Chapter Text
Gaara did not take the decision to step down from his duties as Kazekage lightly.
He thought long and hard about his decision, considering all possible angles. Especially the effect it would have on others around him; including the whole of Suna.
However, after the end of the Fourth Shinobi World War, and after the disaster that his attempted arranged marriage had been – Gaara felt ready to retire.
Still, he would never have considered actually taking this step if Kankurō had not expressed an interest in taking over the Kazekage seat.
When Gaara had initially pitched the idea to his older brother, he had expected a swift rejection.
Kankurō’s actual reply gave Gaara pause.
“You know, if you would have asked me a few years ago, I would have said ‘no way! being the leader of a whole village is way too troublesome!’” His brother replied earnestly, scratching the back of his head. He appeared intensely uncomfortable, yet determined as he continued:
“But now… After watching you for years and having helped you a fair few times along the way…” Kankurō’s lips twitched into a smile. “What the hell! I already know what the position entails. And I trust that I’ll still be able to call upon your counsel if need be…?”
“Are you… saying ‘yes’?” Gaara asked back, feeling bewildered by this turn of events.
Kankurō shrugged.
“I’m saying ‘maybe’. And you’d better explain why you are even contemplating stepping down from the position in the first place! Because if this is some sort of misguided crisis of confidence, or if you think that you’re not doing a good enough job as Kazekage, or some other bullshit like that, then I'm shutting this down- straight out!” Kankurō concluded, giving his brother a hard glare.
Despite himself, Gaara smiled in amusement at Kankurō’s passionate words.
Trust his siblings to always worry about him.
He shook his head.
“No, it’s not about that… not this time.”
“Then why?” Kankurō asked, narrowing his eyes. “You used to be so enthusiastic about being the Kazekage of Suna. I used to think that you’d never retire! And that would have suited me just fine, by the way! Don’t misunderstand me!” He added, holding up his hands in a placating gesture.
The atmosphere around them became heavier and there was a moment’s silence before Gaara replied.
“… I used to think so as well.”
When he did not elaborate further, Kankurō gave him an unimpressed glare, clearly signalling that he would not be appeased without a proper explanation.
… Which was a shame, because Gaara struggled to put his own motivations into words – even to himself.
But apparently, he would need to try and explain himself to his sibling, nonetheless.
He sighed (in that little, almost imperceptible way that he had perfected a long-long time ago) and tried to gather his thoughts.
“Ever since I’ve met Naruto and he changed my life, protecting the people I care about had become my mission.” He said, weaving his thoughts together as he went. “Becoming Kazekage was the easiest way to achieve that. And I do not regret having done so – it helped me mature and it made me realise how selfish I had been until then. Having reigned as the Kazekage for almost thirteen years now, I’ve learnt how tricky it is to balance various interests; and to try and consider the greater good without sacrificing anything – or anyone – in its name…”
Kankurō gave him a search look. “You are considering retiring as Kazekage because… you are - tired?”
Gaara scoffed. He felt grateful for his brother’s bluntness; it was always refreshing.
“Yes, I am probably burnt out, but that is not the reason why I am considering renouncing the Kazekage title. If I was just ‘tired’, as you say, I would ask Baki or you to take over my duties for a few days – as I’ve done before – and I would return to the office as soon as possible, once I've had some rest.”
Kankurō nodded in understanding. “So what's different this time?”
What is different… indeed - Gaara thought to himself.
Outwardly, he clung to his usual stoic, self-assured façade, trying his best to gather his muddy thoughts.
“This time…” He began, biting his lips. “I’ve realised that I don’t have to stay the Kazekage forever if I don’t want to.”
Kankurō’s gaze turned heavy with concern.
“Oh, Gaara…! Shit!” He cursed, turning towards him so that he could look at his younger brother in earnest. “Did you think that me and Temari expected you to --?”
Gaara interjected before his brother could continue.
“I never thought that you or Temari had any expectations of the sort. And yet… ” He added pensively. “I expected myself to be strong enough to carry this burden – indefinitely, if need be. Maybe becoming Kazekage was my way of trying to repent as well; I wished to make amends for all the anguish I had caused during my younger years.” Gaara saw that Kankurō wanted to object but he carried on, pretending not to notice. He didn’t need meaningless reassurances, even if they were sincerely uttered.
