"Gaara? Honey are you awake?" a young women licked her finger with a sigh as she shoved his shoulder, but he didn't move. "Gaara don't make me do this." he was frozen solid in his sleep.
"Give it up HinHin, he's dead to the world and we both know that." Naruto scoffed, waving his hand in front of the red heads shocked face as Hinata shook her head and stuck her finger inside his ear.
"GOD DAMNIT!" Gaara shot up, scrunching his fingers inside his ear to remove his friends spit.
"Knew that would work." Hinata said in a triumphant tone, sitting back in her chair.
Naruto held in his laugh as Gaara grabbed tissues from a nearby box on the desk and scrubbed inside his ear. "Hyuga, you're sick." he spat out, glaring at the girl dressed in all gray and bright red lipsticks she would never have touched on a normal day.
"Why can't you ever call me by my first name, Gaara?" she asked him sweetly.
"Because, you hang out with me, I don't hang out with you." he barked, throwing away the tissue and ruffling his hair back into place in aggravation.
"Aww, he thinks we're bad people Hinata!" Naruto made a puppy face and hugged the girls arm. He wore his bright orange jacket with those ratty jean pants today, something only he could pull off.
"Why do you two constantly stalk me anyway?" Gaara asked them as he sat down at the ring of chairs set up in the empty classroom.
"'Cause..." Hinata replied to him sweetly, and she smiled and pealed Naruto off of her arm with a grin.
Gaara only rolled his eyes and stared at the two people in front of him, all three of them were in there first year of Junior High, Naruto and Hinata having just recently started showing up while he would sit in a classroom to think by himself.
He couldn't keep it in and sighed, buried his face back into his arms. "You alright, Gaara?" Hinata asked him, her hand placed gently on his shoulder.
"Just a little tired I guess..." he muttered toward her under his breath.
"How about some food then? I could go get us some, if you two are hungry I mean." she smiled lightly as always.
"I know I'm hungry! Here, get me something from the Ramen cart, you know what I like right?" Naruto said as he handed her a few bills.
"Sure, just grab me something, I don't care what." Gaara replied, waving her hand off.
"Alright, I'll be back soon ok you guys?" there was always that cheerful light around Hinata, she was always smiling. It made her bearable to be around next to Naruto.
Even if she wore nothing but gray, those pail eyes seemed to be full of light and it made it seem like she wore white and blues. Naruto sat in front of him with a sigh suddenly, interrupting his thoughts.
"Hey, Gaara." he rubbed the back of his neck nervously.
"What?"
"If... if I don't get into the same high school as Hinata... please take care of her for me, ok?" Naruto had a strange but very serious look on all of the sudden, but it vanished with a blink. Something Gaara had never seen on this hyperactive preteen.
"Sure... you know I will." they bumped their fists together and looked toward the ceiling in wait. Naruto eventually broke the silence.
"She needs to be watched over ok, always."
"I will, Naruto. Who else will hang out with me?" his blond friend laughed lightly and they rolled their eyes.
"Geez... High school already! My baby brother is growing up so fast!" Temari shoved Gaara to her chest as she huged him, sniffling a bit.
"Get a girlfriend already." she added on when she let him go, back to fixing his hair.
"Geez Temari! Just because your a senior doesn't mean you can mess with me now ok? I have everything under control!"
The red heads sister only rolled her eyes and ruffled her brothers hair back into the place she liked it. "So, what ever happened to those two kids who used to visit you when you were in 6th grade? You all made catastrophes!" she asked sitting down at the table.
"Hyuga moved... I think. And Naruto... I don't know about Naruto,I think he went off with some hippy group and some dude with white hair, I dunno he stopped writing." he groaned, grabbing a nail polish bottle and working on turning his fingers an even darker shade of black.
"Well, maybe you'll see them this year?" Temari tried sweetly.
"Sure I will."Gaara went back ignoring her.
"Temari, get your ass in here!" Kankuro yelled from across the house, something must have happened. Gaara rolled his eyes and finished off his nails in silence, breathing in the last of the polish smell before tightening the lid back.
