Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto. :D

Summary: Kakashi is going over the edge, Gai worries, but Kakashi thinks otherwise.

Notes: Done for the wonderful wonderful GaiKaka comm on lj, first post, finally got up the courage to write something. Am worried about characterisation and writing and such things. Constructive criticism much welcome! -hands out cookies-

Eternal Springtime of Our Youth

Gai meets Kakashi unexpectedly in the middle of summer, in a field of wilting daisies and dry, overgrown grass, where the battered stumps of training posts litter the ground. It is swelteringly hot and the water in Gai's canteen is tepid, sliding down his throat perfunctorily without quenching any thirst.

Right now whether Gai wants to screw Kakashi into the ground or not has been made immaterial by the simple fact that it is Kakashi wanting to do the screwing, to fuck him right into the ground raw and hard and dry without preemptive measure or hesitance. One day Kakashi's nonchalance and single-mindedness will bring great catastrophe-- Gai knows this for a fact-- because what buoys him through horror after horror cannot be much different from an acceptance of death.

Gai with legs open, back on the ground, stares up into the blue limitless sky that stretches above him. Small pebbles cut into back where his vest has been discarded, and Kakashi's knees dig painfully into his thighs. Gai retaliates, just because he can, and sends Kakashi thudding roughly into the dirt, head slamming against the grass and looking not entirely surprised. "Finally," Kakashi says, looking completely too unfazed by the fact that he is royally fucked up and has Gai between his legs and towering over him.

Gai doesn't spare the moment to process what that word means-- how 'finally' as Kakashi said it sounded too conclusive, too full of quiet desperation, and futility. When Gai takes Kakashi it is entirely of Kakashi's volition and none of his own; he wants to fuck Kakashi, but not when Kakashi wants Gai to fuck him, because while the coincidence of the two events is usually the ideal, something in the way Kakashi holds himself splayed and open, vulnerable to Gai and to the world, makes Gai snap- something is wrong, fucking Kakashi now would be A Very Bad Idea.

Gai pulls out of Kakashi midway with everything undone; he's panting and desperate and Kakashi seems angry behind the ANBU mask. Gai wants to explain- no, no, this isn't the way, Kakashi get back on your feet- but the words hurt him, so he doesn't want to see what they do to Kakashi. Belatedly he realises that there is blood on his shirt and dripping down his side, copious amounts of it. Briefly Gai wonders if it's his own, but decides a split second later that it is Kakashi's, from a deep slash on the side. So much for the Springtime of Youth, Gai thinks as he hauls Kakashi upright and resists the urge to berate the man. Summer is when the earth begins to wither, and droop, Gai sees no youth or vigour- are they really that old?- and waits, because summer will pass, and spring will come again.

Kakashi has his head turned slightly towards the only window in the ward when Gai enters. He has his hands clenched loosely around the sheets. The hospital gown is a detached, clinical white that is made of a paper-cloth blend that scratches. Under that, on the right shoulder, Gai can see a slight bump where a thick wad of bandages is wound around the long cut he saw.

Gai steps in and sets himself down in a chair beside the bed. Kakashi doesn't turn around, but the one hand reaches out to smooth down the wrinkles in the sheets. There are loud proclamations of resilience and perseverance that Gai know like the back of his hand but they do not apply here. What Kakashi needs, Gai thinks, is the will to live. To fight, to survive. It isn't that Kakashi courts death, or wants to die, but he's missing that spark that will keep him alive even when reason and logic dictate that he shouldn't be. Kakashi is a creature of analyticity, of clear cut probability and odds, but he needs that wildcard that will turn the table through desperation and sheer force of will.

In that span of a second Gai wants to deck Kakashi, hard and serious on the face. He almost does, but catches himself in time. Instead, he settles for taking dinner out of the carrier and setting it on the low side table by the bed.

"Dinner," Gai says, and arranges the chopsticks. "Eternal Rival."

