Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto.
Temari barely remembers her mother. She remembers the flash of sunlight catching upon swishing shoulder-length dark gold hair, hair like her own but with more a shade of honey to it. She remembers eyes like the shades of a pine forest, dark green with flecks of gray to them.
Temari is told she resembles her mother; she takes comfort in the knowledge that she looks like Karura, that Karura's fierce, fighting spirit lives on in her. Every time she draws her fan, she feels like Karura is a little closer to her, that she is with her in every battle.
Of course, by virtue of her remembrances of her mother, Temari remembers the anguish and terror of the events that led up to Karura's death.
It all started out so idyllically. Karura was going to have another baby, another boy. Temari and Kankuro, and Yashamaru and, so it seemed, their father too, were all so excited.
Then came the tales of Shukaku.
Temari doesn't know much about the months of her mother's final pregnancy, but she does remember her final meeting with Karura.
Temari shivers and shakes as her mother lifts her hair and whispers, "Temari, whatever you do, do not, never, marry an ambitious man. Do not fall in love with one who would sell his soul for the sake of power. It would be your death, as it has been mine."
Those words stick with Temari for the rest of her life.
What Temari manages to surmise from the final months of her mother's life, are two earth-shattering facts.
Her mother no longer loved her father. She hated him.
To Temari, this is inconceivable. Okaasan loved Father. How could she hate him? It is too much for a little girl's mind. She can not fathom the sort of transgressions that can warp love to hate; she is better off with this sort of innocence, even if most of her innocence has already been broken like glass on a brittle mirror.
The second is that her mother has died to bring Gaara into the world.
For a while, this makes Temari hate her brother. Where Kankuro stands over his crib and stares in wonder, Temari stares in hate. Why should you live when Okaasan died? What makes you so special? Her green eyes narrow. It should have been you. These thoughts, though fleeting, haunt her for the rest of her life.
Her mother has left her with one pitiable mess to clean up, and their father has orchestrated the mess. For this, she hates them both.
Temari grows to hate being told she resembles her mother. She doesn't want to be like the woman who hated her own husband, who cursed the village, and blighted her three children's lives.
Temari supplants her mother in the hearts of her brothers. Eventually, she comes to pity her mother, and hate is no longer an emotion that comes into play when thinking of Karura. She does the best she can, and tries not to think about Karura. She barely knows her mother at all.
Okay, this is part one of three in the Remembrance series. Next up will be Kankuro, as soon as I can write the oneshot.