When Sakura decided for her first kiss, she went against every dream of her childhood. In the fog of the unknown, she realized that sometimes, surprises come in the least expected ways – and could revitalize to feel it like it's the first time, all over again.

Kakashi was flipping through pages of a new series called Blackout. He had finished a non-fiction the other week about tracking and water reading. The book leant a few tips and tricks, and even made Kakashi walk away feeling he had become a better tracker. The non-fiction had been a dry read, though, and had left him hungry for something more passionate. He had picked up this novel in his last visit at the bookstore. It was introduced with raving signs heralding it as a spiritual sister of the Makeout Paradise series. He was not an easy sell, but he was a ravenous reader, and he could only read Makeout Paradise so many times. It was time for him to try out new writers in the genre anyhow.

The writer had an eloquence with language but had an overreliance on flowery words. The descriptions seemed to be a lot denser than what he was used to. The structure of the novel's sentences at first seemed bombastic. He had yet to stumble on the explicit material, but if the reviews were right – the embellishing descriptions would make for some highly satisfying pornographic narrative. Perhaps he was just used to Jiraiya's very overdramatic and overt porn. Jiraiya's language was not especially illustrative, leaving many scenes and characters to the imagination of the reader. He did have a way of pulling heart strings for the characters, kindling the slow burn of love before an explosive sexual encounter. In a way, Jiraiya wrote as the way he lived: emotionally intense, blatantly obvious, and enthusiastic for love.

Comparatively, this author felt conservative, and preferred a very subtle and subversive pull. As he flipped through the pages getting used to the writer, he could feel that the descriptions helped his imagination with vividness. It made it easier for him to vicariously live through the characters. The main protagonist was a complex, lonely character with abandonment issues. Jiraiya always preferred characters who were outgoing, vocal, and far more confident than this. The change of pace was interesting to say the least.

He glanced up from his book, eyeing the silent forest. He was roosting on a thick branch, relaxing against the trunk. One clone was down.

He went back down to the book and flipped the page.

Felix was easy for him to relate to. His abandonment issues were due to being in an orphanage, a mother dead and a father lost to war. The abandonment worsened when his adoptive sister was taken away due to a special ability, leaving him alone. Although the circumstances were different, Kakashi related deeply being left behind and all alone. That was enough for him to feel for Felix.

Oh, clone two is gone.

He fingered the edge of the page, reading a little more about Felix's inner monologue as he encountered another character. A character that Kakashi assumed was the leading lady—

She got the third. That was quick.

Kakashi closed the book, presupposing that Sakura would start hunting for him any time now. He wondered if he could make another body replacement jutsu to leave another trail of diversions. She couldn't keep this spirited fortitude for too long. Or could she?

He dusted himself of tumbled snow, placing his book back in his pouch and started his hike through the treetops. He could hear her coming. Crashes, snaps, the rush of wind. He wasn't sure if revealing herself was part of her strategy. If it was, he had to sit her down and tell her the meaning of ninja was not, "throwing a parade before the assassination." He made another body replacement jutsu at a particular tree, then moved on.

He hopped from branch to branch, heeding that the forest was silent again. Did she get distracted? Did she give up? He'll wait, again. He had left several little clones to keep her busy. He had time.

He looked below and saw a soft patch of grass in the sunlight. The snow had long melted there and looked delightful as a resting spot. He swung down, settled down in the green, and opened the book again. He remained hyper aware even though he got reabsorbed back in the story. Now, as paged through the book, Felix was just about to meet a spirited, stubborn woman named Aloisia.

Kakashi was deeply hooked in his book when he felt a disturbance. The quiet had something amiss and he could feel it. He glanced up slowly, wondering if Sakura had finally found him. He didn't know how much time had passed. Had it been moments or hours? The writer, while he had been critical before, had done a great job suspending him in the literary world. Maven and Fluerie had just convinced Aloisia to take Felix on a celebratory date. They were all stranded on a fisherman's manmade port as they repaired their flying vessel. He wanted to get into the juicy details, as Aloisia and Felix finally moved past their antagonistic relationship with one another. However, other duties called. Duties such as being sure to dodge Sakura's angry fists finding their way into his rib cage. He figured she would be irate with the clone mess he left behind and he was preparing for the wrath.