Kakashi turns around, finally, and looks at Gai with shadows hiding his eyes. The ANBU mask is gone, but the usual blue one is still clinging to his nose and throat and obscuring expression. The twilight makes Kakashi grey and indistinct, seemingly made of shadows and shifting light, more of a ghost than Gai has ever seen, bleached of colour and life.

The wind comes in and flutters weakly, barely stirring the air. Everything is so stagnant and still; like the bottom of the sea, untouched and pristine. Gai wants shout and make a speech, or splash some colour into this unresponsive, immovable world. He wishes his green spandex were greener, if that were possible. But there is a weight into room that is oppressive and dank; a kind of leaden solidity that makes it impossible for him to make the expansive, unrestrained gestures that he is used to. Every movement or breath takes something out of him, like walking underwater.

Kakashi tugs him over by the wrist. Gai settles down in the space that Kakashi has cleared for him. Kakashi can't want that right now, surely not when he's barely recovering and still weak with exhaustion- but apparently Gai is wrong, and Gai finds himself being drawn into Kakashi's arms and pressed with little fluttering kisses. "Gai," Kakashi murmurs, impatient and urgent, entirely at odds with the languid caress of his fingers and slow, rhythmic thrusting.

Kakashi's hands on his abdomen and thighs are oddly gentle- with exhaustion, Gai wonders?- and warm, nothing distant or removed in the way he moulds himself into Gai with startling intimacy. Gai would be tempted to say 'tender', but tenderness is not to be found in Kakashi's hands, not in the Kakashi who takes him or likes to be taken with quick, erratic and forceful strokes. Gai finds himself thinking of the apathetic, flakey Kakashi who embraces tardiness and warps the truth, who thrives on contradiction and shadows. Who takes to ANBU like a duck to water, like he belongs, but Gai refuses to believe that Kakashi is inherently vicious or bitter.

The mask has apparently been discarded in the time that it takes to strip off his vest and shirt: Kakashi has his tongue deep in Gai's mouth doing sweeping, exploratory probing, clutching Gai close and grinding down. Kakashi's gown has been torn right down the front where Gai's scrabbling hands have ripped the material. Kakashi doesn't seem to mind in the least. He shrugs out of it and uses his body weight to pin Gai down, thwarting Gai's attempts to flip them over.

Kakashi enters Gai with a slowness that burns all the way to Gai's chest, infinitely painful and tight, so different from the other times that Gai wants to reach back and run his fingers over the contours of Kakashi's face just to be sure, that he has the right Kakashi and not some variation his evidently derailed mind has come up with. Hatake Kakashi does not take off his mask during sex, does not move slowly, does not speak Gai's name.

Gai feels his insides warm with the heavy intrusion of Kakashi, alien and achingly familiar, hurting as it is wont to do. Kakashi just stays there for a long while, not moving. There is searing heat when Kakashi begins to move again, a burning that claws its way up Gai's spine, bone by bone, nerve by nerve. Gai feels not need nor lust, but a fleeting moment of rightness, like this what he has been waiting for for too long. He buckles under the heaviness that circles his mind, where everything blossoms into heat and light, and bites down hard to taste blood when he finally surrenders.

It is autumn: the wind is cool when it blows up from the banks. There are fireflies just ouside, at the training grounds, where they were previously in a taijutsu match.

Kakashi speaks to break the pendulous silence that has settled between them, just before Gai was going to. "Gai," he says, without the customary boredom or book. "What's the matter?"

Gai wavers between brushing such an open-ended queston off or opening his heart and soul to his Eternal Rival. He has sworn nothing but the most truthful and honest rivalry, not to be polluted by the black seeds of distrust and suspricious, so he keeps his word and prepares himself. "Eternal Rival, your behaviour of late is worrying," he says, projecting in his voice the graveness and consideration this matter warrants.

"Oh?" Kakashi says, turning around so he is facing Gai. They are seated on opposite ends of Gai's sofa, rested and fed, Kakashi previously engrossed in reading Icha Icha and Gai mentally reciting the creeds governing the Responsibilities of Youth. "Is that so?"

