Naruto Fan Fiction ❯ The Curative Career of Kaori the Ninja Nurse ❯ Kaori�s Desperation ( Chapter 11 )

[ T - Teen: Not suitable for readers under 13 ]

Author's Notes: Thanks for the reviews! Disclaimer: Not liable for any accidents or deaths resulting from reading this story.

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Kaori's Desperation

“Never give up! That's our motto isn't it, Lee?” Gai replied when Lee told him the heart breaking news during lunch. They were sitting together in the cafeteria with an abundance of food on the table.

“Yes, but what will you do now?” asked Gai's number one fan.

“I will continue to pursue her until there is 100 percent certainty there is no hope. Even if there were one chance in one hundred billion trillion, I will persist. That's what it means to be a man, Lee, to fight to the end with your last dying breath! Whether in battle or love it doesn't matter.”

“Yes! Never give up!” Lee rooted, throwing his hands up in the air.

“You see, she's just not sure of her feelings right now. I have a tendency to overwhelm women with my brilliance. It just takes time for their eyes to adjust. So don't worry, it will all work out in the end,” Gai said with his usual misplaced confidence. “In fact, I'm going over to visit her right after lunch with another gift…”

-…-…-…-

`I wonder if Lee had a talk with his sensei yet,' Kaori thought as she washed her hands after lunch. `I wonder how he took it. I do feel sorry for him. I wonder how many other women rejected his advances. But really, I can't be seen with someone like that. I'd be the laughingstock of Konoha. I hope he finds someone else who'll appreciate him. Maybe someone who's partially blind.'

Kaori felt guilty about not dealing with Gai directly, and for not returning his affection after he had so generously filled up her refrigerator, but she had no regrets. The odd man in green would be out of her life and she no longer had to worry about him suddenly showing up…

Gai was waiting by her desk with another gift box. “Good afternoon, my dear! I couldn't wait till tonight to give you this,” he said with a bow, presenting it with a flourish.

“Er, no thank you. I absolutely cannot accept any more gifts from you. Did you get a chance to talk to Lee today?”

“Yes, but this gift is not what you think. It's for your training. No matter what happens between us, you must continue your training to be the best you can be.”

“No, no more training. I can't accept…” Kaori protested.

“Ta-da!” Gai ripped open the gift box himself to show his love how serious he was about her training. Inside was a set of weights. The collective metal bars weighed 200 pounds (the minimum beginner's set). It was a good thing Kaori did not accept the box - the sudden weight would likely have broken her puny arms.

All color left Kaori's face. She became mute with horror. The mere thought of more training, with additional weight, terrified her so much she was paralyzed with fright.

“I'll take these with me now, but I'll see you after work for some training before dinner. I'll have a special nutritionally fortified energy drink ready for you. It contains raw eggs, protein powder, herbals extracts and…” Gai continued to horrify her.

-…-…-…-

The poor nurse was on pins and needles the rest of the afternoon. She had to hide from Gai. Hide somewhere he couldn't find her. She could not return home. She looked over at Otoha and sighed, wondering if it were at all possible to hide out at her place.

“More love life problems?” Otoha asked, noticing her coworker's strange mood.

“He came by again after lunch. I thought after I spoke with Lee and Lee had spoken with him, I'd be free, but…”

“Guys like that don't give up. What you should do is date him, take him for everything he has, and then be a total bitch so he'll dump you,” the buxom brunette advised while looking into her hand mirror and applying more lipstick.

“Do you think that will really work?” asked Kaori. She seriously considered it.

“Well, there's always the chance that he likes being treated like crap. Some guys are into that. They like bitchy aggressive women who hit them on the head and run their lives.” Otoha shrugged. “It's worth a try. Couldn't be worse, right?”

Kaori shook her head. “I can't do that. Not only is it against my ethics, that means I actually have to date him for a while. I need another way…”

“Hmmf, good luck, guy like that won't take no for an answer,” said Otoha, annoyed that Kaori would not take her sage, experienced, advice.

Kaori went back to brooding until her afternoon rounds. She was about to have another talk with Lee when she saw his teammates walk by.

“You two, you're Gai sensei's students, you have to help me! I'll give you all my savings (minus retirement benefits)! Save me!"

“What's the matter?” asked Tenten in concern. “Save you from whom?”

