Somebody
By Misery's-Toll
Chapter Twenty-three: Gaara's Interlude
Big shot screaming "Put your hands in the sky!"
(Tearing out all these open pages)
He says, "Give it up boy, give it up boy, or you're gonna die!"
(Woman and kids of all ages)
You'll get a bullet in the back of the neck
(Millions of men with blank faces)
In the back of the neck, right between the eyes
(Italicised lies, headlines, bold)
- 'Hands in the Sky (Big Shot)' by Straylight Run
He never had a mother-figure. He has a father, and he once had a secondary father-figure (I'm going to make you scream, little boy), but in the end whatever existed of his parents doesn't mean much, because he's all grown up and the teenage years are supposed to be the years of rebellion and making life your own, aren't they?
He's sure she must have been beautiful. Though the only picture he has of her is one from her twenties, when she couldn't keep a hair-color for more than a week and her hair is a vibrant, petal pink.
But she died when he was born. And took his father's soul with her. Though Gaara can't really blame her, because dying as a single soul sounds rather lonely to him.
But it's still unfair. Because that means he's in the world all by himself with two dead parents, one literally and one figuratively, and two siblings that couldn't care less whether he existed or not. So he wishes just a little bit that when his mother died, she'd taken him with her instead of a father that can't love him. Because unfairness seems to be the theme of life, and he just wishes that for once it could work in his favor.
One.
Gaara is four years-old.
The world is full of bright colors that the gets to see through the tinted glass of limo windows. Daddy has an important job as the governor and it would be dangerous for him to go out alone, so he lives within boundries of closed-in walls and the constant watch of baby-sitters and security-detail. Life is slow, life is small, life is not quite real...
Gaara has a gourd full of yellow-white ash [Your mother would have loved that. A gourd instead of an urn.] the same size as he is that sits beside his bed. He's young and fun is limited and mommy isn't there because she's only as real as the life he currently lives but she lives in his mind, in the gourd, in the ash and she talks to him and he talks to her because when you're young life is beautiful and it's okay if you play make-believe and no one will look at you funny.
Two.
Gaara is six. Friends are difficult to come by when you're homeschooled and the only thing you really know about people is that they want to hurt you. So Gaara doesn't speak. He barely knows how anyway. Besides, what does speaking matter when there's no one to speak to?
Then Gaara's uncle visits. He's only there to teach Gaara self-defense. But since daddy is never home and mommy only exists in pictures and ash-gourds, he looks up to this man who he's told looks so much like mommy but yet so little.
"This is a photograph of your mother, Gaara. She's beautiful, isn't she? Why don't you keep it?"
He treats the picture like glass. He has to be careful with it. It's beautiful, and oh-so-breakable, and if he isn't careful, it could tear him apart.
Three.
Nine years-old.
"I've put up with this for three years and I-"
Life is as perfect as it could be. He learns things so much faster when his uncle is the one teaching him. He makes things fun. And he always gets to learn things about mommy and the things she did.
"-can't take it anymore because I tried to love you (just because you're hers) but-"
His IQ is much higher than that of both his siblings. He shows the most promise, and gives daddy a good image, gives the man something to feel pride over.
"-you're a monster. A fucking monster, do you hear me? You should have-"
He has toys. So many toys. His room is full of them. Dinosaurs, baseballs, action-figures, books, crayons of every color.
"-died instead of her and you know what? I'm going to kill you. You're going to die little boy and-"
And Gaara's happy.
"-it will be by my hands because it's your fault she's dead and-"
And then his uncle snaps and tries to strangle him.
"-I hate you because she was my sister!"
And then Gaara learns about irony when he somehow manages to stop a man three times his size thanks to the self-defense class the very same man taught him, and stabs him in the throat with a kitchen knife. And then when the media finds out, Gaara's father isn't so proud anymore. [You're a disappointment.]
Four.
When you're ten years-old and still playing make-believe, people aren't so forgiving. Especially after you've killed a man and you never sleep and you never talk but sometimes you scream, and when you do it's for your dead mother (because it's your fault she's dead and-) but when you're the governor's son, you get priveledges like not being sent to a hospital when maybe you should [and you should be greatful, my son].
Gaara thinks about blood all the time, about his uncle's blood flowing down the handle of the knife and all over the cabinets and the floor and his hands and he likes it because he has to.
Five.
When Gaara is twelve he starts visiting a psychiatrist [it's for your own good, son]. He's on medication all the time, and it makes him tired and dazed and his work suffers for it and soon his father doesn't look to him for being his pride-and-joy child, but Gaara looks on the bright-side because that's what the medicine is for, because isn't it just great that he can sleep without dreaming now?
It doesn't take long before his father starts his own self-medication.
Six.
Gaara is fourteen years-old. Now that Gaara's father is a drunkard there's no room for him in politics, and without politics there's hard-labor and little money, and with hard-labor and little money that means no help for homeschooling and no money for psychiatry. So Gaara is thrust into the world of public-schooling, but it's okay because he has Kankurou's own self-perscribed medication of heroine and cocaine and that's enough to get him through the days when the lack-of-sleep and the thoughts of blood and killing and his mother's make-believe voice crying in his head, singing to him from his gourd in the middle of the night becomes too much.
He joins a gang. Life is much easier when you've got people to share it with. People who share your passion for blood and violence and drugs but also share your aching and longing for something better. Even if they don't care particularly for you.
But eventually life moves on and Gaara moves to a new school, where he meets a blonde, whiskered boy that smiles at him and keeps him from beating people up, telling him that maybe he doesn't have to like the feeling of blood on his hands. Forget. Forget. Forget.
Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto or 'Hands in the Sky (Big Shot).' Those belong to their respective owners.
A/N: For some reason the center justification wasn't working, so everything is left justified. And I know what you're thinking. Probably something along the lines of WTF MAN, because I've sort of had this written since July, but it was supposed to be chapter twenty-four instead of chapter twenty-three, but I wasn't happy with the way the climax of the story was gonna go, but I've just sort of accepted it as is. I mean, I've pretty much quit fanfiction except for this story, which I'm going to try to finish once I'm not grounded (I'm not supposed to be on the computer right now, but my mom thinks I'm doing homework). I don't know if I'll actually get to writing the next chapter ever, but I'm gonna try. I think I just have to write two more chapters, and then I have the rest already done.
And thank you to my lovely beta, Ira Feye who has stuck with me despite my complete and utter laziness!
By the way, if there is anything that any of you really want to happen before this story ends, please tell me and I can see if it works in with my master plan, my lovelies. It'll help stimulate the plot-bunnies as well, I suppose.
-MT