of being so well-known by one another, that there were no more secrets that could be kept between them. 

“Why won’t you let me apologise…?” The hurt in his tone was enough to make his teammate squeeze him a little tighter, the first teardrop escaping from the corner of his soulful brown eyes. 

“That was never the problem.” The naturally talented genius had no doubts that if he met Lee's eyes, he’d be giving him that look that pierced right through him. “It was always what came after.”

“‘After’?” Neji parroted the word, question implied. 

“Your actions since then have shown your repentance. I forgave you because of that. So why do you need to be reassured?” 

The question was fair, direct, and cut to the crux of the matter. 

Neji wanted to know, without a shadow of a doubt, that he was completely forgiven. Maybe then he had a chance to not leave behind scorched earth when he finally had a breakdown and told Lee his affections. The man was a paragon of virtue, but even he had his limits. How would he feel when the person he secretly resented for all these years destroyed their team's trust? All because he saw love where Lee was just trying to make the best of a bad situation? If the other man considered him a true friend, then after his rejection and some time, they could mend things. 

“Why didn’t you take the diplomatic position in Suna that was offered to you?” Neji’s voice was slightly desperate, abruptly changing the way they broached the topic.

“You know why.” Lee lifted his neck to frown at the back of the long-haired shinobi’s head. 

“I… actually don’t.” He replied sincerely, uncurling enough that he could look down and see tanned and scarred arms loosely wrapped around his middle. When Lee tried to retract them, he grabbed onto the skin tightly, nails ready to dig in. 

“Neji, look at me please.” His voice was firm.  

There was something in his tone that made him comply, instead of raising his hackles and becoming defensive. He turned, shifting to the side to lean on his hip, and giving Lee his full attention. The question was still there, ringing in the air between them. When the warm hands slipped away, one of them fell into the taijutsu user’s lap, but the other one lifted to tentatively curl around the side of Neji’s neck. It was a comfort to the martial artist, because like this, it proved that the paler-skinned shinobi was physically there, and he finally couldn’t run away from the truth. 

“You did not want me to go.”

Silver eyes widened ever so slightly. “I never said that. I congratulated you.”

“You did not have to say anything-!” He cut himself off, voice raising desperately before he reigned it back in. “You resigned yourself to it. As if you had lost and would have to live with that for the rest of your life. I hated it. I wanted you to be honest.” 

Even the memory of it pained him; mere seconds that felt like they moved in torturous slow motion. How Neji had looked gutted sitting across from him at the Maito-Hatake household. Then his eyes closed for the briefest moment, needing to steel himself away, before he opened them and smiled. He was good, only a moment of true emotion before he reigned it back in. Then he went back to pretending to be happy for his teammate even though it was clear something within him started to wither and die. 

Lee’s eyes refilled with frustrated tears, but his face was set in determination. “If I took that position, it would be the end. You would have never stopped me, and I now realise it is because you thought I would never want you to stop me.”

Neji’s lips quivered, and his breath hitched when faced with the pure honesty and anguish that stared back at him. 

Lee knew. 

“Why didn’t you say anything?” It was a stupid question, and he knew the answer before it came from Lee’s irritated mouth.

“Why did you not say anything?” 

He opened his mouth, but there was nothing there for either of them; no answers, no questions, no redirects. 

It took time for him to collect himself and make a decision, but as soon as Neji’s eyes fell to Lee’s lips, the taijutsu user’s expression turned into one of visceral relief. 

They collided in the middle distance, lips meeting in desperation.

Neji had no idea what he was doing, his whole body was lit up like a ringing alarm; he’d never experienced anything like it. He dragged their lips against one another, still pressing closer even though it felt like there was no more possible space between them. Lee kept one hand on his neck, but his thumb was on his jaw, helping to angle their heads so they slotted together easier. The Hyuuga prodigy wrapped an arm around the back of a broad shoulder, sliding up into short black hair as their mouths continued to move frantically against each other. 

He didn’t know what he was doing, but whatever it was couldn’t stop. Even gasping a breath against Lee’s mouth was too much space between them. The position changed gradually as arms wrapped around backs and waists, bodies lurching forwards in abortive movements to get closer and closer. Neji didn’t know how he ended up in Lee’s lap, just that the slant was gratifying as they kissed and he was thrilled that those hands were under his pyjama top and on the bare skin along his spine.

They met over and over again, like every time they changed the angle of their heads it created a better kiss than the last. There were sighs and little contented hums, but neither of them had any idea who did what. It all melted into each other, and the frenzied feeling never dissipated even when Neji’s hands threaded into his hair to wrench Lee’s head back so they could both suck in grateful gulps of air.

A silent question passed between them while they stared into each other's eyes: ‘do you want this?’

They snapped back together again like magnets, and then Lee's tongue was against his, making his whole body jolt like an electric shock. This time he knew the sound came from him, just by how much it matched the feeling crawling around within him. The friction of their mouths and fingertips were sure to leave a bruised and numb feeling behind, but neither of them were aware of anything else except the need to crash into each other. 

The calloused hands that were once rubbing up and down his spine moved to his front, sliding up to indent into the forgiving flesh of his chest and then one of them framed his neck, thumb pressing against his fluttering pulse. Hint taken, Neji ripped himself away so the two of them could discard his shirt. Their lips reunited the moment it cleared his head, but Lee seemed to realise in that moment that there were other parts that he could worship. He pressed open-mouthed kisses across his jaw, down his neck, testing the indentation of his teeth against the muscles there. 

Meanwhile his hands splayed across Neji’s ribs, and the Hyuuga’s panting got a little pitchier as he tilted his head back to give Lee more access. His hips restless while he sat astride his lap. 

He wanted to feel closer, and he floundered through the haze of lust before he connected what he wanted with what he could change. He leaned away and grabbed the back of Lee’s shirt, dragging it up until his partner had to oblige, stopping the trail of sucking bruises into his neck so Neji could get it off of him. Now, skin against skin, it eased an itch at the back of their brains. With one hand still clutching the back of Lee’s neck, Neji licked his way back into his mouth. 

Lee grabbed the back of his thighs and dragged him forward just as Neji’s hips arched into him. They both moaned into each other’s mouths at the sensation. 

“Lee.” He didn’t even recognise his own breathless voice, nor did he know exactly what he was asking, but somehow the other man did.

He was pushed down onto the bench and then Lee was all over him. Their hips grinding and sending the last of his coherent thoughts flying off into the ether. Neji’s lips dragged against Lee’s as he gasped at the sensation. Eyes fluttering, lidded and unseeing, as the spike of lust overcame him. He dug his fingers into his partner, pulling him closer by the small of his back and leaving red friction lines in his wake. They rocked against each other, the need spiralling and forcing them to search for ways to relieve it. 

Lee got his legs under Neji’s thighs, mouth fastening around his upper chest and biting with each suck. There was a perfect indentation of his teeth just around the outer edge of his nipple, and then his tongue circled the neglected nub. He had to ease off ever so slightly when the Hyuuga arched his chest forward into the feeling, drawing out a low whine.

Neji wasn’t sure what felt good anymore, but what he did know was that his groin was aching, and he unconsciously reached down to free himself from the confines of his pants and underwear. His hand bumped against Lee’s erection, immediately feeling up the outline of it with a hunger that should have been alarming by its intensity. The other jounin groaned against his skin, and then he was reaching down, too. 

They shoved their clothes down just enough so they could still tangle their legs and grind against each other, but now it was one bare erection against another. Lee’s hand wrapped around them both, and they ended up unable to coordinate much more than just gasping against each other’s lips. Their hips swayed until they found a rhythm that dragged them against each other and through Lee’s tight fist. Their combined precome made the glide a little less abrasive.

Neji’s breaths turned into punched out moans as he got closer, brows drawing up, eyes closed, and hands grasping onto any part of Lee’s skin that he could reach and drag him in towards his core desperately. 

Lee’s other hand came to rub the heads of their over-sensitive cocks and Neji’s back bowed off the surface beneath him as the stimulation wound him tight enough to finally snap and release. Ripples of intense endorphins washed through his body as he ejaculated, eyes rolling back and his body writhing. He'd never felt anything like this; even his strongest orgasms didn’t compare, especially when Lee collapsed against him. His hips flattened him into the cushion, making the friction almost painful, but he could feel him coming against his still sensitive dick and that made him release a full-body shudder that felt like a secondary orgasm. The stimulation continued washing over him as his pelvis twitched in the aftermath. 

They caught their breath against each other, Lee’s face buried against his neck even though it must deprive him of fresher oxygen. Somewhere along the way, Neji had wrapped his legs around Lee’s hips to hold him close, and he was just becoming aware of the fact that he’d released him and let them fall back against the bench as the blood rushed back in. The first sensation he clocked was the feeling of heat; hot breaths, sticky skin, flushed complexions.

Then it was a relaxation that he felt down to the marrow of his bones, even though he thought there would be some discomfort with Lee’s full weight on him. 

He actually rather liked it. If he could coordinate his arms, he would hold him there. Instead he just turned his face towards his partner and discretely breathed in his scent. 

When Lee regained his senses, he wiped his hands off on his discarded shirt and fixed their pajama bottoms. When he tried to lift himself off of him, Neji instinctively grabbed his sides to stop him from getting too far away. 

Instead it was just so Lee could push Neji’s hair away from his forehead and kiss him with a softness that they hadn’t mastered yet. Their lips parted with a muted ‘smack’ and then Lee was pulling him up by his arms so they were both sitting up. 

Neji had fallen somewhere into clarity and shock. He put his hand to Lee’s shoulder, sight still dazed as the last few minutes came rushing into his more sane mind. They’d kissed, they’d touched each other, and there could be no doubt anymore about Neji’s feelings towards his teammate.  

“You like me.” Neji finally looked into the other man’s openly smitten face, his own was too busy mirroring his shock and awe. 

“You should not be surprised.” Lee laughed, pressing their foreheads together, noses nuzzling ever so slightly. 

“You… You- I… had no idea.” He stammered; it was like the world beneath his feet had shifted, and now he had no idea why the terrain looked so different. 

“I know.” Lee admitted, and it almost sounded a bit smug. “You would not allow yourself to see it.” He wrapped his palm around the back of Neji’s neck, thumb caressing his nape. “I… could have forced it.” He confessed softly after a small pause. “I was scared, too.”

“Why?” Neji leaned back to look into his eyes, confused. 

“I thought you would do anything to push me away, even if it involved lying. It… had to come from you.” He insisted earnestly. “You were trying so hard to keep me out, and…” He glanced away, saddened. “I did not want you to hurt me again, even if you did not really mean it. I knew it would cost both of us.”

He reached for Neji’s hands, holding them in his own and smiling down at the sight. “I was going to apply for an extended leave, and ask you to come with me. Then I heard about the competition, and…”

“It was never about the curry.” Neji finished for him, and even after everything they’d just confessed and did to each other, it was those words that made him blush wildly. He pulled his hands back just so he could cover his crimson face. The motion made Lee laugh and hold him close so he could indulge his need to hide. “You planned this whole thing?” 

“Guilty as charged.” Lee snuggled into the side of his neck, and he could feel the smile on his lips against his skin. “I was so worried that nothing I did would work!”

The tension left Neji’s shoulders in defeat, and sensing the difference, Lee pulled back warily. 

“You actually played me, and I had no idea.” He didn’t know if he was impressed or indignant. 

“All is fair in love and war.” Lee quoted the words in triumph, pumping both of his fists in excitement for his victory. 

Neji grabbed the sides of his stupid, ridiculous, cute, face and kissed him soundly.   

When he pulled back, he bit his own lower lip in an uncommon show of timidness before he confessed: 

“I don’t know what I want to do with anything in my life.” He took in a shaky breath. “I want you so much that it’s paralysing, but…”

Lee waited an appropriate amount of time for Neji to answer before he leaned in and placed a gentle kiss to his forehead, right over where the branch seal had once married his perfect skin. 

“I will be right beside you while you figure it out, Neji. That is what I want.”

The other man could do nothing but nod, not trusting his voice. Lee rubbed at the back of his partner’s shoulders and then carefully leaned in to brush his lips against his neck, testing the waters. 

“Are we moving too fast?” Lee asked to be sure. 

Neji shook his head, taking in a deep breath and letting it out slowly. “It’s just a bit overwhelming.” He admitted candidly. “I want you to touch me, but… Everything feels different somehow.” 

Lee couldn’t agree more. “Me, too. Do you… want some space for a bit?”

Neji absently fiddled with his hair while he let out a shaky chuckle. “That’s the only thing I don’t want.”

Taking the cue, Lee leaned in and kissed him with intent, molding their lips together again in a way that made an anticipatory shiver run down Neji’s spine. 

When his lips were relinquished, Neji whispered with less confidence than he expected to hear in his own voice: “Take this to the bed?” 

Lee’s grin could power the sun. He stood up and pulled Neji to his feet with an excited bounce in his step. “Absolutely!” 

Chapter Text

xXx

They’d wordlessly stripped out of the remainder of their clothes, everything except for the small bedside lamp extinguished in their suite. It was a warm, intimate light, bathing them in both shadow and golden hues. Now they were lying in bed, facing each other and close enough to touch, but the rabid urgency was dampened by the need to relearn one another. Like a painting they’d taken for granted every day, only to finally look at it and realise how stunning every stroke and detail was.

Exploring Neji’s body was a task Lee took to with determined reverence. He kissed the palm of his lover’s hand and each fingerprint, the tips of his rough fingers skimming along Neji's skin in nerve-wracking tenderness. He brushed up and down the outer edge of his lover’s pale thigh, the bumps of his ribs, the angle of his jaw, wishing he could map every mole like a constellation of stars. 

Neji cupped his face with both hands, holding it like something precious, while he tested different kisses against his lips. All of them were equal parts cloying and endlessly addicting. A barest brush of coy tongue, then a measured and unrushed kiss that left him bereft when their mouths finally parted, to something deep and searching and consuming . Sometimes he pulled away to breathe against his cheek, hold him close, and then searched out his lips again. 

Lee trailed his hand to Neji’s leg, hooking it under the back of his knee and pulling his lower body closer. Once he was able to entangle one of his legs around Neji’s, he moved his touch back up to skim the ridges of his spine. He noted how the other man would arch a bit forward when he was anywhere near the back of his neck. He filed that piece of information away in the newly discovered part of his brain that had to do with Neji and intimacy exclusively. 

The arm that was flat against the bed slithered under Neji’s waist. It wrapped around him, palm on opposite hip, and thumb rubbing back and forth over the often-untouched zone. They were almost fully entangled now that Neji’s arm was under his head, playing with individual strands and locks. He leaned away from the addictive lips distracting him and met the hooded silver gaze. Feeling the urge to check in, he brought his free hand to the other man’s chest and rested it against his sternum. 

“Is this still okay?”

Neji leaned in, lips brushing against the shell of his ear when he replied.

“You can touch me anywhere.” There was no hesitancy in his tone this time. 

Lee cupped his right pec, thumb brushing back and forth over his nipple while he indulged deeper kisses for a while. It was maddening, but Neji never once told him to move away or stop teasing him. If anything, he had relinquished all coherent thought just being this intimately entwined. He wanted Lee near him, in any way, and he’d be happy.  

By moving his attention to Lee’s neck and shoulders, Neji was able to get some revenge on the love bites and bruises that had been left on him. He sucked at the crux of shoulder and neck, only stopping when his breath hitched unexpectedly. A scarred set of knuckles were stroking the skin under his belly button, and his hips jerked forward automatically. The touch made Neji consider where he wanted to go next, and he reached between them to grab Lee’s wrist and catch his attention.

