DISCLAIMER: I do NOT own Naruto. I do not own the sand siblings or their village. The girl with the ball was based off of a real character, but she is older and her personality is slightly different. But I don't think I really own her. I do own, however, the little girl and her mother. I created both of them so they are mine.

AN: So… I wanted to make a long story with this, but I think it will be a oneshot. It's too cute! I got too off-track with my idea. But this is the cutest Gaara story ever! It takes place at the beginning of the two-year interval (where Naruto left to train for two years). Hope you like!

What is Love?

Everything was calm in Sunagakure, the hidden sand village.

Everything except a blonde haired girl, who wouldn't shut up about wanting some girls to hang out with.

"I mean, really, I'm lonely here! And I always have to hang out with you guys," she complained, unaware of Gaara's death glare. "I wish I had some girl friends who I could talk to."

"There are other girls in this village. Why don't you hang out with them?" her brother, Kankuro, suggested.

She groaned. "But they're BORING! Isn't there someone fun to hang out with?"

Kankuro smirked. "What about your boyfriend? Don't you—"

"HE'S NOT MY BOYFRIEND!" she growled at him. He seemed to shrink and could only nod. "Besides, he's too lazy. I want to hang out with someone fun. There's no one fun here. And I don't want to—"

"Temari." She grew silent, since her youngest brother still scared her a little. "If you're so bored, why don't you go do something before I get really annoyed with you." Without a word she was gone. She knew better than to make Gaara mad. Especially because he wasn't mean to her or Kankuro anymore. Not intentionally, anyway.

"I think I'll go fix my puppets," Kankuro said as he made his way quickly to his room.

The sofa was deserted and Gaara was left alone in the main room where he sat on a chair at the table. He wasn't doing much of anything. He had to admit, Temari was right. There was nothing to do. And he hadn't any special friends. People just knew him. He knew however that his time as a jounin was limited, due to the fact that the Kazekage was dead.

Many of the people who were afraid of him were becoming nicer. When he and his brother and sister had returned from rescuing the leaf ninjas, the whole village had heard of Gaara's generous acts. He was also very strong and could surely protect the village from any attacks. But he wouldn't be Kazekage until the paperwork was done and all the other things were ready for him to take over.

"Maybe I should take a walk," he said to himself. It was better than sitting there all day. He grabbed his gourd and headed out the door. He didn't have a particular destination, so he just wandered though the sandy streets.

Suddenly, a ball shot past him. "Sorry about—" the girl stopped mid-sentence. She was still afraid of Gaara. When she was little, her friend had kicked her ball on the roof and it was stuck. Young Gaara got it down for them and was offering it back. She and her friends were afraid of him and refused to take the ball back. They started running away, she being one of the last ones. Gaara tried to stop her but hurt her in the process. His uncle rescued her.

"I'll go get it," Gaara said as he started to turn around.

"No! It's my fault! I'll get it. Sorry for almost hitting you. I'm sorry. Really," she blurted out. She then ran past him to get her ball, which hadn't rolled far in the sand.

Gaara watched her. "I'm sorry," he said without warning. "I didn't mean to hurt you. I was just lonely." His eyes remained on her, as she got closer.

While holding her ball, she said a quick "Bye," as she started walking faster and turned at the nearest street. Gaara saw her disappear around the corner. He had tried apologizing several times, but each time she ran away. It almost made him angry.

He sighed. Why can't she see me for who I really am, like everyone else? he wondered. He brushed it off, knowing that it was pointless to mope about it. He continued walking. Many of the people who had feared him once and stayed away were smiling at him and greeting him kindly. He greeted them back with a wave or a nod, showing that he acknowledged them.

After walking for a while, he finally stopped in front of a playground. He stared at the swing. He remembered sitting there when he was little. His only companion was his trusty teddy bear. The stuffed bear was still on Gaara's bed in the corner. There were other children playing on the slide and running around. Some of them went to the swings. He couldn't help but smile at them; Seeing that they could be happy while they were young made him happy.

