Kakashi Gets Therapy

This is a one shot. I started going to therapy recently and I think I got inspired. My experience isn't very similar, mostly because Kakashi is way to stubborn for his own good, but the seed is there. Hope ya'll like this!

Kakashi dialed the door buzzer once, short and shrill. Perhaps he was hoping that no one would hear if he was fast enough. He wasn't.

"Hello?" a female voice answered. He wondered whether this voice belonged to the one who would be prying him apart like an insect. "Hello?" the voice repeated. "Is this a prank?"

Kakashi didn't say it wasn't. One way or another, he would be wasting this woman's time today. Maybe he should just spare her. He turned around. Hesitated.

"Who is this?" the voice demanded.

"Hatake Kakashi," he told it.

Silence. There appeared to be no recognition.

Kakashi frowned, glanced at the sign that hung proudly over the apartment block door, then back to the buzzer. "I have an appointment."

"Not with me, I don't think," the woman replied. She sounded very certain. "Pigs would sooner fly than Hatake walking into my clinic."

Kakashi didn't say anything. One more person that seemed to hate him, what a surprise. His gut churned. He had come to the wrong address then. He was going to be really late now. He pulled out his book. Hokage-sama was going to scream at him no matter what he did now, maybe he should just… not go at all. It was only making things worse, he could barely breathe now, and he hadn't even gotten to the appointment yet. He should just go back to his flat and read so he could relax and not think about this and be able to breathe a little better.

Suddenly, he felt a chakra presence to his right. His attention was immediately drawn away from his book, ending any attempt at distraction before it could even begin. Worse yet, he recognized the chakra: it was Haruno Sakura's.

Kakashi glanced back to his novel with even more determination than before as he tried to buy himself some time while he decided what to do. Haruno always ignored him, it was fine, he could just wait until she was gone and go back to his flat afterward –

"So it wasn't a prank after all?" That was Haruno's voice. Shit. He glanced up furtively. She was staring at him. She had just talked to him. Worse yet – from her words he realized that she must be the woman he had just spoken to over the intercom – how hadn't he recognized her voice earlier? He was such a pathetic shinobi that he couldn't even place an acquaintance's voice– worse yet: now, because of his screw up, he would have to deal with Haruno.

Kakashi's nausea increased. He didn't want to. Not with Haruno. He didn't want to talk to her. He kept his eyes on the book, pointless though it was.

Haruno folded her arms over her chest and heaved out a gusty sigh. Kakashi's eyes couldn't help but quickly track this before returning to the text. It was enough, though.

Body language: displeased with the situation, his mind rattled off. Her crossed arms indicated he was making her uncomfortable, putting her on the defensive. The way her wrists were hidden beneath her arms showed a lack of trust in him he didn't find surprising, the tenseness of her face indicated the same, and the distance she kept while addressing him was uncharacteristic of her, she must really dislike him, or be wary of him. None of his conclusions were surprising, but still the snake coiling around his chest wound tighter. He couldn't stand the sight of her.

"Yo," Kakashi said, reading the same lines over and over again.

Kaoru kissed the graceful curve of her neck. He suckled it masterfully, in the way only a man with ample–

Haruno was examining him without saying anything. Kakashi found he couldn't read at all under that stare. He moved to leave, to put – at the very least – a dozen buildings between himself and her as soon as possible, but she stepped into his path before he could. Kakashi froze, was forced to glance up again.

Haruno's expression had changed slightly. Her wrists were still hidden, but now her chin was lifted proudly. Ah, he knew that posture well: she always switched to it the second she noticed him noticing her.

"I had heard rumors that the hokage was forcing you on the psychologist population of Konoha." Her voice was calm, but it was a practiced calm, he could tell because he knew all the tricks of the trade. "I assume you have an appointment with one of my colleagues?"

Kakashi nodded slowly, his eyes fixed on the book.

Kaoru kissed the graceful curve of her neck. He suckled it masterfully, in the–

"Then you clearly have the wrong address," Haruno stated.

"Ma. Accidents happen." He had seen the sign and thought this was the place.

"Well, I can tell you where you're supposed to go and you can be on your way," she proposed, then waited, clearly for him to inform her where his appointment was.

There was no use in lying; she would know – and if he left without replying… Haruno was close enough with Tsunade that the hokage would know by tomorrow.

