Lighthouse

Disclaimer: I don't own 'Naruto' and I make no money from these writings.

Summary: Uzumaki Naruto, that annoyingly exuberant new guy, is everyone's favorite employee but Mr. Sabaku is certainly not a member of his fan club. However, after the prodigious newcomer happens to mention he has no home, solitude-loving Mr. Sabaku finds himself offering him a place for the night.

A/N: Inspired by the phenomenon where working adults cannot afford a home in a big city, leading them to not only homelessness but to many other dangers, too. Although you might now think otherwise, I don't intend to make this a sad/depressing story at all, but one with more positive feelings.

This is Naruto (seme) x Gaara (uke) with some Kankuro x Naruto (and with very slight Sakura x Kankuro) in there, too. I hope you enjoy!

Chapter 1: And That Was How I Met Mr. Uzumaki

That blond new guy was everyone's favorite.

And by everyone he meant each and every one of his colleagues, starting from the shy yet devoted interns and going all the way up to the indifferent rows of management on top. Everyone who Naruto Uzumaki had been rubbing shoulder with in this relatively small office of theirs always remembered to praise how polite and easy-going the young man was.

How long had he been working here again? Maybe two weeks, or three if his memory served him right.

He was blond, did he already mention that? Not that it really mattered, though. It was just a thing he had noticed in passing.

"You're often the last to leave, Mr. Sabaku."

Gaara lifted up his gaze from the papers scattered all over his desk and placed his pencil on a penholder. The blond was there, smiling at him with suspicious ease. That expression suited him, he had to admit. Gaara glanced around the office, trying to see if a mop of hair would peek from any nearby cubicle.

No such luck. It seemed it was just the two of them now.

"Why would it concern you, Mr. Uzumaki, if I work longer hours than the others?"

He was not a people person. And even though he couldn't really find it in him to dislike the blond, he wasn't going to join his fan club, either.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to sound rude or anything. I just wanted to say I've noticed your diligence and I respect your work ethic. I wish I could someday be as dedicated to something as you are to your work."

There was that goddamned politeness again. It seemed to work on everyone around, Gaara had noticed, and grudgingly he admitted it didn't feel too bad to be on the receiving end of his graceful manners. Even some of the most reserved and uptight employees around here had somewhat lost their sourness after spending three minutes in Uzumaki's sunlight. Not that it was any of his business, though, but even some of the ladies seemed to have a tad lighter step whenever they had been chatting with the prodigious newcomer.

The beams that shone from Naruto Uzumaki seemed to penetrate everyone and everything, and to Gaara it had been shocking to notice how easily the earlier stiff atmosphere in the office had turned into much more amicable.

The blond was not irresponsible for that. And now their brand new prodigy was standing next to his cubicle like a lighthouse, directing his luminous searchlight on him.

"You don't need to flatter me," Gaara replied to the praise he had received from the blond.

"I would never dare to flatter you. I was merely pointing out a fact."

That guy was good at what he was doing, and it was perhaps a bit annoying to notice how comfortable those words felt. But that was something he'd rather take to the grave with him than admit aloud.

Gaara organized the papers into neat piles and turned off his computer. He swayed his bag over his shoulder and made his way towards the exit. When he neared Uzumaki, the blond stepped aside with a polite smile, granting him a wider lane as he strode past him.

The blond caught him up easily. "I'm going to the train station."

Great.

That was where he was heading, too. But pretending to be going someplace else at this hour of the night didn't sound inviting even for someone as introverted as him. Left with no other option, he grudgingly accepted the fact that the prodigious blond was now keeping him company.

On the train, they sat across each other. Not many other passengers were there at this time of the day, and it was just another reason why Gaara preferred working late.

"When is your stop coming?" Gaara asked, hoping it would be way earlier than his own.

"Well, the thing is, I haven't decided yet," Uzumaki told and leaned back on his seat like it was actually a comfortable thing to sit on.

"Aren't you going home, then?" Gaara wondered aloud.

Uzumaki smiled at him warmly, like he had no care in the world. "I don't have a home."

"What?"

That could simply not be true.

"But you have a place somewhere, don't you?" Gaara asked and couldn't help but feel a little bit curious.

Now the blond's smile was losing its luminosity. His white teeth vanished eventually altogether from view as his grin melted into serious line.

"No, I don't. But I'm looking for an apartment of my own, even though no inexpensive ones have been available yet."

"But how can you not have a home? Don't tell me you're living on the street or something," Gaara wondered again, and leaned closer to the blond opposite of him as his curiosity kept on growing.

Someone so successful and tidy could possibly not be without a decent place to stay in. What he had been told all his life, homeless people looked nothing like Naruto Uzumaki. The blond had a job and was liked by everyone. Surely there was some misunderstanding on his part here.

"Don't worry about it," Uzumaki said and there was that blinding smile again. He could not be serious.

