Hours
Chapter 7
Kankuro blew off some steam. "Man, Shikamaru of all people. I can't understand that." He ate a piece of tofu from his bowl of miso soup. "He's the guy that wouldn't even fight her unless he was tossed down into the ring. You remember that, right?"
"But once he was motivated, he defeated her," Gaara said. "He had the superior strategy."
Kankuro made a face. "I saw how that fight went down. He was totally –"
Gaara raised his eyebrows.
Kankuro choked on his next piece of tofu. He pounded his chest and then hung his head, wheezing. "Alright. Okay. I might be a little biased. But still, I never liked the guy. He's too…whiny."
"He does less of that now," Gaara said. "Ever since he learned to take on more responsibility, he has become invested in the outcome of all of this."
Kankuro looked away, furtively going back to his soup. "What are you trying to tell me?"
"I am trying to tell you that as far as Temari's choices are concerned, there are worse men," Gaara said.
Kankuro groaned.
"She likes him," Gaara reminded him.
"I can't see why."
"I know," Gaara said. "Because he's not like you at all."
Kankuro choked again. He pushed his bowl aside. "Maybe I just shouldn't eat this right now."
"If you want to live through this, probably not," Gaara said, deadpan.
Kankuro sighed and crossed his arms. "What? What is your point, Gaara? Spit it out."
"You haven't dated anyone in months," Gaara said.
Kankuro scowled. "So?"
"You've been too busy pleasing Temari."
That assessment set his teeth on edge. If he really were a cat, his hackles would be up and his tail would be thrashing.
Gaara took a sip of broth and said calmly, "She's not your wife."
"You've been talking to Baki about me," Kankuro said in exasperation.
"Baki has been concerned all along about the dynamic you and Temari have," Gaara said. "Everything you have told me so far implies that Baki has good reason."
"Baki doesn't –"
"Baki isn't afraid to tell us things to our faces," Gaara said. "The rest of the villagers, yes. Our teacher, no. He has been a help to us. He made us work extra hard so we could prove ourselves and not lose face in front of the villagers. We made good on our ancestry because of him. Otherwise we would have been spoiled brats this whole time and not have any talents."
"Aren't you laying it on a little thick?" Kankuro asked. "I don't think we'd be talentless slobs if it weren't for him."
"Maybe," Gaara said. "But he has invested in us. You cannot blame me for giving him some credit for the way we've turned out, or for listening to his advice."
Kankuro sighed and looked down at the table. "No."
"So please understand that when Baki complained about the dynamic between you and Temari, I did nothing until you complained yourself," Gaara said.
Kankuro's head snapped up. "What? When did he tell you about his assessment of our relationship?"
"As soon as I became Kazekage," Gaara said.
"What?" Kankuro exclaimed. "But that was –"
"Two years ago," Gaara said. He folded his hands. "I waited for evidence. I waited for evidence that you were unhappy and that Temari was abusing you."
"Abus –" But the protest died in Kankuro's throat. He stared at Gaara unhappily.
"Baki objected on the grounds that Temari made you a woman in order to neglect her responsibilities," Gaara said. "His opinion is obviously rooted in the old ways of thinking, so I could not take his assessment seriously solely upon his objection that you know certain life skills."
Kankuro smiled wryly. "Thanks for that."
"I know you are proud of being able to clean and cook," Gaara said. "I would never discourage that."
"But?"
Gaara tilted his head. "You're obviously not happy."
Kankuro sighed. "No, jan. I'm not. Every time I get a girlfriend she turns out to be like Temari. Emotionally manipulative and sadistic."
"Why is that?" Gaara asked.
Kankuro shrugged, not looking at him. "I don't know. Maybe it's because I seek her out, jan. That's what you're saying, isn't it? That I just recreate me and Temari every time?"
Gaara nodded, looking at Kankuro warily. "Do you hate me?"
Kankuro's head snapped up. "What?"
Gaara chewed his lip. "Do you hate me for telling you?"
"No, man!" He shook his head rapidly. "No. I'm glad. You're looking out for me. I know that. I just –" He took a deep breath. "I just didn't wanna hear it is all, and you knew that, so you were scared, but I'm okay. I really am. I admire your honesty."
Gaara still looked vulnerable. "Then you won't be angry with me for telling you that I think you want to date Temari, and that's why you don't like Shikamaru?"
