He had had a crush on Iruka since the chuunin became Naruto's academy instructor.
Kakashi had only intended to investigate him as far as whether or not the young man would be a suitable guardian for his old sensei's progeny. He was impressed and delighted that it hadn't taken much prodding for the chuunin's heart to open to the boy that all others ignored. Kakashi didn't really need to watch over the duo after that, but his heart warmed every time he saw them together; the tan teacher giving Naruto the tough-love he needed, while still making sure that the 'love' part was prominent – the way that Kakashi hadn't been able to provide for Naruto in his childhood due to his rank and own inner demons.
It wasn't hard to develop a crush on Iruka. Kakashi was an adult. He could enjoy the fun of a little crush from afar.
On Saturdays, Kakashi took his team out for ramen after training. He was aware that most jounin instructors gave their students the weekends off and used the time to catch up on higher-rank solo missions in order to keep up their skills and line their pockets with extra cash. However, Kakashi was more than happy to use Saturdays as an excuse to put his team through extra rigorous training. It was the one day of the week he didn't act extraordinarily lazy – and the one day a week that his students wished he did. Which was entirely why he did it.
But, at the end of the day, when Naruto's high-pitched whines started resembling those of his nin-dogs, he rewarded them for their hard work with dinner. He knew that the two orphan boys were probably more grateful for the hot meal than Sakura, but she was obviously just thrilled to get to enjoy a casual meal, in public, with Sasuke; so, he was sure that she appreciated it as well, in her own, bizarre, teenage-girl way.
One such night, as he was trying valiantly to lecture Naruto on his horrible eating manners without knocking him senseless, Kakashi was almost kicked off his stool by said blonde boy as the kyuubi-holder suddenly lunged from his place beside him and clear across the ramen stand with a loud cry. Kakashi's every muscle tensed as he whipped toward the commotion, prepared for the arrival of an enemy – and let every muscle relax with an exasperated sigh when he saw the poor academy instructor flat on his butt, arms full of hyper genin.
But his eye curved into a happy arc, and he was more than pleased to echo Naruto's invitation to sit with them. Of course, the blonde insisted on wedging himself directly between his two teachers and loudly drowning out anything anyone else might say with his own complaining.
All of which was about Kakashi and how mean he was.
Which was really quite rude, considering he was sitting right next to him and was paying for the ungrateful brat to stuff his face. But Kakashi only made a resigned, pitying look to the heavens and decided that he could at least be grateful that Naruto had the balls to complain about him to his face. Most people in the village only talked about him behind his back.
He was barely listening anymore until the newest complaint arose that he – mean, horrible, adult that he was – had forced Naruto to order extra vegetables in his ramen and had been diligent about making sure that he didn't pick them out. "He's almost as bad as you are!" Naruto announced, apparently not caring that he was insulting the two people in the village that actually, god forbid, took care of his dumb ass.
But Iruka didn't yell. Kakashi only heard a light, "Oh, really?" And when he looked up, the teacher was gazing at him over the top of Naruto's blonde tufts. His brown eyes were soft and staring at the jounin with a type of admiration and gratitude that he had never seen cross the chuunin's features before. And when Iruka caught his eye, the tan man smiled.
Kakashi was done for.
His mind went blank and his whole being erupted into a searing heat. He had seen Iruka smile a thousand times before. He smiled every day at his students. He smiled every time he handed out a mission or received a completed report. He had even smiled at Kakashi numerous times. But this was different. This wasn't his normal, civil, professional smile that he wore for the world. It didn't show his teeth or take up his entire face, like it was trying to put on a show. Instead, it lit up from within his very soul. It was deeper, genuine, and just for him.
Kakashi gulped and forced air back into his lungs, making a conscious effort to breathe again. He quickly turned his eye up into its patented, casual U-shape and grinned sheepishly beneath his mask before turning away. He had no idea how long he had stared like an idiot before coming back to his normal behavior. It had felt like minutes, but, considering no one else seemed to notice how utterly weird he was being, he figured it had actually only been a passing moment.
He avoided looking at the chuunin again until it was time to leave. He quickly put down enough money to cover the other man as well and waved off the protestations with another wide grin beneath his mask. Naruto, thankfully, interrupted anymore argument on the matter by loudly jumping between them to inform Iruka that he needed to stop working so much so that he could take him out for ramen more often.
Iruka laughed and ruffled the kid's already messy hair. "I wish I could, Naruto. I've barely seen you since you graduated…" he trailed off, trying to hide the sadness that was creeping across his features and into his voice. But Kakashi caught it immediately, and his heart tightened at the mere fleeting sight of a sad Iruka.
"We're here every Saturday," he found himself supplying.
Iruka's eyes snapped to him.
"You're welcome to join us anytime, sensei." He tried to keep the normal smile on his face and his posture firm, while totally not flop-sweating under the intense brown eyes.