“But mostly, I think that I chose to become a Kage because that’s what Naruto wanted; becoming Hokage was Naruto’s dream. And I wanted to understand him better… so I thought – why not trying doing the same?”
“And it worked,” He added. “Becoming Kazekage had taught me that caring for others is not a weakness, as I used to think it was; and it made me realise how important it was to belong somewhere; the sense of joy and contentedness it can bring…”
Gaara felt his throat constrict as he voiced these revelations. It felt quite vulnerable; sharing his innermost thoughts with his brother the way he was doing it right now.
But he did not want to hide his true self anymore.
Even if Kankurō might think less of him because of it… Gaara knew that he had to come clean. There was no other way to convince Kankurō of the genuineness of his intentions; he knew that all too well…
“I can see why becoming a Kage was Naruto’s dream,” He continued – choosing to take a simple but direct approach. “But I’ve realised that it’s not… my dream.”
To his surprise, Kankurō guffawed.
Gaara watched on, feeling dumbfounded by the reaction, but with increasing amusement, as it became clear to him that Kankurō’s laugh wasn’t meant to be mocking or scornful.
“No kidding?!” His brother asked cheekily, once he was able to reign in his chuckles. “It took you this long to realise that being the centre of attention and having to be a social butterfly wasn’t your shtick?!”
Gaara tilted his head, contemplating Kankurō’s words.
“I guess so,” He agreed mildly, feeling relieved by Kankurō’s easy acceptance. His brows knitted in thought as he added. “But I also know that it’s not exactly ‘your shtick’ either.”
Kankurō chuckled, shrugging.
“No… I guess not. But honestly? At this point, I wouldn’t mind giving it a go. I think I’m ready for it now,” He added, giving Gaara a serious look. “And I’m grateful that you’ve spared me from having to take on the Hat way earlier than I could have handled it. I think… that would have been a disaster. But now…” Kankurō added, tilting his head pensively before giving him a sincere smile. “I think I’m ready.”
Gaara nodded. He had no doubts about Kankurō’s sincerity; Kankurō wasn’t one for handing out empty reassurances, after all.
His brother cleared his throat before speaking up again:
“So… say that we go through with this, and I take over as Kazekage. What are your plans after that?” Kankurō asked, sounding honestly intrigued.
Gaara felt himself flushing in embarrassment.
Ah…
This was the hard part.
“Hmm. I am actually considering,” He replied slowly. “Moving… to Konoha.”
Kankurō’s brows lifted but contrary to Gaara’s expectations he did not seem overly surprised.
“Ahh! You’d like to be closer to Naruto and Temari, eh?” He said, giving Gaara a smirk and a wink.” Tcch! Can’t say that I blame you… I miss Temari quite fiercely as well.” His older brother added wistfully.
Gaara nodded, feeling relieved now that the truth was out.
“Yes.” He agreed easily. “And I would like to see Lee again as well; we have lost touch in the past couple of years.” He decided to leave that topic at that; there was no need for Kankurō to hear about how much this simple fact was plaguing him. Instead, Gaara changed the topic:
“And, additionally, I believe that Konoha would be the perfect place for me to practise growing cacti and other exotic plants on a larger scale. The weather there is warm and humid; which is ideal for most plants - even desert-favouring ones. Eventually, I would hope that I could open my own garden centre, and hopefully, it could earn enough to cover my own living expenses…” Gaara wasn’t sure if that would be feasible but it couldn’t hurt to try, he supposed. He had accumulated enough savings over the past ten years to keep himself afloat for a good few months, until the business became profitable – if it would do so, eventually. “And if that doesn’t work, I could always move back here and take up active duty again…”
When he looked up in the wake of his long monologue, he was startled to see that Kankurō was eyeing him with a smug expression on his face.
“What?” Gaara asked, feeling flustered by his sibling’s knowing look.
Kankurō shook his head, smirk still firmly in place.
“Nothing! It just sounds like you’ve really thought this through, little brother. You’ve got a Plan A, Plan B, Plan C… all the way up to Plan Z, I’d guess!” He added, chortling. “Well, I guess that there is no chance that I could dissuade you from moving to Konoha then.” Kankurō said, and something wistful crossed his expression as he said that. Doubtlessly, he felt saddened by the prospect that Gaara would soon move away from Suna as well, and he would the only one out of the three Sand siblings who would remain in their home-country. Before Gaara could think of anything to say to reassure him, Kankurō continued:
“And yes, you know the drill – you’ll have to hang up the kunai; the Council would never permit a Sand shinobi to work for the Leaf, under any circumstances.” Kankurō stated apologetically, but firmly. “Especially not one as powerful as you. I might be able to convince them to offer you some remote missions in time… But don’t count on it!” Kankurō added, earnestly.
