Hi! It's Maka A Kurosaki with a new story!
I have this problem where stuff just floats around in my head until I have to write it out, so here we are with another story!
Enjoy!
Warning! - BL, GAARAXNARUTO, AU, SCHOOL SETTING.
Prelude - Cours 1 - The House of Sand
The house was silent.
It was always silent these days, ever since their father stopped coming home as often, though the echoes of his presence always remained. Like an overwhelming smoke, his last "visit" home left them breathless. The heavy stink of alcohol, the slurred insults, the bruises—none of it was missed. The only thing their father ever left behind was tension, the kind that coiled in the air, thick and suffocating, waiting for something to snap.
Gaara sat at the kitchen table, staring at the untouched plate of food in front of him. It was cold now. He hadn't been hungry when Temari set it down, and he wasn't hungry for it now. Across from him, Kankuro was scrolling through his phone, pretending like he wasn't glancing at his younger brother every few minutes from under his brunette bangs. Temari, having finished her meal, was washing dishes at the sink, her movements stiff, mechanical. She had always been the one trying to hold things together, trying to pretend like they were just another normal family.
They weren't.
They hadn't been for a long time.
And he hated pretending.
Gaara could feel the weight of their unease. His siblings didn't know how to talk to him—not anymore. When they were younger, maybe, before everything became so fractured.
Before their mother died.
And that's when their father turned his attention on Gaara, as the youngest, he was an easy target. He used to not blame them for it as they were all children, but over the years, what was the excuse now? Even as teenagers and college students, they should have been able to stand up for their brother, for themselves...
But they didn't.
So, after the beatings over the years, the days of going hungry, and the vile punishments, Gaara fought back, and everything changed at least for him. If they wanted to keep pretending, keep living in whatever world they made for themselves in their delusions of family, Gaara wasn't going to be there. He wasn't going to be weak, not like them.
He could still remember the look in his father's eyes that night. The moment he stopped seeing Gaara as a son and started seeing him as something else. A threat. That was the last night his father ever laid a hand on him. But the hatred remained. The disgust. The venomous words that were spat at him whenever they crossed paths.
"You're a monster. You should've never been born."
Gaara had heard it so many times that it had long since lost all meaning.
"You're not eating?" Temari's voice cut through the silence.
Gaara didn't respond.
She sighed, turning off the faucet. "You need to eat, Gaara."
Still, nothing.
Kankuro clicked his tongue, tossing his phone onto the table. "You know, ignoring us doesn't make us go away," he muttered, arms crossing. "I get it, you don't like talking, but damn, you could at least say something." Gaara's eyes flicked up, sharp and cold. Kankuro shifted, suddenly regretting speaking at all. "Forget it," his older brother muttered, grabbing his phone again.
Temari dried her hands and leaned against the counter, studying Gaara. He hated it when she did that. Like she was trying to figure him out, like she didn't already know him.
"You're starting at the new school tomorrow," she said carefully. "Are you... ready for that?"
A muscle in Gaara's jaw tensed.
Was he ready?
Did it matter?
He had been expelled from the last school after a fight nearly turned fatal. A fight that, in his mind, had been justified. But the school board hadn't seen it that way. Neither had his siblings.
"Gaara, you could've killed him."
"Maybe he deserved it."
That had ended the conversation.
Now, here he was. Another school. Another place filled with people he would inevitably despise. It didn't matter.
All people were the same.
Gaara stood abruptly, chair scraping against the floor. Without a word, he grabbed his plate and dumped it in the sink before turning and heading to his room.
Temari sighed, rubbing her temples. Kankuro just shook his head.
They didn't stop him.
They never did.
Gaara's room was barely decorated. His bed, a desk, and a few books stacked in the corner. No pictures, no posters. Nothing personal. Nothing sentimental.
He liked it that way.
His mark on the world.
Nothing.
He sat on the bed, staring at his hands. The scars along his knuckles were faint now, but he could still feel the sting of old wounds. The phantom pain of fights that never really ended.
He wasn't angry. Not in the way people assumed.
It wasn't rage that burned inside him—it was something colder, deeper. A numbness that settled in his bones, an exhaustion that never fully faded.
He didn't care about this new school, about making friends, about teachers, or about anything.
He would go. He would endure.
And if someone was stupid enough to cross him, well...
They would learn.
Just like the last one.
Hello~ So this is prelude and its one of 2. We'll be introducing Naruto next and getting to understand his mindset and ideals on life.
See ya there!
-Maka A Kurosaki