Chapter One: Konoha Blues

Gaara checked his surroundings for things that could potentially drive him to kill someone.

The bad news: Gaara saw some reasons to kill.

The good news: Gaara could only see three.

The first one was his older sister, Temari. She was making a last minute attempt to fix his hair. The second one was his other older sibling, Kankuro. Kankuro was doing something similar to Temari's actions, that is, he was criticising Gaara's outfit. What kind of crime did I commit?thought Gaara with annoyance. All he had done was throw on a black T-shirt and a pair of jeans. It wasn't like he was committing fashion suicide of something. They were walking to school, and his siblings were all over him. Gaara was the somewhat-baby of the family, being in 10th grade while his siblings were in grade 11 and 12. Of course, Gaara was also the scariest of the family, with eyes lined naturally with black (and unexplained phenomenon) and a tattoo on his forehead. (It shouldn't be scary,he thought. It only says 'love'. ) They had just moved from the next town over, Sunagakure, to Konohagakure, for their father's job. They were on their way to the local high school, and Gaara hoped this wouldn't be the start of a very, very bad day.

Now, arriving and Konoha High, Gaara saw his third reason to murder someone. As soon as Gaara took a step into his first class, (Gaara had a good sense of direction) he was jumped by a large group of people his age. His siblings grinned and slinked away, leaving Gaara to deal with this on his own. He was barraged by a wall of names, Ino, Naruto, Sasuke, Chouji, Shikamaru (who only came up because he was dragged by his friends.), Tenten, Neji, Lee, Kiba, and Shino. How was he going to remember all of these names!?

Gaara only smiled slightly when he saw two girls walking slowly towards him. The one with the pink hair was quietly coaxing the girl with the black hair to say hello. The pink-haired girl caught his gaze and smiled. They walked up toward him, and the black-haired girl managed to stutter out some words. "Welcome... to Konoha, my... name is Hinata," she said. The one with the pink hair spoke up. "I'm Sakura, welcome," she said cheerfully, and Gaara tried a crooked and demented attempt at a smile. Sakura looked a little creeped out for a second, then she started to laugh. The boys gave him a pat on the back for the effort and then turned around as their teacher, Kakashi, arrived, nearly an hour late. Ugh, he thought. Once the teacher actually got here, class was exactly the same as before.

Here we go again.

Later...

Gaara walked, panting and sweating, towards his new locker. Gaara had just experienced what a pain gym was at Konoha. His new teacher, Anko, knew no fears. His chest felt like she'd skewered him. He paused to dent a locker with a punch. The unlucky locker gave in to the larger being. Gaara's new friends had found this gym class especially amusing. Sure Gaara was strong and tall, but he was also a huge clutz. The had started bastketball today, and Gaara had found himself tripping over every dropped ball and every foot that had been momentarily set on the ground. He had finally found is locker, and he pull it open and shoved his bag inside. It was lunch anyways. People were staring to shy away from him now as his eyes grew crazed. Gaara shut the locker and slid down to lean on it, groaning. A gentle hand tapped his slumped head from above him. He looked up and saw the pink-haired girl, Sakura, smiling down at him. "I take it you had gym class?" she asked, and his head slumped back to his chest in his attempt to nod. Sakura grinned. "Nobody can really meet Anko-sensei's expectations, save Lee. He can be a beast," she explained. He could picture Lee doing this. You couldn't not be athletic when you wore a jumpsuit to school everyday. Ugh.

Sakura held out her hand. "Let's go eat," she said. Gaara didn't take it, but he did get up. They started walking to the lunch room, better known as their sucky cafeteria. Gaara wondered if there was a restaurant nearby. He saw his new friends waving at him from the table where the usually sat. They were definitely not holding cafeteria food. Gaara looked at his own bagged lunch. He saw that Sakura was holding one too. Sakura shrugged.

Gaara's smile was just a little less contorted this time.