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"there's a cool blue heart you're keeping whenever you start to leave" the japanese house - cool blue
Naruto cut another chrysanthemum, putting in Gaara's basket, and proceeded to cut others. Gaara hold the basket very tight, his fist tensed and hurting.
"Oi, mate", Naruto shouted, "stop, your hand will bleed!" He took Gaara's hand and put it on his torso. "I hate when you don't take care of yourself, you know."
"I'm sorry."
Naruto looked at him, staring, and asked, his voice warmer than ever, liquid like the purest honey "Gaara...are you okay?"
Gaara only smiled.
Every few months, they did some gardening together, and Gaara knew it was a excuse for Naruto to check on him and make sure he wasn't lonely, so he always tried to put on a happy face.
Gaara's smiles were never very wide spread on his mouth, his cheeks were rarely red from excitation, and his almost-closed eyes often tainted by contained sadness. However Naruto had always known how to interpret the different lights in his irises, the peculiar bending of his back, every tiniest detail on his face.
Thus, he wasn't surprised when Naruto added "Geez. I don't even know why I ask, because I know you're not. You know I care for you, right?"
Gaara wished the last part hadn't been pronounced at all, because as soon as his soul had heard it, it had craved for an "You know I love you, right?" instead. He heard his lungs cracking, breaking. The flowers in his compressed chest were getting bigger and bigger: he could feel its petals climbing in his throat and and moving swiftly each time he expired, and its leaves being fold and twisted, and its roots piercing parts of him.
The first time he had felt the consequences of the Hanahaki Disease, he still was a teenager. He was talking to Naruto about an important matter, maybe Sasuke or the War, and had seen a petal getting out of his mouth.
Naruto, naive as always, ready as always for a good laugh, had exclaimed "Ha, what the fuck do you eat these days, huh?"
Gaara had caught the petal with his skilled fingers and had gazed at it for a very long time. Then said "I don't eat flowers"
And Naruto had sighed, a bit fond, "You still don't know how to joke, am i right?"
He wondered if he did now. If he knew how to joke. He wondered if his impressive amount of chakra was the reason why the Hanahaki Disease had slowed down that much, if it was keeping it at bay for years - because the illness was supposed to only last a few months, a year if the person was lucky and resistant. Though these days, he coughed more and more petals, seeing little bits of red camellias escaping his body.
He was getting closer to the end.
He stared at Naruto. Almost said "I love you". Almost thought Naruto could return this affection - or affliction. After all, his heart was big enough to love Hinata, and Sasuke, and maybe Sakura too - he didn't really know the nature of their relationship - so surely he had a minuscule place to shelter Gaara and his feelings and his fears?
He shaked his head and touched the "love" graved on his forehead. Precisely, he thought. Naruto was already bearing so much, giving so much. He just wanted him to receive the whole world. Gaara's whole world.
He kept his mouth shut.
One day, soon maybe, the flowers would grow too much and make him explode. That was his fate. He might have changed a lot since his birth, but his inner motto had stayed the same: it would be silly to hope for forever, and it would be silly to fear death.
He couldn't wait to bloom.