Marking his place in the book, he waited. And waited. And waited.

Nothing came.

Did she expect him to come to her? He could simply walk away: she was the one that wanted the mask off him.

He could still feel her out there, though, and knew she was doing something – he just couldn't tell what. Possibly about to cause a widespread earthquake?

He remained in the still stand-off until pink broke the scene of black, white, and green. She was walking through the thicket, letting snow fall onto her shoulders and hair. She came right to where he was sitting and he waited, knowing she was not the type to come so peacefully.

"Got some reading in, did you?" she asked pleasantly, still continuing forward to him. This was a different tactic of hers. She wasn't going for brazen, and that put him on guard. "Well? Is it a good book?"

He stiffened, eyeing her and remaining alert for traps. Was this a distraction? He was paying every attention to all around him now, hyper mindful of every sound, movement, and shift.

"It's one of the new ones that are paralleling to the Makeout formulas, right?"

Kakashi studied her. He watched like a predator as she came closer and waiting any second now for her snap. When Sakura was a few feet away with no sign of combative movement, his mind buzzed with scenarios. Eventually, he replied, "It's decent."

She arched an eyebrow wordlessly. 'Decent' would be something she would describe a boring meal. 'Decent' wasn't a word she'd describe his captivation the past half hour. She had been there for a few moments, feeling for his chakra. It must have been a particularly good scene, because it had been several minutes before he noticed she was around. She wondered what part of the story he was in that led him so deep into thought. A sex scene, perhaps?

"Then we can resume," she said politely, her body moving back to her battle stance. Kakashi remained tense and echoed her stance with a hunched, predatory posture. He still wasn't sure why she was being so calm after her brutality a few hours before. As she closed the gap between them, Kakashi prepared as she recoiled her fist. She sent it splintering the trunk beside him. He had long leapt out of the way. He came up from behind her with his elbow coming down, striking her truly with strength, leaving her both taken aback and excited. She twisted around and slammed her fist into the earth as she went down, creating tremors and rock to burst upward in fragmented pillars. The impact hit him as the shaking earth brought him down, carrying him with a series of strikes as the crack continued to yawn open the earth with rock. Although winded from his punch, she pounced to him with the same recoil of her fist. This time directed at his stomach, and with far deadlier velocity stored within. His eye widened, and immediately did his earth style mud wall, slowing her advance. It shattered and she was still coming. He lifted himself up, performing several hand signals and blowing as hard as he could to fall her lithe body back. It worked – the wind was unexpected, and it swirled over her feet and blew her down. His hands moved hastily for a fireball jutsu as she rose up swiftly. He only had seconds before she'd be on him again.

As his hands flew, something in the back of his head itched. Something was –

"Gotcha," her voice from behind softly said. He felt her grab a hold of his leg, back and then up. He turned halfway through the jutsu and swiped at her with his hand, landing the blow on her chest and – she disappeared. He felt something on his person shuffle, and he spun back around to find that there was another Sakura. She had used the clone jutsu before showing up and he was being distracted as the real one was making a coordinated ploy.

Before he could take hold of the Sakura who had snuck up on him, the one that he had landed a hit moved towards him like a human grenade launcher. They engaged in an intense hand-to-hand combat. He landed several blows on her, but she still persisted through like an unyielding hurricane. He skipped away from her, performing several hand signs, and blowing a fireball that scorched the earth where she stood. He even started to use his lightning style, combating her with electrifying hits with each tap. Another upward kick was stopped by his hand, and he threw his own at her unexposed side. This time he was not holding back and caused Sakura's body to fly. This one didn't react like she usually did, either. It flew, only to dissipate into smoke into the trees.

Another clone, but he knew that.

Two clones and still didn't get near his face. The third was at large and certainly the real Sakura. He seemed unimpressed she had ignored her whole objective. He surveyed his surroundings, trying to sense if she was still playing her cat and mouse game. He couldn't sense anything. Did she run temporarily to try to get the jump on him again?

Kakashi did feel a little winded from the spar, and figured that it was best to find another hiding spot and let her chase. As he adjusted his cloak, double checked all his kunai and weapons were still intact, his wallet, some other incidentals, and smoothed over the pouch behind him to check for his book. His eye dilated. It was empty.

