hindsight

In hindsight, their relationship isn't all that..heinous?

Unexpected, definitely. Weird, maybe, a little. But it's not wrong, per se. It even kind of makes sense, once everyone gets over the initial shock of it all. And once Naruto decides he's no longer traumatized.

It's unexpected because first and foremost, their personalities should, on paper, clash. Hyuga Xin is a bubbly, notorious busybody who has the strangest talent of never shutting the fuck up. She's an oblivious flirt and more often than not, generally clueless when it comes to things like personal space and boundaries.

And Sabaku no Gaara has certainly come a long way from being a psychotic menace to society. Unlike Xin, he's generally quiet, laid-back and far more attentive. He's far more stoic and wiser than the rest of them but in no way is he arrogant about it.

They do, however, share a past for former sadasim so maybe that's where they eventually connected, who fuckin' knows.

None of them really think to question the friendship. After surviving the Fourth Ninja War, there's no need for animosity and baseless prejudices and old rivalries. That's no life to live, they all seemingly decide. It's easier to forgive, to move on and sow friendships than it is to hold onto acidic grudges.

So really, when the Sand Siblings come around and Xin is one of the first to greet them, to greet Gaara, no one thinks too much about it.

And why would they really question it? For all her bubbliness, they know that Xin's lonely. She's the only one on her team that actually survives the War, having watched both teammates and Sensei die in the wake of destruction. Their deaths, along with Neji's sacrifice, cling to her shoulders long after they've been buried.

It's not like they allow her to sulk and wallow in her loneliness and she is grateful that there's always someone checking on her. Whether it's her sister or Ino or Choji. She appreciates it but there's always a bit of disconnect. There's a certain camaraderie born from teams and it's something she's no longer afforded.

So when the Sand Siblings come around and eventually get with the program of pulling Xin out of her pity-party, it's no surprise that she bonds with them. With Gaara.

It's a little odd, at first, to spot Xin with her arms wrapped around Gaara's arm but they think nothing of it because she's a physically affectionate person. She's always been the type to hold someone's hand, wrap her arms around someone's waist, climb up their backs and cling to them like a goddamn koala. It's her love language. It's always been affectionate but strictly platonic of her. She's like that with all of them, it's not weird. It's Xin. Well, maybe it is a little weird but as said before, it's Xin. She's always been a little weird.

Anyway,

So when they see her rush up to the Kazekage, to snatch his hands up in hers and talk a mile per minute, no, they don't question it. When she happily plops down next to him at Ichiraku's instead of sitting next to Lee or Ino or Sakura like she normally does, no one bats an eyelash. She's just as affectionate with his siblings but maybe it's all for show, to throw them off. She wraps her arms around Temari's waist and smiles into the blonde's back, walks close to Kankuro, playfully bumping him with her hip every so often and even boldly nudges at Baki with her elbow.

And Gaara, well, he's not used to such loud affection. Not at first, anyway. Xin doesn't really give anyone much of a choice.

"You can either hold my hand or I can just break yours. Then you won't have a choice." So maybe she's still somewhat of a sadist, no one's perfect.

He takes it all in stride, eventually adapting to it. He doesn't hold his folded arms so tightly against his chest, leaving a gap for her to slip her hand through. Sometimes he doesn't even fold his arms across his chest, opting to patiently wait until she slips her hand in his. He shows up at the hospital to coax her into taking a lunch break because as spacey as she is, she takes her role as a medic seriously. To the brink of exhaustion.

When a handful of them meet up at a BBQ restaurant, he beckons her to sit down next to him. And she does, sliding into the booth next to him like it's the most natural thing in the world. If, for some reason, she can't sit next to him, she sits across from him, smiling and winking and babbling to him as if they were right next to one another.

Sometimes one of them might catch on, might notice something. An inkling, a hunch or a feeling. While Xin is affectionate with everyone she comes across, like some starved teddy-bear, the sort of interactions with Gaara are noticeably different.

Maybe her smiles are softer, maybe his eyes lingers a little longer than necessary. Maybe they're sitting too close to each other and is it necessary for Xin to lean in even further to whisper something into his ear? I think the fuck not.

