"What is your favorite color?" Lee feathers his thumb over the back of Gaara's hand and delights in the feeling he gets just from being able to do so. To think he has gone over five years without this, always searching for it, always wanting it back, and then Gaara walks right into his life with the simplicity of turning on a switch. Where before his life was like the night sky, full of pinpoints of bright reason – his friends, his Uncle, his daughter, his career – now it shines as if the sun has risen and the shadows are all gone.

Gaara stares at where their hands are joined. "I don't know. I never thought about it."

Lee bites the inside of his cheek thoughtfully and leans his head against Gaara's shoulder. His body feels oversensitive still, even after hours in bed, and he wants to do so many naughty things right now… But Yoshe has already walked in on them twice tonight, curious as to why they were no noisy, and a third time will make it impossible to send her back to her own bed.

For someone who has never met their father before today, she acts as if Gaara has been there for every hour of her life, as if she knows him better than she knows herself. When he strolled right into their arms, after her initial remark, she had asked, "Can we get ice cream now?" and then she had dragged them both to the nearest ice cream stand and nothing about the rest of their day had seemed unnatural to her.

"Maybe it's red?" he asks out loud and stares pointedly at Gaara's hair and then twists around to look at the red duster, the red pants, and the red undershirt. "I think it's red."

"So you're saying your favorite color is green?"

"Of course not! My favorite color is pink."

Gaara rolls his eyes around the room. Green ceiling, green walls, green bed covers, green (fluffy) carpet, and green clothes are all in sight from where they lay. "Pink, is it?"

"YOSH! Oops…" He waits for a moment, hand over mouth, but when Yoshe doesn't come charging back in, he laughs softly. "Yes. It is a youthful color."

"Why do you say that?"

"Say what?"

"Yosh, youthful… dynamic."

Lee flushes at the memory conjured up by that third word. "I apologized!"

"It was… cute," Gaara soothes. "You didn't need to."

He smiles and nuzzles against Gaara's cheek. "My Uncle, I suppose. My mom and dad were too young to handle the responsibility of raising me, so they handed me off to my mom's brother and he brought me up. Everyone says he is a strange man and I guess I adopted most of his habits." He smirks dangerously. "You should taste my curry. It's to die for."

He nods fearlessly, if maybe not obliviously. "I'll do that… tomorrow." His hands are wandering, finding Lee beneath the blankets, and he gives his manhood a deft stroke that makes Lee groan. "There are other things I want right now."

"G-Gaara… Q-questions! Questions, remember? I want to know you… I want to know the man my heart belongs to."

Gaara pauses and then he smiles as he readjusts himself to wrap an arm around his waist. "I do too. Ask me something."

"Hhhmmm… Gaara? You said it was your father running the experiment. Who was your father? And… did you ever learn what the experiment was?"

The playful mood disappears. Gaara's arms become iron bands around him. "My father was a man of science. It was his life, but… he wasn't evil. He wanted to solve the world's problems but he went about it the wrong way."

"He went about you the wrong way," Lee says, because he hears it in Gaara's voice.

"He stopped having children when he realized that he could do something for the sake of society," Gaara whispers. "He started having test subjects."

"How did you get away?" Lee asks softly. His hand is crushing Gaara's.

"He was murdered." There is no pain, no sorrow, no emotion in how he says it. "When he put us together, he was trying to disprove the Theory of True Love. When he failed, the man funding the experiment killed him."

"Oh, Gaara, I'm so sorry…"

"Don't be. When he was gone, I was… looking for you. But I couldn't find you. I was looking in the wrong country altogether."

"I tried looking for you too. I couldn't find you on the internet, though, and you actually found us before I could save up enough for a private investigator."

Gaara buries his face in Lee's hair. "When I was looking for you, I made my first friend in life. It took me twenty-two years, but I finally made one. Somehow I knew you would be proud of me. How did I know that? I didn't even know you. I'm still learning. How did I know?"

"The same way I knew Yoshe was going to be a girl the day I found out I was pregnant. The same way I knew that you were my most special person, that you would treat me right. Somehow, we just know these strange little things, yes?"

"Yes." Gaara turns him around so they're facing each other and he kisses him, long and deep. "He helped me find you."

"I want to meet him," Lee chirps. "Oh! But you have to meet my best friend too! And Uncle Guy. Uncle Guy will have a stern word or two with you, though, so I hope you know how to defend yourself."

"I am a master of Aikido and Sambo."

"Oooh, so you're non-aggressive? I want to face your Sambo with my Taikwondo!"

"What belt?"

"Black!"

"That good?"

"YOSH!"

The door opens. Yoshe stands in the ray of light shining in from the hallway, a stuffed squirrel hanging from her hand, and she stares blearily at them. "Mommy? Daddy?"

Beneath the blanket, Gaara slips Lee's boxers back on and then his own. After the last incident, they had made sure to keep them close at hand.

"Yes, Yoshe?" Lee asks, cheeks red.

"Are you and daddy okay?"

"Oh, yes…" There is no stopping her now. He might as well ask. "Would you like to sleep with us?"

Her eyes lit up like Christmas and the squirrel is strangled against her tiny chest. "YesYesYes!"

She squeezes in between them, snuggles into Lee's chest, and looks curiously at her father. "Daddy?"

