So, I know it's been erm... a veeeeeery long time since my last update, and I appologize for that. Um, in slightly more exciting(for me) news, I just got back from the Philippines and Japan yesterday. I'm totally jetlagged(13 hours...), but excited to be home. I got 2 hours of sleep last night, and had a nice 3 hour nap this afternoon. Hopefully I can sleep tonight.

But probably not, because I just got HP7. DON'T SPOIL IT FOR ME PLEASE!!!! lol.

So yeah. This chapter is by far the longest yet, but I'm really unsure about the quality. As usual, it hasn't been beta'ed or edited, and I kinda skimped on the spellchecker too. -sweatdrop- deal please!

Gaara stepped into homeroom at seven forty four alongside his roommate, Hyuuga Neji.

Neji slid into a seat behind a wooden desk at the back of the room. Luckily, the desk next to him was empty. Gaara sat there, copying Neji's movements and dropped his backpack on the floor next to him. He was glad to have it off his back. He didn't know what he would need in his classes today, so he had brought everything. His backpack was heavy.

Even though he had homeroom with his roommate, their first period classes were different. Neji had his accelerated math class, and Gaara instead had history. He hasn't been smart enough to get into accelerated math. It was probably his worst subject. Also, they had different art and theater classes. Other than that, the Hyuuga had been right in his assumption that they would have mostly the same classes. He was happy about it, but he wasn't so sure about the older boy.

Gaara looked around the class. Most people were already there he figured, because there were only two empty desks. Up at the front of the room there was a desk with a computer and stacks of paper and books on it. Sitting at the desk looking at the computer was a man that looked to be in his forties, with dark brown hair.

The redhead snapped back into reality when the bell rang. The man at the desk stood up.

"Good morning students. My name is Sarutobi Asuma, you may call me Sarutobi-sensei." A few students looked puzzled. "Why am I introducing myself almost four months into the school year? Because, for those of you who haven't noticed, we have a new student." Gasps and mutters began growing and spreading across the small room in a matter of seconds. People were looking around the room, but few bothered to look behind them.

"His name is Sabaku no Gaara. Why doesn't he come up to the front of the room and tell us a bit about himself? Where is he from, what he enjoys doing and such." The teacher looked expectantly at nobody in particular. Apparently, he didn't yet know what his new student looked like, and couldn't distinguish him form the other students. Perhaps because Gaara was so short that he couldn't be seen behind the people in from of him.

Neji looked at Gaara encouragingly. The redhead sighed. He really didn't want to do this, but he didn't seem to have much of a choice in the matter anyway. He scraped his chair backwards and walked slowly to the front of the class. There were more people in here than he had thought. Looking down at his feet, he began.

"My name is Sabaku no Gaara. I used to live in the desert in the country of wind." He muttered. "I play the piano and enjoy reading and listening to music." A few students sniggered, and the redhead heard a few snide remarks thrown in his direction too. He looked timidly towards the teacher who nodded. Gaara quickly shuffled back to his seat.

"That wasn't too bad now, was it?" Neji said. He sounded like he was mocking his roommate. Had Gaara been anyone other than himself, he might just have pouted right then. Instead, he just made a sort of snorting huffing noise. Neji chuckled a bit.

"Don't worry. Chances are you won't be asked to do that in many of your other classes. If you really don't want to, you can tell the teacher that you'd rather not have to introduce yourself." Gaara was almost hurt. He's treating me like a little kid! But another part of his mind was more reasonable. He's probably just concerned because I looked like such a shy idiot up there.

But before either of them had the chance to say anything to make the already awkward situation worse, the bell rang telling everyone to rush off to their first period class.

"Well, it would seem that we won't be seeing each other again today until fourth period. Have fun on your first day." The brunette said warmly as he hoisted the bag back onto his shoulder. Gaara tossed his on and followed Neji out.

"Erm… Do you know where my math class is?" The redhead asked hesitantly. Neji turned around.

"Oh, yeah. It's the next door on the left that way." He answered, pointing in the opposite direction. Gaara nodded and thanked him before rushing off so as not to be late for first period.