“From your sensei! He's stalking me! I can't get rid of him.”

“Sorry, but once Gai sensei gets an idea in his head, it's stuck there forever and ever,” Neji said, a bit maliciously.

“But he's stalking me! He shows up at my apartment, at my parents' home, and he's at the hospital all the time. I can't take it any more!”

“Well, we go on overnight missions occasionally, that should give you a break,” Tenten offered sympathetically, hoping Kaori would last another week.

“Mission… yes… a mission…” Kaori muttered to herself. The genin watched as Kaori quickly made her way out of the hospital.

“I was right, as usual. Two days, just what I expected,” Neji said in satisfaction.

“Fine you win. That was a 1000 ryou wasn't it?” his teammate replied in disappointment.

“Just enough for a bowl of House Special ramen and a drink at Ichiraku. Let's go after we visit Lee.”

“Is that a date?” Tenten teased, but secretly hoping it was.

“Date? Hmmf. It's me teaching you a lesson - never bet with a member of the Hyuuga clan. These eyes see more than chakra pathways. We can read into the hearts and minds of people and predict their actions,” said Neji in his usual imperious tone.

Tenten rolled her eyes. Neji was actually very dense when it came to understanding someone's heart.

-…-…-…-

Meanwhile Kaori went AWOL in order to seek out the two elders. There was no Hokage to appeal to, but she hoped his remaining advisors would be available to hear her case.

“Koharu-sama, Homura-sama, you have to help me!” she gasped out when she arrived at the Hokage's adminstration building. The elders were busy prioritizing the incoming mission requests.

“Calm down, miss… you are…?” asked old man Homura.

“I'm Kuchiki Kaori, nurse at the shinobi hospital. I'm being stalked by Gai sensei!”

The two looked at each other and then back at Kaori. They shook their heads in unison. “Not again,” they sighed.

“I need a restraining order or something to keep him away from me,” Kaori begged.

“We're sorry, but that's not going to help. Konoha is too small for a restraining order to be effective. And since you work at the hospital and Gai-sensei visits his disciple Lee all the time, it'll be impossible to enforce,” explained old lady Koharu.

“Well, you have to do something! It's your job to protect the populace from menace, right? Send him away on a mission, a very long, very far away mission. Please! My sanity depends on it!”

The two elders nodded and looked at what was available. “Well, Gai sensei had requested missions close to Konoha since he wants to be with Lee in case something happened but…” Homura began to say.

"Please! I just need a few weeks to come up with a plan. You see these gray hairs? New, just turned overnight!” Kaori persisted.

The two elders thought back to Gai's previous victims who were now safely relocated away from Konoha under new identities.

“How about this mission?" Homura held a scroll open for his comrade to read. "It should take at least a month and it's perfect for Gai and his team."

Koharu took the scroll in her wrinkled hands and read it over slowly. She nodded and said, "They're shooting a martial arts action movie in Tea Country and need some shinobi stuntmen to do double duty as bodyguards for the actors. Tenten is about the same size as the youngest lead actress. Neji with his long hair can double as the older girl or second male lead. And Gai is about the same height as the male lead. They don't even need to use henge. Perfect!"

"We'll talk to him tomorrow.” Homura's wrinkles deepened as he smiled at the pretty nurse. After all, he was old, but not dead yet.

“Tomorrow? Can't you send him tonight?” Kaori asked desperately.

“We're sorry, but you'll have to hold out till then,” Koharu replied a bit unsympathetically when she saw her comrade's overly affectionate smile.

The distressed young woman sighed. How was she going to survive the night?

-...-...-...-

When Gai came by to pick up Kaori at the hospital, she was nowhere to be seen. Instead, Otoha handed him a note.

Gai read out loud, "Sorry, but I won't be able to train tonight. My dog's mother suddenly died so I will be attending a private memorial service tonight."

Otoha curiously observed Gai's reaction. Would he really believe such a transparent excuse?

Gai teared up while saying, "How tragic, what devotion to a lesser creature. She is definitely worthy of my devotion!"

Otoha rolled her eyes. Gai's assumption that Kaori was a saint annoyed her so she just had to say, "Have you ever seen Kaori's dog?"

"No, but she said it's a beagle."

