Chapter 14
Day Two – Evening
They went to Ichiraku for dinner.
Kakashi held his chopsticks with an almost perverse pride and pleasure, remembering how pathetic it had felt to use a fork and spoon to eat ramen only two nights before.
And he positively reveled in his ability to consume the entire bowl in 3.27 seconds flat.
And yet, dinner wore bittersweetly on. Because sooner or later, Kakashi knew, he would have to show Iruka his face. The sooner he got it over with, the sooner he would be able to begin coping with the loss of whatever tantalizing, impossible future they'd pretended to share in Iruka's apartment.
He wanted to get it over with before his feelings for Iruka grew any stronger. If he didn't, he risked staying in some situation that would end up being unhealthy for both of them.
He wasn't even sure what reaction he wanted from Iruka.
"You're going to give yourself indigestion that way," Iruka said, rolling his eyes even as he stuffed his face with noodles.
"Ahh, you're adorable, Iruka-sensei," Kakashi said cheerfully. "I've been eating like this since I was four years old. What makes you think I'm going to slow down now?"
Iruka glowered. The effect was ruined by the ramen that hadn't quite made it into his adorable chipmunk cheeks.
He slurped up the offending noodles and attempted to glower again, but Kakashi's chuckle was well and firmly in place by this point.
Kakashi paid, claiming to Iruka (strictly for Teuchi-san's benefit) that it was "for the thing you helped me with before."
"Would you like to go on a walk this evening, Iruka-sensei?" Kakashi asked with a smile.
"I'd like nothing better," Iruka said with a smile of his own, and Kakashi was dazzled.
Kakashi's smile cracked. It was just a hairline fracture, impossible to see from the outside, but he knew, because he could see the light from the setting sun streaming through the cracks into his solitary soul.
They walked on the path that ran alongside the river. The air was brisk and lively in the way that January air can be.
Children played "missing nin" on a playground, one child counting while the rest scattered to either find hiding spots or defensible positions where they held "senbon" (twigs) and "shuriken" (light plastic shuriken or origami shuriken, depending on the child) to do battle. A child, mittened hand in his mother's, coughed unhappily, his nose bright red, a plastic bag from the pharmacy in his mother's other hand. A young, pretty couple walked in the hibernating grass down at the water's edge, their fingers entwined between them. A man, eyes brimming with tears, sat on a bench, alone, a rattling letter clutched in his hand as he fought back some unnamed sorrow. An old man and woman, surely someone's beloved grandparents, shuffled slowly together along the path, smiles creased into their wrinkles by years of laughter and love. Life happened in little snippets all around them while Kakashi and Iruka walked, silently, side by side.
"Oh." The word came breathed in a puff of white fog from Iruka's lips, full of quiet wonder. "It's beginning to snow."
Kakashi looked at the grey sky streaked with purples and pinks and oranges. And indeed, spiraling down from the painted sky came a few white flakes, fragile and beautiful.
"I think there's a park near here with a fire pit," Kakashi said, his voice low. "Shall we go make a fire and watch the snow for a little while?"
Iruka wore an enormous smile. "Oh, let's!"
They ambled slowly off the main path until they came to a dirt trail. They followed the trail to the clearing where, indeed, someone had dug out a fire pit and lined it with stones.
Kakashi brushed stray leaves into the pit to act as kindling while Iruka collected some larger branches to use as fuel. Together, they broke up the branches to the right size to fit and carefully arranged them in the pit.
"Katon," Kakashi intoned, pleased at the sensation of the flames rippling from beneath his skin, over his fingertips, and into the fire pit.
"You must have missed having your chakra available to you, didn't you?" Iruka asked with a faint smile dancing on his lips. He brushed off one of the logs surrounding the fire and sat down.
Kakashi came and sat on Iruka's left. "Very much. But you made me feel very safe," he added softly, gazing at the flames grasping upwards at the branches. "Thank you."
"I'm glad I could help," Iruka said just as softly. "No matter what happens, I... I'd like to remain your friend. You know? I want you to know that you can ask me for things if you need them. That you can be safe with me. And if that ever doesn't feel true, please tell me. I'd want to fix it."
Kakashi hesitated for a moment. Then, carefully, contemplatively, he pulled down his mask.
Iruka didn't look over.
"After I became a chūnin, I was advised by Minato-sensei to continue keeping my face hidden," Kakashi said slowly. "I think he wanted to give me some semblance of a normal childhood. He said that, if I wanted to, I could wear the mask as a shinobi, and take it off when I wanted to live like a civilian, and then people wouldn't be able to recognize me. Except, I never ended up taking it off. After– after Obito and Rin died, I really stopped taking it off altogether."
Iruka remained silent, watching the flickering fire, but Kakashi could tell he was listening intently.
"You make me feel like I don't have to be a shinobi all the time," Kakashi said softly. "Like I can just be... human."
Slowly, enough so that Kakashi could pull the mask back up, Iruka turned his head and let his gaze flicker from the fire to Kakashi's bared face.
His expression softened and went cloudy.
Again, slowly, Iruka reached up and cupped Kakashi's face in a warm, gentle palm.
"What is it?" Kakashi asked, perplexed by Iruka's reaction. Of all the reactions he had ever experienced to his revealing his face, this soft, clouded remorse was not one of them.
"There's so much sorrow," Iruka said softly, letting his fingers drift across the scar, tracing the edges of Kakashi's mouth. "There's so much sorrow in your face. But I can see happiness, too, you know."
He ran one thumb gently over Kakashi's lower lip. "Your mouth wasn't made for sorrow. There's too much kindness in it."
"I always loved my father's smile," Kakashi whispered, his eyes burning with unshed tears.
"I'm sure he would be incredibly proud of you," Iruka said gently. "Any father would be proud to have a son like you."
Kakashi's lips twitched into an unhappy smile. "Chronically late, speaking coldly to those around me, distant from everyone, and a solitary genius? Who got my teammates killed?" An unhappy laugh tore his throat.
Iruka smiled sadly. "Sincere. Honest. Brave. And you're not alone, and you're not distant. Look. I'm right here. Naruto and Sakura and Gai-sensei and many other people care deeply about you. And you aren't responsible for what happened to either of your teammates. The enemy nin who captured Rin killed Obito. And it sounds like Rin chose to die rather than endanger Konoha. No, Kakashi, you're a good son and a good man. I'm honored to know you, and I'm grateful to have you in my life, whatever form that may take."
What could Kakashi say to that? It wasn't his right to tell Iruka how to feel, after all. All he could do was accept that Iruka felt however he felt.
"Thank you," he whispered, realizing for the first time that this was what he had needed someone to see in his face.
Blinded by the tears burning in his eyes, he twisted and reached for Iruka, pressing a long, sweet kiss to the lips that had named his sorrows and his cherished loved ones, his values and his secret fears.
Iruka let him. He remained simply open beneath Kakashi's own mouth. There was no pressure, no demand, and no resistance. He just was.
"I feel..." Kakashi hesitated.
Iruka waited, patient and unhurried, for the words to come to Kakashi.
"I feel like you love me," Kakashi finally whispered, feeling pathetic even as he whispered the words.
He felt Iruka smile beneath his lips. "That's because I do."