Me: Sorry for taking so long. I feel loved! I got reviews! I want to apologize for something I have been doing by mistake! I have tried a few times to teach myself Japanese, but it didn't work out very well. As a consequence of such, I have been stupidly using "ano saa" as a way to say "I'm sorry" as opposed to "gomen" because I had seen it used in a way several times that suggested to me that it meant as such. I was informed that that was wrong, so I won't be doing that ever again. To say the least, I am rather embarrassed! So, Gomen Nasai! (I know that is correct for I'm sorry. If I was able to teach myself anything, it was that, lol)

"Now where did he go?" Kakashi wondered, looking unhurriedly up and down the street outside the hokage's office. It was still quite early in the morning, at least by his standards, and the people of Konoha were only just rising. "How am I supposed to keep an eye on him if he disappears before I even get out the door." He sighed. The only thing to do was to go look for him. He sent chakra to his legs and jumped up to the nearest rooftop, then from that one to the next. Searching was always quicker that way. As he scanned the streets below, his mind wandered back to his earlier meeting with the hokage.

Two Hours Previous

"You wanted to see me, Hokage-sama?" Kakashi asked nonchalantly as he slouched against the door, half an hour late. (He normally didn't keep the Hokage waiting too long) The other occupant of the room,(besides the two other jounin who were listening without looking like they were listening) the Hidden Mist jounin, looked vaguely annoyed at being kept waiting. Kakashi couldn't really give a hang. After all, the kid was lucky. For him, he was early.

"Ahhh, Kakashi-san, you remember our guest?" Kakashi sent an uninterested "Yo." in the young man's direction. He got a small smile in return. "I regret that we had not had the opportunity to find him someone with which to live." Kakashi got the familiar feeling in his gut he usually got right when something was about to come along and make his poor life even more complicated.

"You want me to take care of him?" Kakashi guessed, ignoring the look that was sent his way by the young jounin at the thought that he needed to be 'taken care of.' The Hokage simply cleared his throat while everyone else in the room looked surprised while trying not to look surprised. "I'll take that as a yes." The Hokage gave a short nod. Kakashi shrugged and headed for the door.

"Sure, he can stay with me. I'm hardly home anyway." he said over his shoulder, motioning for the other man to follow him.

"Kakashi-san, if you would hold on for a moment. I already had Kastumi-san's things moved to your apartment." Kakashi felt a pang of annoyance at this, but by-passed it with another shrug. The Hokage looked around the room.

"If the rest of you wouldn't mind leaving the room for a moment, I would like to speak to Kakashi-san alone." Bowing respectfully, the other three cleared the room, looking curious while pretending they did not to look curious. When the door closed, silence permeated the room for several seconds until the Hokage finally spoke.

"Normally I wouldn't have asked something like this of you, Kakashi-san. However, I want you to keep an eye on him. I don't want him to get into any trouble that might jeopardize our peace with the Village hidden in the Mist. Don't take anymore high class missions unless you feel safe taking him with you." Kakashi made a face under his mask, but bowed anyway. Figuring the hokage was finished with him, he walked out the door. The hokage sighed. He knew that Kakashi didn't like his new assignment, but he was the best man for the job, so he would have to deal with it.

Kakashi looked up and down the corridors. The Hidden Mist jounin was gone. The other two were staring at him with open fascination, not even bothering to try and not look curious. Ignoring them, Kakashi headed out the door to find his charge.

Back to the Hear and the Now

And that was why he was where he was now. Leaping from roof to roof. Until something caught his eye. Something bright orange and yellow.

Yuki was amazed at the amount of concentration baby-sitting took. He had always looked down on the academy teachers in his village as the weak and peaceful types. Iruka was peaceful, but while his strength might not have been fighting, keeping a bunch of kunai happy children safe, alive and relatively unscathed defiantly took some kind of skill. And a lot of it, he thought as a stray dagger was caught by the scared brunet before it could make it's home in a young girl a few feet away. And the whole time the other man had been chatting away happily with him and various students. (in other words, people should respect teachers more. --)

"IRUKA-SENSEI!"

Startled, Yuki whipped around in search of the loud noise. Iruka didn't seem to bothered by it, because he only looked up when a streak of orange and yellow had zoomed passed Yuki at an alarming speed, just in time to catch said blur as it crashed rather forcefully into him.