He walked through the open door into a relatively cold room. He was glad for the uniform jacket's long sleeves as he took a seat in the back row of the room again. There were ten or so other people already there, among them two that he could recognize from homeroom and the boy with the cello that Neji had introduced as Shino on Saturday.

The teacher was a young looking woman with shoulder length brown hair wearing a grey skirt and a navy blue long sleeved shirt. She looked friendly enough the redhead decided. She walked over to him.

"Sabaku-san, correct?" Gaara nodded. "I'm Shizune-sensei, your history teacher for the year. This is the textbook that we're using this year, and we are currently studying world war two." She handed the redhead a large red and blue book labeled 'A History of Japan'. Gaara thanked her, and she walked off.

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Neji sat at his assigned seat in the front row of his math room. He pulled a black spiral notebook, a white folder and a mechanical pencil out of his bag. He opened the folder, revealing neatly organized papers and took the first two sheets on the left side. His math homework. Hayate-sensei walked around and collected the work from each of his students, before beginning to talk about today's work.

The brunette listened attentively and took detailed notes on everything in his neat cursive handwriting. Basically, he did what he did every class. When Hayate-sensei passed out a worksheet to finish in class, he took out his calculator and did the work on a clean sheet of paper which he passed in at the end of class before writing down his homework.

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History had been… well, Gaara couldn't exactly recall how it had been because he hadn't been paying attention for most of class. Shizune-sensei was friendly, but she just talked on and on all class. The redhead had been extremely relieved when the bell rang. Shoving a still unused black notebook and pencil into his backpack, Gaara went off in search of his next class. Theater.

Luckily, the class was in the auditorium, and he remembered passing by it this morning. It couldn't be too hard to fins again. He would just have to retrace his steps and head back towards the dorm rooms.

Now… if only he could remember where those were…

He walked down a hall with walls decorated with paintings and drawings by art students. He took a left at a room labeled 'Philosophy 307', and stopped outside a stairwell. He had no clue where he was. Luckily, he found a teacher standing out in the hall, walking towards the stairs.

"Um… Excuse me sensei?" The man turned. He recognized him as his first period teacher Sarutobi-sensei. The man smiled down at him.

"Oh, Hello Gaara-san! How are you? Looking for your class I presume?" The redhead shifter his feet uneasily. Did he really look that lost?

"Um… yeah. Could you tell me where the auditorium is please?"

"Oh! You were looking for the auditorium? Well, ehm… you're going to want to go back down the hall you just came from, then take a left, go past the nurse's office, and take a right by the cafeteria." Gaara attempted to process all that. Go down the art hallway, take a… right? Past some room, and take a turn by somewhere else…

"Why don't I walk you there? I need to be in the area anyway." Gaara was about ready to fall over in relief. Sure he would look like an idiot getting walked to class by a teacher, but it would be better than wandering aimlessly for the next week and dying of starvation… Okay. Maybe that was overreacting just a little bit…

"Thank you very much." He followed Sarutobi-sensei back down the hallway from whence he came (cue dramatic music and lightning), but this time he took a moment to admire some of the art on the walls. All the art work was beautiful. Gaara was sure that he could never make anything that looked nearly as good.

One that caught his eye was a white canvas with a black circle on it that looked like a gaping hole, and it had flames around the edges as if the hole was being burned larger. Inside the black hole was a white spot of light with a small bright red heart in its center. But it wasn't a heart like on a Valentine's day card, it was an actual painting of a heart, like the one in the body. The white light looked like it was emanating from the heart. As if the light from the heart was what had started the fire that burned at the skin. He looked at the label under the canvas. 'Paper Skin by Hyuuga Neji, Freshman'

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"Okay class. Today we're going to be starting a new project. This time it's a sketch, un." A few groans were heard, but nothing was meant by them, because art was everyone's favorite class. Or, at least the teacher made sure art everyone's favorite class. Neji focused his wandering gaze on the man at the front of the room talking animatedly about the project they were about to start.

