AN: Long time, no post. I've got a good reason though, namely I wanted the next chapter done before I posted this. It will be up shortly.
Kakashi is certain he never agreed to this. He didn't explicitly say no either, because Hermione asked him at a time when he didn't dare upset her more than he already had, but he'd thought he could weasel his way out of it later. It's Thursday now, and they're already on their way, and it's too late to get out of anything. Yet, he found a way to deal with twelve-year-old horrifyingly shy, scared-of-her-own-shadow Sakura; her can find a way to deal with this.
The talking in the car can hardly be called a conversation. Hermione rants about something called Brexit that is apparently a mess. Kakashi looks out the window on the ice-columns frozen where water finds its way down the mountainside, lets Hermione's words wash over him, and tries to hum in the right places. He wishes he'd been allowed to eat breakfast.
He leaves Hermione knitting in the waiting room and follows a woman with hair greyer than his through a pale-yellow corridor. She's his doctor, Kakashi's gathered. Apart from that, he has no idea what to expect. For as long as he remembers, his only visits to the hospital have been either ordered for a specific purpose, or started with him bleeding heavily or unconscious. This isn't a shinobi hospital, it's a civilian health care center, and he should turn around and leave. If he does, Hermione will see him, unfortunately. There are no good options here.
"Well, Kakashi, where are you from?" The doctor – who goes by a strange name Kakashi can't remember – smiles at him from her chair by the desk. Kakashi looks out the window behind her. The sky is blue today, not a cloud in sight.
"Does that matter?" He asks. At the edge of his vision he catches movement in the doctor's jaw.
"Not really," she says, "but I think it's good to know a little about my patients. To put the medicinal findings to perspective." The original question isn't repeated and Kakashi doesn't offer the information. "How about how long you've been in Iceland, and how long you're planning to stay? That is relevant for me to know."
"Two and a half months. Probably another six months." Glancing over at the doctor when she writes his answers down gives Kakashi little to go on.
She asks about what he does next, here and at home. When he says he's in the army her eyes jump from the paper for a split second, taking him in before she finishes writing the word. Family medical history comes after that, and she doesn't ask for details when he says he doesn't know. He remembers little of his mother, apart from the hushed, tense atmosphere of her hospital room, and at this point there is no one he can ask.
"So, tell me; what can I help you with?" The doctor puts down her pen and adjusts her glasses. She smiles in what must be meant to be an encouraging way. But he can't answer 'Hermione,' and that is all he has. "Your friend, out in the waiting room, was she the one who set the appointment?"
"Yes," Kakashi says. A glance shows the doctor looking at something on her computer. On the wall opposite Kakashi are posters showing skinless human bodies. He tries to remember where all the chakra coils are.
"She said you suffer from – and I quote here – extreme tiredness, possibly due to depression, stress, PTSD, or other mental health issues. Does that sound about right?" Kakashi shrugs. The first part is not wrong. He tries to ignore the rest. The doctor adjusts her chair and faces him more directly. "Kakashi," she says, "I can't help you if you don't tell me what you need help with." She doesn't rant and swear like Tsunade, doesn't come off caring the way Sakura does. She is a nameless, faceless healer halfway across the world.
"I am tired," he admits, eyes still on the poster, mind still on where the chakra coils would be.
"Okay," she says, "in which way?"
With a myriad of questions, most of them requiring only a yes or no answer, the doctor coaxes it out of him: The exhaustion, the way he can't fall asleep some evening and can't stay awake some days, the unresponsiveness in his body, the fever he had last week, the way he sometimes looses track of the conversations he's participating in. Kakashi's speech is chopped up, most answers either monosyllabic or only a few words. Maybe that's why his vocal cords cramp up and ache.
"Is every day the same or does it vary?" Kakashi looks from the poster to the doctor's notebook, wishing he could understand what's written there. He wouldn't be here if the weariness of last week had followed him into this one. This conversation is exhausting enough as it is.
"It varies," he says. The tightness is spreading down his throat, affecting his chest.
"Okay," the doctor says. It's been her reaction to everything so far. "I'd like you to fill this one out next." She puts a paper and a pen down in front of Kakashi.