He licked his lips and looked down; they were both hard again, just inches apart from being able to rut against each other. 

“Lay back.” Neji pushed at his shoulder and Lee let him untangle himself so that the taijutsu user was on his back on the bed.

Neji settled himself on top of his partner’s thighs, hands on his chest to steady himself, but also appreciating the muscle that the other man had built up from years of rigorous training. It was a strange and powerful feeling; that he’d be the only one who could truly know this part of the whirlwind that was Rock Lee. He was beneath him; all compact muscle, darker skin, scar tissue, and the sparse hair on his chest that became thicker the further down it went. 

Two rough hands gripped his own thighs, not one to sit by and let his teammate have all the fun. It was slightly distracting to have him rub up and down, just shy of his groin, but the Hyuuga dragged his attention away from his own body and onto his target. He started from Lee’s sternum, pressing his fingers into his skin as he dragged it down towards his navel. Lines of old wounds bisected his path and his chest rose and fell with deep, even, breaths. 

They’d trained together for years; he’d been there for nearly every one of these, but it was so different now. He never thought feeling an ownership over someone else’s body would make him experience such a rush as well as a sense of protectiveness. Lee was his. This was his . He wanted to put marks everywhere; nothing lasting, just enough that there was a reminder to him and anyone else until he could make them again. 

More than that, he wanted to taste him, know the texture of each ridge, swell, and dip. He leaned down, and dragged his lips from his chest to his abdomen, hands groping his sides; the indent between each rib, the tapering of his waist, the strong bones underneath it all that had been broken and bruised. He set out to know it all; the taste of salty skin and the smell of Lee’s arousal making his mouth water. 

His kisses became nips, and his instincts brought him lower towards where the concentration of scent and sweat converged. 

“Neji.” Lee’s voice was breathy and low, the pace of his breathing picking up in anticipation. 

He pulled his hair to one side, tongue finding a dip in his lower abdominals where a drop of precome had dropped from Lee’s leaking member. The taste was potent, and he thought he would never find the idea of someone else’s fluids to be even remotely arousing, but he was incredibly happy to be mistaken. His hands were splayed across the other man’s hips, holding him down, and he looked up to brown eyes to get permission.

The half-lidded gaze that met his was unlike anything he’d ever seen before. Lee’s pupils were blown wide with lust, a blush crawling down his neck, and his mouth open as if in awe. He had no idea what he looked like in return, but he was pretty sure Lee liked what he saw if the shaky way he was breathing and the darkening of his eyes was any indication. The man beneath him reached up and curled Neji’s hair behind his ear, nodding his consent. 

He looked down and considered the sight of his prize. Lee was thick enough that the task seemed a bit daunting, but his excitement well out-weighed his trepidation. There was no way he’d be able to get his mouth all the way down, at least not until he had practise. He was determined to one day be able to do it, because there was no way he could leave such a perfect cock to just his hand. It was curved ever so slightly to the right, and he wondered if he could get the other man to seriously fuck his throat with it, or if Lee would shy away in fear of hurting him. Something about the idea of his usually kind and considerate lover, hand holding the hair at the back of his head in a tight grip and hips controlling the pace, made him unbelievably turned on. 

For now, he had other, less complicated plans.  

His eyes followed the thin trail of precome down the front of Lee’s shaft to the root, nestled in his pubic hair. He circled his thumb and index finger around the base, the others splayed across his pelvis to hold him down. Then he followed that trickle of fluid from the bottom all the way up to the head, the flat of his tongue collecting the preejaculate and then the tip of it dipping into his foreskin to swirl around the sensitive head. 

Lee’s hips bucked up, his voice wrecked as he made a garbled noise.

He took the head into his mouth, sucking ever so slightly, and then leaning back to pull the foreskin down before he put it back in and began to experiment. The muscle beneath his steadying hand was quivering, trying to hold back Lee’s instincts to bury himself in that sensation. His mouth was filled with saliva and the taste of his partner’s arousal. He slid it along the roof of his mouth until it hit the point that he was sure his gag reflex would kick in, pulling back and beginning to bob his head up and down to that area. It took some concentration to simultaneously suck, keep his teeth away, and move. 

From the low breathy sounds and the way Lee’s hand found his shoulder and gripped it hard, he was pretty sure the other man appreciated the efforts. The sight of him; chest rising and falling 

faster, hair a mess, and muscles tensed, made a throb of overwhelming lust punch into the silver-eyed shinobi’s gut. He had heard that a lot of people hated doing this, but they didn’t have the sight in front of him to admire. 

He knew that it likely wasn’t enough to just have him sucking at the tip, so after enough saliva had accumulated, he wrapped his other hand around the base and started to move it up and down with his head movements. The sound that came out of Rock Lee was amazing, and it reminded Neji just how painful his own erection was. The urge to rut his hips against the bed, or even Lee’s leg, was potent. 

Giving his jaw a rest, he pulled back and let his hand take over for a bit, appreciating how slick everything was. It really was a sight, and even though he desperately wanted it back in his mouth again, he refrained. 

“Ne-ji…” Lee’s hand on his shoulder came down to grab at his wrist, and he looked up to meet the debauched gaze. “A… Little harder.” He instructed and then let out an appreciative noise when Neji tightened his grip and moved his wrist faster. “ Yes .”

“Are you close?” His own voice was wrecked, and somehow that was gratifying in a different way.       

“ Yessss. ” His voice had started to sound almost anguished, and Neji began to use his mouth again, feeling carnal delight when the moan got throatier. Lee was jerking his hips up and back, not enough to really thrust into his mouth, but enough that Neji knew he was losing control. 

“Wait-! I am-” Lee started to warn him, but the only thing he got in response was an acknowledging hum that tipped him over the edge. 

Neji pulled back as soon as he felt Lee’s muscles lock up, and then he was jerking him off and watching as he came hard. The strips of semen landed on his partner’s chest and abdomen, some of it naturally getting all over his hand. When he thought the other man was almost finished, he went to wrap his lips around the tip, the last jet getting his chin and side of his mouth before landing directly on his tongue. 

It was a much stronger, bitter, taste, but when Neji sat back and admired the post-orgasm image of his lover, he decided that the next time he wanted to try swallowing it down. He reached up and wiped his chin with the back of his hand, knowing that he needed to wash them at the very least. 

Then he felt another stab of arousal and decided that he wanted to try stroking himself with the hand still covered in Lee’s semen. He had no idea why his animal instincts liked the look and sound of that, but it definitely did something for him to see his hand moving up and down, coating his length in his lover’s release. It barely took any time at all, and then he was holding himself up with one quivering arm as he came all over Lee’s already debauched abdomen. 

He took a few moments to catch his breath, and then when he opened his eyes, two brown ones were watching him, a mouth pouting in disappointment. 

“I could have done that for you.” The other man told him. 

“It’s fine.” Neji smirked down at him, and then made a mental note that they definitely needed to bring towels to bed next time.  

xXx

Neji was fully aware that this was what people referred to as the ‘honeymoon’ period of their relationship. Though he would never take the innocent idiom for granted ever again. Lee consumed his thoughts like wildfire, and even doing mundane things like eating felt like too much time not touching each other. He was genuinely concerned that, had this happened earlier, he wouldn’t have been able to focus on anything else, nevermind an important mission.

Thankfully, Lee seemed to be in the same boat.

Getting dressed felt like such a waste when he’d rather have his lover naked; Lee’s weight pressing him into their mattress and his hands and mouth all over him. It was something he would never take for granted ever again, because it soothed something deep within him. He didn’t know if it was because he felt safe, desired, controlled, or another thing entirely. What he did know was Lee was a really good kisser, and very, very , attractive, and he was destroying every last hint of patience The Hyuuga thought he’d accumulated over the years.

The first morning they woke up together after admitting their feelings was like a fever dream. When the martial artist tried to leave for training, Neji physically dragged him back into bed, trapping him underneath his body and jerking him off slowly as some form of punishment. Then Lee switched their positions and threw one of the byakugan user’s legs over his shoulder, biting and sucking the inside of his thigh, his hips, lower abdomen, and even his scrotum until he finally took pity on him and used his mouth where Neji needed it the most. 

The feeling of being swallowed down made his fists scramble for something to hold onto. He would be almost offended that the ‘genius of hard-work’ was better at giving head and ignoring his gag reflex than him, but he reaped the rewards, so he didn’t think about the competition too much.

But Lee’s hands kept fondling his ass while he used his mouth on him, and he wanted them to stray a little closer . He had no idea how to connect that sensation to a coherent thought until much later in the day, as they were drying off from their combined shower.   

Did he… want that?

He reluctantly let Lee drag him from their room early on Friday to enjoy the fabric dyeing workshop as the sun crested over the hills. Wednesday and Thursday had been a complete write off given the fact that they barely left the bed. Now he had the unfortunate experience of staring at Lee’s hands and getting horny over something that was not meant to be arousing at all. He never knew how erotic they could look just holding long strips of red silk.

The taijutsu specialist decided that he was going to go for a late jog, astutely aware that if they went back to the hotel they’d likely end up distracted touching each other again. Neji told him to go on ahead, slowly walking back to the hotel with his head in the clouds. It was probably for the best that they separated, so his brain wasn’t muddled up in lust while he came to terms with all the things that had happened in the last three days. 

He had never considered where this would lead them, because up until three days ago, he had lived in a completely different universe. Now they were together; and things were all well and good while they were in the safe bubble of their vacation. What would happen when they went back to Konoha? 

Out there in the real world things were complicated, but being in the arms of his favourite person stripped all that away. It was just them, and Lee would never hurt him. 

Not unless he asked him to. 

He sat down at the lounge table, arms crossed on the surface in front of him with his bottom lip worrying between his teeth. There was a mixture of almost-bashfulness and trepidation, but he looked at the cushion beside him and recalled their first time together. Lee over him, recalling the feeling like he’d fly apart at the seams if they didn’t get their bare hands onto one another. What if those scarred, darker, hands ripped off all his clothes and took him right there?

For his entire existence he had fought against the construct of being dominated; being tempered . Yet, a spike of something lit and then sputtered out in his gut, and a breathless, jumpy, feeling squirmed in his lungs. 

Forgetting all the preparation it would take for the moment, or that he’d have to articulate this particular desire because the other man would never do that without explicit consent. Did he want to completely surrender himself to another person, in a way that was previously unfathomable? Did he want someone else to set the pace and carve out a place inside him that could never be taken back?

They were equals in every sense that was important to him. This felt like a shift in that dynamic. A relinquishing of control so completely that he was at Lee’s mercy. It wasn’t that he didn’t trust him; he trusted him more than anyone else in the world. The image became clearer and clearer as he sank deeper into the fantasy.  

The breathless feeling increased, and something warm started to converge low in his belly. 

He shook his head, as if to clear the thoughts and cut off the source of lust. He brought his fingers to his mouth unconsciously, a deep instinct prompting him to hide behind it. 

Was he ashamed of wanting this? Was this some sort of fear that he’d be seen as lesser than if he was in the receiving role? He had never considered it like this before, but now it made some small amount of sense. Clan heads were predominantly male; their wives meant to bear children and support them. He knew many women who were strong leaders; their previous hokage a prime example. Hinata would even be the first woman to lead their clan once her father relinquished the title. He thought of their sensei’s, who loved each other deeply. He didn’t want to think about how they had sex, but knowing who did what wouldn’t change the fact that they were the two most powerful fighters in their generation. 

Then a smaller voice in the back of his head asked him: ‘why do you care if they think you’re weak?’

Because that was it, wasn’t it? Neji and his clan were the only ones who cared if he was ‘perfect’. They were the ones that had wordlessly ingrained these expectations in him; where he had to be the best, the strongest, the smartest, the most dominating . Those were the qualities of being the ‘heir’, and he’d excelled at all of them. 

He actually startled when the door to their hotel room opened.

Whatever he’d been agonising over started to dissipate when he saw Lee smiling at him; like he was just so excited to see him even though they’d only been apart for around an hour. 

Lee walked over and leaned down to give him an affectionate peck on the cheek before he continued on his way to the shower. In an instant all thoughts evaporated into thin air, because that right there was the most nerve-wracking thing that had ever happened to him. He felt his cheeks start to radiate heat at the innocent show of intimacy. Such a simple action, and yet it proved they were more to each other than just teammates or friends. They were in a relationship, and this was the sort of thing expected of boyfriends, lovers, fiancés, and husbands. It shouldn’t send him into a tailspin that rivaled his cousin’s old obsession with Uzumaki Naruto!

He was still red when the taijutsu user got out of the shower fully dressed and brightly suggesting that they go for a walk to enjoy the weather and see the weekly festival. He grasped for the lifeline of something to distract himself, thinking that was the worst of his embarrassment. 

Then his short-haired lover took his hand while they were outside, interlinking their fingers, and he felt like his face was going to combust. He spent the first five minutes completely unaware of what was happening in the rest of the world; he’d had Lee’s dick in his mouth, but this was the thing he chose to lose his mind over? Seriously?

All around them, couples were walking around, holding onto each other in some way. The Land of Tea was so much more open about affection than what Neji was used to. 

The taijutsu user, bless his soul, was fully aware of how shy he was about this easy affection. He was just too much of a good person to ruthlessly tease him about it like so many of their other friends would. He refused to let go of his hand, though, because if Neji actually wanted to he could get out of his grasp. It said something that he was willing to walk with Lee, face bright red, and not try to save his own pride.

Lee kept him out for the rest of the day, this time leisurely weaving their way through the shopping and festival areas. By the time they were on their way back to the hotel, Neji had at least somewhat gotten used to having a hand in his without feeling like his heart was going to beat out of his chest. Though each time they saw someone that they had become acquaintances with, Neji had to actively stop himself from letting go and stepping out of his personal space like he’d been caught doing something illegal. Lee squeezed his hand in appreciation every time he triumphed over the urge.  

When they were safely in the privacy of their hotel room, the usually green-clad shinobi made a point to show his gratitude for indulging him. He crowded the other man up against the wall and kissed him deeply, hands on his hips and thigh slotting between his legs. The gentle-fist prodigy moaned into his mouth and dove into activity with an instantly rekindled hunger. Making out for a few minutes with hands roaming across his body was enough to get him almost completely hard and leaking.

Lee grabbed where his ass met thigh, slotting himself completely between his hips and acting like he was going to hoist the Hyuuga up. 

The thoughts from earlier came back, potent and unbidden; the fantasy of Lee’s fingers and then dick inside him. 

Neji pushed his teammate back abruptly. “I need to shower.” 

Completely off kilter, taking a moment for his brain to come back online, Lee could only blink and give him a confused ‘okay?’ in response. 

He closed the bathroom door shut behind himself and tried to catch his breath, even though he wasn’t very successful. He turned the water on immediately, using the white noise to calm himself a little more. He put his hair up and scrubbed off the day’s sweat, which wasn’t much, and then leaned against the cold tile wall and brought his fingers between his legs. 

The sudden change in water pressure warned him that Lee was likely also rinsing off, anticipating something , and he lost his nerve completely. 

He shut the water off and climbed out, grabbing a towel and scrubbing his body dry with agitated movements. 

He wrapped the towel around his hips and sat down on the tub edge. What was he doing? What did he want ? Why was he anxious? This was Lee .

There was a gentle knock on the door. 

“Neji? Are you okay?”

He got up and opened it. More than his own fears, he didn’t want Lee to think he’d done something wrong. 

“I just… needed a moment.” He insisted. 