Gaara shifts a bit. Lee wonders just how long it must take to go from being a man who had a negligent father to a man who has a child of his own. "Yes?"

"Can I braid your hair?"

Lee chuckles at Gaara's flabbergasted expression and leans down, pressing a kiss to Yoshe's cheek. "Can she, daddy?"

Heat flashes through Gaara's eyes but there is obviously a more pressing matter at hand, staring at him with his own eyes, full of hope and love and Lee wants to know if Gaara ever had that in his lifetime. He said children, right? So he has siblings? Were they ever his family?

"Tomorrow… daughter." That doesn't sound right coming out and by the look on his face, that didn't feel right coming out either. Lee chuckles as Yoshe grimaces. "Honey?" Lee shakes his head and Yoshe sticks out her tongue. "Baby."

"Uncle Guy calls me the Spirit of Youth," Yoshe supplies helpfully and nibbles on her squirrel's ear.

"No." Gaara doesn't even pretend to like it. "I will call you Beautiful."

"Hear that, Yosh?" Yoshe gushes to her squirrel. "I'm daddy's Bootiful!"

Lee leans over her and kisses Gaara fast on the lips. "Thank you, daddy."

"Lee, stop calling me that unless you want me to do something very lewd in front of yo-our daughter."

Lee concludes that it takes longer than a day for a man with a negligent father to realize that he has a child of his own. But Gaara is making progress faster than a plane can fly and that is all he can ask for.

So he pulls his child and his most special person close to him and he hums till Yoshe is asleep and Gaara is as relaxed as mush.

"One more question," the redhead says in a voice thick with sleep.

"Hm?"

"Can I stay? With you… Beautiful… Rest of my life?"

"Gaara, you do not even have to ask."

.

Gaara meets Uncle Guy first, who starts off their new relationship by hitting Gaara square in the jaw and then showing off albums upon albums of Lee from the day he was conceived to present time and then socks him in the gut (which, this time, Gaara is prepared for and he retaliates by twisting Guy's wrist before his fist can make contact and he uses momentum to throw Guy down and Lee has never seen his uncle happier since when Lee did his first front flip) only to show him the albums upon albums he has of Yoshe from the day they realized Lee was pregnant to present time.

Gaara doesn't show a single emotion throughout all of it. If he feels pain, if he feels humor, if he feels sad, if he feels annoyed – none of it is apparent.

Not till they get back that night and Yoshe is staying with Uncle Guy because Guy approves and he wants them to get started on baby number two (even though he does make it obvious that he knows what they did the night before).

But they leave without sex in mind. Gaara walks into the apartment Lee and Yoshe call their home and he looks at the fridge where Lee hangs all of Yoshe's pictures to the ceiling where her Arts and Crafts projects hang by fishing line and then he goes into her room, sits on her bed, and stares at Yosh for a half hour.

When Lee eases in, Gaara's eyes are suspiciously red and he looks up at Lee with something very close to an open, bleeding wound in his gaze and Lee is powerless but to hold him in his arms and wonder what kind of monster could ever raise their child like this, so foreign to the concept of family.

"Fuck, Lee," he husks into his damp shoulder, "how do I catch up with this?"

"I suggest you don't try," Lee answers truthfully enough. "I'm sure if you take your time and care for us as much as we care for you, we'll meet in the middle somewhere."

The silence is long after that, but it isn't foreboding or scary. It's tired and a bit overwhelmed, and yet they're comfortable to let it stay as is.

Then, "I want a picture of us together. As a… family."

Lee pets Gaara's hair out of his face. Braids tickle the pads of his fingertips, incomplete, coming loose, and widely spaced out in the thick mane that was his lover's. "So do I."

.

The family picture makes the photographer flinch but Lee thinks it is the most wonderful thing in the world. Gaara is to one side, his earlier demeanor of "I want a family photo" coming across as "I want to kill the man behind the camera" in the glossy picture. Lee is to the other, grinning wide enough for the brightness of his teeth to cause a glare, the thumbs up he's giving about the only thing visible about him around the blob of white that takes his place. Meanwhile, between them, is Yoshe and she drools on Yosh and seems to think that something on the ground is much more fascinating than what is happening up above.

"Can we put it on the fridge?" Yoshe asks breathlessly. "I want it on the fridge!"

"It must go on the fridge," Lee agrees. "It's perfect, perfect things must go on the fridge."

"This is the perfectest thing I've ever seen," she states.

"It most definitely is."

Gaara lags behind, carrying a wallet-sized copy with him, and he feels his heart melt in his chest. Yes, it is the perfectest thing he has ever seen.

.

Gaara finds out that he has been part of the largest misunderstanding to ever happen the next morning when someone knocks on the door and he goes to answer it.

It should be mentioned that dominants and submissives are rarely "friends". Dominants are too domineering and single submissives usually come in packs that will not tolerate the unwanted territorial instinct of a dominant. In other words, dominants will most times out of none treat submissives like they need protecting or, worse case scenario, like possessions, and submissives, at this rare time when they are not true to their name, will fuck that dominant up.

Now when a dominant and a submissive do become friends, it's much like the tragic story of the lioness who tried to raise the baby deer – the lioness that stopped eating meat and the baby deer that starved because it couldn't get the milk it needed. In the end, the baby deer was eaten by another lion.

