Chapter 6: Family of Secrets

 

 

     “What do you mean ‘what do I think I’m doing’!?” You yelled back at him. You had recovered from your previously stunned state, and was more than ready to fight Gaara if he didn’t let go of you.

        “Your tail.” He growled out in a low voice. You started trembling, and your heart started pounding in your chest, threatening to leap out of your throat at any second, as your whole body went pale with fear.

        “What?” You asked shakily in a quiet tone. You looked down in between your legs, only to see that your white tail had grown from being just down to your knees, to all the way down to your feet. The previously thin and short white fur was now thicker, longer, and more ‘mature’ looking, and it was sticking out of your pants, which weren’t falling down, almost as if you had cut a hole in the back of them for this new tail to fit through. What the hell is this. “How-?” Gaara suddenly grabbed your hat and flung it off to the side, revealing your bent back ears. “Hey!”

        “So you are full blooded.” He muttered quietly, which you didn’t hear, but at this point you didn’t care about what he had said. You just wanted to get out of his grip and run as far away from him as you could. You were completely scared out of your mind, and all that mattered was escaping his grasp. You didn’t know what he was going to do, now that he knew your secret, and you sure as hell you didn’t want to find out.

        “Get off of me!” You shouted, as you struggled against him. You tried grabbing his wrists, kicking him, anything to at least try and loosen his grip, but your moves were too frantic and not well thought out, for he had no trouble holding you in place, and he slammed you against the building again.

        “Stop it and be quiet. You don’t have the right to tell me that.” You stopped struggling, appalled by his words. Who was he to tell you what rights you have and didn’t have, especially since you were telling him to let go of you when he was literally holding you against your will.

        “What the hell makes you think you can tell me what to do anyway!?” You yelled out of blind anger.

        “Because your tail almost got us exposed!” Wait, did he say-

        “Us?”

        “Yes, us.” You were beyond confused now, and everything became dead silent. You were panting heavily, your heart still thumping loudly through your chest, your previous fear still fresh in your mind, and you stared at him with wide, terrified (E/C) eyes. He remained emotionless and unmoving, staring at you with his piercing sea green eyes, never once breaking eye contact with you. “How long have you had your ears and tail.” He asked, more like demanded.

        “Why should I have to answer your questions?” You asked in a firm, yet still slightly shaky voice. He tightened his grip.

        “Just answer me.”

        “Why?”

        “Because I’m going to help you.” You were still heavily breathing, confusion and shock still the predominant emotions running through your head, but anger was quick to take over them, as you began to struggle against his grip again.

        “Help? Help!? Why in the world do you want to ‘help’!?”

        “Because you’re just like me.” You stopped struggling in his grip once more, as you stared at him in utter shock. Before you could question him, you were completely still, paralyzed, as you watched what was happening in front of you. Gaara closed his eyes, and in just one second, his body morphed. Two rugged dark blue wolf ears with light tan colored insides were now on top of his head, bent back against the sides of his head like yours, clearly showing irritation. A long, thick, light tanned colored tail was to his left side, slowly swishing up and down, with the light breeze that blew through. His huge tail also had random points where big chunks of fur spiked/curled out and ended in black tips, which made the spikes of fur look like claws. His whole tail was also covered in many random dark blue stripes, which, at a second glance, almost resembled veins.

       You looked at Gaara’s new form in disbelief. You would’ve never guessed that he had been this, whatever this was, the entire time, and as he said, he was exactly like you. Who are you? Who are we?

        His ears and tail were gone as fast as they came. You remained dumbfounded, watching as his more human form returned, and he stared at you with serious green eyes.

        “What are we?” You asked softly. Gaara breathed a very light, almost inaudible, sigh, as he lessoned the force of his hands pressing against your shoulders.

        “How long have you had them.” He asked again. You were still shocked over Gaara’s transformation to be angry at the fact that he ignored your own question, and besides, maybe he really did want to help.

        “Since this morning, since I woke up.” You grumbled. He continued to silently stare at you, as he seemed to ponder something.

        “So I was right.” He muttered. You shot him a confused frown, which he ignored. “Is there anything else that seems ‘different’?” You stared at him for a moment, processing his question and recalling this morning’s events, though, you wished that he would tell you why he was asking about this stuff.

        “I’m hungrier, my balance is off, my eyes feel different, and my ears, tail, and teeth hurt like hell.” He stood there calmly, once again thinking about your answer, though this time taking longer than before.

        “They’ll stop hurting in the morning.”

        “Why are they hurting in the first place?”

        “The pain means they’re still growing.” He stood there for another moment. “That must’ve been why you didn’t notice your tail was showing.” He mumbled, as he slowly removed his hands from your shoulders, and took a few steps back from you, freeing you from his grasp and now allowing you to move. You took a couple steps away from the wall, and you glared at him as he placed his hands in his pocket. You looked down to the ground, avoiding Gaara’s stare as much as possible.

        “How did you know I was… like you?” You mumbled, hoping that he would answer your question this time. He paused.

        “I sensed something off this morning, which is why I was at school early. The moment you set foot in Kakashi’s classroom, I knew you… changed. But I wanted to be sure, so I started following you. You made it pretty obvious to tell right away.” You frowned. Well that explains his strange behavior and why I’ve felt more paranoid than usual. “I still followed you the rest of the day, to make sure you didn’t expose us, which you almost did a moment ago.” You snorted, annoyed that he was blaming you for something you didn’t know would, or could, happen, and scowled at him.

       “It’s not like I knew that my tail was gonna grow, okay? I don’t even know why I have it in the first place.” He stood there for another moment, not once taking his eyes off you.

        “Who are your parents?” You flinched at his sensitive question, and quickly averted your eyes to the ground, crossing your arms and taking on an annoyed look. You scoffed.

        “Whatever. Fine, don’t answer my other questions and ask stupid new ones.” You mumbled, trying to hide your discomfort as best as you could, though it wasn’t working as well as you hoped. “Why do you wanna know them anyway?” You asked with a very small hint of sorrow, that you yourself didn’t hear.

        “Who. Are. They.” You again winced at the question. You tilted your head down, letting some of your (H/L) (H/C) hair cover some of your face. You stayed silent, until you mustered up enough courage to tell him the truth.

        “I don’t know, okay?” You whispered sadly. You wished that he didn’t hear you, though, you knew it was far fetched, since his heightened senses must’ve heard you loud and clear, and you were right.

        “What do you mean.” His same stern tone never faltered as he demanded an answer. You felt your blood start to boil all throughout your body, and you had to grit your teeth to keep from exploding. He was doing this because he thought he could control you, make you say anything he wanted, no matter how personal or private it was. He was trying to control you, and you wouldn’t stand idly by and let him get away with it.

        “What do you think it means.” You spat out, still not making eye contact with him. Gaara clearly sensed your apprehension, and judging by the lack of response, you assumed he figured out that you wouldn’t be as cooperative as he thought.

        “Do you live with anyone.”

        “No.” You stated, anger still present in your tone. You gulped, and hesitated before continuing. “… I live alone.” You stood there, still refusing to look into his eyes as he in turn stared at your form, once again in thought.

        “That makes this easier then.” He muttered so you wouldn’t hear him, but your hearing wasn’t as dull as he thought it was. The only good thing about this transformation was that your senses were keener, including your hearing. You stared at him in utter disbelief, your rage increasing tenfold. You snarled, but quickly regained most of your composure as you decided that you just couldn’t take it anymore, you simply had enough. You were too emotionally and physically drained, and being around Gaara a second longer would make everything worse, you wanted to leave. You turned around, about to walk through the maze of alleys, since you couldn’t go out in public with your tail and ears showing, and you were too angry to bother taking the time to hide them. However, before you could leave, you were stopped by Gaara’s loud, threatening, animalistic growl.

        “Where do you think you’re going.” You turned and faced him with a glare and growl of your own, and a lash of your pure white tail, which only angered him more.

        “Home, idiot. Away from you.” You swerved back around, about to walk off again, but you were quickly stopped by a sudden tight grip on your wrist, forcing you to once again turn around and meet Gaara’s narrowed green eyes.

        “You are not leaving.” You glared back at him, not intimidated by his warning at all.

        “And what makes you the boss of me?”

        “The very moment you got these ears and tail.” He said in a raised, seething voice. Your eyes widened in shock and fury, but his piercing, threatening glare never left your form for a second, and it was one of the things keeping you locked in place. A moment of silence followed, neither of you moving or saying anything else. “Where do you live.” He asked in a lower tone. It snapped you out of your stunned trance, and your rage replaced your shock.

        “Let go of me!” You tried pulling your wrist out of his hand, but he only tightened his grip in response.

        “Where do you live.” He demanded in a more raised, stern tone. You paused your struggling, causing him to lower his guard just enough. You seized the opportunity, and yanked your wrist from his tight grasp. You continued to glare at him as you rubbed your now sore and bruised wrist, but after another moment of silently staring at each other, you turned your head away from him and sighed.

        “If you must know, I live in an apartment, which is where I was already going, until you came along.” You grumbled furiously, still averting your gaze from his, not wanting to look him in the eyes at this point.

        “Show me.” You snapped your head in his direction, and stared at him incredulously.

        “What!? Why would I show you where I live?”

        “Show me to your apartment.” He demanded. Your eyes narrowed, and you glared at him for a long silent, moment, not showing any signs of giving in to his demands, but you were honestly not sure what to do. There was something in the very back of your mind, something foreign and new, that actually wanted to listen to him, and to just give in and do as he says. It felt like some kind of instinct, and you didn’t know what it was or why it was there in your head, but you felt like it was messing with your mind somehow, and you didn’t like it. I don’t want to just give in to his commands, but really, what else is there to do? I don’t think I can handle this whole whatever this is, on my own. He’s obviously the same thing I am, whatever we are, so he’s the only one that I can trust at this point. Maybe he really is trying to help me, in his own way. And, now that I think about it, as much as I hate to admit this, but if it wasn’t for him, someone could’ve actually seen my tail if he didn’t drag me into this alleyway, and I could’ve been… Although, he didn’t have to be so extreme about it, and he also didn’t have to be so demanding either. But, still, although I’m kind of grateful for what he did, I won’t submit to him like I’m some weak little defenseless pup, wait child… Dammit now my mind is being affected by this ‘change’. Ugh! What do I do? …At this point, is there really any other choice? You sighed loudly, as you made your decision.

        “You’re not gonna leave me alone, even if I say no, are you?” You asked, though you already knew the answer. His stoic expression didn’t change, and his emotionless eyes remained locked with your (E/C) ones, as he continued to stare at you, silent. You sighed again. “Fine. I’ll show you to my house then.” You grumbled, almost too quietly for anyone normal to hear, but you and Gaara were far from normal. He gave a quiet grunt of approval, and took a few steps back, giving you enough room to lift up your shirt and sweatshirt to wrap your now bigger, thicker tail around your waist. You then walked over to where Gaara threw your hat, picked it up, and placed it back over your ears with a snort of annoyance at having to retrieve it in the first place. Then you went over and picked up your school bag, which had fallen off when Gaara had first slammed you against the wall. Finally, you shoved your hands in your sweatshirt pockets and started walking towards the alleyway entrance, not sparing Gaara a single glance his way. He, however, watched your every movement with slight curiosity, while at the same time making sure you didn’t try and leave his sight. As you passed by him, he followed after you, hands in his pockets as well, and you both stepped out from the shadows of the alleyway to the bright light of the city streets.

        The air between you two was cold and thick as ice. Neither of you said a word to each other, nor did you even glimpse the other’s way, as you both walked through the bustling streets of the city, making your way to your apartment. Weirdly, Gaara was supposed to be following you, but he was walking side by side with you as if he already knew where he was going. It was all completely awkward. What made it worse was that he was way closer to you than you would’ve liked. It was to the point where your black sweatshirts were very nearly touching, and it was almost as if he was making sure you wouldn’t leave his sight. In a way, he was acting almost overprotective, and it honestly pissed you off to no end.

        The two of you continued on, despite the different stares and looks of fear and surprise sent your way as people saw you and Gaara, well, mainly Gaara. Some actually went as far as to cross the street as soon as they laid eyes on the two of you. You ignored all of them, you didn’t care about other people, at least for the moment. You just wanted to get to your apartment as soon as possible so you could finally end and escape the day’s events, and nothing else mattered more than that. Besides, at least they didn’t bother you, nor Gaara for that matter. Although, you barely even noticed the weird and confused stares that directed at you.

        As you neared your apartment, the city seemed to disappear altogether, as this area was a place where no one was ever out, and there was even enough space for grass to grow and you and your neighbors to have decent sized yards. The stares you had been receiving earlier were no longer present in the serene environment, and it felt like some kind of weight was now removed from your shoulders. Still, your sour mood didn’t change one bit, not until you were alone in your apartment, away from Gaara.

        When you finally saw the door to your apartment, you swore you were never more relieved in your entire life. The tension between you and Gaara was really starting to make you uncomfortable, and you were more than happy to not have to endure it any longer.

        “We’re here.” You announced, as you and Gaara reached your door. You stepped in front of him and pulled out your keys, ready to escape this whole ordeal the very moment you unlocked the door. However, right before you could insert the key into the lock, you heard Gaara’s raspy monotone voice from behind you.

        “Do you plan on leaving your house at all tonight.” He asked. You halted your movements, the key hovering just a centimeter in front the keyhole. You still faced the door, refusing to look back at him, as you gave your answer.

        “What do you think. No.” Your tone was cold, but it didn’t matter to Gaara one bit. He could honestly care less about how angry you were, that wasn’t what he was concerned about.

        “Good.” You snorted. Of course that’s why he asked, he’s trying to be a glorified babysitter, who ‘has to keep an eye on me’ if I’m not inside my own home. Asshole. Out of the corner of your eyes, you saw him turn around and start to head back to the streets without another word. He had finally left you alone. You wasted no more time and shoved the key into the lock, unlocked the door, and finally entered your silent apartment, quietly shutting the door behind you.

        You weren’t able to control your pent up emotions any longer. You threw your stuff all the way across the living room, not caring that you almost broke your window or that your phone was still in your bag. You leaned up against your door, and slowly slid down to the floor, the stress from today really starting to sink in. You tightened your tail, which was still underneath your shirt, around your waist, hugged your legs together, and buried your head in the crook of your knees. The events from earlier replayed in your mind nonstop, and your jumbled thoughts frantically rushed through your head.

        Stupid Gaara and his stupid controlling shit. I still don’t know what’s going on, I don’t know what I am, what we are, and he won’t explain shit to me! He said that he would help, but he’s not helping at all! I don’t know what to do, what to think, I don’t know anything anymore! Are we even human? And I can’t believe he knows where I live now! God, what is wrong with me!? He knows everything while I know nothing, nothing about this, nothing about him, I don’t even really know why he’s trying to ‘help’ me! Does he have ulterior motives? Does he even care? Hell, the worst part about this is it’s not like I can go to anyone else and ask for help! It’s only him I can trust now, there’s no other choice! Dammit! What… what would James say? Could he help? Why am I even thinking this? He’s not even here, and it’s not like I can go back to that hellhole, even if I wanted to, especially since they finally wanted me out. But if he was here, would he still love me? Would he still see me as his little sister… or something else? You suddenly remembered that James’s wolf pendant was still in your pocket, and you took it out, and held it close to your chest. James… I need help. I’m all alone, please… I don’t know what to do… do you still love me?

*Flashback*

        The sound of a door slamming open resonated throughout the house, and it was followed by a loud bang and a crash coming from one of the upstairs room. Your six year old body was now sprawled up against the wooden bed and flooring of your and James’ shared room. Your adoptive mother stood at the doorway, having just thrown you into the room, which was the cause of all the loud noise. She now stared at your pitiful state with pure disgust and anger, and closed the door immediately, the loud slamming sound again echoing off the wooden walls of the house, leaving you alone in the somewhat dark, silent, empty room.

        You had just come back from a recent punishment, cuts and bruises scattered over your small and fragile body. Yet, despite being so badly injured, you didn’t cry or cower like any other six year old would. You had been through punishments like these so many times, you no longer showed much emotion, you wouldn’t even cry anymore, because when you did, it only made things worse. Compared to those moments, this was nothing.

        You tried to stand up from your awkward, sprawled out position, but you must’ve twisted your ankle when you hit the bed, since it gave out when you applied pressure on it. The door opened again, but this time much more quietly and slowly, to reveal a six year old James, who had arrived just in time to see you fail at an attempt to stand up, and hit the floor on your stomach with a thump and an ‘oof!’. He looked down at you with sorrow filled eyes, and quietly closed the door behind him, the small noise causing you to look up from the floor. You saw James walk over to you, and you managed to quickly sit yourself up as he now stood in front of you.

        “James? I thought you were supposed to be downstairs?” You asked in a worried, yet slightly saddened tone.

        “I heard it from all the way down there.”

        “But, they’ll-“

        “(Y/N).” He slowly drew out the syllables of your name. You said nothing else, knowing that when he said your name like that, there was no way you could change his mind on anything. He gave a disheartened sigh as he knelt down and carefully slipped his arms underneath you. He gently picked you up, making sure that your ankle and your other wounds didn’t hurt as he did so, and carried you to the other side of the room. He set you down next to a grey container full of water, where a rag hung on the side. He carefully slid your dirty plain shirt off of you, grabbed the rag, wet it, and started rubbing it on your back over your many wounds with ease.

        You and James would often clean each other’s wounds after either of you were punished to help them heal faster. The container of water and the rag was actually supposed to be used to wash your clothes, but you and James used it for remedial uses as well since your adoptive parents didn’t keep any medical supplies around, except for themselves and James’s heart medicine, which were of no use to you and James in terms of injury. Granted, the water wasn’t always clean because of this, but it was still better than leaving your wounds untreated. It was the best you both could do, and besides, the water always felt nice against your heated and damaged skin, like now for instance, and you knew James felt the same way.

        James studied all the cuts and bruises on your back as he rewet the rag, and he very gently glided his fingers across every one of them, careful that he didn’t cause any pain. He smiled sadly at your back, as he, now more slowly, rubbed the rag against your wounds.