"Ohaio, Naruto-kun." Iruka laughed. Yuki figured that as long as Iruka was laughing , it couldn't be all bad. He liked Iruka's laugh.

"Naruto." Iruka was saying sternly to the blond boy now hugging his waist in a death grip. "Don't you have training with Hatake-san now?" The boy blinked impossibly blue eyes up at the young sensei.

"Hai, but Kakashi-sensei's always late. Anyway, he's-"

"Ohaio, Iruka-sensei! Oh, there you are, Katsumi-san." Iruka and Yuki's heads snapped up and around towards the voice. Kakashi himself was standing (more like slouching) only a few feet away. Naruto glared over at him.

"I ran into him on my way over here." He explained, sounding apologetic. " He was looking for Katsumi-san, and he figured that if he just wandered around, he would find him sooner or later, so he followed me." he glanced up at Iruka and whispered "sorry." Iruka glanced down at him and grinned before he remembered that he was supposed to be watching children with sharp objects and an assignment to throw them at targets. (The targets in question not always being a red and white bulls eye.)

Kakashi watched Iruka intently, wondering what on earth Kastumi was doing with the chunnin, or, indeed, how they had even come to meet. He watched closely as the teacher jumped forward in time to stop another child from hurling a kunai in a way that would have sent it careening off target and in who knows what direction (but certainly not the right one.)

"No, Konahamaru, you hold it like this!" He readjusted the kunai in the small hand.

"Yo, Konahamaru!" Naruto called with a grin. The young boy turned and grinned.

"Hey boss!" He called back, starting to return the wave, before they both caught the look on Iruka's face. Both boys immediately looked anywhere but each other. Both Kakashi and Yuki snickered to themselves. Iruka adjusted the dagger one more time before turning back to the other three.

"Hatake-san, did you need something? Or were you just looking for Yuki-san?" Kakashi sighed. The young man was always so polite, painfully so to him. Unless he was angry. Looking at the stiffly polite look on the young man's face, Kakashi decided that an angry Iruka might be good. So he grinned (even though the only indication was the curving of his eye) And shrugged.

"No, nothing. I just feel like sticking around, that's all." He said cheerfully. Iruka quirked an eyebrow. "You know, in case you miss another kunai." Iruka's face flushed ever so slightly, but he remained silent. Naruto was looking back and forth between them as they just sort of stood there, not saying anything, but watching one another closely for a few moments, while Yuki just looked bemused. Kakashi plopped down onto the ground under a tree and pulled out a copy of Icha Icha Paradise. Iruka wrinkled his nose slightly at the sight of the obnoxiously orange book, worried that one of the children might see it and decide it looked like good reading material.

"Hatake-san, if you would please not read that here, there are children around." He said, the politeness in his voice slightly strained. Kakashi didn't even glance up. Iruka ground his teeth together, but didn't have time to do or say anything else, as a stray kunai went sailing off in the wrong direction, requiring him to leap after it. Yuki glared over at Kakashi. Now he understood why Iruka had looked at him so oddly when he had told him who his…."roommate" would be. How odd. Kakashi acted differently around the teacher. Almost unnoticeably so, but it was there: A slight change of stance, an oddness in his tone. And Iruka! The teacher seemed agitated by the mere presence of the jounin. It was something that could be advantuouse to him.

Around Six That Evening

Kakashi had hung around for several more hours, laying under the tree, doing nothing but reading, until Iruka had none to gently reminded him that he still had a team to teach. The blond, Naruto, had looked less then happy about the reminder. That had been several hours previous, though as Yuki understood it, still about three hours late. Now he was walking along companionably with Iruka as the teacher headed home for the day, looking tired, but relatively happy.

Yuki had been slightly, but not unreasonably surprised when much of the teacher's tension had disappeared with the silver-haired man. Of course, the man hadn't stayed gone.

About an hour and a half ago, Yuki had caught a brief tingle of the man's aura before it disappeared. It had not come back, but Yuki knew the man was still there, following then, though weather he was watching him like he was sure he had been ordered to, or the teacher like he had been all day, was still open to debate. Yuki was opting for the later, though, as the young man beside him kept periodically stopping and looking over his shoulder.