"It's starting to snow," Gaara noticed as the darkening landscape scurrying by the windows was slowly vanishing behind a grey blur of sleet.

"Hmm. Yeah, it's that time of the year," Naruto Uzumaki replied casually. "I just hope we get snow on Christmas. I got to say, the holidays are nothing if the ground isn't white."

Gaara stared at the blond in horror. How could that man without a roof above his head wish for something like that? Was this a joke? Was Naruto Uzumaki joking?

"So you don't have a place for tonight?" Gaara asked monotonously.

"Nope. But I'll come up with something." And there was that freaking calmness again he couldn't understand.

"You can stay at my place," Gaara said quietly, and as the train rattled on the rails just then, he was sure the noise had swallowed his words.

But when he slowly lifted up his gaze on the man sitting across him, he was surprised to see the shock on Uzumaki's face.

"N-No, I possibly can't," the blond stuttered suddenly. "It's way too kind of you, and I really can't accept such hospitality."

"Uzumaki," he said, meaning to calm down the nervous ramble.

"I mean, I'm thankful you thought of me but I don't want to burden you. And I didn't open up about this because I was looking forward to something like that. It's just… You seem like an honest guy and I thought that maybe if I'm honest, too, I'd earn your acceptance," the blond told.

"My acceptance?" Gaara frowned in confusion.

"You know, the way you give your best at work gives me an image you demand a lot from yourself and from others, too. You don't waste your time in gossips or pointless chitchats, but concentrate on getting your job well done. I look up to you, and in these weeks I've worked there I've decided that it's a path I want to take, too," the blond said and his earlier calmness had turned into shy nervousness.

Maybe there was a chance this guy was not bullshitting him but actually speaking from his heart? Gaara stared at the blond with a hard look, one that Uzumaki didn't dodge but returned with wavering bravery.

"Come to my place," Gaara said like it was already decided.

"It would be too much trouble for you," the blond told him.

"Nonsense. We can go to work together in the morning, so it shouldn't interfere with your schedules too much," Gaara replied calmly.

After train ride they walked towards Gaara's apartment in silence. He couldn't help but notice how Uzumaki kept on glancing around, as if memorizing his surroundings, but whenever he noticed Gaara staring, his fidgety expression turned into luminous smile.

Finally at home, Gaara let his new co-worker into his humble apartment.

"You can sleep in the bed," he said.

His one-night guest glanced around the tiny apartment which consisted of a spacious hallway, a separate kitchen and a bathroom, and one larger room that serviced all other purposes of daily life. Gaara liked to keep the décor as minimalistic as possible, so the main room had only one queen-sized bed in the corner and a TV on the other. A coffee table was placed in the center with neat piles of books on top.

Uzumaki's gaze lingered around the tiny quarters before returning to him. "Are you going to sleep in the bed, too?"

Gaara was a little surprised by the question but then again, his co-worker couldn't have a clue about his preferred sleeping place. He didn't let his surprise show in any way, instead he only studied the submissive way Uzumaki's shoulders had slumped.

"I sleep in the closet," Gaara informed.

The blond noticed the closed door not too far away from the bed. Straightening up his posture, he dropped his bag next to the bed and no doubt tried to make himself comfortable in the scarcely decorated place.

Naruto watched as Mr. Sabaku cut apple into eight even slices. The preciseness he followed at work seemed to be present in everything else he did, too.

A cup of green tea and a small bowl of apple slices were put in front of him.

"Eat," Mr. Sabaku said and sat down at the kitchen table, too.

There was something unnerving in his gaze. It had been there from the very beginning. No matter how calm Mr. Sabaku's jade eyes looked like, it felt like something was stirring just below the surface.

Back in his childhood summers, Naruto and his friends spent uncountable days swimming and fishing and catching butterflies in glass jars, soaking in never-ending sunlight as if they were batteries in need of recharging.

That one peaceful lake was their favorite place to go out camping. "Pike Lake" as the elders called it and―as they would later find out―the name was there for a good reason, too. In the bed of reeds, heavy jackfish kept awaiting for unsuspecting animals or sweaty set of human toes to appear within their near reach. Before the prey would even notice, a wide open mouth full of sharp little teeth was already swimming their way from their blind spot.

Naruto shivered at the long-forgotten memory.

The way Mr. Sabaku watched him without blinking was unusual and Naruto wasn't quite sure what to think of it. When the man sipped his tea and averted his attention, Naruto noticed he was the only one having food.

"Mr. Sabaku, would you like some apple?"

"No," the redhead only said.

Naruto curled his toes under the table, as if some unseen beast would snap them away the moment he let his guard down.

The sound of fruits crunching between Naruto's blunt teeth filled up the quietness of the room. A while ago he had observed where Mr. Sabaku kept his tea and seen a glance at what lay behind those closed cupboard doors. Instead of finding stashes of oatmeal or spices or common things like that, the shelves had screamed emptiness. A half-full packet of coffee had caught his attention next to a can of what could be meatballs in sauce.

