01/13/2019 Editted because I've grown up and some of this was beyond inappropriate. Not surprising, since I wrote it as a teenager, but I couldn't in good conscious not change some parts-I probably didn't even change enough. Honestly, the core conflict in this needs complete rewriting, but this is probably all I'm going to do since I'm no longer in this fandom and the story is so old.

Disclaimer: I doth dis / The claiming of this

Kakashi's worst nightmare was unfolding before his eyes. This whole event seemed so horrendously sick and satanically twisted beyond anything his mind could have prepared him to lie in fear of. No amount of ninja training could have made him ready for what was so forcibly being thrust upon him. Kakashi himself didn't think he'd be able to survive this. It was just...too much.

"I don't know what you're problem is, Kakashi." Gai said brightly, setting down a box. "It's not like I'm moving in permanently. But until Konoha is rebuilt, I need a place and yours is relatively in tact. It'll just be a few weeks - months, at most."

Some higher power must hate me. Kakashi thought grimly, eyeing the few boxes Gai had salvaged from his place and left stacked on Kakashi's own floor. He could see a green jumpsuit sticking out of one of them. My home is forever tainted.

"Uncle Gai!" Just then the second part of Kakashi's torture entered the room, her long, dark braid bouncing behind her. "Where should I put my stuff?"

That's right. He wasn't going to just have Gai alone in his home, but his now recently orphaned niece as well. This was his first meeting with her, and he was dreading the worst.

Maito Michiru's father had been, ironically, a construction worker - a job currently in high demand - but had died when his home had collapsed on top of him during Pein's attack. Michiru's mother, Gai's elder sister and a shinobi, had died when Michiru was a child during a mission. Kakashi recognized her name on the stone that also bore Obito's.

"Kakashi, which room will Michiru-chan be taking?" Gai asked.

Kakashi frowned. "I only have one bedroom, Gai."

"Then I guess we'll be sharing the floor in here, eh, Kakashi?" Gai laughed obnoxiously. "It'll be just like camping! THE BLOOM OF YOUTH!"

Kakashi wanted to cry. Michiru snorted a half laugh at her uncle's behavior and shook her head. "Uncle Gai, I know I'm a girl and all, but I don't need my own room. I'm the smallest person here. I can take the couch."

"Nonsense!" Gai snapped. "The female must have her own courters, separate from the dirty males!"

"You just called yourself dirty, Gai." Kakashi pointed out for no reason in particular.

"It's Kakashi-san's bedroom, Uncle. He should have it. We shouldn't be rude and impose any more than we already have." Michiru said, setting her box by the couch. "Besides, we're related. We can sleep in the same room. You have the floor."

And after an hour of Michiru's patient debating against Gai's screams of outrage, that was exactly what was decided on.

Kakashi laid back in his bed, book held open before his face. He was reading his favorite series, of course, yet again - since, he mourned, there would never be another volume.

"Hey, Kakashi-san?" the muffled sound of Michiru's voice floated through the door as she knocked lightly, and Kakashi debated on feigning sleep. But, so far, Michiru had proved to be a much more tolerable presence than her uncle, so he assented.

"It's open."

Michiru, her short body and small frame dressed in a boyish shirt far too many sizes too large for her, tottered into the room. Kakashi couldn't tell if she had shorts on, the shirt was so long. Kids these days. Did she have no sense? She'd just walked into a man's bedroom! No wonder Gai is so weird about her, Kakashi thought, remembering how Gai had insisted Kakashi's Icha Icha books never leave his room, and never be stored out in the open. His niece seemed to be the only kid he didn't encourage to pursue "the bloom of youth."

Speaking of which - if Michiru tried to make a move on him, he was locking the doors from now on.

"What is it, Michiru-chan?"

She stopped by the end of his bed and sighed. "Um, I know this is kind of a personal question, but...you died in the battle with Pein, didn't you?"

Surprised at the topic, Kakashi nodded.

"Do you remember...what it was like?"

"Not really." Kakashi answered with practiced ease. This wasn't a memory he wanted to share with anyone - she was right, this was personal. "Are you wondering about your parents?"

