Author's Note: The prompt for this chapter was pillow talk and proposals. TW in this chapter for past trauma, car crashes


A string of profanities slipped through Sakura's lips as she dropped forward against Kakashi. His mouth and lips ran across her oversensitive skin, wringing out every ounce of pleasure as her body twitched around him. He panted between her breasts, alternating kisses with desperate drags of air. Sakura released her hold on his back, running her fingers into his hair as the high wore off.

Moonlight streamed through the windows on either side of the room, the only light. Kakashi hadn't bothered with the overhead when he carried Sakura there, and she'd been more than happy to use her fingers to explore his body in the darkness. Even now, sitting in his lap with their bodies still connected, Sakura luxuriated in the feel of Kakashi's bare skin on hers. Six months was a long time to wait, but it heightened every sensation in a way she hadn't imagined possible.

"Damn." Kakashi breathed out a stream of air hotter than the fire still rushing over Sakura's skin. He closed his arms around her, carrying her backward as he reclined on the pillows. She pressed a languid kiss to his lips, allowing herself to enjoy the afterglow for several moments before rolling her hips against his.

Dark grey eyes flashed open to meet Sakura's gaze, and Kakashi laughed. She was struck by just how gorgeous he was with the pale highlight of silver from the moonlight in his hair as ruddy color spread over his cheeks. The man's kiss damp lips were swollen where she'd bitten a touch too hard in a moment of passion. A similar mark marred the juncture of Kakashi's neck and shoulder.

Pressing her hands against Kakashi's chest, Sakura lifted her hips away from his. The emptiness left her disoriented, but it dissipated when she swung one leg over his to nestle against his side. Kakashi closed one arm around Sakura's back, smoothing his fingers down her side. She let her fingers rove over the smooth expanse of his stomach, lazily brushing the soft silver hair lower down.

Aware of the silence between them as the sex high faded, Sakura rested her head on Kakashi's chest and listened to the steady drumming of his heart. She waited for him to say something about what they'd just done, and with every passing second, the fear that she'd been too eager or rough grew larger. It had been months since Sakura had anything except her hand or vibrator to keep her company, too long for her to be patient the way he'd probably wanted her to be.

When she couldn't stand the silence any longer, Sakura pushed up onto one elbow. "Are you having second thoughts?"

One eye peeked open as Kakashi offered a crooked grin. "Only about my misconception of being young still."

Laughing, Sakura nudged Kakashi in the ribs. "So, you're saying that you aren't ready for round two, yet?" A soft groan left Kakashi's lips, and she leaned in to muffle the sound with a kiss. "I'm kidding, mostly."

After a few moments, Kakashi pushed into a sitting position. He gazed in Sakura's direction in the semi-darkness, head tiled thoughtfully to the side. "What about you? Are you having second thoughts?"

"No, not even a little bit." Sakura laughed, unable to wrap her mind fully around the past hour. "I mean, I was sure that I wanted to sleep with you after our first date."

Chuckling self consciously at the way the words sounded, Sakura shrugged. "I mean, you've always been attractive, so sleeping with you was never something I didn't want. But this," she gestured as if what they'd just done was somehow bigger than the bedroom. "I didn't understand why you wanted to wait, but now I do. It's different when you can trust someone completely before the clothes start coming off."

Kakashi's brow furrowed as he adjusted the sheet over his lap. "You've had that before though, right? I mean, you were engaged."

Sakura shrugged and tried her best not to conjure the image of Sasuke out of thin air. It had been a long time since she thought of him, and longer still since she shared his bed. "Sasuke's family trained him to project the best image of himself on everything. I'm honestly not sure if he ever lowered his walls enough to let me in"

The memory stung like a scab torn open again, but Sakura sat with it until the pain began to fade. "He never let me get to know him, not the way you have." Sakura shrugged, feeling more self conscious by the minute. "What about you? Do you always wait this long so you can get to know a person this well before you sleep together?"

As soon as the question left Sakura's lips, she wished that she could recall it. She wasn't interested in learning about the women in Kakashi's past. Their age difference meant that he'd almost certainly had more partners than she had, but she'd tried not to think about it. Kakashi touched her hand, producing a jump of emotion that left Sakura giddy. "Are you sure you want to know?"

"Is the number of women that you've been with going to lower my opinion of you," Sakura teased, hoping her voice sounded light and playful. "Am I going to be horrified to learn that you broke hearts on a weekly basis before me?"

