Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto!

I haven't written anything in a long time so please be kind.

Sakura sat at the edge of her bed and watched as her ex sensei flinched in his sleep. She had healed his wounds when he showed up at her apartment after this particularly difficult mission as she had many times before. This time, however, this time he had made it to her apartment on sheer will power. His wounds were extensive and momentarily, Sakura had wondered if she would be able to tend his wounds on her own, without hospital equipment. He'd immediately blacked out when he made it inside, and it had taken her a few hours to get everything healed this time.

Making sure as not to wake him, she went about cleaning up the rest of her apartment. A trail of crimson made its way from the balcony at her kitchen, across her living room, and into her bedroom, where the copy ninja now slept. Gauze and bandages were strewn left and right. Kakashi's mission pack had been left in the middle of the floor with his shirt and vest that she had cut off of him to access his wounds.

It wasn't that she minded healing Kakashi, or any of her friends for that matter, it was the fact that they had gotten so spoiled to her care that they often sought her out instead of heading to the hospital, even though they were in critcal care. She couldn't count the times Naruto and Kakashi had let themselves in with the hidden key she kept on her balcony and had left her apartment looking like the emergency room after a huge trauma.

An hour later, Sakura's kitchen had returned to its previous state. Everything that Kakashi had bled on had been put in a bag by the door, and she made a mental note to burn it all when she got back from running her errands that morning. She glanced at the clock and sighed. 8:47am. Deciding to start her day, Sakura jumped in the shower, noticing she was also covered in Kakashi's blood. Once she was out and dressed, she quickly left Kakashi a note that said she was going to run some errands and that she would be back later, though she was pretty sure he would sleep the rest of the day.

Sakura was on her way home, arms laden with bags of food and medical supply, when she ran into Jiraiya. "I'm so sorry! I wasn't paying attention to where I was going!" she apologized as she went about collecting her purchases from the ground.

The white haired Sannin laughed as he also grabbed his few belongings from the ground. "It's fine. I'm just headed to Hokage Tower to see Tsunade before the weather starts." They both looked up at the dark sky, a talltell sign that a horrible storm was coming.

"Hoping to get rained in with Tsunade-sama?" Sakura laughed. After the war, Jiraiya had been extremely presistent in his advances on his old teammate.

A mischievious look crossed his face as he grinned. "Can't blame a man for trying. Besides, life is too short for regrets. I died alone once. I don't want it to happen again." He grabbed two tea boxes from the ground, putting one in her bag and putting the other in his.

Sakura nodded, unsure what to say. Years ago, before the start of the last great war, Jiraiya had been killed at the hands of Pain and then brought back by Nagato's Rinne Rebirth. The wind picked up suddenly.

"Hurry home. I wouldn't want you to get stuck in this storm." the toad sage said, his mind clearly somewhere else.

Sakura nodded. " Yeah, I should probably hurry home. Kakashi-sensei is resting at my apartment. Whatever mission he was on was a rough one. Good luck with Tsunade-sama." she laughed.

"You spoil those boys!" Jiraiya said with as straight of a face as he could as he helped her grab all her bags again.

"Righttt." She laughed as thunder sounded in the distance. Sakura knew, however, that he visited Tsunade after every mission and had since he was a young boy. She said her good byes and walked home slowly, ignoring the upcoming storm, and replayed what the pervy sage had said in her mind.

Sakura was by no means an ugly woman. She had filled out in the years since the war and was an accomplished ninja and medic. She had been on a date here and there but nothing serious. Between missions, her demanding shifts at the hospital, training, and her overprotective friends, Sakura wasn't sure she would ever have a social life much less a romantic life.

"That's it! I'm going to start living out of my comfort zone and having fun," Sakura said with solid conviction as her apartment complex came into view.

Before she could make it inside, far drops of rain fell from the sky. Cursing under the breath she jogged the rest of the way to her apartment. When she got inside, she quietly closed the door behind her and left her bags on the cabinet before going check on Kakashi.

His chest rose and fell softly with every even breath he took. She smiled softly at how handsome and peaceful he looked. As she went to place a hand on his forehead and check for fever, a loud crack of thunder rattled the window in her room. She let out a gasp as Kakashi opened his eyes in alarm.

"How are you feeling?" Sakura asked softly.

"Like I got shot at and missed, shit at and hit." he grumbled as he covered his Sharingan with the ball of his hand.

Sakura chuckled as her hand glowed a soft green and she preformed a routine check up. She pulled the blankets down to examine the work she had done on his torso. She blushed lightly as her hand slid over his chiseled form.

Since the war, their friendship had developed into more than mere teacher-student but neither knew what to make of it. They just went with the flow and enjoyed the time they spent together. They had never crossed any lines but they couldn't deny the chemistry between each other. It wasn't something that either ninja knew how to explore. Kakashi wasn't ready to let her meet his demons, though the war had pretty much made her aware of everything and Sakura still felt like he saw her as the weak and annoying 12 year old child she was when they first met.

"Everything seems to have healed nicely." she commented softly, her hands lingering against her warm skin longer than necessary.