Michiru shrugged. "A little. I mean, death is a natural part of life - even more so for a shinobi family - so I'm not bitter or anything, about them being dead. It's just...well, Uncle Gai doesn't like to talk about it."

"You're parent's deaths? Well, your mother was his sister, so-"

"No, not that." Michiru shook her head. "About when you died. Uncle talks about mom - he brags on her, and always says he's proud. But he was weird for a while there, and when I asked why, he wouldn't say. It was during the battle still, so I thought he'd just lost hope. But then someone mentioned later that his best friend had died."

Kakashi looked a little shocked at all this. Gai considers me his best friend? That's...kinda sad. It wasn't like Kakashi was particularly nice to Gai. And Gai was always yelling at him and trying to beat him, being annoying...wait. Was this kinda like what Naruto and Sasuke had going?

That would probably make me Sasuke...Kakashi inwardly groaned.

"Well, Gai seems back to normal now." Kakashi pointed out.

"Yeah." Michiru looked away, seeming to struggle with something. "I guess. Sorry to bother you, Kakashi-san."

"Is that all?"

"Well...like I said, Uncle always talks about mom with a smile. And my grandparents. And now, even dad." Michiru rubbed her shoulders, like she was cold. Her silvery eyes seemed darker in the room's dim lighting. "But when you died, even for just that short while, Uncle didn't smile at all. He wasn't his usually peppy, dorky self. It was unnerving. I was trying to see why you were more special than mom or dad."

"Michiru-chan, you saw Gai right after I'd died, right?"

"Yeah."

"But not with either of your parents, right?"

"Right."

"You didn't find out about your father - either of you - until after the battle, and by then Gai was back to work. You didn't see him immediately after any of those deaths but mine. I'm not more special than the rest of your family, Michiru. He'd just grieved, accepted it, and composed himself by the time you saw him after all the others. Gai has to be strong for his niece, after all. And you can't tarnish someone's memory by mourning them forever. You should be proud, like Gai said."

Michiru seemed to think about all that for a moment, and then smiled. "...yeah. Yeah, that's right. Thanks, Kakashi-san."

Kakashi smiled back. "You're welcome."

With a laugh, Michiru patted the back of her head. "I was worried for a bit there. Hey, what are you reading?" Michiru chirped happily, moving to Kakashi's bedside.

He held the book up and away from her. "Something I was specifically told never to let you know exists in this world."

Michiru stared at him. "Porn?"

Kakashi rolled his eyes - not that she could see both of them. "It's called Erotica when there's no pictures."

"Are you sure?" Michiru asked skeptically, glancing up at the orange novel.

A half hour later, Michiru was sprawled on her stomach at the edge of the bed next to Kakashi, the small orange book laying, forgotten, on his other side. They had spent the minutes having a surprisingly intelligent conversation about the differences in Erotica and Porn, as well as what it was like as an actual literary merit, and not just for horny guys. By now, Kakashi had Michiru dying to read the story, instead of having his (sensored) Cliffnotes version.

"Are you even legal to read this stuff?" Kakashi asked, trying to undo the damage he'd unwittingly done.

"I'm twenty-two. There was a pretty big age gap between my mom and Uncle Gai." After a pause, Michiru rolled her eyes. "Ah, come on, Kakashi-san! You got me interested. I'll even skip over the 'educational' parts!"

There goes half the story, Kakashi sighed. "No, Michiru."

In a huff, Michiru attempted to reach over Kakashi for the book, but he snatched it up first. It was then, while she was still stretched out over him, arm in the air, that her shirt raised up and Kakashi found that she did, in fact, have shorts on underneath the tee.

And that, for someone so short, Michiru had good legs. Having been around grouchy, busty women most of his life, Kakashi fancied himself a legs man. Not that he was sizing up Gai's niece's legs. Oh, no.

And that thought was why he wasn't paying enough attention to his task, and Michiru captured the novel from him.

