Chapter Text
Rock Lee had fought enemies twice his size, enemies with unbelievably powerful genjutsu and ninjutsu, veteran shinobi with long lists of confirmed kills. He had faced the sharingan of Sasuke Uchiha, and the formidable byakugan of the Hyuga clan. He had even fought Gaara of the Desert and lived to make jokes about it. But now, Rock Lee was panicking.
As for his enemy. . . he was standing in the guest suite of an inn, facing down a large, fluffy, luxurious looking bed. Normally, he’d be overjoyed to check into an inn and be greeted by a bed like this one, especially after almost five days on the road, and in the scorching heat and scouring winds of the desert no less. But today the sight of this bed, sitting boldly in the middle of the small room, was enough to tie his stomach in knots.
“Hey, Gaara, um, what are we supposed to do with this?” He asked, fighting to keep his voice calm.
Gaara had been standing beside him silently, with his arms crossed over his chest, also staring at the bed. He turned now to look at Lee with blank eyes and rasped, “It’s a bed, Lee. People like to sleep in them.”
“But there are two of us,” Lee pointed out, deciding to cut right to the chase.
“Yes, there are,” Gaara agreed. “This would explain why Kankuro kept laughing when we parted ways outside of town. He was in charge of making the bookings.”
Lee was not normally a vengeful person, but he made a mental note to give Kankuro a good swift kick once the mission was over.
“The joke is on him though,” Gaara continued. “Because we really only need one.”
Lee nearly swallowed his own tongue. “During missions Neji and Tenten and I have often had to sleep together on one small bed or in the same sleeping bag,” Lee spluttered. “But this is. . . now. . . we cannot. . .”
“What I mean,” Gaara said quickly. “Is that if we’re going to sleep at all, we’ll need to take it in turns.”
“Oh, excellent!” Lee cried. “We can stay up all night like when we were on our way to the Land of Tea! I had a lot of fun when we did that.”
But Gaara shook his head and grimaced. “Not this time, I’ve been awake for six days now, I need to sleep soon. Also, remember the purpose of our mission. If we're trying to draw out my stalker, it would be better if we were both well rested and alert. We’ll take turns.”
Lee nodded resolutely. “Yes, we will take turns. That is very reasonable.”
He looked sidelong at Gaara who was still frowning at the bed as though it had done him a personal injury.
“I mean, not that I would not want. . . I do not mean to say that I do not. . . um, it is just. . . it is too. . .” He fumbled for the words and finally gave up with a frustrated sigh.
“I know what you mean,” Gaara said quietly, still resolutely not looking at Lee. “I’m not like Neji and Tenten, and you are not like Temari and Kankuro. Or anyone else really. We need to keep our focus on this mission now.”
“Right!” Lee said desperately. “Let us go over the details again.”
“Of course,” Gaara agreed, glad for any topic of conversation that was not the one lone bed in the centre of the room. He pulled the mission scroll out of his pocket and spread it over the table. “The farmers in this village grow a crop that is essential to food pill production and I am here to negotiate a new supply contract. Normally I would come with Temari and Kankuro, or Baki, or any of the other advisors. But there has been a shinobi dogging my footsteps since roughly the time we got back to the Land of Tea. My ANBU intercepted him trying to break into my house but he escaped. We have yet to learn what he wants or who he’s working for.”
“That is why you have come to this trade meeting with only me as your bodyguard,” Lee said. “If he believes you are minimally guarded he might make his move.”
“Exactly.” Gaara nodded. “You were the perfect shinobi for the job because you are frequently underestimated by other ninja and I like being near you.”
“What?” Lee asked, surprised.
“I like spending time with you. I like listening to you talk. You don’t annoy me and I never wish you would go away,” Gaara explained. His voice was carefully expressionless, but he turned his face away as he spoke.
“Oh. Okay,” Lee breathed.
“Your team and mine are standing by, watching and waiting. They'll provide back up once we have trapped him," Gaara continued, all business again.
"I wonder what he could possibly want," Lee mused.
During the initial mission briefing, Tenten had suggested that the stalker might just be a lovesick admirer. Gaara had shaken his head and folded his arms saying, "Rumour has gotten around recently that none of them are really my type." Maybe Lee had imagined it, but he could have sworn that the Kazekage's eyes had flicked towards him for the briefest moment as he spoke.
The rest of the day was spent in meetings, which Lee considered to be a form of cruel and unusual torture. He stood behind Gaara’s chair, alert and still, desperately trying not to fidget as officials droned on about tariffs and insurance, shipping and stakeholders. Gaara had told him at the beginning of the mission, in his most stern Kazekage voice, that bodyguards didn’t do push-ups, squats, handstands, or any other form of training (not even stretching!), while on duty. They just stood and watched for threats.
If I cannot stand perfectly still for the next hour, Lee challenged himself, then I will . . . a flicker of movement outside the window caught his eye. It had only been a split second, but that had been enough. Lee now knew two things: there was a shinobi watching them from the window of the building opposite, and he was a Sand shinobi but not one of their party, nor one he recognized.
