Ch. 8: More than Just a Woman

Eyes narrowed, teeth ground strongly together, fists firmly clenched, she was a frightfully terrifying thing. Beautiful too, to an outsider, he surmised. Kankurou was no fool. His sister was an angry and dangerous creature, but a beautiful one at that. He knew the meaning behind the glances the insolent shinobi gave her. He decidedly loathed the shinobi for this matter. For looking at his sister and seeing only the physical and carnal attributes she bore. He doubted his sister even knew how they saw her, or even cared. Temari is always was far too engrossed in her current passion to give mind to what opinions people think of her. She only takes notice when it was those exact opinions that separated her from whatever goal she was trying to achieve. There were lots of things Temari could accomplish had she been born male; a lot things she did now that would have been far easier to achieve. In Suna, the female species was not praised for anything other than that soft frail kindness that was used to care for the young. Probably the reason she detested showing the traits of softer femininity. Despite her talents being wrought inside the wrong gender, she did extraordinary things, and never let anything distract her from the matter at hand. Temari was an amazing thing indeed.

"I'm seventeen," she seethes. "SEVENTEEN." She crosses her arms and stares furiously at the wall.

It was these particular rants she had, that Kankurou had trouble deciphering, mostly because he wasn't sure if she was just letting loose or actually wanting feedback from him. Gaara was much better at understanding Temari. An irony in itself, as Gaara had trouble understanding most any other human thing. "Temari, I don't know what that has—"

She stands up abruptly and starts pacing. She thinks best when she's in movement. A fault, he used to think; now, he's not really sure. "They push aside my points as mere fool-hardy statements of an adolescent who was swayed by the pretty words of a manipulator! They didn't even fucking listen!" She stops abruptly. A scowl worms across her face.

Temari normally doesn't curse. She finds it a derogatory way to express oneself – or at least that what she says.

"What happened?"

"What – What happened?!" She asks fury rising in her face. She kicks the wall and collapses again in a chair. "Kankurou," she says softly, "I have worked and worked and worked, just to get where I am now. I've trained so hard some days I don't think I can move, but I do; I move anyway, because well for goodness sakes' I didn't do all that work to not move. So I force myself to. I try hard to. And not just physically, I mean, I've – I've learned all I can about politics because," she cradles her head in her hands, "I want to know why I'm doing what I'm doing. I know a lot. I do. I know more than half the idiots on the council. And I know that sounds conceited, but…"

"Temari?" He knows how hard she's worked. He's seen her bleed, and break, and fumble, and worst of all, he's seen her accept the degrading words thrown upon her with a grace he thinks few people have the luck to see. He's also seen her accept the words without a trace of grace in her actions. He's seen her fall, but he's always seen her stand again. She's something incredible. But even now, she isn't used to being scorned upon silly reasons.

She straightens. "Why? I mean really, why? I had a good point. I had an excellent point. I know I did. It had proof and statistics and reason and everything, but they wouldn't even drop their callous disregard to listen for a minute. And when I'm done? They tell me I'm a child who can't hope to understand the politics of Suna. That I should go back to playing with my kunais. I mean," Her voice is rising again, "I might understand if, well, if it really was about age, but they've listened to other shinobi before. Shinobi of fifteen years. I'm seventeen dammit!"

He doesn't know what to say, because frankly, he doesn't know. He knows it's her gender that makes the council turn up their nose. He knows it's her affiliation with Gaara that makes them push her aside as yet another woman that's far too affectionate. He knows it's her short temper that makes them consider her ruled by purely passionate bouts of ridiculous emotion. He knows it's her determination that fills them with hatred toward her. He knows all that. But what he knows most of all is that Temari, for all her anger, hidden kindness, and stubborn-headed brashness, would be the best thing to happen to the political sect of Suna – that is, if they ever let her.

Becoming a shinobi was one thing. Temari defied conventions and proved them wrong there. Advancing to Jounin was near impossible but certainly doable for a woman.

But a politician?

That was only a position she could achieve by pleasing the people. By being given that status. It was not something she could train for. Not something she could study hard for. Not something she could obtain with pure resolve. She had to gain the approval of people who had kept her down her entire life.

"I should quit the whole thing." She grumbles angrily.

Kankurou laughs.

She whips her head at him glaring. The wrath in her eyes could burn a hole through a wall, and force silence upon just about everyone's lips. It didn't quite work with him or Gaara anymore. They'd become…immune. He keeps laughing, the mirth bursting from him.

She's ready to hit him. To scream at him. To leave and wish she had never spoken a word. The shaking across her shoulders is enough proof of that.