While Michiru wore normal Chunin clothes around the house, when Kakashi came home some nights later, she was marching around in that same tee and shorts, which were apparently her pajamas, with a tooth brush in her mouth and Icha Icha Paradise held in front of her while she absently mindedly brushed and walked to the kitchen. Mostly likely she had just come from the bathroom.

She was making dinner, brushing her teeth, and reading all at the same time. It was scary, but Kakashi had learned not to doubt Michiru's multitasking skills.

Her hair wasn't braided, like normal. In stead, it was flowing freely with a loose wave in its black depths.

Oddly, Michiru didn't look like a child. At twenty-two, she shouldn't, obviously, but Michiru was short, as Kakashi had already noted, and not very blessed in the right areas. Not that she wasn't filled out. She just wasn't very big, was all. Average. Her breast could probably fit just right in Kakashi's hand-

That train of thought was immediately silenced. I'm reading too mush Erotica, Kakashi chided himself.

But Kakashi couldn't help but notice that, while most of Konoha's women were a full size, Michiru was small. She would definitely not be considered to have much child bearing potential...

Michiru swished the last of her water and spit it out, her mouth and teeth now clean. She stirred the boiling pot, giving it a quick once over before turning her eyes back to her book. She was almost finished...

Neither paying attention, Michiru walked right into Kakashi when she went to step out of the kitchen.

"Oaf!" Michiru rubbed her head and glanced up at Kakashi. "Sorry, Kakashi-san."

"It's alright." Kakashi replied, glad his brain had finally been distracted. It had followed the she doesn't have very good hips track to but she definitely has the legs that go all the way up, short or not and he wasn't sure he was comfortable with his mind there. Michiru's face was not childish or round or, thank goodness, any resemblance at all to her uncle. She seemed every bit like a beautiful woman, except...well, travel size. "Looks like you're almost finished." Kakashi shrugged his wandering, perverted mind off, just like he usually did. No problems.

Michiru smiled and nodded, flipping the page. "Just a bit more...man, this series is great. I can borrow number two, right?"

"Sure." Kakashi replied easily, taking a seat on the couch that had been transformed into Michiru's bed. It smelled like her. He absently wondered what the smell was. Something her mother had worn, probably. She definitely hadn't gotten hygiene advice from her father and Gai. "Same rules though – don't let Gai catch you reading it. He'd kill me."

"I was thinking about cutting my hair." Michiru said, apparently randomly, while she kept reading.

"I like it long." Was out of Kakashi's mouth with surprising honesty.

Michiru glanced up at him and gave him a small smile. "Thanks. My mom's was short, but I think I like it long. It was just a thought."

In the kitchen, Michiru finished the last page of Icha Icha Paradise with the soup still cooking away. She set the book down, a slight blush on her face. And it wasn't from the raunchy book - though it had definitely made her blush a time or two...or ten. She had just caught herself thinking if this was what it was like to be a married couple.

The husband, coming home at night to her, cooking dinner on the stove. And, of course, Icha Icha was sending her imagination places she never dreamed it would go. And she liked that he'd complimented her hair.

She really needed to reign herself in. Yeah, Kakashi was hot. Yeah, she could fantasize. But she really needed to get her mind out of the gutter, anyway. It was kinda...a violation to fantasize about someone, she felt. She'd feel that way if someone sexually fantasized about her.

Still, that probably wouldn't stop her from imagining herself and Kakashi as the main characters in the next Icha Icha. After all, it had been quite a while since she'd had a guy she liked.

It was becoming routine, the whole 'come home, cook dinner, feed Kakashi, sit and chat, read in silence together, be miraculously in different chairs completely across the room from eachother with no books in sight when Gai barges in, put up with him for about an hour, go to bed' thing. It was working out quite nicely. Well, except the whole 'falling desperately in love with the older man' bit. Michiru wasn't too happy with herself about that.

What had been a simple crush was careening out of control. Reading over Kakashi's shoulder had evolved into sitting in the same armchair together. Dinner without Gai had turned into dinner together. And discussing Icha Icha Paradise had turned into subtle and not-so-subtle flirting.