Whatever Lee saw in his face, he couldn’t be sure, but something softened on his expression and he nodded. He stepped forward and wrapped his arms around Neji in a hug; another thing that he’d have to get used to accepting. He didn’t need to pretend he hated it anymore, because he could linger in his embrace, turn his face into the side of his neck and soak up all the comfort the other man had to give. 

“You are always allowed to take a moment.” Lee assured him. “I just ask that you talk to me about it eventually.” 

He made a small acknowledging hum, and then reluctantly pulled back. “Can we just…” 

What… was he asking for? He was a bit overwhelmed, but he didn’t want Lee to leave him alone completely either. He played with the bottom of the taijutsu user’s green sleep t-shirt, trying to think of a possible end that would encompass what he wanted to say.

Lee watched him struggle for a bit, saddened to see such a conflicted look on his face. “May I suggest something?”    

Neji lifted his gaze, tone a bit wary. “What?”

He leaned forward and touched their foreheads together. “Can we just lie down and… talk? About anything, it does not have to be what is bothering you!” He quickly assured the quiet shinobi. “And… I would like to have you close.”

That sounded significantly less nerve-wracking than any of the conclusions Neji had jumped to. He considered the scenario and then huffed out a soft laugh; the two of them were ridiculous. “I think the word you’re looking for is ‘cuddling’.”  

“Would you mind?” Lee pleaded with a hopeful lilt to his tone. Sometimes his teammate reminded him too much of an excitable puppy, and he felt his lips pulling upwards into an endeared smile.   

“No. I don’t mind.” It was probably the same thing he wanted to ask for if he wasn’t so emotionally inept.

First things first, he needed to put on clothes; get a bit of a barrier between them so he didn’t feel as self conscious. He pulled pajamas out, not paying attention to them other than the fact that they matched and covered up his traitorous body. He focused on buttoning up the sleep shirt, listening to Lee shuffle behind him to turn off lights and get ready for sleep. When he turned back around, his face felt a bit warm, because the reality of it was starting to hit him. 

He was out of his comfort zone, and so was Lee. Hugs and easy camaraderie were one thing, but this was something neither of them had really indulged in. Growing up, neither Neji nor Lee had guardians who would snuggle them, and it showed in moments like these. Embraces were meant to relieve stress and release good endorphins; he knew the science behind it. He’d just always thought himself separated from things like relationships and romance. Like he was behind the glass wall, watching from the outside. 

The more affectionate of the two laid down first and then held his arms out expectantly. Despite the fact that he felt too hot and nervous, Neji complied with the wordless offer. Lee pulled in him and they spent the next little bit adjusting to find a good position. They ended up with Neji on his back, arms tentatively resting around Lee’s shoulders with the other man curled up around his side, forehead resting against the side of the silver-eyed man’s neck.

“It has been a while since you went back to the pottery workshop.” Lee commented idly.

“I guess so,” Neji realised. He’d been a bit distracted by the whole ‘their feelings were mutual’ thing. 

The taijutsu user nuzzled in a little more and then rubbed his palm up and down the back of Neji’s arm. “Do you have any other workshops you want to attend?”

“I’d have to look again.” He wondered if they should have relocated to the lounge area instead, just so they could pull out the brochures, but he also didn’t want to move, either.  “What about you?”

“There are a few I was considering.” The other man confessed. 

They lapsed into an awkward silence, but as the seconds went on they turned their focus on relaxing into the hold. Lee could probably hear his heartbeat hammering at first, and then slowly easing down to a relaxed tempo. Even though Neji was sure he was a bit red in the face, he didn’t want to pull away just yet. This was a sort of exposure therapy, he supposed. A vulnerability that went beyond any of the intimacy they’d already shared. The fact that Lee felt like he could ask for it was a good sign. 

Every once and a while Lee would adjust them a bit, caressing his hand against its new position innocently before he settled again. 

“Neji?” His voice was quiet and contemplative. 

He took a chance and turned his cheek in towards Lee’s face, just to see how it felt to reciprocate some of the nuzzling. It wasn’t a bad sensation at all, maybe a bit stilted, but not bad .

“Hmn?”

“You do not have to tell me what it is, but I just want to know if there is anything I can do to make you feel better? Do you need patience and space, or do you want me to be more present just in case you want to talk?” His tone shifted into something a bit more vulnerable, “is there anything I should apologise for?”

“No.” Neji told him instantly. “You didn’t do anything. This is…” He let out a shaky breath. “This is something I’m working through.”

“Okay…?” 

He considered the options. Whenever he’d felt discord at home, he often went into the training fields and spent most of the day working on what he could control. In that way, the two of them were very similar, but that was before and this was now. Lee had offered space a few times over the past few days, but would he take it as a rejection if Neji actually took that offer?

“Tomorrow, I think I want to work on some things…” He trailed off hesitantly.  

“How about we reconvene for dinner?” Lee suggested easily, “and see how you feel?”

He felt like a tonne of weight lifted off his shoulders and he held his lover a little tighter in appreciation. “I can do that.” 

“Good!” Lee nodded his head definitively. “Now, I would like to switch positions, please!” 

Neji was secretly grateful for that because his one arm was going a bit numb. 

Chapter Text

xXx

Neji woke up first, which was very uncommon between the two of them. The light was dull and muted that morning, with the white noise of rain and wind all around them. He sat up and looked down at his lover; Lee was on his back, head turned the opposite way, with one arm curled up under his pillow. A thought passed by; that he could just lean down and give him a good morning kiss; something he’d never thought he could ever indulge in. 

Why couldn’t he?

He leaned down just as Lee started to shift, indicating that he was nearing consciousness. He hesitated for the briefest moment, and then pressed a hurried and off-centre kiss to Lee’s temple. Then he sprang out of bed like it was on fire, and started to throw clothes on. 

“Mmneji?” Lee turned himself towards Neji’s side of the bed, hand reaching out to feel his warmth. When it came back empty, he rubbed his eyes and then came into full awakeness. “Where are you going?”

“Training.” Neji told him, tying the top of his usual travel and training clothes. “What about you? It’s raining.”

A little water had never stopped their team, in fact, it was often a perfect time to work on techniques that would require more finesse. They would have to manage with slick muddy ground, white noise to camouflage movement, and weighed down bodies. After the first time, Gai had told them to start packing a spare change of clothes; to be ready at all times. It turned out that he just wanted to herd them all back to his apartment, let them take turns getting dry, and then pump them full of soup, tea, and hot chocolate to warm them back up. 

Neji had often tried to sneak off when he first realised the theme. Even trying to say he’d ‘forgotten’ a change of clothes. Gai didn’t believe it for a second. He ‘scolded’ him while he dragged him along, and then gave him a pair of obnoxious bright green and orange pajamas with smiling plants all over them that he’d clearly bought for his students. Tenten couldn’t look at him without snorting in laughter. He brought clothes every time after.

That was before he’d essentially moved in after the chuunin exams, when the head family would often send him scathing looks and activate his seal out of spite. He accidentally threw out the top of those pajamas after he’d thrown up on them and deliriously decided it was too much work to wash them. He would still wear the bottoms with a white shirt until he grew out of them. 

In fact, he still owned the pants, even though there was no way he could fit into them. They sat at the bottom of his drawer, and sometimes just the sight of them would ease any anxiety in his chest for a few precious moments. Those had been some of the strangest but peaceful days of his life. His sensei was not as overbearing as he thought he’d be, and if Neji showed up to training with their exuberant educator in toe, neither Lee nor Tenten mentioned it. 

Lee stood up and opened the sliding doors, letting more of the grey morning leak in. He was smiling in that way, which meant he was excited about his plans. “I think I am going to go train with some waves! I bet you that this storm has made them huge!”

Neji huffed out a soft laugh and then walked up beside him to glance at the clock on the wall. “I’m probably not going to be back for breakfast. Do you want me to tell them to cancel it?”

“Yes, please.” Lee squeezed his bicep in thanks, and then started to get ready for training himself. 

Neji had his shoes on, about to walk out the door, when he hesitated. “See you for supper?” 

Lee’s head poked out of the room with a bright smile. “Yes! I shall see you then. Meet me at Mori Curry at six!” He gave him a half-dressed thumbs up. 

Neji returned the gesture, albeit less enthusiastically, and then he was on his way to the front desk to tell them not to worry about their breakfast. He considered his options for training once he stood outside under the inn’s overhang. Activating the byakugan, he surveyed the island with scrutiny. Once he had a destination in mind, he jumped up onto the rooftops. Lee would be taking over the western side of the island where the beaches were located, but the north-east had several large protrusions of rock that he could use. 

The island from above the rooftops, mostly deserted from the storm and the early hours, was quite a scene. It had a different sort of charm to it; peaceful with a sense of historic nostalgia. He noted the security on duty easily, but none of them paid him much mind. 

Going through his kata with nothing but raindrops for company was a soothing warm up. By the time he finished through most of the gentle-fist ones, the rain was no longer cold, but lukewarm. He moved onto the Gokan ones that their sensei had taught them. The movements were more forceful and abrupt, but there was still a fluidity to them that made it seem graceful. He’d watched Lee do them enough times to appreciate the subtlety. 

The next thing he incorporated was his wind chakra, going through the kata’s while improvising wind jutsu and techniques. Ironically, the kata whose title translated to ‘eighth sunrise’ seemed to be the best for his needs. It ended with a lot of open-ended attacks, meant to send opponents flying with their force. 

The Hyuuga had mastered a wind-style palm thrust technique, a trigram rotation variation that created a whirlwind with him at the centre, and a more focused bullet-like barrage. His own creations that felt like each one could be used in conjunction with one of his teammates, even both. As he created new ones, he often thought about what sort of situation he would want to use them in. For instance; his new ‘storm wall’ technique would create a shield of tightly wound circular wind, sending any direct attack spiraling off into other directions. It took a significant amount of concentration, but it would give them enough time to regroup if they needed it. 

Or give Lee enough cover to rip open a few gates.

The next, more frustrating but useful, technique was his attempt at a combination of the  body-flicker, flying thunder god, and the Kazekage’s sand levitation. It would essentially create pockets of compressed air under his feet, allowing him to ‘walk on air’ and propel himself upwards. So far he’d only managed it with something solid underneath the step, and not in midair, but he was determined to get it right.

He only stopped for lunch when he realised he’d used up a lot of his chakra and his stomach started to ache. Buying dumplings in his condition caused a bit of alarm, but he assured them, no, he did not need an umbrella. He was wet on purpose. He also insisted that he was alright standing, because he didn’t want to get their benches soaking wet underneath the canopy. The whole point was that people could eat without the rain getting them soaked. If he sat on one, that would defeat the purpose. 

After meditating for a bit to allow his body to digest the food and replenish his chakra, he was back at it. Another hour went by, and then he became aware of a lone umbrella moving to stand safely at the cliff’s edge, intent on watching him. He landed in front of it and bowed his head in greeting. 

“Good afternoon, Yuran-san.”

“Good afternoon, Neji-san.” She bowed in return. “I hope you don’t mind. My cousin let me know you were here. He’s one of the security guards.” She tilted her head and gave him a smile that reminded him of his own cousin; a combination of happiness to see him and an unsure tentativeness; like she couldn’t be sure if her presence was wanted. “I saw you yesterday from afar. I wanted to say hello, but you looked a bit preoccupied.” 

The previous day when he’d been walking around with Lee during the festival, hand in hand, with a face burning so red and warm that he could probably roast food off of it.

He sighed, trying to will the stupid blush away from his cheeks. “You… could have greeted us.”

Her smile brightened a little more. “That’s good to know.” She stepped a tiny bit closer, holding the umbrella over both of them. It made no difference to her long-distance relative since he was already waterlogged, but it was the polite thing to do. “Last Saturday, you explained that you originally entered the competition as friends.” She hesitated, and then barrelled on ahead: “Am I to assume that has changed? Or is that question too personal? I apologise if so.”

Perhaps if this were one of the other people around his age back in Konoha, he would have snapped that they should mind their own damn business. Through the times he’d spent with her, he deduced that Yuran was curious about him, but not in an intrusive light. She seemed to genuinely want to be friends and share their knowledge of their common ancestors. In a perfect world, this may be how Neji would have felt with someone in the Hyuuga clan if it weren’t for the subjugation and suspiciousness of others in the Branch Family. 

Yuran was easy to get along with; she didn’t push if he seemed uncomfortable, but she also wasn’t too shy to strike up different conversations. In that way, it was different from his relationship with Hinata. His cousin was often too weighed down by her doubts to really open herself up, and ask him to open up to her. They tended to skirt real topics, and if they did manage to get into one, someone would eventually clam up and it would fade into awkwardness. 

“It… changed.” It was the first time he’d confirmed it to someone else. People had given them looks, but not one flat out asked if they were together. 

“Congratulations. I must say, the two of you are a very handsome couple. You complement each other well.”

He had no idea what to say to that, unable to meet her gaze. “Thank you?”

She chuckled. “Sorry, I suppose that’s a bit awkward to hear. I actually came out here to offer you these, and ask if you would like to come for dinner sometime and meet the rest of my family? They are all so curious about you. This invitation extends to Lee-san as well, of course.”  

She pulled a small bento box out of the bag slung over her shoulder and handed it out to him. He accepted it graciously, and then gave her a concerned frown. “Won’t that upset your grandmother?”

“We can have it at my house. My other uncle lives with her at the main house, and he and his daughter are the only ones who can calm her when she starts to get more confused in the evenings, anyway.” She assured him. “How would Tuesday sound? If you’d like, we can do some more work in the shop before dinner? I can also give you your finished pieces at that time.” 

They ironed out some plans and then she waved and left him to his training.

xXx

Having a breakthrough in his training always made him feel more confident and at ease. After Yuran left he’d picked up where he left off with vigour, finally discovering where he’d been going wrong with his ‘Cloud Step’ work. There was a high unlike anything else when he managed to do it somewhat properly the first time, and maintain it five more steps from the peak of one tall rock to another. 

Perhaps what he’d needed was a win, somewhere, to make him feel less unsure about himself. If this past few weeks had done anything, it was shaking up his life as well as his nerves. The rain had stopped and a windy flurry had taken its place, which meant that Neji was damp but not dripping by the time he made it to the discreet store tucked away. He’d noted it during their initial survey of the island, knowing what it was immediately and dismissing it as somewhere he’d actively avoid for the rest of his trip. 

How wrong he’d been. 

He only stumbled and blushed his way through his questions a bit, but the clerk, thankfully, was cheerfully helpful and knew what he meant without forcing him to spit it out explicitly. They spoke with an educated and practiced ease while they showed him different products, which helped his anxiety immensely.

“It will be uncomfortable at first, but it should never cause bleeding.” They were still explaining things while they rang him up. “Planning and communication are key; if you try all the things I suggested, it should be successful. There’s also no shame in stopping, either, if it’s just not the right time and you can’t relax. Your partner sounds great, though, so I think you’ll be fine.”

The byakugan owner didn’t want to presume things; the clerk had given no indication to whether or not they preferred one gender over the other. Their short colourful hair and baggy clothes could mean anything. 

“Have you… done this?” He lifted the bag helplessly, feeling a kick of adrenaline that made him feel jittery and skittish. 

They didn’t seem offended. “I’ve done it for my partner. They seemed to really enjoy it once they got used to it.” 

“Oh.” He nodded. “Thank you.”

“Anytime! I hope the condoms fit!” They waved and he ducked out of the store, jumping to the rooftops out of habit to avoid meeting anyone on the streets. 

One quick check with his byakugan later, and Neji was in their hotel bathroom, clothing stripped, eyes reading labels carefully. The warm water brought his body temperature back up and helped his muscles ease. Even with lubrication, his fingers felt thick and clumsy as he struggled and then eventually succeeded in getting the small plug in. It was an intrusive feeling, but as the time went on, it was easier to accept its presence. 