"You know, no one has ever seen Kaori's dog."

"Really? I guess he likes his privacy. Some people are like that too," Gai deadpanned.

Otoha rolled her eyes again. The man was just too dense. Still, there was something to be said for that.

-...-...-...-

Meanwhile Kaori was hiding out in Kakashi's room. She decided to spend the night there, away from her tormentor. Luckily she had an emergency change of clothes and a few toiletries in her locker. What she didn't have was a bed, but she took some extra blankets from the supply closet and tried to make herself comfortable on the floor next to Kakashi's bed.

"You don't mind me spending the night with you, do you Kakashi-san?" She smiled at the double entendre. "I'm afraid I have nowhere else to go. Your rival might try to hunt me down at my parents' or sister's and they're more likely to turn me in than help me out." Sad to say, but Kaori knew Kakashi rarely had visitors. Aside from herself, Sakura had visited her sensei a couple of times but that was it. Who had time to visit a comatose patient when the village was still in chaos? Gai was only concerned with Lee and paid his rival little heed now that he was no competition. So it seemed the best place to hide out for a night.

"Don't worry, it's just for tonight. By this time tomorrow, Gai sensei will be miles and miles away on a mission. A nice long mission. Sigh, but what will I do when he comes back? Well, Tsunade-sama should be here by then and you'll be cured. You'll protect me from him, right? I'm sorry I wasn't able to go through Gai's training. I had this silly idea that I could cure you rather than Tsunade-sama, but I just couldn't do it. I guess I just don't have the will power. My mother says that's one of my problems, that I give up on things too easily. Of course she was mostly talking about the men in my life. Maybe we can have dinner together once you're well. I bet you'll be really hungry when you wake. So what kind of food do you like? My favorite is eel avocado sushi, but it's a bit expensive so I can only have it once a week. I also like mochi green tea ice cream. Dumplings are good too. I love gyoza and red bean dango..."

All the talk about food made Kaori very, very hungry. Since she was hiding out, she could not go out for food, not even the cafeteria. All she had was some breath mints in her handbag. She thought of all the food in her refrigerator and nearly cried at the irony - that the man responsible for stocking her refrigerator was the same one who prevented her access.

"Well, no more talk about food. Right, I promised to read more `Icha Icha Paradise.' Let's see where we left off."

She read deep into the night, trying to distract herself from her rumbling stomach. The breath mints were all gone. Mint was supposed to have an appetite suppressing effect, but it seemed that was just fraudulent advice from diet gurus. Finally she stopped, yawned and rubbed her eyes. She checked the monitor and was pleased to see the elevated baseline and a few sizable series of peaks. 'Well, whatever works, as long as no one catches me reading this stuff.'

Although her patient lay in a coma, his prestigious standing allowed him a private room with its own lavatory. Kaori washed up in the little room equipped with a small sink and toilet. Showers were still communal and she couldn't take the chance of being seen. What would people think if they saw her spending the night with a comatose patient? If she were male and the patient were female, the implications would be even more serious.

Kaori changed into a T-shirt and sweatpants (her emergency clothing) and stretched out on the floor next to her patient. Despite feeling drained by the strain of dealing with Gai, she could not immediately fall asleep. She whiled away the time just observing her patient, watching his chest rise and fall in shallow breaths. She fought the temptation to remove his mask to gaze again upon his handsome noble visage. But the proximity of his body coupled with the dimness of the room, where the outside stars were the only source of light, made her bold. She sat up and leaned on Kakashi's bed, her arms folded and her head resting dreamily on her arms.

In her mind, she played out scenes from `Icha Icha Paradise' with herself and Kakashi as the leads. Temptation called and beckoned more strongly. To satisfy the urge, she reached under his blanket just to touch his hand, but she ended up holding it for a long time.

Exhaustion finally caught up. Her half closed eyes gazed at her sleeping prince with a sad longing. 'If only...when he wakes I wish he would pursue me as persistently as his rival. I wonder if they're also rivals in love. I wonder if he'll remember me at all.'

With that thought she reached over and brushed her lips lightly against a bit of exposed skin on his forehead. Kaori did not check the brain wave monitor before she fell asleep. If she had, she would have seen an almost imperceptible blip corresponding to the moment when her lips touched Kakashi's perfect brow.

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