"Kurosawa clinic," Kakashi said after a moment.

"Kurosawa is on vacation," Haruno replied tartly.

Now who's pranking who? he thought. Was she purposefully trying to make him even later? He was certain he had an appointment with someone called Kurosawa, today. He hadn't taken Haruno as the pety type, but then again it made sense that even the virtuous ones like her would hate him, or perhaps even especially the virtuous ones. He really couldn't fault her for her distaste.

Still, he wasn't going to give Haruno the satisfaction of thinking she'd made a fool out of him, so he patted his pant pocket in search of the little note he had scrawled at some point or other with his appointment information. He hadn't wanted to open it because it smelled like blood, but now he had to. He stared balefully at his own awful handwriting, about to wave it in front of her face to prove that his appointment information was correct, when Haruno grabbed the paper before he could finish squinting at it.

"Your appointment was on the fifth, not on the sixth. Kurosawa just left today." Her tone as she peered at his note was neutral, but he just knew it was kept that way on purpose. The snake pressed, he had to consciously take a deep breath to get enough air.

There was being a slob like Obito had used to be and then there was this. How could he be so retarded as to write a five that looked like a six? Now Haruno had even more reason to look down on him. He knew she was thinking it. In his mind, he was mostly picturing a deformed-looking version of himself, crosseyed and in a fetal posture, staring with an evil, self-satisfied expression at something. Yes, this must be how Haruno saw him. The noose around his ribcage wound a little tighter yet and he turned to his only lifeline.

Kaoru kissed the graceful curve of her neck. He suckled it masterfully, in the way only a man with ample experience can, swollen lips never straying from the very spot that brought her–

"Well, since you're here, why don't we get it over with?"

Kakashi looked up. Haruno, still cross-armed and far apart, was staring at him in that same defiant way from earlier.

"Excuse me?" He was lost.

"Tsunade-sama is sending you to all of my colleagues. It's only a matter of time till I will be graced with an appointment with you. Since you're here and I am currently free, let's get it out of the way."

Kakashi hadn't expected Haruno to voluntarily subject herself to his presence, but thinking it through rationally, he concluded that her reasoning made sense. He was late to all of his appointments and this was no secret. She likely wished to spare herself the wasted morning by doing it now. They both knew Kakashi would claim that 'she wasn't the right fit' once the hour was up, as he had with all of his other psychologists, and they'd both move on with their lives.

Everything in Kakashi was begging him to turn her down. He could barely breathe, or at least he felt like he couldn't, and he desperately wished to be back under his warm duvet, or on a rooftop surrounded by sunshine and fresh air and far away from anyone who could crack his skull open and pull out the insides like egg yolk. But something made him stop and think about it.

Kakashi didn't… he didn't dislike Haruno. He actually looked up to her, he had realized this some time ago. He hated a lot of things to do with her, but he didn't hate her. He knew this feeling wasn't mutual, that she most assuredly thought he hated her as she must hate him. He didn't, though, which is why he decided to spare her the wasted morning like she wanted to, even though his noose was killing him. It was, after all, the least he could do.

"Alright," he said, tone expertly agreeable. "Why not."

Haruno's eyebrows lifted, but she nodded and gestured for him to follow her. Instead of taking the normal route through the building, they entered her office through the window. Kakashi had guessed that she'd peered out of it in order to check on her 'pranksters' after talking with him through the intercom. He hadn't known she was a psychologist now; he had thought she was still working for the black ops. He didn't ask, though. He knew what psychologists were like: they all tried to make small talk in order to gain valuable information about his character and psychoanalyse them. He was not going to fall for that one.

Haruno's office was… strange. He couldn't help but do a double take. Everything, from the walls to the very door and curtains, was painted to look like a forest. Kakashi had seen graffiti that looked like reality before, but this one took the cake. He examined the walls longer than he would've done in any other occasion, recognising the area that must have served as inspiration immediately. There was a golden light toward what would be the 'forest' background that was sometimes visible in the evenings which Kakashi himself loved to bask in, but then, he supposed his tastes were probably drab and predictable like most people's. The sound of water flowed from somewhere nearby. He had heard it from those bambu fountain things at the hyuga compound, but he wasn't sure whether it was artificial or not, in this case. It irritated him, this fake calm the office was trying to force him into.