After, as he cleaned up and dried himself off, he wondered how he should bring it up to Lee without chickening out and feeling disappointed with himself. He had spent an hour there already, and he was sure that his teammate would have to come by the hotel room to shower and clean himself up for dinner as well. He decided to hide everything away and walk over to the area where Mori Curry was located. Despite the chef’s assurances that they were welcome, he wanted to make sure it was still okay. 

The host remembered him from their last visit, surprisingly, and told him they’d make room for them at six fifteen. He stepped out into the street, glad that he’d clamped his hair up so it wasn’t flying around his face in the wind. He wandered around, window shopping idly. His heart rate was elevated ever so slightly in anticipation, and it sped up even more when he felt Lee’s chakra closing in on his location. 

He stepped out of the accessory store just as Lee rounded the corner. When the taijutsu user caught sight of him, his face broke out into a breathless grin. He jogged over to throw his arms around his lover. Neji allowed the show of affection, even leaning his cheek into the loud smacking kiss that the other man gave him before he pulled back completely. 

“You look very beautiful.” Lee told him earnestly, without an iota of shame. Neji wasn’t expecting such a descriptor, and it took him aback. He was wearing a yukata he’d purchased on the island; something more ornate than just the linen ones from the hotel. Still, he never expected to be called beautiful; nice, sure, but not that .

There were a few things he wanted to say immediately as knee-jerk reactions, but he bit them back. Instead he just flashed him a small, awkward, smile and then changed the subject clumsily. 

“How was training?”

“Fantastic! How was yours?” 

“I made some headway in the Cloud Step. I’ll show you later. Yuran also found me and invited us for dinner on Tuesday.”

“That would be lovely.” Lee seemed pleased by the news, and then the two of them turned in the direction of Mori Curry.

They had a little time, so they stopped to point out things in shops. Lee didn’t take his hand like he expected, but their hands did brush together a few times.      

Tetsu came to say hello when they were at the reception area, and he assured them that they were absolutely welcome even though it was busy. They were led to a spot close to the back of the restaurant. It was a more private table than the last time; put between two large plants that almost hid them away. Lee ended up ordering the Sabaku Curry this time, to try something new, and Neji chose another mild one with coconut milk in it. 

“I realised something on the way here,” Lee segwayed, “during the competition, they asked you what my ‘type’ was.”

Neji took a sip of his water, unsure where the other man was going to go with this. “Yes?”

“Do you think you have a ‘type’?” 

He leaned back to consider the implications of that. Obviously, Lee knew he fell into that category by now, or at least he should. He had actively channelled his energies away from love and attraction for so long that he didn’t have a concrete answer to give. It should be a simple question; people like Haruno or Yamanaka would proudly declare theirs. He wasn’t offended by it, per se, but there was an initial reaction of his hackles rising. 

Still, he brought his fingers to his chin and delved back through the muddled years of his earlier youth. When men would catch his eye and hold it for a second too long. 

“A nice smile.” He confessed tentatively. He didn’t know how many times Lee had made him breathless when he’d grinned at him with a brightness to rival the sun. 

Lee put his hands on his lap and leaned towards him engagingly. “I think I would have guessed that correctly.”

The Hyuuga rolled his eyes, hopelessly endeared. “So you just want to know if you’d have guessed right?”

“Of course.” It seemed like the shorter haired shinobi had taken it as a personal challenge. 

“Then tell me what you think my answer would be.” Neji crossed his arms and leaned back, expression a bit smug. 

“That is not fair! I asked you first.” The frown was closer to a pout. 

“What idiom did you use again? Ah, ‘all is fair in love and war’? Besides, I thought you wanted to know if you got it right? How will you know if you don’t test it?” Was the amused response.

Lee’s mouth dropped open; a myriad of expressions crossing his face before he finally settled on amused acceptance. “I see I have been outmaneuvered.” 

The taijutsu user considered the topic carefully, and face set in determination. When he spoke, it was with a conscientious intensity; like it was a very important topic that he didn’t want to misspeak. 

“Strength.” He announced, and then went on to explain: “both physically and with their convictions. You do not like people who waver, and you admire those who are powerful.” 

Gaining momentum, he continued with more confidence. “I agree that you like nice smiles. I also think you like people who can convince you to see the good in others. Sometimes you can be very pessimistic, so I think there is a part of you that wants to be proven wrong.” 

They were distracted from the conversation when the waiter came over with their orders. They said their thanks and then tucked into the meal for a few minutes before Lee put his spoon down and gave him an eager look. “Did I get it right?”

Embarrassingly so, but Neji was surprised he didn’t mention the most glaringly obvious thing. “Almost.”

This made his partner look dumbfounded. “What… did I miss? No, wait! Do not tell me!” He continued to eat, but his mind was a million miles away. After mentally torturing himself for a while, he glared at Neji, as if he could somehow penetrate his skull and find the last piece of the puzzle. 

“Don’t hurt yourself.” The long-haired man teased him, eating his meal peacefully. 

“I do not want to admit defeat.. But…!” His shoulders sagged, finding it physically painful. “Can you… give me a hint?”

“If you think of the people who fit your description, do they all have something in common?” 

Lee blinked at him. 

Silence. 

He looked so frustrated with himself that he wasn’t getting it. 

It was almost funny. He wanted to let him suffer for a while, feeling triumphant. Perhaps if they were in Konoha he’d leave him for a few days to go crazy over it, but he didn’t want his lover pouting all night in their hotel room. 

Tenten would have gotten it right away; in fact, she’d been the one to hint at it first.

“In theory, I only like approximately half of the population.” 

Lee slapped his hands to his cheeks and gasped. “No!!! I should have been able to guess that!” He wailed.  

Neji gave him a one armed shrug. “You didn’t.”

“Gah! I will do one thousand, no, two thousand laps around Konoha when we return home as recompense!”

“Have fun.” He took a nonchalant sip of his water. 

“You are being very mean to me today.” His teammate was giving him the most pathetic ‘sad puppy’ sulk, and that only made him want to do it more. 

“You knew exactly what you were getting into.” The more stoic of their team reminded him. “I’m not even your type .”

“ Very mean.”  He emphasised. 

Neji couldn’t help but smile. There was one thing that he could confirm, not that he’d ever fully admit it outloud; Lee was the only one who gave him the lighthearted fluttery feeling. There was a part of him that wanted to lean across the table and kiss the pout off his lips, but he could never allow himself to be quite so free with his affections in public. He settled for brushing his foot against the side of Lee’s, and then focusing back on the remaining bites of his food.

“I have another question.” This partner announced, but there was an almost shy lilt to his tone. 

“Dare I ask?” Neji lifted his gaze, and the two shared a more affectionate smile between them.  

For someone who was so used to exclaiming everything that came to his mind; embarrassing or not, Lee surprised him. The taijutsu master lowered his voice and leaned towards him to keep the conversation more private. It was for the reserved shinobi’s benefit, clearly, because he knew that the other man didn’t have an iota of shame over his ‘passionate devotion’. 

“How do you feel about pet names?” 

If Lee wanted revenge, he got it. Neji turned bright red in a matter of seconds. 

“ Um .” All coherent thought flew from his mind. “ What? ”

“During the competition, we used mission code names when they asked the question, but I think it… sounds nice to have a term of endearment.” Though perhaps the brown-eyed martial artist was a bit more affected than he let on. He was wiggling in his seat, and it may be the lighting, but there could almost be a blush starting high on his cheekbones. 

“I will kill you if you come up with something ridiculous.” Neji warned him. The possibilities for absolutely devastating his pride were endless. He knew their sensei liked to call his husband all sorts of endearments; the two most common were ‘my love’ and ‘beloved’. It just felt weird to think of them using something similar.

“I thought of one.” Lee confessed, reaching across the table to tentatively brush the tips of their fingers together. 

“If I hate it will you find something else?” He gave him a pleading look. 

Lee nodded earnestly. 

Neji covered his burning cheek with one hand, glancing around the restaurant. “Can you tell me when we aren’t in a crowded place?”

“That is fair. Shall we head back, then?” 

After paying for their meal and saying a quick farewell to Tetsu, they walked out into the night, both of them finding it slightly chillier than expected. 

“I suppose it will be November soon.” Lee remarked casually, glancing up and mentally noting that the sun had started to set earlier and earlier. 

The Land of Tea was in a warmer, but wetter, climate than Konoha. Whereas their home village had a dry heat and barely a month of possible snowfall, Iro Island was more tropical. That meant there was a dampness to both the warm and cold. Thankfully they hadn’t come in the summer months, because according to the locals, the heat could be oppressive and feel like breathing in steam. This uncharacteristic cool was probably due to the wind coming in with the storm. 

“Almost a month till your birthday.” Neji agreed. 

Lee turned his head to watch him for a moment. “How are you feeling after today? Did you work out what was bothering you?”

Neji didn’t meet his gaze, but he nodded. “Yes.”

Surprisingly, the taijutsu master left it alone. 

Chapter Text

The wind picked up again as they got closer to the hotel, and a misting of rain made them pick up their pace ever so slightly. When they got into their room, they could hear the howling starting to pick up with more ferocity. Only their shoulders and the top of their heads were damp, but Neji decided he’d take the excuse to have a moment alone in the shower. He made sure that he was still at least somewhat prepared from his earlier work, only staying in until felt warmed through again.

When he came out of the bathroom, he let his hair down, dressed in one of the linen yukata from the hotel. Lee was also changed into one of them, and he was sitting on his usual side of the lounge table. When his partner went to sit on the opposite side, he turned his brown doe eyes up at him and then patted the seat to his right. Unable to find an excuse not to comply, the silver-eyed male settled into the cushion beside him. 

Immediately, Lee leaned over and kissed his temple, right over where the newer diamond-like seal for the Hyuuga Clan rested. “Honey.”

The word made Neji pause, head tilted towards the taijutsu user inquisitively. 

“The pet name. I was thinking ‘honey’. It is… not that common in Konoha, but in Kumogakure and Kemurigakure they use it.”

He turned the word over and over again in his head. It was a bit stilted in their language, closer to ‘hon-ni’, but it wasn’t something sickeningly romantic either that would make him cringe if he heard it. The way that Lee said it sounded more Chanese; a natural roll of the tongue. 

“Honey.” He tried the word out. 

“Yes?” Lee answered. 

Neji flicked his hand that was resting on the table in front of them, making the other man laugh. He let Lee lean in and kiss him on the cheek, and then didn’t resist when a darker and rough palm cupped his cheek and turned his face towards him. The next kiss was lips against lips, making him lean into the sensation and close his eyes to savour it. He lifted his hand and wrapped it around the back of Lee’s bicep, the first flicker of lust starting to ignite in his belly. 

Lips slowly parting, they stayed close with forehead against temple. Lee’s arm surrounded his back with a half hug, squeezing ever so slightly before he started to pull away. He likely wanted to give his partner space, especially since he’d been pushed away the day before. Instead, a strong and equally calloused hand grabbed the front of his yukata, eyes lidded and filled with intent. 

“I want you to do something different.” He whispered, and then extricated himself to stand and pull the other man to his feet.

Without hesitation, the taijutsu user took the proffered hand and let Neji lead him into the bedroom.

Once the door was nearly shut behind them, and the rest of the room was plunged into mostly darkness, Neji grabbed the front of Lee’s yukata again and pressed their mouths together. The kisses were thorough and simmering, somewhere between all-consuming and explorative. Lips molded against each other, some chaste but lingering and others open mouthed and hungry; never quite deciding which one they preferred. Lee's lips were warm and plush and insistent. Even the simplest kiss felt full of intent and adoration, and Neji wondered if he had always kissed like this, or if he just had a fantastic learning curve. 

Eventually Neji had to pull himself away, the sliver of light painting a strip down the front of his chest as he undid the yukata and slid it off his shoulders. Lee moved with impatience to match him, and then grabbed the branch member’s nape and pulled him back in. His tongue slid along the inner part of Neji’s upper lip, and then licked into his mouth so one could meet another. Like all the time they’d spent apart since they were last intimately touching needed to be rectified. 

The noise that came from the longer-haired fighter was unrecognisable; the hand at the back of his neck had tightened, tugging at the strands there. At the same time, Lee’s other arm splayed at the small of his back and forced him forward until there was barely any space between their bodies. His breath came out in frantic pants between kisses; some were higher pitched and some were grating groans; especially when there was friction at the bulges of their underwear. 

He needed to be closer, though. The distraction of Lee’s mouth and closeness was nice, but he had other plans. He eventually pulled his face away to take in several deep breaths, and decided that there was no smooth way to transition from standing to lying. 

“One second.” He weaved from the hands that tried to pull him back, walking over to the bag of supplies that he’d hid in the bedside drawer. 

It was a discreet black-zipper bag, and he tossed it at Lee. Only instincts allowed the other man to catch it, because his eyes were glued to Neji while he pulled his underwear down and off, and then knelt down on the bed. The light source was behind the scarred and darker skinned shinobi, so he couldn’t quite see his expression. 

There was a tense second, a coiling of sorts, before Lee sprang into action. Neji’s back hit the bed, prepared for the tackle. He opened his knees and the other man slid right between them. Even if he wanted to pull away, he couldn’t with the pale thighs trapping him there tightly. There were no more barriers between them; the material of Lee’s underwear hitting the floor as an afterthought. 

Their mouths found one another in the dim lighting, and then the weight and tilt of Lee’s hips ground their erections together. The silver-eyed genius rolled his hips up, punching out a low moan from his partner’s throat. Not one to be outdone, his short-haired teammate pulled his upper body from Neji’s frantic grasp so he could readjust their bodies and decide where he wanted to touch. They were both out of breath, the belly and chest beneath him rising and falling in short, deep, intervals. 

Lee’s hands trailed up Neji’s outer thighs, up to his hips, waist, and then he dug his thumbs into the flesh of his chest, cupping the slightly larger pecs. When one rough thumb pressed into his left nipple, Neji’s abdomen clenched, still unsure if it was abrasive or pleasurable. Then a mouth followed shortly after, teeth fastening around the nub and worrying it between them gently. This time his hips jerked up unconsciously as well, making the noise that was punched from his lungs louder than what he expected. It was too much and not even close to enough. 

He grabbed Lee’s other hand and started pushing it lower, head falling back and breaths dissolving into gasps as his chest was attacked by his lover’s tongue and teeth. There was something so deeply thrilling when he could feel the indentation of teeth into his skin; never enough to draw blood, but enough that it felt like a claim. As he tried to focus on moving his partner where he wanted him, his other hand blindly reached out and groped around until it found that satchel with supplies. 

Lee tried to wrap a hand around his length, but then he pulled back from Neji’s chest when he felt the other man nudge his hand lower, brown eyes searching out silver.

“Is that what you wanted to try?” He asked shakily; the other man was already nodding before he finished his sentence. 

“I… prepped earlier.” The Hyuuga sounded just as nervous, glancing down between them to see both their hands disappearing between his legs. Something about that image made a lick of flames dance in his gut. “You should use a condom anyway, but…” He trailed off, the words drying up when he felt one of Lee’s fingers brush against his hole. 

He gave a full body shudder. 

Lee now understood how some people got nosebleeds from sex. He felt like there was too much blood in his body; the liquid thick and heavy as his heart hammered, most of it rushing to throb between his legs. He felt Neji’s grip starting to weaken, probably feeling self-conscious when his usually chatty teammate went absolutely silent at his request. He jumped into gear, grabbing the bag from a slack hand, and opening to find smaller condoms, gel, and then bigger ones. 