Michiru had even caught Kakashi with his headband off coming out of his bathroom, fresh from the shower, once. He'd been fully dressed, but he'd been tying on the headband as he came out. Michiru had seen the scar - and she'd had mixed feelings about it. None of those feelings had been negative.

But once she'd seen him like that, it was hard not to try to imagine his whole face. Gai was her uncle, after all, so it wasn't like it was her first time seeing or hearing about Kakashi when they'd moved in. Having his face covered had never bothered her before - that was just the man that was Kakashi. Now, Michiru found that she was using her talent for drawing more and often - and none of her drawings survived long after being finished, lest they be discovered.

Waving bye with a laugh and a smile had become a façade, and Michiru spent most of the day pacing with worry, despite having her own work to do. Every shinobi was needed to help reconstruct the village, and that included Michiru. That didn't stop her every thought from being of him.

This is turning into an obsession. Michiru groaned as she headed back in the house that night. This can't be healthy. The man's in his late twenties. That's like, what? A little less than ten years older than me? I mean, he's uncle Gai's age! I know there's a big age difference between mom and uncle Gai since they had different dads, but still! This is too weird!

"Michiru? Is something wrong?"

"Huh?" Without having been paying attention to her thoughts, Michiru had marched absentmindedly into the house and collapsed in a curled up ball on the couch - her head inches away from Kakashi's lap. Swallowing her embarrassment, she sat up. "Why are you home so early?"

It was also probably not very healthy that Michiru referred to Kakashi's house as 'home,' but she tried not to think about that as he answered her. "I got scolded for working too hard. They told me to go home and rest."

"Really? Is there anything wrong? Are you tired? Do you want dinner now?"

Kakashi chuckled and ruffled Michiru's hair. "What an attentive little wife I have."

"Ha ha." Was all she could reply through his hands and her blush.

"I'm a bit tired, yes. But I'd like dinner first, if it's not too much trouble."

"Nope." Michiru was up in seconds, picking up the bags she'd dropped when she came in. "I actually just got back from getting groceries. I'll start dinner right away."

Even starting right away, it was still an hour before the food was all done. Steaks and stir fry didn't fry themselves, after all. So when Michiru brought an already made plate out to Kakashi, he was sound asleep on the couch - aka, her bed.

Bad thought bad thought! Michiru shook her head and set the plate down on the coffee table, trying to ignore the fact that the guy she was madly in love with was sprawled out on her bed-couch! Her couch! His jounin vest had been discarded on the floor, so she picked it up and hung it from the back of the arm chair. Anything to keep her from staring at him.

But in the end, she caved. Ten minutes later, Kakashi's dinner was tucked away in the oven to keep it warm and Michiru was curled up in the arm chair across from Kakashi, breathing in his scent from the vest that hung beside her and etching slowly away on her sketchbook. The picture she drew was almost an exact replica of the scene before her - except Kakashi had on no mask in her version.

And did he ever look gorgeous, his lips lightly parted as he breathed slowly, his right arm tucked behind his fluffy silver head as he lay on his back, left hand on his stomach. The almost skin tight ninja garb hugging his frame, his right knee leaning against the back of the couch and his bare left foot dangling off the edge of the arm rest. Heck, the live version, despite wearing a facemask, was even better.

So Michiru was obviously concentrating real hard on her work (and her subject) when a knock at the door startled her so bad she dropped her sketchbook. Crap! She chided herself as she raced to get the door. Some shinobi I am.

Michiru felt even more like an idiot when she finally shoed away the Shinobi checking up on Kakashi and was heading back into the living room. Why? Because Kakashi was standing up, wide awake in the middle of the room, holding up her sketchbook and apparently admiring the work. She stopped dead in her tracks, mortified.

Kakashi spotted her and gave a small smile. "Hey, you're really good at this."

Michiru forced out something, frankly anything would do, from her mouth. "I-I put your dinner in the oven. Do you want it now?"

"That sounds great, thanks."

