Hey there,

Kakashi's been gone for a week now, and I swear if one more person asks how I'm holding up I'll break their figgin neck so fast that I'll instantly be promoted to jounin. I mean, we both know that I lived on my own for many many years. I'm good at living on my own. I like coming home to an apartment that isn't littered with dirty plates and teacups, and getting up each morning to a bathroom that's not knee deep in wet towels.

It's downright refreshing to be able to get dressed and stay dressed the first time, without hands all over me tugging my pants down and my shirt off and a deep breathy voice in my ear out of nowhere telling me that if I wander into MY OWN BEDROOM, with my clothes unbuttoned, I'm obviously just asking for it.

I've actually been getting to the academy early, the way I used to. Instead of rushing in with wet hair just a few minutes before the kids start to arrive. That's given me the chance to finally get everything there back into some kind of order. I've also been able to rewrite my lesson plans to include a section on sonic attacks. And demon vessels too, Gaara's showing at the chuunin exam has given me the opportunity, without the risk of crossing into forbidden territory.

So before you ask, I'm fine, just fine.

Shit who am I kidding? Not you I know, nor myself, no matter how hard I try. Kakashi just isn't ready for a long mission yet. Physically he's as strong as ever. I know that better than anyone because I'm the one he's been testing his endurance on. But mentally he's still barely holding it together, a ship made from eggshell in a sea of icebergs. Why am I the only one who seems worried about the cracks?

I tried telling Sakura-chan, hoping that she'd take the hint and pass it on, but she laughed so hard I thought she's pee herself. She told me that mental stability was not a concept I should try applying to her sensei, that his levels of paranoia and deviance transcend any understanding of anything that would reasonably be considered stable in any normal human being. Then she shrugged and kissed me on the cheek. Just when did she grow up so much? And what kind of books does her new mentor have her reading that have so many fancy words? Still, I can't help feeling that she knows something that I don't.

I'm thinking of offering to help out in the mission room again, I need something to fill up my evenings, and without Kakashi around I could use a little time with 'the grown ups'. I'm just not sure I can stand everyone there hovering over me, waiting for me to have a total meltdown the embarrassingly messy way I did last time he was brought back in a coma. But really, who could blame me? You should have seen him, anyone would have thought he was dead.

Speaking of watchers over, Genma and Gai, the needle sucker and the beautiful beast, keep stopping by at random times. I know Kakashi must have asked them to keep an eye on me, as if I was the one just jutsued into hell and back. so what can I do but ask them in and offer them tea? Then sit quietly and make small talk, while they discretely check me over for signs of losing it, as I glance meaningfully at my piles of ungraded papers hoping they'll get the message.

I know that hiding my innermost feelings has never exactly been my strong point, but dammit, surely I'm not that far gone. Although, come to think of it, I must have been almost certifiably crazy to have taken up with the man in the first place, so perhaps they have a point.

There's a full moon tonight. I think I'll go out and howl to it for a couple of hours.

Yours, edging towards lunacy, whilst enjoying my freedom and chewing my fingernails down to the bone.

Iruka.