He moved slowly around the room so that he was standing next to the window with his back to it and made a tiny gesture with his head towards the window across the alley. Although Gaara was still deep in conversation with the village’s treasurer, he followed Lee’s movements with his eyes, watching the window for a moment, then giving a tiny nod, so quick that Lee barely saw it.
To cover for his movements on this side of the room, Lee poured a cup of tea from the trolley by the window and offered it to Gaara.
“Thank you,” Gaara said absently, his fingers brushing over Lee’s as he took the teacup from his hand. Lee jumped and a few drops of scalding tea leapt out of the cup onto the back of Gaara’s hand, soaking into the sand armour. Gaara waved away his babbled apologies and handed him a clump of wet sand.
“Hold onto that for me until it dries,” he instructed. Lee cradled it carefully in his hands as he would a baby bird that had fallen from its nest.
“Lord Kazekage,” one of the officials spoke up. “You come to our trade talks in armour?”
“Please do not be offended.” Gaara offered them his best diplomatic smile. “I never take it off.”
This seemed to appease the officials, but Lee knew all too well that Gaara was lying. In quiet moments alone, he often conjured up from his memory the feeling of Gaara’s forehead tucked against the crook of his neck as they danced, Gaara’s hands in his, and that brief moment at their last parting when Gaara had brushed his fingers across Lee’s cheek. He was left to wonder now why Gaara hadn’t worn his armour that evening. Did he really trust Lee so much?
Dinner managed to be an even more miserable affair than all the meetings. Despite being ravenously hungry himself, Lee had to test Gaara’s food for poisons and then stand behind his chair scanning the room for signs of the enemy, all the while ignoring the rumblings of his own stomach. The official seated beside Gaara kept up a steady stream of absurdly boring commentary about crop yields and profit margins while Gaara offered polite remarks and the occasional understanding nod as he picked restlessly at his food.
Dessert was brought around, then coffee. Lee’s legs were numb from standing still and he couldn’t remember the last time he had been so bored. He was beginning to think the evening would never end when an official approached Gaara to invite him to join them in the lounge for drinks and cards. And to meet his lovely young niece. Lee wanted to cry.
“That’s very thoughtful, thank you,” Gaara said smoothly. “But I’m afraid I am rather tired from my long journey, and must decline for this evening. Good night, gentlemen, ladies.”
He stood and gestured for Lee to follow him out into the hall.
“One thing before we go,” Gaara murmured, walking briskly down one hallway after another, sniffing as though he were Akamaru on an enemy’s trail. They arrived in a vast kitchen where Gaara sweet talked the staff into giving him a large container of leftovers.
“Thank you!” Lee breathed. “I am starving.”
“I thought so. Sorry, I know guard duty is not easy for you.”
“Nonsense,” Lee babbled. “It is good training!”
“In case an enemy shinobi ever attempts to literally bore you to death?” Gaara quipped. Lee was finding that he quite liked when Gaara tried to make jokes. It seemed to be happening more frequently recently.
They arrived back at the inn and Lee locked the door after them, methodically checked all of the possible hiding places in the room and its attached bath, then unthinkingly threw himself across the width of the bed, face down in the fluffy duvet.
“How do you do this everyday?” He groaned. “It is so frustrating.”
He felt the mattress dip and turned his head to find Gaara lying next to him, an arm’s length away staring up at the ceiling, the gourd left on the floor at the foot of the bed.
“I can do this everyday because I have good reason too,” Gaara said softly. “I do what I have to for my village.”
His words drifted through Lee’s mind without sticking. He couldn’t find any words to answer with. His thoughts had swung back around to the problem of the only bed, and stubbornly refused to focus on anything else. Night had fallen, they had officially turned in for the evening; sooner or later, they were going to have to sleep. We are going to take turns. It will be okay, Lee reminded himself. He turned his face again to look at Gaara and found him staring back.
“I’m going to take a shower,” Gaara said, but made no move to stand up.
“Okay,” Lee replied. He didn't move either.
The moment dragged itself out, both of them staring at each other in uneasy silence, until Gaara abruptly slid off the bed and hurried away into the bathroom.
Lee went to sit at the little table and wolfed down his dinner. He tried very hard not to listen to the sound of water hitting the tiled floor of the shower, forced himself not to think about that water splashing against Gaara’s bare, unarmoured skin. He patted the inner pocket of his vest where he had stowed the little clump of dampened sand, alongside the tiny handful of sand he had found there after their journey to the Land of Tea.
As soon as he had finished eating, he began looking around the guest suite for something to occupy his mind. This was the best accommodation that the small rural village had to offer, in the attic above a tea shop. So, while the room was clean and comfortable, it was also small and bare. There were no books, no television, nothing but the big bed, which he was starting to imagine was gloating. Training then, would have to do. It had never failed him before. He would begin with three hundred push ups, then three hundred sit ups, then three hundred squats. Just a quick workout before bed.
