209Last chapter! Thanks for coming on the journey with me. 😉 Much love to all who read and enjoyed.
Especially a big shoutout to Hiei's Cute Girl who did the work of the angels and left reviews on my Hakuouki fics which in turn gave me the emotional energy to finish this. I tip my hat to you.
I'll be honest with ya'll, I wrote out an ending, then scrapped it. Then planned out another. Then scrapped it. This is attempt three and I have to draw a line somewhere, so here we are.
I really wish I could draw sometimes. I think this would have worked so much better as a doujin series. Alas. Also I should have edged more into steampunk because I'd love to see some steampunk GaaSaku. That in of itself is kind of an inspiring concept. Hmmmm. Might churn out a oneshot for that soon.
Disclaimer: see part 1
"Pull yourself together!" Sakura was in a stifling room with Hinata, Temari, TenTen, and Ino. They had just kicked out Ino's clucking mother, a seamstress fixing a burst seam on Ino's dress, someone who had come in asking about flowers in the reception area, and a random aunt crying about how beautiful everything was. Sakura, who had noticed the glazed look on Ino's face, had kicked out half the room, told Temari to open a window, and was shaking Ino by the shoulders.
"Breathe dammit! You look like you're going to pass out!" She had pulled medical rank on the room to get this far, and she didn't know when that slim line of authority was going to collapse in on itself. "We have to walk out of this room looking like we know what we're doing in less than an hour! So stand up and walk over to the window and take a deep breath."
Mechanically, Ino did as she was told while Hinata tried to wrangle the huge train to the dress and follow. Temari, immensely enjoying the chaos, sat on a table in the corner with her legs crossed and nodded at Sakura's efforts. There had been a bit of tone and tenor to her words that seemed familiar, and that was probably because Temari had said similar words to Sakura not even a month ago when Sakura had discovered their brand new central heating furnace was full blast in the basement in the middle of the night so that Temari could dispose of the most recent assassin from Suna.
The 'conversation' that followed had been ugly. The revelation of Temari's oddly specific gardening hobby in fall and what might lie under the flower beds had been even uglier. They had agreed by unspoken consensus to ignore one another since then, but today had brought them together under a sort of truce because Temari had an obligation to protect Sakura and Sakura was going to be spending a lot of time around strangers thus it was a perfect opportunity for deadly mischief.
"All I have to do is stand there and smile. I don't understand why I feel like this." Ino was finally responding as cold winter air blasted her from the open window, even if her words laid bare the edge of panic she had been outright ignoring right up until today. Two entire dynasties were joining and Sakura knew her friend felt the weight of that far more than knowing she'd be heading to a different bedroom in a different house than the one she had grown up in. Ino was practical, above all, but that didn't mean she couldn't be brought to the edge by the expectations of dozens upon dozens of Yamanaka and Akimichi relatives or the weeks of going over various related business arrangements for the family empires.
"You planned this out to perfection ages ago. If anything goes wrong then it's an act of the gods and not due to you. I need you, Ino Yamanaka, to look at me right now and give me my orders. What am I doing with this bouquet?!" Sakura could count on her friend's instinct for bossiness to override whatever panic attack she was having. Thrusting one hand forward, clutching Hinata's bouquet, Sakura watched Ino's gaze visibly sharpen.
"I told you about a thousand times, I have all your flowers labeled. Can't you do the simplest thing? Find your bouquet and stop messing around."
Sakura smiled and Hinata sighed in relief, Ino was back. It was just in time, too, as the seamstress was knocking on the door again to finish her work. All that stress eating that Ino had done had seriously put a strain on the one size too small dress that her mother had insisted on ordering. Meanwhile, Sakura knew a similarly frantic tailoring job was taking place on the other side of the house as she had heard Chouji had lost a staggering amount of weight prior to this event.