After watching the children play for quite a few minutes, he heard a thump and shrill crying followed after. One of the kids had fallen off the ladder to the top of the slide. The other kids looked scared and didn't know what to do. Gaara started walking to the group. When he got close enough, he could see that the girl had hurt her knee. She was oblivious of anything around her, too consumed with the pain on her knee.

"What's wrong?" Gaara asked, though he already knew what happened. The children moved to reveal the crying girl. He ripped off a piece of his white cloth and wrapped it around the girl's knee. She quieted down to only sniffles as she watched him tie the cloth. "You should go home," he said and started walking away.

Something stopped him. It was something tugging on his leg. He looked and saw the girl's large watery eyes. "Come with me," she said. He didn't really want to baby-sit her but he didn't want to leave her alone as others had done to him.

"Where do you live?" he asked, hoping that she could get home by herself.

"At home," she replied.

It was an innocent answer. But not what Gaara needed to know. "I mean where is your house?" He hoped she understood this time.

She looked down. "Uhh..." She looked at the two streets, trying as hard as she could to remember which way she had come.

"Do you know which way?" he asked her. He was getting a bad feeling about this.

Her cheeks turned pink with embarrassment. "No."

Great. Just great, he thought. "When will you be picked up?" he asked.

"When mommy comes," she answered. What was he supposed to do now? He had no idea when her mom would come. Not to mention how to take care of children. He didn't know what to say. With her knee like that, she couldn't play by herself. It was up to Gaara to keep her entertained. "So… umm… do you want to make a sand castle?" It was the perfect idea. It was completely safe and he could even help her if she wanted.

"No," she said. Gaara was displeased that she refused his idea. "I wanna go on slide."

Gaara was surprised. He would've thought that since she fell off the slide, she wouldn't want to play on it anymore. She tried to climb the ladder, but was afraid to bend her wounded knee. She tried again but still couldn't overcome the dreadful step. She was suddenly floating up to the top of the slide. There was sand holding her and lifting her up. Gaara didn't want her to hurt herself again so he helped her up. She merely stared at his sand.

"There you go," he almost smiled at her curious expression. She didn't seem to be scared of his sand. He walked over to the end of the slide. She waddled to the start and sat down. She then pushed herself down. She was ready to fall into the sand when two arms caught her and held her up. A wide grin plastered her face. It made Gaara smile back. It was a gentle smile, one that didn't scare anyone.

"Let's make sand castle!" she exclaimed. Now she wants to. Gaara gave a hmph. He brought her to an open area with sand and put her down. He then sat down next to her and observed how she was examining the sand. Instead of gathering sand together to make a castle, she seemed to be looking for something. She finally got tired of looking.

"It's not same!" she cried. How could she tell that Gaara's sand was different? He didn't mind letting her play with it though, so he willed the sand to come out of his gourd and it swirled around her. She stared at it in awe. It then settled in front of her on top of the commonly surrounding sand.

A frown conquered her cheery face. "Why stop? Go!" She picked up and dropped the sand to try and get it to move. It then lifted up again. He made it swirl around her again, but then had an idea. I hope she likes this. The sand gathered in-between them and formed into a tiny replica of the little girl.

"It's me!" she cried in delight. The replica then started dancing around. Gaara had no clue what to make it do, so he improvised quite a bit. The girl laughed when it did something funny. It twirled and spun, and it even leaped. It then jumped around and skipped and started spinning more. After several minutes, the little show was over and the sand replica bowed to the little girl. It then dissolved into its normal state. She clapped her hands and her laughter lessened to giggles.

That's good, he thought. She liked it. She didn't seem to remember that she hurt her knee. She got up and hobbled a couple of steps. "Swings now!" she said pointing at the swings. Gaara took her hand and they walked to an empty swing. She climbed up the seat and turned towards Gaara.

"Push me, please?" she asked him. He couldn't resist smiling at her sweet face as he stood behind her swing. He gave her a starting push, and backed up as she went higher and higher. Sometimes he wouldn't push at all, because she shouldn't go too high, but still touched her so she knew that he was still there.