He was only on the hundred and third push up when the sound of the water stopped. He did not want to think about warm, soft towels, or how nice it would be to wrap one around Gaara as he stepped out of the shower, dripping and shiny clean. He started his push ups again at one. On the twentieth, the hair dryer started. It droned on and on, irritating, and much less distracting. He made it to the end of his push ups and started on the sit ups. He was on his fifty third squat when Gaara emerged from the bathroom, fully dressed, gourd in place on his back, the black lines around his eyes crisp and freshly inked. His hair had been meticulously dried so it wouldn’t interfere with the sand armour, but Lee suspected he must have combed it with his fingers instead of a brush as it stuck out haphazardly in all directions.
Lee paused mid-squat and blurted out, “You look cute.”
Gaara’s face shifted through several minute and unreadable expressions in the space of a few seconds, as Lee, still frozen halfway through a squat, tried not to panic.
“Uh, thank you.” Gaara ducked his head and gestured at the open bathroom door. “All yours.”
Lee scurried towards the shower, somehow much sweatier than he should have been after such an easy workout. He paused in the doorway as an awful thought struck him. “But Gaara, if I go in there, who is guarding you?”
“I am,” Gaara said.
“But -”
Gaara held up one hand in a silencing gesture. “You know as well as anyone, I don’t actually need a bodyguard. It’s just improper to not have one, and your superior taijutsu makes you the best complement to the gaps in my own skills. You don’t have to wear yourself out hovering around me.”
“Okay,” Lee agreed. “But you can yell if you need me.”
He hurried away into the bathroom and Gaara climbed onto the bed. He sat in the middle of it and imagined what would happen if he did yell while Lee was in the shower. Would he come rushing out of the bathroom, covered in soap suds and wearing only a towel, to fight whatever enemy Gaara had encountered? He struggled to squash that thought, but found himself instead imagining what might happen if they didn’t need to take turns sleeping. Would Lee sleep beside him in this big, comfortable bed? Would he put his arms around Gaara and hold him close, share his warmth, maybe nestle his face against Gaara’s hair as he had when they were dancing together?
Gaara shook his head hard. This was a mission, and a risky one at that. He needed to focus. He was going to have serious words with Kankuro when this was all over. What was he thinking trapping them alone together in a tiny room like this with only one bed? What did he think was going to happen? He knew how difficult Gaara was finding it to navigate these feelings, how much he was struggling to accept that someone like Lee might want to be close to someone like him. And Lee seemed almost as flustered and upset by the situation as he was. He should have expected something like this really; Kankuro had always been a twisted bastard.
Lee burst out of the bathroom, humming to himself, dressed in his pajamas and rubbing a towel through his hair.
Gaara squinted at the front of Lee’s bright pink sweatshirt and read out, “Deadly Damsel Blade Oil: Perfumed and Poisonous.”
“Huh,” Lee stopped in his tracks and looked down at his chest. “I guess this must be Tenten’s.”
“Your squad shares clothes?” Gaara asked, shuddering at a mental image of Kankuro in one of Temari’s outfits.
“Not intentionally. Neji and Tenten once accidentally wore each other’s pants for a whole week without noticing.” Lee laughed. “But that was not as bad as the time Gai-sensei mistook my suit for his a few years ago. I was much skinnier than Gai-sensei then.”
And there was the most disturbing mental image yet.
“Do you all live together?” Gaara had moved in with his siblings many years ago, but they all went out of their way to keep their things separate and were very protective of their own spaces.
“No, but we all stay at Gai-sensei’s place a lot. And Neji likes to stay with me when he is avoiding the rest of the Hyugas. We keep clothes and toothbrushes and stuff at each other’s places, but things get mixed up.”
He lifted his arms to resume scrubbing the towel through his hair and the hem of his shirt lifted to reveal just a glimpse of bare skin above his low slung pajama pants. Gaara looked away quickly.
“How are you going to fight in pajamas, Lee?” he demanded.
“Easily.” Lee shrugged and grinned reassuringly. He tossed the towel over the back of a chair and pulled his vest on over the pink sweatshirt.
“Do you mind if I sleep first?” Gaara asked. “I’m exhausted.”
Lee heard the strain in his voice and nodded enthusiastically. “I was going to suggest that. Go ahead.”
“Thank you. Wake me when it’s my turn on watch.” With that Gaara shuffled under the luxurious covers of the bed, still fully dressed and wearing his gourd. Lee chose to say nothing about it. They were on a mission after all, even if he had every intention of allowing Gaara to sleep for as long as he wanted.
Sitting at the table, poring over the mission scroll again by the light of one small lamp, Lee listened as Gaara’s breathing slowed. He began to murmur, caught in a dream, and Lee, gripped by a reckless curiosity, rose from his chair and tip-toed closer. He had never actually seen Gaara sleep in all the years they had been friends, and he expected that Gaara would sleep like a corpse on a bier, hands folded neatly on his chest, dark eyelids like the empty sockets of a skull in the shadowy room. Instead, he found Gaara sleeping curled into a tight ball, his hands clutching the duvet in front of his face so that he was visible only as a misshapen round lump under the covers, and a tuft of bright red hair against the pillow with the Love mark just visible beneath.
Lee was overcome with an sudden intense wave of affection and protectiveness. He sat down heavily on the floor beside the bed, leaning his back against the mattress, left breathless by the force of his own feelings.
Gai-sensei, he thought, I have no idea what this is or what I am supposed to do now. But you were right about him.