"The following disclaimer applies to all chapters: These characters, places, and all that good stuff are not my own. My sincerest gratitude to their creator.

The World Is Your Oyster...Or rather, Suna

"Have you ever gotten a grain of sand in your eye? It's amazing how something so small can be so hugely irritating. I wonder if it is that painful for oysters. One teensy little grain of sand inside, or any little irritant really, and they can't stand it. So they take defensive action: they start layering it with coating after coating of nacre. It's a smooth substance to decrease the irritation. I'm not really sure how making the irritant bigger and bigger decreases the irritation, but then I'm not an oyster. And I'm not about to complain because pearls... well, they're beautiful.

How can something so beautiful come from something so amazingly irritating!?
That's how our relationship started.

"Ow, ow, ow, ow!" I batted furiously at my eye, blinking rapidly and dancing on my toes. "It won't come out, it won't come out!"

"Don't touch it, you'll only make it worse."

"I know that! I'm not an idiot!" No matter how much my eyes watered, I could still feel it in there, trapped under my eyelid. I tried pulling the lid away from my eye. It allowed momentary relief, but the grain remained sequestered, ready to torment me until I clawed my own eye out in frustration.

I could see Kakashi's blurry form in front of me. Even through my saline-filled vision, I could tell he was getting bored and impatient. I didn't care. I was not moving from that spot until that grain of sand was out of my eye.

"I hate, hate, HATE the desert, Kakashi! It's hot, it's dry, and there is so...much...sand!"

"Surely it isn't all that bad."

I froze and turned to the unexpected voice.

"You save lives, counteract poisons, crush mountains, split the earth with your bare hands and you're overcome by a piece of dirt?"

I could hear the smirk in Kankuro's voice and scowled at him, still holding my upper eyelid away from my eye. "It's sand. There is a difference."

"Oh?"

"Dirt is tame in comparison. Dirt I can handle. I would rather bury myself in dirt, than spend one more second in this sand. Dirt just washes off. When it gets wet it turns to mud. It can be useful. It makes things grow. When it is dry, it powders. But Sand...Sand does nothing but stick to EVERYthing, make things gritty, and generally is a pain in my ass." There were still tears running down my cheek and I tried not to sound too pissed as I answered him. I think I failed on that last count.

"I won't tell my little brother you feel that way." He came closer, nudged my chin up with surprisingly gentle fingers and held his canteen over my face. "Keep that lid open, and hold still."

"It worked, the water flushed my eye clean. It was still tender, and I'm sure as pink as my hair, but the irritant was gone.

"Thanks," I grumbled.

I saw Kakashi slip his book in his pouch and tilt his head toward Kankuro. "I'm needed back as soon as possible. You didn't by chance bring that..." he trailed off as Kankuro waggled the scroll in question in front of his masked face.

"Ah, thank you." He turned to me. "Sakura, I'll see you at the upcoming exams. Until then... control your temper, and try not to embarrass our village, hm?"

I snorted at him and crossed my arms over my chest childishly.

"That's my girl. Always my best student."

I rolled my eyes. "Just get going, old man."

He faked wounded. "Such disrespect." His eye quickly wrinkled into a friendly look though, and with a final wave and half-hearted two finger salute to Kankuro, he was on his way back toward the cool shade of the forests that I longed to be back in.

Kankuro shook his head. "Your team has always had the weirdest dynamics I've ever seen."

I shrugged. "They're my family. It's like I have brothers and a weird, but pretty cool uncle that teaches you to do all those things that your parents would hate." I smiled. "Though we aren't much of a team any more. With Naruto as Hokage, and Sai training Anbu, we never go on missions together anymore. Kakashi does mostly solo work, and I'm lucky if I make it out of the hospital."

"Life moves on." He turned toward the direction he came from. "Come on, let's get you into the village and get you settled. I'll show you our medical facilities, and introduce you to our man in charge of poisons."

I smiled, and we started off.

Suna had been asking for me basically since I saved Kankuro's life from Sasori's poison. Wow, did that ever seem like forever ago! So much had happened in the following ten years. Naruto was acting Hokage, living his life-long dream. Our village had been destroyed and rebuilt and was finally thriving again. Our ties with other nations were stronger than they had ever been. And I was spending half my time healing in the hospital, and the other half running it. To top it off, I had even trained a few medics along the way, just as Tsunade had trained me.

I glanced at the man next to me as we walked into Suna's headquarters. It was weird, not seeing him all dressed for battle. He had no paint on his face, and only one of his large scrolls on his back. When we got inside, he pulled his hood off, letting his unruly brown hair free. It was nice to see him in a relaxed state. I had only ever seen him under more tense circumstances. I thought that perhaps my time in Suna in the weeks leading up to the Chunin exams would allow me to get to know the Sand Siblings a bit better. I had always thought we might be friends, if given the chance.