Kankuro hesitated. He didn't know what to say. He ran a hand through his hair. "No, man. I mean…" He sighed. "I don't wanna date Temari, man. That'd be weird. We're siblings and all. And she needs somebody other than me. But it makes me feel weird when I try to be that way around other girls and they don't like me."
"What way?" Gaara asked. "You mean, treating them like you've always treated Temari?"
"Yeah, jan. I thought that if you really loved a girl, you'd treat her like a princess. Like she was too precious to be doing any work, and you'd have to do everything for her just to make her comfortable in life. I thought that's what a girl really needed. You know?"
"Because Father said it was," Gaara said quietly.
Kankuro nodded. "Yeah." He looked at his soup. "Bet this is cold again, huh, jan?"
"Probably." Gaara gave him a sad smile. "I'm sorry."
Kankuro shrugged. "It's alright, man. It can stand to be reheated again. It's just soup."
"You smothered them."
Kankuro stared at his brother. "What?"
"You smothered them," Gaara said matter-of-factly. "They grew angry with you because you wouldn't let them contribute their fair share of the work. That makes people angry. When you won't allow enough space for them to live. You need to give people their half of the responsibilities in order to make them happy."
He looked at Gaara hopelessly. "But I don't know how."
"You did it with me," Gaara said.
"That was a fluke, jan!" Kankuro threw up his hands. "I don't know where to begin to ask a girl how to take her share of responsibilities. Every time I look at her – any one of them, man, take your pick – I think: I can't hurt her. I have to make her happy. I have to do everything right or she'll go away." He dropped his hands. "She'll just…go away." He shrugged and looked away. "You know?"
"You're afraid of being abandoned for being inadequate," Gaara said.
Kankuro looked at him.
"I understand that," Gaara said. "I think we all have the same fear. I think that's why Temari refuses to learn how to cook and clean with you around. She's afraid of being inadequate, next to you. She won't even try it. I think to get her to learn how to cook we're going to have to leave her alone and give her enough privacy to make mistakes without feeling mockery."
"So I can't cook, and I can't clean anything, because I make my girlfriends feel like they're not womanly enough," Kankuro whispered. "Because I'm so much better at it than they are. Right?" He felt sick. He didn't want to eat anymore.
Gaara looked alarmed. "Kankuro…"
He rested his face in his hands. He didn't have the energy to keep his head up. "So Temari was right. It is my fault. It is me, it was me, all along. I scared them away, or I made them feel unneeded. I didn't do too little for them. I did too much. And now they don't like me anymore."
Gaara shook his arm. "Kankuro…listen to me."
He didn't respond. He couldn't. If he said anything he'd cry, and he'd been weak enough around Gaara already. He was supposed to be the niisan, damn it. He was supposed to be the strong one for Gaara, not the other way around. He was just making a fool of himself.
"Niisan." Gaara's grip tightened on his arm.
The anguish in his ototo's voice made him look up. A tear escaped his self-control. He wiped his cheek with the back of his hand and smeared his kabuki paint. "I don't know how to be any different. I don't know how to do it so they can't hate me. I'm just a –" He abruptly stood up. "I'm just made this way! I just want to help. After all this time, I can't stop! I don't know how to act any different than I am when I'm with Temari!"
Gaara jumped out of his chair and tackled Kankuro around the waist. He buried his face in Kankuro's shirt. "Niisan, don't be angry with me. And don't be sad. I don't want this to hurt you anymore. I want you to feel better. You can't change what the past was all about. You can only make a new future." He fisted the back of Kankuro's shirt. "So make a new future. Make one with me. You can leave Temari behind if you want. You just have to want to be better, without her around all the time to tell you you're a bad person. You can do it."
"I don't know if I want to leave Temari behind," Kankuro said, bewildered. "That'd be a really bad thing, wouldn't it? She'd feel abandoned."
"She has Shikamaru," Gaara said. "Let her go to him."
"But I don't want her to –"
"Because you think that he can't provide for her the way you can," Gaara said, looking up at him. "You think Shikamaru doesn't know how to treat a princess."
Kankuro felt utterly defeated. He looked into Gaara's eyes for a moment. "You're right, jan. I don't. I think he's a big screwup and he can't put out the energy it takes to make Temari truly happy. I'm just trying to protect Temari's interests –"
"Which are unrealistic," Gaara said. "If she wants to keep Shikamaru she's going to have to compromise. She doesn't know that yet. But she'll figure it out soon enough."