Gaara is that other lion. Standing in front of him is that starving lion(ess) and, by the way his dark eyes bear into him, Gaara knows that this dominant is not happy to see him.

Yoshe dashes past his leg and collides with the stranger's calves. "Sasu! Sasu! Daddy's home, see?"

The raven-haired dominant manages to twist his glare into a half-bored smile by the time Yoshe looks up at him. "I do see… he's finally here. So I guess Lee managed to drag you here at last?"

There are so many insinuations in that tone that Gaara wants to strangle him for – as if he has been trying to stay away this entire time, as if he doesn't want to be here –

"I imagined you would be a bit taller."

– and now he's attacking his height. Admittedly, he's two inches shorter than Lee, but there is no doubt in his mind that he can still force this bastard to cry for his mother.

"I imagined you were… like Lee." Gaara says. In other words, a submissive.

"I bet you did."

And then there is Lee, as Lee always is, bouncing into existence from seemingly nowhere and tackling the stranger with a gleeful "Sasuke!"

Gaara's hand, still on the door, clenches till his knuckles turn white and dents are created in the wood. And that bastard, he knows it too. He looks at him over Lee's shoulder, Yoshe finally breaking free of his knee, and rolls his tongue over his bottom lip.

Yoshe saves the day in that innocent way of hers by grabbing her daddy's hand and leading him towards the kitchen. Then she sends it to Hell in that same innocent way of hers. "We gotta clean the toe-mate-O's, daddy! Sasu likes toe-mate-O's." Not even the cute way she says it can calm the way Gaara seethes inside.

"Gaara! This is the friend I've been telling you about, Sasuke!" Lee laughs softly and bumps shoulders with the raven dominant. "We have known each other for thirteen years now."

The jealousy morphs into a terrible creature that stretches throughout his entire body, his mind, his heart, his soul, his blood – they all burn and it's all he can do not to start a fight in front of his daughter. His hands shake as he crosses his arms over his chest in the hope that caging himself in will help.

Sasuke wraps an arm around Lee's shoulders. Gaara has not felt this murderous rage since he had been twelve and thinking that the world hated him. Sasuke turns to him. "How long have you known Lee?"

He's rubbing it in. He's not even asking him a question, he's just picking at the wound. "Not long enough," he finally manages to say. "I don't think a lifetime would be long enough to know him."

Lee gets that watery look in his eyes whenever he thinks someone is doing something remotely romantic or cute. "Oh, Gaara!" And suddenly he has the submissive, arms around his shoulders, holding him with surprising strength.

Gaara is not childish. He does not give into childish antics. But over Lee's shoulder, he licks his lips, just like Sasuke had done earlier. Except the look on Sasuke's face is darker.

They both know where Gaara's mouth has been and where Sasuke's hasn't.

"Sasu, Sasu!" Yoshe tugs on Sasuke's shirt. "I got toe-mate-O's for you!"

And, suddenly, it's a war over his own daughter.

.

Sasuke doesn't leave soon enough. For Gaara, it feels like hours before he goes, before he stops touching his lover, his daughter, because he stops glaring at their family photo, before he's gone. And the moment he's out, Guy is in and he takes one look at Gaara before he grabs Yoshe and says that she'll be staying with him for the next two days.

Guy is a dominant. He might be strange and he might run around in green spandex, but he knows. When Lee can not even fathom what Gaara is going through, Guy knows. The door isn't even locked behind them before Gaara has Lee shoved up against it, growling in his ear, and is trying to rip his skinny jeans off with only half his mind working properly and that half of his mind is telling him to stop, screaming you can't do this, trying to reason with him, but he's not listening. Lee doesn't even have time to understand what's happening before Gaara manages to drag his clothes off of him, dazed and confused, and hold him still and – yes – submissive.

"G-Gaara? G-G-GAARA!"

There has been one foolproof way to mark a mate that has been on earth for centuries. Luckily for them, it's not pissing on them, but maybe that's only Gaara thinking because Lee isn't prepared when he thrusts into him and it's that first choked sound of pain that finally gets through to him.

"Lee…? Fuck, Lee, I'm – Lee, are you okay?"

There are groves in the door where Lee's nails have scoured it. "M-move…"

"What?"

Lee pushes against him. "Move." He twists around till he can reach over his shoulder and kiss Gaara with all the gentleness of a refreshing rain shower. "Bite, mark, be rough – I love you."

He groans and his eyes slide shut. "Lee." He's leaking around him, not in full arousal, but he's getting there. Gaara reaches around him and pumps his length, other hand at his nipples, and he tortures the front of his body till his backside is dripping and Lee is whimpering and Gaara is drunk off his thrashing and begging and demanding.

Gaara forces him on the ground, all fours, and takes him like the animal he feels like, like they're not even having sex as much as rutting in the woods, letting go of self-control because he wants to be as deep as Lee's heart and he knows, he knows, he can't get there by being gentle, by being considerate, and Lee is prepared for him, so why hold out?

The wet slap of skin on skin drives Gaara up the wall as much as feeling Lee squeeze around him, tremor, tremble, how he mewls and how his voice rises into a scream to sink into a whimper. "G-GAARAAA!" His upper body collapses into the floor and his one hand snakes back to wrap around the one digging into his hip, holding him still for Gaara and his wants, his pace, his fucking. "GAARAAAA!"