This is what peace was like. For so long it felt like I had been tossed from one fire to another. But the fourth great war was over. The land, the villages, and the people were all starting to heal. It felt... good. Like maybe this is what normalcy was.
I shook my head clear and focused on the door we had just reached. Something deep inside of me clenched just a little. I don't know why I was nervous. The Kazekage was a good friend of Naruto's. I helped to rescue him and save his life. I saved his brother's life almost single-handedly. But there was something about Gaara that always made me feel like I should be on my toes. Like I needed to try harder.
Kankuro rapped on the door twice before letting himself in without waiting for an answer. My eyebrows rose, and I followed him inside.
I saw a mass of brick-red hair turned over a desk full of papers.

"The purpose of knocking, Kankuro, is to request permission. If you do not wait for that permission to be given, then why even bother knocking in the first place?" He never lifted his eyes up, but continued with whatever scroll he was working on.
Kankuro grinned impudently. "Because you get pissed when I don't knock at all."

Gaara sighed and looked up from his work, putting his pen on his desk. "Haruno Sakura."

I bowed slightly from the waist. "Kazekage."

He cocked his head to one side slightly and peered at me from black-rimmed eyes. "Were you attacked?"

That caught me off-guard. "Huh?" I glanced at Kankuro only to see him grinning.

Gaara cleared his throat. "Your eye. It's all pink and puffy. Did you get into a fight already? Naruto told me you had a bit of a temper."

I cracked my knuckles and counted to ten in my head. Damn that Naruto. "No, Kazekage."

He blinked at me, and Kankuro chuckled. "She got into a battle with a grain of sand. The sand won."

He blinked again. "You are a world renown medic. Yet you cannot remove a grain of sand from..."

"We're letting it go now!" I exploded. "New subject!"

He cleared his throat and looked down at his desk again before speaking. "Of course. You are here to work with our poison research facility. Suna has long held a reputation in the poisons field. We have access to a more vast array of poisons than any other village. And, until Tsunade and then you came along, we had more knowledge in the field of antidotes as well. However, most of our seasoned experts failed to pass on a true understanding to our younger generations. We are in need of some proper retraining. Our staff is smart and capable, but they lack a true poisons master."

He looked me in the eye. "I want Suna to re-obtain its former standing in this field. A great deal of our weapons and tactics rely on the use of poisons. The agreement I have with your Hokage is that he would send his best poisons specialist to help train my staff, and in return I would send back with said specialist any new chemicals or plant species that the specialist saw fit to obtain. Was that your understanding?"

I nodded. I had been itching to get my hands on some of Suna's herbs and plants. Their greenhouse was a dream come true. They had exotic desert plants whose sole defensive weapon was poison. Organic poisons were versatile and an excellent base for new compounds and new chemical weapons.

"Very good. Now, your Hokage requested that I make you feel as at home as possible."

I rolled my eyes. I just knew where this was going. "Narutoooo," I groaned.

Gaara raised one of his nearly invisible brows and continued. "That is why you will be staying in our family home. Temari is in Leaf until the exams that Konoha is hosting this year. Her wing of the house is therefore empty, and there is a guest bedroom located next to her vacated one. You will stay there, and have all the privacy you need."

I shook my head quickly, "This really isn't necessary Kazekage-sama. I can easily stay in a hotel or something and stay out of your hair."

Kankuro threw his arm over my shoulders and smiled. "Don't be ridiculous! It'll be fun! Much more convenient too. You'll have all the amenities of home, our illustrious company, and a good location too. We're a short walk from the hospital." I gave him a baleful eye and looked pointedly at his offending appendage. He pulled a fake pout and sad eyes. "Unless of course you can't stand to be in our presence?"

"Oh please, if I can withstand puppy eyes from Naruto, I can definitely withstand yours." He stuck his tongue out at me but retracted his arm. "But since you asked so nicely..." It wouldn't kill me to be nice, after all. Naruto had begged me to try and get closer to Gaara in an effort to provide him with more friends. "I suppose I can bunk at your place." I tried not to let my apprehension show on my face. One extrovert with obvious flirtation issues, and one introvert with...well, issues. What was I getting myself into?

Gaara nodded. "It's settled then."

I couldn't help thinking, as we said our goodbyes and left for their, or our, home that my staying in an enclosed space with two men with such distinctly different personalities might not be the best idea. I'm not exactly known for my patience. Also, I had always lived alone. Well, except for a very brief stint with Ino that we both regretted henceforth.

This was going to take a lot of adapting. I felt like that grain of sand was back in my eye, only this time it was bigger.