Gaara and Kankuro were discussing what to make for dinner when their sister walked into the room.
Temari grinned at them. "I just ordered takeout. So no one has to cook tonight." She held her hands out palm up as if she had just given them a great gift.
Kankuro watched her warily.
Gaara raised a hairless eyebrow.
"I guess this means we don't have to cook?" Kankuro said, testing the waters.
Temari tossed her head. "Yeah. Since it's been so much trouble for everyone lately, I just thought I'd take the pressure off and make it a little easier on everyone."
"Very considerate," Kankuro said dryly.
Temari smirked. "Thank you." She flopped down in a chair at the kitchen table. "You can pay me later."
"What –"
She burst out laughing. "Just kidding, bro. I had to. The look on your face! Priceless." She swept the imaginary debt away. "Nah. The food's on me. Don't worry about it."
Kankuro blinked at her. How come she's so back to normal suddenly? "Yeah?"
"Yeah." Temari nodded. "I figured you'd appreciate the night off."
"How come you're so happy?" Kankuro asked.
Temari tilted her head. "Can't I do anything for my family?"
Kankuro held up his hands. "No – I mean, I appreciate it. I didn't mean to make it sound like you didn't love us or anything. I just meant – This is a surprise."
She nodded in satisfaction. "Thought it might be."
Gaara met Kankuro's eyes and shrugged.
"It's also a celebration," Temari said.
"It is?" Kankuro asked. "For what?"
Temari grinned and produced a letter. "Shikamaru actually asked me to marry him."
"What?" Kankuro stared at her.
She reclined in her chair and folded her arms behind her head smugly. "Yeah. He's been waiting all this time to get his parents' blessing, and now he has it. We're going to be married."
Gaara raised an eyebrow. "Doesn't he have to wait for your answer before he can be sure of that?"
"He knows I'll say yes," Temari said. She looked at Gaara curiously. "Why wouldn't he?"
Gaara shrugged. "I don't know. Why don't you make sure of it? I have a mission someone needs to run to Konoha. Why don't I send you?"
"Would you?" Temari asked.
"Of course I would. You're my sister. I care about your well-being and happiness," Gaara said.
"Thank you, Gaara." Temari looked at him with wide eyes. "Based on your behavior, I thought you'd be angry with me if I wanted to go to Konoha again so soon."
"You can take a week off once you're there if you like," Gaara said. "All I needed from you was to run a message. It is important that this message not fall into the wrong hands, but other than that, it is a fairly easy mission for someone like yourself. Why don't you enjoy yourself while you're over there? I can handle things for a little while without you."
Temari looked pleased, and totally thrown off her game. "Thank you, Kazekage-sama."
Gaara smiled wryly. "You're welcome, Temari-sama."
She laughed. "Okay, I get it. You're not my boss right now, you're my brother."
"I'm both," Gaara corrected. "I just want you to balance the two."
She shrugged sheepishly. "I'll try. It's just weird for me to have my little brother be where my dad used to be, you know?"
Gaara said, deadpan, "I could have said the same thing if you had become Kazekage."
She snorted. "Yeah, but I would have been a crap Kazekage. Then you'd have had to complain about me there, too. Not just a rotten sister but a bad leader."
"I don't think you're a bad sister or a bad leader," Gaara said.
"Then what's with all the heat lately?" Temari asked.
"You are doing something that I don't think you should," Gaara said. "Bad behavior is not necessarily characteristic of a bad person, and I don't think you are. I think you're flawed. We all are." He spread his hands. "I said some things earlier that I should not have said, because they hurt you. The words I said hurt you. I should not have said what I did, when what I meant was not the same as what you heard."
"Apology accepted," Temari said dryly. "Now, if you can just keep from belaboring the point indefinitely, we can get somewhere. What would you like to say that I didn't hear earlier?"
"Kankuro shows his love to you in the way that Father told him to," Gaara said.
Temari raised an eyebrow. "Why didn't you say this to me earlier?"
"Because I didn't know that I would wound you by using the words I had chosen," Gaara said. "I did not mean that Kankuro only does what he does because he had to. I meant that he only does what he does because that is how Father told him to show that he loves you. Kankuro thinks that the only way to prove he loves you is to do all of the chores that support you without asking for anything in return."
"But that's not true," Temari said. She turned to Kankuro. "You had to know I didn't make you do it because I thought you'd love me less if you didn't."