He was tall and pale, with bright blonde hair massed up on top of his head in a messy ponytail. His left eye was hidden behind a thick curtain of it, but the right one was constantly darting around the room observing everything. Sometimes he was a bit intimidating and scary, but most of the time he was the ecstatic, bouncy art teacher, Deidara-sensei. He was a good natured man, and very wise, even though he may not look it. He never told anyone how old he was, but he looked almost too young to be a teacher at such a prestigious school.

Deidara-sensei eventually stopped bouncing long enough to explain that he project would be a charcoal sketch of a noun.

"A person, place, or thing if you will. Nothing vulgar, if you want to allude to something or do something funny, by all means, knock yourself out, un! No paneled comics or anything though." He talked a while longer about the project, but when a student decided he was rambling he asked how Deidara-sensei's weekend had been. That had changed the subject easily enough, and sooner than he though, the bell rang and class was over.

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Gaara finally made his way to the auditorium, but he was about five minutes late to class. Luckily, the teacher didn't seem to mind too much.

"New kid, eh?" The man must have been the teacher, because he was sitting behind a large desk, typing away at a computer. He was pale and wore a dark grey suit, but what intrigued Gaara most was his hair. It as like his, bright red.

"And a red head too, eh? Well new kid, we're working on monologues and group acting. See that kid over there?" He pointed to a boy with black hair. Gaara couldn't see him very well, because his back was towards them. "That boy's name is Aburame Shino, and he doesn't have a group mate. Why don't you go work with him? He's a bit quiet, but he's not a bad kid. Oh, and my name is Sasori-sensei by the way." Gaara nodded, and walked over to where Shino was sitting.

"Hello. You're Sabaku no Gaara." He said it very much as a statement, and not a question. It was a bit unsettling. "You play piano quite beautifully." Gaara wasn't really sure what to say to that. It was a bit awkward. He was still standing behind the boy, and he hadn't even turned around. He just spoke to him while still reading his script.

"Thanks…" He mumbled sheepishly. "Sasori-sensei said that we should practice the group acting I think…" Shino stuck his finger in the packet to mark his page and shut it with a snap before turning around to look at the redhead. He had to tilt his head back a bit because he was sitting and Gaara was standing.

"Yes. Let us begin." Gaara nodded stiffly and sat in the blue plastic chair across from him, with the script spread out on the desk in between them.

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Neji was frustrated. He had sat on the bright green painted stool all class, staring at the large white sheet of paper on the table in front of him. It was blank, except for his name and section written neatly in the bottom right hand corner. It was blank all class. He had no inspiration. He couldn't draw anything. He could never not draw.

Why can't I draw anything? He wondered angrily. And that was exactly it. He hadn't been able to draw anything. He had lifted the pencil and set it a millimeter above the paper numerous times, but he just wasn't getting the flowing feeling in his arm that he usually got when he was drawing or about to start. There had been some obnoxious voice in the back of his head telling him that he shouldn't draw yet. That now wasn't the right time. Why?

The thought plagued him as he walked quickly down the hall to his history class. Passing the auditorium, he decided to stop and wait a moment to see if Gaara would come out. To see if maybe he should walk the redhead to his next class so that he wouldn't get lost. The rooms were in the same hallway anyway.

Sure enough, Gaara walked out, shoving a spiral notebook into his backpack while walking. He was so absorbed in getting the book to fit in that he walked right into Neji.

"Sorry!" He muttered quickly. Then he looked up. Neji smiled kindly.

"Hello Sabaku-san. How was your theater class?" The two began walking in stride, the notebook finally put away.

"Um… Pretty good I guess. Sasori-sensei seems friendly." The redhead was speaking very quietly, all the while looking down at his sneakers.

"Yes, he is one of the nicer teachers. But wait until we have Japanese. (AN: Because they live in Japan, Japanese class is basically like English class in the US.) Anko-sensei is… Anko-sensei is not shy." Gaara looked a little worried. I wonder what he means by that. Shit. Shit. Shit! This could be bad… Neji noticed the worry spreading across his roommates face. I wonder if I worried him…

"She's not mean, she just has a very… in-your-face attitude." Gaara almost laughed. He almost cracked up. Hearing the brunette say something like 'She has a very in-your-face attitude' was hilarious to him for some reason. It just sounded very out of place hearing it from him. But his mental laughing was interrupted when Neji spoke again.