        “You’re so strong.” He said in a soft, comforting tone. He sighed. “You really are my little dragon, my tough little dragon, aren’t you.” You looked over your shoulder and stared at him with wide (E/C) eyes, as he continued to work at your back and now sides. A light pink dusted your cheeks, as you swiftly turned your head away from him again. You knew what he was trying to say. You had only been living with your adoptive parents for a year, and you had already ‘grown accustomed’ to their harsh and cruel ways, including the punishments. You never cried, never made any noise of pain, and never gave them the satisfaction of seeing your true emotions. You always took the pain with the acceptance that you couldn’t do anything about it. But, despite all that, your sanity was still in tact, you had never once cracked under your adoptive parents’ tyranny, you never gave up. James always told you that it was a miracle you could even smile anymore, at least around him. To be honest, you were surprised that he could smile around you. He had lived with your adoptive parents, his real parents, five years longer than you had, yet he still found some way to be happy, at least when he was with you. Although, just like yourself, he should’ve still lost his happiness and sanity a long time ago, more so than you.

        James slipped your shirt back on while you were still lost in your thoughts, not noticing what he was doing until you had to put your arms through your sleeves. Making sure your shirt was smoothed out, he turned you around to face him.

        “There. Better, right?” He smiled, but soon curiously cocked his head to the side, as he saw your still disheartened expression. He had noticed that you had been less talkative and more down than usual the whole time he was with you, and he thought that maybe this certain punishment must’ve gotten to you more than the others. He smiled, trying to comfort you. “It’s okay (Y/N).” He raised his hand to your cheek to stroke it. “It’s over now. It’s-” He stopped talking, and his smile disappeared, as you winced when his fingers came into contact with your skin. You averted your gaze to the wooden floor, not wanting to look into his sad light chocolate brown eyes out of shame. His hand hovered over where he just touched you, and that’s when he noticed how red your cheek was, and he knew it wasn’t because you were just blushing. He lowered his hand back down to his side, and continued to stare at your crestfallen form, now knowing exactly what had happened to make you act this way. “(Y/N)? Did she slap you?” Your eyes darted up to his for a split second, then lowered back down to the floor out of embarrassment. Your reaction told him everything, and he sighed. Slapping was always something that seemed to impact you more than anything, and James knew this very well. You didn’t know why you were so terrified, you couldn’t remember a time before that would’ve caused this fear, but it still always made you feel weak to admit it. Nonetheless, James had always accepted this about you, that it was just the way you were, and he had always told you that it was okay, that there was nothing wrong with this, and that there was nothing to be ashamed of. Unfortunately, none of his comforting words could get rid of your fear, and you still had your moments every time one of your adoptive parents slapped you, just like this one.

        James placed his hand under your chin, and tilted your head up so your (E/C) eyes now gazed into his empathetic brown ones. He was smiling sweetly at you, and it only made you want to look away from him more. He leaned down, and placed a long, soft, gentle kiss on your still stinging cheek. “There, do you feel better now?” You nodded your head, as he wrapped his small arms around your tiny waist and pulled you into his lap for a hug. You hugged him back and nuzzled your head against his chest as he rested his chin on your head. You closed your eyes, and smiled against his shirt, as he shut his eyes as well. He sighed. “I love you (Y/N), my sister. I always will, no matter what happens my little dragon. I’ll always love you.”

*End of Flashback*

 

          You felt something wet dripping down your cheek, and you lifted your hand to see that a tear had escaped your eye. You quickly wiped the tear away, not leaving any trace of it behind. You promised yourself that you wouldn’t cry, not anymore. You promised that you would be strong, you had to be strong, for James. You put the metal chain of the pendant around your neck, locking it in place, and you shakily forced yourself up off the floor. You slowly trudged over to where you threw your stuff and picked it up. You may be dealing with ‘issues’, but you still had homework to do, even if you weren’t in the right state of mind to focus on school right now, you still had to do it nonetheless, though you still didn’t bother to check your phone. You took off your sweatshirt and hat, and threw those on your couch, but not without taking Kimchi out and setting her on the coffee table first. You let your tail and ears stretch out for the first time today, then turned your TV on for some background noise in your otherwise silent apartment, and begrudgingly started your homework.

          By the time you were done, it was already getting dark outside, and you were exhausted. You had been right, you couldn’t focus on your homework the entire time, and normally the work that was once easy to do now gave you a headache, only adding on to your still sore new wolf-like parts. Although, you at least felt that your work was… ‘adequate’ for someone going through the problems you had anyway.

        As you were putting your homework away, your stomach rumbled and growled from hunger. Oh yeah, big appetite. Almost forgot about that. You went to your kitchen, grabbed a lot of random, yet reasonable, food items from your fridge, and set them on your table. To your surprise, and slight horror, you wolfed everything down in only a couple minutes. Jeez! At this rate, I’ll have to go grocery shopping every other day. I really hope I can afford that. Honestly, after the day you’ve had, money was the least of your worries, at least for the time being.

        After cleaning everything up, you decided to watch whatever was on your TV to try and distract yourself from, not only your sore limbs and aching head, but everything else that had happened today. You flopped down on the couch, layed your tail off to your left, kept your hands by your sides, and just leaned back as much as you could into the softness of the cushions. The glow of the TV seemed to blind your eyes, since the rest of your apartment was completely dark, but you still sat there, trying to drown your mind in the world of television, and somehow calm your restless emotional nerves. But it didn’t work, your mind still wouldn’t let you focus on anything besides your own troubling thoughts, the sounds of the TV barely even being heard.

        When you realized that there was nothing you could do to try and ease your mind, you decided to go straight to bed, figuring that at least some rest would help you calm down. You turned off the TV, grabbed Kimchi, who was still sitting on the coffee table, and lazily ambled off to your room. You collapsed on your bed without getting under your blankets or even changing into more comfortable pajamas, you didn’t even take the pendant off from around your neck. You just lied there in your black shirt and sweatpants, curled up in a ball, with your white tail wrapped around your body hiding some of your face, and looking out the window to the beautiful scenery that sent you to sleep every night. Except for this one. This was the first night where it wasn’t the view of your window that lulled you into sleep, but your tired, overwhelmed mind that became too much, when your eyes eventually shut.

        The alarm woke you up at 6:00 am. like every other morning, though this one was obviously far from ordinary. Your tired eyes were forced opened at the annoying sound, wanting desperately to lower themselves again for just five more minutes. You had barely slept at all last night. You didn’t have any dreams or nightmares, there was nothing but restless darkness, and you often woke up during the middle of the night due to the stress that was constantly on your mind.

         You sluggishly hit the button on your alarm clock to stop its constant beeping, then you forcefully pushed yourself up with your arms and sat upright on the bed. You noticed that your ears, tail, and teeth were no longer sore, and upon closer examination, you saw that your tail had grown just a little more since last night, about another inch in length and a few more in width, and your white fur looked a little thicker and softer as well. You placed your hand on top of your head, and started caressing your ears, which had seemed to grow as well. You licked your teeth and found they had grown as well, about another centimeter, and they felt sharper than yesterday. So Gaara was right, they did grow more, and since the pain stopped they must be done now. Freaking finally.

        You rubbed your heavy lidded, drowsy eyes, and slowly placed your feet on the floor. You stood up, making sure that you didn’t lose your balance like you did yesterday and proceeded to get ready for school. You didn’t bother to shower or even change your clothes, as you really didn’t care if you and your clothes were dirty or not. Instead, you worried more about hiding your parts. You wrapped your tail around your waist as tight as you could, pulled your pants up to hide some of the thick white fur that stuck out from your tail, put your sweatshirt on to completely cover it, then grabbed Kimchi and put her on your shoulder, where she burrowed herself into your sweatshirt. Lastly, you grabbed your hat and slipped it over your ears, and since they were bigger and thicker than before, it was a tight fit, but you managed to make it comfortable for the time being.

        You walked into your bathroom and checked yourself in the mirror to see if you hid everything well. You definitely looked… exhausted. Maybe it was because your eyesight was better, but you could see huge bags under your eyes, your face was still paler than usual, and your stature itself seemed slouched, which caused you to try and straighten yourself up once you saw this. You were never a makeup person, it wasn’t like you had the money to buy it before or even cared about it anyway, so you had no way to cover up anything that made you look different than your usual self. You sighed, and your stomach growling drew you out of your thoughts, so you chose to ignore your appearance and made your way to the kitchen.

        When you arrived you made two pancakes with butter and syrup, sausage, bacon, and you also grabbed a big glass of orange juice. You set your breakfast on the table, sat down, and began to devour your breakfast. Not surprisingly, you were done in a matter of minutes, and you then proceeded to make and pack your lunch for today. You went into your living room and decided to watch TV until you had to leave, or at least until you started to fall asleep again. You were surprisingly fine for almost a whole hour, though your eyes still felt a little droopy, but you were sure you would be more awake once you got to school. That’s when shit seems to happen nowadays.

        You turned off the TV, grabbed all of your stuff, and opened the door to go outside. When you closed the door to your apartment, you turned to start heading out, only to see Gaara standing a mere few feet away, hands in his pockets and giving you his usual scowling expression. You jumped and stumbled back out of surprise, but luckily you steadied yourself by placing a hand on your door before you could trip and fall. You were breathing heavily due to your still shocked state, which Gaara watched with a faint hint of curiosity, and what you swore was the slightest bit amusement.

        “Jeez Gaara, don’t- wait. What the hell are you even doing here!?” You yelled as you came to your senses, your breathing now becoming more regular. He snorted.

        “What do you think.” You stared at him incredulously. Is he walking me everywhere now?

        “Oh come on!” You whined. “I didn’t exactly expect you to be here-“

        “Well you should have.”

        “What! How!? Wait, when did you even get here?”

        “Is that really important.” He asked, and if he had eyebrows, he would’ve raised one.

        “Uh let’s see, you were standing outside my apartment for who knows how long, YES it’s important!” He gave an annoyed grunt.

        “It doesn’t matter.” You let out a defeated groan. It was too early in the morning to get into a stupid argument with him. Besides, a headache was already starting to form, and you had no intention of making it worse. “You should’ve been able to sense me though.”

        “Well, I wasn’t exactly looking for you, or anyone else for that matter.” You mumbled. He quietly hummed in thought.

        “I guess we’ll work on that later then.”

        “Wait, what?” But before you had the chance to question him any further, he already started walking ahead of you. He checked to see if you were following, and with one long final sigh, you caught up to him. His followed you the entire time, and he turned his head back over his shoulder and started walking with you, side by side, just as you both had done yesterday.

        Neither of you said anything else to each other, not a single word. All that was there was the same silence and tension as before, only now, you felt more defeated, or really, trapped, since you felt that this time you were really following Gaara, and that he was leading you, even though you both were going to the same place. It made you feel more dependent for some reason, and you didn’t like it. You felt weak for allowing this to happen, but at this point, you couldn’t do anything about it.

        The day was ironically sunny, the exact opposite of your crappy mood. The heat was beating down on your black sweatshirt, and the only reason you weren’t sweating your ass off was because of the slight breeze that blew some refreshing cool air your way. At least the universe isn’t totally against me. You thought as you kept walking, hands in your pockets, actually liking something about this morning. Though it was short lived, as you were starting to come across people who began to stare at you and Gaara in frightened, confused, and questioning faces. What made it worse was you were getting more looks than you did before, more people surprised that you, another person, was seen even near Gaara, much less walking with him. It was uncomfortable, and it started to remind you of when you were at your old school: the stares, the whispers, the rumors, the teasing, the taunting, the beatings, all those memories started to come back to you. You shook your head, discarding those thoughts aside, for now.

        When you arrived at school, the stares of the students were worse than the ones of the people in the city. Some of the groups that were usually there on the front lawn gasped when they saw you and Gaara, and started to whisper to each other as you two passed by them. But, despite being able to clearly hear them, you ignored the groups of students, and continued to walk down the sidewalk path and eventually through the front door.

         As soon as they saw you two, they stopped talking and stared at you two, some whispering amongst themselves in a frantic manner. It wasn’t hard to figure out what they were saying, even without special hearing. You somehow ignored these people as well, or you tried as best as you could, as you walked through the familiar busy hallways.

          You and Gaara reached Kakashi’s classroom rather quickly, and when Gaara opened the door, he stepped inside with you following suit. As you entered the classroom, you saw the now pale faces of your friends, who were all sitting in their usual seats, sending you shaky smiles while at the same time quickly darting short glances Gaara’s way, except for Sasuke, who looked at the both of you questioningly. Even though she was nervous, Ino waved at you, and happily motioned for you to come and sit with the rest of them. You were about to go join them, that is, until you heard a very low, threatening growl from Gaara that only you could hear. You understood exactly what that growl meant, and you didn’t even need your new senses to figure it out. Don’t even think about going near them. You looked at Gaara, to see that he had stopped walking was now looking over his left shoulder, eyes narrowed, glaring directly at you. You looked back to your friends, gave them an apologetic, timid smile, and before any of them, especially Ino, could say anything, you turned and started off after Gaara, leaving all of them speechless. When Gaara saw that you were walking behind him again, he turned his head back over his shoulder, and resumed his path to his desk like nothing had happened. You shot one last glance at your friends, and noticed something different, or rather, missing. Naruto was no where to be seen. Pushing that thought aside for now, you quickly caught up to Gaara, angered at the fact that he had just made a scene in front of everyone.

        “What the hell do you want!?” You whisper yelled.

        “Just sit down first.” He said sternly. You growled under your breath in response. He had better explain something, or I’m seriously gonna kick his ass in front of the whole class, school, hell even the whole damned city! Despite your raging thoughts, and using all of your self-control to not ‘do anything rash’, you managed to suppress your anger and continued to follow Gaara to your seat, ignoring the whispers of your classmates that were obviously centered about what had just happened. When you made it to your seat, you placed your stuff at the side of your desk, and sat down. You instantly turned your head to Gaara, who was looking at the front of the class, not even paying attention to you, which only pissed you off more than you already were.

        “So what was that all about?” You whispered, trying to hold in the snarl that threatened to escape your throat. Without even looking at you, he gave a tiny snort as his answer. You scowled. “Fine, then if you actually need me for something, I’ll be over there with my friends-”          

        “Don’t even think about it.” He growled.

        “That’s what I thought, so what the hell is your problem?” Again, he growled.

        “You’re not going over there.”

        “Why not!? They’re my friends!”

        “I don’t care.”

        “I do.”

        “…I still don’t care.”

        “Then why do you care if I’m just going across the room to talk to people?”

        “Because you don’t need to.” You were utterly appalled. Who does he think he is! “Don’t forget about your mistake yesterday, the one that almost exposed us.” He said in a deeper, firmer voice. So that’s what this is about!?

        “So you don’t trust me to be five feet away from you because of something I didn’t even know would happen, happened?” You asked sarcastically.

        “Exactly. You’re new, there’s a lot of things you don’t know about.”

        “That you won’t even tell me!”

        “This isn’t the place to discuss everything, and neither was yesterday.” You were about to say something in response, but he cut you off. “Since you don’t know much, I have to keep an eye on you, so deal with it.” Your nose scrunched in anger, but you dared not say the string of curses that threatened to leave your mouth, for the tone in his voice warned you not to test him any further, and you wouldn’t, not too much, at least for now.

        “And how are you gonna ‘keep an eye on me’, when we don’t have all the same classes together?” You asked smugly, glad you finally caught him at his own game, or so you thought.

        “I’m taking care of that.” You grew quiet, staring at him in confusion.

        “What do you mean?” You asked worriedly.

        “You’re switching your classes to mine.” You were stunned, and your eyes widened a considerable amount.

        “Wha- no! I’m not changing classes!”

        “Yes, you are.”

        “No, I’m not. I picked them, I like them… relatively speaking, and I stay in them. Period.” He heaved a long heavy sigh, and closed his eyes in thought.

        “Fine.” You inwardly exhaled a breath of relief. Gaara then opened his eyes again. “I’ll switch mine.”

        “What!?” You stared at him again in utter shock. “N-No! No one’s switching classes!”

        “It’s either you switch yours, or I switch mine.” You continued to stare at him, anger beginning to rise once again.

        “Don’t you think that, I don’t know, you’re going a bit overboard?”

        “No.” His eyes finally met yours. They had a threatening gleam to them, daring you to speak further against him. You rolled your own eyes and scoffed.

        “Ugh, whatever.” You grumbled, as you crossed your arms on your desk and layed your head down on them, placing your right cheek in the crook of your arms so that your head faced away from Gaara. You were just too tired and too mad to deal with him any longer. He hummed.

        “That’s what I thought.” You snorted at his comment. There was a pause of silence, until Gaara spoke up again. “Although, unfortunately, the earliest I can switch them is tomorrow, so your classes will still be the same, only for today. That’s it.”

         “Well thank gosh for something good today then.” You mumbled as quietly as you could, but you knew he had heard you loud and clear, though he didn’t do anything about it.

         The bell rang, cutting into the tense silence between you and Gaara, and soon right after, you heard the door open. You wondered who it was, since no one ever came into the room once the bell rang. That can’t be Kakashi, he’s never on time. So… who is it? As you turned your head to the door, you thought you saw a familiar tuft of spiky blonde hair rush into the room. Naruto? But he’s usually never late to first period, he’s always at his seat when I get here. He’s also never sick, so he shouldn’t be feeling bad or anything. I wonder what’s up? Your thoughts were interrupted by the door opening once again, and you saw Kakashi standing in the doorway, looking and acting, well, normal, like nothing was wrong, which was strange. Okay, now I know something’s wrong. Technically he’s late, but only by a few seconds… which is still completely insane in every way possible for this man. Everyone in the class was silently staring at him, they as well were shocked to see that Kakashi was unusually on time. He noticed the dead silence of the entire class, and realizing the cause of it, he smiled sheepishly under his mask.

        “Morning class. I… actually made it on time today.” He muttered the last part out as he rubbed the back of his neck. Class had officially begun.

        When the bell rang at the end of the lesson, you looked to see if Naruto was still in the room, but you didn’t see him or his blonde hair like you had earlier. You stared across the room at Naruto’s empty seat curiously. Did he already leave? And so quickly? He usually waits for me. Is it because of Gaara, or something else? What’s going on- Your line of sight was suddenly blocked by Gaara’s black sweatshirt, interrupting your thoughts. You looked up to see his glaring green eyes focused straight ahead, and you figured that he was waiting, rather impatiently it seemed, for you to get out of your seat. You sighed, and started gathering your stuff up.

        “Let me guess, you’re walking me to my classes too.” He gave an annoyed grunt as his answer, which was all you needed to hear. “Of course you are.” You grumbled. “Do you even know my schedule?” You questioned angrily. He looked at you as if the answer was obvious. “You do then, somehow, and I’m guessing you won’t tell me how, either, right?” You asked sarcastically. He just continued to give you that same stoic look. “Of course you won’t.” With one last sigh, you begrudgingly stood up from your chair and followed Gaara down the aisle, out of the room, and into the hallway.