Iruka scratched awkwardly at the scar on his nose. "Oh! I wouldn't want to intrude…"
"No intrusion at all. It gives Naruto someone else to complain to all evening."
The brown eyes stared again.
One beat.
Then two.
Finally, the tan face relaxed into another grateful smile, and Kakashi used every jounin power he had to keep from bolting away like an embarrassed little kid with a bright red face. "I would like that. Thank you, Kakashi-sensei."
Kakashi merely nodded. He hoped it made him look cool and calm, but mostly, it was because he didn't trust words to come out properly anymore.
That was the night that his little crush became not so little.
And Saturdays became his new favorite night.
Saturdays hadn't been that way in a while. He didn't have a team to train or treat to ramen anymore. He honestly didn't know if Iruka would have joined them any longer, even if he did. Things had been strained between them since they had disagreed over whether or not the chuunin exam was a good idea for his students. The teacher had still shown up most weeks, purely to see Naruto, but had always made sure to sit as far from him as possible and avoid most conversation. He definitely hadn't let Kakashi pay for his meals anymore. The more time that went by with them still on unpleasant terms, the tenser it became for them to continue interacting as though nothing was wrong.
After all was said and done, Kakashi cursed himself for not just being an adult and apologizing. Iruka had done his share in saying sorry to him in private for his disrespectful outburst in public. Kakashi had accepted it graciously… but had failed to offer his own apologies for the things he said. He had still been a little salty at the time, but now, he realized what a dumbass he was for being too stubborn to just do what needed to be done to truly smooth things over. Iruka was only caring about his students – and wasn't that what Kakashi liked about him in the first place? He wasn't 12 anymore. He shouldn't have been so damn triggered by someone questioning him.
Iruka was too polite to insist upon a return apology, but he clearly noticed the lack of it. Since that conversation, Kakashi was lucky if Iruka even threw him a polite, tight-lipped smile in the mission room when they absolutely had to interact. He certainly didn't smile at him in the way that made Kakashi's heart go crazy.
It had been so long now, he felt like his window for apologizing and getting them back to normal had passed. So, he kept quiet and simply avoided the teacher as much as possible so that he didn't have to suffer through a detached, or irritated, look from him.
Kakashi didn't have a ton of free time lately to think about how his crush had blown up in his face, but on nights like tonight, when his brain was trying desperately to unwind from battle and think about anything else, it often popped into his head. Saturdays were now nights when he was normally dragging his mission-weary form home from a week or two out in the field.
They were also the nights when Tsunade insisted on getting drunk and playing poker, despite the fact that she knew damn well that Kakashi would probably be returning with sensitive information, so he normally reported to Shizune instead, lest the Hokage not quite remember everything he told her, or worse – shanghaied him into playing with her. He didn't much care to be swindled out of money by his leader. Or to take her money, as she would surely make him suffer for it.
Shizune spent every Saturday night doing end-of-the-week filing in the mission room. Which was probably why Tsunade picked it for her poker night – so that her assistant couldn't be around to chastise or physically stop her from making poor choices.
At least that made one of them easy to find to report to. He could see the light still on up in the mission room as he approached. Good. All Kakashi wanted to do was give his report, shower, and sleep.
But just as he was about to pull himself through the window, he jolted to a stop and quickly crouched back down, sticking to the outside wall with chakra. It wasn't Shizune inside.
It was Iruka.
His heart leapt at the unexpected sight. The chuunin's back was turned, so luckily, he hadn't seen Kakashi about to come in. The jounin deftly crawled his way to the side of the window and leaned over just enough to peek inside. The tan man was sorting papers with his normal diligence, though he was moving with a much more relaxed posture than he normally did during the workday. No sign of Shizune. Maybe she was sick.
He watched the other ninja work for a few more minutes, relishing in the fact that the darkness allowed him to take a good solid look at the other man in a way that he hadn't been able to for months without pissing off Iruka. His stomach twisted painfully as he realized that he probably hadn't even seen Iruka's face look so calm since their argument, as the chuunin was always instantly tense around him now.
His eye softened in sadness. Back in the day, this would have been the perfect opportunity for him to go in and say hi; to get a few moments of alone time with the teacher. But he couldn't do that now… It would only disturb Iruka's peace.
He finally turned away and propelled himself to the nearest roof, breaking his depressing reverie. He still needed to find someone to report to.
Shizune wasn't at home, nor in the hospital, dashing Kakashi's theory about her being sick or injured. He finally found her flanking a drunk and rambunctious Tsunade in the shadiest bar in town, the sober assistant trying fruitlessly to talk the blonde woman out of a ridiculously ill-advised bet. When she spotted Kakashi, she pleaded in vain with the Hokage not to make any decisions while she stepped away for a few minutes and led the jounin to an empty room in the back.