"Well Sabaku-san, this is your class. Mine is over there, but I'll meet you back here for French after this." He said, pointing in the direction they had just come form. Gaara looked down at his feet and muttered thanks. He just walked me to class. He even went out of his way to do it! We walked right by his class, and now he has to run halfway back down the hall to get back…

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Gaara walked out of his math class half asleep. He never had liked math very much. Too many numbers, hell, they even threw in letters. On the other hand, math was one of his best subjects because it made sense. Math was always logical. There were formulas, and if you just plug in the numbers, you'll get a logical answer. Nothing to it.

He stepped out the door, backpack slung loosely over one shoulder, and looked down the hallway in the direction of the history room. He felt like a little kid waiting to get picked up by his parent or something. He felt pathetic. Adjusting his backpack so it was placed more in the center of his back, Gaara started off at a brisk walk towards Neji's class.

He made it to the door just as the brunette stepped out. This time, he would be more collected. He hoped…

"Hey Neji." Surprisingly enough, he looked a bit flustered. His backpack was open and held in front of him, and a textbook that he recognized as the one he had been given this morning was sticking halfway out. Not to mention the way he had practically stumbled out of the classroom looking as if he had to be somewhere very far away very fast.

He looked down at the redhead for a moment before replying.

"Hello Sabaku-san. I apologize that I was late. I made you come all the way down here." Gaara shook his head. Neji was just too polite sometimes.

"It's okay. French is this way anyway, right?" The brunette nodded, tossing his backpack over his shoulder.

"Yes. Shall we?"

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Gaara shoved his books into his bag three minutes before the bell rang. Three minutes and thirty four seconds to be precise. He had been watching the clock since class started.

It would seem that the teacher, Asuma-sensei had taken a liking to Gaara because Kurenai had told him what a good pianist he was. Because he had taken a liking to him, he picked him to answer all sorts of questions that he did or did not know the answer too. But whether or not he knew the answer wasn't the point. Because he knew most of the answers, Asuma-sensei liked him more, therefore he picked him more. Not to mention the weird looks he was getting from the rest of his classmates.

And because of this, Gaara decided that he didn't like French class. At all. At least he got to sit next to Neji. But on his other side was an annoying boy with long black hair (AN: Just a random character…) who kept tapping his pencil on the desk. The noise was beginning to drive the redhead insane.

So when the bell rang at exactly noon, Gaara was the first out of the door. Even though he sat in the back of the room. He didn't even wait for Neji, for which he felt a bit guilty, because Asuma-sensei was smiling at him again in a way that looked like he wanted to talk. Leaning against the wall right outside the door, Gaara wondered absent-mindedly why the teacher hadn't noticed him nearly this much in homeroom.

"Sabaku-san, there you are." Gaara spun around quickly, and was met with Neji's smiling face.

"Yeah. Sorry 'bout that." The brunette shook his head.

"Not a problem. Asuma-sensei asked you a lot of questions. I've heard that he does that to his new students." Gaara nodded. What an odd man.

Well, hopefully his next class would be less awkward. In fact… what did he have next? He moved to get his schedule out of his bag, but Neji was a step ahead of him.

"We have Japanese now." He said calmly. Gaara nodded meekly and resumed looking down at his feet while following Neji.

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Gaara didn't concentrate much in his next class either. Why you may ask? No, not because he didn't like this class, but because Neji had been right. Anko-sensei was defiantly not shy. She was, exactly as he had said, very in-your-face.

The moment he had walked into the class, she spotted him. Gaara-kun! She squealed, observing that he must be the new student she had heard so much about. How could she have heard about me? It's only fifth period… Then she had put him in a seat at the front of the room, effectively moving a brainy looking boy with short brown hair (AN: just another random charrie.) to the back. He hadn't looked pleased.

