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((Set shortly before Iruka's 29th birthday. Contains non-explicit yaoi! You have been warned!))
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Chapter 10; Yes, Sensei
Kakashi was quick.
Not just physically, but also intellectually fast. Quick to snap a comeback, quick to make scathing comments… Quick to think up a lie.
And yet it took him a grand total of seven months to come to the conclusion that Umino Iruka was the human equivalent of a pit-bull puppy.
When they'd first started their relationship, Iruka was a bundle of energy whereas Kakashi was a bundle of nerves. Iruka was bright smiles and perpetually eager to show Kakashi new things, and share his worldviews, while Kakashi sucked it all up like a sponge and said very little about himself.
Iruka's apartment was meticulously kept, despite the fact it had a homey, chaotic feel to it.
Kakashi had offered to help Iruka clean once, in the early months of their relationship, and wound up standing timidly near the window with his hands tucked under his chin because Iruka had practically pounced on him every time he'd tried to organize the papers on the chuunin's desk, or put his books on the shelf. Or organize the dishes in the cabinets.
Kakashi pictured a puppy, a lanky pit-bull puppy with sharp pointy little teeth and wide wild eyes throwing itself ferociously atop a hand that had strayed too close to its favorite chewing toy, or a foot that got too near its bowl of kibble.
It wasn't that Iruka was trying to be— Kakashi thought the word was 'territorial', Iruka explained in a huff, a vein throbbing on his forehead, that he had a specific way of organizing things so that he could find them when he needed to, and didn't have to go searching for them and making a big mess.
Kakashi watched him with Sharingan wide as he'd separated all his paperwork into neat stacks.
School papers, personal papers, scribble papers, crumpled papers, wrinkled papers, blank papers, papers that were strange colors, or had cute little cartoons on them. News papers, tissue papers, rice papers, tracing papers, wax papers, papers that had delicate little lacy designs cut into the edges… Papers Kakashi didn't even know the name of. All of them stacked and placed in an intricate spider web pattern around the chuunin where he sat in the middle of his living room floor.
Then he would take each neat stack and go through it, alphabetize the pages, stack them all neatly, alphabetize each stack and then put them in folders, and then into his desk drawers.
It was dizzying. But, Kakashi saw the logic behind it… At least he pretended to anyway.
And then there were the bins.
Iruka's apartment was a two-bedroom place, and one bedroom was filled entirely with plastic milk crates filled with all manner of strange and odd things.
Kakashi had decided to clean in there about a month after that, just to see if there was a bed in there like Iruka had said there was. And had used the Umino Patented Sorting Technique he'd copied on each bin… Only to be pounced again when Iruka stepped into the room and saw what he was doing.
That was the day Kakashi noticed that not only did Iruka pounce like a pit-bull puppy… He foamed at the mouth and snarled, and fought like one too.
Iruka had leapt. That was the only way to describe it, a graceful nose first dive over the stacks of now empty bins, and tackled Kakashi. Scattering the papers and trinkets he'd been sorting.
They'd wrestled about for a bit, Kakashi spluttering and asking repeatedly what he'd done wrong, heart hammering in his chest.
And Iruka had snarled where he was leaning, on hands and knees, scooping armfuls of papers and pages and letters toward himself like a threatened beast.
That was also the day Kakashi realized sometimes, when Iruka was very emotional, he said things that he hadn't meant to say.
Kakashi had left quickly after that, and taken a month long high ranking mission thinking Iruka no longer wanted him around, and resigned himself as a bachelor again. Feeling cold and hurt the whole time he'd been hunting the rogues.
He'd returned from that mission a little worse for wear, ten pounds lighter and sporting new scars.
He hadn't even made it through the gate before he found himself yanked into an alleyway and pinned against a wall. Broad tanned hands running all over him searching for wounds, a voice chanting apologies in his ear, tears warm and wet on his neck.
It rained that night, and Kakashi found himself in Iruka's bedroom for the first time. Found himself being gently stripped of his uniform, lips and teeth kissing and scraping against his skin, dark hair tickling places he'd never let anyone see.
Iruka's eyes were large and dark in the dim light, the sharp, thin stubble on his cheeks adding the illusion of shadow to his face as he'd asked in a whisper why Kakashi was shaking.
He lied. Said he was cold, and Iruka had pulled the blankets over them grinning. A crooked impish grin that made his eyes sparkle, and dimples form on his cheeks, the very tips of his teeth shining white in the false shadow on his face.
Three firsts happened that night.
The first time Kakashi ever allowed anyone to pull his mask off without a medical excuse.
Iruka caught the lower edge of the dark fabric with his teeth and tugged gently, hearing the fabric rasp against sparse little prickly hairs on Kakashi's chin, his head tilting inquisitively. Waiting for the jounin to protest.
Kakashi thought that if Iruka had had a tail it would have been wagging erratically when he didn't say no.
The chuunin traced the pad of his fingers across Kakashi nose and lips, gently. Oh, so gently.
The first time Kakashi had ever felt another man's lips against his own.
It was so much different than he'd imagined it would be. It was a different kind of soft from a woman's mouth. A cooler, darker taste. Sharper insistence of a tongue against his own. A different kind of feeling making his stomach buzz and tighten… A different reason behind his shaking now.
It was a strange sensation the final first, Iruka's legs, lightly dusted with hair, tangled with his own, the warmth and firm pressure against him so unlike the warm yield of a female bedmate.
It was so different. Frightening in its potential to familiarity… But Iruka hadn't slid between his shaking legs. Hadn't put a forceful hand on his throat. Hadn't bitten or scratched…
Iruka kissed, touched, and suckled. Gentle and yet powerful, guiding and being lead.
Kakashi found himself falling in love with the glide of another man's body against him. The scrape and crinkle of dark fuzz trailing below the chuunin's navel catching lightly against the downy white below his own.
Kakashi found himself whining and clutching, eyes heavily lidded, mouth open and gasping, pulling Iruka down by the shoulders so the firmness was trapped between their stomachs and the pressure seemed unforgiving as they'd rocked together, newly slicked and breath mingling into a single inhale, and a single exhale. Sweat mixing, scents melding, body and soul seeming to merge with every movement and twitch and beat of their hearts.
The first time he made love with another man.
The next morning Kakashi woke with Iruka's nose buried in the nape of his neck, a well muscled, heavy arm across his chest, loosely holding his left hand, a thick leg over his bare hips, the sheets twisted around them. Soft grunting, newborn puppy like noises escaping the academy teacher while he dreamed.
Kakashi lay there utterly still with his body relaxed, and for the first time in more than two decades… enveloped in a warm, thick blanket of pure, complete… peace.
Relief washed over him, relief and at the same time an overwhelming sense of trepidation.
What if something happened to Iruka? What if someone hurt him just to get to Kakashi?
What if he's killed because of me?
He closed his eyes tightly, vision blurring, and huddled himself back into the sleeping chuunin's embrace.
I won't let that happen… I'll work harder… I'll be better, more vigilant… I'll protect him.
He didn't even notice anything was amiss until he felt Iruka's body tense behind him. Felt that arm draped possessively across his torso tighten, fingers curling and hesitantly touching a smear of wetness on his cheek.
"'Kashi?"
He snaked his right hand across his chest and tangled his fingers in the sheet, childishly drawing it over his face, mumbling a quick something about bad dreams, discreetly scrubbing his cheeks dry.
"Are you alright now?" Iruka planted a few open mouthed, laving, puppy like kisses to his shoulder and neck.
"Yes, Sensei…"
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