"I need some air," Sakura looked to Hinata. As maid of honor, this was her job to keep Ino level now that the initial emergency had passed. When Hinata had pulled her into the room in a blind panic, TenTen following Sakura out of sheer curiosity, Sakura had been relieved that this was all it was. The Hyuuga heir made it sound like Ino was having an actual medical emergency. "You've got it from here, I'll make sure everyone's in place for the walk."
Temari jumped off the table and exited after Sakura, as had been their habit these past months. Everyone in the village had seemed to come to accept the blond bodyguard, but most people were under the assumption that the council had ordered it due to the fact that Sakura's life could be in danger from other villages who were displeased that they had unilaterally decided to stop the sacrificial practices. It wasn't entirely a lie, but most of those protests had come through envoys and ambassadors. Sakura was notorious now, branded as a travel risk and banned from visiting most of the surrounding country. Everyone waited to see what the demon would do in retaliation to Konoha despite assurances from leadership that the problem was well in hand.
Sakura wondered if the council was having second thoughts about allying with Gaara, particularly when his inconvenient disappearance meant they could not provide proof of his reformed behavior or generalized lack of menace. They were pretty close mouthed about the whole thing, and Temari hadn't been very forthcoming about how the process had—
"Do you know what helps someone who may be, I don't know, vomiting from nerves a lot or something?" Shikamaru had sauntered up out of nowhere, but only Sakura had been surprised. Temari knew where everyone was in relation to both of them at any point in time. It was one of her skills Sakura found highly useful as well as moderately disturbing. Shikamaru held up a hand to acknowledge Temari, his smile for her a little warmer than the mere smirk he offered to most people.
"A piece of bread and some water will probably be all you can do for him. Is Chouji really that nervous?"
"Did I say that it was him?" Shikamaru looked shifty for all of a moment but gave up fast when Sakura gave him a dubious glare. "Yeah, he's that nervous. How's Ino holding up?"
Sakura shrugged. "About the same. They'll both be ready, they're adults and they know what they're doing."
"They're the same age as us and I can't imagine getting married." Shikamaru's eyes darted over to Temari briefly and then he seemed to get nervous in a way Sakura didn't fully understand. "I'm going to go find that bread you recommended. See you in an hour." He was moving faster than she had seen him go in a while and Sakura sighed, her breath a puff of vapor in the cold air.
The chocolate colored furry stole that Sakura had been gifted by Ino to go around the deep boatneck of her long-sleeved indigo dress didn't completely erase the chill of the snowy day. Midwinter had been a month ago, but that merely meant they were at the peak of the chill. The ground was frozen solid and spring was a distant memory with all the white powder dusting Konoha. A large barn on the Akimichi property had been cleared out for the wedding ceremony and reception, and Sakura knew it was a short walk from the house to the relative radiant warmth of the barn. Temari was shivering softly under layers of coats, and glaring at Sakura for lingering in the cold longer than strictly necessary.
"My brother's fine. Stop brooding and let's get warm again."
The harsh words broke through layers of Sakura's mind to remind her that just because Gaara was a little later than she expected him that there was absolutely no reason to think something terrible had befallen him. He was practically indestructible by any human means and probably quite a few inhuman ones, so worrying about him was pointless. It didn't mean she didn't do it on nearly a daily basis ever since he had left to go confront the other demon host. Not even resuming her medical training months ago had fully distracted her from her erstwhile fiancée.
Maybe it was because reminders of him were everywhere, from Temari's very existence to the home that was his but not really his that she lived in, or the strange questions about her missing time that the council had asked her not to disclose but which were still posed to her on a weekly basis by her patients.
"Who said I was thinking about him?"
Temari rolled her eyes. "Don't piss me off today, Haruno. At least not until I get some wine in me."
Usually Temari wasn't this surly, but Sakura chalked it up to the bitter weather and started back towards the barn with purposeful strides. The path had been cleared by various Akimichi cousins, but it was still slick and Sakura had to concentrate on where she was placing her booted feet. Temari was directly behind her, even pushing her forward as they entered the barn turned event space. Before Sakura knew it, she was smiling over at how Temari was crowding next to the radiant stove that had been installed to provide relief.