“More likely than not, the Council will be royally pissed at you for choosing to move to Konoha and for taking an early retirement in the first place! So they might not be in a charitable mood… for a long-long while. I’ll do my best to persuade them, of course, but –”
Gaara interrupted his brother gently, giving him a small smile.
“Kankurō – that’s… thank you.” He said empathically. “But – truly –… I do not expect to receive any missions; I will be okay if I cannot work as a shinobi again, as long as I live in Konoha. I hardly took part in any missions in the last five or seven years as Kazekage, anyway…”
“Ah, I guess you’ve got a point there!” Kankurō acknowledged, grinning widely. “Well, I wouldn’t mind taking a break from active duty, so that sounds peachy to me, actually! Sooooo… when will you announce it to the Council?”
Again, Gaara felt surprised - but also, very-very pleased - at Kankurō’s apparent enthusiasm for his plan.
They continued their discussions deep into the night in Gaara’s personal quarters.
---
They announced that Gaara was stepping down as Kazekage three days later, and Gaara nominated Kankurō as his successor – which was immediately approved by the Council.
Although some of the Elders were clearly irked by Gaara’s decision to abdicate the Kazekage’s position, apparently, they were all in agreement that choosing another member from the ruling family’s bloodline was an acceptable alternative.
Witnessing this had helped put some of Gaara’s lingering doubts at ease; the Council’s easy acceptance of Kankurō as his successor gave him hope that they would warm up to Kankurō in time - just like they had done with him. They always seemed weary of new Rulers at first - but Kankurō was Rasa’s son as well, and arguably, he was even better suited for the position than Gaara, since Kankurō was the eldest out of the three of them.
And despite his occasional laziness, Kankurō was a masterful strategist and he cared about the wellbeing of Suna’s citizens above all.
Gaara knew that he would be a great Kazekage.
---
Less than three months later, Gaara was on his way to Konoha with a sizeable backpack fastened on top of his gourd.
He chose not to bring too many personal belongings; just a few changes of clothes, some framed pictures of him, Temari and Kankurō, and as many seeds and seedlings as he could possibly fit into his pack.
The cacti and plants that were simply too large to move had been left in Baki’s and Kankurō’s capable hands. Gaara left them with strict instructions to give the plants away to whoever wanted them. But Kankurō came up with a surprisingly elegant solution; he decided to use Gaara’s collection of succulents and cacti to adorn the Administration Building (which contained the Kazekage’s office and the Council’s meeting chambers, amongst other offices), and the Kazekage Residence respectively.
Kankurō had argued that since most of these plants were native, housing them within the Administration Building would be a nice way to showcase the abundance and exceptional beauty of Suna’s native flora to the foreign trade-partners and diplomats who would be dropping by these buildings occasionally.
Despite Kankurō’s reasonable explanation, Gaara was still half-convinced that Kankurō had kept all of his plants because he did not want Gaara to miss any of them in case he decided to return for them at a later date.
But truthfully – his plants were the least of his worries currently.
He was anxious to get to Konoha so that he could begin the process of settling in; figuring out his new life for himself.
And frankly, he could not wait to see the expression on Naruto’s face when he would turn up at his office out of the blue, in a few days’ time!
He hadn’t informed Naruto about his plans of relocating to Konoha, because he wanted it to be a surprise.
Since Naruto had become Hokage a few years ago, his friend had become extremely busy, so they haven’t had much time to see each other outside of Five Kage Summits and trade agreement negotiations… But Gaara hoped that would all change now, hopefully.
When Gaara considered that soon, he would be able to see Lee again as well (after nearly three years of absence), his feelings became much more mixed.
He sincerely hoped that Lee would be happy to see him; that his old friend would welcome his choice to move to Konoha.
But admittedly, Gaara wasn’t sure if what he and Lee had even counted as a ‘friendship’ anymore.
