It took longer than Kakashi had expected for Sarada to start asking questions about her father, and longer still for her to get up the nerve to ask him specifically. Not that he couldn't understand why. Probably with any other man, it would have been awkward, if not outright insulting to hear it coming out of the child they raised's mouth.
"Kakashi," Sarada began, using his proper name instead of the nickname she had been calling him since she had learned to speak. Another warning about the heavy conversation that was on the way. "Why...why did mama and...and my birth father decide to break up?"
Okay, so maybe she wasn't asking it exactly how he expected. If anything it was a lot nicer than some of the scenarios that he had run by in his head. Though who knew. She might still bust out with "You aren't real my dad!" And he was still ready to take that like a man, and try not to get so frustrated that he unleashed A Thousand Years of Pain on her.
Putting that aside for now though...
He set his dog eared copy of Icha Icha Tactics aside, and pat his hand on the cusion of the couch, inviting her to sit next to him. "I suspect this is why you told me to get your mother a few flowers from Ino on my way home, hmm?"
She didn't take a seat, instead, just stood in front of him, answering his question with a slight nod. "She didn't really tell me anything. Just said he's a complicated person. Then well...I got mad and she got mad."
"And while you cool down quick enough in the face of reason, Mama needs to let her anger run its corse. And your father, Sasuke...well, you don't take after him either when it comes to anger either." At least not the Sasuke he knew from the age of twelve. It was hard to imagine this girl of his getting that arrogant. Believing that the world had to center around her.
"Did...did he leave mama because I didn't take after him enough? 'Cause my eyes are bad and stuff?"
Oh. Oh no. No! Time to nip that kind of thinking right in the bud.
Kakashi lifted his arms up and wrapped them around Sarada's shoulders, pulling her in for a tight hug. "No. Never. I can tell you right now, he would never have left you and your mother for that. The closest thing to joy I ever saw on his face was when he looked at you. I can promise you, that is not why things happened this way."
"Kashi-papa, you're squeezing too tight!" The girl choked, but still returned his embrace, patting his back.
He sighed, pulling back from her, more than a little relieved to hear that he was back to being 'Kashi-papa' again. "Maa, sorry. You know, your Auntie Ino has been looking into how many hugs a person needs a day, and I thought maybe it was time for a booster shot for you. So to speak."
He waited for her to mutter "Sure you did, papa." before he continued. "Getting back to your first question. Your mother is right. Your father, Sasuke Uchiha, is a very complicated man. The war...well...it left wounds on everybody. Some you can't even see..."
"Like what Auntie Ino and Sai work with, right?"
He smiled, a real one behind his mask that reached his eyes, ruffling his daughter's hair. "That's right." Kakashi relaxed back against the couch again, once again inviting Sarada to sit with him. This time she accepted, and the man once again found himself making comparisons between her and her mother. Only good, really!
"Mm, but...he went through a lot. Your mother was willing to help him, you know how she is. She was willing to wait, or willing to follow him." Into hell if need be, not that Kakashi was going to add that outloud. What he did say was, "Then, you were born...and your father...well he couldn't be a good father or husband. So...he set you and your mother free. He loved you both too much to put you in that situation."
He looked back at Sarada then, watching the look of thought on her face. She finally turned her face back to him. "He loved us so much he left us...sounds kinda stupid."
Kakashi could only nod to that. Yes, it was very, very stupid. So stupid that for the first year he had delegated any reports from Sasuke to Naruto and Shikamaru. But, he had promised himself and Sakura that he would try his best not bad mouth the younger man when speaking to or around Sarada. "Maa...like I said. Complicated."
There was silence again as the girl next him thought...and then sighed, leaning against him, head resting against his arm until he brought that up to wrap around her slim shoulders, his own head tilting down to kiss her hair through his mask.
They sat like that a while, and the man was just about to pick his book back up when his daughter, (No matter who her biological father was, she was his!) hit him with one more question.
"So...is Mama my real mother too?"
That made Kakashi snort. "Young lady, with that forehead, I don't think you could belong to anybody else."