Sakura had to keep reminding herself that the woman hadn't even been displaced from her home for a year, and given the culture shock over differences between the pace of life in Konoha and Suna she actually did pretty well. Shikamaru had been a large help in that regard as the two of them spent enough time together exclusively that Sakura felt like she could maybe risk teasing the assassin about it here and there. Sometimes she couldn't help but say something snarky because every time Temari went on a date Sakura had to hide in a secret panic room that Temari had had constructed in Gaara's house. Easiest thing to do when that happened was to catch up on her reading.
All her Doki Doki books had gone into the furnace straight away, though, so there wasn't much besides medical scrolls and textbooks. Sometimes instead of reading she would think about her future, or come up with outlandish scenarios. You could take the romance novels away from the girl but their legacy persisted and the only real target of it all was the one man Sakura had any romantic experience with, even if that man was not entirely human. If the thought of Gaara riding into town on a white horse and demanding her hand in marriage before the whole village made her laugh to herself, then the more realistic imaginings of him staring up at a starry night sky and thinking of her made her sigh.
Separation had, oddly, made him feel closer. Without all the messiness of hormones, of course. She often wished she could ask his advice when she first began running into villagers that feared her. Everyone knew she should be dead and while they agreed that sacrificing girls was abhorrent, many people saw her as a precursor to doom for Konoha no matter what the council said. Every so often she was spat at, or people made signs to ward off evil when she passed. Once she was denied service in a small restaurant on her lunch break. Temari and Tsunade both were of the mind that she should either ignore the idiots or mess with their heads. That wasn't Sakura's way: first she got angry, then—later, privately—she got sad. Gaara would have understood, having had a lifetime of fear and reverence directed at him, and she figured he had interesting insights about it. Assuming she could get him to say something, but in her fantasy scenarios he was a bit more approachable.
"Sakura, right? I asked that guy over there who the pink haired girl was and they knew right away. You're a lot cuter than I expected. Especially in that dress." A smiling blond man, probably around her age, looked down at her with an eagerness that confused her. She saw what had to be the most interesting dimples on either cheek before taking a step back to put some distance between them. Close talkers were a minor pet peeve for her. Getting a good look at him, his dark clothes were a bit rumpled given Ino's request family come dressed at least semi-formally.
"Uh, thank you?" She was used to being known, at this point, but usually the reaction was a bit less exuberant. Frankly, most people who didn't know her already weren't going out of their way to find the failed sacrifice. If it weren't for Tsunade, some of her patients would have asked for a different medic as well.
"Like, you don't even know! I've tried to imagine what you looked like and I figured you'd be a lot tougher. But wow, now that I see you…"
This was getting less charming as he continued talking. He was blond haired and blue eyed so he might be a Yamanaka, but Sakura thought she had met just about every one of those over the years that were even vaguely close in age to her and Ino.
"And you are?" Sakura backed up another step and grabbed her stole with both hands to make sure the man didn't try to shake hers.
The smile he continued to give looked warm and friendly, but also oddly sharp. "Oh sorry, Naruto Uzumaki. I see people all over the place and they all seem to have jobs. Is there anything I can do to help? Carry a table? Stir a pot? Help people to their seats? I get antsy if I don't have something to do."
With all that energy he would probably be a menace if she didn't give him some busywork. "Um, I suppose you could be an usher, since TenTen is probably going to stick with Hinata and Ino… just help anyone who looks confused to a seat. I guess."
"Yes, boss!" Naruto said with a grin, rubbing at his short spikey hair, and Sakura found herself smiling back despite herself. Weird guy.
The ceremony was a blur. Sakura had already been through the rehearsal of it the day before and after reaching her spot she found her mind wandering. People in the audience blubbered, others looked on with a mix of boredom and vague happiness. Maybe some were remembering their own wedding, or meditating on how much stronger this would make both families commercially.
