Chapter 13

                                    

                                          

That night, Ino had a very uncomfortable sleep filled with listless dreams of things that she could vaguely remember had happened before. It did not feel like déjà vu or the like. If anything, it was like watching events of her life through the eyes of someone else. Most of these events circulated around gatherings between the other Hidden villages that were held in the Leaf.
In those scenes flashing though her mind's eye, she could see herself busy with banquet preparations and seating arrangements. Most of those responsibilities were done voluntarily, because Ino preferred the settings and wrap-ups than mingling with guests and representatives. She did not know how her priorities had changed from standing in the spotlight to blending into the background, but after everything that had happened, she had grown out of her childish ways and... well... grew up.
She saw herself busy in the many different flashbacks flipping through her subconscious as she slept, and while she had always thought this to be pretty normal, she did not understand why in most of those scenes, she could see in the corner of her eye a tall figure of a man dressed in a maroon tunic and multiple sashes. The figure was either standing with other delegates, never contributing to the conversation but was obviously listening politely to what they were saying. Sometimes, the man would be sitting alone in his seat while the others had started mingling or dancing. He would be watching everything before him with uninterested eyes as he pretended to enjoy his drink, but he would never try to make a move to join the crowd. In other scenes, he would be talking with Naruto about something she couldn't quite hear, but he would talk in a low voice, expression as solemn as it could be.
In all the scenes, the man's face would be obscured from her line of vision, but she knew deep down who he was. That tall physic, those red, flaming locks, that brooding posture.
It was Sabaku no Gaara, and Ino did not understand why she was dreaming about him.
She woke up with a gasp in the darkness of her room, the only light source she had was the nightlight provided somewhere overhead. She could hear the loud howling of the wind from the outside, and the shutters of the only window in the room rattling noisily with every gust. It took a few seconds before the events of the past day came crashing back to her, and she groaned in despair as she turned over in her bed, burying her face into her pillow. Well, technically not her bed, and not her pillow, because she was lying in Gaara's bed, with Gaara's pillow, in the chambers for the representatives of Suna. She had agreed with Gaara that staying in their respective quarters would be best for the situation. And because of this, she had found herself in the inner chambers of the Suna quarters where she could hear Kankurou's loud snoring from behind the sliding door. Temari had never returned for the night, and Ino had a wild hunch that she was anywhere Shikamaru was.
Pushing thoughts of Shikamaru and Temari and whatever they may be doing out of her head, she gave her pillow a couple of punches with the hopes of getting comfortable enough to fall back to sleep, but was interrupted by a strange sound coming from behind her. Her eyes popped open and she raised her head quickly, looking over her shoulder in resignation. She did not know why it did not surprise her to see Gaara sitting down on the edge of the bed, wearing nothing but a very thin, purple sleeping gown. He was looking down at her, those blue eyes practically glowing in the dark.
Ino was too tired to even get mad. Instead, she rolled over in her blankets, propped her head on a hand and stared at him, waiting for his nonsensical reason as to why he was not asleep in his own bed in the Leaf representatives' quarters.
Gaara hitched his legs up onto the bed, hugging his knees to his chest, exposing his thighs.
Ino scowled, grabbed the edge of her blankets and threw it over Gaara's legs. "What do you think you're doing? It's freezing."