"You and I both know that that sentence is a complete load of rubbish. You've never quit anything in your entire life; even when the whole damn world thought you should."

"I—" she begins furiously.

"You're ridiculous if you're honestly contemplating quitting now." He sits beside her and draws his legs up to the table. "Fuck, Temari, you're the superhuman bitch. Never quitting, never stopping, never giving in to pressure. Are you honestly going to tell me you're going to let those fuckers keep you where you are, when you've defied them before?"

"This is different!" she hisses. "I can't just – I can't just do what I did before! I can't just do a job two times better or even three times better than a regular male! I have to – I have to— I don't know, dammit! There's nothing that can be done! The forces in power inside this village will NEVER accept that I—"

"And when have you ever let what other's think stop you?"

"Politics is composed entirely of people's opinions!"

He looks at her calmly. "Temari, you want this."

"So what if I do?" She turns her head to the window, a bitter scowl on her lips. "It can't happen. What's the point in dreaming something that has no hopes of occurring? I might as well let it die."

"Fine. Be unhappy. Let them know they won."

She's angry again. "You couldn't face half the shit I get from them in one day! How dare you say that to me when you wouldn't do it?! When you couldn't! You would just let them keep your dream and live how they expect you too!" She standing again, her hands balled into tight fists, he thinks just looking at her that her rage is at the point when she stops realizing what she's doing or saying. Her nails have probably cut into her skin. She's angry at him. She's angry at the council. She's angry at Suna. She's angry at the male population.

But mostly, she's angry at herself.

"Duh, Temari. Of course I couldn't. I'm not you. You're…spectacular, you know that? I'm nowhere near as determined, and passionate, and strong as you are; I couldn't even dream of doing what you've done. I couldn't overcome all that oppression." She isn't the first female to push past the sneers and prejudices of Suna. But she is one of the very few. "But if you just lie down and quit, then you aren't the Temari I grew up with. The Temari I've always admired." He sees the blood trickling down over her knuckles. She was the craziest female he'd ever met. Truly. "Don't let them win, Tem. You'll hate yourself for the rest of your life if you do."

His mind drifts back to the past, when he himself had been ready to quit being a shinobi. When he was going to drop his dream.

"Shut up. Look, idiot, don't you dare give up. I'll help you." She snapped angrily.

"You have a hard enough time doing things for yourself as it is."

"Who cares? I won't sleep then. No big deal. What is a big deal is you thinking you can quit. Only losers quit. Quitting is only for the sane. If you pull through the pain and hardship you lose your sanity, but you get to see and live all kinds of crazy things."

He scoffed. "Oh yeah? Like what?"

A soft grin spread clearly across her lips and a sparkling longing in her eyes he'd never really seen. He thought maybe, if she smiled like that more often, he would find her less intimidating. "Your dreams." She whispered it like it's the greatest vision. Like it's magic.

"Quitting is only for the sane, Tem." He grins. "Don't you wanna see the magical fucking insane things?" A smirk, a challenge is in his eyes. Temari has yet to turn down a decent challenge, a ribbing on her skills. "What? Is my big blonde sister afraid of a little hostility?"

"Why don't you just shut up?" She snaps. "Idiot. I swear." She sits back down and sighs. "You're not supposed to use my own words against me."

"Then you shouldn't have said such wise words to begin with."

She scoffs, "Wise? You say I'm off my rocker every time I talk to you."

"All genius requires lack of sanity."

She raises an eyebrow, "Oh? So now I'm a genius?"

Kankurou leans back in his chair. "Eh, you try."

She sighs irritably and kicks the leg of his chair. He falls to the floor with crash!

"Oy, not cool!" He shouts.

She leans down to the floor and kisses his forehead. She doesn't do that much.

She hugs him. Berates him. Yells at him. Smacks him. But she doesn't kiss him much.

"You're insufferable, but I love you. Thanks. I needed that."

"Yeah, yeah, yeah." He grumbles picking himself up from the floor. "I can really feel the love, insulting me and knocking me to the floor. It's so endearing."

She grins. "I'm glad you think so."

Things would be a lot easier for her if she had been born male. But she wouldn't quite be Temari if she wasn't female. And he wouldn't be himself either. It was hard for her, but he was secretly glad that she went through so much; it was what made her really special.

Maybe one day, a real shinobi could look at her and see what Kankurou saw. Instead of the attributes the other shinobi focused on. Maybe one day, someone could understand her, and show her not all men were fucking assholes.

For now, she had him and Gaara.