Sakura wondered if, had she been in Ino's place, would she be able to marry someone she didn't necessarily love but definitely was friends with and respected a great deal. There was also the non-minimal issue of the question she had to answer once Gaara returned. Most certainly she respected (and feared, always a touch of that) Gaara. Given the experiences they had shared and the time they had spent together, they weren't precisely friends but there was a bond there that was much closer than she felt to most people.
Was it love? If not, could it become love? Ino had pointed out practically from day one that a normal date with a normal boy couldn't compete with the intensity that marked her interactions with Gaara.
She had been mulling these questions over for months and on any given day the answer fell on a spectrum that was broad enough to carry it either way. As the officiant droned on about the nature of love, Sakura found herself ticking off boxes in her mind slowly. Patient, kind, generous… that wasn't the love Sakura knew. More like covetousness, persistence, and hunger—but perhaps that was merely the dark side of the moon. Gaara had proved both to her and himself that he could be more than the monster he had been branded, so why couldn't he find greater capacity in himself to relate to others as well? The lighter side of love was possible for him.
A shiver that had nothing to do with the draft coming from a nearby shuttered opening into the barn rocked Sakura and had her snapping her head to attention and subtly scanning the crowd. Did she wish him here so strongly that he had appeared? No glimpse of rust red hair greeted her, just a tiny wave from that weird Naruto dude who seemed more interested in staring at her than at the bride and groom. She rolled her eyes and tried to come back to the present. Straightening her spine, she formed the vacant smile and relaxed posture that Ino had demanded of her bridesmaids to the point of forcing them to practice standing for hours on end last week. At the time it had been an easy thing to humor her, but now she was glad she could do it without thinking.
Thinking was going to get her in trouble.
Before she knew it, Ino and Chouji were marching hand in sweaty hand down the aisle and back into the house while people clapped around them. After they had made it nearly out of the barn, the rest of the wedding party made their way out. The barn was going to be converted into a reception area as soon as the clapping and general buzz of interest passed. Weirdly, Sakura realized a rather serious looking Temari wasn't moving from her position near the stove that she had immediately resumed as soon as people stood in their seats. Sakura, last of the bridesmaids, linked arms with Kiba and tried to keep him from walking too fast and stepping on the heels of TenTen and Lee down the narrow path through the snow. TenTen, bless her, was patting the hand of a very emotional Lee and Sakura was glad she didn't have to deal with that mess.
As soon as it was socially acceptable, Sakura dropped Kiba's arm and he immediately jumped the line of groomsmen to punch Shikamaru in the arm and in general successfully make Hinata extremely uncomfortable as she politely listened to his plans to prank Chouji during the reception. Having been abandoned to the end of the line and without her normal escort, Sakura felt oddly exposed. So when someone pulled her to the side, hand immediately covering her mouth, she didn't have enough time to even scream.
She did, however, bite down as hard as possible on the hand covering her face until she tasted blood. The world was a mass of white as she was dragged somewhere dark and then suddenly let go.
"You've made a huge mistake! Kill me now or bring me back, you're going to die either way." Sakura said, panting from the exertion of flexing her whole body against her captor. She wiped what was no doubt his blood from her face, and spat on the ground.
Pinpricks of light allowed Sakura's eyes to adjust and finally note that she was in a small toolshed, which seemed a strange place to kidnap someone to given it was full of weapons.
"It's an unconvincing argument." Gaara's distinctive voice caused Sakura to feel light headed on top of her rapidly beating heart. "There are far more alternatives than killing you or bringing you back."
He had allowed her to break through his defenses and pierce his skin. A bit of pain was only fair given he had been forced to delay his promised return. Kankuro's difficulties in Suna had been complex and simply murdering the opposition until everyone came around to his way of thinking wasn't going to be a successful application of force. There were debates, spaces for elders to express their doubts and displeasure, and then—as with all things Suna—a few highly public battles to the death. Kankuro, who had always been dismissed as the weakest of the siblings, had proven himself a deadly opponent and that had gone a long way to winning the respect of the senior clergy as they stood at the moment. What was left of them.
