For Phoebe
Disclaimer: Naruto isn't mine.
"What's up with those two?" Neji and Tenten followed Kankuros gaze to the two figures groaning on the floor.
"They thought they'd make the last three miles a race." Tenten sighed at the level of idiocy she had to put up with.
"…A race?"
"Yep."
"In the desert?"
"Yep."
"In the middle of the day?"
"Yep."
"Any sympathy I may have had is gone." He rolled his eyes and gestured for them to follow him. "Gaara's waiting in his office." At the mention of Gaara, Lee suddenly jumped up.
"We're going to see Gaara?!" There was a shocked silence.
"What did you think we were doing?" Tentens hand was twitching and reaching towards the nearest weapon.
"I thought we were just delivering a message!"
"To the Kazekage! Who else?"
"Oh. That makes sense."
"I despair of you. Now come on, we've messed around here for long enough."
"But what about Gai-Sensei?" He pointed towards to still half-dead figure who seemed to be mumbling something.
"Leave him," Neji and Tenten said in unison and they stormed off with Lee hurrying behind.
Gaara was waiting in his office, the same stoic expression on his face as always with Temari standing behind. It would've been a perfectly normal meeting if Lee hadn't tripped over the doorway, rolled into the desk and jumped up suddenly before shouting out.
"Gaara! I-!" He was stopped in this by Tenten who came dashing over and punched him, slamming his head down on the desk.
"What are you doing you moron?! I'm so sorry Gaara!"
"It's fine." He seemed to have barely noticed the weirdness although Kankuro was trying not to laugh in the corner.
"Don't you usually have Gai with you?" Temari was peering round in case he suddenly appeared.
"He's somewhere." Tenten was pretty dismissive.
"Here's the message from Tsunade-Sama." Neji pulled out a scroll from the bag on his side and handed to Gaara. "It's about preparations for your visit next month."
"I thought so…"
"You're visiting next month?!" Lee was as always overly loud.
"We've only been discussing this the whole way here!"
"Oh yeah! Sorry Tenten, I was busy." Lee always felt odd being around Gaara. The boy had helped them out many times before but despite all that he still always remembered the first time they met in the Chuunin exams. He wasn't the type to hold a grudge but it would always be a major defeat to him.
And he didn't see Gaara that often either. They were from different villages and they didn't know each other that well. Lee liked befriending people and he had always wanted to have some kind of friendship with him. It was hard to find the opportunity. He was aware that the others were talking and started paying attention again.
"-maybe one night might be good."
"Especially with our idiot sensei in that condition."
"There's plenty of room in our house so-." Temari was interrupted by Lee.
"We're staying here?!" He couldn't believe the opportunity. Finally he had a chance to sort things with Gaara. This thought was interrupted by yet another punch from Tenten.
"Pay attention for once!"
"It'd probably be a bad idea to travel back straight away. We need supplies for a start."
"Do you think we should send Gai to the hospital?" Kankuro was looking down towards the end of the corridor where he was still slumped on the floor.
"A cold bucket of water will probably sort it." They'd used this method before and it seemed to work. Gai wasn't exactly a normal person.
"Ok… I'll show you where you'll be staying then." As they followed Kankuro out of the office, Lee looked back and noticed Gaara was staring at him. He looked away when Lee met his gaze.
Eh? Lee looked again. Gaara was flicking through a few documents on his desk and Lee thought he'd probably imagined it.
"Hurry up Lee!"
"Oh! Coming!" Lee hurried to where Tenten was waiting and forgot about any weird glances from Gaara.
-Page Break-
"GAH!"
"What?!" Neji had been just in front of Lee and the shouting had been in his ear.
"This room is huge!" Usually they stayed in dingy rooms in an inn in the middle of nowhere. In comparison the room he and Neji had been given to share was practically a palace.
"Could you keep it down a little? You shouldn't be shouting in other people's houses."
"But it's so amazing!" Neji flinched.
"It's not gonna be like this for the rest of the night is it?"
"The pillows have feathers in them!"
"…" This was interrupted by Gaara.
"Is this room ok? If it's not I can always-."
"It's perfect!" Lee had pretty much dashed to the other side of the room in seconds and was now right in his face.
"That's good." He still managed to look completely deadpan with Lee right in his face. It was pretty impressive. "…Do you want to go get some Dango?"
"Dango?! Yes!" This could be a good way to get to know Gaara a little better and he'd get delicious food out of it.
"That's-."
"Neji! You get Tenten, I'll get Gai-Sensei!" And he dashed full speed out of the door.
"Sorry Gaara, he doesn't mean to be rude. He's just excited."
