((sorry for not updating. I've just been busy with my Bloody Acquaintance story. I have done a lemon and have completed the story... I just haven't put it up yet. gomen... please tell me if we are allowed to put lemon's up. my friend says no but I see them up all the time. And thus, now I am confused. But anyway, I will now put this in... would it be third person? I think so... there will be no "I"s as of this point))

Chapter 2: Drawings of my Heart

Chikage was drawing in her sketchbook. Nothing new, right? Wrong. She was drawing Gaara because she herself had just been crudely critisized. Now she knew yet another reason why she was made fun of-- her hair resembled Gaara's. So her knew nickname was Monster's Bride. Everyone knew that she would LOVE to be with Gaara... because she was always drawing him... making him look almost kind. His eyes never looked cold in her book... his lips seemed to hold hidden smiles. And for that... they believed that she should go to Gaara and ask him to love her. Just like that... no foreplay, no dating, not even an innocent walk home.

But she could never be so forceful... expecially on something that would only be a joke to them... and maybe even Gaara himself. She wasn't delusional to how Gaara was. Chikage knew that he would simply tell her that he only loved himself and walk away... and that wasn't worth breaking her own heart. 'Not this time...' she thought as she finished the final touches of her latest masterpiece.

Chikage had once told Gaara that she loved him. Everyone already hated her. So even if she confessed, it wasn't like her social life would be run down the drain. Unfortunately, she had told him too late. That silver-haired man... his uncle Yashamaru... had attempted to kill him... and Gaara had stopped opening his heart. He told her that he only loved himself... because his name meant self-loving demon... and if she went to him again for something so stupid as love, then he'd kill her.

'His voice was so cold... His eyes were daggers... and he left my heart to bleed all of our pain... despite him not feeling any better about the situation,' she thought, closing her eyes against the old feelings. Chikage didn't want them to come up... didn't want her eyes to betray the hurt from so long ago... didn't want to cry now that Gaara had seemed to be making progress.

The clearing of a throat brought her attention to a certain red-haired sand manipulator. "G-Gaara-san..."

Gaara looked down at her with slightly warmer sea-green eyes. Kneeling down, he touched the outer-corner of her right eye. "Why are you crying...?" he asked in a deep, still vaguely monotone voice.

'Be still my beating heart... wait, I am... CRYING?!' Chikage stared in horror as she saw the shiny wet sadness upon his fingertips. "I-I'm sorry... I promised myself I wouldn't cry... but here I am, grieving like some stupid girl who just got thrown away... I'm sorry..." More tears fled her eyes as she stood up and ran away.

Gaara looked after her with confusion floating off of him. 'What just happened...?' he asked himself before looking back to where she was sitting. 'She forgot her book... I should return it to her.' Picking it up, he went to go to her house... when he realized that he didn't even know who she was... or where she lived.

"Kankuro should know..." he mumbled as he disappeared in a whisp of sand.

((what was the picture she was drawing? what will Kankuro say if he saw all of Chikage's drawings? will Gaara die from a heart-attack when he realizes that she was that girl who loved him then... and apparently now? TUNE IN NEXT TIME! AND PLEASE GIVE ME ANOTHER 4 REVIEWS AT LEAST!!))