Kakashi didn't seem the least bit phased, but Michiru was redder than a tomato when she buried her face in her hands once she was in the kitchen and out of his line of sight. Jeez, why not just write 'I LOVE KAKASHI' across the cover of the freaking book! Way to go, Michiru!

...Wait, what else was in that sketchbook?

Michiru almost spilt everything off of Kakashi's plate as she rushed back into the living room, trying to pretend she was just bringing his food and not freaking out about the book. But how Kakashi was leaned back on the couch and holding the book open in front of him wasn't an encouraging sight. "H-here's your d-dinner, Kakashi."

Kakashi looked up from the book oddly and Michiru almost swallowed her tongue. "Hm? When did we both stop using honorifics when we talked?"

Since he didn't sound mad, only puzzled, she paused to think about it, and found she didn't know. That threw Michiru for a moment. She hadn't really thought about it before. She had always used 'san' when addressing Kakashi when she first moved in - as was proper for a young girl to address her elder - but for the life of her, she couldn't remember the last time she'd used it. And she couldn't remember when Kakashi'd last called her 'Michiru-chan' either. He'd originally called her 'Michiru-san' and Gai had quickly corrected him, saying "Michiru-chan is Michiru-chan, Kakashi!" They always used honorifics in front of Gai, but alone...

"I don't know." Michiru finally replied. "I guess I hadn't really noticed."

It was then that Michiru finally got a good look at the page Kakashi was open to, as the book lay on his lap. She sucked in a horrified gasp as she realized it was the picture of Kakashi getting out of the shower without his headband on - only in her depiction, he didn't have a shirt or mask on either, and was drying his hair with a towel. It was a sexy and well drawn shot - only Michiru's best works were kept, after all. But now...

"Hm?" Kakashi followed Michiru's line of sight to the picture and then back to her. "Oh, this? Do want it back?"

"It doesn't matter anymore." Michiru sighed, setting Kakashi's plate in front of him. "Seeing as that's the picture I would have tried the hardest to hide. So why not let you look? This situation can't get any worse now."

Kakashi chuckled lightly as Michiru sunk onto the cushion beside him. "You've got some great work in here. You actually have some pictures that make Gai look cool - and that's a feat to behold!"

Michiru had to laugh along with that. "Yeah, I used to draw uncle Gai all the time. I never told him that, though - the last thing he needs is an ego boost by having his niece admire his fighting form enough to draw it. As long as he's seriously training and not striking a goofy pose, uncle Gai can look surprisingly cool, believe it or not."

Kakashi's eyes closed in what Michiru knew was a bright smile behind that (stupid) mask. She could almost imagine it, the (stupid) mask gone and the (stupid) headband stripped away as well. A normal Kakashi. A gorgeous man - scar and all. It made her want to touch it, the scar. To trace her fingers lightly down it, then rest her hand on his cheek. To kiss his closed eye, to move down slowly to his lips...

Raising both hands to her face, Michiru slammed her palms down onto her cheeks so hard her face stung and her ears started to ring.

"Michiru? What did you hit yourself for?"

"Reality check." Michiru replied, cracking her neck and leaning back to stretch out.

"Yeah, you probably needed that." Kakashi replied slyly. "With how much you seem to be fantasizing about what my face looks like without my mask and headband."

"Ouch."

"Hit the nail on the head, didn't I?"

"Yep. Can we change the subject now?"

"I think that would be best." As if they both knew why the subject needed changing, the next half hour was spent discussing safe topics - the weather, the progress of Konoha's reconstruction, both their days at work, all the times Kakashi had beat Gai, etc. The sketchbook lay forgotten and somehow Kakashi managed to eat his whole dinner without Michiru even noticing.

Safe.

Empty.

Kakashi took a deceivingly lazy stroll around his house, and concluded with assurance what he had originally surmised: Gai and Michiru had moved out, taking all their stuff.

His relief at having Gai gone was a bit smothered by the fact that his house was looking fairly bare, and that when he'd opened the door he'd stood there for several seconds, absentmindedly waiting for a greeting that never came.

Because Michiru wasn't there anymore.