Once Lee rolled the condom down two of his fingers he poured a generous amount of lubrication on to coat it. Slick sounds filling the air between their breaths, he looked back up at Neji’s face. 

“Still yes?”

Neji swallowed around a dry throat and nodded. 

Lee didn’t put his fingers back down immediately. First he leaned in and kissed his partner; sensing the anxiety rolling off of him in waves. This was what he’d been struggling with; the thought came unbidden to the forefront of his mind. Neji had shied away from his grasp the previous evening because he had to decide if he was okay with this. 

He knew that there were couples who didn’t do this. Or who both liked it equally. For right now, he was just happy to find new ways to make his lover feel good. Neji was holding onto his shoulders like a lifeline while they kissed a bit uncoordinated. He planted one elbow by Neji’s head, trailing the kisses bit by bit away from his mouth and to his neck. There was a spot that he liked, and he sucked at it leisurely while he traced his fingers up and down over his opening. He pulled one finger back and sank the other in, pressing forward until he was down to the second knuckle. 

Neji lurched up against him, gasping with a higher pitch than what Lee had expected from him. 

The finger went all the way in and then back out, just teasing the rim instead of trying to stretch him right away. There was significant tightness, but not as much as there could have been if the other man hadn’t worked on it earlier. After a few movements of the one finger in and out with relative ease, he pulled out almost completely and pressed the second finger into the condom and pushed against the resistance. 

A hand clamped around his forearm when they were halfway in, and Lee pulled back from kissing across his collarbones and the dip of his throat to just let his lips hover above his skin. 

“Do you want to stop?” 

The vice grip instantly eased and disappeared. “No. I don’t know why I did that.” Neji’s voice was uneasy. The instinct had been so potent, but it didn’t hurt at all. “Keep going.”

Once the second finger was completely inside, the other man stopped to let him adjust. His abdomen was trembling with the effort to not clamp down against the intrusion, but he never once told him to stop. He started to move his hand with more purpose, and that shifted things; like an itch that Neji couldn’t decide if he wanted to angle his hips towards or pull them away. His lover gave him a small peck against the corner of his lips to distract him, watching for any hint if Neji wanted to stop. In return, the older jounin looped his arms around the back of his neck loosely and closed his eyes to concentrate.  

Lee hooked his fingers and pressed them up along the front wall, towards his centre. When he found the spot, Neji’s whole body bucked up, and the noise he made was a cross between a sob and a wail, almost swallowed by Lee’s mouth against his. The hand that dug into the back of Lee’s bicep was sure to leave a bruise, and the nails that dragged against the skin of his shoulder left welts in their wake. 

Lee readjusted so he was mostly leaning his weight onto one hip, and then began to give careful little thrusts of his fingers against that textured spot. Neji’s whole body shook when he stimulated it, and the gasps against his skin were bordering on a helpless, wordless, plea. He pressed into it a little harder as the tempo naturally increased, making the pitch of those breaths a bit higher and his knees tremble. The rush of power and joy he felt knowing that he was making his partner react this way was addictive.  

When Lee would intermittently open his mouth to ask if it was still okay, Neji would cut him off by dragging him up for a kiss. The sounds he swallowed from his lover were desperate, and when he pulled back to watch Neji’s flustered and distracted face, he wondered what it would feel like to be inside this tightness. He pulled back and used his other hand to push a third finger into the condom, before he sank it back in. The stretch would be more painful, so he aimed for that spot almost immediately to ease the discomfort. 

Neji’s eyes squeezed tight, and he hid his face against Lee’s shoulder. “You can… ah… You c-can have me-” 

The roar of lust those words caused within blindsided him; and he wanted to desperately rip open another condom and bury himself inside. His thin self-control hooked in right before he could hastily accept the offer. 

“Not this time.” He held Neji against him, like if he put any space between them he’d do what the other man suggested in the heat of the moment and then regret it later. “Can you touch yourself?”

A shaky hand touched Lee’s chest, curling up against the skin there. “You, too.” The words were said into his shoulder. “You should… feel good, too.” 

Lee kissed the side of his face that he could reach, trying to tether himself to what was normally a staunch self-discipline. “After.” He promised against his ear. 

Finally reaching the end of his patience, Neji’s hand wrapped around himself and he began to strip it up and down. Matching his pace, they had the Hyuuga at the precipice quickly. 

“W-wait. Lee.” He tried to comply, but then the other man grabbed his wrist when he tried to pull it out. “Don’t stop.” Neji growled. 

“B-but…” He didn’t have much mental capacity to argue, but he figured it must be okay if Neji was moving his hips to match the movement of his wrist as he pushed the fingers in and out. It became clear the second time he got close that Neji had no idea what he was saying when he was this stimulated and overwhelmed. His muscles locked after he curled into Lee’s chest, hand clutching at his back as he came hard. He sounded like he was gasping for air after drowning, whole body shuddering through each wave of his orgasm. 

Lee stilled his hand, waiting until the writhing stopped before he eased his fingers out. 

“Just… You should have fucked me.” Neji moved with surprising swiftness after such an intense release. He wrapped his hand around Lee’s dick and began to stroke it furiously. Silver eyes boring into his with an intensity that was almost startling. “You still can.”

“No…” He groaned as he closed his eyes and bowed his head. The last twenty or so minutes caught up with him on hyperspeed. 

He held out for longer than he thought he would, but when Neji leaned forward and bit the meat of his trapezius, he let out a low, grating, moan and came into his fist. 

They collapsed side by side, their lungs trying to learn how to breathe slowly again. He could tell from the pensive look on the prodigy’s face that Neji was wondering why he hadn’t just complied with his request. He sat up and disposed of the condom, grabbing a towel they’d left in the room after the last time. Once they were both wiped off, he gathered his slightly disgruntled lover into his embrace and kissed across his face until his expression smoothened out. 

“I want to be mentally prepared for when that happens.” Lee brushed his hair from the side of Neji’s temple. 

That made the other man pause. He’d been so focused on his own preparedness, that he hadn’t considered that maybe his lover needed time to wrap his head around it, too. 

“Oh.” He felt quite guilty, now. “Is that… something you’d even want?”

“Very much so, I think.” Lee tilted their heads together, laying so they were angled towards one another. “I just felt a little…”

“Blindsided?” Neji finished for him. 

“Um, yes?” He confirmed a bit sheepishly.  

“Sorry.” Neji stared down at Lee’s chest, trying not to spiral too deeply into self-flagellation. “I just assumed… That… wasn’t fair.”

Lee just nuzzled a little closer to acknowledge he’d heard the apology. 

“Will you tell me when you’re ready?” Neji pushed a little further, hoping that didn’t make him seem like he was trying to put his needs over his lover’s.

“I will. I promise. There are other things we can do for tonight, if you’re still willing?” He offered, rubbing up and down his lover’s thigh comfortingly. 

Instead of answering verbally, Neji just leaned in and kissed him deeply. 

Chapter Text

xXx

The shuffling of someone’s movement skimmed across Lee’s consciousness the next morning, the rolling of a sliding door open and then shut, and the padding of footsteps across the floor. The silence afterwards allowed him to sink back under the waves of sleep for a little while longer. He was so relaxed; the two of them had fallen asleep sometime after they both orgasmed one more time each. Bruises and scratches were barely an afterthought compared to the bone-deep satisfaction.  

He wasn’t sure if it was the absence of his lover or the time that registered the next time he came into consciousness. It could have been hours later, for all he knew, but in reality it was only about a half an hour later. He stretched leisurely and then considered his options. He really should shower, so he grabbed a robe rather than getting dressed. When he stepped into the living area, it was still somewhat darker, which meant the sun hadn’t fully risen yet. 

The door to the hot springs was cracked open, and he could sense Neji on the other side. He carefully slid it open, wanting to preserve the stillness of the morning. The longer-haired jounin was sitting with the water up to just below his ribs, legs drawn up to his chest. He had his arms loosely looped around them, cheek resting against his knees sleepily. His hair was down; the longest portion swaying in the hot springs. 

The taijutsu user walked over to the marbled shower area, stripping and turning the spray on to rinse off quickly before he joined his teammate. 

Neji didn’t even stir when he stepped into the water behind him, nor when Lee sat against his back and bracketed his hips with his legs. It was cool enough outside in these grey hours to buffer the heat from the water, which was why the Hyuuga had been comfortable enough to stay there so long. A scarred hand draped the rest of the long strands over one shoulder, soft but slightly chapped lips brushing against a passionate bite mark that was revealed from the night before. 

“Good morning.” The darker-skinned shinobi could feel the rumble of those words through the back up against his chest; the roughness indicating that it was probably the first words his lover had said since awakening. 

“Morning, Honey.” Lee replied with a content smile; he felt rather than heard Neji’s soft huff of amusement.

They stayed like that as the sun rose enough that the colours faded from oranges to clear blue. It was intermittently cloudy; the remnants of the storm lingering around. Neji still smelled a little like sex and sweat, especially when his partner could rest his face against the side of his neck and breathe him in. His hands tracing designs against the hips and thighs under the surface of the water. 

The martial artist was tempted to coax his lover back to bed; even just being this close to him was enough to make desire start to sluggishly circulate his arteries. 

“It will be an adjustment; going back and not sharing living space anymore.” Neji mused, shuddering when Lee’s fingers brushed against the back of his thigh suggestively. “I think… I want my own place.”

“You would move out of the Hyuuga compound?” His voice was caught somewhere between surprise and consideration. Sensing that this was probably a more important issue than his libido, the brown-eyed man moved his hands to a more neutral place. “How do you think your uncle will respond?”

“Not sure.” The branch family member leaned back against his partner’s chest, grabbing Lee’s arms and wrapping them around his middle now that there was space for them. “It’s going to cause a fight.”

That was an unexpected insight. “You truly think he will argue with you against it?”

“Yeah, I do.” A bone-weary sigh. “It’s bound to happen. I’ve avoided it long enough.” 

“I wish that were not the case,” Lee said sadly, “but I do agree that you should speak with him about how you feel. It does not have to be perfectly articulate, it just has to be honest .”

“He’ll still have Hinata-sama and Hanabi-sama.” It didn’t sound like he was reassuring his teammate, but himself. “I… need my own space. I’ve always lived tripping over other people in the Hyuuga grounds; I don’t even have my own kitchen. I can barely even cook for myself.” 

“It can be very lonely, at first.” Lee admitted. “When I moved out of the orphanage, I was conditioned to the noise and constant movement of people. It was freeing and I did not want to go back, but it took me quite some time to feel comfortable.”

“When did you move out?” He wasn’t sure if he’d ever asked; the first time he’d been to Lee’s apartment was when all three of them were already chuunin. 

“When we graduated from the academy. After our first meeting as a team, I had to go and buy basic household supplies.” He recalled; the memories were always tinged with a bittersweetness. He was glad to be away from the constant mocking of the other children, but he never expected to feel even more lonely. Even bad company was sometimes better than no company. 

“You’ve lived by yourself since you were twelve,” Neji mused. “Never thought I’d consider myself ‘spoiled’.”      

“Neji,” The orphan sighed. “I was allowed to leave. It is a very different set of circumstances.” 

“At least I never had to worry about food, or doing laundry, or affording things.” Lee had been excited to get hand-me-down chairs at fourteen. He’d been sitting on the ground . Neji had never known that sort of poverty. He never would, either. His money sat untouched, growing over the years since he barely had to use it. He could buy a plot of land and build a house with money to spare. 

“I do not consider myself less fortunate, Neji. I may have been poor, but I had freedom. I had a place of peace away from the expectations of others. I am not saying it was not hard, but we both have had our difficulties.” He chewed over the next words in his mind before he spoke one more. “I admit I was… envious of you at first. You had a big family and I had nothing; I could not understand how someone who was so surrounded by other people could be so lonely. It was not until later that I really understood how naive I had been.”

Neji’s voice sounded amused. “You didn’t come out of the womb with perfect emotional intelligence? The shame.”   

“You are mocking me,” Lee pouted. 

“A little.” Neji agreed, and then finally turned around and pressed a closed-mouth kiss to Lee’s lips. “We should get ready for breakfast.” 

“Okay. Can we go to that flower farm? I want to see the bees. Oh! And I heard they have kits, too!”

xXx

To say that Neji had to physically drag Rock Lee away from the flower farm inn was an understatement. He was pretty sure the other man would live and die there if they’d let him. He got him to sit still long enough to have lunch at the restaurant, and then he was off. Neji sat himself under an outdoor umbrella table and enjoyed his tea while the usually green-clad fighter went off to wreak havoc. He spent nearly all day wandering around the grounds, cooing at all the animals and petting literally everything with fur and four legs. He also patted animals that he should not pet. 

When the usually stoic one of the two eventually set off to find him, he was easy to locate even without the byakugan. Apparently the taijutsu user was the talk of the grounds; many of the tourists had even taken pictures of him interacting with the creatures. If requested, he would take children onto his shoulders and bring them over to meet the animals that were too skittish to be approached normally. 

Once he caught sight of him, his partner slowed to a stop and watched from afar in exasperation. An older man nearby, one of the few gawkers watching the bizarre situation, introduced himself as the owner of the inn. He wanted to know if his partner was using some sort of Jutsu; he had heard that they were shinobi. 

“I think they believe he’s one of them.” Neji sighed in dismay, arms crossed as he watched his lover be swarmed with about four different types of birds, a whole family of rabbits, a one-eyed cat, two squirrels, and a bumble bee that he’d named ‘Gogo’. He was sitting in one of the fields of brightly coloured daisies, hands full of seeds that they sold in their gift shop, playing referee between the birds and the squirrels. 

The fact that Lee was a compressed ball of energy and noisy chatter didn’t seem to bother the animals. Even when the other jounin lifted his hand to wave frantically at Neji, all of them just clasped on for dear life instead of taking off. “Honey! Look! This one has a heart on its belly!” He held up said kit, which looked perturbed by the manhandling but also resigned to its fate. The Hyuuga had never related to an animal more.

“Very cute,” Neji called back, trying to sound at least somewhat supportive.  

“Come here! I want you to meet Yura! Look, she likes to sway.” He held his hand out for one of the vibrant orange and yellow birds to hop onto his finger. Said feathered friend let out a trilling sound and swayed back and forth as if to prove his point.

Neji walked over slowly, trying not to spook anything because he didn’t have the same weird animal pheromones that his partner seemed to possess. He knelt down in the grass, careful not to squish the flowers, and sat formally on his knees a few feet away. The squirrels immediately took off, and the one eyed cat lifted its head from Lee’s lap and gave him a warning hiss. 

“Seishun, that is not very nice.” Lee scratched under the cat’s chin, tone chastising. The cat immediately preened and started to purr. 

“Have you named every animal you’ve met today, or just these ones?” He had to ask, though the answer seemed fairly obvious. 

“Many of them already had names. This is Mimi.” He pointed to the mother rabbit, who was nudging her kits around. “No one has named her babies, yet, so I did! This is Hana, Ame, Yume, Sora, and Kaze!”   

He plunked ‘Ame’ on Neji’s lap, the one with the heart design in her fur, and watched as his partner awkwardly made sure she didn’t fall off while she squirmed. He listened intently as Lee rattled off names, learning that there was a deer that he’d met that reminded him of Shikamaru while it blinked at him lazily, so he named it ‘Maru’. Then there was the fox he’d named Ryusei, because it was very fast. After a short while, all of the birds including Yura had flown off. Ame had finally squirmed her way off Neji’s lap and started wobbling her way back to her mother and siblings to nurse. In their place came another cat, carefully stalking them for a while before they determined it was safe enough to cautiously approach.  