Haruno didn't comment on his inspection of the area and plopped down on a hammock chair that hung from the ceiling. She wordlessly began to scribble on a notebook. Kakashi immediately honed in on it, trying to see what she was writing down, but was unable to from the angle he was at.

"You can take a seat, if you want," Haruno said, shrugging as she glanced at him, as if to say 'you do you, I won't care either way'. Kakashi was about to open his mouth to tell her that there weren't any seats beside her own when he noticed the pulleys crisscrossing the ceiling. He understood then that Haruno kept various different kinds of seats stuck to her ceiling and used a complex pulley mechanism to pull down whichever one suited her when needed. He didn't debase himself by asking her where the trigger for the mechanism was and instead inspected the different strings, pulleys and the genjutsu covering them, until he was fairly certain that he knew how to pull down each and every one of the hammocks, armchairs, and other miscellaneous seats that the woman kept in her ceiling.

He ended up picking a swing like the ones children use, mostly because it was the only chair that was facing away from Haruno. He also wanted to see if he could get a reaction out of her. She didn't. She didn't comment on the fact that he had figured out her complex pulley mechanism, or that he had helped himself to a random chair without asking her first, or that this chair was in fact a swing, or that this swing was facing away from her.

No matter what he did, Haruno kept scribbling in her notebook. It irritated Kakashi. What was she even writing down? He hadn't spoken at all with her! She couldn't be psychoanalyzing him already.

He pointedly took out his book to show her that he wouldn't fall for her mind games and stared at it determinedly, but found he couldn't read at all. After exactly one minute, he passed the page, and then the next, and the next.

Before he knew it, the hour was over, and to Kakashi's surprise, he had actually been able to read his book toward the end of it. He no longer felt like he was about to die the second he forgot to make himself breathe deeply, either.

He glanced at the clock. Haruno didn't seem to have noticed that the hour was over. She really didn't seem to care what he did. Maybe she hated him and that was why she refused to treat him. Yes, that had to be it. Kakashi cautiously got up and approached her, using his leaving as a cover to take a peek at her notebook. What he found shocked him.

It wasn't a complex psychoanalysis of his character writen in code – it was a doodle. Haruno had been drawing all this time! She hadn't been paying him any attention at all. Suddenly, he felt like an idiot. How could he be so self-absorbed as to think she'd care enough about him to waste an hour of her life on him? Of course she was indifferent.

The drawing was of a woman combing her hair. Kakashi wondered who it was. Closer inspection revealed that the hair being combed morphed into eels towards the tips. Life eels. Kakashi thought they might be electrifying the poor woman if her expression was anything to go by. The comb looked suspiciously charred…

Haruno closed the notebook before he could stare at it any longer. Kakashi was almost upset, but he let it go.

Haruno got up. "Well, obligatory appointment out of the way," she said, giving him a wry, self-deprecating smile. "You won't have to drop by my evil lair again."

Kakashi was suddenly struck by the burning need to ask her why she hadn't tried to talk to him like a normal patient, why she had refused to treat him period. Wasn't there some law she was breaking by getting paid for just sitting there and drawing? And ignoring him?

He was on the verge of asking, but he held himself back. Instead of voicing his thoughts, he stepped toward the window and, with one last nod in Haruno's direction, leapt into the morning air.

The visit, however, stayed with him. It hadn't been at all like all the other psychologists who had been smarmy and invasive in equal parts. The next time he was forced to go on an appointment – this time with the actual Kurosawa – Kakashi found himself thinking about what Haruno would be doing if she were his psychologist the entire time, ignoring the man actually sitting in front of him entirely. She was a prodigy, he understood that now – if much too late. As usual.

Haruno certainly was bound to have treating her patients down to an art form, like that drawing. When he had seen her on the street, realized she was the owner of that office, he had been surprised she would stoop so 'low' as to quit her other career to become a psychologist. She was the most talented medic nin in Konoha, barring perhaps Tsunade. Sasori's corpse could attest to that. Konoha medics had so much more prestige than the 'head crawlers' – as many shinobi called them – her choosing to become one made no sense. Why would Haruno quit her prestigious job to become a head crawler?

…what would she be like, as a psychologist? Would she actually be as good at this new job as well asat everything else she'd tackled so far?

