And I'm sure he'll help me…
Help me feel.
Help me experience the things I've been deprived.
Help me find the meaning behind what I don't understand.
Help me live.

It wasn't long before a week came and gone. I'm surprised; it's as if staying with Naruto is natural and routine. As if this entire threat to our home village is a bad dream, and that this is the reality. I can see it not only in my own situation, but a few other peoples' as well: smiling faces, mingling between the oh-so-different cultures, and laughter.

Over the course of this first week, Naruto has done a lot for me. He cleared out half the drawers in his dresser for my clothes, let me sleep in on the mornings I went to bed late (I was absorbed in a book; I found that when I was alone and bored most nights during my insomniac years, reading became my new hobby, and I still enjoy it), and when he could – which was usually after some training – the blonde would sit and talk with me.

I think, out of the things here in Konoha, I like that best. I never say much during our conversations, but Naruto always has a story to tell. Many of them involve from what I can tell are fatherly figures to him, like Iruka-sensei and Kakashi-sensei and Jiraiya. The latter being stories from the nearly three-year-long time span when he was absent from Konoha with the legendary Sannin on a rigorous training session all over the adjoining countries. I was very curious about those; I haven't visited much of anywhere besides between here and my homeland, and where ever I was dragged to by the Akatsuki.

I shudder at the final destination. I would hate to go there again… to me, that location signifies death. And somehow, I keep thinking about it; surely it's a giant step for a human being, having died and been brought back, but I should stop dwelling on it. To me, this right here – Uzumaki Naruto and the harmonious aura of his village – that signifies life. I should focus solely on that.

Tonight, Naruto comes home sweating and flushed in the face. Somehow, the image of his golden locks damp from perspiration and his cheeks pink make my heart speed up in the slightest and a shiver run down my spine.

He smiles wearily at me when he enters his bedroom for a change of clothes. "I'll be in the shower, but when I get out, we can talk, okay?"

I nod and set aside what I had been looking over. I sit with my legs crossed, listening to the water running in the room behind my back as I wait for him. Part of the routine I mentioned included the little chat we were about to have; every day this past week, Naruto would ask me what I did that day and then he'd tell me what he did. Sometimes we'd breeze over other topics, and sometimes he'd be too tired to say much more and would go to bed.

I learned that Naruto is currently resuming some training with Kakashi and a man named Yamato that had been interrupted not too long ago. The training was simple: improve on jutsus related to his element, which he told me is wind. My own is earth, more specifically the sand, which is harder to control nowadays, but I manage.

Naruto takes shorts showers. In minutes, he's back in his room with a towel on his head and a t-shirt with boxer shorts on. He carelessly tosses the towel into a hamper in the corner and smiles. "So… how'd today go for you?"

I lean back the tiniest bit and shrug. "Smoothly. Hokage Tsunade-sama and I held a small meeting."

"What happened in it?"

"We decided tomorrow would be our first test. A group of two will venture to the desert and see if the storm as hit yet, and then report back." I explain. Naruto looks interested and comes to sit beside me on the bed. I feel the mattress sink with the new weight, and my skin tingles with an electrical current of some kind as his hand brushes mine on accident. I pull away instantly, my body moving to the far end of the bed faster than I could think.

Naruto blinks at me. "Gomen," he mutters. I hear confusion in the back of his tone and see it reflected in his eyes. But I can't explain my suddenly jerking action. Perhaps it was static electricity that did it…

I shake my head. "Anyhow," I murmur, "What about your training?"

"Oh, right…" the blonde says while pulling his legs up onto the bed. "Well, I made some real progress today; like Asuma-sensei, I can now cut a tree open with a sharp blade of chakra! It's a small tree and not the giant one he demonstrated all those months ago, but I'm really getting the hang of it. It's a huge improvement compared to the leaves I practiced on the first time around."