Kankuro swallowed and faced her down. "That's not what you said."
"When?" Temari demanded.
"You said I should cook dinner to love you again," Kankuro said.
Temari raked a hand through her bangs in frustration. "That's not what I said! Okay? You heard me wrong."
"I didn't," Kankuro said. "You said wrong."
"I was perfectly clear," Temari said. "I said you should love me again because you ought to respect me again. By quitting on me in the middle of the week when I have a million other things to do besides cook, laundry, and clean dishes, you put me in the lurch! You made it harder on me to get through the week for no reason other than your selfish desire to show me that you didn't have to do what I told you to do." She stabbed a finger at him accusingly. "When, if you remember in the beginning, you volunteered. I didn't ask you to do anything."
"I volunteered because –" Kankuro sensed the heatedness of his words and swallowed them. He couldn't bear to say them. He couldn't face the consequences.
"He didn't volunteer," Gaara said, stepping in. "Father forced him to. It looked like volunteering because you didn't know the whole story."
"Then why didn't you change and decide not to do it after Dad died?" Temari yelled at Kankuro. "I would've been fine with that! You didn't have to knock yourself out to prove anything to a corpse! He was dead!"
Kankuro flinched. "I didn't wanna be alone. I thought if I didn't do your laundry and stuff, you would leave me."
Temari glared at him. "Is that what you think? Really? That I would leave you?" She pursed her lips in annoyance. "Then our bond as siblings means nothing, I guess."
Kankuro's jaw dropped. "But –"
"You thought I would leave you. After Father died. And we were all alone." She cut her hand across the air. "What kind of monster do you think I am?"
"You are hardheaded," Gaara said. "Not a monster. I doubt we would be having this conversation now if I had not brought it to your attention repeatedly beforehand that we needed to talk."
"By arguing with me to my face?" Temari asked dryly.
"It got your attention, didn't it?" Gaara replied.
Temari rolled her eyes and crossed her arms. "Alright, fine. But what do you wanna talk about? How bad a person I am? How bad Father screwed Kankuro up? Because I already know all of that. I was there. Unlike you."
"Then you must have noticed that he can't get a date because you're too demanding of him around the house," Gaara said.
Her mouth opened and stayed that way.
Kankuro felt himself wearing a similar expression. "Holy shit, Gaara, that's so not cool!"
Gaara turned his gaze on Kankuro. "What's so not cool about it? You told me the truth. I'm just agreeing. I know Temari will too. You're a horrible dater because Temari made you think women are demanding and want everything from you, when most women I have observed want to contribute to their husbands' lives by cleaning and cooking dinner. That's the norm. Temari is asking for things in a relationship for herself that are atypical for her culture. As long as you think you need to find and please a woman like her, you're never going to find anybody. Temari's concept of manhood scares women away."
Temari progressively blushed with each new idea out of Gaara's mouth until she was bright red. "Gaara…"
Gaara turned to her. "Yes?"
"You really are an idiot sometimes." Temari looked bewildered. "That's not what men want. That's what men say they want. What men want – what men need – is a strong woman. Someone who can pull their own weight instead of being a weight around his neck. Shikamaru told me so. Shikamaru is relieved that I am nothing like his mother."
Gaara just blinked at her.
Kankuro sighed. "As dumb as it sounds, Temari…Sometimes, I do feel the same way. I do get to feeling like I'm overachieving and overbalancing my life by dating, because I do want her to be happy, and I don't want to be a dumb male who keeps expecting her to do all the cooking and cleaning at home. I thought all girls would be like you. When we were first starting out on your own, you threw a fit because Baki reprimanded you for not knowing 'the skills of a woman'. I mean, we were all spoiled. We'd all had servants. None of us knew how to do anything. But he picked on you because you were a girl, and that was unfair. He singled you out. I just took your idea too far. I thought that if a girl I was dating had to do any cooking and cleaning it was unfair. You told him no one should ever have to do anything just because of their sex organs."
Temari stared at him, her blush fading. "That's…not what I meant. I just thought you liked cooking and cleaning, and I wanted you to do it if that's what you liked. I didn't want you to be bullied, and I wanted to give you some space. I'm just not that into it. That's true. But I'll do it if I have to. You've known that. You've eaten something I've cooked before, when you were sick or injured and stuff."
"Yeah, and I'm surprised I recovered," Kankuro said. He made a face, hoping to lighten the mood.