"It's fine…" Although still hard to read he did seem almost sad. Before Neji could ask if he was ok Lee reappeared.
"Let's go!" They both shrugged and followed him to the hall where the others were waiting. Temari and Kankuro both seemed bemused by this strange turn of events but this soon turned to horror when Gai appeared.
"Right! The last person there pays for everyone else!"
"You can't just decide that!" Tenten couldn't believe she'd been stuck with this idiot as a teacher.
"I'm sure Gaara would agree with me." Gaara didn't look too keen but he didn't have much time to argue before Gai ran full speed out the door with Lee close behind.
This would've been bad enough but Gai decided to slam the door of the restaurant open whilst shouting "Victory!" A quick smack on the back of the head by Tenten with a paper fan soon silenced him.
"Stop embarrassing us!"
"Gai-Sensei!" Lee was the only one who seemed at all concerned.
"So… do you think that table over there would be good?"
"Looks big enough." Tenten and Neji chose to conveniently ignore their teacher and teammate.
"…Shouldn't we sort something out?" Kankuro gestured to the scene at the other side of the room.
"He'll live." Neji just accepted these kinds of things. "Lee, come on."
"But what about Gai-Sensei?!"
"He usually recovers when food appears so stop worrying about him."
"But-." He was distracted by the plight of Gai when he saw Gaara sitting in a far corner of the table, the chairs either side of him empty. This was his chance to get to know Gaara better and he nearly knocked Neji into a couple at the next table in his rush to get to one of the seats.
"Gaara!" The redhead barely blinked at the eager face staring at him. This wasn't unusual though. "Can I sit next to you?"
"…Ok." Lee couldn't help but feel surprised that he hadn't refused. But then he wouldn't say no anyway. He's a pretty nice person really.
"Great!" He even pulled the chair a little closer meaning their arms were nearly touching.
As expected Gai was soon revived by the smell of the plates of food when it emerged from the kitchen. Although Lee had managed to get a space next to Gaara he still struggled to think of something to say. This was pretty odd considering that normally he'd never shut up. Even Neji and Kankuro were deep in conversation and Gai was stuffing his face with food so there was no help on that department.
"Err…" Gaara looked at him and he froze. He'd already started talking so there was no going back now but he had not a clue what to say. Damn. Why didn't I think this through?! "Um… Nice weather we're having?" It was the most awkward he'd been in a while.
"I suppose…" Come on brain! Think! As he spent most of his time training he couldn't think of many other topics.
"So you like Dango?" It was the best he had and he was sticking to it.
"Yes…" It was fairly obvious from the way he was midway through eating one of them and Lee internally started hitting himself on the head. At least he thought this was internally until he realised that he had begun hitting his head on the table and everyone had stopped talking to stare at him.
"What are you doing?" Neji had moved his chair away slightly.
"Um…" There seemed to be no good explanation.
"I can see what you mean." Temari was smirking at Tenten who was scowling at her embarrassing team mate.
"Could you stop being such an idiot for more than ten seconds?"
"Maybe…" This was so embarrassing. He looked out of the corner of his eye at Gaara. The redhead noticed him looking and nodded slightly. It was almost a comforting gesture. Instead of making more disastrous attempts, Lee decided to resume eating.
"…Lee?" Hearing the other boy start talking made him almost choke.
"Yes?!" The shock caused him to shout a little and the other boy stared.
"…I-."
"Lee!" Gai chose then to jump up from his seat and slam the table.
"Yes Gai-sensei!"
"We should have a Dango eating contest!"
"Of course!" He glanced at Gaara but he was no longer looking in his direction. It probably wasn't important then.
-Page Break-
"Thanks for letting us stay. And I'm sorry about our idiot teacher." Neji and Tenten glanced towards Gai who was currently fiddling with a puzzle box he had found in the corner of the office. Tenten just sighed.
"It's fine." Gaara paused a minute. "…I'll need to speak with Lee before you leave though." This was clearly a surprise to him. Maybe he'd done something wrong and now he was in trouble.
"Cool, we'll wait outside." Lee almost begged for the others to stay but the door soon slammed and he was left alone with the straight faced Gaara.
"…I-." The redhead had barely started to talk when he was interrupted.
"I'm so sorry! Whatever I did, I'm really sorry!"
"You haven't done anything…"
"Really?" This was a massive relief. "Then what is it? Is something wrong? Do you need any help?"
"Not exactly." Gaara looked down and it was then Lee noticed that his cheeks were looking a little red.
"Gaara?"
"I need to tell you something." Gaara took a deep breath to steady his nerves.