He told me about that. I'm quite impressed; not many people are of the wind element, and if they are, I doubt they could learn such advanced jutsus at such an early age, and at merely genin level… although, in my opinion, Naruto deserved the title of chunnin, and could definitely have the potential to one day become the 'Kage status he dreams of.

"That's wonderful," I reply, my voice revealing none of the approving emotion I hold. I probably shouldn't do that; he might think I'm being insincere. For Naruto's sake, I should probably start revealing my emotions if at least in my tone. But it's difficult; as much as a trust him (with my own life; for obvious reasons), I can't seem to break the habit of keeping a level of indifference at all times. I should practice using more emotion now that my duties are minimal.

I should do all these things… but I don't know if I can.

Naruto adjusts his position and leans against his headboard, his hair spreading across the tapestry hanging on the wall. "Oi, Gaara… do you ever have nightmares about your demon?"

That's random. But knowing Naruto, it's not; it's most likely something he's wanted to ask for a while, or something related to his train of thought. Slowly, I answer with: "Hai. I have multiple times. Doushite?"

"Because," Naruto mutters wearily, "Last night I had one. I have plenty of nightmares; some of being utterly alone, some of Kyuubi like last night's, and some that are silly like forgetting to wear pants. But I was wondering… do all Jinchuuriki fear their demons? Do all of them have nightmares? I mean, I know Shukaku is gone, but I was thinking you might have nightmares of him anyway now that you're able to sleep."

I had been correct; it is something he's been meaning to ask for a while. I clear my throat. "I didn't hear you cry out. I would've woken you if I'd known," I murmur.

"Nah, it's fine. It wasn't too bad of one, or else I probably would've made some kind of noise. But I usually can wake myself." He sighs and leans forward, his elbows on his thighs. Idly, the kitsune traces a pattern on his sheets with a finger. "So… what are yours about?"

"You first," I say. I want to hear what his demon brings to his dreams. My own are… gruesome. I'm hoping his aren't as much.

He blows air out his mouth, nearly whistling. "It's not pretty, 'ttebayo," he says with a crooked smile that doesn't reach his eyes. The truth without the humor. Naruto sits up straight once more. Then, he dives into the dream without any sort of transition. "It starts off like any other dream; charcoal grey, senseless, fuzzy on the edges. I hear echoes of water dripping into water. Slowly, I see pipes. And water at my feet. But I feel nothing, no wetness, no coolness or warmth, nothing. Suddenly, a light blinds me, and the light is red. It flashes across my vision and I panic. I begin running with no real destination. I feel weightless, and the run is effortless, but I also feel naked; not of clothes, of 'course, 'cause I'm wearing the same thing I always wear, but I mean naked of protection. Of weaponry. Of just about anything that can same me from the source of that flashing red. And then… I meet him. Kyuubi. He springs in front of my face and stares at me. His eyes are red, his fur russet orange, and his nine tails whip around me. And because of what I found out, in the recent nightmares of this reoccurring one I see my father. He stands tall and comes between me and Kyuubi, and before I can do anything to help him, he gets slain and Kyuubi flies to me – or maybe he jumps? – and dives into my body. I choke and sputter and catch on fire, the flames consuming me. I feel cold, though, as if the fire is so hot it freezes. And that's when I collapse to the ground and begin sweating blood." I see him shudder, and watch as his arms wrap around himself. "I think… I think the sweating blood thing is from when I went into a four-tailed rage. You haven't seen it, but I can get more than one tail on my cloak of red chakra. It's pretty scary… I never feel like myself. Things just happen in sequence, and I follow my raw animalistic instincts and want only to kill. Did you feel like that when I met you at the chunnin exams? Did you only follow that strange bloodlust?"

I'm a bit shocked by the questions he throws at me, but I answer them without thinking twice. "Hai," I admit in a noticeably smaller voice, "In retrospect, I was following whatever murderous desire Shukaku asked of me. In a way, I thought it was helping me feel like I was alive… but really, I was feeding Shukaku and helping him feel instead."

Naruto nods. I'm positive that he's storing this information for future reference. "What about your nightmares?" he wants to know.

