Disclaimer: The lovelies don't belong to me. I'm going to go kill babies.
Warning: Kind of AU, a good dose of GaaraNaruto loving. Bow chika wow wow.
Summary: Gaara, sometimes, is almost as good as the real thing. And Naruto's sometimes okay with that.
Pairing: Mostly one sided GaaNaru, SasuNaru
What Really Feels
Gaara frowns lightly as he slips into Konoha, leaping from the rooftops with silent, graceful movements. He remembers how this all started, and slips through the veil of darkness.
It started off with letters. They'd write back and forth sometimes, nothing special. It was casual, and skirted around what they wanted to say.
That's how it started. It didn't end there. Gaara would invite Naruto to Suna, though he almost always declined.
Gaara had finally been more urgent in his requests later in their friendship, and Naruto finally accepted. When he greeted the blond into his borders, he was shocked to see tired blue eyes and something broken stirring in those depths. Gaara didn't need Naruto to tell him to understand the problem.
Uchiha.
But he didn't ask, and Naruto never told.
The visits would gradually become more frequent, until it was almost monthly unless there were missions in the way.
It was a steady friendship. Their pasts had been the same, they could relate to each other better than anyone in the world. Naruto slowly regained his cheerful exterior, and Gaara was relieved.
Until...
Something happened. Naruto had came to Suna unannounced, with a stone face and his entire body shaking. Gaara was unsure what to do, so he did nothing. Naruto was sitting at his kitchen table, staring at the tea in his hands, before he finally looked up, into the other man's eyes. "Gaara... "
Those eyes Gaara had come to grudgingly adore, were the same broken, insecure blue they had been the first time. He couldn't keep looking at this fragile thing that had become Naruto so easily. He damned that Uchiha thrice times over.
But like always, he didn't ask, and Naruto didn't tell.
Gaara knew, however, what the blond wanted, and led him to his bedroom with each dreaded step.
He tried to stop the crushed feeling as Naruto whispered 'Sasuke...' over and over again until his lunges were sore, and his tears were dried. If Naruto wanted to pretend, who was Gaara to deny him? He played the part of the stoic raven so well, it pacified Naruto into a false dream. Delusion. And it was his fault. After everything Naruto did for him, how could he deny him such a small thing? Even... if his own happiness was stored away.
The strong friendship they had built crumbled around their feet, without either even knowing. Gaara felt something change, something die, and now it has become this.
...Now, Gaara feels nothing. He hops into the always open window of Naruto's apartment, carefully laying his gourde against the wall. Naruto doesn't turn around at the stove, or acknowledge his presence. But he doesn't need to. Gaara slips behind him, nuzzling his neck. Naruto leans back, smiling up at his face softly. Gaara hesitantly frowns back.
"Sasuke, you're back early."
"Hn."
Gaara doesn't feel pain, or regret, he simply acts his part.
Naruto's arms go around his neck, those plump pink lips brushing against his with sensual grace. Gaara closes his eyes, and breathes in the scent of cold ramen that is always around the apartment. He can't escape it. He breathes in the strawberry mango shampoo Naruto has used since they were twelve years old. Something behind his eyes sting, but he shakes his head, narrowing his them.
His hand, cold and pale and perfectly like his goes up into sun kissed locks, pulling the other man's face closer. He is the perfect replica of Uchiha Sasuke, the only differences are his blood red hair, and eyes, and the tattoo marring his forehead. To any other, these differences would be significant, but Gaara is like Sasuke in too many ways.
The way he moves is graceful and careful, the way he speaks is humorless and calculating, the way he touches Naruto is soft and fearful. He is the epitome of Uchiha Sasuke. And he excepts that.
Naruto smiles, and it's strained, painful. He takes Gaara's hand and leads him back, into the hall and to a room he knows by heart. A turn of the knob, and Gaara is greeted by Naruto's bright room. It's always been messy and disorganized, always. Gaara likes it that way. The bed is unmade and almost too small for two people. They make do.
Naruto sits down, tentatively smiling. Gaara stands there surveying a moment longer, noticing the picture on the desk that he has always wanted to burn a hole through. Kakashi, Naruto, Sakura... and his eyes land on him with his condescending smirk. Gaara glares. I am you now, and you have no right to exist anymore.
Gaara has to initiate it, always.
"Dobe." He nearly spits the word out, sitting beside Naruto.
"Teme!" Naruto fires back, just a shell of his old self.
It happens like always, Naruto jumps and crushes their lips together, pushing Gaara back into the sheets. His mouth is hot against Gaara's cold skin, demanding and pressing. Lips travel down his neck, teeth nip and finger's start removing is layered clothing. His own hands gently yet forcefully slip Naruto out of his black tank top, teasingly running down the tanned abdomen. Naruto hisses, speeding up his mission to get Gaara out of his baggy pants, and just as he's gotten the strings done with, Gaara flips them and sucks on the other man's collarbone.
"Th... that was dirty te - teme!" Naruto moans, hands roughly pulling on Gaara's shaggy red hair. But he knows in Naruto's mind that it's midnight black. He's grown it out so it hangs around his face more, though he refuses to style it in the stupid parakeet way the Uchiha was so fond of. Never.
Gaara licks a trail down, sucking and biting, massaging Naruto's warm sides with his hands. He gets to the seal and sighs against it, Naruto's stomach quivering with the action. He traces it with his tongue, over and over again until he has it memorized and has Naruto squirming impatiently. Gaara smirks, his slender finger's hooking into Naruto's jeans and sliding them down, revealing tanned, tone flesh to his greedy eyes.