“Oh,” Lee let out a soft little coo, eyes watering with how happy and endeared he was. The new cat was sleek and white, and it was sniffing Neji but backing away when he so much as twitched. “I heard she is very nervous; she showed up on the ferry one day and no one had noticed she came aboard.” 

Seishun made a disgruntled little huff when Lee leaned forward and held out his palm for the white cat to scent him.  

“Did you know that many white cats with blue eyes are deaf?” He whispered thoughtfully, brown eyes softening even further as the cat timidly nudged her cheek against his hand and then backed away. “I wonder if that is why she is so skittish?”

“A lot of cats are naturally… oh.” He blinked when the cat turned around from looking at Lee and stared at him when he’d started to talk. “I guess she’s not deaf.”

“I suppose not.” The white cat sat back on her haunches, looking back and forth between the two of them. “I wonder what her name is?”

“They didn’t name her?” That seemed unlikely. A kitten this cute was sure to have a name. 

“The caretaker I spoke to earlier said she does not come to eat when there are humans nearby. They’ve just taken to calling her Shiro.” 

“A little on the nose, isn’t it?” The Hyuuga snorted. This time the cat let out a little squeak when he’d finished talking, staring at him with curious blue eyes. 

“I think she likes the sound of your voice.” Lee’s tone held a bit of wonder to it. 

“You think?” Neji doubted it, but he held out his hand and started speaking to her softly. “Do you like the sound of my voice? Is that why you came over here? No. You just wanted to see what all the fuss was about.”

Squeak. Squeak. 

The cat seemed to ‘respond’ to him, and then moved closer and rubbed her cheek against his hand, when he turned it over she startled a bit, but let him start to pet her with gentleness. 

“She’s, what, six or so months?” Neji guessed idly. “Not fully grown. She’s in her awkward teenager phase.” He scritched behind her ears more confidently, “you’re like a little noodle.” 

“ Soba !” Lee gasped. “We should name her soba!”

 The cat hid behind Neji at the sound of his exclamation. 

“Oh, I am so sorry, Soba, I did not mean to frighten you.” 

Neji spent the next little bit getting more confident in petting her, and tried to coax her over to Lee with his fingers, but she would not budge from his side. 

“She likes you.” Lee had hearts in his eyes, watching as his lover was bathed in cat hair and purrs. 

“Lee, no .” Neji’s voice was a warning.

“I did not say anything!” Lee insisted, but he was already giving him the big puppydog eyes that meant she would probably end up poking out the top of his travel pack at some point on their way home.

“I know that voice. We are not taking her home. The trip back will traumatise her.” He pointed out, always the more logical one of the two. 

“You do not know that.”

The longer-haired man switched gears, “we should really get going. We’ve spent long enough here even though this isn’t the inn we’re staying at.” 

“I suppose…” 

They both stood up and Soba took off into the wilderness. “See? She likes it here.” Neji pointed out as they picked their way over the flowers and back towards the front of the inn. Lee still held Seishun in his arms; the fat older cat had yowled pathetically when he tried to put him down at first. He even followed Lee down the road a few steps once they were at the main building. The spoiled feline cried for him, and then decided it was too much effort after about ten paces and flopped onto his side to sunbathe instead. 

“Do you think you will get a cat when you have your own place?” Lee seamlessly laced their hands together while they went for a stroll around the market area of the island, trying to decide where they wanted to eat for dinner. The sun was starting to set, and more people were milling around looking at the different izakaya options.  

“If one shows up at my door, I guess.” Neji replied absently while he considered a ramen stall and then decided against it. 

“Oh! Rokku-san! Hyuuga-san!” 

They turned around at the greeting to find Yorumi and Taida, of all people, waving as they walked towards them. Rather, the tour guide was, and the hotel clerk was trying to stop her from knocking into people while she moved. 

“Hello Yorumi-san! Taida-san!” Lee returned the pleasantries. 

Yorumi was staring down at their joined hands rather obviously, her cheeks flushed and her speech ever so slurred. “I am glad to see you out! Taida-kun told me-”

He slapped his hand over her mouth immediately. “I apologise, she’s been drinking. It’s her day off.” 

She elbowed him in the ribs rather harshly, making him let out an undignified yelp and retracting his hand to rub at his side.  

“What are the two of you in the mood for? If you want drinks, there’s this place-” She turned around to point behind her, stumbling slightly. 

“-No alcohol.” Lee and Neji shot that suggestion down in unison. 

“Aw, well, I bet you’ll enjoy your night either way! Ow, Taida-kun, stop grabbing meee .” 

“I am never buying you drinks again.” Their concierge hissed furiously at her while he dragged her away from the pair. 

“But, I was right they did end up- Mmf- stop that!” She kicked him this time when he covered her mouth. “See if I go easy on you the next time we play shogi!” 

Lee chuckled in amusement. “I am glad to see that she is having a good time.” 

Neji rubbed the bridge of his nose, but the redness on his cheeks had nothing to do with imbibing. 

Chapter Text

xXx

Lee tasted like strawberry ice cream. 

He tasted like strawberry ice cream and Neji didn’t care how incredibly uncouth it was to be making out with him in a dimly-lit dirt path between streets where anyone could stumble upon them. In fact, there was a part of him that hoped the news spread back to the other patrons of that damn ice cream shop. 

They decided to have an after dinner treat, which seemed to be a common conclusion for the tourists. After deciding on their flavours, they sat down on one of the last open tables; a four-person seater. Almost immediately, two tipsy women slid into the opposite seats and said they’d noticed Lee working out on the beach every morning, and they’d been there the day they both learned how to surf. At first he’d politely indulged them, but it became increasingly clear that they were flirting with the both of them and trying to get them to agree to a ‘double date’. Neji was full on glaring at the intruders, and Lee was a bit flustered when he tried to tell them, no, they were not interested. Somehow, that seemed to spur them on more.

The one on the Hyuuga’s side of the table actually leaned over to try and grope at his biceps, saying he seemed like he was good with his hands. Lee’s mouth fell open in shock and then the two of them stood up in unison. Neji didn’t even respond, just grabbed Lee’s hand and the two of them left their half-eaten ice cream right there.

They pulled apart from the kiss and took a moment to come down from the combination of jealousy and irritation. 

“The lady from the massage parlour was much more polite.” Lee looked disgruntled, which eased his partner’s ire and let him see some of the humour in the situation.

“I can’t believe that just happened.” He cracked a smile, shaking his head at the antics of two inebriated women they’d never even met. 

“I would like to go back to the hotel now.” He didn’t think he’d ever seen the taijutsu user look quite so vexed before. It was the gentle fist user’s turn to be led away with a purpose in his partner’s step, fingers interlocked tightly; as if his quieter teammate would ever want to pull away. 

When they made it back to the hotel room, Neji had to turn on some lights since they’d left back when it was daylight out. He turned back around, and Lee was still standing by the door looking troubled and lost in thought. 

“Lee?” He called, question implied. 

“I had… thought that maybe we could try tonight, but now I am worried.”

Neji’s heartbeat picked up in anticipation. “About what?” He crossed the room to stand in front of his lover. 

“That it will seem like we rushed things… and that I am just being possessive.” The other man admitted, forlorn. He reached for Neji’s hands haltingly, and the other jounin met him halfway and squeezed his fingers ever so slightly. 

“When did you decide you wanted to try?” There was still a part of him that was a bit agitated from their interrupted snack, but he did not want to let them ruin this, either. 

“While you were petting Soba The Cat earlier.” Lee’s brows were still drawn together, muscles tense. 

Neji mulled the situation over. “How about we see if it leads to that?” He tugged on their joined hands, giving the hint that he wanted them to be closer. Lee stepped more into his personal space and then relinquished himself to the searching kiss that the other man initiated. When they parted, silver and brown eyes were half-mast. “Shower, first, though.” 

Lee chased his lips and kissed him deeply until his partner was breathless, voice dropping lower when he asked, “can we shower together?” 

Equal parts of him wanted to say both yes and no, but eventually he begrudgingly erred on the side of caution. “No. I’ll try to be quick… I think if we get naked together right now it won’t end like we want it to… And we will waste water.” 

It was clear that the other man didn’t like his answer, but he respected the decision. “Okay. Please do not keep me waiting long.” 

It was a polite request, but the edge of his tone made Neji feel the urgency to move quickly, grabbing some things from the bedroom and then closing himself in the bathroom. When he was finished, Lee had already rinsed off in the outdoor shower, and was waiting for him in bed. He was sitting in his underwear; cross-legged and pensive. Immediately, the longer-haired man stripped off his robe and settled in his lap, interrupting the brooding. 

He wrapped his arms around Lee’s shoulders and had to repeat ‘patience’ like a mantra in his head. He kissed the side of his face, the top of his shoulder, the dip between collar bones. The other man held him close, but he didn’t reciprocate any of the advances. Eventually the older of the two sat back and poked at the middle of his forehead. “Do you want to just sleep?” He didn’t like the idea of stopping since he was already turned on by the sight of his lover almost-naked in their bed, but he would. 

“No,” Lee said immediately. “I just… do not know if I can be… composed. I would like to touch you very much.” 

This time Neji did sound slightly annoyed. “Do you know who you’re talking to right now? I’m a jounin. I’ve dealt with worse than you being a bit rough.” 

Brown eyes met silver. “It is not that. It is that I do not like how I feel. Like I want to…” He trailed off uneasily, looking down between them. “It feels like I do not know myself. What I want to do is very…” He dragged his hand down Neji’s chest, fingernails leaving faint pink lines down his pale skin.  

Neji grabbed his jaw and forced him to look into his eyes again. “Then you finally know how I feel. What I’ve wanted.” He hissed darkly, but then reigned it in a bit when he added: “I don’t only want the composed version of you. In case you've forgotten, I've seen you drunk.” 

Then he shoved Lee’s shoulders back against the bed and followed him down. The kiss was searing, and Neji’s grip on his hair was on the painful side, but the other man felt that darker, more base, feeling bubble up almost instantly. He flipped their positions, flattening his lover against the bed with his hips, and grabbing his wrists when he went to steady himself. The low noise against his mouth indicated that the Hyuuga didn’t mind the treatment at all, bucking his hips up as if to simultaneously grind their arousals against each other as well as check the hold. 

Kisses were frantic and on the edge of brutal, the two of them taking and taking with no indication that either of them were unwilling participants. When Lee let go of his wrists to roughly feel up his chest, Neji immediately grabbed the meat of his ass and rocked their pelvises together, accumulating in a sensation that made them both gasp and have to separate. Their breaths were shallow, and then Lee was sucking and biting his chest in a way that made him feel ravaged like a wildfire. 

“Underwear off.” Neji instructed, voice harsh, and started to try and wrestle both of them out of the last barrier between them. At first his partner almost fought him on it, but then he conceded and helped kick the articles of clothing down to the end of the bed. “I’m not…” He let out a shaky exhale, head tilted back and a bit overstimulated. “I’m not going to last.”

The taijutsu master hummed against his nipple and then pulled off just long enough to say: “Me neither.”

Taking that as permission, The longer-haired shinobi grabbed their erections in his hands and started stroking them with the same untamable frenzy. It was abrasive and almost uncomfortable, but neither of them would dare separate to try and find a way to fix that. They hit their peaks one after the other, the unbearable heat finally breaking, but not disappearing completely as they gasped to catch their breath against each other. 

It wasn't enough. 

Lee leaned back, gathering his wits first, and then reached for the supplies that he’d prepared while his lover was showering. He sat back enough to grab the back of Neji’s knee and push it out of the way before pouring the lube directly against his hole and slicking up his fingers. Their eyes met for a suspended moment, and then a finger sank into the Hyuuga all the way to the base. 

A spark of pure adrenaline and pleasure shot up his belly, forcing his spine into an arch with an unbidden moan falling from his lips. It was too much, but he would never tell him to stop. His hand shot out and grabbed Lee’s bicep with his nails digging in to ground himself. He felt like he’d forgotten how to breathe; every sensation inside him was like touching a live wire. The second finger was treated much like the first; giving him barely any time to adjust before it was grinding and stretching. 

“Fuck.” Neji wasn’t in control of anything anymore, least of all his voice or reactions. He must be giving the other man some sort of desperate look, because Lee leaned down to kiss him and he melted into it. His arms felt uncoordinated, but he ended up being able to wrap them around two darker shoulders, holding on and letting out a sob against the other man’s mouth when the pads of his fingers brushed past his prostate. 

It wasn’t until the third finger was pressing in that Lee started to focus on that spot purposefully. Neji’s body was held open, and all he could do was take and hold on while he was prepped and kissed. He’d never felt anything like it; neurons shooting off in all different directions without being able to focus on one thing at a time. What he did know was that his body and psyche were absolutely enjoying this, and he was growing impatient again. 

He grabbed Lee’s wrist and pushed it away, the taijutsu user’s eyes shooting open so that he could put space and look into his face in concern. “Did I hurt you?”

“N-no.” He shook his head, voice cracking while he responded. “Just get inside me.” What was supposed to be an order sounded more like a plea. 

“Okay.” The other man sounded just as shaky as he reached for the condoms. “Turn over.” 

He clumsily turned over onto his knees, but he already felt like he had no strength left to hold himself up. He grabbed a pillow and pulled it under his chest, using it to help prop himself up while his skin prickled; bereft of his lover’s touch. He was more so resting his chest against his thighs rather than kneeling, and he decided it was good enough. He trusted the other man to work with it. The indication that Lee was ready was a soft kiss against the nape of his neck, and then the feeling of something pressing up against him. 

The pain was not unexpected, but what he didn’t expect was how viscerally that would turn him on. It was like the stretch and sharp pinpricks of pain were proof that he was finally getting what he wanted. All that Lee saw was his shoulders rounding forward and tensing, and the way he clutched onto the pillow like a lifeline. 

“Is it okay?” He had gotten the head in, stopping immediately when he felt the other man clamp down onto him instinctually. He brushed his hand against the back of Neji’s neck.

“Yes, yes.” It barely sounded like the stoic member of their team anymore; the words grating on his vocal cords. The shaft pushed in, slow and steady, and when it naturally found his prostate thanks to the position, his whole body jerked. He was so aroused; the pain was probably the only thing that distracted him enough that he didn’t come right away. There was already a puddle of precome forming underneath him on the sheets, his gaze hazy and swimming in and out of focus. 

It kept pushing deeper and deeper, punching the air from his lungs so he could only take in short bursts of air, but then it hit something inside of him that was on the knife’s edge of uncomfortable and stilled. They both sounded like they’d been running for hours, Lee leaned over his back and started to kiss the side of his neck and shoulder, trying to offer comfort that wasn’t needed, but definitely appreciated. 

“You… can move.” He was finally able to find his voice, and then it switched to a low moan when Lee pulled his hips back, hands settling around his waist, and started to move his hips. 

He couldn’t imagine getting more turned on than this, all he knew was that he didn’t want it to stop. The constant pressure against his prostate was mind numbing. He also had no idea what his expression looked like, but it was likely a cross between blissed out and overwhelmed. It felt like Lee dragged against his insides even with all the lubrication, the stretch to accommodate him both painful and satisfying. He was breathless, sparks of pleasure shooting like unstable fireworks and yet he still wanted more. This was beyond a feeling of taking or giving, it was both a connection and a craving. He wanted Lee's fingerprints branded into his skin, and at the same time he wanted his soft praises whispered against his ear. This was finally happening and the person making him feel like this was the one he had wanted so desperately for so long. 