The questions buzzed in his head for a month, until he couldn't stand it anymore and decided that he was a shinobi for a reason – using his ANBU skills to infiltrate enemy territory came as easy as breathing to him, after all. And yet, Kakashi found Haruno's office harder to infiltrate than your average Iwa stronghold. It was sealed from top to bottom. He had expected some kind of anti-eavesdropping measure, of course, but he would never have guessed how tight the security around the cozy room was. He should've known better than to expect anything else from Haruno though.

Kakashi was thus forced to put a halt to his efforts, but the fact that the answers to his questions had been denied only stoked the curiosity within him. And so, the next time Tsunade called him to her office for a mission, he gave in to his urge and added, just as he was about to leave:

"Ah, and by the way, hokage-sama. Regarding the other matter… Haruno will be alright for next time."

Tsunade gave him a surprised look.

"You already had an appointment with her, didn't you?"

"She was the least annoying." Kakashi was struck by the truth of it. It had to be the office, that was it. Nothing else.

"She might not want to," Tsunade cautioned. "I hear you weren't very nice to her, Hatake."

"I know," Kakashi said quietly. Even Tsunade had heard, huh? He was a fool for hoping otherwise.

Tsunade sighed. "I'll ask her directly. I'm sure she'll give it some thought if it's me."

Kakashi nodded his thanks – and wasn't that strange? Him thanking her – for booking him an appointment with a head crawler? With Haruno? The world must be ending.

The time had come. Kakashi dawdled on the street where Haruno's office was. This was the only appointment to any head crawler he had visited so far that he wasn't late to. He was certain that if he were to be tardy, she'd take the chance as an excuse to ban him permanently. But he was going to be late if he waited outside any longer. He went through his plan again.

Firstly, Kakashi repeated to himself, he was going to her clinic as a way to satiate his curiosity, not because he wanted her to pry his head open.

Second, as this was a recon mission of a sort, it meant that he was in control. If Haruno acted like she was, it was because he was letting her, and he could leave any time he wanted and it wouldn't matter.

Third, Haruno also had demonstrated that she was willing to get paid for just ignoring him for an hour, so if this visit panned out, maybe Kakashi could have somebody to visit and pretend to Tsunade that he was getting 'treated', without actually getting his head pried open. He could just read peacefully in one of Haruno's hammocks and be left alone.

Having reminded himself of his three cardinal points, Kakashi finally took a deep breath and carefully jumped to Haruno's office window. She looked his way immediately, before he could even rap his knuckles against the glass. He was going to find out what seals she was using at some point, he bowed to himself.

Haruno waved him in and Kakashi reminded himself that he was the commander officer of this recon mission, Haruno just didn't know that. He went in.

Haruno stood up to greet him and closed the window behind him in one fluid motion. Once this was done she peered at him, posture completely neutral, and offered him a seat. Kakashi went for the hammock chair she had sat on last time, wondering how she'd take his power move. Haruno didn't comment on it, which irritated him. She sat down on the swing, which had been pulled down already.

"Well, I can't say I'm totally surprised," she opened with. Kakashi resisted the urge to turn to look at her and pulled out his book. He wondered if that was going to offend her. "After all, I let you get away with just reading your book in silence last time."

Kakashi did glance at her when she said this. "Are you saying you're not going to do today?"

"No. I won't lie to Tsunade-sama for you."

"You already did," he pointed out.

"Last time I was convinced the one hour we spent together was only a formality. Why are you back?"

Kakashi shrugged. "Because you left well enough alone." It was mostly true, though he wondered if perhaps he wanted her to do the opposite. Just so he could satiate his curiosity, of course.

Haruno hummed thoughtfully. "You want me to pretend-treat you." Her tone was disapproving.

"You already did it once," Kakashi insisted, repeating himself.

Haruno frowned. "Look, I have principles. I'm working this job because I want to help people. If you take away my time, you're taking away my ability to help someone who actually wants my help."

"Ah, but you're the doctor. You should be able to help any patient given to you, hm?"

"The mind's injuries are different from the body's," Haruno said. "I can heal someone's broken bone for them, but I can't heal trauma or PTSD."

"I'm sorry? So you're saying you're useless?" He was maybe being a little aggressive today. She would kick him out before he found out what seals she used, but he couldn't help himself.

"You didn't let me finish," Haruno told him. "I can heal someone's broken bone for them, but I can't heal trauma. What I can do is teach people how to live with it better, how to adress it, and yes, even heal it. But if you don't cooperate? My time will be wasted."

