Chapter 13
Day Two – Early Evening
"I should put Iruka-sensei in charge of getting you to your appointments from now on," Tsunade said with obvious approval in her voice. "You were only two minutes late."
"I'm so sorry, Tsunade-sama," Iruka said, and Kakashi could hear him bow. "I take responsibility for our lateness. We were sharing stories about Naruto, and I lost track of time."
Tsunade laughed. "I wasn't expecting Kakashi to be here until well past five," she told him.
"See?" Kakashi said to Iruka a little mulishly. He was still trying to will away his arousal from Iruka's promise– er, threat.
"You can stand to be on time for your medical appointments," Iruka retorted, completely unimpressed. "Didn't we agree?"
"Yes, sensei," Kakashi said quickly.
Tsunade choked on a laugh. "Never thought I'd see the day. I should have sent Kakashi home with you months ago!"
Iruka sputtered.
This only made Tsunade roar with laughter.
"What am I missing?" Kakashi asked, thoroughly confused.
"Nothing," Iruka muttered.
"I have never seen Iruka-sensei so red in my life!" Tsunade crowed. A door slid open. "Oi! Shizune! Come see this!"
"No," Iruka yelped in mortification, his voice muffled. "See you all later!"
"Just one second," Tsunade said, and it sounded like a flak jacket had been grabbed. "I need you to sign off on the fact that you took care of Kakashi and you've brought him back. You can't leave." She cackled.
"Oh, my god," Iruka moaned.
"What's going– Iruka-sensei?"
"Everything's fine!" Iruka said sharply, his voice still muffled.
"You need to take your hands away from your face to sign this paperwork," Tsunade said gleefully.
"No. I live in the hospital now."
"You definitely don't," Shizune said, barely failing to hide her own amusement. "I haven't done the intake paperwork."
"In the ceiling, then!" Iruka countered, still muffled.
"No can do, Iruka-sensei. I can't even begin to get that paperwork put through," Shizune said smugly.
"Just qualify me as a long-term exterminator," Iruka retorted into his hands. Kakashi snorted.
"That's... actually not a terrible idea," Shizune said, clearly impressed. "Still. No."
"Come on, brat. I'm going to leave these two paperwork geniuses to work out what needs to be worked out. You and I have things to do," Tsunade told Kakashi. "Up."
She took Kakashi's hand without preamble, sending his survival instinct into overdrive. It took everything he had not to yank his hand back.
"A little warning, please," Kakashi said lazily.
"An elite jōnin like you shouldn't need my verbal warning," she pointed out primly. "Sounds like Iruka-sensei's been spoiling you."
Kakashi tossed a few replies around in his head. Since most of them would result in his embarrassment, Iruka's embarrassment, or both of their embarrassment, he said nothing. Instead, he just climbed up onto the hospital bed and settled back onto the pillows. On the other side of the room, Iruka and Shizune began quietly going over paperwork.
"What happened to your foot?" Tsunade asked curiously. It sent a small throb up his leg in response to her words.
"I've been blind for two days. What do you think happened?" he replied flatly.
"Did you kick my couch?" Iruka asked incredulously.
"No," Kakashi said sullenly. "Maybe. Yes."
Iruka muffled a snicker. "I wondered what you'd done. I was in the kitchen this morning, preparing breakfast," he explained to the ladies. "Heard a loud noise, but...." Fabric shifted in the now-familiar shape of a shrug.
Tsunade tsked, somehow managing to make even the tsk sound amused. Nevertheless, she sent chakra seeping into his foot, soothing away the pain there.
"Better pull down your hitai-ate, brat," Tsunade advised.
He'd almost forgotten it was straight across his forehead again. He pulled it down over his Sharingan and closed his eyes.
His chakra roared back to life through his body like liquid lightning. And god, it was such a relief and a pleasure to feel it humming contentedly beneath his skin again.
When he opened his single native eye again, the world came back in bursts of color, far more vibrant than he remembered them ever having been. Had Tsunade's hair really been that blonde?
And then his glance caught on Iruka and stuck. Had Iruka always been that gorgeous caramel, like burnished gold glowing softly in lamplight? Had his eyes always been that luscious, rich brown, like dark chocolate with just a hint of cream? Had his hair always caught the red of the sunset so vibrantly?
Tsunade cleared her throat. "Alright, brat. You need to sign some things, which means you need to stop staring at Iruka-sensei."
Kakashi immediately flushed hot red and looked away. "I wasn't staring."
"Uh-huh," Tsunade said, clearly disbelieving him. "Shizune? Could you please get him to fill out the paperwork before he tries to escape out a window? I don't need any more incomplete paperwork from jōnin this week," she added in a low mutter to herself.
"I don't think he would," Iruka said mildly. "For one thing, he still needs to collect some of his belongings from my apartment, and I'm now holding them hostage until the paperwork is complete."
Kakashi gave Iruka a pained look.
"I know you're perfectly capable of filling out paperwork like a textbook example," Iruka reminded Kakashi. "And I am not going to chase you down later to finish the paperwork."
"I would never try to leave the hospital without completing my paperwork," Kakashi protested.
Iruka raised one eyebrow. "No?"
Kakashi quailed. "No," he said meekly.
"Alright, then." Iruka smiled brilliantly. "Shizune-san?"
Shizune gave a small start. "Oh! Right."
She really wasn't at fault for her surprise, though Kakashi had the brief, uncharitable thought that as a jōnin herself, she really should be better trained. But Iruka's complete one-eighties in his moods were capable of startling some of the best jōnin Konoha had to offer... Kakashi included.
Kakashi just smiled over his mask, pulled out his personal signature stamp, and began the process of signing out of the hospital.