        As soon as you exited the room, you were bombarded with the all too familiar stares and whispers from the students around you. Only now, they were much worse. You could hear the harsh words that many of them said, and you really wish you couldn’t. Even though the distance to your next class wasn’t too far, it felt like the longest walk you ever trekked, and you dreaded the thought of it getting worse as the day grew on.

        When you and Gaara reached Iruka’s room, you subconsciously blew a breath of relief, glad that all of the noise finally stopped, for now. He stood there, watching you, and you realized that he was waiting for you to enter the classroom, he was making sure that you didn’t sneak off to anywhere else. You opened the door, and disappeared into the room without a single glance back, knowing that Gaara was already leaving. Right when you were about to turn away from the door and head to your seat, without warning, someone grabbed your left wrist. You were too startled to see who it was, as they hurriedly dragged you up the aisle of desks. They quickly, yet carefully, pushed you down in your seat, and you looked up to see Ino nervously staring down at you. You shot quick glances to the seats surrounding you to see Choji and Shikamaru giving you the same looks as Ino. You noticed that Naruto wasn’t here either, but you would worry about that later, since that wasn’t your main concern at the moment.

        “Ino, why’d you do that!?” You only half yelled so as not to draw attention to yourself. She shot a nervous glance to the door, sighed a breath of relief, and sat down in her own seat. You were giving her a confused look the entire time, but she seemed to ignore it.

        “Good. He’s not coming in here.” She whispered, more to herself than to anyone else. Oh, you were trying to get me away from the door, in case Gaara came in and made me avoid you guys again… like last period. She suddenly turned her now serious gaze to you, and you thought you saw concern in her wide, light blue eyes. “What was that all about last period!?” She whisper yelled at you. Oh no.

        “Calm down. It’s alright-“

        “It’s not all right! Not when all I’ve been hearing, and seeing, this morning that my friend is all of a sudden changed and is now hanging out with someone as dangerous as Gaara, when they, just the other day, hated each other. A-And, and…”

        “Ino. Calm down.” Shikamaru eased her. Ino started taking deep breaths, trying to relax as best as she could. “(Y/N), Ino just told us what happened last period.”

        “Yeah, and we’ve been hearing stuff all morning too.” Choji added. Ino finally seemed to come out of her scatterbrain state and was now able to speak.

        “And we wanna know what’s really going on, from you.” Ino said. When you stayed silent and didn’t answer, she sighed. “We just… wanna make sure you’re okay. You were acting weird yesterday, and then Gaara of all people is suddenly with you, and you’re following him, and… we just, you know…” You couldn’t help the slight twitch of your lips that formed a smile, just for a millisecond. They really care. You took on as calm a demeanor as you could pull, and tried to speak in that same kind of tone as well.

        “Guys, I’m fine. Really, it’s nothing to worry about.”

        “Well, it sure seems like something to worry about.” Choji said.

        “Yeah, it’s not like this is anywhere near normal, you know. Well, at least not for you.” Shikamaru agreed.

        “Trust me. It’s no big deal. Hey, where’s Naruto?” You tried to change the subject to avoid further conversation about you and Gaara, and at the same time you wanted to know what was wrong with Naruto, and you figured that they may have those answers.

        “Come on (Y/N), we know what you’re trying to-” Shikamaru was cut off by Choji.

        “Actually, he’s not here Shikamaru. Even you have to admit that it’s a little weird for Naruto to skip.”

        “Yes, but-“

        “Well, he was here this morning. He was late last period, but he was still here, and I thought I saw him take off right when the bell rang too. I don’t know why he looked like he was in such a rush though.” So I really did see him. Then why is he acting so strange? Hmmm. You started to zone out, lost in thought, until Shikamaru snapped you out of it.

        “Back to you (Y/N).” He said impatiently, while looking at you with a stern expression. He raised a brow, waiting for some kind of reaction from you, but most importantly, he wanted answers. You gave an apologetic, guilty smile. “Seriously. There’s obviously something going on. I know you were fine when we went cloud watching on Saturday, so something happened between when I left the park to the moment you stepped foot in the school yesterday to cause you to act as weird as you did. And to top that off, you then leave the school and then suddenly the next day you’re awfully close to Gaara. It’s not a coincidence that both of those things happened one right after the other in two very close time periods, so they must be tied together. Something big happened that’s now made you and Gaara close, just, what is it (Y/N)?” You gulped. Damn. I knew you, Neji, and Shino were already suspicious of me before Gaara even came into the picture, but this is just… wow. He’s acting like a full blown detective. If I don’t watch my back, they might figure it out. They were all staring at you,, waiting for your answer, with Shikamaru giving you the most questioning, yet concerned filled one out of all of them. You stayed silent as you sat there, trying to think of something that you could actually say, and that they’d actually believe. But eventually you sighed, failing to think of a good lie to tell them.

          “Look, I swear that I’m okay. It’s just, that, uh…” A loud ringing sound prevented you from finishing your sentence, and on instinct, you all sat forward and faced the front of the class, where Iruka was beginning to stand to start the class. You were literally just saved by the bell.

          As the lesson carried on, you would see Choji, Ino, and Shikamaru giving you anxious glances, with curiosity, though mainly worry, shown in their eyes. Shikamaru would sometimes stare for a longer period of time, observing you the best he could, trying to figure out what your secret might be. You realized then and there that you had to be more careful around Shikamaru, and the ones who were just as suspicious as he was.

        Naruto never showed up for the entire class. He was nowhere to be seen, you even checked the rest of the room to make sure he wasn’t sitting somewhere else. You didn’t hear the door open or close once, yet you still sent quick glances at Naruto’s seat, only to find it empty every time. This is so unlike him, he should be here… there’s definitely something wrong.

        When the bell rang again, signaling the end of class you grabbed your stuff as fast as you could, rushed out goodbyes, shot out of your seat, and shuffled down the aisle and out the classroom with all the other students before Ino, Choji, or Shikamaru could try and interrogate you more. As you entered the hallway, you were surprised to see Gaara leaned up against the wall to your right, already impatiently waiting for you. His eyes traveled to you, and that was your signal to start heading with him towards Orochimaru’s class. He pushed himself off the wall, and when he was walking next to you so quickly, you growled under your breath.

        “How’d you even get here so fast?” You muttered.

         “I’m not that far away from your class.”

        “Of course you’re not.” You muttered as quietly as you could. There was an awkward, tension filled silence for a few moments.

        “You’re still going to sit with those friends you usually sit with.” You snapped your head in his direction, not believing what you had just heard. You tried searching his face for any kind of emotion, a sign, something to tell you what he was thinking, but his emotionless eyes remained locked forward, nothing but his signature scowl was shown. After everything else that’s happened today, you didn’t exactly trust him, or at least not completely.

        “What’s the catch?” You asked suspiciously. From the way you’ve been acting this morning, I doubt that you’d just say that I can actually socialize with my friends, and then just leave it at that like it’s no longer a big deal for you.

        “Nothing.” You raised an eyebrow, wanting to know why he was being ‘generous’ all of a sudden. He noticed your puzzled expression, and glanced your way. “You’ll be working the whole time, so I doubt you’ll be able to talk much with them, and I can still keep an eye on you. There shouldn’t be any problems to worry about.” Of course you’d say something like that. But why do I have a feeling there’s another reason for this… “I thought you’d be happy about this little ‘freedom’.”

        “I am.” He grunted.

        “You don’t seem like it.”

        “It’s just… nevermind.” You turned your head away, not wanting to bother questioning him any further. It was the most information he told you all day, and you were at least somewhat happy with that, no matter what it was for, though you wished you could get more out of him. He hummed, and you continued on your way to class.

        When you reached Orochimaru’s room, Gaara opened the door for you and you both walked inside. You slightly quickened your pace, and walked over to Shino, Kiba, and Hinata, who were all sitting at your usual group table. Upon seeing you, Kiba looked up from his work and sent you a small smile and wave, which was quite unlike the usually overly energetic dog boy you’ve come to know so well. Shino and Hinata, noticing Kiba’s actions, looked up as well, with Shino giving a nod of his head as acknowledgement, and Hinata smiling her usual nervous smile, though something seemed different about them. Well, at least they’re acting… sort of normal. But that all changed when they saw Gaara walking behind you. They all seemed to tense up as he started to walk down the aisle, even Shino was awfully still. You ignored their anxious states, and sat down next to Hinata like you always did, which thankfully drew most of their attention back to you.

        “Hey (Y/N). Feeling better today?” Kiba asked with an unusual softness in his voice, the opposite of his usual loud and excited one.

        “Yeah, I feel fine Kiba.”

        “Y-You just s-seemed s-so, so… d-d-different y-yesterday. A-Are you s-sure y-you’re okay?” Hinata stuttered. The corners of your lips twitched up into a slight smile, knowing that they were trying to look out for you, just like Ino, Choji, and even suspicious Shikamaru had been doing.

        “I swear it.” You replied, surprised that you were able to have sincerity in your voice. However, not everyone bought it. Shino kept on staring at you through his sunglasses, which you couldn’t see through, but you could tell he was observing your behavior closely. After all, he was one of the ones who was already suspicious of you yesterday, and you were sure that he, and frankly everyone else, had heard something about you and Gaara that probably only made it worse.

        “Well, it’s good that you’re feeling better today then.” Shino said, seeming to be done with his examination of you. 

        “Yeah, it’s great that we’ve got our wolf girl back!” Kiba’s voice rose back to its normal excited self, but that only made what he just unintentionally did worse. Shit! How could I forget that Kiba’s nickname for me is wolf girl!? You felt eyes boring holes into the back of your head, and it wasn’t hard to figure out who’s they were. Aaaand I’m in trouble. Your face paled with fear, and you tried to keep a look of worry off your face as Gaara continued to glare daggers at you. The one time he lets me hang with my friends. Great. You felt his eyes eventually leave your form, and you inwardly sighed a breath of relief. Wew. That was a close one. You realized that Shino might’ve noticed your odd behavior, and you hoped he didn’t. With your luck, he probably did, but even if that was the case he refused to say anything about it, which was good enough for you at this point.

        You continued to talk with all three of them throughout the class. Thankfully they didn’t mention the rumors that you knew they all heard, probably because they were trying to not make you uncomfortable. You didn’t have to worry about Hinata at all, since she was too shy to say anything that could hurt you in any way, shape, or form, it was really just Shino and Kiba that you were worried about. You didn’t want to talk about Gaara, because for one thing, you didn’t even want to try and explain things. Then there was also the fact that he was sitting at the table directly behind you, and you knew that he could easily hear what you say with his better hearing, and that would not make your relationship with Gaara any better than it already was. But maybe that was why they didn’t talk about the rumors about you and him in the first place, since they knew Gaara was too close to your group for comfort. All in all they proceeded to act as if there was nothing unusual on their minds, even though you knew they were filled to the brim with questions.

        You, Hinata, Shino, and Kiba continued to work all throughout class, not having any more ‘problems’ like the whole ‘wolf girl thing’ earlier. You never thought you’d see the day where you were actually happy to do school work, but you couldn’t help it, it was just so distracting from everything else. Unfortunately, there were only a few days left to work on the project in class, so you would no longer have that distraction, and you’d have to deal with Gaara when the time came. But you didn’t think about it too much, as you wanted to enjoy your temporary break from everything.

          When the bell rang, you put away all of your stuff and started saying your goodbyes to the trio. You glanced over to where Gaara was sitting, but he wasn’t there. He was gone. Your eyes widened for a split second, then quickly lowered to their original height as you walked out of the classroom and into the hallways. You looked all around you, but you didn’t see a single trace of Gaara, so you just decided to start walking on your own without him.

        Where is he? I’m grateful for the small amount of freedom and all, but it’s strange for him to just disappear like this when he doesn’t trust me at all to even walk to my classes. I didn’t even hear or see him the leave room, though maybe I was just too focused on my work, or he’s very skilled at being stealthy, or both. I wonder where he is though, and why would he just vanish without a trace for no apparent reason. I hope this isn’t because of Kiba’s nickname, the last thing I wanna deal with is a pissed off Gaara. Although, it finally feels like I’m getting some space, and I don’t feel like I’m constantly being watched by him. But there’s still something that feels weird, like it’s not over yet. I guess I’ve gotta take advantage of this moment as best as I can, since this is probably the only chance I’ll get a break for a while now. Trying your best to push all of your troubling thoughts aside, you walked down the familiar halls and stairs, all the way to the gym, enjoying the ‘fresh air’ as much as you could.

        When you finally reached the gym, the first thing you did was look around to see if Naruto was anywhere nearby, since he was usually right in front of the locker rooms before you had to go and change for class with Tenten. Wait… oh no! I have to change! SHIT!! What do I do? What do I do? What do I do!? Okay okay wait, calm down. Don’t worry, I’ll think of something, I’ll think of something. I just have to stay calm. You approached the locker rooms, pushing down your worry for now and going back to your original goal of trying to find Naruto. In the slight darkness of the hallway, just past the girls’ locker room, you saw a figure standing against the wall of the gym. Your enhanced vision identified the person as you got closer. It was Gaara, and he was looking straight at you. Surprisingly, it wasn’t in a threatening or angered way like you had expected. He nodded his head to the side, motioning you to come to him. You reluctantly complied, and walked to where he was standing, afraid that he was still mad at you for Kiba’s nickname.

        “You can put your stuff at the wall over there.” He motioned to the wall in front of him.

        “But don’t I have to worry about changing first?”

        “No. I took care of it.” You were now confused, and tilted your head to the side, staring at him. Is that where you were when class ended, to make sure I didn’t have to change? But… how?

        “What do you mean by that?” You asked suspiciously.

        “It means you don’t have to worry about changing.” Yeah, no duh dipshit. I wanna know how you got that to happen. You saw no point in trying to press for more answers, you knew he wouldn’t tell you what he did to get you out of changing, besides give you more vague answers that were of no use to you. You couldn’t believe you were already ‘growing used’ to his stubbornness. “Now come on… wolf girl.” He muttered the last part out. You instantly grew flustered, as he just continued to head towards the gym doors. I knew it!! You quickly pulled yourself together and glared at his back.

        “It’s a nickname he’s called me since we first met!” You yelled in a frustrated tone. He abruptly stopped, and kept his head forward.

        “I know.” He stated monotonously, and started for the doors again. You growled under your breath, but said nothing else, as you followed Gaara into the gym.

        When you entered, you saw the familiar faces of your gym class, and you immediately didn’t feel right at all. You felt like you stood out too much, and really, you did. You and Gaara were the only ones not in a proper uniform. You both wore all black clothing and you your red hat, quite the opposite of the gold and green on everyone else’s uniform. You were about to head to where the girls were lined up, but Gaara stopped you, one look from his eyes telling you to not even think about it. You guessed he didn’t want you wandering too far away from him and talking with Tenten, again keeping you away from your friends. You glared back at him, but nevertheless followed him to where the boys lined up, and stood against the bleachers with him.

        It was all highly uncomfortable. You could feel the stares coming from the other people in the room, and you didn’t even have to look to know. You imagined it must look weird, for a girl without a uniform on, standing with Gaara wearing the same kind of black clothes as he was, where only the boys were supposed to be. Great. One more thing to add to all the gossip around here.

        Oddly, Anko didn’t seem to even care about you and Gaara, since she continued on with her attendance, not once looking your way. Even Guy wasn’t concerned with you, not sparing you a glance as well, even though you were basically on the wrong side of the gym. That must be how you ‘took care of it’ then. You must’ve talked to Anko. That’s what you were doing after third period. But what did you say if no one can find out the reason why I can’t change, or you for that matter? Wait, is she… no. She can’t be like us too. I can’t sense anything about her like I can now with Gaara, plus she would’ve had ears like me and him do, and she obviously doesn’t, since she’s not covering her head, and her hair isn’t big or thick enough to hide something like wolf ears, so she couldn’t be like us. Did he blackmail or threaten her? Possibly, but Anko doesn’t seem like a person to get intimidated by someone like Gaara, or is she? Maybe he lied to her, or maybe there’s something else to this that I don’t know about. What I do know, is that there’s obviously some kind of ‘excuse’ that’s getting us out of changing, but what is it?

        Anko and Guy blew their whistles, signaling that everyone’s free minutes had now started. Usually, you and Tenten would walk over to the guys and talk with them, but you wouldn’t be able to do that today, not unless you wanted to deal with Gaara. You could only stare longingly at Tenten, as she made her way to the usual spot with Neji and Lee meeting her there. You saw Lee look over to you with the same sad, sorrowful expression you had, and you immediately turned your head away from him, averting your eyes to the floor next to you so you didn’t have to look into his big confused, saddened eyes. You shot a quick glance their way, seeing Tenten put a hand on Lee’s shoulder, and guide him away into a group huddle with Neji, who occasionally would send you suspicious and almost calculative looks, the same as Shikamaru and Shino had done.

        You saw them whispering to each other, and you wished you could be over there with them, but… it wasn’t just Gaara holding you back. Even if you could be with them, how would you be able to come up with a believable explanation for not having to change, as well as for the rumors that they, like everyone else by now, had heard about this morning? You sighed, and continued to watch them talk about things you couldn’t hear, when you suddenly realized that Naruto wasn’t there with them. There was absolutely no sign of him. He was late to first period, then sometime during class rushed off to somewhere, never showed up for second period, and now he’s not here for gym. Where the hell is he?

        You heard Anko and Guy blow their whistles again, snapping you out of your thoughts, and you saw the boys already start to run outside. You turned to see Gaara seemingly walking towards them, but he passed by the line of running boys and was now heading for a different direction than the usual exit doors. You curiously followed him, and found that he was walking towards a small side door near the corner of the gym. He opened it, and allowed you to go through first, and just like that, you were outside, a bit aways from the soccer field where the boys were and where the girls were starting up the concrete path that lead to the track. Not one group noticed yours and Gaara’s whereabouts.

         You heard the door close behind you, and you turned around and saw Gaara walking to your left along the building, and you followed suit. He turned the corner and leaned up against the stone wall, unmoving, and looking straight ahead.

         “Is this what you do every time we have gym?” He hummed, which you took as a ‘yes’. You sighed, and walked just a little further past him. You leaned against the building yourself, and slid down the wall until your bottom hit the cool hard pavement. You turned your whole body to your left, and let your left cheek rest against the wall. You wrapped your arms around your legs and moved your head to the crook of your knees, where your eyes began to lower. You were still tired, since you didn’t get much sleep last night, and the position you were in was actually very comfortable, too comfortable to not want to submit to slumber in your current exhausted state. Your head began to drop, and you jerked your head back up once you realized you were about to fall asleep. You had to repeat this action a few times, but it wasn’t enough, for you eventually closed your eyes all the way, and fell into a nice dreamless sleep.

