Title: The Lines We Draw

Series: Naruto

Word Count: ~ 3,200

Pairing(s): Gaara x Lee

Summary: There's no solace, no spirit in the faceless models that grace billboards and toothpaste commercials. With Lee, there's a humanity, a strength and a weakness. It begins with an email…

Warning(s): Slash and highschool AU. Yeah...

A/N: While using the word 'random' seems a bit much, I really REALLY don't know why I wrote this.

XXXXXX

"Alright, I will see you tomorrow!"

Lee's back vanishes as it becomes one of many in the after-school fray, and while Gaara can't quite define it, something feels immeasurably off. It might be the weight in his outstretched hand, made by the slender piece of paper with Lee's email address on it, but he knows it's impossible for an insignificant and light object to become so heavy. The pull nestles in his elbow: an uncomfortable itch.

"'Splendid_Blue_Beast34'?" His brother reads over his shoulder, letting out a low whistle when he's done. "Getting email addresses? My little brother's all grown up. Soon he'll be breaking hearts…"

The look Gaara gives him is more than a threat and Kankuro shuts his mouth so fast his teeth painfully click.

For the entire walk home, the paper remains in its place, curled in Gaara's palm. A few times, the wind threatens to pull it away, but he reacts too fast. Temari tries to psychoanalyze him out of the corner of her eye - like his belly's been cut and pinned to the sides of a dissection tray in a nightmare's version of Biology- but he ignores it.

It's too alien, too strange. The paper doesn't carry any physical weight, no real monetary or sentimental importance to speak of. Made of block letters in thick, black Sharpie, it's easily replaced and imitated. There's no real value.

Gaara knows it's impossible, and yet, there's viable proof right there in his palm.

He can't take his eyes off it.

XXXXXX

"Gaara?" Temari's head pokes out from behind the doorframe, toothbrush protruding from her mouth in a circle of white suds. "What're you doing?"

He thinks about it, fingers poised on the keyboard but not applying pressure. Not yet.

"I don't know," he answers, and Temari jokingly remarks something about him browsing for porn on the family computer. While he wants to remind her that only Kankuro does that, he decides it must be some sort of joke, and just stares until she goes away.

When he looks back at the computer screen, the message is still blank. Gaara hasn't even decided on a title for the email yet. The momentous task of picking the contents is next.

It takes him several hours to write out a cautious greeting, and a few more to finally hit the send button.

XXXXXX

Lee's his 'friend'. At least, that's what Naruto says.

The blond shares his Advisor Block, which consists of waiting for the Advisor teacher to show and take attendance. There's no real point to it, and Naruto has many conspiracy theories about the class, which Gaara listens to with half an ear. He could tear holes in those theories, but Naruto would not appreciate that. That's about the extent of his compassion for others.

"See," Naruto begins, one finger outstretched and dangerously in Gaara's personal space, "friends exchanged emails. Heck, we do it all the time!" He must be paraphrasing because their conversations consist of Naruto sending him chain letters and bizarre News stories, mostly about World Records and other trivial things. "This whole thing shouldn't weird you out that much, Gaara."

It's a mystery where Naruto gets his facts. Gaara is not 'wierded out' in the slightest. It's more perplexing than anything else.

"Hey! Don't give me that look!" Naruto exclaims loud enough for it to echo off the small classroom walls, successfully disturbing the few students who were actually studying. He will fall off his chair if he keeps rocking like that.

"I don't understand," he finally admits as Naruto tries to balance on the back two legs.

This will end in disaster, but it's useless to warn him.

"Don't understand what?"

Naruto's blue eyes go impossibly wide as the chair teeters, but he manages to compensate. If anything, Naruto is adaptable, and Gaara admires that in him. Sakura, the Student Council President, uses the terms 'dense as a rock' and 'persistent idiot' to describe Naruto, but he knows those are grossly inaccurate.

Naruto is simply…

"Woah! Woah!"

…persistent.

After a long moment in which Naruto falls but ceases to learn his lesson, Gaara contemplates his answer. Throughout years of hesitant social interaction, he has learned the effects of 'coming on too strong'. It's the sort of thing which makes Naruto laugh and his sister turn red in mortification.

"Why he wants to be…," and he trails off because that word is still foreign.