Gaara knew it was going to take more than a simple pronouncement to change decades upon decades of tradition, but he had had some recent practice at diplomacy that didn't involve blood and, as much as it galled him to say, Naruto was also a help. For the people that couldn't be intellectually appealed to or physically dominated by the Suna siblings, sometimes the fox would step in and flip a moral switch that he particularly had access to in others. Naruto's mercy and Gaara's brutality made for the ultimate push and pull, and the village of assassins was finally on the right track.
Which left one other task before Gaara could decide which next steps were necessary in his life. He licked blood from where Sakura had torn his flesh on the inside of his middle finger and Shukaku trilled in happiness in the back of his mind. She was still strong, attacking with her whole body even when the odds were against her, and she wore a dead prey animal around her shoulders. He spoke to drown out the cheerfully bloodthirsty nonsense the tanuki was spewing.
"You look well."
Apparently, she wasn't in the mood for pleasantries. "Why, and I really hope you have a very good reason, would you kidnap me and not just come up to me at the reception like a normal person and let me know you had come back?!"
There were so many people out there and there would have been no way to secure her attention privately. It had made sense in the moment as the opportunity arose, but then Naruto had been telling him for months that he needed to think more like a normal human man and less like a militaristic demon host. It was hard to unlearn the training of a lifetime.
"Is there anywhere on this property that isn't crawling with people?" He felt like that question encapsulated his dilemma. Sakura softened her expression slightly, but she still looked incredibly displeased, arms crossed. "I've been surrounded by the people of Suna for weeks on end. I'm not in the mood for more people."
"And yet you needed me right here at this very second."
He didn't hesitate on that note. "Yes. Precisely." That answer went a long way to mollifying her as she gave a deep sigh and took a step towards him.
"Let me see that finger. I know I drew blood, somehow." Gently, she bridged the last of the distance between them and turned his palm over in her hands to find the already partially healed tear of flesh. He was stronger than she had seen him last, his body knitting skin together practically as she watched with a fascination he was happy to provide to her. "Your body is incredible," she murmured and then looked up at him with pink cheeks in the half light.
What he wanted to do was kiss her, and gather her body to his own with a crushing pressure. The desire to simply absorb her into himself was so strong he knew he had to continue to let her make the moves. Too long away from Sakura had given him an edge of desperation he didn't like, and it was testing his control more sorely than he had counted on.
"Your hair is shorter…" she said, reaching out to touch the unruly strands before realizing what she'd done and withdrawing her hand with a start.
"A compromise," Gaara murmured, eyes flicking down to her lips before meeting her eyes again, "I didn't wish to shave my head."
Sakura smiled to herself, "Who wanted you to shave your head? Kankuro?"
"Naruto." Gaara was swaying towards her, even as she took a step back. This isn't what he wanted to talk about. He didn't want to talk at all.
"Not a Yamanaka, then…" She didn't take long assembling the information and arrived at the endpoint with a sick look. "He's like you, isn't he?"
Gaara scowled, displeased the intimate mood was dissipating all because of the fox. Naruto knew how to be annoying even when he wasn't physically present. "He's not like me. But he is a demon host."
She was brooding on the possibilities of Naruto loose among the wedding guests, judging by how she kept looking off into the distance. Her hands were clenched in determined fists, but she could just as easily have been steeling herself against the cold. A gust of wind blew through the shack and Gaara was tempted to seal it up with sand. The ground was frozen and his powers would be sluggish to respond in these conditions, but he could do it in a matter of moments regardless. They would lose all the light though, so he refrained. It might bring up bad memories of the last time he had locked Sakura away with her friend.
"I can't do anything about the both of you being here, crashing my best friend's wedding, but swear to me that neither of you will cause any harm."
"Define harm," Gaara countered, wondering if she was implying they had poor control over themselves. Clearly, if he and Naruto were going to destroy one another it would have happened prior to this event.
