Hey everyone! Thanks so much for all of the feedback! I know I haven't updated as soon as you'd hope, but school has been keeping me down (strangling my creative mojo D:). Luckily, writing this was a real mood lifter for me, so I hope it does the same for you! And I'll try to update...sometime before next year. Onward!

Pick Up Lines? Aisle 19

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The next day, Neji and Tenten had arrived to the training grounds early, but neither had spoken a word. Lee had shown up a few minutes late…wonder why.

"Hey…Lee." Neji whispered to Lee as Gai droned on in another youth speech. Lee gulped as he looked to his left towards Neji.

"Y-yes?"

"What was…that," Neji coughed, "all about…last night…?"

"Uh!" Lee's faced paled, "Well, you see…my water broke."

Neji's eye twitched. Lee meekly held up a water bottle with a bandage on it and jiggled it so the water swashed around.

"Heheh…" Lee nervously giggled, "All fixed."

There was a moment of silence as the wind blew before Neji fell over, stiff as a board, anime-style. Tenten noticed Neji's temporary state of unconsciousness and decided to take advantage of it.

"Lee! You know how we talked about you-know-what last night; do you think you can come over my house tonight?"

"S-sure thing, Tenten-chan!" Lee stammered.

"We need to discuss last night's conversation…" Tenten said in a low tone. Lee gulped again. "Great! Seeya then!"

With that, Tenten ran off for some solo training. Lee turned back to the unconscious Neji and tried to wake him up. He tried slapping him, splashing him with water, singing "Little Bunny Fufu," but nothing worked. Finally, from the pocket dimension that existed somewhere in his skin tight uniform, he pulled out a large mayonnaise-sized jar of…curry?

"The curry of life will definitely wake him up!" Lee said as he dug a massive spoon into the gloop. At the sound of speed, Neji's hand reached up and grabbed Lee's arm before any damage could be done.

"Don't. Even. Think. About it." Neji growled before helping himself up.

"Ahh! Neji-san, you're awake!" Lee said. Glancing at the spoon, he decided to eat the curry instead of letting it go to waste and had an instant food-orgasm.

"Ergh, Lee, I need you help me get supplies today."

"Surplizz?" Lee slurred with the spoon in his mouth.

"Yeah, you know…supplies."

"Aha! Right!" Lee jumped up and grabbed Neji by the wrists. "I know the perfect place to go!"

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A few minutes later, they reached an American grocery store.

"Stop&Shop?" Neji looked up at the huge letters in front of the store, quirking an eyebrow.

"Yup! Hey, did you hear how Stop&Shop and A&P merged? So now they're called Stop&P! Ahaaahha-snort-hahaha!" Lee snorted and laughed, doubled over, slapping his knee.

"…Are you drunk?"

"Ahahaha-snortt-hahhh—maybe a little." Lee said stoically and coughed.

"…"

"…C'mon, let's go inside!"

Neji and Lee walked through the automatic doors and looked around. The whole store seemed to be empty except for two employees. One was a red-head, but he was turned so his face wasn't showing. The other was a girl of about 17 years of age, with brown shoulder length, loosely curled hair. She seemed to be giving the boy a hard time…

"Gaara! As my official trainee, you have to do as I say! You can't keep scaring away customers like this, you gotta smiiiillllle!!" She exaggerated this last word by stretching out her mouth with her fingers.

"S-heee? Sh-miiilllle! Or else you don't get any hummus!"

"…But I don't want hummus. I want death and destruction—"

"Well then, no death and destruction for you!"

"…" She narrorwed her eyes in frustration, but then noticed Neji and Lee stand near the doorway, looking lost.

"Customers! Here's your chance Gaara! Redeem yourself! For the hummus, for the pudding, for the produce section!" The girl shoved Gaara in Neji and Lee's direction. He wore a blank expression.

Several awkward moments passed as the girl stood in the background cheering on Gaara to do his best while the boys stared at one another.

"…"

"…Hello, my name is Gaara. How may I help you…?" Gaara turned his head towards his co-worker. She jumped up and down, pointing at her teeth. Gaara turned his head back and did a half smile, half screw-your-face-up-like-you-were-constipated-look. Luckily, Lee was too busy admiring Gaara's green store-apron, and Neji had spotted a mirror not far from him, and started doing little macho poses as well as pointing, winking and clicking his tongue at himself.

'Boys…' The girl thought to herself as she groaned.

"Ehh, good job, Gaara! You did great! So great infact, you get to help me re-stock aisle 19!"

"Aisle…19…?" Gaara asked.

Somewhere in the depths of his heart (oh yes, he has one of those), he knew there was something wrong concerning that aisle. What was it? What was it he couldn't remember, the reason why all of his male co-workers had quit?