Dinner wasn't cooked. The laundry wasn't done. His bed wasn't made. All volumes of Icha-Icha were shelved nicely. He would have to put his vest away himself. He'd have no fun waking up before Michiru, just to aggravate her. No more long talks and laughs, no more teasing her about her secret sketches, no more of his inside jokes with Michiru that left Gai confused. No more anything.

Empty.

They'd been moved into their new home almost a week, and Michiru wasn't sure if she was happy Kakashi had been gone when they'd left so she hadn't had to say goodbye - or completely miserable about it. It was probably for the best, she kept telling herself. She'd have done something embarrassing like cry, most likely. But still...

There wasn't a moment his face didn't sneak into her head. She thought about him all the time, played back scenes from their time 'together' over and over, cherishing them. Wishing she wasn't such a coward, wasn't so much younger than him, wasn't related to Gai, etc.

Her mind was depressingly reeling these thoughts through her head when Gai responded to a knock at the door. "Kakashi! Come to see our new place, have you? We didn't forget anything, did we?"

Michiru felt like she'd just swallowed a rock. Her throat tightened, tears welled, and her stomach did a three-sixty, twisting her organs into a painful ball. Grow up, Michiru! She screamed at herself.

"Michiru-chan?"

Like the whole world had stopped turning, Kakashi was suddenly the center of everything. She knew Gai was talking, but she couldn't hear a word. I must look like an idiot, sitting here staring at him!

Shaking herself and forcing a smile, Michiru rose up from the couch and stepped forward. "Hi, Kakashi-san."

"Hey." Kakashi smiled behind his mask, his eyes closing in her usual cheerful, laid back way.

Michiru suddenly realized her uncle was still blabbering away, but neither one of them seemed to be paying him any mind - not that he'd noticed. She tried to hear him, really did. But when Gai's mouth shut and he turned to stare at her, she had no idea what he'd just said.

"Michiru never had a problem cooking for all of us before." Kakashi to the rescue. "I'll stay for diner, I guess. If that's not a problem?"

Michiru shook her head, finally getting control of herself. "No, that's fine. Anything in particular you'd like?"

"Something I can't cook myself - which is just about everything, in case you didn't know." Kakashi turned to Gai with a laugh. "I'm going to starve to death without Michiru-chan around anymore. Heck, I can barely remember how to do my own laundry!"

Gai returned the laugh boisterously. "I know what you mean! She's such a good housekeeper, I don't know how I got around without her before!"

"Yeah," Kakashi sent her a sideways glance that was soft and quick. "Me neither."

Michiru gave her uncle a hard jab to the side, and the only response she received was a loud snore. "He's out cold. Kakashi, would you mind dumping him in his room?"

Kakashi hoisted Gai easily over his shoulder, not troubling the sleeping man at all. "Geez, how much did he drink to knock himself out this hard?"

Michiru shrugged with the growing ease of a practiced liar. No need to mention she'd spiked just about everything on Gai's plate because she knew he could hold his fair share and she'd wanted him out of the way when dinner was over. She'd had no drinks herself, even though passing them around had been her idea. And, of course, she couldn't be sure if any of the empty bottles were Kakashi's, as she could never catch him actually drinking. But he seemed perfectly sober, which added to her suspicion he'd known what she was trying to do from the start.

Made her nervous, that thought did.

When Kakashi re-entered the room, it was with a lazy guit while he popped his neck. "Hm, that was a great meal, Michiru. Thanks again."

"Wasn't nothing." Michiru grinned playfully. "It was nice to cook the right porportions for once – I kept making way too much when we first moved in here."

"Aw, you missed me?" Kakashi teased, ruffling her hair.

"You know I did." Michiru growled under her breath, but when Kakashi moved his hand away, she was smiling away like she hadn't said anything. "So how's life treating you, Kakashi? Have you gotten any-"

"Michiru."

She resisted the urge to continue to stare at the floor and swallowed hard. "Hm?"

"I did hear that."

"Figured you did. Was hoping you'd pretend you didn't."

"Normally I would. But if I did, then what would have been the point of knocking Gai out?"