"I wonder how often you send reports about your crazy patients to your bestie at T&I?" Kakashi asked pleasantly, inspecting his nails. "Weekly? Bi-weekly? Do tell."

"Ino and I never discuss patients," Haruno replied. "Unless I think that person poses a threat to the village, of course. Are you a threat to the village?"

"No."

"Then you don't have to worry about that."

Kakashi tensed. That had almost sounded like a threat. Had she intended it to?

Haruno softened. "Look, Hatake-san. You're not the first shinobi distrustful of my ability – or desire – to keep your secrets. Some issues, however, can be treated superficially without knowing the specifics, at least the physical symptoms can be. For example, breathing exercises can be recommended for cases of anxiety, without knowing the specifics. If you tell me your general problem, I may be able to help you at least a little."

"There's nothing wrong with me."

"Then why are you here?"

Kakashi frowned. "Psych eval. It turns out some chump down there thought mine was 'worrying'."

Haruno nodded. "And do you know why he might have thought this?"

"No." Kakashi had passed all his previous ones, why was this one different? He said as much to Haruno.

"Hm, I see. Well, this year, Ino is in charge of that department for the first time. I believe she may have done some… restructuring. You must have gotten a new evaluator."

That sounded plausible. Damn the bastard, whoever he was.

"Would you like to go through an evaluation with me?" Haruno offered.

He gave her a look. Not in a million years.

"Then it is fortunate that I requested for your old psych evals in advance. We can go through those instead."

Damn it. She'd been steering him into a trap all along. Kakashi gritted his teeth but said nothing.

This is just a recon mission, he told himself. I'm just here to watch how Haruno runs this place and then I can leave and never come back. She can't hurt me.

"Alright," Haruno said, pulling out some papers from a drawer. "So, let's start with the most recent one – this year's. I'm going to read some of the questions, your answers to them, and if I need clarification, I will ask for it. Is that alright with you?"

Kakashi gave a hum of indifference and opened his book. She couldn't hurt him.

"Do you worry about lots of different things?" Haruno read out loud. "You've circled 'very applicable'. What sort of things do you worry about?"

"I'm a ninja," Kakashi stated, resisting the urge to glare at her.

"Are you?" Haruno asked.

What kind of question was that? "Is this a trick question?"

"No, just curiosity. For example: are you a ninja when you're chilling in your flat, or as you're sitting here, or while you're buying groceries?"

Kakashi stared at her blankly.

"It's a yes or no question. No tricks."

"Yes, I am a ninja. And I don't see where the problem with that is. I reckon I would be a rather pathetic one if I forgot all my skills the second I finished a mission."

"Pathetic," she repeated, without inflection. "Is that a word you use often in relation to yourself?"

"No."

Haruno hummed.

"Being a ninja outside of a mission is not a matter of forgetting skills," she said. "It's a matter of preparedness. A good ninja must always pay attention to every detail, never drop his guard, never fully trust anyone who hasn't proven that they aren't a hengued enemy, and so on, no matter where he is or what he is doing. Would you agree with this statement?"

Kakashi exhaled.

He hated trick questions.

"Are you trying to make me say I'm a bad ninja for your own amusement?" he challenged.

"No, I am just asking. I don't know you very well. I'm trying to do my job and understand what you're like." She raised an eyebrow. "So, in accordance to the definition I've just given you – would you say you're a good ninja?"

Kakashi frowned. "Decent." He made a face. "But those standards have nothing to do with what makes a good ninja."

"Ah, yes. Teamwork – your nindo, if I remember correctly," Haruno said. "Good teamwork usually rests on a foundation of strong friendship. Would you say you have lots of friends?"

Kakashi tapped his fingers against his book and resisted the urge to adopt defensive body language. "Teamwork between to individuals can take place without them being friends."

"I'm not saying it's a requirement, but there is a pattern, if you want to call it that. You strike me as more of a lone wolf. I am surprised you put so much stock in a skill you exercise so rarely."

"Rarely?" Kakashi couldn't believe the gall of this woman. "I always exercise teamwork. I always put my teammates first, I will always protect them."

"And yet it says here that ninety percent of the missions you take are solos, and of your kills, most of them aren't assisted. Wouldn't you say that's a contradiction?"

"No. Taking solos is better, that way no one else is in danger."