Sakura, shivering visibly from the cold, drew her stole closer to her throat. "Don't do anything… supernatural. I'd say act normal, but I don't think I'll get much value out of that considering I have no idea what normal is for your friend…"
"… he's not my friend…"
"… and normal for you is, frankly, weird."
This is not how he imagined their reunion. To be fair, there was probably no way it was going to be touching given Sakura's temperament. She didn't have a tendency towards sentimentality in regards to him, which was fine by Gaara as that softness would have been foreign to him. But perhaps, buried deep, he'd hoped she would have shown at least a little bit of overt affection. He had no idea if she was going to reject his suit or not, and while he was confident she would make the correct decision, he couldn't be absolutely certain until it came to pass. His feelings had not changed.
In fact, his feelings had intensified to the point of pain.
"Are we going to stand here all day, or are we going to head to the reception?"
He hadn't actually planned on joining the crowds. When he had caught Temari's eye and signaled for her to hold position he had figured that was an much contact as was needed. Originally, he was going to grill Sakura for an answer as to the nature of their relationship, but the interrogation had gone awry as soon as she had bit him and gotten his blood pumping. She accused him of acting erratically, but all his moves were calculated and only she created anomalous reactions in him.
"I would rather stand here."
"I didn't really mean—" Sakura sighed and continued to shiver. He watched her try to keep a cap on her growing ill temper. "If you don't want to come to the wedding, what do you plan to do?"
"I was going to examine the residence you and Temari have been gifted."
It was her next words, clearly ripped from a reluctant place in her mind, that caused him pause. "Maybe I would like it if you joined me, tonight. At the party, I mean. You might even enjoy yourself. That Naruto guy seems to have made himself at home already. And if he gets out of hand you're the only one who could do anything about it."
She ended her offer with an argument towards practicality, but the way she was red in the face and unable to meet his eyes told him there was probably more emotional sincerity there than as a mere check against Naruto.
Naruto had asked him once what drove him to make peace when the demons inside of them were demanding one another's blood? The fox and tanuki had always been in opposition to one another and it was accepted as the way of the world in their circle. They were sitting by the entrance to a system of caves where Saiken's host was currently hiding away from the world and knew it was going to take a lot more than a show of force to get the slug to rejoin the world and participate in the new society that Naruto and Gaara were building for the tailed demons.
Gaara had shrugged at the time, unwilling to mention Sakura in case something befell him and he couldn't return. It wouldn't do to make her even more of a target than she already was. It was Kankuro, his idiot brother, who had mentioned to Naruto "Gaara'a pink haired betrothed". Then the damn fox wouldn't shut up about her, and precious people, and love taming the most vicious of beasts, until Gaara was closer to fighting him than when they had met again in summer.
But even as he had scoffed, there wasn't a good explanation why Gaara was about to agree to sitting around a bunch of people he had no interest in merely because Sakura asked it of him. Was this being tamed? He didn't particularly like the thought of that, and neither did Shukaku. "I'll join you."
Pleased, and possibly also motivated by her shivering, Sakura slid closer to him until he noted how she smelled like floral soap, but she seemed unable to take that last step. "Thank you."
"After your party, when we are back at my residence. I expect an answer." He appreciated that she didn't pretend ignorance to his demand, but he didn't like the alarm in her eyes that rivaled the moment he had grabbed her from outside.
She couldn't meet his eyes. "What if I need more time?"
"Would more time change the outcome? Whatever you decide this evening is sufficient. Lack of an answer will be considered a no, in case you felt like a technicality would save you trouble." He turned around to open the door to the shed, and the blast of cold air didn't seem to bother Sakura anymore now that he'd given her a deadline to decide if she accepted him or not.
Usually the closure Gaara got was rather deadly, so this had its own novelty to it.
"Sakura, dance with me again!" Naruto grabbed her by the hands and swung her around, surprising her into taking an awkward breath that made it hard to follow him at the speed he was going.