Kakashi laughed, studying Sakura with a playful expression. "You asked how many girls I felt that way about, not how many fell for me."

Despite the nervous tension in her chest, Sakura laughed. "Have you always been this arrogant? Did I just miss it?"

"Confident is the adjective I would choose," Kakashi corrected, rubbing the back of his neck with a grin. "And, you have a way of bringing it out in me."

Rolling her eyes, Sakura bumped against Kakashi's side. "Fine then, Mr. Confident, how many women have you felt that way about?"

Kakashi caught Sakura's hand and squeezed it with his. The touch made her heart flutter in her chest as their eyes met. "I've only felt that way about two women, and you're one of them," he answered.

In the months that she and Kakashi had dated, Sakura had learned to read the man well. Despite the gentleness of his confession, Kakashi's eyes were shadowed with reluctance. There was more to the answer, and he was giving her the opportunity to escape from a conversation that wouldn't be pleasant. Sakura wasn't sure she could live with herself if she took the easy way out, though. She exhaled and tried to prepare herself for whatever came next. "Who was the other?"

Instead of answering, Kakashi disentangled his fingers from Sakura and moved away. He stood on the opposite side of the bed and walked toward the bathroom connected to his bedroom. Sakura watched him go, focusing on the smooth play of his muscles instead of the fear gnawing in the pit of her stomach. Despite the trust she felt, Sakura felt a disorienting sense of terror growing in the back of her mind. Had she missed some major warning signs in Kakashi's life? Was there someone else and she'd simply been a passing interest?

No, the logical part of Sakura's brain insisted. Kakashi wouldn't do that. He didn't attempt to pursue the relationship in the first place. There's no way that there's someone else.

The toilet flushed, then water ran into the sink in the bathroom, and Sakura swallowed the fear that swam into her stomach. Kakashi reentered the bedroom, but a weight had settled on his shoulders. He paused by the dresser and pulled out a pair of solid black pajama pants that he slid on. Sakura wondered at the symbolism of putting a layer of fabric between them, but she didn't draw attention to it. She already wished that she hadn't asked the question, but it was too late to back out now.

When Kakashi slid back into the bed Sakura reached out and touched his shoulder. "We don't have to—"

"On our first date, you asked why there wasn't a Mrs. Hatake, do you remember?" Kakashi looked past Sakura, seemingly unaware of her touch. When she nodded, he blew out a breath. "Well, a long time ago, there almost was."

Sakura instinctively knew that Kakashi was working himself up to talk about something painful, so she remained silent. He needed space, but she dropped her hand to his thigh so that he'd know she was there if he felt alone. Exhaling, he continued. "We met in middle school, became friends, started dating in high school, and got engaged soon after. I guess we were your stereotypical first loves."

The words were delivered with a cool inference that made Sakura feel sick. When she talked about Sasuke, it was hard to remove the pain of what happened between them. Kakashi could have been telling the details of someone else's story. While Sakura hadn't lived as many years as he had, she knew all about first loves and heartache that came with them. She wondered if the woman and Kakashi had broken off the engagement. He'd never mentioned being divorced, so she could only assume that their relationship had ended before the wedding. A million scenarios jumped into Sakura's mind, but she didn't ask.

"A couple of weeks after we got engaged, we went out with some friends to celebrate. We were late leaving the restaurant because we hadn't seen each other in a while." Kakashi laughed, but the sound was melancholy. "I remember it was snowing because Rin was enamored with the way it looked. She said the trees were 'cloaked in starlight', and it made her feel like anything was possible."

The story stalled as Kakashi fussed over the blankets in his lap, smoothing them across his thighs. "I thought the roads were wet, but we hit a patch of black ice. The car flipped a few times, but I don't remember it. The doctors told me that it is normal to have memory loss after something like that, but the details never came back. The next thing I knew, I was hanging from my seat belt and the car was smoking."

Nausea filled Sakura's stomach, and she tasted bile in the back of her throat. "We'd gone over an embankment, then the car came to rest in some trees. I was able to get loose, but Rin was pinned by the crumpled vehicle."

Kakashi's voice broke, but he didn't look to Sakura for comfort. He was reliving the moment in a way that she couldn't help him work through. "Gods, I still remember how cold the metal was when I tried to get her free. We didn't have cell phones back then, so I couldn't call anyone for help. We were stranded on the side of the road, and I had to get back up to the side. I couldn't leave her there."

