Tenten stared into her cup of tea as tears welled up in her eyes. It had been three months since she had gotten the news of Neji's death, and to some degree it was finally starting to sink in. Shikamaru had grieved for him just as he had for the others who left the world before him, but he now had a child on the way, which occupied most of his thoughts. Temari would be staying at Konoha for maternity leave over the next year to be with Shikamaru. Even with Lee, Gai, and everyone else who knew Neji, it seemed that his death had hit her hardest of them all. The pain of doing things on a regular basis that he had always been around to do with her before, ate at her constantly. She didn't want to do anything. She had temporarily left the ANBU to have some time to find herself again. So far, she had succeeded in nothing more than staying in doors and moping around. She had gotten very thin and pale in the last three months. It was partly due to her lack of motivation to cook or even eat regularly. While it was true that occasionally Sakura and Lee would come by to check up on her, or Gai would drag her out of the house to have a bite to eat with him, she rarely said or did much of anything. After the first week, she had successfully dragged herself out of bed and bathed and had continued to do so regularly from then on, but everyone had to admit that it was meager progress.

Clutching the picture that was taken when she and Neji became ANBU, she stared at it dejectedly. As she looked at his smiling face for the ten-millionth time that week and started to feel alone all over again, she heard a knock at the door. Slowly getting up, her pink kimono brushed the almost empty tea cup and tipped it over onto the table. Merely pausing to glance at it, she walked towards the door.

As her fingers numbly twisted the knob, she pulled the door back and came face to face with Kakashi. The cold of winter pressed in at her unrelenting. Snow had taken up residence for the past two weeks and had refused to melt at all since.

When Kakashi saw her with her hair completely down and untidy, and her expressionless face, his visible eyebrow immediately knitted towards his headband and his eye gazed at her with pity. She had indeed been taking it very hard.

Taking a deep breath, he began, "I'm sorry to disturb you, but there's someone with me that's been waiting to see you for a long time."

Tenten frowned slightly as Kakashi looked sideways at something and cocked his head gently, unsure of what else to say. As he stepped away from the door, a tall man with long black hair and whitish-silver eyes came into view. His face was red with the cold and his body language told the story of his exhaustion. His expression was slightly pained, but when he saw Tenten a shadow of a grin broke over his face.

"N-Neji…" Tenten managed to say. Her mouth went suddenly dry and her throat made it hard for her to swallow.

"Tenten," he said quietly. It felt good to say her name again, but it hurt him to see her the way that she was. Her beautiful hair had not been kept, her mouth was drawn down at its corners, and she looked much thinner and paler than he remembered.

"Neji…oh my god…y-you're alive!"

Tears started pouring down her face as she threw her arms around him. As she did, she prayed that it wasn't a dream. Smiling painfully, he gasped as tears started clouding his vision too. Gently, he folded his arms around her as well, pulling her closer to him. They stood there like that for a long time, letting the moment sink in. Neji slowly bowed his head and reached a hand up, pulling back a lock of her hair. Turning his head, he kissed her cheek. Moving the same hand to her chin and lifting her head up gently, his lips met hers. After a moment, his hand slipped to the back of her neck. Their tears mingled together in wordless harmony.

Kakashi watched the two in silence. He had known for a while that there was something between Neji and Tenten, but he didn't know how deep their relationship went. Now he was beginning to understand why Tenten had gone into such a deep depression after Neji was thought to be dead. Quietly, Kakashi departed to meet Sakura and Naruto for dinner, leaving Neji and Tenten alone.

As Neji broke the kiss, he pulled her into his arms a little tighter, "I love you."

"Neji…I thought you were dead. We all thought you were dead," Tenten sobbed.

"I am so sorry. Never again. I'll never leave you like that ever again…not ever again," Neji vowed, tears still streaming down his face.

