A/N: Hey, I'd just like to say thank you to my reviewers! Your comments are greatly appreciated! I also apologize for any major grammar errors you might encounter, I'm really tired right now.

Chapter 3

The sun was setting in the west of the Hidden Leaf Village. Hinata sat in her room looking outside, watching the massive yellow orb sink lower and lower out of sight. How beautiful it was. If only her day had been as beautiful. Naruto hadn't exactly paid very much attention to her… I have to stop getting depressed over things like this. She thought to herself.

And then there was the fact that she had agreed to let Gaara help her with her training. She had recently started seeing Gaara in less of a frightening light, but spending more time with him than was necessary didn't appeal all that much to her. The words had just tumbled out of her mouth and she had been too shocked to say anything else when she had seen him smile.

For a second, she thought that the smile had been a trick of the light. Could Gaara smile? Was he capable of it? Of course he was. All humans are capable of smiling, she thought……. is Gaara even completely human? At this moment, her rational side stepped in, dismissing all thoughts of Gaara not being human.

At that moment, a knock on her bedroom door shook her out of her thoughts.

"Yes?" said Hinata.

"There's a young man at the door. He wishes to speak with you." said a maid.

Hinata's eyes widened. Who wanted to speak with her now? A young man. Perhaps it was Naruto? Quickly, she hoisted herself off the chair she had been sitting on and left her room; following the maid down the steps into the entrance hall. Leaning against a door frame was Gaara.

Hinata felt the hopeful bubble, which contained the notion that her visitor could be Naruto, pop. She sighed quietly.

"Hello G-Gaara." she said without very much enthusiasm.

Gaara didn't say anything. His eyes traveled slowly around the room and came to a rest on the maid who was standing beside Hinata. Taking his icy glare as a cue to leave, the maid scampered out of the hall. He chuckled. "People are easy to scare. All I have to do is look at them."

Hinata wasn't sure what to say.

"S-so, w-hat can I d-do for you…?" she asked.

Gaara looked at her. "You agreed to let me help you train."

Hinata looked at him quizzically. "Actually, I was g-going to go to bed…"

Gaara's eyes flashed. "You aren't going to bed. You're going to train."

Hinata's mouth fell open. As scared as she was of Gaara, she was prepared to turn her back on him and march up the stairs to her room. Today hadn't been a good day for her. She had trained for an extensive amount of time. Naruto had hardly paid any attention to her. And, she had agreed to let a killer help her with her training. She was definitely in need of a good night's sleep.

Making up her mind, she turned on the spot and began walking towards the stairs. "I'm going to bed."

She wasn't sure what she had expected him to do when she had turned her back on him, but a torrent of sand flowing out of his gourd and wrapping itself around her wasn't one of them. She could feel the sand pressing her body from all sides, but, thankfully, it wasn't crushing her.

"What… are you d-doing…?" gasped Hinata.

Gaara began walking towards her. "Don't walk away from me. We're going to train!" his voice was becoming even louder with each syllable.

The sand surrounding her was tightening its grip. "It h-hurts…" Hinata began gasping for breath. Surely he wasn't going to kill her?

The sand, which had gradually been increasing its pressure on her, loosened and then vanished altogether. Hinata dropped to the polished floor and grabbed her left arm. It was shaking uncontrollably, as was the rest of her body. Her eyes concentrating on the blue floor tiles, she thought over and over again that there was no chance in the world that she'd train with Gaara after this. She was scared of him. She was really scared of him.

Slowly, she lifted her head to look at Gaara. He was staring wide-eyed at his hands with a horrified expression etched into his features. He was drawing in ragged breath after ragged. She felt some of her fear melt away. This was the most emotion she had ever seen on his face and by the looks of it; he was horrified with what he had done.

Hinata continued to watch him. She was internally debating with herself about whether or not she should approach him. He had just attacked her. This fact made her want to run away. However, seeing him the way he was now, looking so disgusted with himself, made her want to comfort him. He almost reminded her of a child who had promised his mother that he wouldn't touch her vase of flowers, but had touched it anyway—causing it to crash to the floor. Except, he hadn't broken something, he had attacked her.

Before she could make up her mind about approaching him or not, Gaara's breathing calmed down and his horrified expression withered away. He looked at her with his hard green eyes and began walking towards her. He stopped right in front of her and said, "Fine. You can sleep. But be up early tomorrow morning."

With that, he turned on his heel and walked out of the Hyuuga Household. Hinata stared at his retreating silhouette until it dissolved into sand and disappeared.