"So isolating yourself is the same as teamwork for you? You're taking solos so others don't have to, is that right?"

"Next question," Kakashi spat.

Sakura gave him a long, slow look, but obliged him. She glanced at his psych eval again. "We were on the first question – whether you worry about a lot of different things. You told me that you do, because you're a ninja. You claim this is natural?"

"Yes. A ninja that doesn't worry about possible enemies coming back to kill him is either a genin or a dead ninja."

Haruno nodded. "Well, I can't say I'm not in the same position as you, but the way in which we tackle these worries differs quite a lot from individual to individual." She lowered her gaze to the paper again. "Do you have trouble controlling your worries?"

Kakashi hated how all-knowing those eyes suddenly seemed, like he couldn't hide from her.

"I can control my worries very well," he said.

"Do you have any particular way of doing that? I sometimes have trouble with these things when missions get hard." She shot him a smile, but he could tell she was trying to see if he was lying or not.

Kakashi irritably paused to think about the question. How did he control his worries? Well, by not thinking about them. Simple. However, perhaps Haruno would natter to him about that was unhealthy. He tried to think of what someone who could control their worries in a more 'acceptable' way would do to accomplish this. He couldn't. Picturing someone like Gai worrying was impossible, in fact, picturing most of his ANBU and jonin colleagues doing so was impossible. All of them always seemed confident, like they never had a day of self doubt in their lives. He glanced at Haruno, who had freely admitted to being an exception to this. He wondered how she tackled her worries. Probably by heroically saving lives and by being disgustingly perfect.

He decided she probably wouldn't be able to find fault in Obito's nindo, taking her own penchant for goody-goody actions into account.

"Hm, I do plenty of things to distract myself, like going on more missions to help comrades who need my help."

"And when you aren't on a mission, what do you do?"

"...help old ladies across the street."

"Do you ever talk to them?"

"What?"

"The people you help – do you ever talk to them?" Haruno asked.

Well, of course not! He was ANBU, ANBU didn't talk. He didn't help old ladies beyond maybe hauling their groceries home for them. He didn't stay behid for tea, obviously: he went ahead and got the job done efficiently and then removed himself from the equation.

"Do you ever talk to your patients?" Kakashi shot back defensively, then realized his mistake, because of course Haruno would chat up even the most annoying genin with tonsils if given the chance.

Sakura smiled bemusedly at him. "I'm doing so at the moment."

Kakashi stewed in his irritation and made no comment.

"I'll take that as a no," Haruno replied. "You don't talk to most of those around you. Not beyond the necessary."

"I have a good rapport with the people I help," Kakashi insisted.

"Could you name one fact about any of them that isn't widely known?"

"Of course."

"Alright. Tell me abou the last non-ANBU mission you have gone on that wasn't a solo, who were you with?"

"Ukita Kaeru, Yuhi Kurenai..." he trailed off, unsure who else had been there.

"Alright. Let's just pick those two. Could you tell me about their lives? Their hobbies? Anything?"

Kakashi opened his mouth to answer, but closed it. She probably wouldn't count the jutsu they knew. He mentally went through the list of recollections he had of those two and drew up a blank. Only information about their fighting styles and mission performance remained.

Haruno nodded, taking his silence as an answer.

"Do you get irritable and/or easily annoyed when anxious?" she read the next question to him. "I see you have written 'absolutely not applicable'. Why is that?"

Kakashi wanted to shake the woman. How was this answer wrong? It was a good thing not to get irritable!

Stop dissecting me! he wanted to shout.

"I imagine because I can control my emotions better than your average five year old. Next question."

Haruno gave him a look but didn't comment. "Does worry or anxiety make you feel fatigued or worn out?"

"A shinobi is never tired."

"Ah. So you never let yourself feel tired?"

"That's not what I said."

"So then you do feel tired?" Haruno confirmed.

"At night. Like most people."

"I've seen you napping in trees sometimes. Is that because you don't catch a lot of sleep or –"

"I'm not napping. I'm reading. It's a hobby ."

"I have seen you napping, though. Are you saying that you pretend to be napping without actually napping?"

He sometimes put a genjutsu on himself to make it look like he was napping so that people would leave him alone. Haruno was a genjutsu type. She knew damn well he wasn't actually napping – why did she have to ask?