"What is it?" He really had to know now.
"I… Well I wanted you to know…" He seemed to be fumbling and sighed. "I like you. A lot."
"…Like?" Lee wasn't quite sure what this meant. "You mean you want to be friends with me?"
"In a sense…"
"I'm so glad!" Lee was practically in his face. "I've always wanted to be friends with you but I thought you hated me!"
"I don't… And that wasn't what I-." Tenten chose that moment to lean in the door.
"Are you finished yet? Sorry, but we really need to go."
"I think so. Are we?" Lee stared at Gaara.
"Just one minute."
"Oh ok… We'll be waiting downstairs." Lee gave him a questioning glance.
"What is it?"
"I don't think you understand." Gaara was standing now and he saw that they were fairly similar in height.
"What is it? What happened?" Lee was still pretty confused.
"I like you. Since the end of the Chuunin exams…"
"Oh!" Wait… What did he just say? Now that he understood what the redhead meant he suddenly felt really hot. Particularly his face.
"…So now you know-."
"GAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!" Even Gaara jumped back when Lee started shrieking. He was so confused his brain was unsure of how to react and so he ended up simply yelling. After a bit of yelling in the office he made his way down to the bottom floor where everyone else was waiting.
"-AAAAAAAAAAAAH!"
"What the hell Lee?!" Tenten had covered her ears and Neji looked pretty confused. "Shut up already!"
"What's wrong with him?" Temari was looking in disgust.
"I don't know… We'll just get him out of here." And Tenten gripped him and began pulling him out of the door. "Can't you just calm down for once? You're as bad as Gai-Sensei."
"But-!"
"Just come on, we have to get moving." Lee was still in shock over what had just happened and allowed himself to be dragged down the road.
-Page Break-
"Lee!" The sound of Sakura next to him soon bought Lee back to reality. He'd been zoning out more and more ever since that visit to Suna and now just days before Gaaras visit he was freaking out. Particularly as he had most definitely offended him.
Why did I do that? He's gonna be so angry with me! And I just wanted to be friends! Although it had turned out that Gaara had wanted even more than that. The thought had him going bright red and swaying slightly.
"What the hell Bushy Brows, why are you mumbling?" Naruto, Sakura and Sai were staring at him.
"Eh? I was?"
"He's been doing that a lot lately."
"Yeah what happened?" Sai had started rifling through a small notebook from his pocket. "What are you doing?"
"It started approximately twenty six days ago when he returned from Suna."
"You make notes?"
"Of course." Naruto looked in horror at the small book. He didn't want to know what kind of stuff it had about him in there.
"So what happened in Suna?" Sakura was looking concerned. The word Suna however had once again reminded him of that fateful day.
"GAAAAAAAAAAH!" The others looked at him with a mixture of concern and annoyance.
"What the hell is wrong with you?!"
"Shut up you idiot!" A hard punch to the face soon ended it.
"…Sakura-chan… I think you hit him kind of hard."
"I think he needed it."
"According to this book I read-." Lee wasn't paying attention to the words of his friends. He was too busy thinking about the impending visit from Gaara. What if he expected some kind of reply? What if he was angry and never spoke to him again?
"Ah. He's crying now." They all stared at the pitiful figure on the ground.
"…I think Bushy Brows could do with some professional help…"
"Amen to that."
By the time the day actually came Lee was stumbling around like a zombie and walking into various walls and doors.
He's gonna be so mad with me! What am I gonna do? Even training wasn't distracting him.
"Hey Lee, we have to go to the Hokages office." Lee looked over at Neji whilst practically tearing up and Neji almost walked off.
"Neji!" Having your weird best friend jump on you whilst crying was pretty disturbing. Especially when he started rubbing their faces together.
"…Lee? Could you stop doing that and tell me what's wrong?"
"I think Gaara's mad at me and I don't know what to do!"
"Why would he be mad at you?" Neji had horrible visions of Lee forcing Gaara into one of those green body suits or drawing matching eyebrows onto him and shuddered.
"He told me something and I reacted weird."
"Oh… Err… Lee?"
"Yes?" He looked at Neji hopefully. I should've asked Neji sooner! Of course he'll know what to do, he's a genius!
"You always react weirdly." This was a pretty sudden shock.
"Eh?!"
"You have over the top reactions to everything. It's like a defining part of your personality…"
"Oh…" Noticing that he seemed put out by this, Neji decided to change tactics.
"But that's not a bad thing or anything! I mean, you're a nice guy and I'm sure Gaara knows that. Just talk to him when he gets here."
"Ok." He was still sniffing a little. "Neji…" Oh no. There was no time to react before he was once again jumped on. "You're such a great friend!"