"I've been looking for you for an hour. I went to the mission room first, but…" Kakashi gestured to her, not really bothering to hide the fact that he was annoyed by having to track her down.
Shizune had the grace to look abashed. "Yeah, sorry. I was complaining this morning about how I always spend Sundays cleaning up the fallout from whatever mess Tsunade makes here on Saturdays, and Iruka overheard me and offered to take over the weekly filing. I wasn't about to turn that down." She gave Kakashi a quizzical look as the thought hit her. "He knew where I was. Didn't you ask him?"
Kakashi scratched the back of his neck, not meeting the woman's eye. That would have been the most intelligent thing to do. But it also would have meant interacting with Iruka and dealing with a civil, but cold, reception. And he just hadn't had it in him to deal with that after the week he'd already had. He didn't feel like explaining any of this to Shizune though, so he opted for very smoothly changing the subject to his verbal report without answering the question. She let it slide, but he didn't miss the brief look of exasperated understanding that flitted across her face. She hadn't been around for their little disagreement, but the fact that a chuunin had stood up to and yelled at Kakashi Hatake was practically legend around the village, so he knew she had heard the story at some point.
It was probably the tamest gossip about him floating around, but it stung more painfully than some of the harshest rumors.
Kakashi had thought about Iruka taking over the end-of-week filing all week. It made sense, he supposed. Iruka was already a bit of a workaholic. And now, he didn't even have Naruto to spend his Saturday evenings with. He probably volunteered just to give himself something to occupy his time on the night that he had come to associate with seeing his favorite student but was now sadly vacant.
Kakashi understood that feeling. He tried to act like the dissolution of his team didn't bother him beyond Sasuke's betrayal, but suddenly being genin-less had left a rather large hole in his heart. He briefly thought about the fact that their similar loneliness would have been the perfect excuse to continue their Saturday night dinners one-on-one, but that obviously wasn't an option anymore.
He was currently on his way home from briefing Shizune at the bar again and had to go right past the mission room. Before he even had time to realize that he had had the thought, he was up several stories and stuck to the wall outside the window again. He just wanted to take a quick peek. Really.
Iruka was moving languidly yet efficiently again. And he was also…
Kakashi leaned forward just slightly and strained his ears as he saw the chuunin's lips moving.
He was singing.
Kakashi was shocked but delighted. He had never seen or heard Iruka do such a thing. Most ninja, in general, did not wander around singing.
It was soft, but the tones hit Kakashi's ears, and he decided that the tan man actually had a pretty decent voice.
What really caused his heart to swell though was that Iruka was smiling softly as he sang. It wasn't quite the same type of smile that he used to wear around Kakashi, but he looked happier than he had been in months since Sandaime's death and Naruto's departure. All Kakashi wanted at that point was to see Iruka happy.
And if that meant keeping himself in the shadows and out of the chuunin's way, so be it.
That didn't mean he stopped spying, however. It became his new Saturday night ritual, post-mission or not, to head to the window and watch Iruka work. The teacher seemed to genuinely enjoy his time filing, and had found in it a secluded break from everyday life that didn't involve sitting around his tiny apartment.
After a couple weeks, he graduated from singing by himself to bringing a radio. Kakashi had to stifle a laugh when he discovered what Iruka's favorite song was, because the chuunin would bust into dance every time it came on. His dancing, sadly, was nothing like his singing. But it obviously made him happy, and Kakashi found it endearing that he would dance at all when he had to know how terrible he was at it.
Sometimes, Genma stopped by to gift him takeout and chat for a bit.
Every once in awhile, Konohamaru was with him, because Ebisu had work to attend to and didn't trust the kid to put himself to bed. Kakashi loved Konohamaru nights, because Iruka would entertain him by telling stories. And when Iruka told a story, he told a story. He knew exactly how to pace his wording to build suspense, used facial expressions to his full advantage, did all the voices, and acted out fights. He had Konohamru absolutely howling with delight when he would throw the papers out of his hands and jump up on the mission desk while animatedly detailing a fast-paced, action-packed scene.
The kid had told him on the first night that he wasn't a baby and didn't need to be told stories, but Iruka had started in on one anyway. Kakashi was pretty sure he went so over the top with it just to cheer his student up given how his life had gone in the last few months. And it worked. The jounin could tell how insanely happy it made Iruka to make Konohamaru laugh again.
Once it got later, he would wind him down with a less thrilling story, recited in a soft voice while he got back to his paperwork. By the time Ebisu showed up to collect him, he would be peacefully asleep atop a blanket on the floor.
Kakashi's time at the window quickly progressed from just a few minutes to check on him and see his face to being outside until the chuunin finished up and walked out the door.
And yes, he was perfectly aware that he was both creepy and pathetic, thank you very much.
But seeing Iruka happy again, if only for a few hours on Saturday nights, was the only thing Kakashi currently had in his life that made him happy.