Disclaimer: I don't own. Happy?

A/N: This idea glued itself to my brain. I wrote it. Really, that's all I have to say, except that I was the one writing this and it nearly made me cry. you have been warned.

He waits, just as he always does, by the fence enclosing the playground at the school. Black rimmed eyes scan the area, noting the absence of people in his area. They think that if they stay away, if they keep their distance, they will be safe from him.

Fools. His reach is greater than they know.

He doesn't want to kill them, and he doesn't understand the rumors that he hears about him. They say he killed his mother, that he's a monster. All he knows is that the sand comforts him, moves where he wants, and refuses to allow him to be hurt.

He wishes he knew what it felt like to be hurt.

"Gaara!"

The call of the one child that doesn't shun him makes him turn his head. The girl, only a year older than his young five, isn't running like she usually is. She makes her way through the sand and comes up on the fence, slumping into the sand on the other side. This is odd. She usually climbs over the fence to talk with him.

"Sorry 'm late." Her breathing is harsh, even though the clouds cover the sun and she hadn't been running. "Mom tried t' stop me from comin'."

Gaara eyes his companion with look that one usually does not expect to see on the face of a five year old. "Karisi?"

"What?"

"What is pain?"

He's asked this question to his guardian numerous times, but never anyone else. His father won't allow him to see his siblings, and the way people fear him means that nobody else will talk to him. Except her.

She looks thoughtful. "Hmmmm…. I dunno," she says eventually. "Maybe the best way is t' 'splain how it feels when I get a stubbed toe."

She shoots a questioning look at Gaara. He nods, and after a cough, Karisi begins to explain. "Well, first it's almost like shock, 'cause you don't believe that anythin' happened. Then when your brain knows that somethin' happened and that you're hurt, your toe burns."

"Burns?" Gaara asks. Karisi nods importantly.

"Yup. Like when you're out in the sun too long an' your skin goes all hot. On'y just on your toe."

Gaara blinks his understanding. He's done that before.

"Anyway," Karisi continues on, "Then it starts to throb."

He tilts his head to the side, confused. "Throbs?"

Karisi looks around for a moment. Her eyes settle on Gaara's arm. Then, in the manner of a true six year old, she reaches through the fence and takes Gaara's arm in her hand. He starts, unused to the touch of others, and the sand starts to creep up on Karisi's arm. In a fierce mental way, he orders it to back away. He doesn't want to hurt the only one who's ever called him a friend.

Unnoticed by the girl, she squeezes his arm gently. "Like that," she explains, continuing to squeeze and release, squeeze and release. "On'y harder."

She withdraws her hand, and Gaara looks down at his arm. He copies what she did, squeezing it and then letting go. "that's pain?" he asked eventually, looking at the girl on the other side of the fence.

"Yeah, but that's on'y one kind," she explains. "There're others, but I don't really know how to 'splain them."

"Try," Gaara suggests. Even now it's more of an order than a suggestion.

"'Kay," Karisi cheerfully agrees. She's caught up in a coughing fit and Gaara waits. When it subsides, she shoots him a weak grin and begins. "Ever not been able t' breathe?"

He shakes his head.

"Well, that's another kind of hurt. It's like somethin's squeezing your throat an' your chest. An' it's more scary than hurtful 'cause you can't breathe an' you don't know if you'll be able t' again."

Karisi trails off into silence and Gaara waits for her to continue her explanation of pain. However, the topic apparently isn't one she's willing to discuss, and she stays quiet. After what seems to be a lifetime of sitting on the hot sand, she reaches into her pocket and pulls something out. "Hand," she tells Gaara.

Gaara holds out his hand, pushing it through the fence, and his friend drops something into it. Hand automatically closing around it, Gaara pulls back and looks at the new item he's just been given. It's a stone, a silvery stone, and it shines brightly in the sunlight.

"It's lucky," Karisi explains.

"Why did you give it to me?"

"'Cause you need it lot more than I do," she replies.

After a moment's hesitation, Gaara puts the shiny stone in his pocket. "Thank you," he says. Karisi grins, and looks about to say something, when the call of her parents reach the twosome's ears.

"'Bye, Gaara," Karisi hauls herself to her feet, a cough racking her body. "See you tomorrow."

"'Bye," he says as she walks away, waving. He raises one hand in farewell, but then the bell rings and he has to go inside. Fingering the stone in his pocket, Gaara stands from his spot and walks inside, trying to ignore the fearful stares shot his way and the students scurrying away. He sits in his spot in the back, a wide circle of empty desks around him.

He waits, just as he always does, by the fence enclosing the playground at the school. It's late, after school, and she still isn't there. He takes the stone out of his pocket and turns it over in his hands, silently admiring the way the light reflects off of the silver color.

He waits, and she does not come.

Gaara stays there until the sun sets and his guardian comes over to get him. He doesn't know why she didn't come to get him before, and suspects that it has something to do with the way he is, the way he doesn't sleep and everyone hates him.

"Why didn't she come?" he asks, worried that his friend might hate him.

"Who?"

"Karisi," he prompts. "Where is she?"

As his guardian explains, Gaara's hand tightens around the stone. "She died last night, Gaara. Her lungs gave out on her."

He stares straight ahead, unseeing, not knowing that he's stopped moving and that people are backing away nervously because he's making the sand around him shift uneasily. He can feel the dull corners of the stone in his hand, and suddenly hates the beautiful silver stone. It was luck, she had told him. A lucky stone. He took her luck away, and she died.

Gaara throws the stone away with all his might, and it clatters against a wall and lays there, cushioned in the sand. Tears in his eyes, his guardian gently pushes him away and puts him to sleep. He cries himself to sleep, blaming himself for his friend's death and mourning the fact that she died.

Years later, he is Kazekage. He has lost the beast that people feared him for. The memory of the girl who befriended him is trapped in the recesses of his mind. As he walks back to his office, his foot strikes something, an object that proceeds to skitter across the top of the sand and is halted by a fence. Gaara walks over, looking down at the ground, and in disbelief reaches down and picks up the object. The sand obligingly moves away from it, allowing him to trace the flowing silver with one finger.

It's a lucky stone, a voice from long ago echoes in his ears. You need it more than me.