He's hitting that sweet spot, he knows he is, it's in how Lee's eyes dilate, how his body jerks, how he howls his name.

Sasuke is never going to know that, though. He never is. He's never going to know. Because this is Gaara's, this is all Gaara's, and if that bastard thinks he can replace him, if he thinks he can be with his lover, his Lee, then he has another thing coming.

The thought of what Sasuke's face would look like, the betrayal in his eyes, the defeated slump of his shoulders, makes Gaara wild and he almost hopes that Lee didn't get to lock that door, that Sasuke will come right back in thinking he can come between them, and he wants Sasuke to see what he can drive his lover to, how he alone can make Lee feel.

Because, no matter how much longer Sasuke knew Lee, Gaara is the only one who knows him this way.

Lee makes a sound that's like a scream, a grunt, and Gaara's name all in one and then he's climaxing. He clamps down on Gaara with the power of Nirvana in mind and Gaara isn't ready to go yet. One more thing, one more moment…

And he orgasms, teeth clamped over Lee's shoulder, and the jealous monster that has been crawling through him ever since the moment he saw Sasuke closes its ugly eyes and sleeps.

The first thing he notices when he comes back to himself is that Lee is bleeding. The bite mark is bleeding, he's bleeding from where they're still joined, and the horror is so much greater than the relief. "Lee?"

His lover gives a tired "Hhhmmm?"

"Lee, I – fuck!" Lee whimpers when he pulls out but he picks Lee up in the next moment and rushes for the bathroom.

The hot water from the tub really puts a light on the situation, like the bruises on Lee's hips, the scabs on his knees, just how deep that bite mark is, and, worst of all, how red blood is when it flows with a torrent of semen.

Lee pouts, somewhere closer to being asleep than awake, and swats Gaara's hand away when he tries to wash away the evidence. "Sleepy, Gaara, wanna sleep…"

"I have to take you to the hospital." He knows anal tears are not good, that they are a danger to Lee's health, and Lee won't stop bleeding.

"Can I go later?"

"No."

Lee sighs and wiggles around till he seems to find a position that gives him the strength to reach out and grab Gaara's face in his hands. "Gaara, that was amazing. The fiery passion of jealousy went from you to me!"

He stops all movement. "You knew?"

"Sasuke is my best friend, Gaara… that does not mean I'm ignorant to how he acts towards me and all the dominants that are close to me. Do not worry, I get my revenge every week on Sunday. I take him to Uncle Guy's dojo and I show him that dominant does not necessarily mean better."

"You knew I was jealous and you let me do this anyway?" He had asked for it too, hadn't he?

"I let you do this because I knew you were jealous." Lee moves a bit more till his head has found a pillow in Gaara's arm. "I remember once when I was a teenager… I was in a car accident and my left arm and leg were shattered. To make a very long story very short, after being told for a year that I would never recover, we found a specialist who could work miracles and then I was on the road to a full recovery, YOSH! We still send her Thank You cards every anniversary of my surgery.

But then when I was getting better, Uncle Guy took in a student for his dojo and he was a submissive too but he was… better than me. He was a better fighter and Uncle Guy adored him – but Uncle Guy was all I had through my childhood! I was so jealous… and so hurt. Uncle Guy began ignoring me for him and I just wanted to be in top condition so I could impress him again.

Instead, it turned out that the other submissive had two brothers and they robbed Uncle Guy. When Uncle Guy got hold of them, he beat them bloody and blue and spent hours driving the Youthful Way into their skulls and then I was his favorite again. I was so very, very, very happy."

"… About the beating or that you were your Uncle's favorite again?"

"Hush, no one needs to know the answer to that." Lee sighs and his hands fiddle with Gaara's sleeve. "I know what jealousy feels like and how terrible it is to think that you have been replaced. I want you to know that no matter how sexy Sasuke is or how passionately he seduces me –" Lee laughs as Gaara growls and his free arm comes around Lee like a collar, "– you are who I love as my lover, my mate, the father to my child, the man of my dreams, and the lucky fellow who lived to see daylight after meeting my Uncle."

Gaara closes his eyes and stops breathing for a moment. But then Lee is humming a tuneless song and he doesn't stop the single tear that escapes his tight hold. Lee catches it with a kiss and burrows himself into Gaara's chest.

He doesn't know how to say it back. How to say "Lee, I love you". It's beyond him. So he lets the silence settle as he takes a rag and washes Lee clean of sweat and dirt and blood and their essences.

But then he can only be fair. "Lee, my best friend is a submissive."

.

Meeting Gaara's best friend is a complete accident. Lee has snuck away while Yoshe is distracted by her daddy and her cone of chocolate mint ice cream to buy that stuffed turtle she had been eyeballing from down the street.

"Daddy, what's your favorite ice cream?" She gazes up at him, looking as cute as can be in the polka dot green dress her mommy got her. "Is it choc'late mint ice cream? Is it? Is it? Is it?"

"I don't know, Beautiful. I've never had ice cream."

Her expression is tragic. Yoshe almost looks like she can cry. "N-n-never? You want… you want some of mine, daddy?" She holds her cone, standing up on her tiny tippy-toes, and there is no saying no to that face, to his own aquamarine eyes.

