Sakura could not fall asleep, try as she might.
After going through the routine of making Gaara take his chakra-enhancing tea followed by assisting him in his paperwork while they discussed war strategies, things almost felt normal again.
Until she remembered exactly where she was supposed to sleep afterwards.
Gaara had given her a concerned look when she stopped writing mid-stroke, her brush left hovering over a scroll. He reached over to tap her gently on the shoulder, and she shot up from her seat so quickly that it looked as if she had jumped an extra metre into the air. Sakura giggled sheepishly, brushed off his questioning gaze, and resumed working with her lips thinned into grim resignation.
Once the table was cleared for the night, Gaara pointed her to a privacy screen at the back of the tent and excused himself for some fresh air. Sakura was grateful that he was at least gentlemanly enough to give her privacy to prepare for bed.
Except now it was two hours later, Katsuyu had long fallen into a gentle slumber inside her flak jacket that she had hung over her cot, and Sakura was still wide awake.
She chanced a glance towards Gaara, her eyes now having adjusted to the darkness. She could make out his form slowly rising and falling, as if he was already well into slumberland. However, Tsunade had told her of Gaara's habit to meditate in place of sleeping, so Sakura subtly probed at the chakra signature he was giving off.
No good – he was either in REM sleep, or in a deep meditative state. She had read before that it was hard to tell the two mental states apart unless one was in physical contact with the subject, and Sakura was not about to be accused of feeling up the Kazekage in the middle of the night no matter how curious she was.
She really needed to go to sleep now, Sakura told herself. She had to be up in less than three hours if she wanted to squeeze in at least an hour of studying, and Gaara had hinted that they might break camp within the next few days when they begin an all-out offensive against Akatsuki. There was a lot to do before that.
Sakura tried turning over to see if a new position would help her sleep better, and she barely stopped herself from yelping out loud.
The metal frame of the cot was freezing.
As if noticing it for the first time, Sakura realised how much colder it was inside Gaara's tent than it was compared to her own. She sat up and rubbed at her arms, a little surprised to see a puff of her warm breath appearing before her eyes.
It must have been all her scrolls and books – lined against the walls of the tent, they had also doubled as buffers against the cold desert nights.
Briefly, she envied Katsuyu who was curled up all warm and safe inside her jacket. There was no way she could wear her flak jacket to sleep – the thick, rigid paddings inside would practically guarantee her a backache the next morning.
Sakura quietly sat up from the bed, glancing once more at Gaara to make sure that he was asleep, then finally placed her feet on the icy floor before standing up and making a break for the flap of the tent.
"Sakura, what are you doing?"
Sakura froze mid-step. Busted. So he was meditating after all.
She turned around to look at Gaara, who had not moved at all from his prone position, then replied, "I'm going to get an extra coat or something from my tent. It'll be real quick – they are… directly… under… my… cot…"
Sakura had to fight the urge to smack herself in the forehead. Before she had even finished her sentence, the image of her book-buried cot in her own tent had flashed vividly in her mind. After they had cleared a path out of her tent, she had agreed with Gaara that they would have to leave the rest on her cot for tomorrow as it was already late. There was no way she would be able to get to those items without literally mining for them.
"Sakura?"
"It's freezing in here!" she whisper-shouted to Gaara, and rubbed at her arms for good measure.
It was impossible to read the nuances of Gaara's facial expression in the dark, but she suspected he was most likely amused by her predicament.
"Here."
Gaara's bed creaked under his weight, and the sound of fabric rustling followed. A large object came flying right at her, and Sakura instinctively threw her hands up and caught it. It took her a moment to register that she was holding Gaara's robe in her grasp.
She promptly dropped it like a hot potato.
"Gaara, did you just strip and give me the robe off your back?" Sakura was not going into hysteria for this; logically speaking, even if he did just give her the clothes off his back, there was no way she could see his nudity in the dark. And he had to be wearing something under those robes too, right?
That, however, did not mean that he was any less naked. Behold, the Kazekage's bare arms, Gaara's fanclub.
Gaara's only reply was a chuckle – "No, Sakura. Those are my spare set of robes. Just put them on and go back to sleep."
Still a little leery, Sakura never took her eyes off Gaara's form as she knelt down and picked up the robe. The coolness that radiated from the fabric indicated that Gaara seemed to be telling the truth – a recently worn garment would have trapped some body heat at least.
As she slipped them around her shoulders, she instantly understood the meaning of 'bliss'.
Gaara's robe was incredibly cosy.
She should not have expected less for the Kazekage's wardrobe.
"Thank you."
Gaara's only reply was a grunt of acknowledgement. Sakura slipped back into her cot, pulling the robe a little tighter around herself and smiled; she would never underestimate the value of a warm jacket ever again.
For a while, all was quiet in the tent again. Then Sakura found herself talking aloud to no one in particular. Or maybe just to a certain redhead.
"Back in Konoha, I have a cat named Harumi. She likes to sleep against my neck at night. I appreciate the attention, but not so much during summer," Sakura sighed wistfully, "It would be so nice to have her with me right now, helping me sleep with her purrs."
There was no response from the other end of the tent, and Sakura assumed Gaara was either asleep or ignoring her.
So imagine her surprise when a feline-like shape materialised suddenly near her chest, softly rumbling as it padded closer to press its sandy body against her neck.
Sakura was so shocked that she did not know how to react to the sand-cat that Gaara must have conjured up for her. Tentatively, she reached out for the sandy feline, and it immediately arched its back into her hand to ask for a pat. The grainy texture felt strange against her fingers, but it was not uncomfortable. In fact, it felt oddly soft, almost like talcum powder.
The sand-cat rubbed up against her face and neck, a rumble emitting from its chest region. That made Sakura giggle. Gaara must have had some experience with owning a cat, seeing how feline-like the sand creature was behaving.
She reached up to rub the sand-cat behind the ears, and declared playfully, "I'm going to name you Mr. Fluffy-kins."
The cat dematerialised and shot back into Gaara's gourd so quickly that his gourd rattled violently.
Gaara turned over and gave her what she assumed was a pointed look from across the tent.
"Did you just scare my sand?"
"I was just teasing it," she pouted.
Gaara sighed, and the sand-cat appeared once more on Sakura's bed. This time, it did not approach her so readily, so Sakura had to reach out to pick it up and carry it into her arms as she laid down.
"Go to sleep, Sakura," Gaara muttered as he pulled his covers up a little higher.
And she finally did, lured to sleep by the sand-cat's comforting warmth and rumbling purrs against her chest.