Hi everyone! I decided to write a short one-shot after a very long hiatus. I've been getting into this pairing a lot these days... after the manga finished orz why D: Anyways, I'm thinking of extending this one-shot to a full story depending on the success (?) I guess. If it is made into a story, it's probs gonna be a 20 chap, time travel one (haha love those), so yeah. I hope you like this! Please comment, favourite, follow, if you do!

I'm the pilot of my dreams

watch me cruise the silver beams

In my dreaming I can fly

I've become a butterfly... -Butterflying

'Hmmm...how do I put this? My first impression of you is...I hate you'

As the silver-haired man lazily droned out these words, Naruto had chuckled to himself. Kakashi had looked at the blonde hair radiating like the glow of the sun quizzically and smiled to himself.

'In the Ninja World, those who break the rules are scum, that's true...but those who abandon their friends are worse than scum!'

The impassioned look on Kakashi's face had jerked a string in Naruto's heart. The cerulean eyes which used to look at this scarecrow-like man with interest now stared at him in adoration. Kakashi pretended he did not see.

'Naruto, it was really cool how you removed the poison and all, but if you lose any more blood, you're going to die. Good idea to stop the bleeding now...seriously.'

Kakashi had been frightened. Yet he placed his mask firmly and refused to show it. Naruto was too young to see Kakashi's emotions flickering under his mask. To the young Naruto, Kakashi's words were scorning, mocking, sarcastic... Like the rest of the villagers. When he held out his fast-healing hands, his eyes were blank.

'I'm telling you this because you don't get it, and you think you get it, which isn't the same as actually getting it. Get it?'

Naruto had looked at Kakashi blankly - not because he didn't understand, but because he realised that Kakashi was same as everyone else. And when he realised, his adoration for the man had stopped. And yet - and yet he could not stop the throbbing in his heart, and the tears that he forced down.

'Don't look away...When you live like a Shinobi, this is how it ends.'

Naruto knew the life of a Shinobi. Perhaps he knew it even better than Kakashi did, having been hated his whole life, having seen the grief and anguish his mere presence could bring to the people. And Naruto knew that Kakashi knew. So Naruto wondered if Kakashi hated him as well - to make him see the brutal scene and make him feel the guilt for the long-haired boy he had befriended.

'I've been around longer than you have kid. And I've had my share of troubles. You are not the only one who knows how it feels to lose somebody. So, it looks like neither of us have lived a charmed live exactly, have we?. Still. We're not all that bad off. At least you and I have been lucky to find new comrades to feel the void. Anyway, I do know how you feel.'

Kakashi always seemed to hang around Sasuke these days. Ruffling the black hair, looking into those jaded black eyes with understanding. Naruto had shuffled his torn blue sandals and looked down. He would have said to himself that they were just having a friendly teacher-to-student moment, if he had not seen Kakashi's gloved hands trailing down Sasuke's cheeks, and the way his sensei looked at the bastard.

So when Sasuke left the village, when Naruto saw the pain cross Kakashi's usually dulled eyes, he had shouted 'Believe it!'. When he decided he wanted to see Kakashi happy, Naruto knew he would easily forsake his own happiness and life. Because Naruto knew he could never become happy - as the monster he was. It was not just the Kyuubi. It was himself - for loving his teacher, for being jealous, for believing that he could become happy.

Up into the sky right into the sky

When I go butterflying

Up into the sky

I'm gliding up above you...

'I will bring Sasuke back for sure. This is a promise of a lifetime!'

Kakashi was internally glad he had thrust the overbearing weight of guilt on Naruto. He had wanted his Sasuke back, at all costs, although he refused to show it. At one moment, he was willing to let Naruto die in exchange for Sasuke. But when he saw Naruto at the point of death, with only the monster inside him to hold onto, Kakashi realised what he had done. Kakashi realised how his decision to overlook the boy's feeling as well as his own with the excuse that Naruto is sensei's son broke the boy.

And Kakashi regretted not apologising when Naruto left.

And when Naruto returned, his blonde hair rustling in the breeze, the sun producing a halo around his hair, with his arms and legs toned from the intense training, with his blinding smile, with the toad sage next to him, and the way Naruto looked at Jiraiya... Kakashi could not bring himself to ask for forgiveness. When Naruto had found happiness despite all the grief Kakashi had thrown onto him.

And when Naruto had given him the new Icha Icha, he was even less inclined. He gritted his teeth, put on his mask and rambled on excitedly about the book, ignoring the small smile Naruto gave him - a smile that said 'I forgive you'.

Can you see the brand new day

Chasing dreams away?

Don't you see the morning sky

Waiting to appear?

'I think I'm starting to like you'

Naruto had recoiled both internally and physically, when he heard these words in the midst of training. Does this person not have an idea of what appropriate place and timing for this shit is? Kakashi had been wounded by Naruto's reaction. He wondered why Naruto was so aggressively reacting to it. He knew that Naruto was gay, or perhaps bisexual. He heard from floating rumours around Konoha that Naruto was getting love confessions everywhere, even from random Grass-nins. Kakashi decided that perhaps Naruto simply did not like him, and saw him as a sensei, rather than a man. A really bad sensei, Kakashi mentally noted.

'Jiraiya-boy is dead'

First Kakashi was astounded by the sheer hatred Naruto showed. The pain of losing a loved-one was understandable, but to think Naruto, the bubbly ball of sunshine and happiness, was capable of such aggressive hatred...

Then Kakashi was worried when he heard from Iruka that Naruto had been going around the village, head down, refusing to talk to anyone.

Then Kakashi was jealous when he saw Naruto crying for Jiraiya. It made no sense to be jealous over a dead person, but Kakashi felt his head throb as he restrained himself from jumping on the blonde, from kissing away his salty tears - kissing away Naruto's memories and feelings for Jiraiya. Yet Kakashi restrained. His features paling at the thought and at the simultaneous realisation that he simply did not have the right to love the blonde.

But when he heard that Naruto was drowning his grief in having multiple one night stands, almost daily, Kakashi had frowned. By the time Kakashi had heard, Naruto had gotten with almost everyone in Konoha, including Kiba, Shikamaru, Neji, Hinata, Ino and Gaara at some point at this one time he had visited. Yet, regardless of how long Kakashi waited for Naruto to approach him, he never did. Kakashi now knew it was not a teacher-thing, since he had gotten with Guy (who had babbled on about it to Kakashi, talking about Naruto's 'flaming youthfulness') and Kurenai and even Ebisu. And Naruto hated Ebisu.

Yet, still, Kakashi waited.

But Naruto never came to him.

Then Naruto's fight with Pain.

Then the Fourth Shinobi War.

No matter how long Kakashi waited, Naruto never looked at him as anything besides a teacher and a comrade.

Then Kakashi became Hokage, and Naruto married Hinata, had children, seemed happy.

And Kakashi never forgave himself, when he stepped down from Hokage, the fact that he never told Naruto. Still, Naruto seemed happy, and there was nothing he could do about it anymore.

So, blindly assuming that Naruto was happy, Kakashi had remained a teacher and friend.

And blindly thinking that he could never be loved by the person he loved, Naruto became Hokage, and remained a student and friend.

Never knowing how close they were to each other.

Never to know that they loved each other all along.

Can you see the brand new day

Chasing dreams away?

Don't you see the morning sky

Waiting to appear?

END