He crouches down and licks a dollop off of the scoop. The frozen ice sits awkwardly on his tongue as he tries to think of what to say. "It'sh… chold."

She giggles. "You sound weird, daddy."

The chocolate chips melt against the roof of his mouth. "Dho hI?"

"Yeah, you do, Red!" A blonde swaggers into the picture and Gaara's head shoots up to see a familiar grinning face. "Who would've thought that you made such an awesome dad with the crap you grew up with, huh?"

"Who're you?" Yoshe asks, tucking her ice cream safely to her chest and consequently getting globs of melting mint on her dress.

Gaara pets her hair soothingly. "That's my best friend, Beautiful," he tells her gently, then stands up. "Naruto, it's good to see you again. I wasn't expecting you for a few more days."

"Heh! Can't keep me away, y'know? I wanted to meet your family!"

"Daddy's never had ice cream before," Yoshe informs him, as if this somehow ties into the current conversation. "Why didn't you ever give daddy ice cream?"

"Uuuhh… I didn't know I had to." Naruto scratches the back of his head. "Was I supposed to?" He turns to Gaara.

"Beautiful says so." Gaara blinks, his version of a shrug. "You should have given me ice cream earlier."

"OI! That's not my fault!"

Yoshe giggles and nestles against Gaara's leg. Naruto growls for another moment but Yoshe's smile is contagious and he's grinning before long.

"So what's your name, Beautiful?" Naruto asks.

"Mommy!"

"Huh? That's a weird name…"

Yoshe runs past Naruto and tackles her mom's knee, ice cream cone flying in the air and splattering against the seat of Naruto's pants. Gaara smiles as the blonde sputters and growls and tries to wipe it off. Yoshe doesn't even notice because her eyes are fixed on the gift bag her mommy is carrying.

"Hi, Yoshe… Hey, daddy." Lee looks at the redhead with so much love that Gaara feels his heart squeeze painfully. Then he looks at Naruto with honest curiosity and a hint, just a hint, of uncertainty. "Hello, my name is Lee Rock. And you are?"

"Naruto Uzumaki!"

Realization dawns. Lee's smile is genuine. "Naruto? Gaara has told me a lot about you! YOSH, I feel as if I know you already!"

"… Yosh? H-hey, whoa!" Naruto looks confused. Gaara is amused. And Lee and Yoshe… they're happy.

They're always happy whenever they're hugging someone, Gaara notices. Even if that someone looks as awkward as Naruto does.

"Thank you," Gaara hears Lee whisper to Naruto, who stops freaking out long enough to listen, "for being there when I couldn't be."

Yoshe nuzzles his calf. "Thank you, Naru."

He looks at Gaara over Lee's shoulder. "… Yeah. Uh, no problem." He pats their backs. "I do what I can."

"Daddy," Yoshe whines. "You gotta hug him too."

"No he doesn't!"

"You heard Beautiful, Naruto. I've got to." He doesn't have the length of arm to wrap them all up, but he reaches around Lee and Yoshe giggles at his knee. Naruto grumbles.

"Whatever." But he's smiling too.

"Mommy?" Yoshe chirps after a second, getting straight to the point. "What's in that bag?"

.

Sasuke is coming for a visit.

Gaara is not pleased. He's holding Yoshe to his chest like she can ward away bastards who are after his lover and trying to control his own jealousy. Lee is humming as he makes lunch, wearing a pink apron that says Made with Love decorated with thick lipstick kisses and hearts.

"Daddy, are you okay?" Yoshe pats his cheek and frowns. "Mommy, I think daddy's broken."

Lee laughs. "No, he's okay. Daddy is just... just… excited that Sasuke is coming! YOSH, that is it!"

"I'm excited too," Yoshe giggles. "I miss Sasu."

Something snaps in Gaara's mind. Lee sees it instantly. "Hey, Yoshe, how about we all go see Uncle Guy, hm?"

"What about Sa-" Yoshe grimaces and wriggles. "Daddy, I can't breathe."

Lee steals Yoshe from Gaara and pushes them all out the door, note and pen in hand. "We have to go to Uncle Guy right now. I will leave a note for Sasuke and he knows where the key is so he can get in."

There is fire in Gaara's lungs. Sasuke can get into their home? So not only does he have Gaara's daughter, he has his haven.

In the back of Gaara's mind where he is sane and he knows that this jealousy and possessiveness is not only pointless but incredibly stupid and unnecessary, a voice of reason says, with the simplicity Gaara has likened himself to, "Kill him."

But then Lee leans over and kisses him. "I love you, Gaara."

And it isn't so bad. Especially when Yoshe grins, not exactly understanding what is going on, and leans over to kiss his cheek too. "Love you, daddy."

That makes it even better.

.

Sasuke is on his way to the elevator when he hears the most annoying thing in the world.

"OI! You, duckbutt, stop the elevator!" That voice.

Duckbutt? He made sure to press the "Close" button. Catch the next ride, idiot.

Except a hand thrusts between the sliding slabs of metal before they can shut and Sasuke's dark gaze meet the blue sky. Wait, that isn't right.

He meets blue eyes. Angry blue eyes. The blonde the eyes belong to scowls at him and slips in. The doors shut with a "ding". "You asshole, I asked you to hold the elevator!"