The martial artist readjusted his position, one hand stabilizing against the bed beside his lover’s ribs. He had grown more confident, using Neji's breathing and voice to gauge his actions. He started to circle and roll his hips, seeing how the silver-eyed man would respond to each one. 

“Oh!” Neji’s hand flew out, fingers curling into a fist on the sheets above his head and hips trembling. “There. Ah. Lee.” He chanted around heaving breaths. Pale skin pressing back to try and replicate the sensation without conscious thought. 

Gaining momentum, the thrusts started to pick up in speed and strength, and he fell into a rhythm. When Lee felt himself ramping up, he’d slow back down and change the tempo, keeping them both on the precipice of almost there and not quite enough. 

“Lee.” The tone was impatient.

Neji’s other hand went underneath him, and then he was stroking himself in time, breaths turning into gasps. Lee could tell that his partner beneath was close, but he still had some space to keep going. He focused on that spot that the other man liked and kept his attention there. Watching with fascination as Neji got closer and closer; relishing in the way his body tensed and his breaths changed as he neared his peak. He had an idle thought that he wished he could have watched his face when his usually stoic lover orgasmed, but then rhythmic clamping down on his erection distracted him for a moment. It was still nice to hear the low sob and see his pale skin trembling as his hips jerked through his release. 

The gentle-fist user collapsed into the bed, and Lee carefully pulled out of his body. His instincts wanted him to bury himself back in and rut until he came, but he held back. Lee stroked his thumb on the base of his cock, trying to decide if he should ask his partner if he could use his thighs. 

Then Neji turned onto his back and reached for him. Curious, Lee leaned forward and allowed his teammate to wrap his body around him, feeling his lover’s softening cock resting between Neji’s pelvis and Lee’s stomach. “It should be fine like this.” 

“We do not-” He started to assure him that being inside him wasn’t necessary, but he got a very piercing look and it cut off the rest of his sentence. “Are… you sure?”

“Yes.” He reached down and shakily grabbed Lee’s still hard length to give it a clumsy stroke. “Just… get back inside.” 

Neji was more relaxed this time when he slid in; likely thanks to his orgasm. He still flinched a bit at the sensation, but then his hands wrapped around Lee’s shoulders and pulled him in so they could press their mouths together. Lee’s hips started to move on their own, hesitant at first, and then working up past the speed of his previous rhythm. He wondered how it felt to his lover, to be not completely aroused and have someone still stirring up inside him. Now that he was no longer focused on making sure the man beneath him felt good, he started to move how he wanted. 

Eventually Lee couldn’t focus on the kiss, and instead wrapped his arms around the body beneath him. He kissed against the pale skin of his partner’s neck in nonsensical designs. It all started to merge into one point, and he could feel nothing but the molten heat hitting its peak and overflowing. Finally coming with a low groan, Lee enjoyed the way his release ebbed and flowed until he was finished.

When they parted, they were both sweaty and sticky. Lee flopped onto his back beside him, expecting that Neji would want some space. Instead, he found his partner turning his face into his shoulder, angling his pale body so he was curled up against his arm and hip. It had never occurred to him that the other man would want to stay close after something so overwhelming. Then again, it had been a more vulnerable experience for Neji; having someone else inside of him like that.  

Once he regained control of his limbs, the taijutsu user carefully extracted himself to peel off and tie the condom and grab something to wipe them with. He started to work on the worst of the mess, and when he went to help his partner, Neji’s hand shot out to grab the towel. He sat up, throwing said article back over Lee’s shoulder dismissively. His expression and the kiss that followed were filled with both heat and promise. The Hyuuga grabbed the back of his lover’s neck and fell back against the mattress, pulling him back on top.

“Keep touching me.” Neji instructed, taking his hands and placing them back on his sides. The silver-eyed man seemed content to map out the scars on his back with his fingertips, lips tracing the ones on his upper chest and shoulders with a startling gentleness. It was such a sweet juxtaposition compared to the kiss seconds before, that Lee was left reeling for a moment before his mind caught up. 

Lee combed his fingers through the mess of usually pristine long black hair, letting his partner indulge himself for a bit before he started to explore a bit himself. He was kneeling between Neji’s thighs, becoming more and more aware of the fact that the byakugan prodigy was gearing them up for another round. Heat began to travel around his body once more, the soft touches along his back igniting the embers. 

“Neji,” he didn’t even realise he’d spoken, but it made the silver-eyed man settle back against the bed and stare up at him in silent question. 

He grabbed the back of Neji’s knee and pushed it to the side so the other man had to turn on his left, settling in behind him so he could get his hands back on his chest and abdomen. He nosed the hair out of his way so he could plant several sucking bruises along the column of his neck. A strong hand curled up into the back of Lee’s shorter hair, and then the quiet shinobi was turning his upper body to pull their mouths back together, groaning softly when their tongues reconnected. 

He followed the trail of hair from Neji’s navel down to his already full-mast erection, fingers gathering fluids to make the gentle glide of his palm up and down easier. There was a shaky huff against his mouth, and then the hand unthreaded from his hair to reach down between Lee’s legs. He was almost fully there as well, and but his partner was much less gentle when he began to stroke; his movements were with the intention to rile him up.

“Again?” He asked against Lee’s cheek. The taijutsu user should have made some sort of token protest; but he had long since learned to follow Neji’s lead.

The fact that Lee had to take his hands off of him to get a new condom and re-apply lubrication was practically torture. His brain nearly short circuited completely when he saw that Neji had pulled his knee up and was holding himself open, ready for him to slide back in. He barely remembered lining himself up, because the next thing he knew, he was buried back inside of his lover, surrounded by tight heat. He wrapped his arms around the body in front of him, hips instinctually rolling forward to chase more of the sensation. 

The older jounin reached back to grab onto Lee’s hip to slow him down, eyes flying open and lungs gasping for breath at the depth he’d hit with one stroke. It was more so a shock than anything, but at least his partner noted his tension and forced himself to stop. 

“Sorry,” his face was buried against Neji’s skin, words whispered hotly against him. 

Hands groped restlessly across Neji’s hips and chest, as if to make up for the lack of movement in his hips. Even as the Hyuuga curled, angling a little bit more onto his front, his partner’s body followed him. Lee’s one arm anchored across his chest, the other propping him up so he had more space to cautiously test out short and careful thrusts. Neji’s hand intertwined with Lee’s against his sternum, the other curling into the bedspread restlessly. 

The pace this time was much slower, even as the taijutsu user’s pelvis rocked forward and back, the tempo never increased past long, rolling, thrusts. This was what he’d wanted their first time to be like; something more akin to making love than fucking wildly. He could hear the soft groan and gasps that were timed with each meeting of their hips; thrilled that his partner was enjoying himself now that they’d established a gentle rhythm between them. 

Lee kissed a patch of skin where the silken strands had parted to reveal his love-bitten nape. “so perfect…” 

The gasps that met his ears were slightly different in pitch, “Lee…” 

Neji couldn’t reach his lips, so he kissed the side of his face that he could. “This is…” He couldn’t find the words to describe just how it felt. Each stroke sent bursts of pleasure roaring through his pelvis and up his spine, and he was starting to take pleasure in places inside that he had never expected. Something different, stronger, was growing inside of him, and his eyes were watering even though there was no pain anymore. He hid his face against the comforter, letting it soak up the tears and some of his moans.  

In between thrusts, Lee was gasping an alternation between his name and the pet name. The speed of his hips didn’t change by much, but the strength did. Both of them were completely lost in each other and the sensations, toes curling, fingers grasping for traction, and sight wavering. It didn’t even occur to Neji that he wouldn’t get to the peak without physical stimulation to his erection. Everything was spiraling higher and higher, and his cock was practically drooling against the bed, a thin string of pre-come connecting the tip to the puddle.

Lee slammed his hips into him a bit roughly, something between a moan and a shout indicating that he was coming, and that jolt of lust sent his partner over almost simultaneously. Neither of them knew where one orgasm started and the other ended; the tightness and subsequent rutting kept them on the knife’s edge of too much. It felt like the ripples of pleasure lasted far beyond what was usual for an orgasm, but neither of them minded. 

They collapsed against the bed completely, and when Lee went to move his hips away, Neji threw his hand back and held the darker, scarred, thigh to prove a point. This time, Lee knew to keep his arms around his lover, the two of them catching their breath and cooling off, still completely intertwined. Even when Lee nuzzled his nose and forehead against Neji’s back, their sweat and fluids going cold and tacky, he still didn’t move to separate them. 

“We should clean up.” Lee murmured. 

“That is annoying,” Neji groused with a rough voice, “I want to stay here, but I need a shower.”

He was clearly blissed out and didn’t care if he wasn’t making complete sense. 

“Bath?” His teammate offered as a compromise, sounding way more composed than Neji felt. 

“Fine.” He grumbled, and made the barest effort to help pull away, leaving the work up to his much more energetic lover. He curled up more onto his side, almost falling into a doze by the time Lee came back for him from readying a bath. 

“Do you want me to carry you?”

There was about seventy five percent of him that wanted to say yes, but his pride kicked in at the most inopportune moments. Neji hauled himself to a half-propped up position on one hip, took a steadying breath, and then found his way to standing. He ignored the raw feeling between his legs, instead letting Lee take his hand and lead him to where the tub was already filled with warm, soapy water. 

Neji sat on the step leading into the raised tub, watching with interest as Lee used the showerhead to rinse himself off. It was an attest to their recent activities that neither of them felt very self conscious about watching each other get clean enough to sit in the tub. The silver-eyed shinobi obeyed quietly when Lee asked him to come and sit down in front of him on one of the shower stools. He didn’t even pretend that he didn’t enjoy it when the other man proceeded to help him wash even though he was perfectly capable of doing it himself.

Eventually the two of them were half-lying side by side in the tub, the water up to their shoulders and the bubbles up to their jaws. They could share the tub by sitting on opposite ends with their knees slightly drawn up without even touching if they wanted to, but neither of them saw the point. 

“Hey, Neji?” Lee said after some time lounging and enjoying the heat on his well-used muscles. 

“Yes?” The other man tilted his temple against Lee’s in a show of acknowledgement, looking just as relaxed. 

“I really like you.” He told him as a matter of factly. Just from his tone alone, his partner knew that reciprocation wasn’t necessary, and it was just something that his brown-eyed lover wanted to express.  

Neji’s lips curled up at the edges and he sought out Lee’s hand under the water. “I think you’re pretty great, too.” 

Chapter Text

xXx

The dinner at Yuran’s house was bittersweet. It would mark their last night on Iro Island, as well as the first time Neji met a family that actually felt like how a real, functional, one should feel. They wanted to know everything about his personal life; even the mundane things, and they all approved of Lee just based on the fact that they seemed so at home with one another. None of them had any expectations of him other than his happiness, and that was both jarring and heart-warming. 

They bickered like any close-knit family. Yuran’s mother and sister fought good-naturedly over who served what and sat where; their husbands in the kitchen plating the food and joking over who was the better cook based off of previous mishaps. Yuran’s niece and nephew were enamoured with Lee and asked him rapidfire questions while they hung off of his arms and demanded he flip them upside down like their other uncles. Their mothers, one of which was Yuran’s sister, were in Kemurigakure on a business trip so their grandparents were looking after them. Everyone had the same silky black hair as the Hyuuga, but their eye colours varied from blue to almost-golden hazel. The only one who had different hair was the nephew, who apparently took after his other mother and her chestnut locks.

Despite what must be many burning questions about his lineage, none of them broached what it was like being a branch member of his clan. They wanted to know what his relationship was like with his parents, smoothly redirecting when he said he only had an uncle left. When he gave them the olive branch about his closeness with Hinata, they looked relieved that he had someone, and wanted to know about her next. 

They insisted that Neji, and by proxy Lee, come visit Iro Island again. Except next time he would stay with their family as a guest, and not have to pay for a hotel. Yuran also extended the invitation to Tenten, excited to meet the girl that the two boys considered their family, and not unlike how one would describe a sister. 

Yuran walked them to the edge of their family’s property, and would have insisted on walking them all the way back to the hotel. Neji had to point out that they didn’t want her to go through the trouble of walking back in the dark, even though the island was incredibly safe.

“Um, Neji-san…” Yuran looked conflicted for a moment. “Oh, I’m just going to go for it.” 

She hugged him tightly. 

“Please, write? I know we barely know each other, but…” She trailed off and stepped back, looking nervous for his reaction. 

“I will.” He assured her. “I’ll send a letter when we get home safely.”

“Wonderful. I hope it is a nice trip back.” She broke into a relieved smile. 

“May I have a hug, too?” Lee asked eagerly, holding out his arms. 

“Of course!” She grinned and hugged him with much less awkwardness. “I really do hope you take us up on the offer to stay here sometime soon. Don’t worry about my grandmother, she hardly comes this far away from the main house.” 

“Thank you, Yuran.” They parted with smiles and waves, and then Neji and Lee were walking back to their hotel.

It was after midnight, the night air was cool, and the world was calm. 

“I think I would very much like to come back and visit again. Perhaps we can make a yearly trip of it?” Lee suggested. 

“It… would be nice to come back.” His teammate admitted with a tentative smile.

“I know it is late and we must leave tomorrow, but… may we take the long way back?” He held out his hand for Neji hopefully. 

He wordlessly took it, and without even discussing it, they took that moment to say their goodbyes to the island that would hold a lot of memories for them. 

xXx

‘SQUEAK!’

Neji blinked. 

Lee blinked.

Soba blinked back. 

“Lee?” The Hyuuga turned to his teammate warily. 

“I did not even see her get on the ferry!” Lee looked positively thrilled, kneeling down to her height and waiting for her to rub against his outstretched hand before he started to scratch under her chin. She immediately began to pur, alternating between rubbing her side against Neji’s pant leg and then going over to Lee for pets. One of the attendants came over, astounded that the cat had actually followed tourists onto the boat. She knew of the white cat, and that she’d been seen around the island with no real owner. 

“I can take her back?” She offered warily, even though Soba looked like she’d rather jump off the side of the boat than go near anyone else that wasn’t Lee or Neji. 

“I believe we have been chosen by the cat distribution system.” The taijutsu user grinned at his partner triumphantly. 

Neji sighed in defeat and leaned down to pick up the cat. She immediately began rubbing all over his face, purring so loudly that her vocal chords trilled with each breath. It was almost hard to hold onto her with how excited she was, but he decided it was easier to put her in his shirt and just let her flop around in there, tying his belt tight enough that she wouldn’t slip through while he moved. Eventually she settled enough that, despite some odd looks, they could make their way from the port towards home. 

He got sliced up for his troubles, because when the thugs from the gang Lee stopped before their trip came to, once again, ‘exact’ revenge, they startled her into sinking her claws into his abs. She spent the next few seconds scratching him as she scurried around to his back and curling up in a trembling ball while Lee launched into action with a whoop of excitement. Neji was still dabbing at his newly acquired wounds with disinfectant after Lee had taken all of their adversaries into custody and dropped them off Kemurigakure’s police box. 

“I shall ensure that no one else startles her before we return home or I will do five thousand one-armed push ups!” Lee assured him with a bright smile and thumbs up. 

“I am going to hold you to that.” Neji warned him dryly. It took him until they stopped for the night at an inn to get her to come out from his back and eat. She seemed content to mill around in the bushes beside their room, eventually jumping back in through the windowsill and settling in for the night on top of the gentle-fist user’s stomach. He tried to move her twice before he finally gave up and just let her sleep there.

Lee thought it was adorable. 

He wished he could say it wasn’t, but she just stared up at him with her sleepy blue eyes and he decided fighting her wasn’t worth it. 

