You walked in the pale winter sun, not knowing where you were, not caring either. A slight breeze chilled your face, still sensitive and slightly sore from the tears earlier. Your eyes, over bright, were haunted, your clothes torn, the badge that had been a gift for your birthday from your foster family clung desperately onto the fabric. You had run for miles, and then walked for many more, until the blistering heat of the desert has dulled to the warmth of the scrubland. Exhausted, you finally collapsed by a thorny bush and fell instantly into a deep, dreamless sleep.
A little while later, you woke up. You prepared yourself in case a certain annoying brother tackled you, but after a few moments, realised where you were. Another few moments and you realised why you were there. A fresh flow of tears streamed down your face, as you tried to come to terms with what had occurred, not a few hours ago.
Laughing, your 'mother' had laid breakfast on the table and called for you to come downstairs. The tempting smell of pancakes drifted up to your nose, but you decided to wait a little to wake up more and let your breakfast cool down. A few moments later, you heard a scream rip through the house. It came from outside, so you leant out your window and looked to the street. Two shapes of sands were suspended in mid-air. You idly wondered why there were screams until the shapes shrank suddenly, and blood spattered everywhere, including on the face a boy with blood red hair. You wondered why he seemed so familiar, but became preoccupied with finding out who the dead were. You gasped as you recognised the clothes of you foster father and brother, soaked in blood. You didn't notice when the boy turned his gaze to you. Your foster mother, noticing the danger to you, ran out and fell on her knees in front of the boy. "Please, don't hurt her! I'll do anything, just don't hurt her!" You jumped out the window, and your foster mother turned to you, her arm outstretched and palm facing towards you in a stop motion. "Run!" Your mother screamed. You started forward, but sand covered her in an instant. You kept running, but before you reached her, the sand tightened and everything is covered in her blood. You looked up at the boy. The last of your foster mother's chakra curled up around your legs and forced you to run, far away.
The boy, alone, had reached out his hand to where the girl had been. His fist clenched and he looked down at the corpse. Kicking it, he muttered to himself. Turning back the way he had came, he walked back to his hiding place. The other villagers in the street watched with horror, but he didn't notice them. After a while, a neighbour of the family shattered by the Shukaku reverentially placed the bodies in a graveyard, and called the mortuary.
Back in the silent scrub again, you watched the skies change as slowly as a flower opening, with the same beauty and care. No matter what happened, the clouds would keep drifting, the sky would gradually darken and stars begin to shine. You rolled onto your front, and studied the ground. A beetle scuttled past, its shiny black armour gave the appearance of being indestructible. Thirty seconds later, you found out the truth as a bird that hadn't noticed you swooped down and broke the shell in an instant. The bird's harsh caw split the silence, and the other crows joined in. They all flew away, coarsely shrieking, and soft footsteps warned you a second before a pair of feet in sandals stopped in front of your nose. You didn't want to look up, so you waited until whoever it was either sat down or spoke. They did neither, and you kept silent, studying their feet. They smelt slightly of cinnamon, you notice, in a sick kind of tribute to that morning's uneaten spicy pancakes. There was a crack in one of the toenails, which suggested that the owner was either a boy or a girl who didn't care for her body. The latter wasn't very common, so you supposed it might be a boy. The skin was rough on the bottom of the feet and smooth on the top, a sort of milky white colour. A small cut on the side stained the surrounding skin with a crust of old blood, in stark contrast with the rest of it. The sandals were black, and scuffed around the edges. The areas which weren't scuffed were high quality black leather, and the symbol of the kazekage family was on the inner side of the ankles, although it had a slash through it, as though somebody had cut through it with a knife. The feet were small, so you figured that it must be the youngest of the three siblings, the infamous Sabaku no Gaara. The only one with the ability to control sand, you realised with shock. The sand that had killed the ones you loved.
Idly, you waited for him to crush you with sand, twisting a dead piece of grass on the ground before you. You pondered on what it would be like to die, whether it stopped hurting, and whether you'd meet your families again, although you didn't know much of your blood relations except for the smell of spices, and a line of a lullaby sang to you, the moonlight shining through the curtains. The feet still didn't move. An hour or so passed in awkward silence, and the birds flew back to their perches. One mistook you for a rock, and landed on your back, staring at the boy suspiciously. It started pecking at you, so you rolled over, frightening it. It frantically escaped into the nearest tree, and cawed to its kin. You suspected it was the same crow that had killed the beetle; the same mischievous gleam was in its eye. Your eyes closed, because you knew that if you left them open you'd have to look into the eyes of the boy, and you had no desire to do that. A small noise behind you indicated that the boy, Gaara, had sat down. You turned onto your side, moved into a semi-curled position that you generally found more comfortable, and fell asleep. You didn't know why, but you felt completely safe. You thought it was because you had accepted death if it came, but your subconscious told you that you felt safe for another reason. You ignored it, and your last thoughts before sleep were 'how can I possibly feel safe because I trust him? He just murdered my family!' You slipped back into the warm embrace of sleep, and the cold terror of nightmares.
Gaara watched you, no emotion showing on his face, as tears coursed down your cheeks and you bit your lips till they bled, curling up tighter until your knees reached your chin. He was puzzled; he hadn't inflicted any pain on you. He remembered a conversation he'd once had with Yashamaru about dreams, and the conversation had, of course, turned to nightmares. "I guess that because I can't have nightmares when I sleep, my life is a nightmare" Gaara had said, smiling faintly, his eyes full of sadness. He supposed that was what the strange girl was having. You woke up with a gasp, looked around frantically for a moment, reassured yourself of your surroundings, and relaxed. Right up until you turned and looked straight into Gaara's eyes.