Right, that voice. It grates on Sasuke's nerves. "You asked me to hold the elevator? My name isn't duckbutt and I didn't hear a question. Idiot."

"Who're you calling an idiot?"

"Do you see anyone else in here?"

The blonde snarls and Sasuke returns his glare full force. Then, unexpectedly, he calms down. "Alright, listen, I didn't mean to call you a duckbutt, I just really want to see my friends, y'know? And they live on the top floor, can you believe that? I don't have the energy to run all the way up there!"

He doesn't remember asking, but, for some reason, he's more amused than he is aggravated. "So you call everyone you come across duckbutt when you're impatient?"

"Nah. It's just your hair reminded me of a duck's butt."

Sasuke grabs him by the collar of his jacket and shoves him up against the wall. "What was that?"

"No need to get touchy! Geez, you've got some fucking issues…" He gulps.

Sasuke is obsessively aware of how close he is to the blonde, how harshly he's breathing, how very close he is to touching the blonde's skin. The idiot's clothes smell of sunshine and grass and Sasuke wishes that the aftertaste of ramen he's getting from inhaling the same air as the blonde can overpower it but it doesn't even come close. He has tan skin Sasuke wants to touch and he doesn't know why, his head of golden hair beckons for Sasuke's hand and he wants to give in and his lush pink lips make Sasuke want to beg for a kiss but that isn't Sasuke.

Sasuke never has those kinds of thoughts. He has one-night stands to scratch the occasional itch and the only person he has ever wanted this much is at the top of this building with another dominant's child in another dominant's arms.

"So, uh… name's Naruto Uzumaki… Yours?"

"… Sasuke Uchiha."

"G-great, erm, you wanna back off?"

Sasuke takes a moment to check Naruto over. Submissive or dominant? He's pissing him off like a dominant but there's something burning beneath his skin that isn't anger, it's something else completely and he doesn't know what… it… is…

"I don't think I do." He's leaning in, zeroing in on Naruto's mouth, and he is about to maybe make the worst or greatest mistake of his life when the elevator dings and he realizes just what wall they're leaning against. The doors open and they fall out in a tangle of limbs.

He doesn't know why he does it, but he twists around so that Naruto lands on top of him and he takes the brunt of the plunge. Naruto yelps as momentum bounces them and then –

Naruto tastes like ramen, yes, but there's a tang of peppermint toothpaste, spring water, and something he can't name but he's addicted to it the moment it registers in his mind. He tangles a hand in Naruto's hair and the tresses are soft and light around his fingers. Naruto groans and goes limp on top of him.

He feels the giving contours of Naruto's body beneath his clothes. Submissive. That makes sense, Sasuke is a dominant, he would get hot and heavy for a submissive, but the degree to which he's feeling all this lust and want and fucking need makes him want to take a step back and ask himself what the hell is going on.

No time for that, though, Naruto is there, Sasuke is too, and if he lets go for an instant, it will be an instant too long.

And then the elevator doors bang against his ankles, open, try to close, open, try to close, and Sasuke snarls at the interruption.

"Aw, man…" Naruto groans against his jaw. "What am I doing? I have to, uh… There're friends I have to… H-hey! Get your hand out of t-th-GAH!"

He's heavy. Very heavy. Sasuke didn't know that someone who at least appears to be on the slim side could weigh this much. Regardless, he strolls down the corridor, blonde over his shoulder, and he glares when someone opens their door to check out what the ruckus is. One look and the woman scurries into the safety of her apartment.

"Where do you think you're taking me, you bastard? I have to surprise my friends! OI, are you even listening to me?"

Sasuke stares at the paper taped to Lee's door, Naruto wriggling violently for freedom, as he palms the spare key Lee gave him two years ago.

The note reads:

To Sasuke,

Forgive us for not being home when you get here! There was a problem of sorts, so we went to Uncle Guy's house. Feel free to come in if you want but we will most likely not be back for awhile.

With love, Lee~

There is even a little heart at the end.

Despite everything, this is actually very good news. Sasuke smirks as he unlocks the door and steps into solitude with his blonde prey. Naruto goes still for a very tense, very long moment. And then he roars. "YOU PERVERT, WHAT YOU ARE THINKING OF DOING WITH YOUR HAND THERE?"

Sasuke kneads the globular flesh. "You'll find out soon enough."

.

Naruto is a beast in bed, or, really, on any surface. Sasuke learns this firsthand and though he's insanely pleased about it, someone may also have to die because this experience speaks of non-virgin things.

After humiliating Lee's kitchen counter, then staining his couch, ending with them getting suspicious claw marks in some of the walls, they have relocated to the bathroom where Naruto lies limply against Sasuke's chest, the Uchiha running a hand towel across his body.

He didn't do it to be spiteful against Lee. Never would he do that. No, he wants Gaara to come home first and see it.

"Have you had any lovers before me?"

Naruto sputters and nearly drowns as he dips beneath the water. "W-what? What kind of question is that?"

"A possessive one," he growls back. "Don't I have the right to ask?"

"No!"

"Answer it anyway, idiot."

"Bastard!" Sasuke pinches his ass. "Ow! What the hell?"

"Naruto…"

The blonde flinches and looks down and away. "Hey, what's with that expression, huh? If looks could kill… Stop it, alright! Geez, are you psycho?" Then something occurs to him. "I don't even know you! Fuck, I just got screwed by a complete stranger! Are you a psycho? Serial killer? Oh, god, you're an alien, aren't you?