"Here, you get to hold these while I arrange by product number, bar code, size, density, and alphabetize and color code the entire shelf!" the girl loaded a three foot pile of tampon and pad packages into Gaara's arms.

"…"

"Let's go!" She shouted dramatically, cracking the whip that had suddenly appeared in her hand. Gaara silently followed the girl down the store, somehow seeing where he was going.

"Ohh…I didn't get to ask him if they had any of those aprons in fuchsia!" Lee blurted as he snapped out of his daze. Neji pictured Lee wearing a frilly, fuchsia apron on top of his hideously tight, green spandex and shuddered.

"Dirty images…"

"Whats that?"

"Dirty dishes. They're, uh, waiting for me at home. Let's make this quick."

"Let's see…I guess I'll need some shampoo okay…" Neji stole a glance at some of the Herbal Essence bottles. 'On sale…Berry Tea and Orange Flower…or Fruit Fusions?'

Neji looked around, stashed some bottles in his basket, then quickly covered them with a pile of Axe, razors and beef jerky. Suddenly, someone tapped his shoulder.

"It's for Hinata, I swear!" Neji looked around wildly. Lee stood there, happily chewing away at some candy, apparently not hearing a word Neji said.

"Neji, Neji! Listen to this! What kind of shorts do clouds wear?" Lee read off a Laffy Taffy wrapper.

"Uh…" Neji said, more out of confusion than thought.

"Thunder-pants!" Lee went into hysterics. "Hahahahoohoo! Ahh…I have to remember that one!"

Neji's eye twitched again. "Something in your eye, Neji?" Lee asked; Neji groaned.

"C'mon Lee, we don't have time to mess around; we gotta get through this list of completely masculine products before—"

"Never fear, Neji! For all we need is THIS!" Lee held up a magazine.

"Adolescent Magazine…?"

"Yup, all we need" Lee nodded.

"Over my dead testosterone filled body. It looks like the magazine child of Cosmo and Seventeen. Not that I would know such a thing…it just…looks…like it." Neji mumbled as he crossed his arms. When Neji looked up, Lee was already paying for the periodical. The girl (who appeared to be taking a break from her re-stocking duties) held up one paper and one plastic bag.

"Kill a tree, or strangle a bird?"

"Oh! Neither would be very youthful, I think I'll just hold this—"

"Kill a tree!" Neji grabbed the paper bag and shoved the magazine in it. "No one, I repeat, NO ONE is to see us walking out of this store with that magazine!" Neji whispered urgently into Lee's ear. "Let's go!" Neji said as he pushed Lee through the automated doors.

"Hey! You forgot your change! This quarter was made in 1998!" The girl shouted after the two.

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"Hmm…Adolescent Magazine suggests pick-up lines to 'charm your lady lover'."

"Ugh, please don't use words like that."

"But it's true!"

"Well, fine then, let me see a few. All I have to do is charm Tenten and the deal is done."

Neji grabbed the 'zine, but was quickly met with confusion.

"I can't read a word of this."

"Oh, let me! I'm fluent in English!"

"Your penpal, right?"

"Err…yeah, that—him, hehe, right." Lee sweat dropped as he took back the magazine.

"Ah…these should do." Lee started scribbling the translations for the Worst Pick-up Lines column…

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Neji and Lee had spotted Tenten walking down the street after finishing lunch with some of the other kunoichis in town. Lee pushed Neji out from behind the tree they were using as cover, and gave him his trade marked Good Guy Pose.

"Are you sure about this? Some of these lines seem…off."

"Trust me! It's all the rage!"

Neji took a deep breath and sighed. "H-hello, Tenten."

"Oh hey Neji. Something the matter?"

"If…uh…if you were a burger, you'd be McBeautiful!"

"…What?"

Neji panicked, his voice got louder and higher as he spoke. "I'm looking for treasure! Mind if I search your chest?"

"Escuse me?! Neji Hyuuga! Explain yourself!"

"Guh!!" Neji quickly searched his mind for another line. Neji grabbed Tenten's ass.

"Aaiiiiieee!!"

"Is this seat taken?!"

Tenten started lashing out at Neji, who kept dodging, and pitifully trying more lines.

"Is your father a baker? Because you have the nicest set of buns!" Neji's voice cracked as he dodged another punch. "You're so hot, your ass is on fire!"

"That's it, Hyuuga!!" Tenten landed a perfect uppercut under Neji's jaw, and sent him flying into a near-by stream.

"That oughta cool you off! Jerk…" Tenten stalked off, fuming.

"Y-you've been a ba-ad girl…go to my room!" Neji said before sinking to the bottom of the stream.