He wore a black shirt with the words 'I am Hell' written in red and white that at the time of purchase had been a great laugh. Now on the other hand it was just something comfortable.
His baggy cut up jeans hung on his waist loosely, his old black tennis shoes topped of his net gloves he'd stolen from his sisters Halloween bag and black eye shadow to try to hide his severe sleepless nights. He blew dry his fingers as she tossed the rest of his belongings into his backpack and sighed.
"I am going to hate tomorrow... I can just tell..." he grumbled, grabbing his backpack from the floor and heading for the roof with a pack of cigarettes he'd stolen.
"Gaara! Come on you goth-ass-emo bitch! Get in the damn car!" Kankuro shouted from the front yard as he slammed the back door to his car. The one mentioned walked outside with a groan wearing the same clothes as yesterday and supporting the black ratty old backpack and biting off gummy bears heads in a plastic baggie.
"Hold on to your gay ass and I will!" he shouted back, walking slowly to the black pickup his brother drove as if every step would kill him. There were no good mornings between the two, just insults and laughter and snide remarks that came with a good few shoves into the wall.
They were still on a good brother relationship though.
When they arrived at the school, Gaara walked over to a bench after scrambling out of the pick up and sat next to a girl with a bowl cut that he thought needed to rethink her next haircut.
She was dressed in jet black, makeup all black and purple and emo bracelets all over her arms, over-doing the style he himself wore daily.
But she looked... familiar, very familiar. She sat there with her backpack in her lap, playing with her fingers and her pail eyes almost as pail as her skin, looking down at her shoes.
"Hyuga?" he asked it on reflex, looking at this girl in a strange manner.
"Hmm?" she looked up quickly, as if afraid someone was going to hit her and blinked through her dazed fog. "Oh, hi..." she kept it simple. "Do I know you?" she said, finally standing. Her black shirt struck Gaara with a cord as he read it over on instinct.
'Screw this or Do this.'
Her legs were covered in long black nets that were almost hidden under a black rag skirt. Her chest and grown out plenty at least, if this was still her.
Her lips were painted black surprisingly, her eye shadow bringing out a lilac in her eyes Gaara had never seen before... maybe it wasn't her, he hoped it wasn't.
"6th grade, Hyuga, don't think to hard on it." Gaara leaned back on the bench with a wave of his hand, hoping she would catch on. Her eyes lit up.
"Gaara?!" he nodded as her arms swung around his neck so fast he thought he had gotten whip flash. "Oh Gaara!" her voice was watery, her grip tight. Something made he keep her in place, maybe it was the fact he was now 15 and had hormones, maybe it was her body pressed tight against his.
Or maybe it was because Temari was walking by.
He smiled and pulled her to his eye level. "What happened to you? You're... goth-tastic." he asked her, looking her over again. She looked at the ground in distaste.
"Oh. Father pulled me out of school... I had to beg him to let me back in... I kind of thought I was going to be a shut in." she said it simply, still perched on his lap and ready to go back to her death grip hug at any second.
"How have you been?" she asked him, succeeding in hugging his arm like she used to when she was younger.
"Me? Oh... I've been better." he said simply, moving over a bit for her.
She smiled and hugged him again, that light he was so used to back in her eyes. "I missed you so much... Niisan wouldn't let me send you any letters, he said you were a bad influence, just like Naruto." she whispered it softly as he stopped hugging her, she had such a hurt in her voice.
"Everything really alright?" he asked her, pulling her into his view.
She smiled nonchalant and nodded. "Everything's perfect, Gaara-kun." the first time she had called him that she had broken her finger and he had 'kissed it better'.
It made his heart scream in an odd joy to see her again, the pain was bitter sweet. He lifted her up out of his lap and stood up, holding her bridal style. "Come on, we have to get to class." he said, grabbing her backpack from her. "I'll walk you."
As it turned out they shared 4 classes together; Algebra Honors, some sort of Science, Accelerated Academics which was also the same time around lunch, and then Art.