"I don't know what you're talking about," he went with obstinately.

Haruno sighed and read the next question. "Do you follow a regular sleeping schedule?"

Kakashi remained calm. He didn't outwardly tense, he pretended to be disinterested. Alright, so he stayed up reading a lot of the time, or he had a nightmare and stayed up reading, or he woke up thinking he had forgotten something important and couldn't fall back asleep, or he slept in and didn't wake up for an entire day, or he didn't sleep in but couldn't muster the energy to do anything but read in bed all day... but none of this was Haruno's business. If he said it out loud... it would be more real. He could deal with the situation fine. He liked reading at night, really. Fortunately, he had slept mostly well the yesterday.

"Doesn't my lack of eyebags answer your question?"

Haruno pursed her lips but once more said nothing.

"Does worry or anxiety make it hard to concentrate?"

"No. A shinobi –"

"Yes, yes, don't start with that. I can tell that when you were reading your book when we met last time, you immediately noticed my approach even from afar. If you'd really been immersed in Icha Icha, you wouldn't have. I was concealing my chakra."

"I am a good enough sensor to notice anyone's approach."

"I see. Do you feel jumpy then?"

"I'm a shinobi," he reminded her. Again.

"Do you worry about how well you do things?"

Finally. A question he could answer easily.

"I am chronically late," Kakashi said happily. "I read porn. I halfass everything. What do you think?"

"I think you're evading the question," Haruno said pleasantly. "Again."

"I disagree."

She sighed. "Do you worry about things working out in the future?"

Kakashi never thought about the future. Ever. "No," he could replied honestly. "I never worry at all in that regard."

"That's interesting. Why ever not?"

"I am content with my life. I like it the way it is."

"You risk your life every time you go on a mission."

"I am content with my life," Kakashi repeated. Some had called him arrogant before; the truth is he was simply indifferent. He didn't think it was a bad thing. Fear never clouded his judgment, nor did folly. He could always act logically and make the best choices when the time came. Perhaps, ironically, it was his indifferent toward his continued survival that had made it possible. He, naturally, said none of this.

Haruno gave him yet another look but moved on. "Do you worry about things that have already happened in the past?"

Kakashi turned to stare at her forest backdrop wall. How could he lie to that question? He hadn't been able to lie on the psych eval either. Doing so would be a slight to Obito's memory.

"I don't worry about whether I've left the stove on, if that's what you're asking."

"Avoiding the question again? I am sensing a pattern."

"It isn't really worry," Kakashi dismissed. "I think about the past, but I don't worry about it."

"Ah, so you think about the past a lot?"

"You could say that."

"Do your muscles get tense when you are worried or anxious?" Haruno continued reading.

"Is this a trick question? You're a medic. Don't you know that that's a biological reaction?"

Haruno sighed. "How often have you been bothered by feeling down, depressed or hopeless?"

"Never. I have plenty of hobbies, thank you."

Another look. "Ah, your porn, yes. How often have you been bothered by feeling bad about yourself, or that you are a failure, or have let yourself or your family down?"

"I don't have a family, so no worries there," Kakashi chuckled.

Haruno sighed. "Once again you have avoided to say whether you consider yourself a failure, whether you beat yourself up for things, and so forth."

"I have nothing to say. I'm not a failure. Why would you say that?"

"Objectively, you are the strongest ANBU currenlty in the village. I never said you were a failure. You put the words in my mouth. Do you often think people think you're a failure?"

"It is none of my business what other people think."

Haruno shook her head to herself, then turned back to the paper. "Alright. Last question: h ave you had an anxiety attack?"

Kakashi deliberately didn't pause. "Of course not."

Haruno put his paper down.

"Well, Hatake. The number of times you lied should give you a good estimate of how much is wrong."

"I didn't–"

"Don't. I know you've lied to me. P lease don't lie to yourself as well. You are a good liar, body-language wise. I am not surprised that you managed to fool the polygraph every year."

"Such accusations. You wound me."

"I am sure that's the case." Haruno stood up and turned his hammock chair with her hand, so they could finally face each other. "Can I say something?"

"What?" Kakashi narrowed his eyes suspiciously.

"Take these words from Haruno the medical professional, not the genin you once met, okay? But if you really have been lying about as much as I think you have, you need help."

"I am sure that's what you tell all your patients with money in their pockets."