Naruto, as it turned out, was as sociable as Gaara was reticent. Gaara, while agreeing to come to the reception, had taken up a spot in the corner next to a now empty table and seemed content to watch. Sometimes his eyes were on her, sometimes Naruto, but more often than not he was simply observing life as it unfolded. From the kids sneaking sips of wine from drunken relatives, to people dancing to the band made up of Yamanaka relatives that sometimes played reels for spring festivals, or even any number of conversations happening over the food—there was lots of people watching that could be done. There had already even been a fight as two Akimichi uncles got into it over who said what about who's mother.
Oddly enough, it had been Naruto who broke the fight up, easily separating the two stout men as if they were scrapping children. Sakura hoped no one would find it weird.
"I need to catch my breath!" Looking over, spotting Hinata fretting next to the dessert table, she dragged Naruto over to forcibly join his hand to Hinata's. "Hinata, you should dance with my friend here. Don't worry if you don't know the steps, neither does he!"
"Hey!" Naruto laughed while Hinata seemed to find the floor far more interesting than she had before Sakura had approached.
Just because her friend was feeling shy, wasn't good enough for Sakura to save her from the situation she had planted her in. "Have fun! I'm going to go check on someone." Naruto's eyes flicked to Gaara and that sunshine bright smile of his broke out before he dragged an only partially willing Hyuuga to the dance in progress.
"Did you eat anything at least?" Flushed and sweating in her long-sleeved dress that had seemed so practical in the cold weather earlier, Sakura sat heavily in the chair next to Gaara.
"No." Gaara blinked slowly, and Sakura wondered if he was tired. It seemed he had stamina for days, maybe even weeks, of grueling sustained travel but put him in a room full of people and he looked like a shriveled plum after a few hours.
They watched the lines of dancers weave around one another and Sakura thought about how when—if—she got married that it probably wouldn't be like this. There would be confusion, acceptance, then probably fear and years of careful interactions with the people of Konoha after the truth of Gaara came to light. Some people would pity her, others might envy her, but everyone would have opinions and feelings and mostly likely they wouldn't be simply happy for her.
When she was sinking into her own mind at work sometimes Tsunade would loudly slap a surface near her to see if she would jump out of her skin. Then she would scold Sakura for thinking about herself too much. There was no Tsunade in front of her to wake her up out of her brooding here, but even she knew she was thinking too hard on this.
Yes or no. It should be simple.
It occurred to her that her relationship with Gaara only had two speeds, and fast had been too fast while his absence had been as troubling. There had never been a time where they took things at a normal pace. What would normal even look like?
Edging over, curious in spite of herself, Sakura covered the hand that Gaara was resting casually on the tabletop. He looked over at her with questions in his eyes, slightly accusatory. "What does this mean?"
"Does it need to mean anything? Can't I try to hold your hand?"
He shook his head briefly, "It means something; you're being disingenuous."
And he was right, damn him, but she didn't want to be caught out so quickly. On the bright side, he wasn't pulling away. "You could still let me enjoy it a moment. Is it unpleasant?"
"No," he sighed slightly, more a huff of air in this drafty corner. And Sakura wondered if perhaps his feelings had never diminished despite the separation. Given their associations and her close observation of his body language she'd almost think he was a bit forlorn.
Lacing her fingers with his, she asked him a question that chilled her more than the sweat on her body. "What would you do if I said I didn't want to marry you?"
Gaara watched the dancers laugh and stomp their way through the song. Naruto was pulling Hinata along about as aggressively as Lee was pulling TenTen and it occurred to Sakura that those two men would probably get along well. Gaara's voice was flat but sure as he answered her question.
"I would find another residence to claim for myself, and Temari would continue to be your guardian. I would perform my duties to Konoha as per the contract and split my time with Suna when needed. There's additional correspondence I'm obligated to as the rest of the jinchuuriki establish themselves in their territories. There's much I can accomplish while others sleep." He paused. "I would attempt to avoid interfering with your life, but I'm unsure if I'd be successful. I wouldn't want to be successful."