Gai recognises the slight quirk of Kakashi's eyebrow for the skepticism that it is and contemplates for a moment, the wisdom of broaching such a subject. "Eternal Rival, I am flattered that you have considered me worthy of your lustful attentions. However," Gai says, not missing a beat, "I must ask that you do not engage in them when you have just returned from a mission and in dire need of medical attention."

Kakashi opens his mouth to reply, but Gai is faster; having seen the miniscule movement in the fabric he carries on, keeping momentum. "Also, you need to learn the Value of Your Life. It is precious and cannot lightly be thrown away."

"What, the feeling isn't mutual?" Kakashi drawls, rather dryly and cryptically, until Gai realises that Kakashi is talking about his euphemisms of 'lustful attentions'.

"No, no, Eternal Rival, you misunderstand," Gai says, eager to correct Kakashi. "The point is that--"

Kakashi puts a stop to Gai's explanation by simply crawling into Gai's lap and placing his hands on either side of gai's shoulders. "Gai," he says, looking at Gai levelly (which Kakashi seems to be doing a lot these days). "I understand perfectly."

Gai tries to protest that no, Kakashi evidently does not understand. It isn't about the action of sex itself, which is perfectly fine and great, but about Kakashi, who is losing himself in ways that Gai doesn't want to begin to understand. Kakashi, however, has other ideas. He leans closer into Gai's space and forces Gai to press further back into the couch. "When I came back from the mission that day," Kakashi says, enunciating each word clearly, "I thought I was going to become a name on the memorial."

Gai nods, a small one, because that is the only thing that he can do. How did he not notice that, he wonders. Kakashi continues. "I went to see you at the training grounds, instead of the hospital, because if I'm going to die, I'm going to do it being happy."

If this is a revelation Kakashi is doing a very backhanded approximation of it, so Gai tries not to think too much about Kakashi apparently being 'happy' fucking him in the middle of the day in the training grounds. "And if you think I take my life lightly, Gai, then you're more of an idiot than you look," Kakashi says, looking down at Gai with a mixture of fondness and exasperation.

Gai wants to tell Kakashi that he's not implying that Kakashi is being reckless and taking silly chances because of course Kakashi is too good a shinobi to commit those mistakes. Gai isn't saying something so rudimentary and simple, Gai is talking about the psychological makeup of Kakashi, where Kakashi can and will lose himself if he doesn't start thinking of himself as someone worth protecting. There's only so much you can do to protect other people if you're dead, after all.

"And by not taking my life lightly, I mean wanting to live, desperately, because I get to screw you to the wall another day." Kakashi is leering by now, good humour seemingly restored. Gai looks at Kakashi, really looks, becauase light-hearted as Kakashi's tone is there is concern and truth lurking behind, something more than what Kakashi is saying. More than Gai being a good fuck-buddy or Eternal Rival (although he most certainly is both), more like please don't go, you are my friend and I fight to come back to you.

Gai blinks back tears of relief and quells the sunset that threatens to materialise behind him. He nips at Kakashi's throat lightly and wraps his arms round Kakashi's waist, slipping one hand deftly below the waistband of the sweatpants Kakashi is wearing. There are words on the tip of his tongue that want to spill out to Kakashi, go deep into Kakashi and touch the core of his existance. Gai feels a little like the day back at the hospital, where he was underwater and struggling for breath; Kakashi stifling and pervasive, drowning Gai in stillness and gentle, gentle strokes. The slowness almost kills Gai- so ponderously slow, that he can count time by the beating of his heartbeat. There is none of the desperation that marked their other encounters. Only an excruciating awareness of time and an overwhelming sense of security and relief.

Gai wants to cry out and sing the praises of the Springtime of Youth, but it is already autumn, and spring is far away yet. He sees the promise clear on the horizon- Kakashi will be there for Gai- and Gai vows that he will be Kakashi's Eternal Rival, and eternal means forever in an infinite way that his finite mind cannot fully understand but can try. He makes a promise to never leave, and never it be said that Maito Gai did not keep a promise that he made.

Gai loves Kakashi, but that is immaterial in the face of the fact that Kakashi might possibly love him back, because that is all that matters.

The End
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