Haruno didn't jump to the provocation, as usual.

"It's your choice to seek a specialist's – or even a friend's – help out or not. I am not going to waste my time with a patient unwilling to do so. If you come back to my clinic again, it better be with the intention of doing something about your problems. If you'd rather place you trust in someone else, that's fine. I completely understand. Why would trust a civilian born? And a woman too, right? Regardless, you should trust someone. You have plenty of people who care very much about you. Let them help you."

"Just for the record, I don't make any distinction between women or civilians," Kakashi said, ignoring everything else. He was actually offended Haruno thought so little of him.

"You're dodging the question again. And also, I don't believe that."

Kakashi frowned. "You want to ask? Ask. I will tell you why I did what I did."

Haruno's jaw clenched. "I don't want to know. I don't respect the choice you made, I don't care to hear your justifications. As a medical professional, I am prepared to help you. As Haruno Sakura? I won't take any shit from you."

Kakashi found himself speaking before he even gave his brain the order. "I forced the hokage to kick you out of team seven because I didn't want Naruto and Sasuke to live through the death of a teammate at such a young age. That's why. It wasn't because I hated you: You were just the weak link."

Haruno pursed her lips. "And I? What was I? Chopped liver? You only cared that they would have to see me die, not that I actually died?"

"I don't get attached to people," Kakashi said slowly, aware that she must hate him for this confession. "I was attached to Naruto before meeting him because he is my sensei's son. You, I didn't know. I didn't want you to die, like you don't want some stranger to die, that was it. I thought you weren't responsible enought to make the choice of risking your life, but the choice was yours. I might have kept you on if not for Naruto."

"And Sasuke? You didn't care whether he lost a teammate?"

"Sasuke was broken enough that it might not have made a difference."

Haruno's jaw trembled. "You nearly destroyed my career."

"But I didn't. You proved me wrong."

"I did," she agreed grimly.

Kakashi sighed heavily. "For what it's worth… I'm sorry." It felt cathartic to finally tell her. "I should have kept you on that team. Many deaths could have likely been avoided if I had."

Haruno didn't say anything for a long time. "You've actually thought about this, haven't you?"

Kakashi didn't disagree.

"I... thank you."

"No thanks, please. You owe me nothing."

"I know. But... I'm not sure those deaths could have been avoided," she confessed after a long silence. "Maybe if you had kept me on team seven, I would have died young. I really was an idiot at that age. Or maybe I would have never found the motivation to prove you and all the gossips wrong and never made chunin, like you said."

"Do you hate me?" Kakashi wondered, voicing the question he had wanted answered all along. He didn't understand why he cared. Most people's opinions left him cold. He could count those who didn't on one hand… why was Haruno – this complete stranger, objectively speaking – one of them?

"In the name of honesty… I resented you for a long time. Maybe until five minutes ago," Haruno answered. "I don't really know. But, now I think that I fed that fire for too long. Resenting you was a good source of motivation." She chuckled without amusement. "I am the type of person who draws energy from being told I can't do or be something. In a way, I might have to thank you."

"I see," said Kakashi.

"You were probably right to kick me off that team," Haruno said. "I think I accepted that you might have been right even back then, but everyone I knew acted so outraged on my behalf that… well, it felt good. It made me feel like I was worth more. But really, I failed your teamwork test miserably, and I had a civilian upbringing. I wasn't ready for the field, and less to be tossed out on a team with two, no, three, S-rank targets. Hanabi Hyuga was a better fit."

Kakashi nodded. "So… you don't?"

"Hate you? No. Do you often think people hate you?"

"Yes," he answered, truthfully, for some reason.

"Me too," said Haruno. "I for one thought you hated me."

"Ah." His voice didn't betray the surprise he felt. Kakashi didn't know what to say to that. Haruno made him want to put his trust in her, despite everything. "Would it be alright… if I sent you letters?" he asked.

"Letters?"

"I am… not good at face to face… I lie, even if I don't want to. Maybe if I just wrote it down… and you burned it… and signed a fuinjutsu contract that you won't betray my secrets…"

Haruno chuckled, waving her hand bemusedly. "I can try it your way, I suppose."

"You can?"

"Sure. Whatever makes you the most comfortable. I mean it when I say I want to help my patients however they let me. But they have to let me," she tacked on.

Kakashi nodded slowly. "Alright. Please help me."