"Gah! Lee! Get off, we need to go now!"
-Page Break-
Seeing Gaara again after their last disastrous meeting was an odd sensation. All he could think of the redheads face from before. Now he looked just as calm and collected as ever and it was pretty confusing. If he was facing someone who'd reacted so negatively to his confession he'd at least feel odd but he seemed no different.
Maybe he's forgotten all about it… This was an upsetting thought. Although he was unsure of what he thought about that sudden confession still, he had been thinking about it non-stop for the past month. Just as he was attempting to put it out of his mind he looked up and for a second their eyes met. Gaara soon looked away but there had definitely been something there.
Oh my god! He must be mad with me… And now his face was turning red. Being looked at in a weird way by someone you knew was pretty depressing. They'd never been close but Lee had always wanted to get along with him.
After a while of Gaara and Tsunade talking they finally split off and Lee's group began guiding the three siblings to where they'd be staying. It was pretty reminiscent of the last time they met and he could tell that Gaara kept looking at him.
"Wait!" They all turned and stared at him and for a minute he was kind of lost for words. "Umm…"
"Can you stop screwing around Lee, you've been acting weird all week."
"Gaara!" Gaara stared at him now. "I need to talk to you for a second."
"We don't have time for this Lee, Gaara has loads he needs to do." This would normally have put someone off but Lee was determined and so he grabbed Gaara by the hand and ran full speed.
"Lee!"
"What is that idiot doing now?"
"Wow. I have no words right now…" Kankuro seemed almost impressed by this turn of events.
When they finally got to somewhere quiet Lee let go of the other boys hand and sighed with relief. This relief turned to panic when he realised he had nothing at all to say.
Oh no! Why am I such an idiot at the most important times! He was avoiding looking at Gaara who probably thought he was useless as well as a complete and utter jerk.
"Where is this?" It was a surprise to hear him talk and he nearly jumped.
"Eh?" He then noticed where he'd taken them. "Oh… This was where I used to train." The stump he's used over the years had been ground down and now was barely left at all.
"I see…" Neither of them could meet each other in the eye and there was a distinct awkwardness.
"Umm… Gaara!" That came out too loud… "I'm sorry about before with the screaming and the running and-."
"It's fine." It didn't sound fine though. "I'm sorry I inconvenienced you."
"But you didn't! I was just surprised so… I mean, no one's ever confessed to me before…"
"I've never confessed to anyone either…"
"Really? But why me? There are loads of people who'd be interested in you!" Not only was Gaara the Kazekage he was also pretty attractive.
"Because you're the one I like." And again there was he slightest hint of a blush on his cheeks.
"But… why?"
"You're just so… alive I suppose…" Eh? This didn't seem like much of a compliment. "And positive… I just keep watching you so…"
"You do?"
"Ever since the end of the Chuunin exams…"
"Oh…"
"I'm sorry."
"For what?"
"For what I did. I'm sorry."
"It's no problem! I'm fine now and we get on ok so there's no problem!" He wasn't quite sure if they got on exactly but he did forgive him.
"That's true…"
"And I'm sorry I couldn't give you an answer! I just didn't know what to say…"
"I was the one who forced it on you."
"But it was fine! I didn't dislike it so-." Gah! What the hell did I just say?! That almost seemed like he was admitting it was mutual and he started banging his head against the tree.
"…Are you ok?" Gaara looked genuinely concerned then.
"I just know what I think right now! I've always liked Sakura-chan but now I can't stop thinking about you!"
"I see…" Lee didn't know what he felt anymore. Looking at Gaara it was clear he wasn't sure what to say either. Until Lee had an idea.
"I know! I mean, we could try something…"
"What?"
"…Could I k-kiss you?" He saw the look on Gaaras face and blushed. "J-just to see if I feel anything!"
"…Ok." He hadn't expected approval and it was with much awkwardness that he lent forward and brushed his lips against the other boys. It was short and confusing and very embarrassing but he hadn't disliked it.
"Th-that wasn't too bad…"
"…Would you like to do it again?" Gaara was a lot closer now.
"…I think so…"
"Lee! Gaara! There you a-." Neji stopped at the sight of the two of them and froze.
"Neji! This is…. Well it's…"
"…I'll leave you two alone." He paused and added a quick "S-sorry," Before dashing off.
"…Gaara?"
"Yes?"
"Do you want to get some Dango? Just us this time though!"
"I'd like that."
This is a late Christmas present to my best friend who loves Lee and Gaara. I hope you enjoy it Phoebs and thanks for always being awesome ^^