"I managed to get Rin out of the car, but there was so much blood. It was the only warm thing that I remember from that night." Kakashi shuddered, unresolved emotions tightening his throat. "I was afraid that the car was going to catch on fire, and I wouldn't be able to get back to her in time. So, I got her out and carried her up to the road with me."

The sickness doubled in Sakura's stomach as tears spilled down her cheeks. She knew what was coming, but it seemed too horrible to be true. "I don't remember who called the ambulance, or the man that stopped to help us. It was so cold." Kakashi shrugged without seeming to realize that he did it. "Rin bled out in my arms while we waited for an ambulance"

"The paramedics said that if I left her there, she might have made it. They would have been able to stop the bleeding better than I had" Kakashi shook his head and exhaled with a broken sound that shattered Sakura's heart. "My decision to help her was the thing that killed her."

"Oh, Kakashi," Sakura breathed, wrapping her arms tight around the man beside her. His head sagged against her shoulder as deep breaths that might have been sobs shook his body. "I'm so sorry. So, so sorry."

Smoothing her hand down Kakashi's back, Sakura held her tongue. Part of her wished that she'd never asked about the other women in his life, but another was glad to see this side of him. Sakura wondered if he'd ever talked about what happened with anyone. The pain leaking out against her skin had been locked away for a long time. She kissed Kakashi's forehead through his hair. "It wasn't your fault. Even if you hadn't moved her, the same thing might have happened."

Kakashi nodded and mumbled something that might have been an agreement, then pulled away. He rubbed at his eyes, but they were clearer than Sakura expected them to be. "After Rin, I went into a tailspin. I had a sport's scholarship, which is actually how I met Tenzo by the way. I got kicked out of the program when I started failing my classes. I screwed or drank my way through the next four years. Then, I almost died in a bar fight and had to spent a couple weeks in the hospital. While I was there someone dropped off a book called Beginning at the End, and it changed my life."

Making a mental note to look up the book as she had the opportunity, Sakura nodded. "So, why are you telling me this now?"

"It's been almost twenty years since anyone made me feel the way Rin did, and it terrifies me." Kakashi managed a soft, self-conscious laugh as he ran a hand through his hair. "I'm not trying to compare you two, it's just that I never thought I could love anyone again, not so deeply and completely. And, I needed you to understand the broken places inside of me, because there's something that I wanted to ask you."

Sakura's heart stopped beating, lurching to a standstill in her chest that made it impossible to breathe. Kakashi exhaled again, an uncertain sound pushing through his lips as he chuckled. "I know we've only been together for a few months, and I know that what happened tonight might cloud things, but I wanted to know if you'd consider moving in with me."

Before Sakura could come up with a response, she stared at Kakashi in stunned silence. "Take as long as you need to figure things out, but you're here practically every evening anyway," he continued. "You wouldn't have to pay rent at the apartment, it would be easier to give you a ride, and I do have a spare bedroom, a couple actually, if you aren't ready—"

"To sleep with you?" Sakura laughed, head spinning from the sudden changes that their night had taken. "I'm pretty sure that's no longer a valid concern."

Kakashi chuckled, some of the earlier warmth returning to his voice. "True, but I didn't sleep with you to get you to say yes. Honestly, I meant to ask you before things got this far, so offering you a room of your own made a lot more sense when I was hyping myself up to ask."

"Aren't you worried what everyone else will say," Sakura questioned, tilting her head to the side to study Kakashi. "That we're moving too fast and all the other things?"

"I'm worried about what you think." Kakashi scrubbed the back of his neck with an almost nervous smile. "And your dad, I'm still worried about that too."

Laughing, Sakura kissed Kakashi's cheek. "He's going to love you."

Kakashi cast an apprehensive stare in Sakura's direction, looking as unsure of himself as she'd ever seen. "How can you be so sure?"

"Because I love you," Sakura murmured, brushing her lips against Kakashi's.

The man's lips curved against Sakura's. "Yeah?"

Humming, Sakura answered with another long, lingering kiss instead of words. One day soon they would talk about everything that Kakashi had revealed and deal with the past traumas. But, for now, the future looked brighter than it had in a long time. Sakura didn't mind taking things slow.