        Gaara noticed you sitting there, weirdly not moving or trying to ask him any questions at all, which is what he was expecting you to. His eyes traveled to your form, and waited for something, anything that he was anticipating. When he received nothing, he fully turned his head to you.

        “What are you-” He stopped himself as he saw your back, rising and falling in a steady manner, signaling that you were fast asleep. He hummed, and turned his head away from you again. He would let you sleep, since he knew that you didn’t get much last night. He sensed your exhaustion ever since this morning, and it wasn’t hard to tell either just by looking at you. He would wake you up in a little bit, just before the rest of the students went inside, so you could get as much rest as you could. He sighed, as he shut his own eyes, the silence of nature, and knowing that you were peacefully sleeping, but most importantly safe, lulled him into a state of relaxation.

        You suddenly awoke to your head snapping up from your knees, your eyes a bit droopy from just waking up. The little time that you were asleep didn’t feel like much, as if only a few seconds had passed, and you still felt tired as hell. You yawned, which seemed to have drawn Gaara’s attention.

“Did you enjoy your nap?” He asked with a very small hint of sarcasm. You tiredly groaned and ignored his comment.

“How long was I out?” You asked, another smaller yawn escaping your lips.

“We have five minutes until we need to go back inside.” You rubbed your still drowsy eyes.

“Oh.”

“I was actually about to wake you up myself since we have to leave soon, so don’t fall back asleep.” You groaned again.

“Whatever.” You mumbled, too tired to come up with a good retort. You sat up straight, and leaned your head more against the wall, unfortunately with a headache starting to form, as you tried to keep yourself awake for the time being.

By the time five minutes passed, you had fully woken up, or as much as any person who didn’t get much sleep could, and Gaara said that it was time to leave. You slowly rose from your spot, and followed him back inside the school, noticing that both the boys and the girls had already gone back inside. You both then proceeded over to the wall where you had set your stuff, picked it up, and continued walking out into the main hallway. Only, instead of the usual bustling and crowding of students like there usually was, the hallways were deserted besides the two of you. “Did the bell ring yet?”

“No.”

“Then why are we here so early then.” When he didn’t answer, you glared and crossed your arms, deciding to move on. “So, we’re ‘allowed’ to be in the hallways, then?” You asked half sarcastically half seriously. He shot you a glance, which you took as ‘Are you dumb?’. You just rolled your eyes and continued walking in the unnaturally empty, silent halls.

Not long after, the bell rang, and almost instantly, the hallways were teeming with students pushing and shoving their way through to get to their next class. By now, you were nearing the staircase that lead to the roof, where you always ate lunch. Why would Gaara be heading this way? Wait… is he? You slowed your pace down so that you were now almost directly behind Gaara, letting him lead now rather than walking with him. Just as you predicted, when he reached the roof staircase, without hesitation, he turned and started heading up the steps. You kept your eyes glued to the back of his head, as he continued to walk up both flights of stairs to the third floor, up the extra set of steps, and finally stop in front of the roof door. He stared at the metal door in front of him, but did nothing to open it, and instead just stood there, silent and unmoving. He waited until you stood next to him, and when you did, you copied his actions, and stared straight ahead at the door, both of you not once looking away from it.

“Show me how you’ve been able to open the door for the past week.” He ordered. I knew it! It was you! You continued to stand there, keeping as calm a composure as you could, refusing to move a muscle. You were not about to show something as personal as James’s pendant to anyone, especially to Gaara.

“You have more experience, I’m sure you can open the door faster than I can.” He shot you a warning glare, but soon looked back at the door.

“Ladies first.” You smirked.

“Yeah, exactly. Be my guest.” He glared at you again.

“Just open the door.” He’s not good with patience, or comebacks, is he?

“Why can’t you do it?”

“Because I told you to open it.”

“So?” You heard a loud threatening growl.

“Open. The door.” The tone in his voice was dangerous, and there was something in the back of your mind that was warning you to just do as he says before you got into trouble, the instinct you had felt since yesterday. Your stubbornness was clashing against this foreign instinct in a heated battle, but after another moment of debating with your own mind, you sighed. It seemed instinct had triumphed over stubbornness.

“Fine.” You grumbled. You reached inside your shirt, grabbed your white wolf pendant that was still around your neck, and held it out in front of you. “Move.” You could tell Gaara wasn’t happy at all with your command, but nonetheless he took a step back and now stood to your left, which allowed you to crouch in front of the door to pick the lock. Gaara watched you intently as you inserted the pointed tail into the lock and fumbled with it like you did everyday. You heard a click in only a few seconds, your own personal best, and stood back up from your crouched position. You gave Gaara a nasty look as you pushed the door open with your right hand. “There. Happy?” He eyed your pendant, observing every detail of it. In fact, he almost looked suspicious about it.

“What is that?” He asked, still not taking his eyes off your pendant.

“What do you think it is?” You asked sarcastically. He glared at you, not at all amused by your answer. You rolled your eyes and sighed. “It’s nothing important. It’s just something that belongs to me. That’s it.” Though your words and tone made your lie sound true, you couldn’t help your eyes convey a different emotion. It felt wrong to say that your pendant was practically worth nothing, even though you were only trying to keep your past a secret. As if reading your mind, Gaara didn’t move, and just kept staring at you. He knew you were lying, and he wanted the truth. Unfortunately for him, he wouldn’t get that answer, not from you anyway. You sighed. “Whatever. I’m going outside.”

You slipped your pendant back inside your shirt, with Gaara watching your hand it was wrapped in, and you pushed the door all the way open. As you made your way outside, you slid your hand off the door and let it start to close. You heard Gaara catch the door with his hand, signaling that he had finally snapped out of his trance, and he gently closed it shut behind him. You walked to the edge of the roof, sat down, and let your legs dangle off the side of the building as Gaara came over and sat next to you, crossing his legs and staring out at the view ahead. Much to your discomfort, he was close to you, so much so that his sweatshirt almost touched yours. You glared at him in annoyance. Why can’t you just go sit wherever you’ve been sitting the past week instead of being less than an inch away from me? I know you don’t wanna be here either, so why are you over here in the first place? Are you this serious about ‘keeping an eye on me’ when there is literally no one around except us? Ugh. Still shooting wary glances his way every once in a while, you grabbed your lunch, which was a sandwich, and started to, unintentionally, wolf it down.

“Don’t eat so fast.” You stopped in the middle of chewing a huge bite, and turned your head to him. “It’ll only make it worse.” You still kept the bite in your mouth, as you continued to stare at him. He was still looking straight ahead, not meeting your eyes. “Self control is very important. Trust me, I know.” You finally swallowed the bite of sandwich, though you were still shocked at what he had said. He wasn’t just giving you a command, it seemed like he was giving you advice, like he was trying to help. Your eyes soon lowered to a glare. There is no way you’re actually trying to help me this time, you’re still just trying to order me around, and I’m not gonna take it.

“What are you, my mom?” He finally made eye contact with you.

“I’m serious.” You rolled your eyes and huffed.

“Yeah, when are you not?” His eyes narrowed, and you could just barely hear a low growl ringing in your ears. You sighed. “Fine, I won’t eat so fast.” You muttered in a mocking tone. You were about to take another bite of your sandwich, until Gaara stopped you once again.

“Don’t take such huge bites either.” Your teeth were just starting to graze the sandwich, and when you removed your teeth from the bread, there were two huge bite marks present. You frowned.

“Couldn’t you have told me this, I don’t know, before I started eating?” You asked irritated. He didn’t respond, he just continued to stare at you with the same stoic expression. You sighed. “Is there anything else you need to tell me?” Again, he said nothing. “Finally.” You mumbled, as you began to eat once more, this time taking smaller bites and trying your best to eat slower, just as Gaara had ‘advised’ you to do. When you were done with everything, you set your trash aside and tried to relax as best as you could. Although, yesterday’s and today’s events kept running through your head, and Gaara’s presence next to you wasn’t helping, and only seemed to increase the stress. With a quiet sigh, you lied down on the concrete roof, using your arms as a makeshift pillow for your head. Gaara watched what you were doing, wondering why you were moving, but when he realized you were only lying down, he averted his eyes back to the view of the school lawn and distant city in front of him.

As your head lay against your arms, you gazed up at the blue sky and all the white clouds scattered about, and you remembered when you and Shikamaru went cloud watching just Saturday. Will I get to do that again without having to worry about Gaara being on my tail… literally and figuratively? Well, he won’t monitor me if he knows I’m in my own apartment, so I could always lie and say that I’m not doing anything, and then just wait until he’s far enough away and leave. But for all I know, he could live really close to me and I wouldn’t even know it, so maybe he might see me if I leave my apartment, and then he’d stop me from going anywhere. Plus, maybe he can sense and/or smell me if I’m out somewhere, somehow, but even then, it should be too much trouble for him to go on a wild goose chase around the city just to find me. Though, this is the same person who said he was gonna switch his classes to mine so that he could keep an eye on me and make me avoid my friends. Then there’s that stupid instinct thing I have that still wants to listen to him and not do anything that could get me in trouble with him, which is honestly getting on my nerves. I don’t take orders, and the only times I did were… You shook your head, not wanting to remember your adoptive parents at the moment, or the rest of your life for that matter. With a soft sigh, you focused on clearing your mind and trying to relax for the rest of lunch.

When you saw Gaara stand up, you took it as your signal to do the same, since the period was most likely about to end. He waited for you to get up and get your stuff, and when you did, the both of you walked over to the door. He opened it, and as you both stepped inside, you were greeted with the usual crowds of students in the hallways, not caring at all where you and Gaara just came from. You closed the door on your way inside, and followed Gaara all the way down the stairs and to the first floor. When you reached the last step, you tried searching for Naruto, since he usually waits for you by the cafeteria and pesters you about where you ate lunch everyday, but you couldn’t find any trace of the energetic blonde. With one last glance at the cafeteria doors, you turned away, disappointed that you couldn’t find Naruto again. You walked with Gaara all the way to Ebisu’s room, and when you reached the classroom door, he stood and watched as you entered the room, not leaving until you fully closed the door.

As you started for your seat, you noticed that none of Sasuke’s fangirls were crowded around him like usual, Sakura wasn’t even there yet. You glanced around the room and noticed that the corners were occupied with girls, who you recognized as the ones you told off on your first day here. They were whispering to each other, and you could just barely hear what they were saying, and thanks to your better eyesight, you saw them steal more than just a few glances at you. Deciding that they weren’t worth your time, you ignored them, and continued to make your way to your seat.

Sasuke was sitting with his eyes closed, elbows on his desk, and his fingers interlocked with each other and pressed to his lips, just like any other normal day. When he noticed you sitting down, he opened his eyes and set his hands down on his desk.

“I’ve gotta say, I’m enjoying the break.” You shot him a confused look.

“And what does that mean?” You asked with a raised brow. He smirked.

“Those girls who always stalk me are too afraid of you and Gaara to get near me, and since they obviously know you sit next to me, well, you do the math.” You looked back at the girls who were whispering, and now glaring, at you. When they saw you glaring at them yourself, they immediately turned around and continued their whispering, doing a horrible job at pretending that they didn’t just look at you. You scowled at them then turned back to Sasuke, who was trying to hold back his laughter at the sight of your intense glare. He knew you well enough to know exactly what you were thinking, or must be thinking, and it was hilarious to him. You huffed.

“They should be scared. Most of them don’t even look like they can lift two pounds without being a bitchy crybaby. I mean, they glare at me behind my back like they’re freaking queen bees, yet they can’t even look me in the eyes, and they can’t even think of good comebacks to throw at me. They just stand and whisper like the cowards they are.” Sasuke couldn’t hold it in any longer, and he loudly chuckled.

“So, I take it you’re feeling better today?” He asked through fits of chuckling. You snorted.

“I’m not sure if ‘better’ is the right word, but yeah, something like that.”

“So I’ve heard.” You sighed.

“Of course you have.” You mumbled.

“What’s up with that anyway? I thought you two hated each other.”

“I wouldn’t say hate, just… greatly very much completely dislike each other.”

“Most people would call that hate, (Y/N).”

“Like who, Duckbutt?”

“I’m just saying. Just yesterday you two ‘didn’t like’ each other, and then suddenly today he’s super close to you. Don’t you think that’s a little concerning, especially to your friends?” You smirked.

“Aw, you do care, and you admit that you’re my friend.” You chuckled.

“Hn. Yes, fine, okay I admit it. You’re my very good friend, whatever. Now back to you.” You smiled, but soon that changed into a frown, since you knew were still expected to answer his question. You sighed.

“It’s… complicated.” Sasuke kept looking at you with his stubborn onyx orbs, waiting for you to say something more. “Fine. Uh, let’s just say it’s a personal thing, okay? Happy? Now can we not talk about it anymore?” It took Sasuke another moment of staring to finally give up. He sighed, and turned his head away from you, looking at the front of the class, interlocking his fingers and bringing them to his lips once more. That usually meant he was thinking about something, and you didn’t know what it was.

“You know, Itachi hasn’t stopped calling me Duckbutt ever since you told him about that nickname.” You smirked and chuckled, glad that he had decided to change the subject.

“Good. You deserve it, Duckbutt.”

“Hn.”

“Hey, I told you to call him Raventail.”

“I do.”

“Then what’s the problem?”

“He’s still being super annoying.”

“And?”

“What do you mean ‘and’? There’s no ‘and’ to it.” You tsked.

“You don’t understand sibling rivalry, do you?”

“What do you mean?” He frowned.

“The reason he’s still being so annoying is because you two are basically in a war, a being annoying sibling war at that, and you’ve just gotten both of your weapons, those nicknames. Now you’ve gotta be just as annoying or, preferably for you, more annoying than Itachi, then you’ll eventually win.” He huffed.

“And this is part of the ‘sibling rivalry’ you were talking about?” He asked sarcastically, though you ignored his mocking tone.

“Of course! Haven’t you ever heard of the unspoken rules? It’s all written in the siblings handbook, duh. You should know this stuff Duckbutt.” He chuckled.

“You’re so weird.”

“Good or bad?”

“Both.”

“Aw, thanks.” You laughed.

“And how do you know so much about ‘sibling rivalry’ in the first place? Hm?” You flinched ever so slightly, which Sasuke noticed. You smiled shakily, accidentally giving away some of your nervousness, which Sasuke also took notice of.

“Heh, there’s a lot you don’t know about me.” You rubbed your neck sheepishly. James may have only been your adoptive brother, but he was still your older brother, and you were still his little sister, and despite your horrible ‘living conditions’, like any other brother and sister, you behaved like them too.

“So, you have a sibling?”

“Well-”

“SASUKE!!! AND (Y/N)!!” Uh oh, cotton candy attack! You closed your eyes and braced yourself for what was about to come. You felt a familiar skinny arm snake around your neck and lock you into a choke hold. You opened your eyes to see Sakura’s arm in front of your face preventing you from breathing. You looked over to Sasuke, and saw that he was suffering the same fate, only, you were sure that he had it worse. I bet someone $100 that he’s gonna die by Sakura before he graduates high school. His eye twitched, and you were sure that if she didn’t let go of him soon, he would flip out. Make that sophomore year. Luckily, she let go of you two quickly, Sasuke more reluctantly of course, and you drew in a deep breath once you were finally able to breathe again. She went to her seat behind Sasuke, and happily sat her stuff down, acting as bubbly and cheerful as usual. “Sorry I’m late. I was looking for Naruto. He didn’t show up for lunch.” You turned and looked at Sakura, slightly surprised. “He’s actually been acting weird this whole day, too weird in fact, even for himself.” So I’m not the only one who’s noticed.

“What do you mean?” You asked. Sakura turned to you and blinked, and though she knew you were just as concerned with Naruto as everyone else was, she wasn’t expecting your question to sound so serious.

“Well, he didn’t really talk with anyone today, he was super late for first period this morning, and like I said before, he wasn’t at lunch.” He hasn’t talked to anyone? That doesn’t sound like Naruto at all. Is there something else I, we, don’t know about? “And I tried looking for him, which is why I wasn’t here earlier, but I couldn’t find him anywhere. It’s like he just disappeared.” Now I’m really worried for him. This whole thing just gets weirder and weirder. Maybe she knows more about this?

You didn’t have time to question Sakura any further, as you all heard the bell ring, and as everyone grew quiet, Ebisu started the class. During the middle of the lesson, you happened to glance over at Naruto’s seat, and what you found shocked you. Naruto was actually sitting at his desk, and even paying attention to Ebisu no less. Your eyes widened a considerable amount, but you immediately snapped yourself out of it and looked back at the front of the class so you wouldn’t get yelled at by Ebisu for being distracted and not focusing on the lesson. When did he even get here!? I didn’t hear him sit down, I didn’t hear the door open, I didn’t even see him until now! Did he open the door when the bell rang and then sneak around the desks when class started? But if he did, why would he go through all that trouble, and for what? Just to not be seen?… What is going on with you Naruto? You didn’t look back at Naruto for the rest of class, trying your best to focus on Ebisu and his lesson, but your mind kept wondering back to him. You just couldn’t figure out what was wrong with him, and the lesson was the last thing on your mind.

When the bell rang again, you grabbed your stuff as fast as you could to try and beat Naruto to the door so you could try and talk to him, but by the time you sat up, Naruto was already gone. How does he move so fast? Jeez! I didn’t even hear him move, or the door open at all! You weren’t the only one who was confused at Naruto’s behavior, Sasuke and Sakura were staring at the door just as you were.

“What was all that about?” Sakura asked quietly.

“I don’t know.” Sasuke mumbled.

“He just showed up without notice, then took off without even saying anything.” You stayed silent the whole conversation, too lost in your own thoughts to even try and ask them about what they saw. When you realized that Gaara was probably waiting for you, and most likely getting impatient, again, you shook your head out of your stupor.

“I’ve gotta go guys, bye.” You waved to them as you hurriedly sped walked to the door. Sasuke and Sakura simply stared at your fast retreating form, not completely out of their own daze to stop or question you about why you were in such a rush.

When you exited the classroom, you found Gaara leaned up against the wall to the left of the door, and not surprisingly, looking as impatient as ever. Once he saw you, he immediately pushed himself off the wall and started walking next to you. Both of you went down the hall, up the stairs, and eventually all the way to Deidara’s room. Although, before you had the chance to open the door and go inside, Gaara stepped in front of you and stopped, causing you to halt as well.