Gaara still cared about Lee dearly and thought about him often. He had sent him several letters in the past few years as well – but Lee returned very few of them, and even when he did, his replies were usually quite short and to the point: simple messages assuring Gaara of Lee’s continued health and prosperity; sadly devoid of the personal touches which Lee used to include in his earlier letters in prior years. Such as: sharing his hopes and concerns with Gaara, or sharing recent dreams he had had, descriptions of foods he had eaten…
Lee never used to be succinct before. Gaara found Lee’s change of style so unnerving that he eventually gave up on messaging his friend altogether. It was simply too painful to receive these new, woefully short letters…
So they haven’t exchanged any letters… for almost a year now.
As the Kazekage, Gaara could have taken advantage of Suna’s Intelligence Division and he could have requested regular updates about Lee’s whereabouts, or about his daily activities (anything he wished to know about, really); but that would have felt like a violation of privacy; so he had refrained from doing so.
Although it wasn’t easy – he came close to succumbing to the temptation a few times…
Especially on lonely nights when he was working overtime in his office and the whole building was empty, and he found himself wondering what Lee might be up to… Whether he was doing okay or not…
But deep down, he knew that his concerns were irrational; if anything would have happened to Lee, Naruto would have informed Gaara about it immediately.
Gaara had no doubts about that.
So this lead him to the only reasonable, rational conclusion: that Lee was okay. And he simply wasn’t messaging Gaara because he did not care to do so anymore.
The realisation hurt, and it stung… but he accepted it for the uncomfortable truth that it was.
(That was the only reasonable course of action he could take, anyway.)
But he continued to care about Lee nonetheless.
He could have asked Naruto about how their mutual friend was doing, but again – that would have felt like a violation of Lee’s privacy… And it might have caused Naruto believe that there was a rift between them; which wasn’t true, strictly speaking.
He and Lee had simply stopped talking to each other.
As a result, Gaara had no idea about Lee’s current living situation: whether he was still living with Tenten, or if he had gotten a place of his own…
Or if he may have found a partner and moved in with them, perhaps… - he thought, feeling his mouth curling down in distaste and thinly veiled jealousy at the thought.
And therein laid the problem: Lee’s living arrangements should not have mattered to Gaara.
Once he arrived to Konoha, he would need to arrange his own accommodation for himself anyway; he would not have wanted to inconvenience Lee (or Naruto; or Temari, for that matter) by asking their help in this regard…
But annoyingly, no matter how much Gaara tried to ignore it, a part of his mind kept telling him that Lee’s living situation (and his relationship status) mattered.
More than anything else.
Because while the thought of Naruto living with Hinata elicited no emotion in him whatsoever, the thought of Lee living similarly: with a partner of his own, caused Gaara’s stomach to twist and churn unpleasantly.
Although he hated to admit it (even to himself), the thought that Lee may have settled down with someone was... painful.
However, it would not have been unexpected, by any means: it would have explained why Lee had stopped writing to him.
Because indeed, why would he have needed to write to Gaara about how he was doing, if he had a partner; someone whom Lee could talk to every day?
That was much better than having a distant pen-pal, Gaara supposed.
Unfortunately, Gaara had never confessed his crush to Lee, so the other shinobi could not have known that Gaara was even remotely interested in him.
And truthfully, he would have never dared to hint at his attraction, because he wasn’t even sure if Lee liked men or women, or all genders perhaps…?
The few times he had discussed this with Temari, his sister had advised him to ‘just tell him!’ and she seemed reasonably sure that Lee would either return his feelings, or he would let him down 'gently' (whatever that meant).
But the risk of rejection had been simply too great for Gaara to bear. It would have crushed him if Lee would have turned him down.
So naturally, he never told Lee about how he felt about him. Which wasn’t hard to do anyway; they barely saw each other for more than a few minutes over the last five or so years…
But Gaara wanted to change that now.
Because he liked Lee.
Even if he and Lee could only ever be friends - he could make peace with that. At this point in his life, Gaara wasn’t expecting any miracles; he was simply excited to be near to his old, dear friends again – and to get to see his sister and his nephew, Shikadai, on a regular basis.
He knew that he could count on Naruto to be his friend, at least. And even though their letter-exchanges had broken down, deep down Gaara was convinced that Lee hadn’t changed. Although his last few letters were short (and oddly succinct) – they weren’t rude or off-handed in any way.
Maybe Lee was just extremely busy. – Gaara told himself. – Or there was something he couldn’t tell me about in his letters…
Well, I guess I’ll find out soon enough – he thought to himself as he marched on towards Konoha.