He did insist they get her a collar with a bell before they left the populated areas, wanting to make sure that he could find her if she ran off while they were distracted. 

xXx

“That… is a cat.” 

Neji nodded. He was tired.

“I have many push ups to do.” Lee confessed with a grim determination. 

Neji grabbed the back of his flak vest before he could take off to do said one-armed push-ups, and squats, and laps. To be honest, he’d lost count of all the self-rules Lee had broken while they travelled home with their extremely skittish cat. He was covered from head to toe with scratches, and there were several times when the thought of leaving Soba behind crossed his mind. He never would, but the thought was there.

“She’s very cute?” Tenten offered, as if that would lessen the blow somehow.

“Do you want her?” Neji held her out towards the third of their trio. 

Squeak.

“Neji!” His partner’s tone was chastising. “You must stop saying such things! Poor Soba may internalise it!”

“‘Poor Soba’ can’t understand human speech, and she is lucky she’s cute.” The Hyuuga pulled her back in towards his chest and let her snuggle up under his neck, like she wasn’t the world’s worst menace with a frustratingly sweet face. 

“I shall go get Sakura-san to heal your scratches.” This time he wasn’t fast enough to grab onto the green-clad jounin, and so the fastest of their team took off to procure someone who would momentarily rid him of his cat-induced injuries. 

He sighed. “Let’s go. I want a shower.” He turned in the direction of Lee’s apartment, already cataloguing all the supplies they’d need to keep the feline comfortable and well taken care of. He had no doubts that the other man would find them; Neji had been complaining about wanting to get into clean clothes for the last half a day. 

“So…?” Tenten fell into step beside him, excited for an update. “How did it go? Was it fun? You look tanned!” 

“Good. Yes. And yes, I am several shades darker.” 

Neji answered her questions, already dreading when he’d have to reveal the most pressing update. It didn’t take long to get to Lee’s apartment from the main gate, and he one-handedly fished his keys from his pack to let them in. Once they were inside and the door was closed, he let Soba down from his arm so she could wander around and acclimatise herself. Tenten wandered into the kitchen while he grabbed some of Lee’s spare lounging clothes and took a quick shower. 

Soba darted under the couch when the bathroom door opened, and the weapon’s master made a noise of disappointment. She must have been trying to get her to relax so she could pet her. 

“It will take a while. She’s extremely jumpy.” Neji informed her, rubbing at his damp hair with the towel. Lee’s pajama bottoms were slightly too long for him so they dragged a bit on the ground while he walked. Even though they were only a centimeter or two different in height, the taijutsu user was mostly leg, so he had to get his pants with a longer inseam. At least his long-sleeved green shirt fit him well enough, even though it seemed that the neck was a bit stretched out. 

“Huh,” Tenten stared at him from where she was sitting cross-legged on Lee’s living room floor. 

“What?” He disappeared back into the bathroom to grab a hair brush and start working through the tangles in his hair. At one point Soba had actually crawled up the back of his neck and got her paw stuck in there.

“She did a number on you.” His teammate’s voice held an undertone that he didn’t like. He still grabbed the teapot of tea that his friend had prepared and padded into the living room with it, juggling four cups. He took his first sip of tea that day and nearly melted into the floor. They couldn’t stop at any of the rest stops because the children there often tried to grab at Soba and try to convince Neji to let them hold her. 

“Though I don’t think that bruise on your neck is from her.” She mused, leaning over to poke at it pointedly. 

Shit. 

The front door opened, spilling Lee and Sakura into the apartment. 

The four of them stared at each other awkwardly. 

“I told Sakura-san.” Lee said a bit guiltily. 

“Tenten was just coming to the same conclusion.” Neji sighed. 

“Wow, that cat did a number on you.” Sakura toed off her shoes and stepped into the living room, walking over to assess the damage. “Though the bruises on your neck are definitely not cat-related.” 

He couldn’t help the pink that crawled up his cheeks as he sipped his tea, unable to meet any of their gazes. Tenten’s brown eyes were boring into the side of his head, but he instead found it easier to focus on directing the healer to the many gouges that Soba had left all over him. Lee took that moment to go for his own clean-up, likely to hide away for a bit and regroup like Neji wished he could. 

Eventually the cat cautiously crawled out from under the couch, ears flat while she eyed the new face. 

“Okay, that is one adorable cat.” Sakura allowed as she healed the scratches on Neji’s lower back through the shirt. “Hello Soba-chan. Did you cause trouble for your fathers?” 

Soba cowered back at the sound of her name, but when she realised no one was grabbing for her, she carefully slunk around Neji’s other side. It took her a bit to get into his lap and settle, curling into a tight ball. She didn’t pur even though he scratched at her chin and behind her ears, probably too overwhelmed to let herself fully relax. When Tenten reached for her, she let out a pitiful little noise of protest, but still let her stroke her soft fur a few times before she started to inch away. 

“So where did the cat come from?” Tenten asked. The two girls were obviously burning to ask other questions, but they held them back. 

“We went to another inn for lunch, and she came out while Lee was attracting all the other animals.” He explained, putting his hand on the side of the feline’s little head to soothe her while Sakura snuck in some pats. “They say she stowed away onto the ferry one day as a kitten from the mainland, and she’s hidden around the island for a while. For some strange reason she decided she wanted to come home with us.”

“Wow, well, she made a good choice. Lee loves animals.” Sakura chuckled. 

The bathroom door opened and said martial artist walked out freshly showered. “Neji is her favourite.” He had caught the tail-end of their conversation, smiling with endearment at the sight of the white kitten on his lover’s lap. 

“Hence why he is the one covered in war wounds.” Tenten snorted in amusement, which made the cat flinch ever so slightly. “Oh, Soba, don’t worry, you’ll get used to us.”

Sakura had taken a break to drink some tea, and then cheekily pointed to Neji’s prominent love bites. “Want me to fix those up too, or are we wearing them as trophies?”

“Ew,” Tenten made the appropriate gagging gesture. 

Neji wanted to hide under fifteen layers of blankets and not resurface until his face stopped getting ridiculously pink. “I’m sure you have more important things to do.” He wiggled in his seat in discomfort. “But… if you could… get the ones that are… visible.”

Nevermind an argument, his uncle would drop dead if he saw Neji like this and had to hear that he was moving out of the Hyuuga compound. 

Sakura took one last sip of her tea and then leaned over to nonchalantly hover her hand over the side of his neck. The chakra had a different cadence to it now; healing bruises required a bit more finesse. She looked satisfied after a few minutes, and then turned her attention to his lover. Lee had sat on the other end of the table, smiling at the three of them softly. Meanwhile, on his left side, Tenten had a pensive look on her face that never boded well for their team. 

“I am learning so many things about you today, Lee-kun.” The pink-haired healer was giving him a sly grin.

“Oh-kay,” Tenten stood up abruptly, startling Soba back under the couch. “Neji? We are going for a walk.” She grabbed at the back of his shirt and all but hauled him to his feet. 

“That’s fine,” he resigned himself to his fate, “I have to stop by the housing office.” He turned to Lee and Sakura, who were both looking a bit unsure how to respond to the sudden departure. “Thank you, Sakura-san, and I’ll either be by later this evening or tomorrow morning to give you an update, Lee.”

Then he put his shoes back on, grabbed his travel pack, and left with Tenten in toe. 

She lasted all but two minutes, barely out of earshot of Lee’s apartment. 

“What the ever-loving-fuck, Neji?” She demanded, gesturing back towards their teammate’s living accommodations. 

“You wanted us to talk.” He reminded her tersely, but he was being obtuse and they both knew it. 

“Yeah, about your family, not come back co-parenting a cat and clearly fucking our teammate!” She hissed furiously, just barely keeping her rage in check as they unanimously decided to take the rooftops. It would stop civilians from overhearing them, but he wasn’t too sure about any ANBU on duty. He’d rather have this conversation at a training ground, but the housing office would be closed by the time she finished yelling at him. 

“Can you wait until after I apply for my own apartment to tear a strip off of me?” He stopped once they were about half-way there, turning to give her a frustrated pleading look. 

She pursed her lips defiantly, but when they started moving again, it was silent. 

The civilian realtor was a harried man in his mid-twenties who looked like his job had aged him about a decade. When he saw Neji walking into his office, he had the appropriate forms all gathered by the time they moved from the door to his desk. 

“Fill these out,” he sounded exhausted. 

“Not the first Hyuuga, I take it?” Tenten gave him a sympathetic look. 

“No, and he won’t be the last. Are you going to be living with him?” He looked up from his filing cabinet, a new form ready in hand. 

“Nope,” she shook her head, smiling sweetly. “I’d kill him.”

“Well that makes things a bit easier,” glancing down at the plaque on his desk, they noted that he was a part of the Fukami clan. “One bedroom apartments are easier to find than multi-bedroom ones or houses.” He pulled a stack of papers out of the middle drawer and then sat down at his desk and began to spread some of them out in front of Neji and Tenten. 

Neji, who had sat down to fill out the forms, handed the clipboard back and then gingerly picked up the first listing. 

“This would be so much easier if we could get access to the Uchiha compound, but nooo.” Fukami grumbled under his breath as he stood up and walked towards a different filing cabinet, flipping through Neji’s application. He probably thought they couldn’t hear him, or he was just too stressed out to care. He got to the last page of the application and then stopped and turned back around with a frown on his face.

“It says here you live at the head family’s mansion?” He looked a bit bewildered. “I’ve gotten a lot of applications, but none from there. Honestly, it’s the most extravagant place to live in all of Konoha, and that includes the Hokage’s housing.” His face turned a bit sour at this point. “Not that the current Hokage is using them.” 

This guy did not give a flying fuck about decorum. Tenten liked him. 

“Is there a question?” Neji narrowed his eyes at him techily. 

“You know, it’s really none of my business.” Fukami waved his hand dismissively. “We’ve all got our reasons. Just saying; none of the places I’m showing you have even half the amenities this place does.” He tapped the paper with the back of his fingers. “You’re in for one hell of a downgrade.”

“You’re really selling this,” Tenten crossed her arms and leaned back into her seat, tone amused. 

“I’m just trying to set realistic expectations.” He assured her, filing the paperwork in one of the many subfolders under ‘Hyuuga’. “It would be impudent of me not to. Now, is there a price range I should keep in mind?” He gestured to the few he’d laid out. “I’m showing you some decent variety, but I can narrow the search if you need me to?”

“Is there anything in the new subdivision above Hokage Mountain?” Neji asked. 

“As far away as possible, huh? No, it’s got a waiting list. If you’re okay with being neighbours with the Hokage-”

“-No!” The two jounin immediately paled at the thought. He would never know peace; Gai would be at his place all the time trying to mother-hen him.

“You sure? It’s a nice set of townhouses, we are pretty picky about who we offer it to.” Fukami was glancing through his options, pulling a few more out of another drawer. 

“Why offer it to me?” Neji asked, careful to keep the infliction from his tone. 

“You’re, what, a jounin? ANBU, even? I can tell the type. You’re less likely to gawk.” He replied off-handedly, making both the shinobi in his office relax. “You’re probably around their student’s age, so you grew up without being too star-struck.”

“I promise you, there is no chance of that.” Tenten chuckled, and avoided Neji’s pointed kick at her under the cover of the desk. 

“Oh? You know what, better I don’t ask.” He looked a little intrigued, and then quickly decided against it. “Okay, um, how about these ones?” He handed Neji and Tenten one each. 

“This is in my neighbourhood, actually!” The weapon’s master showed her teammate the listing eagerly. “I can come make sure you don’t burn down the house!”

“I can cook, Tenten.” He gave her a haughty look, and then took the proffered paper. “It says it’s a three-unit dwelling?”

“You’ll have neighbours below you, but they mirrored the layout so living spaces and sleeping spaces are on opposite sides. Soundproofing isn’t too bad, full bath-which is nice, kitchen is a bit small, but you’ve got a small dining room that you can turn into an office pretty easily.” He clearly knew what he was talking about, because he barely needed to skim the listing before he knew exactly which one it was. “It’s one of the more recently rebuilt neighbourhoods, so instead of slapping up living spaces quickly, they put a bit more effort into making this.”

“Is it wheelchair accessible?” Tenten asked immediately. 

“After the war there were a lot of people who came home with accessibility needs.” He took the listing to look. “This neighbourhood went up right around the time they were passing the veteran mandate enforcing at least two residences in a dwelling have accessibility… Ah, yes, it looks like the ramp is at the back of the building… and it reaches this unit.” He looked relieved as he handed it back. “If you or a person you know uses mobility aids and you’re worried about two flights of stairs, we can always look for something on the ground or second floors.”

“No, this is fine. I’ll take it.” 

Fukami looked a bit surprised. “Are… you sure? We have other options…”

“No, I’m sure.” He went to return the listing, but Fukami waved him off. 

“That’s yours then. When were you thinking of moving?” He pulled out a giant binder, found a duplication of the listing, and started filling in the paperwork, copying Neji’s information onto the application. 

“As soon as possible.” 

The realtor paused, double checked something by pulling out another binder, and then unlocked his bottom desk drawer with a keychain he had in his pocket. “To be honest, the unit is unoccupied, and I have the keys here… It’s just I technically have to tell your current… um… landlord that you’re vacating the space. That can take a couple days. He has to sign indicating that he received the notice and he’s aware of you moving out. If he doesn’t respond in a week, I will likely have to go see him in person. Now, it’s a formality that he has to sign it; if I tell him face to face, it’s enough notice. We give them a week grace period, but we also know that there’s been some… reluctance to relinquish tenants from their houses. Which is why they passed the bylaw stating in-person is ‘final’ notice.” 

He explained all this while handing Neji the forms and contract to sign and date, pointing to where he needed his signature and fingerprint. 

“And if I can get him to sign it tonight and bring it back to you tomorrow morning?” The Hyuuga asked as he did as instructed and signed the form. 

“Well, if you can, and it has his official clan seal… You could move in as early as tomorrow afternoon.” Fukami took the papers back and then handed the gentle-fist user an envelope that he’d filled with an official release requisition. “You do live in the same house, and it’s a bit unorthodox, but if you get the signature sooner is better than later. I’ll also send a letter by mail just in case you meet resistance. That way we have a paper trail and we’ve started the clock on when I can intervene.” He looked grim, but his demeanour softened ever so slightly before he decided to tack one last thing on.

“If there are any signs or attempts at any form of retaliation, I want you to come back here immediately, or come up with contingency plans to send someone else in your stead if you don’t check in.” He linked his fingers on the desk in front of him in a professional manner, but his eyes held some sadness. 

“Have there been cases that resulted in retaliation?” Neji’s heart froze in his chest. 

“Officially, I am not at liberty to discuss such things,” Fukami responded succinctly, “personally, I can say I have had to make some… harrowing housecalls.”

Neji hadn’t heard of anyone dying trying to leave the compound, but that didn’t mean they weren’t abused in some way before they managed to get free of their ‘head branch’ landlords. His stomach roiled and that same gnawing, deep-rooted, anger in his core flared up like gasoline on a fire. Of course he’d never heard of such instances; he was the nephew of the clan head; he’d been held apart from both sides of the family for his whole life. Too important to belong with his fellow branch members, but too lowly to be a part of his head family relatives. At least not until he was in his mid-teen years and his uncle had insisted he move into the main house. 

He stood up and bowed. “Thank you for your help, I will see you tomorrow morning.” Then he threw his bag over his shoulder, clutching the envelope with a shaking fist, as he left the office. 

Tenten was on his heels, thanking the realtor profusely before she fell into step beside him.