“I’m coming in with you for this one.” Your eyes lowered into an annoyed glare.

“Oh come on! For what?” He glanced at the door for a moment, like he was checking for something, then leaned in close to your head and whispered in your right ear.

“Because I don’t trust Deidara to leave you alone with him.” You stared at him incredulously as he leaned back up.

“Okay. This is where I draw the line.” His eyes narrowed, which just about pushed you over the edge. So you can tell me what to do, but I can’t even tell you to back off when you’re being ridiculous!? Seriously!!? Before you started cursing him out and let your short temper get ahead of yourself, you sighed, and calmed yourself down. “Look, I realize that you’ve got some kind of issues with him, but that doesn’t mean-”

“Why do you think I’ve ‘got issues’ with him?”

“A little birdy told me.” You stated nonchalantly, which took Gaara a little by surprise. He was about to say something else, but before he had the chance, you cut him off. “Look, it doesn’t matter. The point is, just because you have problems doesn’t mean I do. Nothing happened between us last week before any of this even started, and he didn’t find anything out about… ‘this’ yesterday either, so everything’s fine.”

“I still don’t trust him.”

“Well I do, and if nothing’s happened to me yet, then nothing’s gonna happen to me today.” You crossed your arms over your chest and waited for Gaara’s answer, hoping it would for once leave you be. He suddenly looked at the clock on top of the wall behind him, one of many other clocks randomly scattered around the school. He growled under his breath and turned his head back to you, but this time with a much more intense scowl.

“Fine, but the only reason you’re going in there alone is because I have to leave, or I’ll be late.” You heard him mumble a few curses about how Deidara’s class was so far away from everyone else’s, before he turned around, and started off back down the hall. “You’re lucky… this time.” He called back in an almost ominous tone. When he was a far enough distance away, you let out a breath of air you didn’t realize you were holding, and uncrossed your arms. I would’ve never thought I’d be able to convince him to leave, and that I’d actually be happy to be on the other side of the school at the end of the day. With one last, final, quiet sigh, you opened the door.

When you entered the classroom, you saw Deidara sitting on top of his desk, which was normal, except for one thing. He was glowering at you, or really, the door you were still standing by.

“So, I see that the rumors are true then, hm?” He asked rather angrily, still not entirely looking at you.

“Dammit.” You muttered. Deidara raised an eyebrow, and you knew he wanted you to speak up. “I mean, I forgot that you’d hear about…” You trailed off, Deidara already knowing exactly what you were talking about.

“First of all, that’s all anyone’s been talking about, ever since this morning. And second, I saw you two out there, having some kind of argument, and it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out what that was all about.” You were staring at him, a little concerned that he had seen you and Gaara through the door’s small window, but overall, you were worried about Deidara himself. His tone sounded completely infuriated, the opposite of his usual playful, teasing one you’ve grown used to. This new one didn’t sound like the Deidara you knew at all.

“Why do you sound so angry?” Now his glaring eyes focused completely on you, catching you a little bit off guard. You never thought he would look at you like that.

“Because the moment I step foot in this school, I hear you and Gaara of all people are suddenly ‘buddy-buddy’ when just the day before you guys hated each other, and you were downright sick too! You didn’t look well, you didn’t seem well, you weren’t acting like yourself, and then the next day boom! You and Gaara are close! And like that’s not concerning enough, I hear he’s practically controlling you, having you follow him around the school and making you outright avoid people. Hell, I thought you weren’t even gonna be here at one point, and I was almost right, after I saw you two out there in the hallway arguing! And to make matters worse, the things I’ve heard people call you all day, I just wanted to, to… UGH!!” He threw his hands in the air then grabbed the edge of the desk so hard his knuckles started turning pure white, while simultaneously turning his head away from you, too angry to even look you in the eyes. All you could see was his golden hair up in its usual high half ponytail, which was now a little disheveled, and his left shoulder and arm that was now facing towards you.

You were utterly silent, unable to say a single word. You’ve never seen Deidara lose his cool over anything, nor did he seem like the person to freak out in front of another person. Sure he had his ‘I’m serious’ moments like your second day of school last week, but it never went to the point where he was losing it, and trying to control his anger. All because he was worried about you.

“Hey, calm down.” You tried to sound as reassuring as you could. “I ignored those people the whole day too. Besides, I’m fine, you don’t need to be so overdramatic. It’s not a big deal.” He turned his head back to you, his serious sky blue eyes hadn’t changed in intensity.

“Are you kidding!? It is a big deal!” You didn’t say anything in response. “(Y/N), I’ve known you long enough to know that you’re not fine. I can see it in your eyes.”

“You’ve known me for a little over a week.”

“Exactly, hm!” Well, it sure sounds like he’s back to normal, for the most part anyway. You sighed.

“Deidara, I swear that I’m fine.” You tried to smile as best as you could, but Deidara saw right through it. He gave you a suspicious look and crossed his arms over his chest.

“Okay, if you swear you’re ‘fine’, then prove it.” You raised a brow.

“And how am I supposed to ‘prove’ to you that I’m fine?” He smirked in response, which to you wasn’t a good sign, but at least that meant that his usual self seemed to be back. He uncrossed his arms, and brought one of his hands up and stroked his chin. He playfully looked up at the ceiling, and hummed, pretending to think about it when you very well knew that he already had something in mind; he was just drawing out the suspense, mocking you. After another moment or two of this, his eyes landed back on you. He stopped stroking his chin and dropped his hand back down to his side. His smirked widened into a mischievous grin, revealing his pearly white teeth. They were all not good signs… for you at least.

“I want a hug.” He stated nonchalantly, as if what he said was no big deal. You stared at him in disbelief.

“What?” You asked, hoping that he didn’t say what you thought he just said. He finally pushed himself off his desk, faced you, and playfully crossed his arms over his chest.

“You heard me. I. Want. A. Hug.” You crossed your own arms over your own chest, though for you it was out of defiance, as you continued to stare at him now in slight annoyance.

“You really are a wuss, you know that.” He walked closer to you, standing only a foot in front of you now.

“I mean it (Y/N), hm.”

“No.” You asserted. You didn’t feel like giving Deidara a hug. Affection wasn’t really your ‘thing’, even with James you were always at least somewhat shy. Plus, what if he felt your big fluffy, furry tail underneath your sweatshirt, or your thick furry ears under your red hat? You couldn’t risk a hug at this time, but you couldn’t tell Deidara why of course, for both reasons.

“Well, then I guess you’re not fine then, hm.”

“Just because I won’t give you a hug doesn’t mean that I’m not fine.”

“It doesn’t matter what you say until you give me a hug.” You groaned, and while still crossing your arms, you turned to the side so that your right shoulder faced him, and closed your eyes. You huffed in defiance, and he chuckled, amused by your petty actions. “Fine, but I’m getting that hug one way or another.” He crouched down in front of you, and when you noticed this movement, you opened your right eye to see what he was doing. He was still smirking, his devious grin never faltering, and you were sure that you didn’t want to know what was going on inside his mischievous mind. Then, with one simple action, you regretfully understood what he was trying to do. He poked you, and kept poking you on your right shoulder, hard. You opened your other eye, and glared at the desks in front of you, refusing to look at Deidara, since he most likely found your annoyed reaction very amusing, and you did not want to see that smug expression of his. Another few seconds of him poking your shoulder passed, and you realized that he wasn’t going to stop anytime soon. You groaned.

“Are you really gonna keep this up?”

“Yes, yes I am. I told you I want a hug.”

“No.”

“Alright, suit yourself then, hm.” He started poking your shoulder harder, and what was worse was that it was the same exact spot each time. “Come on.” Poke. “Give me a hug.” Another poke. “I want a hug.” Poke again. “I. Want. A. Hug.” He poked you with each word he spoke. “I-”

“You’re gonna get tired of this eventually. You know that, right?” From the corner of your eyes, you saw his smirk widen.

“A thing you should know about me, (Y/N), is that my stubbornness is as big as my huge ego.” You rolled your eyes, and continued to glare at the desks in front of you.

“Of course it is.” You muttered. He heard you, and chuckled, as he continued to poke your shoulder.

“Come on.”

“…”

“You know you want to.”

“…”

“I can tell you’re getting annoyed.”

“…”

“It’s only a matter of time.”

“…”

“I guarantee I’m more stubborn than you are.”

“…”

“Come on.”

“…”

“You. Know. You. Want. To-”

“Okay, okay! FINE! I’ll give you a damn hug, just KNOCK IT OFF ALREADY!!” You shouted as you swatted his hand away. Deidara wasn’t affected by you hitting his hands, he only smiled triumphantly, since his plan worked. He had won. You hesitated, figuring that you could just suck it up and get it over with, and that maybe if you were fast enough, you wouldn’t risk exposing anything. With one last sigh and groan, you quickly wrapped your arms around Deidara’s form, but he didn’t even have time to respond before you pulled away from him just as quickly as you came.

“What the hell was that, hm?” He asked jokingly. “I said a hug, and that wasn’t even close-”

“You never said how long the hug had to be.” You smirked as he didn’t respond. You got him. “You weren’t expecting that one, were you?” He actually looked surprised that you had stumped him like that, something else you would’ve never guessed Deidara would show, but after another moment his expression faded into another widening smirk.

“Well, I know you weren’t expecting… THIS!” Without warning, he wrapped his arms around your waist and back, and pulled your form against his chest. He rested his left cheek on your head, and closed his eyes, smiling a big goofy smile. You were too shocked to react at first, but when you came back to your senses, you blushed, and quickly tried to push him away. It was no use though, he would only tighten his grip on you so that it was impossible to move from him. After another few failed attempts at escaping his hug, you knew that there was no getting out of this, and you slowly let your hands drop to your sides, finally giving up. You just embraced the warmth Deidara was radiating, which was actually very comforting. Your muscles became less tense, and before you knew what you were doing, you wrapped your arms around his own waist and hugged him back, and he immediately pulled you closer to him as a result. Your right cheek was pressed up against his chest, and since your ears were right next to his heart, you could hear it beating a fast, yet steady, thumping rhythm. It sounded… nice, and peaceful. The more you listened to it, the more soothing it felt, and from everything that’s happened so far, this was the first thing that actually made you feel relaxed. You sighed in content, and closed your eyes. Thump. Thump. Thump. His heart continued to beat its nice soothing and hypnotic rhythm, as you burrowed your head deeper into his shirt, and you swore you could feel Deidara’s smile widen.

Deidara shifted his head so that his chin rested on the middle of your scalp, thankfully right between where your ears were bent back, and he was now looking straight at the door. His grip on your form suddenly tightened, and even though you couldn’t see his face, you could tell he was glaring at the door. His grip wasn’t uncomfortable, his arms just tensed and became more secure, almost in a protective way. You couldn’t sense anyone at the door, so you figured that he was just thinking about something, most likely Gaara, and he was. Gaara wasn’t at the door now, but Deidara still remembered him there, arguing with you about something, and it pissed him off to no end. He imagined Gaara there, outside the room, watching you two hug, and he couldn’t help but glare at the door because of this thought. It was his way of showing that he would protect you from him, even if Gaara wasn’t there to see this for himself.

Eventually, albeit very reluctantly, you both pulled away from each other. You looked up to see Deidara’s sincere smile, and your face instantly became a bright red, as you lightly pushed Deidara back from you. You turned away so that your back now faced him, and you crossed your arms over your chest, too embarrassed to look him in the eye.

“Whatever.” You quickly and quietly mumbled. You were too flustered to come up with a better response, and you knew Deidara was smirking because of this, you could feel it. You knew him too well to know that he must find your current state very amusing, and he did.

“Aw, did someone enjoy themselves, hm?” He asked teasingly. You felt your blush darken, and you became even more flustered.

“Shut up.” You mumbled.

“Admit it.”

“Admit what?”

“That you enjoyed the hug, silly.” You immediately answered back.

“No.”

“Do it.”

“No.”

“I’ll start poking you again.”

“Okay okay!” You paused, then with a sigh, you uncrossed your arms and turned around to see his mischievous smirk, which only caused you to hesitate more. “I, maybe… needed, that hug. Thank you.” You mumbled. His smirk widened, and he cupped his hand behind his right ear, pretending that he didn’t hear you.

“What’s that? I couldn’t hear you.” He teased.

“I said I needed the hug and thank you, alright!?” You yelled, and turned away from him again. You closed your eyes and frowned in frustration, and Deidara just continued to smirk.

“See, was that so hard, hm?”

“Yes.” He chuckled, but when he saw that you were refusing to look at him, he sighed and walked around you. He stopped right in front of your face, and crouched down to your level. You opened your eyes to see what he was doing, and you saw the corner of his lips twitch up into a small smile.

“You know I’ll always be here for you, right?” You scoffed.

“You’re really annoying sometimes, you know that?” His smile changed into a smirk.

“But you still love me anyway.”

“Don’t be weird.”

“I’ll take that as a yes then, hm.” You snorted.

“Yeah, whatever.” He chuckled.

“And I guess you proved that you are indeed ‘fine’, hm?” Your frown lessened, and you looked at him with softer eyes, the frustration you felt earlier almost disappearing. After all, you couldn’t stay mad at Deidara forever, could you, especially when he smiled at you like that. However, his smile soon changed to a smirk, as he flicked your nose and then immediately stood up, walking back to his desk like nothing happened. You twitched your nose and looked at it, cross eyed, then you covered it with your hand.

“Ow! What was that for?”

“For being you, of course.” He mocked your tone of voice, poorly at that. You looked at him furiously, and although he couldn’t see since his back was facing you, he knew you were glaring at him, and he secretly found it hilarious.

“Hey, that’s my line!”

“You snooze you lose (Y/N), hm.” You glared at him, and you knew his smirk was probably widening at your increasing frustration.

“Asshole.” You muttered.

“Hm? What was that (Y/N)?” He turned his head a little so that you only saw the left side of his face.

“Nothing.” You called back instantly. He stared at you, smirking, then turned his head away from you.

“Mhm. If you say so.” You let out a silent breath of relief, glad that he decided to not be over annoying for once. As if on cue, the bell rang, and you headed for your seat while Deidara went to his desk as the usual people started filing into the room. When everyone sat down, class began as usual.

For most of class nothing worried you, nothing was on your mind, and nothing really happened either. Everything was pretty normal, relatively speaking, that is, until you remembered something important. Wait, I forgot that I have work today! I never called off sick! Will Gaara try to stop me from going? Knowing him, he most likely will. But, if he won’t let me go… what’ll happen then? You quietly sighed, not wanting to finish your thoughts. You decided that you would worry about work when the time came.

The bell rang, and you slowly gathered your things, with whether Gaara would let you go to work or not still the one thing on your mind. You reached the front of the class, when Deidara placed a hand on your shoulder, stopping you from leaving.

“Hey, you gonna be okay?” You looked into his concerned filled eyes, and nodded your head.

“Yeah, I’ll be fine.” You gave him the best smile you could muster, and he smiled back. You looked over your shoulder, and saw the last person from class close the door, leaving you and Deidara alone. Surprisingly, you didn’t see Gaara anywhere near the door, and now was the perfect opportunity to ask Deidara a question that’s been on your mind ever since you first met him. When he noticed that something seemed to be bothering you, he removed his hand from your shoulder, and stared at you in worry, yet in slight curiosity.

“(Y/N), what’s up? Are you worried about Gaara or something?” Your serious (E/C) eyes stared into his confused and worried sky blue ones.

“What exactly happened between you and Gaara?” He grew dead silent. He said nothing, as his worry disappeared, now replaced by solemnity. He bit the inside of his bottom lip, and slowly averted his eyes to the floor. You understood why he seemed uncomfortable, you knew that whatever the issues between him and Gaara were, they were pretty bad, he had almost gotten worked up by it before. You knew that it may be hard for him to talk about them, so you waited patiently for an answer, ready to accept whatever it was. After another silent,tense moment, he very slowly nodded his head, his eyes still avoiding yours and looking to the side as he answered.

“Okay. Okay, I guess you deserve to know what happened.” He stopped moving his head, and finally looked back to your awaiting (E/C) eyes. He sighed. “It was about a couple years ago. We never exactly saw… eye to eye before, but this was a little… different. We were in a ‘fight’ over… something. It was a big fight, one where it went beyond just hand-to-hand combat. We used actual weapons, and I mean weapons, if you know what I mean.” He sighed, like he wasn’t proud to admit it. “We fought near the city, down a little bit in an alleyway, so no one would ‘interrupt’ us.” You nodded, understanding his story so far, even though the details on why he was fighting were vague, but you had a feeling he didn’t want you to know that piece of information, at least not yet. “I was so confident that I could easily win against him, that he was just another kid who I could beat no problem. Hm. Well, I was wrong. During the middle of the fight, well… he almost… severed my arm.” Your eyes widened, and your jaw dropped. You weren’t expecting something as severe as that.

“What!?”

“Yeah, my left arm was almost completely ripped out of my shoulder. But somehow, I kept going, and I almost landed a fatal blow near his head. Well, it hit, but not in the way I expected. I didn’t want to actually kill him or anything, but… he had no problem trying to kill me.” You still stood aghast as he continued on. “The fight was mainly ‘a draw’. I landed more hits, but I was hurt worse than he was, though he was pretty injured too, hm. So, eventually, he left the alleyway, and I stood there, not able to follow him. The adrenaline from the fight wore off though, and the pain of my torn arm became excruciating. It was so bad, my friend, my man Sasori, had to help me walk out of the alley without further damaging it. I got it fixed, it was sewed all the way back on, and eventually, miraculously might I add, it healed very well. The only thing that’s different about it is my arm’s kinda off to the side, I guess you could say, and a huge scar formed around my shoulder where it got torn.” He paused again, and started to rub the back of his neck, like he was embarrassed about something. “It’s pretty ugly. I put concealer on it, so you couldn’t see it even if I showed you, hm. It’s not like I have to, it’s just in case anyone does see it or-”

“Why would you hide the scar?” You quietly blurted out, interrupting Deidara mid sentence. You didn’t realize that you had said your thoughts out loud until it was too late, though, you were too spaced out at this point to care. Deidara stared at you in utter shock, not expecting such a question from you. He stayed silent as you continued, your distant (E/C) eyes not completely meeting his. “It’s like trying to erase a part of you that makes you unique, like a signature to a work of art, just because it’s different than everybody else, or you’re trying to forget the past that will never go away. The scar will always be there, no matter what you do, so why bother hiding it when there’s really no point? You should actually be proud of it, it’s part of who you are. If anything, it makes you stronger. Who cares about what others think? Just because they may say it’s ugly, doesn’t mean it is. They just can’t see what real beauty is. You should accept the scar for what it is, because the sooner you do, the easier it gets. It’s better than trying to hide something that’s impossible to hide, something that’s a part of you, that you can’t change.” Your eyes began to slowly travel to the floor. “No matter what you do.” You finished with a soft, distant tone in your voice. The whole time you spoke, you felt as if you were partly talking to Deidara, and partly to yourself. After all… Deidara wasn’t the only one with ‘battle’ scars.