"What?"

"Listen, E.T., I didn't mean to insult you or anything, so don't eat my brains!"

"That's a zombie, you idiot!"

"Bastard! You've already probed my ass!"

Sasuke pauses. This is true. Then he shakes his head. "Just answer the question!"

"Fine! Okay? I've been in two relationships and they went pretty far… but you can't get upset – HEY, HEY! I said, you can't get upset 'cause I know you're not as pure as the driven snow either, so stop looking at me like that!"

"How am I looking at you?"

"Like you're going to eat me... GAAH! What the hell?"

"I'm eating you." Sasuke bites the other shoulder, just as hard, and a bead of blood wells up. Naruto growls and fights for freedom, causing water to slosh over the sides of the tub. "Stay still, I'm not done."

Someone else touched this body. Someone else was where Sasuke is. Someone else had what Sasuke wants. Sasuke is, as far as he is concerned, reasonable in his anger. Because this boy belongs to him as of before he was even born. He doesn't understand the feeling, it makes him slightly agitated if he thinks about it for too long, but it's there and he isn't going to deny it.

"Like hell you're not! I'm tired, you asshole, so don't – GAH! Aaah…" Naruto grips the side of the tub with white-knuckled fists. "S-Sasuke…"

Sasuke thrusts a little harder against the crease of his ass. The head of his cock searches for Naruto's entrance, nudges it, and pushes in. Naruto arches against his chest, groaning. "Fuck, why does this still feel so good..?" Naruto clutches at his hair and twists his head over his shoulder. Their lips meet awkwardly but with no less ferocity than they have been showing. "Shouldn't feel so good…"

"I just must be that good," Sasuke growls. "Better than anything you have ever had before."

"You arrogant ba-STARD! OH GOD!" Naruto jerks as if struck by lightening. "T-touch it again… Don't l-laugh! J-just…"

"I know." Sasuke nips his earlobe. His hips are bucking up frantically, finding that hidden bundle of nerves again, and water spills over onto the tiled floor. "You're just so…" he stops himself. He isn't the type of guy who says "cute", damn it. Instead he finds himself pressing soft, kittenish kisses along Naruto's jaw, down the thick chord of his throat, and back over the line of his shoulder. Naruto's breath catches. "Fuck, you're squeezing me!"

"I don't m-mean to! It's y-you're fault! S-shit… Again…" Naruto clenches his fist in his hair, tugging. "Again!"

He growls. "It's a good thing. But let go of my hair."

"Are we really having this argument when you're fucking me?"

Sasuke has to admit. That's a good point. He smirks and twists them around till Naruto on his knees, braced on the lip of the bath, and Sasuke is crouched over him. "You're right. The only thing I want to hear from you is my name."

"A-arrogan… B-basta-… BASTARD!" Naruto sags into the wall the tub is connected to, gasping and moaning. The sound of wet skin slapping wet skin resounds through the room. "Oh GOD!"

Sasuke licks his lips. "God has nothing… to do with… this!" He bites the back of the blonde's neck. "Just me."

"Oh fuck! SASUKE!"

Sasuke reaches around and touches Naruto's erection. That's all he does, he just touches it. And Naruto's done. Sasuke feels his walls tremor and flex around him, hot and wet and flowing, and his length flinches in his hand, releasing his climax.

He goes limp beneath him. "I'm not done with you," Sasuke snarls.

"Heh… E-uh…. Then… get done." Naruto throws a haughty look over his shoulder at him. "C'mon, Sasuke… D-don't I feel good?" He squeezes again.

Sasuke feels a guttural howl build up in his chest. He's doing it on purpose. His hands dig into Naruto's hips. "You tease." He leans back and watches himself pound Naruto's ass. The blonde groans and falls into the wall. "You want me to cum… so bad? In you? Fine. Have… what… you… want!"

His essence beats at Naruto's insides and he swears he hears Naruto whisper "Oh, fuck, too deep… Too deep!" Then, louder, he grouches, "did you just eject into my womb?" A thought occurs to him. "Shit, we haven't been using protection!"

"What about it?" Sasuke slouches back and drags Naruto with him. The hard, cold lip of the tub digs into his shoulders, but the heat Naruto exudes somehow overcomes that.

"What about it? I could be pregnant, you asshole!"

"Would that be a bad thing?" Did he just ask that?

"Did you just ask that?"

"Yes, I did." He tries to understand his own thought process. In the end, all he can admit to is, "I wouldn't mind." He can't quite face the feeling of possessive, prideful excitement that touches his heart. "It's not like I'm letting you go anytime soon."

"Y'know, that's the most romantic thing I've heard you say since I met you. It really doesn't suit your douchy personality."

Sasuke glares. "Shut up."

"Heh heh… hah!" Naruto keeps laughing and rests against Sasuke. "Geez, what the hell kind of couple are we? I mean, who are you to begin with? Heck, where are we? Is this your apartment? It looks like you've got a kid…" He pokes a squirrel bath toy. "Oh yeah! That reminds me, I was going to surprise my friends with a visit! You wouldn't happen to know where apartment 211 is, would you?"

"One question at a ti- … 211?"