"Nhhh," Naruto gurgles out as he takes the other man's cock in his mouth, agonizingly slow. Naruto watches him with hooded eyes, navy blue in their lust.
The taste of Naruto is surprisingly not ramen, as everyone would think. It's spicy, musky, delicious. Gaara never gets tired of this feast before him. He gives a few languid licks up Naruto's length before returning to a steady sucking motion. Gaara got used to what he would hear after Naruto climaxed. The first time it happened, he had been hurt, darkly jealous, and angry. But now, now he's just glad in reality, he's not the one making Naruto arch off the bed like this.
Hands fist his hair, and Naruto sputters and comes, crying out. The name on his tongue is not Gaara.
It's never 'Gaara'.
"Naruto," Gaara rasps, and it's low and he feels his blood pounding in his ears. He kisses the blond softly, once, twice, and stares into those sated eyes. "Would you... do you want this," it comes out more of a whisper than a question, but Naruto hears him.
He nods.
So Gaara tentatively spreads Naruto's strong thighs, moving between them and leaning over to search inside the drawer. He finds what he's looking for and holds it above Naruto's head. "Now?"
With a growl that can scare the bravest ninja, Naruto reverses their position, taking the tube and spreading some of the cool jell onto his fingers. He squints, pressing his arm into Gaara's pale chest. Naruto's breath hisses, and those digits disappear, leaving Gaara with the obscenely erotic images of what the blond is doing. To. Himself.
Gaara mutters something unintelligibly, and it's these moments, in the heat of all the passion, that he forgets who he is and is supposed to be. They're tangled together and he's forgotten all about being someone he's not.
Naruto is making the loveliest sounds, and Gaara is almost sure he can just get off on that alone. He so hard it's painful. But Naruto's hand is back on his chest, his breathing evening out again. The blond sits back and smiles, eyes full of affection and determination. He nips at Gaara's ear playfully. The red head's arms shoot out, and he digs his nails into Naruto's hips, smirking smugly up at the other man.
"Ready?"
Naruto's answer is slamming himself down on Gaara's cock with a breathy sigh. Gaara makes a noise that sounds like a cat screeching, and his hips erratically thrust up before Naruto has given the go. Thus, when sharp teeth rips open the flesh of his neck, he is not surprised.
"I didn't say yes, asshole."
Gaara wants to say, my bad, but it's too unlike him, so he doesn't. He winces as Naruto's skilled tongue laps at the wound he just created, moving a little on Gaara experimentally.
After that, it is a fury of movement and moans whispered to the night, body's in rhythm and moving so delicately.
They kiss passionately, hinting only a trace of the bitterness Gaara can't keep from seeping in. He's the artist at holding in emotions, but this, this is something entirely different. His tongue traces Naruto's lips, licking and nipping as the other man pants, rocking forward and meeting all of Gaara's thrusts vigorously.
Gaara moves over, pinning the writhing Naruto to the bed, hiking his legs over his shoulders, and building up the pace. In. Out. In. Out.
His hand snakes down, taking a hold of the weeping length begging for touch. Naruto chokes, fingers shredding the sheets. "Yesss," he hisses, his face a soft shade of red.
It doesn't take long before Gaara's coming, long and hard and his hips move, keep moving until Naruto is moaning uncontrollably, his release taking him away. The name on his lips only makes Gaara thrust faster.
When they are spent and tired, Naruto hooks his head between Gaara's neck and shoulder, playing with a few strands of darkened red hair. At night, it's easy for someone to mistake the blood color for a black.
So easy.
"Gaara," Naruto whispers, and Gaara's eyes widen just a little. Naruto stares at him, tears threatening to spill down his whiskered cheeks.
"Sasuke's dead."
He doesn't ask, even now, but Naruto tells.
"I was there... in the final fight between him and Itachi. I saw him die."
Naruto pauses to take a breath, swallowing thickly. "I knew he wasn't strong enough. I could feel it. And this time, Itachi didn't leave him alive."
"And you?" Gaara whispers, and Naruto nods.
"I barely got out of there. It was insane. The amount of chakra. ... Sasuke..." But Naruto shrugs, as if it hurts to remember.
"This is the last time I'll ask you to act to... I'm so sorry Gaara. I'm a horrible person, god, it's just I - "
Gaara shakes his head, and pulls the other man closer.
"I do it for you, for your happiness. Do not apologize."
Naruto smiles that toothy grin through his anguish, clutching those pale arms to him tightly. "I'm fucking selfish. Too selfish. How did you stand it?" He laughs, humorless and dry.
Gaara touches Naruto's upper lip, and smiles slightly. "You are human."
"Thank you for putting up with me. I think now, I can love you. I can really start loving you... if you want me too. I've said goodbye to Sasuke tonight."
Naruto pulls the cover around them, and Gaara let's the chains around his heart loosen, just a little.
"Then so have I, Naruto."
End.
Aww, poor Gaara. I'm so cruel to him.
Originally, this was supposed to be pure GaaNaru, but I can't help it. I love my otp, and thus, it goes into everything... meaning SasuNaru. Hah... -kills self-.
This is also blatantly AU and probably ooc. -sigh-. But I hope you enjoyed it? It's my first attempt at serious!GaaNaru.