Naruto stared at his brother's pained expression and muttered, "So you killed your..." Gaara looked down at his tightly fisted hands and nodded his head, yes. Knowing that he couldn't very well lie to Naruto now that he was in the same precarious position that he'd found himself in all those years ago.
"I was far too young, immature, and unstable to understand, much less nurture a relationship of that kind with anyone."
Naruto blinked at him and slowly nodded before saying gently. "You don't have to explain yourself to me Gaara."
"I'm not." Gaara said with a slight frown before saying more to himself than Naruto, "Well okay I am," Before tacking on quickly for the blond's benefit, "But that isn't the point. The point that I'm trying to stress here is that isn't going to happen with you. You are emotionally developed to the point where you can do this. You are mature enough to handle nurturing a relationship of this kind."
"Y-You really think so?" Naruto asked, his tone somewhat uncertain as he chewed his bottom lip nervously. Gaara gave Naruto his first real smile since finding out what was wrong with him. It helped to know that Gaara was confident in his ability to do well in this particular area. Even when he was already silently questioning both of their sanity's.
"I am," Gaara said with a slight nod. "I know that you can begin, and nurture a relationship with whomever you are bound to." Naruto's eye brows disappeared under his long bangs as he gave Gaara an incredibly wide eyed look that the red head recognized as his My-hand-is-stuck-in-the-cookie-jar/I've-been-so-so-bad look.
It was the same look that Naruto often got when he visited Sauna and got into some utterly ridiculous sort of mischief that Gaara usually had to save him from. Which caused Gaara's instincts to kick into overdrive as he narrowed his eyes at his brother before asking, "So when can I meet this person?"
At which point Naruto muttered something about needing a drink and promptly walked into the kitchen an began digging around one of his cabinets for his secret stash of sake that had been given to him by both Kakashi and Tsunade when he had first become Hokage.
This was the first time that he had ever seen Naruto touch the stuff in his presence. Which made him more than a little bit curious about why his little brother felt the need for liquor when all he had asked was when he was to meet his chosen mate. After all the only real reason he could think of that would even remotely call for liquor was if Naruto's chosen mate was...ill?
Or possibly even married.
Worried that one or both of those things may somehow apply to his little brother's situation, Gaara was up and over in Naruto's personal space in the blink of an eye, his hands once again on the younger man's shoulders- startling Naruto into accidentally dropping one of the three sake bottles he was holding as Gaara asked, "What is it? What's wrong?"
Naruto didn't answer, he just gave him an awkward twitch, and held up one finger- miraculously managing not to drop anymore sake bottles. Gaara released him long enough to let him put down the sake, and then watched as the blond sort of shuffled around a little bit before saying, "I'll let you see- but no one else is to know. Everything on the disk is personal, and above all- private. Promise me you won't tell anyone unless I give the okay to do so."
Naruto's tone was pleading. Borderline begging.
The Naruto he knew never pleaded or begged for anything unless it was ramen. So whatever it is he was going to share with him was obviously privileged information. Perhaps even highly confidential. Which meant that it was either shinobi/ village related or a high profile crime.
Gaara wasn't sure which he would be more comfortable dealing with, but if it had something to do with Naruto's chosen mate... Then perhaps he was right to suddenly feel worried.
Still, he promised Naruto that he would not speak of what he was to share with him and the blond left- briefly- and returned a short time later with a DVD in hand and then after putting it in his DVD player. And then adjusted the TV so that Gaara could see it- began drinking and non too subtly pushing the spare sake cup and a bottle towards the red head who shot him a quick look of reprimand as the video began playing.
In the first five minutes of watching, Gaara began to look a little green.
In the next twenty minutes, the red head had paled considerably and his hands had begun to shake a bit.
By the very end of the video- Gaara was in the kitchen, leaning over Naruto's sink, dry heaving. And by the time he was done, Naruto had already gotten up and gone and got him a wash cloth and wet it some in the bathroom and then had come back and handed it to him before he started to rub his back, right between his shoulder blades.
Like he usually did whenever he was around and Gaara got sick nowadays.
Once Gaara was sure he wasn't going to be sick anymore, he put the wet rag against his mouth and sighed softly. Christ, no wonder Naruto is drinking and shit. Gaara thought darkly. The man could barely function at the moment because of his bound status. But what he'd just seen on the video that Naruto had showed him made things so much worse.
He wasn't sure if Naruto would be able to nurture a relationship with the woman- of any kind now.
Truthfully, he felt more than a little bit unsure of what to do now. On one hand, he wanted Naruto to have the love and happiness that he had desired since he was young. But he wasn't sure if he should continue to encourage his brother to pursue someone romantically who would- and he didn't make this point lightly- in all probability be downright terrified of any male in close proximity to her for a very, very, very long time.
What a mess...