I swallow. Which one should I tell? I have so many…

In the end, I decide on the ones that hurt me most, the ones that cause me to wake up sweating. Once, after a nightmare of the same type, I woke up with scratch marks on my arms. It took me a minute to realize my own nails were bloody and that I had done it myself. After that incident, I made sure my nails were constantly cut down to nubs and smoothed.

"Anou…" I begin with a low voice, "One I have often is when I'm a child. I didn't always have this scar," I inform, touching the 'ai' on my left brow lightly. "And it's that time that I see my body as. And as a child, I'm wandering the desert alone during a storm. In the distance, I see a woman in a maroon cloak holding something in her arms. As I come closer, I see it's a baby swathed in the same fabric. She's his mother, I know, but as I look closer, it's my mother. She smiles sweetly at me and lowers the baby for me to see. But when I look at it, it's a miniature Shukaku. He grins evilly at me and leaps from her arms to consume me. And then I'm somewhere dark and damp, and I think the bakemono had eaten me when I see a light ahead. I follow it, and still as a child I see my dead teenaged body lying on what I assume is the ground, although it's as white as the space around me. I touch my older face with a childish hand and begin crying. And I don't know why I'm crying, because I don't feel sorry for myself; iiya, I feel sorry for my siblings instead. I feel like I'm hurting them for being what I was – a carrier of a Bijuu and a heartless person – and then abandoning them by dying. And that's when I watch as my mother comes into the room, the baby Shukaku in her hands, and she sets him down. He crawls over to me and points at my dead body and my mother. She's kissing my forehead on my mark and steadily crumbling to sand. It washes over my dead body and them grows to begin choking me, slowly pouring the blood from my body and washing everything with red. All the while, Shukaku is grinning darkly and laughing."

I never want to have to repeat that. Nor say so many words in one sitting; already my throat felt dry and sore from overuse. Both of our dreams, I notice, carry guilt throughout them. And both show what we regret losing: our parents. My mother, his father… things we never had. We have substitutes, like Temari and Iruka, but nothing quite compares to having your birthparent to raise you.

"Kami, Gaara…" the blonde says in bewilderment, his hand running through his hair. "It's a wonder you don't wake up screaming."

I'm not about to tell him that I do. I never make a sound, but I do wake up to an aching, open jaw and deflated lungs, as if I had screamed all my breath out. I don't think my vocal cords are capable of screaming any longer, so it seems I scream in silence. How depressing.

"Ne, Gaara, do you know what my nightmare could mean?"

"It's simple: you fear the power Kyuubi gives you, are saddened by your father's cause of death, and have an eerie sense of never being completely solitary because of the creature you have sealed within you," I tell him. Naruto accepts this with a nod. "And mine? What do you think?" I'm genuinely curious about what he thinks of my gruesome tale.

"Hmm…" he ponders, his index finger tapping his sun-kissed chin. "I'd say it shows how much you feared Shukaku and death, and how much you miss your mother and regret never meeting her, and how sad she'd be if she had been alive long enough to see your death. And it almost shows betrayal… like, when her body became the very sand you used to kill with, and yet it was killing you."

I'm thoroughly shocked that he came to those conclusions since those are nearly the exact ones I thought of. Plus, Naruto's not known to be especially intelligent, especially not in the common sense department, yet it seems he can interpret dreams well.

He smiles suddenly, a bright one that lights up his eyes. "You know, I'm glad we talked about this. I feel better now, and I also think I got something special from you: a little speech and something personal I bet you don't share with anyone else. Arigato," Naruto thanks with a curt bow of the head.

I blink once or twice. Then I break eye contact and nod. I can hear him smiling wider (if such a thing is possible) as he says, "It's getting late, we should sleep. Good night, Gaara!" And he exits the room, shutting the door behind him.

I stare at his place of exit for who knows how long. Soon, I'm slipping into the covers and shutting my eyes.

I know I won't sleep a wink.