"Yeah."

"And who do you know at 211?" Because if he thinks of the address on the front door…

"My friend, Gaara, got together with the guy of his dreams recently and he's been wanting me to spend time with them and their kid as a fam-…ily… Hey, why are you looking at me like that?"

"And how am I looking at you?"

"Like you want to – HEY, I'm not falling for that again! Lemme go! You're dangerous, you asshole! What are you, the mafia? LEMME GO! SOMEBODY, HELP ME! RAPIST ASSHOLE ON THE LOOS – GAH!"

They tumble over onto the soaked floor.

From there, it's all a matter of letting their bodies argue with each other.

.

Gaara comes home first. If he's going to meet with Sasuke, he would rather do it without his daughter watching or Lee playing referee. They'll have to fight it out at some point. If they don't, it will never be okay. Sasuke will always be after his Lee, and he might hurt Lee again if this continues.

Except, when he walks through the front door, the scent of sex is thick in the air and there are stains where such stains shouldn't be. Anger and curiosity war with each other in his mind. In the end, he lets curiosity win. That at least can lead to anger and with his curiosity assuaged, he can commit manslaughter.

So he follows the stains and strayed clothes till he finds himself in his bedroom, the one where he and Lee make love and where they as a family have cuddled. On the bed is Sasuke. If not for the unmistakable blonde head sticking above the covers next to him, lying half over him, he would have murdered him in cold blood.

Naruto snores, snuggles closer, and smiles in his sleep. Sasuke opens drowsy black eyes to blink at Gaara. "Home so soon?"

.

Sasuke, more as an Uchiha than as a dominant, is too prideful to ask for help. But when it's three weeks later and he's still on Naruto like an addiction, he knows he needs someone to explain to him what the hell is going on with his life.

But he hates Gaara, Guy has always had something against him, and he obviously can't ask Naruto. There's Kiba, Neji, Shikamaru,… so on, so forth. But he doesn't care to talk to them. He would much rather spend his time with a snake that had its fangs stuck in his eyeball.

So he goes to Lee.

He feels, just slightly, uncomfortable as he waits for the awed submissive to say something. "Sasuke…"

"I wouldn't be surprised if you didn't understand it either," he adds onto his quipped explanation of his inner confusion and want.

"But I do understand what is going on!"

"… Really?"

"YOSH! Sasuke, this is the Theory of True Love! You and Naruto are meant to be together!"

"… No. Next explanation."

"Sasuke!"

"I don't believe in that bogus theory."

Lee huffs. "Then I don't know what to tell you! I believe in it, Gaara believes in it, and Yoshe believes in it!" He offers a sly grin. "I hear that Gaara got Naruto to believe in it too."

Sasuke looks at him out of the corner of his eyes. "Is that so?"

"Yep! Naruto is a believer! I don't know why you're not, I thought I rubbed off on you…"

He has, Sasuke thinks to himself, but in other ways. Not in the ways Sasuke had wanted, but… in hindsight, maybe that's a good thing. If he had had Lee, chances are he wouldn't have Naruto.

"I was in love with you," he admits without really meaning to. But it's out now and he can't take it back, so he waits.

Lee smiles sadly. "I know. Or, well, I knew. But, Sasuke… there is only one man I want in my life. I'm sorry I could never return your feelings – wait, no, I'm not! Because, in the end, this turned out well for everyone."

Sasuke relents. He has to. "Gaara's a lucky son of a bitch to have you. If he ever treats you less than you deserve, I will kill him."

"He treats me as if there is nothing more precious in his life," Lee boasts. Then laughs sheepishly. "Except our daughter."

Sasuke sighs. "… So the Theory of True Love?"

"YOSH!"

"I still think the man who made it up –"

"Discovered it –"

"Is nothing but a pervert."

"I can live with that. But he is a wise pervert."

.

Yoshe thinks it's the coolest thing that her parents' best friends are a couple now. They're really cute!

Especially when they're sleeping on her bed.

Naruto is squeezing Yosh to his chest, slobbering on her princess pink pillow, and Sasuke is leaning against the wall decorated with yellow flowers, pictures of her family, and green frog stickers. Naruto's belly is on Sasuke's legs and Sasuke has one hand in Naruto's hair. In Sasuke's other hand is Yoshe's stuffed chipmunk.

She smiles and waltzes out of her room, in her pajamas, and crawls into her parents' room.

"Sasu and Naru look really cute," she says randomly to her sleeping dad. "They're in my bed," she chirps to them both in general.

She doesn't expect her dad to shoot out of bed like the blazes of fury have woken him up and he rushes down the hall. The next thing she hears is Naruto screaming and she thinks Sasuke says a bad word.

She curls into her mommy who hugs her back in his sleep. Okay, now her daddy is scary.

After a long moment, she hears her dad growl something.

"Mommy?"

"Mmmm…?"

"What's sex?" And why is her daddy making it sound like such a bad thing?

Suddenly her mom is wide awake. "What?"

.

Author's Note: tmmdeathwishraven wanted a one-shot version of this for SasuNaru… except it kind of turned out like this. I'm sorry! But, at the same time, I'm not… I'm happy with how this turned out, but I don't think it was exactly what was asked for… I hope this appeases you, tmmdeathwishraven! Have a good day, all of my readers!