"Friends?" Naruto says, filling in the blank with the same word. To him, it's thrown around so frequently that its meaning has become comfortable. Gaara would find the concept of sleeping on sandpaper more appealing. "You don't know why he wants to be your friend, right?"

He nods once.

Naruto is smarter than he appears, and so, instead of answering, he fixes Gaara with an all-too familiar look. It's the infamous look of 'I'm not going to tell you, so figure it out on your own'. He's a personal advocate of Gaara's personal growth, expansion of horizons, and all sorts of painful, strange things.

Gaara doesn't appreciate it.

His foot intervenes a few minutes later and Naruto falls into an ungraceful, swearing heap. Beneath the frustration, there's laughter in Gaara's eyes.

XXXXXX

"Why are you reciting poetry?" Gaara asks one day as he walks home with Lee, their mutual Physics project swung over Lee's steady shoulders.

Lee stops in his tracks. He's staring at Gaara like he's an alien or something equally fascinating. Absently, a leaf lands in his dark hair.

"You think…" Lee can't finish the sentence because his eyes start watering. Gaara's not good with emotional people, and he thinks it may be time to rethink this 'friendship' with Lee. "You think…the way I talk is like... It is like... Poetry?"

Maybe that was the wrong assumption. Temari, after a rather peculiar incident in Elementary School, taught Gaara that apologizing was the decent thing to do when he made people cry. The lesson didn't stick very well, and even when he apologized for inconsequential actions, people would cry regardless.

Tears have welled in Lee's eyes and they eventually break free, spilling down his cheeks. Gaara isn't panicking, because he doesn't do that, but he wants to. He should be doing something at least, but his usually analytic mind has shut down.

Lee reaches up and futilely attempts to wipe the tears away, but they keep coming. His shirtsleeves become damp, darkening to a muddied forest green. Gaara likes that shirt on Lee, and he can't help but feel something for causing Lee to tarnish it.

Lee finally looks up. The whites of his eyes have a sheen to them that Gaara cannot ignore.

"I apologize," he says, voice remarkably steady. "That is the nicest thing anyone has ever said to me."

Gaara has never felt awkward before, but this must be it. He can't face Lee, but simultaneously, not facing Lee is equally uncomfortable. This is a feeling he does not like, but it's not Lee's fault –Gaara made him cry in the first place.

He manages to glance up. There's a desert in his mouth, but he passes it through will alone. He has to speak.

"That's the nicest thing I've ever said to anyone," Gaara admits, and the smile Lee gives him could power a city.

XXXXXX

It begins with the realization that when Lee's not there, Gaara misses him.

He misses their mundane conversations, how their arguments go in circles, and when Lee laughs at something Gaara says. The strange, social world that sometimes swallows Gaara whole isn't so deafening with Lee at his side. He's not trying to fumble his way through a maze with Lee, trying to decipher hidden meanings and intents. Lee is true and honest. He's one of those knights from the movies Temari watched as a kid.

Lee makes sense. Gaara likes that.

He's gone for Track. These competitions are the highlight of Lee's life, and Gaara just knows that from the way he smiles at the thought, the prospect of competing. Gaara has an absence of that. There's a new hollowness in his routine: a void that now lurks behind every thought, every action.

He wants to find something, but he's not sure what.

XXXXXX

Gaara tries to explain this to Lee one day as they lie outside on the bleachers.

"Maybe it is a hobby you need," Lee says, but Gaara's not really paying that much attention. He's taking a guilty moment to watch the rise and fall of Lee's bare chest, bronzed by the sun, as the athlete catches his breath. It's common practice for Gaara to watch Lee train, but there's an ulterior motive behind it.

Lee is beautiful.

Not in the conventional way, because Gaara's never been conventional. He's utilitarian, sculpted, and a work of perseverance that has evolved into art. There's no solace, no spirit in the faceless models that grace billboards and toothpaste commercials. With Lee, there's a humanity, a strength and a weakness, that Gaara has fondness for.

He knows it's an honor to be so close to Lee. Others question their friendship, sometimes vocally and sometimes masked behind the wall of gossip and the metaphoric 'grapevine', but Lee never wavers. He is loyal, so very loyal that Gaara sometimes question if he can stretch that loyalty, that friendship, and perverse it into something else.