.oOo.
A piece of surgical tape pulls uncomfortably at the skin in the crook of Kakashi's arm as he rejoins Hermione in the waiting room. The blood samples a nurse took from him after the doctor finished will take several days to analyze, and the doctor will call with the results. Hopefully he'll never see this place again.
"All done?" Hermione asks, stowing the knitting away. Wisps of unruly hair are escaping the bun on the top of her head. She thinks he's mentally ill, he remembers. That's what she said when she called to set the appointment. She thinks this is happening to him because he can't control his own mind.
"Yep," Kakashi says and stuffs his hands in his pockets. He tries a deep breath to try and force the pressure off his ribcage. Hermione moves relatively normal now, but the care for her knee is there if one knows where to look.
"How did it go?" Hermione asks once the door swings shut behind them. "If you don't mind me asking?"
"I'm a bit tired of answering question, to be honest." He means for it to come out as a joke, he really does, but his voice goes flat in the wrong way. Hermione glances at him carefully. Like she thinks he's losing it.
"Alright," Hermione says, "how about," she cuts herself off, "no, that's a question." She stops with a sigh and turns to him, effectively forcing him to do the same. The sunshine has a bit of warmth to it, and early promise of spring. "Unless you object I'm taking you to this café I know. I only had time for half a breakfast, and you haven't eaten, and they make great pie." Hermione's shoulders shift in the silence, the details of the motion lost in her jacket.
It's the perfect opportunity to distance himself from her. Just ask her to drive him home instead, and then never talk to her again, but Kakashi doesn't want to risk an outright fight. He doesn't have the energy for one at the moment. Besides, he is hungry. He can get through this, and once he'll get home he can avoid her peacefully. Kakashi is fully functional, tiredness or not, and he doesn't need people in his life who thinks otherwise.
"Show me the way," he says and folds his eyes to a smile.
.oOo.
"You are not his mother," Hermione's mum had said when Hermione told her about taking Kakashi to the doctor. It's true, Hermione is not, but she likes to think she's his friend. Friends are there for one another. "You need to stop sacrificing yourself for others. You care too much." It's been said so many times Hermione had known it was coming a good minute before the words were spoken. It's also true. Probably. People have taken advantage of her again and again. Even so, Hermione refuses to see a world where me is put before we and caring comes with a prerequisite of getting more out of it for yourself.
Hermione has spent enough time with Kakashi by now to have a framework for how to read him. She knows which tone he uses when he jokes, how to tell from the shape of his chin under the mask if a smile reaches his lips, how he stills when he freaks out. She knows to tell his disinterested absences from his tired ones. But as they eat their pies, she has no idea what to make of him.
Kakashi can be distant in his laid-back way, but as they make small talk over the scruffy hardwood table of the café he is actively distant. More than that even, Hermione realizes; he's being passive aggressive. And passive aggressiveness is probably on the top ten of Hermione's most hated things, right along things like bigotry, wars, and alternative facts.
Finishing up her food Hermione folds her napkin up and throws it on her plate. A sigh escapes her. "Let's get out of here," she says. The whole thing is putting her in a bad mood.
The walk back to the car is done in silence.
Leaving the car key unturned in the ignition Hermione leans her head back and looks at the beige fabric on the ceiling above her. She doesn't know who she's angrier with: Kakashi for being infantile, or herself for being lousy enough to keep ending up in situations like this. Letting her head fall to the right she watches Kakashi watch the windshield.
"I was going to suggest a road trip to Goðafoss since it's only half an hour from here, but since I'm not allowed to ask questions I guess we're going home, huh?" Resorting to passive aggressiveness of her own might not be the best way to deal with this situation, but Hermione is hurt, and angry, and doesn't feel like being reasonable.
"Whichever you want," Kakashi tells the dashboard.
"What I want," Hermione says, losing the passive dimension of her annoyance, "is for you to tell me what is wrong."
"Nothing is wrong." Kakashi glances at her, his composure stony calm, "except you are yelling at me."
