Gaara made a point of dressing in his robes of office in preparation for Naruto's arrival, having decided it'd be best to start their meeting in his official capacity and feel things out from there. He assigned missions like usual, took briefings like usual, and tried to not distract himself with calculating potential arrival times or considering just how bad his letters to Leaf could've looked to an outside viewer.
One of the head medics chased him down a few blocks from the hospital. They told him they felt Sakura's potential was being wasted on basic medical work—but as a matter of security, Sand didn't promote other countries' shinobi. They wanted to know if he intended to officially bring her into Sand; they wanted to know if it'd be out of place to start hinting at the doors that would open for her should she reconsider her loyalties.
Gaara knew it would be something she wanted. He also knew it'd look like bait.
"Don't make any offers," he told them. "Not yet."
The medic smiled a little too knowingly in response before thanking him and leaving him to his thoughts.
Gaara closed his eyes, forced his breathing to slow meditatively, and let his hands relax as his sides. He grounded himself with memories of her, strung together like gemstones: the smell of her skin; her smiles; her fingers twining with his; the easy way she'd hugged him goodbye that morning. Everything seemed clear, as it should be.
One of his shinobi landed beside him. "Kazekage-sama, he's here."
He murmured an affirmative but didn't open his eyes. He could have this for just a few more seconds.
She'd said she wanted him.
"Gaara!"
He opened his eyes to find Naruto bearing down on him, his jaw set and a concerned team of sentries following as if being pulled by his wake.
"Where's Sakura?"
Gaara inclined his head in the direction of the hospital. "Working." Then he glanced up, checked the sun's position, and shrugged. "Maybe sleeping."
The answer threw Naruto off, and he slowed his advance. "Sleeping?"
"She wasn't sleeping well when she got here. She's gone polyphasic—it seems to help."
"She's not a hostage?"
Well, now he knew how the letters had looked. Gaara shook his head. "She's a refugee."
Some of the tension left the set of the blond ninja's shoulders, and he took another few steps forward. "You're taking care of her?"
"As best I can."
"Gaara . . . What the hell is going on here?"
"Where do you want me to start?"
ooo
One of the ramen shops Gaara's genin had found was a tiny hole in the wall where they wouldn't be disturbed, with a single line of seats and a proprietor who could be trusted not to talk. The two of them sat, with untouched food and tea, as Gaara finished his closely controlled explanation of events—one that left out most of his feelings about his own family history.
"It's happened before, and not just here. But I won't let it happen to her."
"Do you really think they'd put that on her?" Naruto asked. "Even the Fifth?"
"Not her. That's why she sent Sakura to Sand."
"No one at Leaf knows what's going on. Hell, I don't think Sasuke even knows—the last time I saw him, he was still looking up how his family did weddings."
"There's plenty of people there who could tell him. You know why they won't."
"They expect he'll do something else stupid," Naruto said, and sighed.
"Yeah. And I'm not giving him the chance to involve Sakura in his stupid choices."
"Gaara. He's stupid sometimes, and a bastard sometimes, but he's not evil."
Gaara glowered. "There's no point in splitting hairs over if something is done for stupidity or malicious intent if the end result is the same."
"There's only no point in splitting hairs if you're out to damn the person either way."
"I'll let his actions speak for him." The words came out with more snap than intended. Gaara scowled and reached for his tea; it wouldn't do to get this worked up in front of other people, and could prompt Naruto to start asking questions he wasn't ready to answer. Too much of a push and everything might spill out, and he might start making vocal comparisons which would be better kept to himself.
"I just . . ." Naruto slumped. "I saw him with the scrolls and I was happy for him. I thought he'd found someone and that he might be trying to start an actual life with us."
"Maybe. But he's not owed someone else's place in that life."
His words were still unintentionally sharp-edged, and Naruto scrutinized him, concerned. "You're really not okay with any of this, huh?"
You're really not okay, Gaara heard.
He scowled again and took a deep, slow breath; he needed to change track to avoid any more questions, and fast. "Maybe you're right. Maybe he's just stupid. If I proposed to someone and they immediately cut off all contact and left the country, I think I'd be concerned enough to say something."
Naruto raised his eyebrows as he picked up his own cup. "You're thinking about proposing to someone?"
"No." Gaara waited until Naruto started drinking; then, pettily: "But I am seeing your teammate."
Naruto choked on his tea and started hacking, and Gaara helpfully slapped him on the back.
That would work.
ooo
Sakura found the two of them headed towards the hospital, looking for her. Naruto's greeting was to the point: "So I thought he'd kidnapped you—"
"You what?" Then to Gaara, as he stepped up beside her: "What have you been sending Leaf?"
"Enough to get my point across," came the unrepentant reply.
She noted how close he was standing—and how closely Naruto paid attention to the lack of distance between them—and guessed: "You told him about us too, huh?"
"Yeah," he replied, and she breathed a quick sigh of relief—at least that was out of the way.
"I've got some things to attend to," Gaara continued. "I'll see you both later?"
"Okay."
"Sure."
He stepped back and was gone, leaving her with a wolfishly grinning teammate. "Go ahead," she sighed. "Say it."
"He likes you."
Sakura rolled her eyes. "Walk with me back to Temari's, okay? I'll fill in any blanks he missed."
"About how you're not a hostage—"
"I'm not . . . Seriously, you came here because you thought—"
"No! Well, not really. Nothing was really making sense and . . . I just wanted to look him in the face when I asked if you were okay. I wanted a real explanation—not that stilty political shit they've been sending each other."
"I haven't seen any of what he's been saying," she admitted.
Naruto rubbed the back of his neck. "The letters said one thing, and Tsunade told me they really said another, and it just looked bad, you know? For the past few weeks he's been threatening to keep you here for good."
"Weeks?" Sakura couldn't keep the dismay out of her voice. Gaara'd hinted at being interested in keeping her around for a while before, but . . . "He brought it up with me last night. It seemed like something he'd been thinking about . . . but I didn't know he'd been thinking about it for that long."
"You guys are that serious?"
"I don't know if I am. It's just still so early, and . . ." She looked at the ground and shook her head. "I guess he is, though." She'd have to talk to him about it later.
Naruto shrugged. "It's Gaara. He doesn't seem to really feel or do things halfway."
She might be able to see that.
"Hey. Sakura. It's been weeks. Were you planning on coming home?"
"I've wanted to. I've just been waiting for it to be safe. We—Gaara and I—we both wanted to be sure I wouldn't get shoved into anything when I got back. The last I heard, the elders had basically tried to bribe him into returning me, like . . . Like I was a lost piece of luggage or something. Gaara didn't take that well. Neither did I, when he told me."
"I bet."
The words were spilling out now, though, as her low-simmering anger finally started to boil over. "I get following orders, and I get doing things for the good of Leaf . . . But this just feels obscene. And the more I think about it all, the more pissed off I get. You didn't hear Sasuke. He talked about how it would be so much more convenient for me to stay shut up in Leaf, taking care of our children—like I should be happy about it, like I haven't spent years training with Tsunade-sama or my whole life training to be a ninja. Like what he wanted—or what the elders wanted—somehow should matter more than anything else. It was insulting. I'm eighteen—I don't want to get married yet. I don't want to go back and start having kids. And I don't want him or really anyone else to try and tell me this is really somehow what's best for me, or what I should want for myself and my own life!"
Naruto stopped walking. "Sakura?"
He reached for her upper arms when she turned to him, then gave her an affectionate squeeze as if to allay the gravity of his expression. "Tell Sasuke that."