It was the girl. It was the freaking girl.

And it was all he could do to stop himself from running to her—Hyuugas had an insurmountable amount of dignity after all—that he had to settle with walking fast. Really fast.

A month ago

Of course he was dragged. There was no other plausible explanation for the fact that he was at a bar with his best friend and his best friend's friends. Who were as loud as his best friend. And he couldn't believe that he was still best friends with his best friend. Nor could he believe that he allowed himself to be with his best friend's friends.

"But it's my birthday!" Lee had whined, and he was scary when he whined, as he had the tendency to roll over the floor, roll roll roll, reminiscent of an old teacher's patently untrained dogs. So Neji had no other choice but to go along with the most clichéd plan on earth for a birthday—to go to a bar. Honestly, shouldn't people be more original and choose a place different from a bar?

Apparently not, for there were other people in this bar, celebrating Lee's birthday.

Upon arriving he had done the only thing he was comfortable of doing in a bar: sit down in a quiet corner and drink shot after shot. After all, Lee was paying for all of this. And he could have all that he wanted. For Neji never got drunk. Never. That was his belief, albeit Lee just laughed at him and said, "Believe what you want to believe, buddy."

It was after about five shots and two bottles of beer that he found the seat beside him occupied by none other than Uzumaki Naruto, Lee's louder friend. Or perhaps 'loudest person of his acquaintance' would be a much better description.

"Neji! I've got to introduce you to someone! You and Sasuke-teme both! You've done nothing but drink all night, isn't it time for you to boogie?!" The idiot did a little jig in his seat, and Neji looked at him as one would look at a piece of lint on his sweater.

But he was no match to the blonde's inordinate strength—Neji never got drunk, but alcohol did weird things to his strength. Anyway, he was dragged, for the second time this night already, into the dance floor.

Where his most hated enemies were congregated.

Groups of girls. Or rather, gaggles of geese—ahem—girls.

"Sakura-chan!" Naruto was exclaiming, hugging a pink-haired girl. Neji couldn't help but stare at the whack of a dye job that was her hair. And couldn't help but get horrified, because was this the girl Naruto was going to introduce to him?!

Apparently not, though. A disgruntled, yet slightly tipsy Sasuke, was conjured out of thin air by Naruto.

"Here you are, Teme! Sakura-chan, this is my best friend. Sasuke, this is my bestest cousin." The girl rolled her eyes at the description, and was about to open her mouth to berate his grammar, Neji presumed, when the said cousin clasped both Sakura and Sasuke's hands together, pointed toward the general direction of the dance floor, and gave both of their backs a shove.

Uchiha must have been drunker than usual, for he strode off to the dance floor when the girl laughingly pulled on his hand. Hmmm. Neji thought.

And it was now time for the idiot to round up on him. He was tempted to say, "Yes, Naruto? Anyone for me?"

He didn't, though. However much he was tempted.

Naruto tapped his shoulder. He inwardly cringed and turned around.

"Sorry, Neji, she seems to be inebriated now. But on the bright side, you can be her rescuer!" Naruto pointed to the dance floor once more, and Neji's gaze landed on a pair of swiveling hips first before he caught the red dress and the long, long, slightly wavy hair that almost reached the small of her back.

And couldn't help the pang of lust that ran straight to wherever pangs of lust ran to. She was twirling from the arms of one guy to another, a bottle of beer in her hands, a resplendent vision. He knew he wanted her. This was the first time he felt a pull towards a girl, regardless of how obviously drunk she was, and world be damned, he was going to get her.

He was walking forward before Naruto got a chance to put in another word, and ignored the blonde's requisite snort and muttering of, "I knew the both of you would be perfect together."

He had spent that fateful night with her only, laughing, dancing, and singing along with the bar music. He was able to get her number, only to find out later in the morning that it lacked a digit. It had been about a month, and all he got from her was a bracelet of beer bottle caps she had laughingly strung around his wrist (using the amused bartender's pocket knife), her phone number sans a digit, and a buss on the cheek. Not even a name.

He had even asked Naruto, to no avail:

"I don't have her number."

Upon hearing the response Neji couldn't help but think of a few things—that Naruto's throat was just a mere arm away, and that the circumference of his single hand could easily encircle that throat. And if not one hand, then both would certainly suffice.

Be that as it may, a barely restrained, "Why?" was all that he could manage.

The blonde had the audacity to shrug. "Because,"—and the mettle to give him a weirded out look, as Neji struggled to keep his clenched fists at his side—,"I never knew her."

At the I-don't-believe-you-look, Naruto lifted both hands into the air in the universal I-surrender pose.

"Look. The girl you were flirting with the whole night? Was not the girl that I was supposed to introduce to you. The girl I had in mind? She's blonde, and is my cousin's best friend, who, I'm telling you, was pretty disappointed, and is now taking it out on my cousin, who is sure to turn on me. And that's all your fault, man, 'cause you were supposed to go left when you went right, and ran straight to that brunette instead of the buxom blonde I was setting up for you."

"Huh," was Neji's response. This was the mother of all dead-ends. He had approached the girl in red, flirted with her, danced with her, all night. Exclusively. And she had flirted back. And remained in his company. (And even told him that he smelled good, over all the brandy he had consumed.)

He had never done that before. Nor had that ever happened to him before. In his whole life. He had never thought he would be intoxicated by the mere sight of swaying hips dressed in red, and would never have thought that he would approach her (though clearly he was a bit intoxicated at that time).

And all he got from the encounter was an entry in his phone for someone named after the number 10, and a phone number that lacked a single, lone digit.

It wasn't much to go on, even for a determined man as Neji. (And he was, given that he had swallowed his pride and asked Naruto about the girl he had introduced.) There wasn't anything he could do now.

He was quite despairing for the last month, but as luck had it, as he was picking up his cousins from a fast food joint somewhere around their school, he found her. Now, she was no longer the girl in red, nor was her hair down—it was up in two buns, she was wearing cargo shorts and a dark green hoodie that was too big for her, and carrying a big backpack and a stack of paper, but there was no mistaking it, it was she.

So he called, "Hey," and tapped her shoulder lightly.

He held her breath as she turned around and saw him, a confused expression taking over her face.

"Remember this?" He said, holding up his left arm and giving it a shake, the bottle caps clanking against each other, and watched the play of emotions in her face—from confusion, to realization, to patent and profound embarrassment. He distinctly remembered her telling him that that had been her first time in a bar, and her first time being picked up by anybody. He also remembered that the bottle cap bracelet was her long forgotten childhood pastime.

She nodded, as her face began flaming red, up to the tips of her ears. She was clutching the papers in her hand, rather tightly.

He smirked. He was going to cut to the chase now—"I'm Neji, can I get your name and number?"

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Hi everyone! I am (sort of) back! rouse is going to be updated next, i suppose.

Please review, thanks! :)