"Really?" Hermione makes a great effort to maintain speaking volume. "Really? Then what are you doing? Because the way I see it you're either punishing me for something I didn't to, which is unfair. Or, you're angry about something I did do, without giving me the chance to either explain or apologize, which is also unfair. So, if you can quit being a baby about it and tell me what's going on, that'd be great." Hermione crosses her arms but refuse to break eye contact. When fighting with a dog, whoever looks away first loses.
Kakashi unbuckles his seatbelt and turns away. Hermione feels victorious until she realizes he's opening the door and stepping out. "What are you doing?" She asks, the edges sharp against her tongue.
"I'll walk home," Kakashi says, as if it's a perfectly normal thing to do and Hermione's not in the middle of a fight with him. He closes the door before Hermione can remind him it's a 25-kilometer walk, but it's his own damn fault anyway.
It's tempting to scream or hit the steering wheel, like they do in the movies, but Hermione sits quietly and watches Kakashi walk away in the rearview mirror. Once he's out of sight the impulse has gone away.
This is not good. No. This is fucked up. Beyond all reason. Hermione breaths, slowly, in and out. Tries to tell herself the pain in her abdomen is righteous indignation. It's unfair, Kakashi behaving like an ass and then acting all innocent about it, walking away with his honor intact while anxiety grows in Hermione like a weed.
Okay. She needs a plan. Nothing can be done about what has already happened, but if she can come up with a way to fix it she'll be fine again. Kakashi can get some time to walk it off, half an hour maybe, and then she'll catch up with him and apologize. It will be fine. Just breath. 23 minutes she tells herself; when the clock hits a quarter past she can go make it right. She has until then to plan what to say and get herself under control. There will be no screaming on her part, and no crying. She can do this.
Hermione's hands are sticky against the steering wheel as she starts the car. Her thoughts feel like a herd of pixies, wrecking general havoc inside her head. She drives slowly while she's in town, forcing her mind to focus enough to not run red lights and make sure there are no pedestrians at the crossings. It's not until she hits fifty kilometer an hour that she realizes she's still in the second gear.
The regular houses have given away to farms when she catches up with Kakashi. Like ever, he's got his hands in his pockets, looking for all the world like he's on a relaxed stroll down the road. Hermione's mouth dries up. According to plan she drives past him, stops at the side, turns on the hazard lights, and steps out. She walks back to meet him.
"I'm sorry." The wind is in her back as Hermione stops, certain she's close enough for Kakashi to hear. "Okay? I'm sorry. For yelling." She's not sorry for calling him out on his behavior after all. Kakashi hasn't acknowledged Hermione's presence in any way, and he's almost at her side now. With her knee she won't be able to keep up with him if he passes. "But please," Hermione continues, "don't do this to me."
She feels like crying and screaming, but she promised herself she'd do neither. Closing her fist, she burrows the nails into her palm and focus on the pain there instead of in her chest. Her other hand reaches out to catch Kakashi's arm before he walks away. He stops and turns to her, raising his eyebrows in question, like she's a stranger asking for directions.
"Don't do this to me," Hermione repeats. "It's not fair, I've been trying so hard to be your friend, you can't just," she shakes her head and bites her lip. She's been working on not being herself, she thought she was making progress, and now here they are. "Just tell me what I did!" The words rip from her in a tone too close to desperation, but she cannot take them back. Will not. If anything, Kakashi owes her this.
"You did nothing," Kakashi tells her. It feels as physical as a punch to the diaphragm.
"Yeah?" Hermione has tears in her eyes and she can't tell if they're from anger or pain. She snatches her hand back from the contact with Kakashi. "Because if I haven't done anything wrong, I guess I must be wrong. And I'm so goddamn tired of feeling like that."
Hermione keeps her back straight and her head high as she walks away.
.oOo.
Kakashi stands on the empty road with sun in his hair and ice in his veins. Hermione and the car are gone. He'd meant to create distance between them, but not like this. This aches deep inside him in a nauseating way.
His fingers move undirected to the arm where Hermione was holding him, only minutes earlier, brushing over the fabric of his jacket. Closing his eyes Kakashi tries to take a deep breath, but it gets stuck in his chest.
He starts walking.
AN: Cliffhanger, I know. Sorry! Like I said, the next chapter will be up shortly. In the meantime; let me know what you think!