Say No to This

"Oh, we'll need some more rice as well!" I commented and dragged Kakashi over to another part of the store. With Kamiko gone on a long-term mission with Team Chi, I was pretty much spending all of my spare time with Kakashi. Kakashi grabbed a big bag of rice and put it with the rest of the groceries.
"Kakashi? Akira?" a familiar voice asked from behind us. I turned around and saw Kurenai and Asuma. Asuma continued talking after getting our attention. "Have you finally started dating?"
"Pardon? If the ever-awesome Nakamaru Akira starts dating someone, I promise you that it'll be totally obvious! Like how the two of you are!" I stated with a mischievous smile, loving their embarrassed looks. The two of them stuttered awkwardly about how that was not the case at all and that they were merely hanging out. "Sure, sure."
"Maa, maa, Kira-chan, let's not embarrassed the couple any further." Kakashi chuckled and put his arm around my waist. "We'll see you guys later."
The two of us walked away from the jonin couple and I tried my best to keep my blush at bay, hoping the extreme cases of blushed for the past year would be enough for me to have learned how to subdue it.

"Kakashi? Why do everyone think we're going out?" I asked him after we payed for everything and started our way to Kamiko and I's apartment.
"Well we're buying groceries together, I usually stay at your place whenever Kamiko is gone and not to mention that…-" Kakashi started responding as casually as if he was talking about the weather.
"By that logic, I might as well be dating Kamiko though! I mean we actually live together!" I insisted, still confused as to what that had to do with anything.
"Hm… How about we change it to why did you think Kurenai and Asuma are going out?" Kakashi questioned.
"Because they were totally obvious! Groceries shopping, the casual touches, the looks they think nobody else can see. They're clearly together!" I explained with an eyeroll.
"Oh, like this?" Kakashi leaned closer and brushed some of my hair behind my ear. "Not to mention that the two of us are doing the same thing."
"Yeah… Just like that." I somehow managed to say without stuttering, feeling a heath try to creep up my neck.
"Is my Kira-chan blushing?" he asked me, and I could practically feel him smirking behind his mask.
"I am not!" I insisted but checked my reflection in the window behind him to be on the safe side.
"Mou, mou, I'm only joking Kira-chan." He chuckled. "So cute Kira-chan."
"Shut up, Kaka-baka!"

Waking up with Kakashi holding me, feeling his heartbeat under my head was one of the best feelings in the world. Unfortunately, it was always followed up by one of the worst feelings in the world: having to get up from his warm grasp.
"Time to get up, Kakashi." I mumbled into his chest, cuddling into his warmth.
"We can always be late." He mumbled back and pulled me even closer. "We can say that we got lost in the bedroom."
"That sounds even worse than your normal excuses." I scoffed and somehow managed to find the will to try and release myself from his grip. "Let's get up, Kaka-baka. I have a bunch of new missions to distribute between my force and old drills to renew."
"Always so serious, Kira-chan." Kakashi said and reluctantly let go of me. "Tsunade-sama did threaten to illegalize Icha Icha if I was late for another meeting…"
"Yeah, the one time I delivered my monthly rapport late, she through her desk at me." I smirked at him. "You might not want to risk it."
"Fine, fine…"

By the end of the following week, I noticed a change in Kakashi. First of all, he went on a lot of more solo missions than before. And not just any types of solo missions, but the ones meant for jonin teams. Missions that were considered too suicidal to complete alone. Yet he insisted on going alone and as the village was currently lacking in manpower, Tsunade had no reason to tell him no. I noticed how tired he looked, how he always had to stop by the hospital and while it hadn't been anything serious yet, it was only a matter of time. Now life as a shinobi was far from risk-free, but what he was doing was just plainly suicidal. The thought of him losing his life was a horrible one that made my insides churn in pain, my heart clench in agony and my mind lose focus completely. Still, I had no authority over which missions he chose to take, and it was starting to piss me off. If that brat had stayed in ANBU I could have ordered him to take the missions as a team, but alas I now stood without any power to stop him. Still, finding out that he had gotten himself hospitalized because of a mission was enough to make me feel like the world was falling apart as I knew it.