When Yuki had asked him why he was doing this, the chunnin had simply blushed and said he had the feeling that he was being watched. Yuki had raised an eyebrow, the silver-haired jounin immediately popping foremost into his mind as suspect numero uno, but before he could say anything, the chunnin had simply dismissed the feeling as silly and continued on his way. It hadn't stopped him from looking uneasily over his shoulder though.

Yuki had remained silent for most of the trip, simply enjoying the presence of the tanned man next to him. He had found that though the man at first appeared to be strict and a little stuffy, he had a surprising sense of humor, and a keen instinct when it came to children, especially the trouble makers. When Yuki had commented on this, he was shocked when he heard the teacher giggle. Yes, giggle! The young man had then informed him that he had, at one time, been the biggest prankster in Konoha. He hadn't believed him. He was rewarded for his lack of faith when Iruka and a couple of his students teamed up in catching him in a prank of their own.

As a smug looking Iruka helped him wash the peanut butter and mayo (make up something here, because I'm not a prankster, and couldn't come up with a decent prank if it killed me) out of his hair in the school bathroom, Yuki had been forced to admit that he believed the man now, or suffer going back to Kakashi's apartment with the gunk the teacher had come up with all over his head and shoulders. He didn't think he would live it down if he did.

But even though he could still faintly smell the peanuts in his hair, he had to admit, even if it was only to himself, that he had enjoyed himself more that day then he could remember ever enjoying himself before. And it was all thanks to the man now telling him that they were in front of his door.

Yuki looked up at the building. Iruka lived on the ground floor of a fairly good sized apartment complex. The young man was already opening the door, and was about to head in when Yuki's hand on his arm stopped him. He paused and looked up, a questioning look on his face. Yuki grinned. He bowed to the now blushing and flustered-looking man, his hand traveling gently down Iruka's arm to grasp his hand in his own, and bring it up to his face, to stop just an inch from his mouth.

"Thank you for giving me one of the best days of my life, and if you would allow it, I would like it if you would allow me to accompany you tomorrow as well, if I am able?" He asked softly as Iruka's fingers wiggled slightly in his grasp. Yuki held on though.

"S-sure if you want to….." the flustered young man trailed off as Yuki pressed his lips to the back of Iruka's hand, lingering for a few seconds before pulling back and looking at the teacher's face, now a shade of red that would make any tomato pale with envy.

"Cute." He thought. Out loud he said "Thank you, Iruka-sensei. I look forward to spending more time with you." He turned, still smirking, as Iruka just stared dumbly at him, and walked off. A few seconds later, he heard the tell-tale sound of a door being shut behind him. His smirk widened even more. He was going to enjoy his week here. A lot.

At the same time in a random tree over looking the entire scene

Kakashi caught himself growling as he watched the smirking Mist ninja saunter down the street. Why should he care if the younger man liked his student's ex-sensei? He didn't. And that feeling bubbling up annoyingly in his abdomen was most defiantly not jealousy. The great Hatake, Kakashi, copy nin of Konohagakure, did not get jealous. It just didn't happen! I mean, what was there to get jealous of? Nothing, that's what. Absolutely nothing!

Kakashi knew he sucked at lying, he just whished that for once he could lie decently to himself.

At the same time in Iruka's apartment

Iruka was lying on his bed, arms crossed behind his head, staring at the ceiling, wondering how he was going to face Yuki-san the next day if, indeed, he showed up, without blushing and stammering and making a complete idiot of himself. He sucked in a breath, scowling as he mentally berated himself for acting like a school girl with a crush. He would just act like nothing happened. Surly Yuki-san hadn't meant anything by it. And if he did, Iruka shouldn't care about it. He was never one for one night stands, and with Yuki-san simply visiting, all he would be was a fling.

That settled, he closed his eyes to get some sleep, but they flew open a second later as a masked face, curved eye, and gravity defying silver hair behind a neon orange book floated across his mind. This time Iruka sat blot upright, as if he had been shocked. What the hell?

"Ok…..why did I just think of Hatake-san?" he asked the wall on the other side of the room. The wall decided not to answer, so after a few moments of confused staring, a rather worried Iruka laid back down and waited for sleep to come. Today had been very……different.

Me: Sorry for the sucky-ness of this chapter, and how long it took me to get it posted. I had writers block for a good deal for this chapter, and the first part was written in Drivers Ed. That class is relatively boring. Oh well, tell me if you liked it or not, and why, please. Reviews are like oxygen to me. So if you don't want me to die, then review please .