"Are you having fun, sweetheart?" a woman called to the little girl. She was smiling at the two of them.

"Mommy!" she exclaimed. Gaara slowed and stopped the swing so she could get off. She slid off the seat and ran to her mother.

Her mother picked her up and noticed her covered knee. Her smile straightened out. "What happened to your knee?"

"I fall down," she said sadly. But she perked right back up and pointed to Gaara, who was standing by the now empty swing. "He made it all better, mommy. An then he played with me!" she explained how he helped her up the slide, made the sand move and dance as a copy of herself, and how he pushed her on the swing.

"Sounds like you had fun," she said as she put her daughter down. Her smile had returned. "Thank you so much for taking care of her. I don't know what she would have done without you."

"Of course. I… couldn't leave her crying there," he paused for a moment. "I'm sorry I couldn't bring her home."

"No, no! She seems to have had fun. And I wasn't home anyway. She wanted to stay here and play with her friends rather than stay at home. I had to pick up her cousins who live a bit far from our house. And her father is on a mission right now, so I made her promise to stay here until I came back," she explained. "Thank you again for keeping an eye on her." She turned to her daughter. "Honey, it's time to say goodbye."

The little girl ran up to Gaara and gave him the biggest, warmest hug he had ever gotten. He bent down and patted her head. "Don't hurt yourself."

"I won't!" she said. She gave him one last hug and then ran back to her mother and grabbed her hand. As they were walking away, the little girl turned her head and called out to him, "Bye-bye, Mr. Sandman!"

Gaara chuckled at his new nickname. He watched the mother and child walk until he could no longer see them through the sandy breeze. "Is this love?" he pondered out loud to no one in particular. "Is this what it is like to be loved?"

He gazed at the sky. The sun would set soon. He wanted to be on his roof to see it. So he started to make his way home. She wasn't afraid of me. She liked me. It was… nice. His thoughts whirled in his head as he wandered home. He soon reached the sand siblings' house and opened the door.

Kankuro was lying across the sofa and sat up at his entrance. Temari was cooking dinner. "Hey, you're just in time. Dinner's ready, guys," Temari said as she set three plates of food on the table.

Temari ate at a normal pace while her brother Kankuro was stuffing his face with food. Though as much food as he had already eaten, Gaara still finished before Kankuro did. "Where you going?" Temari asked, being that the pig next to her had his mouth full and couldn't ask, though he stopped his food rampage to hear his brother's answer.

"The sunset is lovely tonight. I want to watch it," he calmly replied. The two siblings were stunned at his choice of words. What did he just say? Lovely? Since when did Gaara ever say lovely?

Gaara exited the house through the back, jumped up to the roof, and sat on the edge closest to the sunset. He was thinking about the little girl. "She was cute." The sun was almost gone. "I wonder if I'll see her again."

He watched the sun disappear below the horizon but stayed even though it was dark. He gazed at the stars and large moon in the sky. "Is this what love is?" he finally said. The girl liked him, and he realized that he had really enjoyed playing with the girl. "If it is, I think I kind of like it."

He stayed on the roof for about twenty more minutes, and then withdrew to his room. As he was lying on top of his bed unable to sleep, for more than one reason, his attention was drawn to his teddy bear. I like this feeling. I like love. He then clutched the bear and hugged it, remembering the little girl's hug and all the wonderful things of his day.

The next day, at the same time, he went to the playground and watched the girl play. She had a proper bandage on her knee today. It looked better than the ragged cloth he had tied around her knee before. She was playing in the sand. He decided to lean against a wall a good distance away. But that didn't stop her from seeing him when she looked up.

Her face lit up as bright as the sun when she saw him and she called out, "Come play with me Mr. Sandman!"

AN: So is it good? It came out so cute! I personally love it! If you have ideas for other fanfics, I would be glad to hear them. My favorite character, if you couldn't tell, is Gaara!

Thanks for reading! Hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it! Sayonara!