Obsession

1. Revelation

Sakura had never seen her old sensei look so vulnerable before. Sure, she had seen him exhaust himself in battle more than once, but even then he had always remained somehow calm and in control of the situation even if he could hardly move. This was the first time she had seen him as a 'patient', rather than as an 'injured team leader', and the difference was startling.

She was on duty in the hospital's emergency unit when he was brought in, and it had taken a few minutes for her to register the fact that the man on the trolley was Kakashi-sensei.

He had looked smaller without his usual bulky vest and baggy shirt, and he looked much younger than Sakura had presumed he was. The most disturbing thing for Sakura was that he looked just like many other patients she treated every day; just another seriously injured young shinobi fighting for his life.

Sakura realised with some surprise that he was firstly, a man, and secondly, he was pretty young. She had never really viewed Kakashi as a man before, and she hadn't truly considered his age either. He had always just been simply 'Kakashi-sensei', a strange, ageless, timeless, seemingly indestructible ninja who always brought his team back home safely.

Coming out of her momentary reverie, Sakura tried to force herself to spring back into professional mode, but it wasn't easy.

One of the nurses was pulling off Kakashi-sensei's hitae-ate to make him more comfortable, and after laying it on a small trolley beside her she pushed his floppy silver hair back off his forehead, checking for any hidden head wounds.

Sakura stared.

She touched her own brow absently as she looked at Kakashi-sensei's broad, wide forehead, usually kept covered by either his headband or his hair. It was so similar to her own brow, which she had been teased mercilessly about as a little girl.

She wondered if he had always hidden it to avoid being poked fun at, as she had done before Ino had taken her under her wing and persuaded her to show it off.

It made her wonder why he hid herself from the world. She looked down at him again. Why did Kakashi-sensei hide this slender, muscular body beneath layers of loose clothing? And why on earth did he hide his face?

She began to wonder for the first time if there was more to these masks than she had always assumed. Perhaps he didn't just do it to annoy everyone after all, but rather because he had some fundamental insecurities about his appearance. He had obviously never had a friend like Ino-pig.

Sakura finished treating a major stab wound to Kakashi-sensei's stomach, and once she was satisfied that all his critical injuries had been treated and his other injuries were being suitably dealt with, she made her way to the head of the operating table and pushed her sensei's hair back from his forehead as the nurse had done.

She took in his face. Black mask that she didn't dare to touch, closed eyes, left one struck through with an old scar. Just like so much else about her sensei, Sakura had never examined that scar closely before, but she'd always assumed it had been caused by a downward stroke. Now, close-up, she could clearly see that the slash that had caused that scar had been an upward stroke. It ran from below the line of the mask to cut through Kakashi's silver brow line, and it had evidently been far more vicious than Sakura could have imagined. She traced a finger over that eyebrow, shuddering slightly as she felt an indentation where the blow had actually chipped through the brow bone, and followed the scar down over his eye. The lid fluttered delicately under her touch, and she could vividly imagine the eye being sliced through, knowing the feel of an eyeball under a blade from her medical training with cadavers. Her left eye squeezed itself shut on instinct, and she felt a sudden rush of sympathy towards her sensei.

Strangely enough, Sakura had not thought about the injury that had caused Kakashi to lose his own eye, and how painful it must have been. He was just 'Kakashi-sensei' and he had come with a scar over his left eye. To her shame she hadn't considered how the actual injury might have occurred, nor how he had acquired the Sharingan which lay beneath that tissue-paper thin eyelid. She now found herself wondering how old he had been when it happened, and could picture him stoically taking the blow and carrying on the fight.

Then there was that forehead. Perhaps Kakashi didn't care about it and had never been ridiculed for it, but somehow Sakura felt that he did care. There must be reason he kept so much of himself hidden, both physically and emotionally.

That wide, high forehead, so similar to her own, was what Sakura kept coming back to. It was representative of so much more. She had been so blind. How had she missed, through all the years she had know Kakashi-sensei; beneath the masks and his legendary status, he was just as human and just as fragile as she was.

Note:

And so begins a little tale involving the lovely Sakura and her ex-sensei Kakashi.

I must warn you, most dear and appreciated readers, that this will be a well-behaved story, and there will not be any of 'that sort if thing' going on around here; no hanky-panky going on behind the bike sheds, so to speak. Not on your nellie.

I only bring this up now so as not to disappoint anyone who might be looking to read a story containing 'that sort of thing'.

Thank you so much for reading this, and I hope you enjoyed this, short as it is.

I would love it so much if anyone fancies sticking around for Chapter 2, titled Awakening, in which Kakashi will wake up.

Ta muchly, and I hope to see you soon for tea (there will be scones...!).

Toodle-pip chaps and chapesses,

The You of Yesterday