And essentially, that's what it boiled down to for Sakura as well. Being with him made her uneasy in more ways than one, but if he lived in Konoha could she really stay away? Did she want to?
"I'd like it be a long engagement at least." As she withdrew her hand, she found that Gaara wouldn't let her. Instead, their hands dangled between them, tightly entwined in Gaara's shaking grip. "Ow, ease up a little bit. It's not a competition."
He was breathing deliberately, like he was trying to calm himself, and his eyes were opened too wide. This was a moment to be happy, but Sakura wondered anew if she had signed her own death warrant instead. This arrogant, powerful, confusing man that she was connected to was never going to be normal.
"I'd suggest going home, but the last wagon full of people left ages ago so I'll probably have to spend the night here or at the Yamanaka's." It was late and Sakura was suddenly tired, all her tight emotions draining now that the focus of them had been essentially resolved. New problems and worries were for tomorrow. "Ino's mother told all the bridesmaids they were welcome to set up in Ino's room tonight since she'd be staying here at the Akimichi farm from now on. And while I would think it wouldn't need to be said, I will absolutely say that you cannot be in that room with us."
He refused to let go of her, and he also wasn't saying anything or even looking Sakura's way and it was disturbing her deeply.
"I didn't expect you to gush about how you're the luckiest man in Konoha, or sweep me up into your arms, but it would be nice to know that you have at least a little bit of emotion regarding the fact that you win and I agree to—"
Since they were already joined at the hand, when Gaara pulled her to her feet and kissed her she didn't have any time to do much besides let him. The dance was reaching its finale and as soon as people broke away from the floor no doubt they would be spotted. Sakura, kissing some strange man in the corner. Another log to fuel the bonfire of her infamy. There was a strand of social anxiety in her mind that told her there would be repercussions from this. However, the dominant part of her mind was telling her that if she moved her fingers just so with her free hand then she could pull up the side of his jacket and possibly feel some skin near his hips.
Chemistry was a good enough place to start, Sakura thought, when it came to finding the lighter side of Gaara's love. Whatever he thought love to really be. Seemed to be a little backwards to her, starting on a path to romance through engaging herself to a near stranger but then she had never taken the easy way.
He didn't want to let go of her hand even when she yanked on it none too gently to reclaim it, and Sakura thought a little sadly that maybe he wasn't so much a stranger to her as she thought. She knew this man, even if he had secret parts to him that were ferocious and frightening. There was plenty about her that he didn't know yet, either. Maybe he wouldn't like what he learned; maybe he would change his mind. It was hard to tell what was a legitimate worry and what was invented through catastrophic thinking. Glancing over, she saw he was smirking as she failed to extract herself. Everything had to be a battle. The prospect was tiring and exciting in equal measure.
"If you're going to make a spectacle of us, the least you could do is let me sit down. Or get me a drink."
"Again," Gaara said, expression bland but still betraying an inner intensity through the stiffness of his posture that she hoped she could match someday soon. More than anything she wanted to approach him with close to equality in all things, being competitive by nature. "There are more choices, than letting you go or getting you a drink."
From the way he finally let her hand go to instead trace a meandering line along her exposed clavicle, she could guess where his thoughts had strayed.
"I may have said you won, but I don't believe I implied I was surrendering." Sakura said, swatting at his hand and sitting with folded arms. But the slightly coy smile she gave him softened the rejection. Maybe some things could be less a battle and more a game.
"Semantics," Gaara said, but he didn't push the issue even as his eyes raked over her. He sank back down into his own chair, only to reach over and drag both Sakura and her chair closer until their thighs were touching.
Laughing to cover her awkward fluttery feelings, Sakura wondered why she had missed this at all when he was always going to be the one setting the pace despite her protests. Rocking her head to the side, she rested on his shoulder and closed her eyes.