Your adoptive parents were brutal and harsh, especially when it came to punishments, and you of course had your fair share of them. The scars weren’t as big as Deidara’s must be, but they weren’t all small either, and they ‘healed’ enough to blend in with your skin a little at first glance, so no one like Tenten, who you had to change with for gym, would question them. You had a couple on your shoulders, a little more on your stomach and chest, and you knew you had some going down your back. You remembered how you got them too, and those memories were something you really did wished you could erase.

You were too distracted by your thoughts to see the look Deidara was giving you. What you said, the way you talked, you sounded like someone who knew exactly what they were talking about, someone who wasn’t just giving friendly advice, someone… with experience. He had a feeling that he wasn’t the only one with a scar, and that he wasn’t the only one who’s been through a rough time.

He put his right hand on your right shoulder, startling you out of your thoughts. You looked up, only to be met with Deidara’s sincere smile.

“You really are something special, aren’t you, hm?” You smiled back.

“Thanks, Dei.”

“I should be saying that to you.”

“Then why don’t you?”

“I don’t feel like it, hm.” You rolled your eyes, and punched him lightly in the chest.

“That’s for being you.” You mocked him, like the way he did to you earlier. He just smirked and chuckled in return, not affected by your punch at all. You turned around, and headed towards the door while waving behind you. “Bye Dei!” You called back to him, as you opened the door and exited the classroom, starting your long trek all the way to the front of the school. Deidara leaned against his desk, staring at the doorway where you had just disappeared.

“Dei, huh?” He closed his eyes and put his hand up to his chin, humming in thought. “I like it, hm.”

As you made your way to the front door, there was not one other student among the empty silent halls, which was worrying. You expected Gaara to be right outside the door when you exited Deidara’s room, angry that you were in there for so long, but he wasn’t. There was absolutely no sign of him in the hallways, stairs, inside other classrooms, or anywhere else in the school at all. Something’s not right. Sure, you liked the fact that you weren’t being watched and followed like a hawk, but from the day you’ve had so far, it was becoming unnatural at this point that Gaara would just leave you alone. The atmosphere was foreboding, as you continued to make your way to your destination.

When you reached the front doors of the school, you glanced from side to side, and you still didn’t see Gaara anywhere. You let out a breath you didn’t realize you were holding, though you knew you weren’t completely off the hook yet. You just knew that something was probably waiting for you, but you nevertheless began to slowly walk to the tall black gates. About halfway there, you felt someone roughly grab your wrist, and you were too shocked to say anything or see who your kidnapper was as you were quickly dragged off the path to the left. You almost tripped on the pavement as you and whoever was pulling you all of a sudden stopped at the side of the school and right next to the wall. They removed their hand from your wrist, releasing you from their tight grip, and as you shook your head out of your shocked state, you saw none other than Gaara standing in front of you, with his signature posture and scowl. Why am I not surprised?

“What the hell was that for!?” You shouted.

“Just come on.” As he turned around, he started walking away. You stared at his form for a moment, everything had  happened so fast you had trouble comprehending his words.

“Where are you going?” You asked suspiciously. He stopped, and turned his head over his right shoulder, one of his emotionless green eyes staring at you.

“The same place you’re going.”

“I don’t know if you know this, but I have a job after school, and I have to work today, so-”

“That’s taken care of.” That’s your favorite sentence, isn’t it. You were silent for a moment.

“What do you mean by that?” You asked, your anger starting to rise.

“It means you don’t have work today.” You little piece of bullshit- Despite the sudden uncontrollable urge to punch him in the face, you forced yourself to calm down, and instead tried to civilly talk with him.

“How’d you even know I had a job in the first place?”

“I’ve got resources, that’s all you need to know.” You sighed, still trying to control you temper as much as you could.

“Okay, if I’m not going to work, then my apartment’s still that way, and I’m going home.” He looked at you like you were one of the most oblivious, stupid people in the world.

“That’s taken care of as well.” Your eyes widened, then narrowed in anger, shock, and confusion.

“What happened to my house?” Still, his eyes showed no compassion or mercy, only irritation.

“Come on.” He said in annoyance. You clenched your fists in anger, your knuckles turning white, and you kept your feet firmly planted on the concrete ground.

“No.” If Gaara had any eyebrows, the side that was facing you would’ve been raised, and that’s how he was looking at you now. Nevertheless, you stood your ground, not budging under his intense glare, refusing to even be slightly intimidated by him. There was no way were you going to ignore the fact that he ‘took care of’ your work as well as your apartment, whatever that meant, and you were certainly not going to let him boss you around like this any longer. You had had enough.

“Yes, you will, or I’ll drag you there myself.” He snarled. You growled, just like an animal, and he instantly narrowed his eyes.

“I dare you.” You challenged. Gaara continued to glare at you, but then he snorted, his expression now rid of some of his previous anger, and you wondered what he was thinking, and what he was planning.

“There’s no point in going back to your apartment anyway, because like I said, I took care of it.” This only pissed you off more, and you were having a really hard time controlling your rage, you were literally on the verge of attacking him. You took short breaths in, trying to focus on calming down as best as you could.

“What did you even do?” You asked quietly. He snorted again, and turned his head away from you, looking straight ahead, obviously not going to answer you anytime soon. Of course. He never told me anything before, why would he do so now. You turned away from him, about to walk off and go to your apartment, despite his forceful orders, but his deep raspy voice cut into the tense silence.

“You’ll never get all the answers you want.” You stopped in your tracks. “What you are, what we are, you won’t know if you go back.” You were completely caught off guard by what he said. He was offering you answers, or rather, he was bribing you with them. You turned back around, and saw that his back was still facing you. You were dumbstruck to say the least.

“How do I know you’re going to tell me anyway?” You asked suspiciously. Answers were something you’ve wanted from the beginning, and he knew it. You weren’t sure if he was using this knowledge to trick you, or if he was actually telling you the truth, that he was actually willing to give you the answers you’ve wanted since this whole mess started.

“You won’t know unless you come with me.” He fully turned around and faced you, startling you a little. “And if you don’t, you’ll never know.” You didn’t move a muscle, really, you couldn’t. Although you didn’t want to admit it, he was right. On one hand, if you turned back and see what happened to your apartment, there was a chance he may never offer you answers again. But on the other hand, he may not tell you what he did to your apartment, but at least there was a chance where you could finally figure everything out. Though, you hated how he could have this kind of influence and control over you. It pissed you off to no end, but really, what other choice did you have? With a begrudging sigh, you grumbled your answer.

“Fine.” You paused. “But I better have those answers.” Gaara looked satisfied with your answer, and grunted, not seeming to care about your threatening tone. He waited impatiently for you to catch up to him, and when you did, you both started walking in awkward, tense silence, to wherever Gaara had in mind.

He led you past the side parking lot and to the trees near the back of the school, which continued in a line that eventually led to a forest that surrounded the school’s track and soccer field. There was a sidewalk that was next to the trees that led to part of the city behind the school, and you both now walked on this straightforward path. Next to it was a street, and across that street were some kind of city buildings, most likely small apartments, but despite their housing looks, Gaara wasn’t taking you to one of them.

You kept walking for about fifteen minutes, the line of trees never stopping, seemingly endless, until Gaara suddenly took a left turn off the sidewalk, and now headed towards a small opening between two slightly larger trees, which you would’ve never noticed if he wasn’t leading you through it now. When you entered the hidden tree entrance, and what you assumed was part of the forest, you were now walking on a small grassy path surrounded by all the shadows of the trees. You could see that it ended in another opening between two more trees not too far away from where you were, but you still couldn’t make out any details except for the sky over a green horizon in the distance past those two tress, which looked like the end of the path.

It only took you about a few minutes to get to the opening where the light seemed to shine the brightest. You stepped off of the dark grassy path and onto a huge, wide open field that was all surrounded by the forest. It was… beautiful, absolutely stunning. To you, fields like these represented freedom. You could run around for miles wherever you wanted, roll around on the grass and get as dirty as possible, or simply just lie down and waste the day away watching the sky, doing nothing else but relax, and no one could stop you or order you around. You always imagined something like this when you lived with your adoptive parents, since all you ever thought about was freedom, and how could you not, being treated as you were.

James had always talked about how you and him would someday be free, how you both just had to be patient and wait for the right time. You both had thought about running away many many times, but after careful thinking, you both had decided that no matter how bad your adoptive parents were, you would actually have a better chance of survival if you stayed with them. If you had run away, they would’ve tracked you both down if they found either of you missing, they couldn’t bother to not have their little slaves do everything for them. But even if you did manage to successfully escape, you both would’ve lived on the streets in the same crappy conditions you had always lived in, only you’d have no place to live, scavenging for food would be more difficult than just rummaging through your own trash, you wouldn’t have had money so you wouldn’t have finished school, which you both were dependent on to get a good job for you to move out, and treating James’s heart condition would’ve been pretty much impossible. Running away had always been too risky, and that was why you both decided to deal with your adoptive parents for as long as you had to Now you were starting to wish that James was here with you, seeing this beautiful field like you and him always dreamed of, and not back with your adoptive parents who were probably treating him worse than before.

You realized that in the middle of your thoughts you had stopped at the entrance to the field. You shook your head to clear your mind, and searched for Gaara. You found him walking off to your right, continuing on as if you were still with him. He wasn’t even looking at you, which meant he didn’t notice you had stopped, and judging by how far away he was, you hadn’t zoned out for too long. Not wanting him to actually see that you had stopped following him, you began speed walking across the field towards him, but not too fast as to draw attention.

When you caught up to him, thankfully without him noticing that you had not been with him before, you finally had the chance to see where he was taking you. In front of you, about one hundred yards away, was a small one story light tan house, although it looked two story. Maybe there was an attic, and/or a basement, but that was it. It had a dark brown roof and dark brown borders for the few windows you could see and the front door, which was a crème color. The house was near the back edge of the field, yet a little ways from the border of trees. There was no driveway, sidewalk, or path that led up to the house. Only grass surrounded it, and there was only a couple steps that led up to a very small wooden porch where the front door was.

In a few short minutes, you and Gaara reached the house, and headed up the stairs and on the porch. Gaara opened the door, and lightly shoved you inside the house and onto its crème colored carpeted flooring. He soon joined you and stood right behind you, but he didn’t close the door for some reason, he only stared straight ahead of him.

The first thing you noticed when you were fully inside was that you were in a living room. Across from you on the opposite wall was a doorway that lead to another room, most likely a kitchen/dining room, and to your left against a wall was a medium sized TV on a medium sized dark cherry TV stand. Between this wall and the doorway was an entrance to a hallway that led off to the left, so you couldn’t see where it went due to where you were standing. To your right was a brown couch in the middle of the room that faced the TV, and in front of it was a big wooden coffee table. There were end tables on each side of the couch, with a lamp on top of each one that illuminated the light yellow of the walls. They were the only light sources, it seemed, in the house, since the two windows on the wall to your right were covered by blinds. But none of that was what really caught your attention. What had you shocked, petrified, and deathly silent, were the two people in the living room along with you and Gaara. They were none other than Temari and Kankuro, Gaara’s older siblings… and you finally figured out what Gaara truly meant by us.

Kankuro was lazily sitting on the couch with his left leg crossed over his right, his arms hanging around the back of the cushion, and eyes closed, though he wasn’t sleeping. His black hood that usually covered his head was now lowered, and it revealed his dark brown wolf ears, only slightly darker than his hair, perked up on top of his head. But that wasn’t all. His tail, the same shade as his ears, was strewn about on the cushions, taking up most of the remaining space on the couch.

Temari was standing in a doorway directly in front of the armrest of the couch, on the same wall the other doorway was on, and it looked like it lead to the same room as well. She was leaning against the side of the doorway, arms crossed, and her sandy colored tail, only a little lighter than her hair, hung behind her legs. The same colored ears were perked up towards where you and Gaara were standing, probably because she had heard the sound of the door opening, and her ears must’ve turned on reflex. Her eyes were closed just like Kankuro’s, coolly and relaxed, not yet realizing that you were in their house. Oh my gosh, how could I forget about his siblings!? They’re even in Biology with me, and they sit at the same table as Gaara, how do I NOT remember that! But, actually, come to think of it, I didn’t see them this morning-

“Gaara, what took you so long?” Kankuro’s irritated voice snapped you out of your thoughts.

“Yeah, you’re usually never this late.” Temari and Kankuro both opened their eyes.

“We’ve been waiting here forev-” Kankuro stopped mid sentence, as he and Temari finally saw you. “-er.” They stared at you for a few awkward, tense moments, until their expressions changed to fear and anger. “What the HELL Gaara!”

“What is she doing here!?”

“She can’t be inside the house!”

“Why is she-”

“Show them.” Gaara’s commanding voice immediately stopped their panic. The room grew dead silent, as Kankuro and Temari stopped yelling, and they stared at you with a mix of shock, confusion, and curiosity. You subconsciously gulped, realizing that now all of the attention was on you. The tension in the air was thick, as you slowly took off your hat, revealing your bent back white wolf ears, and simultaneously uncurling your tail from around your waist, slipping it through your sweatshirt and letting it fall to your side. You perked your ears up, and started swishing your tail from side to side, the first time since this morning being able to stretch your limbs out, while staring at Kankuro’s and Temari’s dumbfounded expressions with your own surprised, confused, and a whole jumbled mass of emotions filled one. Temari was the first to come to her senses.

“Oh boy. Uh, here, I-I’m sure you’d want a shower by now, is that alright?” Not knowing what else to say or do, you nodded your head. She immediately walked over, grabbed your hand, lightly pulled you past the TV, and took a sharp left down the hallway you had not been able to see past earlier. You could already hear whispering from behind you, and it wasn’t hard to figure out what they were discussing. You quietly sighed so as not to alert Temari, and continued to let her lead you down the hallway.

Eventually, not too far from the living room, she stopped in front of a door on the right side of the hallway and let go of your hand. She rubbed the back of her neck sheepishly, and averted her eyes to the carpeted floor.

“I guess I should properly introduce myself shouldn’t I, though, you probably already know my name, don’t you?” You nodded your head, and her lips twitched up to a small smile. “I guess I know yours too… but whatever. I’m Temari.” You weren’t sure if you should respond, but concerning the circumstances at hand, it would probably be worse if you didn’t. Besides, she was at least trying to be nice and make everything less awkward, so it wouldn’t hurt to be nice back. Reluctantly, you told her your name.

“(Y/N).” Temari flashed you a shaky smile, at least glad that you were talking to her, then opened the door, revealing a pure white bathroom. The floor was tiled in small smooth squares, which gave off a shiny glow, really giving away how clean and spotless the room was. Straight ahead on the wall opposite of you, was a rectangular bathtub with cream colored curtains that had a dark brown and maroon bottom. The wall on your right had a white toilet with two towels, one dark brown and the other red, on top of the tank. A silver towel rack, where another light yellow towel was hung, was between the toilet and tub. Opposite of that wall was a nice silver sink, with drawers and cabinets underneath, a square mirror above, and a silver medicine cabinet to the left of the mirror.

“Here’s the bathroom. Everything you need is already in the tub. You pull the knob thing on the faucet to turn the shower on, and you turn left for hot, right for cold. There’s special shampoo and conditioner for your ears and tail, but use the regular stuff for everything else. When you’re done, you can just use my towel. It’s the yellow one there.” She pointed to the towel on the towel rack. “And you can just put your clothes where the sink is, oh and here, let me take your school stuff for you.” She held out her hand, and you reluctantly gave her your bag. “Well I think that about covers everything, did you get all that?” You nodded, and she gave you another rushed and half shaky smile, though the sincerity in her eyes made you a little less uncomfortable.

“Thanks.” You tried your best to sound nice, but there was still a slight strain in your voice. Temari didn’t seem to care though, as she smiled and put a comforting hand on your shoulder, then stepped out into the hallway.

“Oh, and by the way, when you turn the water off, keep the curtains closed.” Wait, what? Why would I have to-? Before you could ask her about her strange advice, she had already closed the door, and her footsteps quickly faded from hearing.

You sighed, ignoring her comment for the time being; you just wanted to get this shower over with as soon as possible. It wasn’t like it was going to make your situation any better at this point, and the sooner you got it done the sooner you would finally get the answers Gaara had promised you. Plus, you still haven’t showered in a couple days from dealing with everything that had happened the past couple days, and washing away all the dirt and stress you’ve acquired wasn’t a bad idea. However, the fact that you were in Gaara’s house, in his bathroom, not able to be in your own, wasn’t helping to calm your unsettled mind. But still, some relaxing warm water sounded nice, and it wouldn’t hurt to at least try to calm your nerves down.

In the middle of your thoughts, you remembered that Kimchi was still in your sweatshirt, so before you did anything else, you had her crawl out onto your hand then set her down on top of the sink. She crawled around a bit, seemingly studying her surroundings, and when she finally got her bearings straight, she tilted her tiny head up, looking at you with her wide questioning eyes. You had honestly forgotten that she was there the entire day due to your mind being focused on ‘other events’, which felt a little guilty about.

“Sorry Kimchi, I forgot you were with me.” She chirped happily, which you smiled at. “Now let’s see, usually you’d just stay in my room while I take my showers, but you obviously can’t now, so where should I put you?” She only responded with a chirp and a squeak, which you took as an ‘I don’t know’. You put your hand up to your chin and hummed, thinking about what you could do. “You know what? Screw it. We’re both girls, you can just get in the shower with me.” She replied with an excited sounding squeak.

       With the decision having been made, you slowly began to undress, folded all of your clothes, and set them on top of the sink like Temari told you to do. You stretched your tired limbs, twitching your ears side to side and swishing your tail around, finally having the chance to be free and not constricted. Once you felt satisfied, you set your free hand down in front of Kimchi who then crawled onto your palm, and made your way over to the tub. You pulled the curtains back, carefully stepped in, and closed the curtains behind you. You searched for a good place to put Kimchi, and right away you found a big silver shower tray with body wash and two sets of shampoos and conditioners. One was just some regular brand, and the other was one you’ve never seen before. That must be the special stuff that Temari was talking about. You paid no more attention to the products as you set Kimchi down in the middle of the silver tray, where you thought she wouldn’t get drowned and battered by water. Then you turned the faucet and finally start.