But, Gaara would never do that. Even thinking it is ridiculous.

Still, he hopes. He hopes as Lee's chest rises and his smile stretches wider and wider as he delves into a story, a recollection of his recent Track Meet. The story strays, as it always does, into his personal thoughts on running, competing, what drives him, and life.

Gaara watches and he listens. He is there for Lee, and maybe, that will be enough.

XXXXXX

Lee thinks he loves Sakura, but Gaara knows that's not true.

Lee is supposed to love Sakura, as it is expected. She's aesthetically pleasing, Gaara assumes, and her intelligent matches her popularity.

Lee does not love Sakura. He does not talk about his fears and wants with Sakura. He does not stay up astonishingly late to exchange emails with Sakura.

He does not smile like that for Sakura.

She is nothing to him.

That logic, Gaara knows, is faulty. But he can't help it.

The sheer gluttony he gets from the thought, the idea of Lee, is enough to drive an agonizing guilt deep into his chest. He truly is a demon for thinking this way.

He wants to believe, because as the months pass and Lee grows brighter each day, it is not enough. What he is to Lee is not enough anymore.

XXXXXX

Naruto calls him possessive.

It's meant as a joke, but the emotion clawing in his chest as Lee asks out Sakura for the third time that month is going to kill him. Soon, he's going to fall apart, and it hurts, it hurts far too much for a simple 'friendship'.

Gaara sticks his foot out, sending the blond into a recycling bin, and just keeps walking.

He doesn't speak to Naruto for weeks.

XXXXXX

Lee is really trying to pry answers out of Gaara. He wants to know why he's so distant, so quiet.

Gaara can't give him an answer.

Refusing to lie to Lee is one thing, but telling him the truth, the truth that is tearing him apart, is too much. The thing lurking in his thoughts sometimes conjures images. They are images of Lee's rejection, his disgust, and while it's impossible because that's not Lee and Lee couldn't be so cruel, Gaara believes them sometimes. That brings on doubts about Lee, and that leads to guilt. It's the cycle that has manifested in his head and refuses to leave. It stops him from moving forwards, but going back…

He doesn't want to go back. He doesn't want to retreat, become the class recluse again, and not know the meaning of friendship. Watching Lee practice, renting the worst horror movies for a quarter, and listening to those speeches that flow in improbable but beautiful ways… Gaara refuses to give it all up.

Lee's running laps when Gaara finds him. Everyone else has gone home, and the only souls about are the lowly janitors, teachers polishing off their last few photocopies, and the occasional jogger.

No one is looking at Lee except him.

The sun has begun its early descent, and the world is awash with yellow and orange, dying Lee's skin an even richer tan. There's an unearthly fluorescent tint to the sweat that drips off Lee's brow, pools above his cheekbone, and slides down his neck. In this evening light, there's a world of infinite, impossible color and Gaara sees it all in Lee.

The steady rhythm of his steps slows to a crawl and Lee stretches his arms high. Shadow curves around the muscles there and trails even further, nestling on a visible hipbone.

It's not enough, Gaara thinks, to merely be a voyeur.

His courage fails when Lee finally turns, a dash of red on the bridge of his nose, a star's reflection in his eyes.

It's not enough, but he doesn't know how to move forward. He's stuck offering a mumbled apology that Lee quickly accepts. Despite the raw urge in his chest to just scream for the injustice of it all, Gaara nods along as Lee bursts into a flurry of pent-up conversation, the type only he and Gaara could share.

Lee swings his gym bag over his shoulder and he smiles. "It is good to talk with you again, Gaara. I missed this."

There's the Band-Aid approach to things, Kankuro always says. He's never bothered to tell Gaara what happens when it comes off.

XXXXXX

Sakura rejects him again, and while Lee pulls the usual theatrics, Gaara is by his side – listening.

"I do not understand," Lee mumbles, a far cry from his usual articulation.

Gaara has offered to intimidate Sakura in the past, change her mindset to the correct frequency, but that alarms Lee and starts a whole new conversation.

Combining with the lingering wind chill, the concrete steps outside the gymnasium are very cold.

He feels comfortable enough to sit close to Lee now. Their shoulders brush, but it's distorted through layers of cloth. Today, Lee's wearing his usual coloured windbreaker. That deep shade of green is quickly becoming Gaara's favorite color. There's no use denying the reason behind this decision.