She had ignored him for most of the rest of class, something for which he was grateful. Normally he liked this class. He loved writing, and he wasn't half bad either. But this teacher just creeped him out. He wondered briefly how the other students could stand it.

Not to mention that it was one o'clock in the afternoon by the time class finished, and Gaara was hungry. He had checked his schedule, and luckily he had lunch right after. On the other hand, knowing that it was almost lunch time just made him hungrier. He hoped that he had the same lunch as Neji. If not…

Then he mentally chided himself for thinking like that. He had become so dependant! Hadn't he always eaten lunch on his own? When he was a lot younger he would eat with one or both of his siblings, but for the last three years, he had been on his own. Why should it matter now that he had no one to sit with? He had gotten to used to being with other people, even though it had only been a few days. He was becoming pathetic.

"Sabaku-san," He recognized the voice. It was Neji. "You have lunch period now I assume?" The redhead nodded.

"You?"

"The same." He replied, with the usual amount of formality in his voice. "Shall we go?" Gaara nodded.

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"We have music next." The redhead muttered in between bites of his turkey sandwich.

"It is a two-hour period." Neji replied, calmly wiping a stray drop of water from the corner of his mouth.

"Then we meet with Kurenai-sensei for an hour." To this, the brunette simply nodded. Lunch with the Hyuuga was a horridly silent affair, and Gaara was constantly painfully aware of every crumb that fell on his lap and every drop of water that hung off of his lips. He was eating a turkey sandwich on white bread with a slice of cheese in it, and a bottle of water. Neji was chewing on a neat bite of his meal, a turkey wrap with lettuce and tomatoes.

Gaara was actually excited about going to music class though. He felt uncomfortable with all the stares that he was getting in every one of his new classes, but if he could play the piano again, he would be alright. Especially if it was the exquisite white grand piano he had been allowed to perform with last time.

With thoughts of playing on his mind, he quickly devoured his lunch and drank down his water. As if it wasn't embarrassing enough that he was such a messy eater, by the time he had finished, Neji was still coolly munching on his wrap. The redhead tried his best to check his watch discreetly. They had twenty minutes before class started.

"We should begin to go to class, Sabaku-san if we want time to warm-up beforehand." Gaara was a bit startled, but he nodded, and followed Neji as he dropped his finished bottle in a recycling bin and left the plate on a conveyor belt inside the cafeteria.

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"Gaara-kun, just go sit by Neji at the white piano, would you please?" Gaara nodded, and walked off behind Neji. He seemed to be nodding a lot today. Not to mention that she had answered his question before he had even asked it. This whole school was very weird for him, and by this point he was just glad that he was sitting by a piano. This was his comfort zone.

When the faint sound of scales being played pianissimo reached him, he looked up to see Neji practicing at the black grand piano across him. Taking a deep breath, he gazed down at the white and black keys. They looked, and even felt like real ivory. He scrunched his pale fingers into fists then stretched them out a few times before setting them gently on the ivory.

He began playing.

It was slow and quiet, just a simple piece that he liked to use for his warm-ups. A note here and there, and his eyes drifted shut as the familiar sounds flowed from this unfamiliar instrument. It was nice to know that even if he was surrounded by people and things that made him feel small and insignificant, this would always remain.

That was what music was for him. It was a constant in life, and he would keep playing for the rest of his life, pouring his heart and soul into every note each time he sat on the bench because it was always going to sound right if he did. Every time he completed a section of a melody, it seemed to fit somewhere inside of him, and it felt so right. So good.

The class had filled with students now, a few playing scales, some talking, and one or two others like him playing warm-up pieces. But Gaara noticed none of them. His head was swaying in time with the beat, fingers ghosting over keys and applying just the right amount of pressure to the chosen few notes that he wanted. His thin arms stretched to reach one end of the scale, then quickly retracted, seamlessly switching keys.

"Alright, everyone stop playing." Kurenai's voice snapped him out of his playing, and immediately the music stopped. But no one noticed, because he had been playing too quietly to hear with all the sounds of other students practicing around him.