After a moment Tenten lightly backed into her home, never letting go of Neji. Being nothing else for it but to walk with her, Neji let her drag him inside. Blindly shutting the door after them, Tenten wiped the tears from her eyes and leaned back slightly. As she did, Neji looked up as well, coming eye to eye with her. She had never actually seen tears in his eyes before. He had always made an effort to hide his weaknesses from her before she could see, but now, as she stared into his handsome, tired face, she could see them falling in streams. She reached a hand up to his face, softly brushing the tears from his cheeks.

"What kind of hell did you go through to make it back to me? Forced off a cliff, endured this winter's bitter cold, left behind to die, and three months later, here you are."

Neji pulled himself together and managed to give her a weak smile, "You can't kill me that easily."

Her arms locked themselves around him as she buried her face in his shirt once again. As Tenten stood there in his embrace, Neji told her all about the battle and about how he had been injured. He told her about all the people that died and how Sasuke had blocked his retreat. He told her about falling, and about him waking up to find that Itachi had rescued him. Then about how Itachi had left and Neji had had to stay there longer to heal.

"I would have been here sooner," Neji said, "accept that by the time I could finally move freely again…everything had frozen over. I had to use the forest path rather than the trees to get back. The limbs were too slippery."

Tenten slowly lifted his shirt to reveal the scar of a stitched wound on his side. Neji frowned slightly at her as her eyebrows knitted together in sorrow at the sight of it. She gently put a hand to the healed wound and touched the scar. He reached down and covered her hand with his own.

"Its nothing," he said, watching her.

"There wasn't a day that went by that I couldn't stop thinking about you," Tenten said, shaking her head and looking up to meet his eyes.

Neji continued to watch her calmly, "That's never what I wanted. If anything ever were to happen to me, I wouldn't want you to waste away like that."

"Stop…I don't want to talk about losing you anymore…"

Neji gave a deep sigh, frowning slightly, "You know…you're what keeps me alive. You always have been…"

Tenten reached her arms back around him and rested her head on his chest, closing her eyes, "I should have told you years ago. I love you so much."

Neji smiled, putting his arms back around her, "I know. And I love you. And I'm not going anywhere…"

The dim moonlight fell on them light a spot light in the dark room as they remained in each other's embrace. Snow continued to fall like a soft white blanket on Konoha signaling a kind of frozen calm in the village.

Sixteen months later…

The sun was beating down on the treetops near Konoha and a couple walked hand-in-hand through the brush below.

"You should have seen it. He was so cute. Shikamaru scooped him right up and put him on his shoulders. Toya just stood there and tried to dance while Shikamaru held. Of course…Temari wasn't too pleased, but she got over it really quick," said the black-haired Neji as he walked with a beautiful brown-eyed Tenten.

"Sounds like they have their hands full. Just wait until he gets older."

Neji smirked imagining the little blonde-haired boy with brown eyes becoming a shinobi, "It'll be just like everyone we knew. Speaking of which…did you hear? Naruto and Hinata are getting married soon."

Tenten smiled, "Yeah, she told me. She still blushes every time she talks about it."

Neji smiled, "Maybe she won't be the only one…"

Tenten looked over to him and saw him stop. She frowned, confused. Neji suddenly kneeled down in front of her. He looked up at her, smiling nervously.

"Tenten, we've been together for a year and a half and I have loved you for so much longer than that. So, I need to ask you…will you be my wife?"

Everything around them was suddenly still. It was as if time had frozen and the entire world around them was standing still. Tenten stared at him for a moment, not really believing she had heard right, but at the same time, more happy than she had ever been in her life. A smile broke over her face.

"Yes."

Neji smiled, taking her left hand and slipping a fireburst stone ring on her finger. From a branch on a nearby tree a black-haired man with a bowl haircut smiled and turned to face a younger man with the same haircut.

"See Lee…"

Lee smiled, "Took him long enough…"

Gai ruffled Lee's hair, "Better late than never…"

The sun shown brighter and longer that day than it had all year…


Alright. Its done, finally. Hope you liked it. Until my next story…bye all!