Temari laughed. "Yeah, me too. That's why I don't cook. I kill people. I mean, I do. Professionally. We all do. That doesn't mean I wanna kill people at home, too."
"The reason you were angry when you returned home from Konoha is because we suggested changing something," Gaara said. "You were unprepared for that, even if we were reacting to events happening around us, like your imminent marriage announcement."
Temari shrugged. "I guess you're right. I mean, I just don't want things to change around here. You're always going to be my ototos, and I want to save that."
Gaara furrowed his brow, looking confused. "How do you save that which cannot be threatened? We are your ototos, true – but nothing can make us biologically not your siblings. Nothing can take away the bonds as brothers and sister we have created. We have been on the same team, fought the same wars, gone through the same tests together. We have been and always are going to be siblings."
Temari sighed. "Yes, I know. But I don't want this to change." She gestured at the room in general. "I want this to stay forever. That is why I want Shikamaru to come live here. He can't understand the way we feel about each other here until he comes to live here. And then he'll understand why I can't leave. Trust me."
"Things will change simply by having your husband live with your siblings," Gaara said.
"Why?" Temari asked despairingly. "Why do you think that? Why do you keep saying that to me? Why will things change? Why will they have to, if none of us want them to?"
Gaara glanced at Kankuro and said, "You are assuming that none of us want anything to change. Kankuro and I do."
Temari stared at him. She whispered, "What do you want changed?"
"We want more space for Kankuro to be himself," Gaara said.
Temari looked to Kankuro.
Kankuro nodded.
Temari's expression hardened. "Don't just nod at me. Talk to me."
Kankuro took a deep breath. "I'm…not…" He almost backed down, but then he decided to say it. "I'm not happy."
"My god, Kankuro, none of us are happy. Not all the time."
"I'm not happy," Kankuro said. "Most of the time. And…And you are. Because you don't do the things I do."
Temari raised an eyebrow. "Like?"
"I get up in the morning, and I make breakfast. Then, I make lunch from dinner leftovers to send with you and Gaara to work, as well as something for myself. When I get home, sometimes I have time to take a shower, but if I don't – which is often – I go straight from the front door to the kitchen and start making dinner. When that's done, I do the dishes – by myself, unless Gaara decided to help me – and check on laundry. I have time for my puppets in theory, but most of the time I just go to bed. When I wake up in the morning, I do it again."
"You make it sound like you have no free time," Temari protested.
"When you factor in laundry, house cleaning, and shopping, I don't," Kankuro said.
Temari stared at him. "Then why don't you ask for help? You know, it's a pretty prideful thing to do, to carry an entire house by yourself."
"I didn't think I had a right to," Kankuro said. "A problem we were just discussing. So you know the answers, Temari. I did it because I thought I had to."
Temari wiped her forehead. "Okay, I'll think about it." She turned to walk upstairs and looked at them over her shoulder. "You know, you talk about abandonment issues and Kankuro, but I think I have 'em, too. I just don't want anybody to leave as soon as I'm gone for a day or two. You guys really freaked me out when you changed the rules."
"Sorry," Kankuro said.
She held up her hand. "Good night."
"Night," Kankuro said.
As soon as she was gone, he realized he felt weak enough to collapse where he stood. Why? Why did that conversation take so much out of me?
"You look pale," Gaara said.
Kankuro took two steps to a chair and collapsed onto it. "I feel like tofu." He made a wiggling gesture with his hands. "All…jelly and stuff."
"She really scared you, didn't she?" Gaara looked concerned. "Or else you would not be affected this way."
"I guess," Kankuro said. "She looked like she was going to just get angry and stay angry again. I don't know how you managed to talk her down. But you did." He smiled up at Gaara weakly. "Thanks, man. I really appreciate that. I didn't think I could take much more of her yelling."
Gaara walked up to him and patted him on the shoulder. "I care about you. I didn't want you to get hurt. You're my niisan."
Kankuro snorted ruefully. "A wreck of a niisan, but I guess if all you've got are knockoffs, then –"
Gaara's expression turned serious. "I want you the way you are. You're not a knockoff. You're my Kankuro, my niisan, and I will protect you."
Kankuro looked away, a little intimidated by the weightiness of this conversation and definitely embarrassed by it. He patted the hand Gaara rested on his shoulder. "Okay. I'm your niisan, and I love you too. We can protect each other."
Gaara nodded.