"So here's the deal. We're running out of time, because the concert is less than a month away and closing in way too fast. Got it?" No one dared to answer her. Although she was a kindly woman with a friendly disposition, she knew how to command a room.

"Now, there has been a rather huge change in plans, so I'm going to tell you all about it, and I want no complaints." There was a bit of hushed whispering rippling through the room, but it died out quickly when the students saw the look their teacher was giving them. It was chilling.

"Our current soloist is Hyuuga Neji-kun. As we saw yesterday, our new student Sabaku no Gaara-kun is a rather outstanding pianist himself, and he knows our performance piece. It has been agreed upon by the three of us that Gaara-kun and Neji-kun will work together to re-write the solo part into a duet that the two of them will share. This will not change any of your parts, I just wanted to tell you, even though you have no say in the matter." A few students chuckled at her crude joke.

For the next two hours, class went as usual. They went through the piece time after time, going back to fix small errors until the song flowed like clockwork. Neji and Gaara took turns playing the solo, and a few times they switched off every page or so. Kurenai looked pleased, and when class ended, a few people smiled at Gaara, and two even said hello to him. It was a first.

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After spending ten uneventful minutes in homeroom, Neji and Gaara trudged back to their room, backpacks heavy with books and homework. They had about twenty minutes before they had to go back to the music room to meet Kurenai-sensei. There was no way they could even make a dent in their homework by then, but it wouldn't stop them from trying.

The second they entered the room, Neji put his backpack down on his bed, shrugged off his blazer, folded it, and set it next to the book bag before reaching into his dresser to find some new clothes.

"You're not required to wear your uniform to meet with teachers after school Sabaku-san, so feel free to change if you wish." He looked over his shoulder as he spoke, but quickly spun around again to search through his clothes, and the sudden movement made his carefully tied ponytail whip around and smack him in the face on the other side. Gaara almost laughed. He was beginning to slowly realize that Neji was human, just like him. He wasn't always perfect.

"Do you mind if I use the bathroom?" Gaara answered no. He was already seated at his desk with a notebook and math book open, tapping the eraser of his silver grey mechanical pencil on the wood absentmindedly. Then on second thought, he decided that he would change also, and he went to go rummage through his drawers.

He pulled out a baggy pair of black pants with a few silver chains on the left side and some safety pins on the pocket and hems, a plain black T-shirt, and his new fitting bright red zip-up. When Neji left the bathroom, Gaara moved to go in to change. He would have gone right away, but he felt the need to marvel at the brunette's sheer beauty for a moment.

He was wearing straight grey jeans with a fitting black long sleeved shirt that showed off the muscles on his arms and abdomen. But most beautiful, his hair wasn't tied, but instead hanging loosely around him, cascading over his shoulders and back, and yet not a strand was out of place. For the millionth time since he had gotten to Konoha Music Academy, Gaara found himself comparing himself to his roommate.

While Neji's hair was long, straight and perfect, Gaara's was short, spiky, rough, and a perpetual mess. When he dragged a brush through it, it produced a hideous ripping noise. Neji's style, while not that of your traditional rich prep-boy stereotype, wasn't far from cliché. His clothes, while not as expensive as they may look, were always neat and matched perfectly, and he always seemed to know what to wear for every occasion. Not like Gaara, who, if not prompted to do otherwise, could wear the same outfit for days in a row.

"Sabaku-san, would you like to change before we go?" The redhead was a bit startled. Had he spaced out? No… he had been… staring. At Neji. He must think I'm a complete idiot!

"Yeah." The brunette moved aside graciously, and Gaara walked into the bathroom hurriedly and clumsily. He could feel the heat in his cheeks and wanted to escape from view as quickly as possible.

In the bathroom, he leaned back against the sink and let out a deep breath. Perhaps if he just acted as if it had never happened? Soon they would be concentrated on music anyway, and then they would eat and spend the rest of the night on homework. There wouldn't be time to be uncomfortable about it. Deciding that this was the smartest plan, or at least the smartest plan he could think of right now, Gaara began to change.