"Aren't you hungry?"

"No," Mr. Sabaku replied and for some reason, Naruto didn't doubt it at all.

He was thankful of this unexpected opportunity to spend the night in here even though he reminded himself to not rush his judgment. This was better than a bench in a park, and that one public sauna he preferred was off-limits for tonight. Given how there was only a handful of passengers on trains at night, sleeping in there was sometimes an option. For the past five nights he had been couch surfing in some of his friends' places but given how so many of them were already married with kids, he never dared to expand his visits for longer than one short night.

Sometimes he helped them by looking after their children or walking the dog. If it was weekend, he offered to wash their car or cut the lawn. In winter, it was always fun to build snowmen with kids. And he could never grow bored of the incontinent joy the youngest of them showed whenever they stuck the carrot nose and coal eyes in place and the frosty masterpiece was finished. The parents were thankful, for in the meanwhile they could have a moment just for themselves.

But then there were other kind of friends who had quite different needs when it came to payback.

Warily, Naruto followed Mr. Sabaku with his gaze as the man stood up smoothly and swam behind his back like a silent jackfish. He turned his head just enough to see, but not too much to reveal his uncertainty. But it seemed he was only leaving the room. After some hesitation, Naruto stood up too and followed him.

Mr. Sabaku was sitting on the floor next to the coffee table, reading a thick book. The way he licked his thumb before turning a page happened to catch Naruto's attention. Given how short the frequency between those tiny licks of his finger was, he had to be quick reader.

Naruto studied the sight for a moment before sitting down on the bed. It looked like the man didn't give any regard to his presence. As Naruto leaned more heavily on the bed, the springs squeaked and revealed his movement. Just to ease out the tenseness in the room, the tenseness in him, he wondered if he should open a conversation. But Mr. Sabaku seemed so deeply concentrated in his reading.

Not daring to interrupt, Naruto pulled his legs closer to his body and waited for what would happen next.

After a comfortable hour of silence, Gaara yawned and closed his book.

A glance at Uzumaki's direction told him the blond had lain down on the bed. Given how stiff he looked, he was hardly relaxed. As soon as the blond realized his lingering attention, his blue eyes sharpened and an unsure smile came to grace his features.

Uzumaki was strange, there was no question about it. With another quiet yawn, Gaara locked himself in the bathroom to change on his pajamas. Even though they were both men, he didn't deem it appropriate to change in front of his colleague.

What he had found uncharacteristic throughout the whole evening was Uzumaki's silence.

Given how talkative the blond was at work, he had expected him to have talked off his ear by now.

Then again, it was completely possible the blond had detected his preference for quietness and solitude and acted accordingly. If that was the case, Gaara was thankful. Letting someone close to a stranger bunk in his bed was uncharacteristic for him and for a good while now he had been secretly worrying just how much social interaction there would be waiting for him thanks to his hasty offer.

Luckily, it seemed his patience would not be tested with useless chattering.

When Gaara walked slowly back to the main room, the blond startled again when he emerged from behind his blind spot.

"Are you going to sleep?" Uzumaki asked as he noticed his change of attire.

There was a strange pink hue on his cheeks, one that Gaara couldn't fathom an explanation for. It wasn't that he hadn't noticed them before, but there were peculiar whisker-like marks on Uzumaki's face. The more his blush deepened, the more those marks seemed to fade, rendering his skin close to what was considered normal.

How strange.

The fabric of his pajamas was making his neck itch again, and not for the first time he reminded himself to finally unlearn his years-long habit of buttoning up his pajamas all the way up. Casually, he opened the uppermost button and felt immediately at ease.

Uzumaki was staring at him from his spot, his eyes attentive and sharp. Gaara decided to open another button as the itch refused to subside, and even he could not miss the silent cough coming from the blond's direction.

What a weird guy.

He wasn't sure what was wrong with the blond, if anything was to begin with, and he most certainly wouldn't waste his time solving that little mystery. With one last look at the tensed, strangely blushing Uzumaki, he said, "Goodnight. Don't stay up too late if you want to have enough sleep."

And with that said, Gaara let himself into the comfortable privacy of his closet.

It was a small space and the floor was covered with a mattress some earlier resident had left here. At first he had wondered about it but soon learned that the closet was the only place where the loud fighting of that couple next door didn't carry to.

With his earplugs filling up his canals the world was comfortably silent. Gaara glanced up at the shelves attached on the walls. Even though he only saw the undersides of them, he could feel their emptiness.

Emptiness was good. Emptiness meant absence, and absence was to be desired.