First period he was separated from her though, as well as second. He had Guitar lessons and then English, she had some sort of Symphony class and then normal Orchestra. She played Violin, another thing she had to beg her father for.
Homeroom only lasted 15 minutes but they were still apart by then. By third they both had Algebra Honors and then fourth was their science where they sat right next to each other and droned on and on about how things had been.
Fifth class they had to go to there least favorite class; Accelerated Academics, a class where you actually had to think.
Afterwords was lunch which they shared together by block, sixth was English for Hinata and shot class for Gaara.
Seventh they both headed toward the Art class, and that was the best part of the day for both of them. They were close in every area of school, sure, but the school was still huge. Gaara had gotten used to the school already, even gotten in nice with plenty of the teacher.
All except for the Accelerated Academics teacher of course, that one he would never get used to. Coach Orochimaru.
Flat out freak he was.
He sighed and sat in Temari's car at the end of the day, reaching for a pack of cigarettes on her dash board as he readied his lighter. His sister, still not paying attention, never noticed him sneak a cigarette.
Before he could close the door though Hinata had grabbed his arm out of the blue, suddenly beside the car. "Jesus Hinata! What's up?" he asked her, she looked a little frantic as it were.
"Gaara I need a ride home!" she sputtered it out quickly, her hair ruffled and looking utterly out of place. Temari finally looked her over and unlocked her back door, shrugging.
"Hop in sweet heart, where to?" she asked in a warm voice, taking the cigarettes from Gaara fingers with expert ease. He really thought she hadn't noticed.
"Hey,I was gonna light one of-"
Hinata reached forward and took a cigarette from Temari's hand and lit it with her own lighter from her jean pocket. "Please just hurry up and go..." she muttered, inhaling deeply as she closed her eyes and sank into the seat further.
Gaara looked back at her, puzzled and dazed. "Are you smoking?!" she only nodded and ducked her head as they drove passed a boy with pail eyes and long hair, he was scanning the crowd and Gaara's skin crawled.
"Neji, should have known..." Gaara growled out as they went passed.
"Whose Neji?" Temari asked, handing Gaara her pack back as they drove around the corner. "And when you get lung cancer I topld you so." she muttered.
"He's my cousin...." Hinata said dryly, smoothing down her hair as she leaned over the seat to hug Gaara's arm.
"I'm guessing you don't like him then?" Temari asked, pulling out of the school zone and speeding up.
"More than not like him." Gaara said, ruffling Hinata's hair with a sigh.
"Let's just go." she said with a sigh, relaxing under his touch.
Gaara dropped Hinata's bag on his bed after swearing his friend could spend the night to both his siblings and plopped into his favorite arm chair inside his room. Hinata cuddled up in his lap quickly like a pet rather than a friend, chain smoking through two packs of cigarettes already, much to her friends distaste.
"When do I have to go home?" she asked him gently, turning slightly as she mumbled her words.
The friction of her bear legs against his jeans was driving him insane.
"Whenever your dad comes to pick you up." he said through a hazy voice, moving hair from his face.
"… Gaara are you high?" she asked him as she turned again, her legs spreading on top of his.
'Think calming thoughts, think Kankuro and face paint, Temari in the morning, Orochimaru in a speedo... yea I went to far with that one.'
"I'm not high. But I do suggest you put your smokes down, Hinata. You've had more than I do in a month." he said taking, the rest of the cigarette from her fingers. She sighed and nodded, leaning back against his chest.
"I missed you so much."she said it simply so he knew she meant it.
He just smiled and turned on a movie in his TV. "Can we go lay down? The chair is only comfortable for one." he asked her, lifting her up from under her knees as she rolled her eyes. She laughed and got up though, running over to his bed and plopping down on the sheets as she grabbed a pillow and clung to it. Gaara just rolled his eyes and followed her.
He crawled onto bed and felt her cuddle up in his arms, pillow in her own. "I'm tired..." and those were her last words throughout the whole movie.