When the warm water hit your still pale (S/C) skin, it felt… nice, and calming, especially on your ears and tail, which had been stiff the whole day from being stuck in one position. You couldn’t help but sigh in bliss as you felt all the dirt, grime, and sweat you’ve gathered over the past couple of days wash away. You finally started to relax, though it was only short lived, as the memories of just a few moments ago were still fresh in your mind, and you couldn’t help but think about how you were going to have to face whatever they had in store for you more sooner than later. Nevertheless you continued your shower, grabbing the regular shampoo bottle, and began to wash your now soaked (H/L) (H/C) hair. When you finished with the shampoo, you rinsed it out, and moved on to conditioning and combing. When you were done with that, you eyed the ‘special’ shampoo and conditioner for your ears and tail, studying it carefully. You hesitantly grabbed the bottle of shampoo, and slowly started working on your ears. It felt really nice, you could already feel your fur getting cleansed of any filth that was trapped in it. You then brought your tail around to your front, and started rubbing it with the shampoo as well which felt just as good. After all that was done, you saw a rag that was on the tray along with  body wash, and you grabbed those items and started washing your body.

Once you were done, you put everything back on the tray, and you were about to turn the water off, but stopped just before you could reach the faucet. You retracted your arm, and held your wrist against your chest with your other hand. The sound of the water hitting the tub’s floor seemed to surround your very being, and it pulled deeper into your thoughts the more you listened to it. You slowly slid down to the floor and wrapped your arms and tail around your legs, resting your head in the crook of your knees, as you thought about the situation you were in, as the anxiety and fear finally started to sink into your head. What was the point in bringing me to his house? Why can’t I just go back to my own home? He said that he ‘took care of my apartment’, but what did he really mean by that? What exactly did he do, and why? Why won’t he just let me go home? Why is this even happening to me in the first place? I don’t know who, or even what I am at this point, and even though there are obviously ‘people’ like me, I feel like there’s no one to help me, no one to turn to. I’m all alone. You heard a small chirp above you, and you looked up to see Kimchi, who was tilting her head to the side, peering down at you from up on the silver tray, almost in a concerned-like, curious manner. Of course, except you Kimchi. I still have you. You flashed a tiny smile at Kimchi to show that you were okay, and she happily turned her head back up with a small cheery approving squeak.

You slowly began to rise from the tub floor, and this time you actually turned the water off. Remembering Temari’s advice, you didn’t open the curtains yet, and waited for something, anything, to happen. Suddenly, you started shaking your head back and forth, followed by your neck, shoulders, body, legs, and finally your tail, flinging water all over the walls, curtains, and even some droplets on the ceiling in a matter of seconds. When you stopped shaking, you realized what you had just done. You just shook most of the water off of you like a dog would, a shake-off. So that’s why she said to keep the curtains closed. An annoyed squeak drew your attention to Kimchi who was completely drenched, with many tiny drops of water dripping from her body. Oops. You smiled sheepishly at her, and rubbed the back of your neck, feeling guilty under, or rather over, her gaze.

“Heh, sorry Kimchi.” You apologized. She blankly stared at you, then chirped, signaling that she was okay. You let out a breath of relief, as she herself started to shake most of the water off of her, with quite a few tiny drops landing on you. You let out a faint giggle. “I guess that’s revenge, huh?” This time she squeaked, which was a definite ‘yep’, and it made you let out another small giggle. After you wiped some of the water off your body, you held out your hand to let Kimchi crawl onto your palm, and then pulled the now slightly damp curtains open.

The first thing you noticed when you stepped out of the tub was that there was something ‘off’ about your clothes. They looked cleaner, smelled fresh, were facing a different way than you had originally put them, and suspiciously, your hat was missing as well. Did someone come in here while I was in the shower and clean them? I didn’t hear the door open or close, much less someone walking into the bathroom. Plus, that was pretty damn fast for them to clean all of my stuff, and why is my hat missing? …Please tell me it was at least Temari.

You sighed, not wanting to worry about your mysteriously washed clothes any longer, and quickly set Kimchi down on the sink next to your now clean clothes. You then went over and grabbed Temari’s towel off the towel rack to dry off whatever remaining water was left on you. Not surprisingly, it didn’t take that long to fully dry yourself, and you hung the still mostly dried towel back on the towel rack and went back over to put your fresh clothes on. When you reached the sink, you didn’t see Kimchi anywhere, and you were about to start panicking until you heard a chirp of excitement coming from somewhere in the pile of clothes. You frantically searched for her, and she popped her head out of the shoulder of your sweatshirt, her usual spot when you had it on. She let out another little peppy and excited chirp, then burrowed herself back into the black fabric, and purred in comfort. You wondered what got her in such a good mood, so you curiously slipped your clothes on, looking, and smelling, for anything else different that you may have missed. As you finally finished putting your sweatshirt on, your eyes widened in amazement, as you realized why Kimchi was acting the way she was. Holy shit this is warm! Your clothes felt so soft and warm, very comfortable and soothing, and you found yourself snuggling into your sweatshirt more.

You shook your head, realizing that you had been distracted for too long already. No matter how warm and nice your clothes felt, you had to go out and talk to the three siblings at some point, even though you really weren’t looking forward to the upcoming conversation. However, you needed answers, and they were the only ones that could give them to you. You just had to find out what you are. Gathering up your courage, not even bothering to hide your tail and ears, you sighed, and exited the bathroom. You gently closed the door behind you, and took a left down the hallway, where the siblings were surely waiting for you at the end.

As you neared the living room, you could hear whispering, alternating between high pitched and frantic to calm and deep. It wasn’t coming from the living room, but the room next to it, where the open doorway you saw earlier led to. The closer you got, the easier it was to understand what they were saying, though it was still only a few words at a time, so you slowed your pace to try and hear as much of their conversation as you could. You weren’t going to ‘eavesdrop’ per se, but you knew that they weren’t going to tell you everything, so why not see if you could catch at least a few of their secrets. If you were going to full out eavesdrop, you were sure you would get caught, and that would only make this whole situation you were in with them worse. But that didn’t mean you couldn’t try and hear some of their conversation, and that’s why you were still slowly making your way down the hall, now being able to hear more of what they were saying, listening very closely.

“I already understand the circumstances.” You recognized the feminine voice as Temari’s. “But how could we not know? We’re supposed to be able to sense this stuff, yet none of us did. That’s my problem with all of this.” More lower, rougher sounding whispering followed, and judging by the sound of the deep and raspy voice, you assumed it was Gaara, though he was still too quiet to hear.

“Well there’s gotta be some kind of explanation.” You recognized this sarcastic sounding voice as Kankuro’s. “This stuff just doesn’t happen, in fact, it’s never happened. I’m surprised they didn’t get to her first.” ‘They’? Who’s ‘they’? And what would ‘they’ want from me? Again, that same low, rough whispering followed. You were now close enough to see that they were sitting at a round dining room table fit for four people: Temari was on the right, Kankuro on the left, and Gaara, who, unlike Temari and Kankuro, wasn’t showing his ears and tail, was sitting so that he faced you, but was currently turned towards Temari as he seemed to be whispering to her. A fourth chair sat across from Gaara, which you assumed was where you were going to sit in just a few seconds.

“Are you sure she’s not-” Temari stopped mid sentence, as Gaara suddenly averted his intense green eyes to the entrance of the hallway, where you now stood. Kankuro and Temari followed Gaara’s line of sight, and their eyes landed on yours. You stared back at them, feeling small under their observing gazes. Sensing your discomfort, Temari sent you a small smile, trying to somewhat lighten the awkward mood. “Hey (Y/N). Come in, have a seat.” She patted the chair next to her, the very one that you had predicted you were going to sit in. Unfortunately, that also meant that you were sitting across from Gaara, which was going to make things even more awkward. Hesitantly, you started to step through the doorway, and you slowly approached the table, with Gaara’s eyes never once leaving your form, even as you sat down in the chair. It only made you more uncomfortable. An awkward silence followed, as no one really knew what to say, and the tension from Gaara still staring you down wasn’t helping in the slightest. Temari was the one to eventually break that silence. “We need to, of course, talk about, well… everything.” You now looked at Temari, and Gaara still didn’t take his eyes off of you. “We should start from the beginning.”

“Well, obviously you’re not human.” Kankuro started. “That much you should already know.” He sounded sarcastic, and maybe he was, but from the way you’ve heard him talk before, you were pretty sure that it was his normal voice, at least, you were kind of hoping it was. At least he’s talking ‘normally’ to me.

“Yeah, I kinda figured that out already.” You retorted with your own sarcasm. He raised a brow, surprised that you were even talking to him at all, and you saw his lips twitch up into a slight smirk, probably amused by your tone.

“Well, you don’t know what you are, do you?” He asked in an almost teasing voice.

“No, because no one’s told me.” You flashed a glare Gaara’s way, but he didn’t react to it. Kankuro and Temari briefly glanced at one another, giving the other knowing looks, and turned back to you.

“Well, uh, let me tell you then. You, we, are called Jinchurikans. It’s essentially like the concept of werewolves, but not exactly. We are actually only the tiniest bit human, but we’re mainly wolf. So we’re all basically in human form, thanks to our human gene, which is the only reason we have it in the first place, but since it’s so small, we don’t completely change into humans… as you can already tell.” You were listening intently to every word Temari was saying. At this point you weren’t surprised to hear that you were just barely human, but actually hearing it out of the mouth of someone who was the same as you, and who knew what they were talking about, was like a blow to your head. After all, you always thought you were human, purely human, and never believed that such creatures, like you now, existed outside of fairytales. However, this was still the first answer you had actually received since your ‘confrontation’ with Gaara yesterday. It was at the same time both troubling and yet, to an extent, a form of closure.

“So since we’re basically wolves, we behave and act like them too.” Kankuro broke your train of thoughts. “Part of that means we’re a pack.”

“And Gaara is the Alpha, the leader, of this pack.” Temari added. Right after she said those words, Gaara raised his head just a tiny bit, and you almost didn’t notice this action at first. It was a subtle act to show that he was more superior, that he has more power than you. You didn’t even flinch, refusing to seem weak in front of him, and this was your way to show that you didn’t care if he was ‘Alpha’, to you he was still just an asshole. That actually explains a lot though. For one, it’s probably why I have that stupid instinct that wants to listen to him. It also explains why he always expected me to follow his orders, and why he wouldn’t listen to anything I said, because he’s used to people following him and not being questioned. But, I still don’t care what he is, he was, and still is, an asshole. And… wait a minute… if he’s Alpha, then what the fuck does that make me-

“That’s not even the strangest part.” Kankuro interrupted your thoughts. “This is.” He paused. “The reason we’re not like ‘regular werewolves’ per se, is because well, first of all, we don’t look anywhere near how they’re usually thought of, our true forms are not ugly two legged beasts, we look like giant more powerful, and might I add intelligent, wolves.” Temari rolled her eyes. “Second, we have a certain control of… ‘magic’ I guess you could call it.”

“Well, it’s not really anything big, I would barely even call it ‘magic’, just certain powers that all Jinchurikans have. We can do small stuff like conceal our ears and tails, or even increase our strength, but even that’s limited.”

“It’s why we wear these hoodies all day.” Kankuro pinched and held up the sleeve of his sweatshirt, then let the fabric fling back to his arm. “Think of it almost like enchanted clothing… sort of.” That must be why my tail was showing yesterday without me even knowing. It was because I didn’t even know I had these powers, or whatever they’re supposed to be, so I couldn’t have controlled it. That’s also why my tail just slipped through my pants without them falling down, it wasn’t just because my tail was growing. Why didn’t Gaara just tell me this sooner?

“Plus they’re pretty comfy.”

“And black goes good with anything.” They continued their conversation about their clothing, while you just spaced out. You were still able to hear their conversation clearly, but you were more reflecting on what those two had already explained, trying to take in all of the information you were given so far. “How come you didn’t know any of this until now?” Temari’s question startled you out of your thoughts.

“Yeah, didn’t your parents tell you anything?” You unintentionally gulped, and before you could say anything, Gaara decided to speak for the first time during this whole explanation.

“Remember that she just moved here, alone.” Your eyes widened for a fraction of a second, then narrowed into a furious glare directed at Gaara. He already knew that you didn’t know who your parents were, you told him so yesterday, but he was trying to get you to admit it to Kankuro and Temari on your own, and he wanted to get more information out of you than before, you were sure of it. You asshole son of a- 

“Oh yeah, that’s right.” Kankuro said slowly, as if starting to feel guilty that he might’ve touched a sensitive topic.

“Uh, I just, kinda wanted to be more independent, you know, start getting experience and-”

“Don’t. Lie to us.” Gaara interrupted before you could finish. You glared at him again, and crossed your arms, becoming more furious by the second.

“And how would you know if I was lying about that?”

“Tell us. The truth.” You didn’t even flinch at his demanding tone, only maintaining your glare, and refusing to give him the satisfaction of submitting to him. Gaara glared right back at you, no mercy in his stoic sea green eyes, and it only made you even more infuriated. Kankuro and Temari remained silent the entire time, showing no emotion, waiting patiently for this stare-off to end, though they already knew what the outcome was going to be. You proved them right when you sighed and leaned back into the chair.

“Okay, fine. I’ll tell you the whole truth.” You paused, looking at Gaara for some kind of response. His glare lessoned, seemingly satisfied, at least for the moment. “I don’t, actually… know my parents.” You mumbled. “I just know their last name, my last name, and that’s it.”

“Do you know what happened to them?” Temari questioned in a light tone.

“… I was told they died, but I don’t know how.”

“And who told you this?” Kankuro suspiciously questioned. You stared at him for a moment, memories of how your adoptive parents would constantly say that your ‘stupid’ and ‘pathetic’ parents’ deaths actually made the world a better place, filled your mind. You wondered if you should try and lie to them again, since there was no way you were going to tell them about your adoptive parents, and even if you really wanted to, your mind, your sanity, wasn’t ready to relive all of those memories, not yet anyway. However, you realized that another attempt at lying would most likely not work, so with this in mind, you gave them an answer.

“No one really important.” You calmly stated. Technically, it was the truth. You couldn’t care less about your adoptive parents, the only reason you still even gave a shit was because James still lived there, and he depended on them, at least for the time being. Otherwise, for all you cared, they could go rot in the pits of Hell for the way they treated you and James. While you were still lost in your thoughts, Gaara was staring at you suspiciously, deciding whether or not he was satisfied with your answer. Luckily, he didn’t question you any further, seeming to sense the great discomfort you felt on this topic, and you inwardly sighed a breath of relief. Thank goodness.

“I guess that explains it.” Kankuro mumbled, still a little suspicious of your answer as well, but he didn’t say anything else about it.

“Even so, you should’ve figured it out before now, even if no one told you.” Temari started. Before you could question about what she meant, she was already speaking again. “Hmm, can I ask you something?” You slowly nodded your head. “You didn’t discover that you were a Jinchurikan until yesterday, and your ears and tail kept growing until this morning, right?” You nodded your head again. It didn’t surprise you that Gaara probably already told them just about everything he knew. “So that means, physically, you went from a child to a teenager in only a day.” You raised an eyebrow.

“What do you mean?” You asked concerned. She paused, as a tense moment of silence passed, before she spoke in a serious tone.

“That’s not supposed to happen.” Wait, what?

“Then… what should’ve happened?” Again, she paused before answering.

“A Jinchurikan is always born in their true forms, so even when we’re in human form we still have our ears and tails, and they’re supposed to stay and grow like any other normal body part. The only time they wouldn’t be seen is when we hide them properly, but that’s it. For you, it was the complete opposite, they didn’t even begin to show until years later.” You were silent. You didn’t know what to say, or even what to think. Then, why am I different? “Plus, we should’ve been able to sense what you are, but you always seemed like a normal human, until now that is.”

“Are you sure she’s full blooded Gaara?” Kankuro asked.

“Yes. I’m positive, there’s no mistaking it.” Wait, Gaara called me that yesterday in the alley, when he threw my hat and saw my ears.

“Full blooded?”

“There are those who are full blooded Jinchurikans, full blooded, and those who are half human half Jinchurikan, half blooded. Usually they’re not born with ears or a tail like us, they can even live their whole lives without even knowing that they’re not entirely human.” So that’s what Gaara meant. “But sometimes there are oddities among them, and they have some kind of property of a full blooded Jinchurikan. The thing is, though, they usually only have one, so for example, they may only have a tail, or ears, or certain powers, never more than one.”

“At first, me and Temari were thinking that you may be some super rare half blood or something, but Gaara obviously knows otherwise, and trust me, he can tell, so we don’t know why you went from everyone thinking you were human to now suddenly you’re a full blooded Jinchurikan. And no, it’s not like you can be ‘turned’. You’re either born a Jinchurikan or you’re not, it’s that simple, so don’t ask.”

“I wasn’t going to.” You mumbled. I really am full blooded, aren’t I. Gaara’s right, even I can tell by now, or… at least I think I can. Maybe I’m just going crazy. I can’t believe all of this was kept hidden from me all my life, and there’s something that prevented me from knowing what I even am, and no one knows what that was. That’s when something clicked in your mind. Did my assoholic parents know about what I was?… And if they did, was that why they treated me so badly? No, that’s not why, because James was treated just as bad as me, and he’s definitely not a Jinchurikan. I know he’s not, since my adoptive parents are his real parents, and that means even if James was a Jinchurikan, then they’d be too, and they wouldn’t treat their own son badly because of something they are as well. But, maybe they still knew somehow, and they just added that on to the list of reasons to hate me and treat me bad. But if they did, how would they have known? That was when you realized something, something that made you forget about your adoptive parents all together, something you wished you realized earlier. If I’m full blooded, that would mean that… both my actual parents were Jinchurikans as well. …Who exactly were my parents?

“Well, at this point, it doesn’t matter that we don’t know why.” The sound of Temari’s voice snapped you out of your thoughts. “The important thing is that you are full blooded, no matter what. So, that makes you part of the pack.”

“Welcome to the pack, pack sister.” Kankuro said with a smirk. You cocked your head to the side, confused.

“Huh?”

“Well, like I said, you’re part of the pack, and anyone who’s in the pack is basically close as family, pack sister.” Temari explained. That’s kinda weird, since we all only really just met right now, but I guess… it, doesn’t feel ‘wrong’ or anything.