But then…Gaara and Xin? I mean, really? There's no way anything could be going on there. Though they were each, in their own right, popular among the opposing sexes, neither really seem interested in dating. Which is saying something since the rest of them, save for a select few, have begun to pair up one by one. Dating doesn't seem to cross either of their minds.

Which was probably a big fuckin' hint that they were all too stupid to catch on to. The pieces are there, none of them have enough brain cells to put them together. The two aren't interested in dating other people because they're too busy being interested in each other. Duh.

Until, well, Naruto comes along.

Naruto has the strange habit of entering his friends' rooms from their opened windows. Most of them allow it, having grown used to it but he usually remembers to break that habit when he's visiting a girl. The last time he scrambled into Sakura's room during a girls' gathering, Xin shoved him out before he could fully crawl in.

"Learn to use a door!" She shouted as he tumbled backwards. She blames his abysmal upbringing but he's a grown ass man now, he should know better.

He's far more mindful when climbing into the girls' windows. The guys, however, there's no need to extend that basic courtesy to those motherfuckers. None of them have anything to hide. Gaara certainly doesn't, he ignorantly thinks. Why else would the window to their hotel room remain open? Because there was nothing to hide, obviously.

He slams the window open a little wider, ducking down low to fit his massive frame in. "Oi, Gaara! We're all getting some BBQ and—" He comes to a screeching halt, halfway into the hotel room.

To her credit, Xin remains surprisingly calm, if not a little confused from their position on the couch. She's sitting on top of Gaara, pale thighs spread over his lap. Her cropped jacket lay in a crumpled pile on the floor, her skirt rucked up to her hips. Gaara still has his clothes on, thank fuck for that but he's just as disheveled, Xin having popped the buttons to his jacket open to dip her hands under his mesh shirt. She's got her hands halfway up his chest, nails digging into his skin.

Naruto goes still, his brain malfunctioning as the two stare at him. Steam nearly puffs out of his ears as he tries to make sense of what he was looking at. Gaara's hands rest on her thighs and she doesn't slap them away. Xin's mouth is swollen and red and her eyes are half-lidded, almost like she's drunk.

Looking at them, looking at him, looking at them is like a goddamn cursed image. It's…it's unnatural. Up until that very moment, he'd been convinced that Gaara was asexual since he never seems interested in women.

Because he was too busy being interested in Xin.

Jesus Fuck.

"Is…is he breathing?" Xin finally asks and her voice comes out too breathy. Naruto practically recoils because this is Xin we're talking about, straddling the goddamn Kazekage like it's the most natural thing in the world.

Xin, with her weird habits and her unyielding affection and her freakish cackle. Xin, the little terror that once attempted to drown a kid when she found out he was picking on her sister and Naruto when they were still young. He's never even thought of her as a girl—a woman. She was more so like a goddamn entity that just took on the appearance of Hinata.

"Aren't you the medic here?" Gaara huffs from underneath her. His voice is naturally low but now there's a grit to it. Low and gritty. Naruto knows that sound because he often sounds like that after Hinata works him up, he thinks. Oh, God. Ew.

Xin purses her lips but sighs, deciding that if Naruto isn't breathing, it's up to her to fix him up. For Hinata's sake, at least.

She draws back from Gaara, climbing off of him in one fluid motion. This was clearly not the first time she's been on top of him, Naruto thinks in muted horror. More steam puffs out of his ears. Xin pauses long enough to fix her skirt. She smoothes the wrinkles out of it, letting the black material tumble down her legs. She turns towards him and Naruto nearly reels back at the sight of several purple marks dotting her décolleté.

It occurs to him, at that moment, that Xin actually has hips and breasts and thighs and that Gaara is all too aware of that.

"Naruto," Xin approaches him. She doesn't smell like her usual self. She smells like sand and the hot sun and the desert. She smells like Gaara. "Are you okay? Say something."

And then he did.

"I'm telling everyone."

TeeBeMe: Xin wouldn't be as unhinged in the canon storyline but she's still a menace.