He unzipped the blazer and tossed it on the ground, then bent over to slip off his socks. Slowly, he unbuttoned the small white buttons on his shirt, slipping it on top of the pile by the toilet. He shivered when the cold air hit his chest after he stripped off the white undershirt he had on, then stepped out of his pants. He took the heavy pants off the lid of the toilet where he had left them, pulling them up and shutting them. They were a bit big, so they hung low on his thin hips, showing off a good two inches of his red boxers. He had, however, picked a strategically long shirt. When he zipped the sweater halfway up, it revealed the end of his shirt under the hem.

Gaara folded his pile of clothes, and left the bathroom without looking in the mirror. He knew if he did, he would find some little detail he didn't lie about his appearance. There was always something, so it was probably best to not look.

He stuffed the soiled undershirt in a paper bag under his bed, and put the folded uniform back in the top drawer of his dresser. Neji was sitting at his desk, writing something in a notebook. When he heard the silence that meant that Gaara was done putting his things away, he turned to face the redhead.

"Shall we go?" Gaara nodded, but Neji didn't move. He knew that Gaara's things weren't yet packed for their meeting with Kurenai-sensei. He was proved right when his roommate went over to his desk instead of the door and took some books out of his backpack, replacing them with notebooks and a folder of sheet music and staff paper.

"Okay. Time to head out pretty boy." Gaara shocked himself with the comment. He had no clue why he had said that, it had just come out of his mouth. He felt like bashing his head into the wall behind him, but that would probably just make him look even stranger. Neji turned in his chair. Not quickly, not slowly, he just turned.

His hair was tied off up at the top now, and it fell over his right shoulder, reaching past the back of his rolling chair. The look in his eyes was unreadable, but his mouth was set in a thin line. Although, Gaara could have sworn that for a second he saw the edges of the brunette's mouth twitch upwards.

But instead of saying something, anything, he instead took his bag and walked straight past his roommate, and opened the door. He held it open and looked behind him at the stupefied redhead. Gaara noticed that he was holding something in his hand, something… pink. It seemed somehow familiar, but he couldn't place it. Until Neji spoke that is.

"Coming?" Here he made a sound that sounded like suppressed laughter. "Gaa-chan?" Gaara's eyes widened, and recognition flashed through his head. That pink thing, it was an envelope! And it was from Temari! How could he not have remembered; Temari always used pink envelopes, and addressed her letters to 'Gaa-chan'. But… how did Neji get a hold of it?

Of course, of more pressing urgency than figuring how the letter came to be in his roommate's possession, was getting it back. Gaara lunged at the older boy who skillfully moved out of the way, causing the redhead and his bag to fall/run out into the hallway. He stumbled, but managed to regain his balance before falling flat on his face or hitting the wall. Neji began running, rather fast, down the hallway, so Gaara chased after him.

Gaara wasn't a particularly fast runner, but had had to get that letter back! Temari had a tendency to write all sorts of crazy things in her letters to him, and if Neji read it… Not to mention that he had told Temari a bit about his roommate when he had called her the night before. And… he had actually let slip that he maybe had some feelings for the other boy. He had always felt like he could trust Temari, however misplaced that trust was.

What Gaara didn't know, was that Neji was known as one of the fastest players on his soccer team. The speed he was running at now was fast, but not nearly as fast as he could go. He risked a glance over his shoulder, if only to gauge how fast the redhead was. He almost laughed out loud to see the boy struggling to regain his balance after lunging out the door. Neji spared him, and slowed down a bit.

Gaara chased Neji all the way to the door of the music room. There, the brunette finally stopped, only the slightest bit out of breathe. When Gaara caught up, he was panting hard. He bent over, resting his hands on his knees until his breathing returned to relatively normal. He straightened and looked up at Neji.

The brunette smiled. It was a real, honest to God smile. And he was smiling at Gaara. To put it bluntly, Gaara was amazed, dazzled, stupefied, and at a loss for other adjectives to describe his surprise. He handed the younger boy the pink envelope, and walked into Kurenai's classroom, holding the door open behind him. Gaara scrambled to recover his senses and sort out his mind, and followed him in.