“Oh. Then, does that make you…”

“Yup, your pack sister.”

“And pack brothers.” Kankuro slung an arm around Gaara, who looked very unamused by the action, and smirked, pointing to the both of them. You laughed a little at this, and Gaara directed his heated glare towards you, which only fueled your laughter more.

“Oh, and since we’re on that topic, there’s something else you should be aware of.” Temari started, stopping your fit of merriment, as your attention was now on her. “The pack’s not all you’re a part of now.” What else could there possibly be? “Don’t freak out about this, but uh, how do I put this? Well, um, you know… Gaara’s not just the leader of a pack. He’s also the leader of a very powerful gang, the Fire Shinobi.” Your eyes widened for a brief moment.

“What!?”

“But don’t worry. We’re not ‘bad’, we don’t do crimes or anything.” Uhhh, should I still be concerned? “We have a territory though, which is basically the whole city. We actually protect it from other gangs.”

“Oh, uh, o-okay. Well, I guess that’s not ‘bad’.”

“And being part of the pack, well, and living in the city, obviously, means you’re automatically in.” Wait, what? What the hell! So not only am I in basically a freaking WOLF pack, I’m in a gang too now?… What the actual fuck happened to my life? 

“Oh, and you should know that there’s a hierarchy to the Fire Shinobi. Usually, any Jinchurikan is at the top, or the Inner Ring, but since technically you’re not an ‘official’ member of the pack, yet, you’re at the very bottom.” You cocked your head to the side.

“Wait, I thought you said I was already ‘part of the pack’?”

“Well, you are, being the same species of course, but you have to be initiated to be a full member. Usually that’s done when you’re younger, but we’re pretty sure that didn’t happen, otherwise you would’ve been old enough to remember it and we would’ve been able to sense you better.” Oh great. Another thing I have to worry about.

“We have a meeting once a month when the full moon is at its brightest.” Gaara finally spoke again, which slightly startled you. “That is when we do initiations, for the gang, and the pack.”

“You obviously don’t have to do it for the gang, since you’re already in.” Temari quickly added.

“Wait, didn’t the full moon just pass?”

“Yes. In exactly one month we will have another meeting. That is when you will become a full member of the pack.” Gaara explained.

       “I have to wait a whole month!?”

“Yes, and during that time, you will also be training to be a part of not only the Fire Shinobi, but also the pack. I will be keeping a close eye on you, which is why there are going to be rules set in place for you.” You glared at him.

“Rules?? What kind of ru-”

“And furthermore, you’ll be living here, with us.”

“For a whole month!?”

“No. More than that.”

“Woah, woah, wait… what!? Why do I need live here in the first place? I already live in my own apartment.”

“I will say it again. I took care of it.” You narrowed your eyes at him.

“What did you do.” You asked in a low tone.

“It doesn’t matter.”

“It’s my apartment, my house, that I pay for, and I live in. Yes it does matter.”

“Not anymore.” Your eyes widened in utter disbelief.

“And what does that mean.” You said through gritted teeth, and you clenched your fists so hard your nails, or rather claws, almost cut into your skin.

“You live here now, and you don’t need to worry about that place anymore.” You felt your rage boiling up, ready to explode at a moment’s notice. Meanwhile, Kankuro and Temari remained silent and unmoving in their seats during your whole argument with Gaara. They knew they shouldn’t get in the way, it would just make everything worse. Plus, they already knew who was going to win, no matter what anyone did.

“Why do I even have to live here.” You half snarled, keeping your glare locked on Gaara’s unmerciful eyes.

“You’re not trained, you barely know anything about being a Jinchurikan, you can’t even control your own powers, and you are not under the full protection of the pack yet. If something happens to you, we’re completely on our own. It’s safer if you stay here and live with us, so I can watch over you better.” Oh come on!

“What could possibly happen to me that would require that much protection?” The two eldest siblings stole glances at each other, knowing exactly what the answer to your question was, and that they couldn’t be silent any longer.

“Remember how I said that we protect the city from other gangs?” Temari spoke up, coming in between you and Gaara’s heated ‘discussion’. You momentarily diverted your gaze to her.

“Yes.” You said more calmly now, as you slowly nodded your head, already getting an idea on what she was getting at.

“Well, we’ve recently been dealing with another powerful gang that’s been causing a lot of trouble for us.”

“They call themselves the Akatsuki. They’re pretty dangerous, and they deal with very high ranking crimes, their most notable trait being their uniforms, a black cloak with red clouds. They’re NOT someone you should mess with.” Kankuro informed.

“They’re our number one enemies at the moment, and they’ve been attacking us more and more lately. They may not know that you’re part of the Fire Shinobi yet, but we can’t take any risks. You never know what they might have up their sleeves to find out.” Temari warned.

“And since you’re part of the pack, well… let’s just say we don’t take it ‘well’ when someone from our pack is in danger.”

“That is the reason why you will live here, and that is why I will be keeping an eye on you. Do you understand.” Gaara firmly stated. You glared at him, but this time, the intensity you had before was gone. All that was left was defeat, as you gave Gaara your answer.

“Fine, okay. I get it. I understand.” While you spoke, your glare didn’t move from Gaara’s form one bit, and even when you finished your sentence, your furious (E/C) eyes remained locked on his own annoyed sea-green ones. This doesn’t excuse the fact that you were isolating me from my friends, you’ve done something to my job and my apartment, and you forced me into this whole living with you situation. I will find out what you did, and I will never forget what you’ve done. 

Kankuro and Temari merely watched as you and Gaara continued to glare at each other, thinking about what you had said. They had already known your answer before you even gave it. They knew the moment you and Gaara starting going at each other that you would eventually give in. After all, Gaara is the Alpha, and no Jinchurikan, or any pack animal for that matter, can say no to the alpha. Gaara knew this as well. No matter what he said or what he did, you would’ve given in despite all that. After all, it was in your nature, your blood, to follow the Alpha’s commands, his commands, and no matter how much you could deny this fact, it was true. He just had to be patient, no matter how obnoxious you were, and it eventually worked out in his favor, just like he always knew it would.

Everything was dead silent, the air became thick and suffocating as you and Gaara became locked in a heated glare between each other. The two elder siblings were beginning to feel awkward, being practically caught in the middle of all the tension between you and him. Temari, feeling almost unbearably uncomfortable, averted her eyes away from the two of you, trying to find something more interesting than focusing on the awkward situation in front of her. Her eyes drifted to the window that was over the kitchen sink, and she saw that it was already starting to get dark outside, which gave her an idea. She gestured for Kankuro to look out the window himself, and as he glanced over his shoulder to see the approaching night sky, he knew what Temari was trying to say. She and Kankuro stood up from their chairs and Kankuro headed for the fridge that was a few feet behind you. Temari stood there looking at you, which got you to break your glare with Gaara and move your now curious gaze to her.

“It’s getting a little late, and we didn’t eat yet. We were just gonna eat leftovers from yesterday, is that okay?” You slowly nodded your head.

“Sure, thank you.” Temari smiled, and walked over to the cabinets that were to the right of the fridge.

“You don’t need to say thank you.” Kankuro called from behind you, opening the fridge as he spoke, the sound of the cold air rushing out was loud and clear to your keen ears. “You live here now, remember?” You frowned at his comment.

“Yeah, I remember.” You mumbled angrily, as Temari came back over to the table. She set something down in front of you, then sat back down in her seat. You stared at the item curiously, which looked like a bite sized brownie. The thing was, it didn’t smell like a brownie at all, it smelled like there was some kind of medicinal something in it, but what, you couldn’t tell. You wondered why she set it down in front of you, and why she was looking as if she was studying your confused reaction. You looked at Temari for some kind of explanation, which made her chuckle.

      “Eat it. It helps your appetite, which I know must be out of hand already. I remember how mine was when I was younger.” She sighed, and looked up at the ceiling as if remembering something. “Good times.” You nodded your head, showing that you understood, and looked back at the ‘brownie’ in front of you. “It also helps with fleas too.” You heard her mumble something, but it took you a minute to realize what she had actually said. Did she just say-

“Wait, what?”

“Nothing.” She quickly answered, which only increased your worry. You honestly hadn’t heard what she said the first time, you were only assuming what you thought you heard her say. By the way she was acting, you still didn’t know exactly what it was, but she had definitely said something she regretted telling you. “Don’t worry about it, it’s fine.” You still gave her a concerned look, and she just ‘innocently’ smiled in return. You heard Kankuro turn on the microwave in the background, and you figured he must be heating up whatever the leftovers Temari had mentioned were. You turned your gaze back to the ‘brownie’, carefully picked it up, and sniffed it for a second time. You studied it for a moment, then you placed the whole thing in your mouth, and starting chewing it. It’s kind of bland, but all in all… it’s not bad. You only had to chew it three times before you swallowed it, and instantly you felt something in your stomach area change. It felt more ‘normal’. “There, now you won’t feel like you’re starving to death anymore.” Right then, Kankuro came back to the table with four disposable plastic containers, and set them down in front of all of you. You opened yours up, and saw about one pint of ramen inside. Kankuro handed you all chopsticks, and you four began to eat.

Once you all finished your meals, Kankuro took the four containers and went to throw them out. Temari motioned for you to stand up and follow her, and you willingly obliged. You saw Gaara stand up from the table as well and walk over to Kankuro, where he began a conversation with him that you couldn’t hear. Meanwhile, Temari lead you into the living room and sat you down on the couch.

“Stay here while I take care of something real quick, kay?” You nodded in understanding, and she smiled in return. She then started off down the hallway, disappearing into the darkness so you couldn’t see her anymore. You looked away from where Temari once stood to your left where the two living room windows were. You immediately noticed that the sun had already set, and now you were aware of the obvious fact that the living room was shrouded in darkness, the only light source being from the kitchen lights. Where did the freaking time go, out the window? Jeez! You turned away from the windows and peered behind the couch to the other half of the living room, which you didn’t pay much attention to when you first entered the house.

There was another larger, wider TV at the back wall standing on a huge mahogany TV stand with cabinets and slots filled with stuff you couldn’t quite see. In the middle of the other two walls, the ones next to the TV, were dark wooden tables with two identical lamps on top of them. Finally, there was a second identical couch that was pressed up against the one you were currently sitting on, and you were surprised that you didn’t notice it until just now. Why do they have two living rooms in one room? …Oh well. I guess I’ll ask about it later.

You decided to stop focusing on the ‘second living room’ for now and turned around to stare at the other TV you had first seen when you entered the house. A yawn escaped your mouth, and that’s when you realized how tired you still were. Even though you had a nap during gym, it didn’t make up for the fact that you still didn’t get that much sleep the previous night. Your eyes, and ears, began to droop, and your head started to lean forward. It got lower and lower, until you jerked yourself back up, your eyes still lowered halfway shut, trying to stay awake as best you could. You started to lean your head on your left shoulder, your whole body following suit, until you were laying on your left side on the couch, which suddenly seemed more comfortable than before. You curled up into a ball, let your ears lower down to the sides of your head, and wrapped your tail around yourself so your face was almost covered. You couldn’t help but, after possibly the two longest days of your life, close your tired eyes shut, and let sleep consume you.

Temari was now walking back down the hallway towards you, a blanket in her hands, and calling out to you, not yet realizing that you were asleep.

“Your room’s not exactly ready yet, so you gotta sleep on the couch for tonight. Is that okay-.” She stopped as she reached the end of the hallway, now seeing your unconscious form on the couch. She smiled, and watched your sleeping form with a sense of peace.

As she continued to stare at you, Gaara came out of the kitchen, and noticed that Temari was standing in the middle of the living room. He came up and stood beside her, curious at what she was looking at, when he saw that you had fallen asleep on the couch. He didn’t say a word, and just continued to stare as your chest kept rising and falling in a steady rhythm. Temari finally noticed Gaara standing beside her and sighed. “Man, I bet she’s really exhausted from today. I mean, that was a lot of information to take in, especially when she just found out that she wasn’t human the day before. That must be hard on her.” Gaara made no comment, as Temari cocked her head to the side, and studied you a bit closer. “Huh. You know, she actually looks kinda cute, like an adorable pup, don’t you think?” Gaara snorted, an obvious ‘no’ to her question, as he continued to stare at your passed out form.

There was something about you in this state that made him feel… different. He just couldn’t look away from the sight of you sleeping. Sure, he had seen you sleep earlier during gym, but he never took the time to notice what you actually looked like. You just looked so, so… peaceful. You looked calm, and your features had softened from any anger or annoyance that he was used to seeing, to almost innocent, and maybe something else just as enlightening. But, it certainly wasn’t what Temari was saying, that you looked… cute. Or, was that really the right word? He didn’t know. It’s not like he ever found something, no less someone, ‘cute’ before. Maybe it was because he had actually never seen you in such a relaxed state; all he had ever seen was pure ire and rage directed at him. Even when he saw you messing around with your friends from time to time, he had never really seen your face, although he knew you must’ve been smiling and happy. All he did know was that he liked how you seemed peaceful, and the rhythm your chest rose and fell at was nice. It gave him a sense of ease, to know that you were safe.

He wondered what you would look like if the moon was shining on you; if your pure white fur would shine, or become even whiter than before in the glistening moonlight, and how your pale (S/C) skin might glow brighter, especially if it was under a full moon. Also, would your features be more illuminated than before? He even wondered what your fur felt like, if it was soft and luscious, or thick and fuzzy, or a mixture of both. He started to really focus on what your (E/C) eyes would look like under the bright full moon, or even… what your smile looked like.

Temari noticed that Gaara hadn’t moved for an unusually long time, staring at you along with her. “Gaara, you okay?” She asked concernedly. Gaara heard Temari’s voice, and managed to, albeit slowly, pry his eyes away from your form, and move them to Temari questioningly. He snorted, which was him saying he was obviously fine, and then immediately moved his eyes back to you. Temari knew that, despite his ‘answer’, this was not normal behavior for Gaara at all. And now, the more she watched him continue to stare at you, the more suspicious she became. He even seemed to space out once again, without even noticing Temari’s questioning stare directed at him.

By now, Kankuro had finally finished his business in the kitchen, turned off the lights, which now shrouded the rest of the house in darkness, and walked out into the living room. He saw Temari and Gaara standing in the middle of the hallway for some reason, and as he came up and stood next to Temari, he realized what that reason was. He cracked a small smirk at the sight of you passed out on the couch.

“Hm. It’s gonna be a long first month, isn’t it?” He asked almost sarcastically. Temari and Gaara both looked at Kankuro, a smirk still plastered on his face. Temari cracked a small smirk as well, while Gaara remained stoic, as they all returned their stares to you. Silence filled the room, and for once, it was actually comfortable.

“Do you think she still needs this blanket?” Temari asked, breaking the once nice silence, and holding up the blanket that was still in her arms. “I mean, she still has that sweatshirt on, and not to brag or anything, but I’m pretty damn good at washing clothes, just saying, so they must still be warm. But, I mean-” She stopped when she saw Kankuro giving her a look, and she returned it. “What?” She scoffed. Gaara ignored Temari’s comments, and continued to stare at you.

“Put it next to her then, just in case.” He told Temari, still not breaking his eye contact with your form. She stopped giving Kankuro looks, and turned away from him. She slowly, and quietly, walked up to your sleeping form and set the blanket down by your feet. She then, just as carefully, made her way back to her original spot between Gaara and Kankuro. Another moment of comfortable silence passed, all three of them still admiring their new pack sister’s relaxed state, until Kankuro spoke up.

“Maybe we should leave her alone, and let her sleep in peace.” Temari nodded with a smile while Gaara said nothing, though he silently agreed. The two eldest siblings both took one last glimpse at you, then at Gaara, and finally started down the hallway to their rooms. Gaara was the last one left, and he found it hard to move his eyes off of you. Hesitantly, he turned around, and started walking to his room as well. Although he never slept, even he needed some kind of rest, because he very well knew that it was going to be another long day tomorrow, dealing with you and teaching you how to be a proper Jinchurikan. But for now, he would let you sleep in peace, and rest, for Kankuro was right. It was going to be a long first month.

 

*Meanwhile*

        The alleyways were just as dark as any other night in the city, maybe even darker this night. The same figure walked the same path, to go to the same meeting spot, and to meet the same person as last time. Their footsteps echoed off the walls, just as before, though, this night they seemed even louder. The figure as well seemed different this night. They appeared more serious, more enraged, marching onwards like a rigid soldier, different from their normal calm composure.

As the figure approached the meeting spot, another familiar, shadowed person was already standing there, their back facing the figure, waiting impatiently for them to arrive. Closer and closer the figure got, and the shadowed person finally turned around, their outline and eyes the only things visible in the darkness of the night. That same, familiar, deep voice from before resonated off the walls, as the shadowed person began to speak.

“Report. What is going on with our target.” The approaching figure finally stopped, flinching when the voice said ‘our target’, and hesitant on giving an answer.

“The mission will be harder than expected. He’s gotten to her first.” The owner of the deep voice stood there, contemplating what the figure had just told them.

“That should not be too much of a problem… but there is now a time limit. The mission must commence before the end of the month.”

“The problem with that is now he is always with her. Getting close to her now will be nearly impossible.” The figure clenched their fists, their knuckles turning whiter the longer they spoke, and the owner of the voice noticed this, as well as the venom in the figure’s voice. They very well knew it wasn’t just because the mission was merely more difficult now.

“You sound as if something else is bothering you besides this hindrance. What is it.” The voice demanded. The figure merely clenched their fists harder in response, refusing to say a single word. But this was not a problem for the voice, they needed nothing more than the figure’s reaction to know exactly what they were thinking… and what they were feeling. “As I told you before, do not let your emotions compromise this mission.” The figure unclenched their fists, almost in a defeated manner, but it was something else. It was more along the lines of calm rage.

“You shouldn’t be talking. After all, you’ve met her before too, and already knowing her, you know exactly how I feel, don’t you?” The figure accused. The owner of the voice said nothing in return, and stared at the figure in front of them. A few minutes of silence passed, until the voice finally gave a response.

“The mission will continue as planned. We will not let anything get in the way of it. Do you understand.” The figure smirked at the voice’s response, knowing that they had been right, she had gotten to them as well. The figure turned around and started off into the alleyways, with a triumphant smirk still plastered on their face. The owner of the voice did nothing in response to the figure’s actions, for even if they did, what was the point, they could not deny the simple facts of the truth, no matter what they did. The still shadowed person stood there, watching the retreating form of the figure, knowing that their mission was now going to be harder than they thought, in more ways than one… or three.