"I don't understand either," Gaara says, and he barely has to turn his head before Lee's right there, eyes wide and clear enough to show his reflection. Earlier, Lee was near-tears, and a diluted red tone lingers near his bottom lids. He thinks of what Naruto didn't say those many weeks ago when the concept of 'friendship' was new. "But… Maybe there's nothing to understand."

Static hums in the air. Idly, Gaara observes the strange phenomenon of Lee's close proximity and its direct relation to the increased beat of his heart. There's an emotion for this, he knows, but he can't quite place it.

"Sakura's a lucky girl to have you," he mutters and looks away. Lee's doing that overtly emotional thing that Gaara's never quite gotten used to, taking those words as a well-intended compliment.

Even though he meant to finish the statement, Gaara leaves it hanging between them. In his mind, the meaning has become clouded.

It weighs on him, pushing further into his bones than any cold ever could.

XXXXXX

He makes his move in mid February.

One day earlier, Lee sent him a virtual gift card. Valentine's Day is the sort of thing Gaara purposefully forgets, having never received one before. The idea of giving seems even more ludicrous.

The animated squirrel held a pink-on-white banner, spelling out 'I'm Nuts For You!' in disgustingly perfect cursive, the kind only a computer program could emulate. The pun was worse than the mediocre design, and he promptly informed Lee of this in a stern email, but the response was all in emoticons and capslock and far too cheerful for Gaara's minimalist taste.

At the time, he pondered, once again, if they were too different to be compatible. The negativity doesn't last long because, as he scrolls down to delete the message, he noticed one grammatically correct sentence, typed out in Times New Roman 12, which apologizes for the gaudy banner.

Difference is what creates the many polarities in nature and, simultaneously, brings them together.

Gaara finds Lee moments before he leaves for another Track Meet.

Apparently, and judging by his choice of volume, Lee is genuinely surprised to see him. With a quick glance, Gaara notices his change of clothes, the bag hefted over one shoulder, and concludes that he doesn't have much time.

"Naruto," and the blond boy stands to attention, sneakers still untied. "Leave."

He throws the predictable fit that Gaara would usually brush off. Maybe he's too harsh in forcing him out the door, but then Naruto gives him an all-knowing, sly grin and complies without another word.

"Gaara?" Lee beings, bouncing on his heels while maintaining that dumbfounded, innocent expression. He has no idea what's going to happen and Gaara likes that. "What are you doing here? Is something wrong?"

Subtly has never been Gaara's forte. Teachers ranging from kindergarten to highschool have repeated the statement, putting their own unique spins on how to best phrase 'does not play well with others' and not offend his highly influential father.

"You don't love Sakura," Gaara says, and Lee just looks at him, slack jawed, and blinks a few times.

"What are you saying?" Lee's still blinking, his eyes growing into concentric circles. "Of course I love Sakura. She is my destined, my pure and honorab-"

Lee is cut off with a sweep of Gaara's hand. The silence is deafening, pounding fast in his ears, but Gaara faces him all the same, refusing to flinch or blink or consider thoughts of retreat. The raw, open emotions on Lee's face feed the thing within his chest. It gorges.

"No," and it's too firm to be questioned. "You don't love Sakura."

The gym bag slides down his shoulder and hangs off a bare elbow. Gaara watches it all and tries, he tries so hard, to make Lee understand: it's there in his eyes, his face, his chest. Lee cannot deny it now.

"Gaara." His voice comes out as an awed whisper, but his expression is stern. "What are you trying to say?"

Gaara smiles for the first time in years, cutting his face in a smooth curve that emulates the blade of a scythe: far too sinister to be ignored.

He doesn't say anything because he doesn't have to. His hand is there, holding the back of Lee's neck and pulling him down.

Gaara kisses him hard to show he means it.

XXXXXX

Nothing compares to the feeling of Lee kissing him back, the sound of the gym bag falling to the floor, and the distant blaring of a bus horn. Lee is late and mutters so, urgently, against open lips and teeth, but Gaara has no intention of letting go. Not when there's something indefinable filling his chest, pushing out all the jealously and anger.

He feels whole, and it's wonderful.

XXXXX