He didn't have many things to begin with, and over the years he had strived to dispose the most of his material belongings. Not that he often had others' needs in mind these days anymore, but the lack of property assuaged him, for it only meant they wouldn't go through too much trouble emptying this apartment once they'd find his body.

In the middle of the night, Gaara just had to go to the bathroom. That last cup of tea had turned out to be a mistake. Silently like a burglar, he broke free from the closet's safety and tiptoed towards the bathroom. He happened to glance towards the bed as he walked past it, and stopped.

Uzumaki was snoring there, seemingly oblivious of the world around him. But that was not what had caught his attention in the first place.

Naruto Uzumaki was naked. And thanks to the way he lay on his stomach, the blanket hardly covering him at all, he could see his bare buttocks.

In the bathroom, Gaara took out the earplugs for a second. They always started hurting his ears whenever he wore them for too long. Yelling and cursing echoed from the ventilation system and somewhere a bit closer the blond's carefree snoring interrupted the sounds of fighting.

Gaara put the earplugs back in place and wondered if pulling the plug would wake up the blond. The idea of stark naked Naruto Uzumaki being awake when he ventured back into the safety of his closet felt unpleasant to him. But the image of his guest finding an unflushed toilet first thing in the morning was not a pleasant option, either.

Feeling sorry in advance, Gaara pulled the plug.

In the morning, Gaara was the first to wake up. World was quiet again except the loud snores that repeated at steady intervals. Uzumaki was still asleep.

Quietly, he tiptoed into the bathroom and locked the door behind him. After having a nice, hot shower he finally felt he was ready for the minimalistic socialization he was no doubt expected.

Rich scent of freshly brewed coffee wafted into his nose when he stepped out of the bathroom. Uzumaki was in the kitchen, fussing over the dishes like he had lived here for always. What seemed like an attempt of breakfast lay proudly on the kitchen table.

"Here, have some," the blond said cheerfully when Gaara slowly wandered in, allured by the promise of caffeine.

Gaara stared at the plate of omelet, at the little pieces of eggshell sticking out here and there, but for some reason he had no heart to point that out. Unhurriedly he started to fork food into his mouth, finding the crunchy sensation of eggshells not totally unpleasant.

Unlike Gaara had expected, Uzumaki didn't sit down to have a bite with him, but hurried to the bathroom to take a shower.

And unlike Gaara had thought, the blond didn't lock the door behind him now, or on any other upcoming day when he would crash in his place.

Not long after, squeaky-clean and shower-fresh Naruto Uzumaki strolled back into the kitchen and exploded the room with the scent of his shower gel. Without knowing better, Gaara guessed the name of that impudent smell just had to be "Energy Sports" or "Active Steel" or some other ridiculous bull the men's products were named after these days.

Gaara coughed, trying to shut off his nose with expected unsuccess.

He glared at the blond, at his stupid artificial fragrance and the utterly ridiculous little towel he had tied around his waist. Given how Uzumaki was, he had probably purchased the soap just because of the name. Only someone naively energetic like him could get excited about slogans like that.

Uzumaki seemed to be oblivious to his obvious distaste, and when his cough didn't settle Gaara stood up to take a glass of water. The blond was standing in front of the sink, humming happily and fixing himself some leftover omelet for breakfast.

"Move," Gaara said as he was searching for a clean glass and the blond's head was about to get hit by an opening cupboard door.

"G―" the blond startled and dropped his fork to the floor.

There was that strange awareness on Uzumaki's face again. Gaara ignored it and snatched a glass from the shelf before his cough would get the better of him. Up this close the scent was even stronger and as soon as his glass was filled, he hurried to the table.

It took a few seconds before his guest returned back to normal, and soon Uzumaki's carefree humming filled the room. If he was forced to choose, his off-tune melody was better than his "Steel" scent or whatever its official name was.

Given how the blond paraded around in his tiny towel and how he had chosen to sleep naked in the middle of the winter, it was quite strange to have him startle at sudden closeness. Along with his musings, his attention came to linger on his guest and on the white terry cloth hanging on his hips.

Still happily humming, Uzumaki stepped on the fork on the floor and yelped, quickly bending down to pick it up. In that moment Gaara wished he hadn't been paying such keen attention to Naruto Uzumaki's short towel that now so poorly managed to hide those bare buttocks he had seen an unwanted glimpse of last night.

Jesus Christ.

He was certainly not shocked but the heat on his cheeks made him quickly avert his attention back to the window again. Nakedness was unnatural. Seeing another man naked was even more unnatural, and that was the reason he was suddenly feeling this way. He gripped his mug tighter and only when Uzumaki poured more coffee to him, did he look at the smiling blond again.

A/N: Woohoo, that was chapter 1. Thank you for reading this far, I hope you liked it.

I plan on keeping all the chapters this short (4000-7000 words) so they're easier to handle.

And oh, in this story Naruto and Gaara's relationship will develop quite slowly, so be prepared for that.