I had left a few Shadow Clones to do my normal work and used the Shunshin to get to the hospital quickly and found him sitting up in his bed with bandages wrapped all around his chest era.
"Kami! What happened?" I gasped and ran the final steps over to the silver-haired man.
"I miscalculated." Kakashi stated with a shrug, as if he hadn't gotten stabbed with a sword and barely made it back alive.
"You miscalculated?" I asked, now feeling angry at the top of all the worry and stress. "You fucking miscalculated? Had it not been for Tsunade's quick treatment, you would have lost your life and all you can say is that you miscalculated?"
"Maa, these things happen, Kira-chan. You've been hospitalized a lot as well." He responded calmly, triggering the brewing storm inside me even more.
"At least I don't leave on mission I know will highly likely leave me dead!" I hissed at him, furious at his light thoughts on the situation. "What am I supposed to do if you are killed in action, huh? Cheer up and move on? You of all people should now that life doesn't work like that!"
"It's a wound, it'll pass." He told me, still not taking the matter seriously.
"And I guess after you're cleared, you'll pick the hardest possible mission and do it solo?" I fumed at him, wanting so desperately to slap some sense into the bastard.
"It's my job." Now he was serious as well.
"Yes, but the least you could do is bring a team. That's what everyone else does." I argued, feeling my eyes burning with angry tears. "For someone who stresses teamwork, you sure seem to forget about it when it comes to you."
"You've done just as dangerous missions before, who are you to tell me to stop?" he scoffed at me, his one visible eye glaring. I flinched at it, never having seen his angry glare directed at me before.
"Only when necessary. I know it's your duty, but you're running in with no regard for the people you leave in Konoha. You have your friends, your students. You have me!" I couldn't stop the tears from falling, crying again for the first time since I lost Shisui-nii-san and Tachi. "Why are you taking these missions when there are others who can take them with you?"
I looked at me in complete silence. The fierce glare leaving his eye, and a look of understanding replacing it. Carefully, he grabbed my hand and intertwined our fingers.
"Why don't you sit down? Let's talk about this calmly." He proposed and positioned me on his bed so that I was still facing him.
"Fine…" I muttered and dried my tears with my sleeve, snuffling slightly. "I'm worried about you. Every time you pick a mission like this, I fear it'll be your last. I can't lose you, Kakashi. Especially you."
"How about a deal, then?" he asked me, using the hand not holding mine to brush yet another tear off my cheek. "I'll only take on these missions solo, if necessary."
"And? You said a deal." I asked him, wondering what he wanted in return.
"Tell me what you mean with what you just said." He asked me and I looked at him in a mild confusion. "What do you mean by especially me?"
"Oh…" I muttered and looked away from him in embarrassment. 'How do you tell a man that you think you like him, but you're not really sure because you've never liked anyone before?' I asked myself in frustration. I took a deep breath in and opened my mouth. "You're… you're special to me. I suppose I've gotten so used to having you around that it feels wrong for you not to be there."
"Meaning?" Kami he was really going to make me say it, wasn't he?
"Meaning that you mean a lot to me. I care about you a lot, and I like you a lot." I muttered the last part so quickly and lowly that I couldn't imagen him understanding what I was saying.
"I like you a lot too." He responded, shocking me and invoking a harsh blush. "I've liked you a lot for quite some time now. Though clearly my advances weren't strong enough for you to notice them."
"What? I think I would have noticed that!" I argued, turning back to glare childishly at him. "I'm not blind!"
"Akira, I've literally been hovering around you for the past year." He deadpanned and I realized that he did in fact have a small point. Not that I would ever admit that. "Do you think I would spend so much time and effort spending time with and flirting with someone I didn't like?"
"You were flirting?" I asked him in shock.
"I gave you a nickname, held your hands, introduced you to my friends, invited you for dinner… Hell I even slept over at your place more times than I can count." He told me with a snort. "The only way I could have been more obvious would be if I walked around with a sign saying that I am interested in you."
"Oh… I must seem pretty stupid and unobservant…" I muttered ashamed. He did state some very valid point, though for some reason it was a lot easier to notice someone else being approached in similar manner than when I was the one getting approached.
"Well, when it comes romantics, yes." He stated shamelessly. "As a ninja, though, I would say no."
"Well, at least I haven't lost all of your respect." I groaned. 'Ok, maybe we should abort mission visit Kakashi?' I probably would have used a Shunshin had it not been for his hand still holding mine.
"There's one way to regain all of my respect though." He said solemnly and my eyes snapped up to meet his. "You must say yes to my question."
"Sure! What's the question?" really, I should have known what would happen. I wasn't called Konoha's Pranking Queen for nothing. Yet in that moment all such thoughts alluded me.
"Be my girlfriend?" he asked, and I reacted the way any reasonable person would, and hit him hard on the shoulder.
"What the hell, Kaka-baka?" I hissed and would have jumped right out of the bed had it not been for the hand holding mine. 'If this is a prank or something, I will seriously maim you!'
"I'm serious though… C'mon, Kira-chan! You promised!" he whined and tugged on my hand.
"Fine, but only because I really like you!" I huffed and turned my head away, my cheeks flaming up, much hotter than ever before.
"Great! Now give your boyfriend kiss, Kira-chan!" it felt strange to hear him refer to himself that way, strange but also somehow right.
"No can do, you're still hospitalized, wouldn't want to risk the health of my boyfriend." I told him with a sweet, innocent smile and got up. "I need to get back to work now, so you just focus on getting well again."
"Mou, so rude, Kira-chan…"