Michiru sighed. "For a Kunoichi, I'm a big coward."

"And for a love interest, you're too young."

"Ouch." Michiru leaned back and shut her eyes, willing the tears to stay down. "Can't say that wasn't exactly what I was expecting."

"Can't say it still doesn't hurt, though." Kakashi added sympathetically, sitting down in the chair beside the couch despite there being plenty of room beside her. "I'm sorry, Michiru."

"Then why did you even come?" Michiru moaned, covering her eyes. "Saved me the humiliation? Because, frankly, you not visiting was message enough."

"...I did miss you."

"That makes me feel so much better." Michiru coughed, and it almost covered her sob. "Hey, so does that mean if I had been older, I'd have had a shot?"

"Who knows? No point in speculating."

"Jerk."

"I know."

"Screw this." Michiru growled, standing up and bringing her fists down to her sides. Her normally silvery eyes were red rimmed and set. "I'm not that much younger than you, really! It's just nine years-I'm an adult. Even if I've still got some learning to do, it's not like I'm a child!"

Kakashi shook his head. "But you're still only twenty-two, Michiru, and-"

"If you don't love me then don't call me 'Michiru' so casually!" She snapped, glaring at him as she furiously wiped her tears away with her fists. "I mean, jeez! Have some shame, Kakashi-san. You shouldn't be so informal with the niece of a colleague. It's inappropriate. Especially after you just rejected her."

Kakashi stared at her sadly for a moment, knowing she was right and yet still feeling the sting of her words. "I'm sorry, Michiru-chan. I really am. I should go."

"But I don't want you to go!" Kakashi had stood to leave, but Michiru threw herself at him, wrapping her arms around him and burying her face in his chest. "Gosh darn it all, I love you!"

Kakashi felt his resolve slip as he held her shaking form, and had to gather himself again to do what had to be done. He hated to hurt her, but there was no avoiding it. Because, one way or the other, Michiru was going to get hurt for her love, and that was all there was too it. Care about her or not, Kakashi couldn't love her. He couldn't.

...Even though, sometimes, it felt like he did.

So when Michiru raised her face up, still streaming with tears and twisted in sorrow, he didn't say anything. And when she released him and instead brought her hands to his chest, he didn't stop her. And when she stood on her tiptoes and still failed to reach his face by only inches, he might have leaned forward slightly. Just slightly.

Michiru kissed his lips, mask and all. It was firm, and Kakashi watched her as she did it, her eyes pressed close in pain. She didn't linger. It seemed more like a final request than part of her fight. Like she was giving up, but she was taking this memory with her.

Kakashi watched as a hand reached up and brushed against her cheek. It carressed her face, running it's thumb up and down, wiping the tears from her eye and barely touching the smooth skin of her lips.

A part of Kakashi was trying to lie to himself and say that wasn't his hand. Because he wasn't allowed to touch her like this.

But the part that believed that lie was dying for it to be his.

And the part that knew it was his was marveling at how beautiful and soft she was.

I'm going to hurt her.

Kakashi leaned forward and pressed his forehead to hers, closing his eyes.

If so, I might as well make it worth the pain.

With his free hand, he reached up and pulled his mask down slowly. With his forehead to hers, his face was just out of her vision, teasing her eyes that couldn't see unless she pulled away. And she didn't want to pull away.

It was a good thing she didn't, because Kakashi thought vaguely that he probably would have ran if she had.

As it was, he kissed her.

And then kissed her again.

And again.

Somehow, Michiru's hands found their way up into his hair, and his headband lay discarded on the ground. And Kakashi was holding her close, one arm around her waist and the other on her nape, snaking his fingers into her hair and untwining her braid.

And just like in her fantasies, Michiru got to run her thumb down Kakashi's scar, and then lean in the kiss it. And then his cheek. And then his lips.

And then Gai walked in.

Ho boy, Kakashi thought. Guess it's time to find out just how drunk he is.

As it turned out, Gai was a very emotional, understanding man when he was hammered.

...Not so much the next morning.