"Never doubted you."

Sakura frowned. For a second she had doubted herself. She had worked a long shift at the hospital and had he gotten to her any earlier, she would have had to tap into her chakra reseves to heal him. It took almost all of her rejuvinated chakra to heal his ribs, internal bleeding and severely damaged organs.

"Rest and I'll go make some dinner and tea."

As she stood up and made her way to the door Kakashi called out to her. She looked over her shoulder at the silver haired man laying half naked in her bed. "Thank you."

"Anytime. Now rest. I'll bring you food and tea when it's done." she exited the room and went to the kitchen to prepare dinner and tea for her guest.

She opened the box of tea and frowned. "I must have accidentally grabbed a different kind." Sakura gave the tea a whiff and shrugged. Seeing nothing wrong with the way it looked or smelled, she waited for the water to get hot enough for her to put the leaves steeping.

...

"Come in!" Tsunade said from her desk. She couldn't wait until Kakashi took over as hokage in a few months. This last mission had been his last. If he returned alive, he had agreed to take over. He'd start training under her with Shikamaru Nara as his main advisor as soon as he was able.

Jiraiya entered the office with a brown bag in his arms. "I come bearing gifts." he smiled. Tsunade eyes him wearily.

"What are you up to?" she asked as lightning illuminated her office.

"I can't come have tea and dango with a dear friend of mine?" he asked, grabbing his chest in mock hurt.

"You can but that doesn't mean that I won't be suspicious of your underlying motives."

"I just want to spend the afternoon with you and gaze upon that beautiful face of yours."

"You're full of it!" the hokage growled though no one could miss the faint blush that spread across her cheeks.

"I'll make some tea." the white haired ninja smiled as he crossed the room and set about his task with a glint in his eyes that said he was up to no good.

The two friends chatted idly as the water warmed. When that was done, Jiraiya took out some of Tsunade's favorite dango and brought it to her while the tea leaves steeped.

"You're kissing ass... why? What have you done or what are you ABOUT to do?" she asked, inspecting the dango.

"I'm genuinely hurt, Tsunade. There is nothing wrong with that dango." he said, slightly peeved but also slightly amused.

Tsunade narrowed her eyes before taking a bite of the sweet and accepted a cup of tea from him. She sniffed it and took a sip, swishing it in her mouth and tasting it for anything out of the ordinary. Deeming it safe, she swallowed. "I don't typically drink something tea this floral but it's decent." she stated.

Jiraiya's grin could have split his face in half. Tsunade glared at him but that only made him smile bigger. "You have to the count of five to tell me what you did before I break all your ribs."

"Okay, so don't kill me," he said as he made his way to where he had prepared the tea and handed the box to the female Sannin.

She read the box over and over before handing it back to him. "It's tea?"

"Yes, but it's SPECIAL tea. See here, it says... oh shit..."

"See what?"

"I fucked up."

"What did you do!?"

With a sigh, Jiraiya began to explain himself. "So you know how we talked about hooking up, but wasn't sure how to cross that line or when would be an appropriate him?"

Anger began to roll off of Tsunade in waves. "Yessss..."

"Well I discovered a tea... that.. urmm.. well... it's a tea that would have... helped things along... you know... got the nerves out of the way..."

"So you're telling me that you bought a tea laced with aphrodisiacs and intended to give it to me without my knowledge while I'm in the middle of a work day?"

"Now when you put it like that it sounds awfully illegal..." the older man frowned.

"But this is regular tea."

"Yes."

"So what happened to your horny tea, Jiraiya?" the blonde woman asked, terrified of what his answer might be.

"Well you see, on my way here I ran into that little apprentice of yours..."

"SAKURA HAS YOUR DAMN HORNY TEA?!" Tsunade bellowed.

"I believe so..."

Tsunade growled and slammed her fist on her desk, causing it creak in protest. The man in front of her flinched. "At least she'll be home alone in this storm. The effects will wear off by the time she has to go into work in the morning. I can tell her about it then and she can DISPOSE of it properly."

"Ummmm... about that..."
"WHAT NOW?!"

"She may have mentioned that Hatake was at her house. He came back from his mission this morning and apparently it was a rough one. She healed him and he was still there resting..."

Tsunade narrowed her eyes before picking her desk up and launching it at her friend. He narrowly dodged it as it shattered against the wall across the room from where the seething Hokage stood.

"Think about it though, Tsuna... Hatake and Haruno... it might not be as bad as you think. They're both single and you can't tell me that you've never picked up on something between them. They would be GREAT for each other! This maybe exactly what they need to take their relationship a bit further."

Tsunade didn't say anything as she thought things over. "For all we know," her author friend continued, "she may have noticed the disclaimer on the bottom of the box and threw it away without serving it."

"If this goes bad I'm coming for you head... BOTH of them!" Tsunade growled as two ninja brought in a new desk from the storage closet. They kept a few on hand over the years, given the hokage's temper and strength.

Jiraiya cringed, praying for his sake, that things between his biggest fan and the little kunoichi worked out well.