Huh?

He felt it again and the bag was, indeed, empty.

Did he drop it? Did he somehow not button it securely in? He looked around and about. There were hundreds of footsteps, shattered rock, scorched ground, splintered wood, but no book. His mind rattled on the exchanges that they had – when could it have dropped? It wasn't where he had been reading. It wasn't where she had knocked him around a few times. His air jutsu might have blown it over a few feet around, but there was no trail to say that such a thing even happened.

Kakashi was confused, but only for a few seconds.

Well? Is it a good book?

No, she didn't. She couldn't. Did she?

He felt for the book again. He didn't even remember what page he was on.

Kakashi decided with quick deduction that yes, Sakura Haruno had stolen his adult romance novel. A 16-year-old girl was off in the forest with a fine piece of X-rated material. He had once wondered what would happen when Naruto, Sasuke, and Sakura grew up and were able to understand the content of the Makeout Paradise Series. In his assumptions, he knew his reaction would be stoic as usual, unaffected. Theirs widely ranged from groans, to comical disgust, to full blown seen differently. While Kakashi was not one to be bothered by other's opinions, he seemed particularly sensitive to his students seeing him differently than the stoic, level-headed sensei. The truth was, deep down inside, there was a queasiness about them knowing his vulnerability. The sex scenes were easy to play off humorously. It was the deep loving dialogue that followed before and after those steamy scenes that made him feel bare.

He needed to get it back. Now. He was not prepared for that day to be today.

It was hard enough hiding a hard erection in these ninja pants. The thought of Sakura discovering he was a few minutes away from one before her siege would leave things very awkward. He looked at the footprints that laid about. By observation and process of elimination, he had found the trail that had been the real Sakura. Her landing had left a foot trail that went back to where she came. He followed it all the way until it disappeared up into the trees. He lifted his hi-tate momentarily, activating the Sharingan, to find chakra signatures. Once he pinpointed, he lowered it back again, pulled a scroll out of his pants, and slung it out in front of him.

He sliced his thumb on a kunai, cast it on the paper, and whispered, "Summon, fanged pursuit."

It was one thing to demask him, it was another thing to touch his book.

It was Pakkun who had found her first. She was back at the meadow and in plain sight. Pakkun had waddled over her and, while her scent was Sakura, she did not look like Sakura that Pakkun knew.

She was sitting at the tree, the sun hovering over the horizon, bathing in the last warm rays of its reign. She had shed her red jacket and looked comfortable in the puffy jounin vest. Her hair was long and put in a messy ponytail, pooling over her shoulders and laying rest on her stomach. Long eyelashes flicked back and forth over the book in her hands. She had been reading for a while before the rest of the ninken caught up with the pug. Once they signaled her location, Kakashi came in a flurry of leaves in his teleportion jutsu. He was on guard to find an insolent 16 year old who had stolen his property. He had expected pranks from Naruto of this caliber. Sakura's disrespect seemed both odd and worrisome. He prepared a teacher's scowl and reprimand but when he found himself approaching a grown woman, both responses seemed inappropriate.

Her facial structure was similar to Sakura but distinctively different. A 29-year-old woman was holding a book he had been reading, and she looked at him with recognition. He wasn't sure who he was looking at.

Was this a genjutsu? Was she doing a genjutsu to distract him running off with his book? She was pulling all the ridiculous stops to slip his mask off, wasn't she?

"This Felix really is an emotionally restrained guy," the pink haired stranger said. Her voice was deeper, older, but still familiar. Kakashi didn't say anything.

"Aloisia has a lot of patience for him. They're going on this date, and he has to be escorted by his team members to meet her at this amphitheater, all set up for him. He seems to want it, but he's fighting every step of the way. Why? And," she realized what she was doing, and then brought her hand near her chest, "ah, oh no, I'm spoiling it for you."

Kakashi still said nothing. He was still as winter with a steel eye remaining fixated on her form. His battle senses were raging and told him not to relax. Her peaceful demeanor still set alarms in his head. He remained tense and ready for another surprise. Perhaps, Sakura was playing a mind game. She created a stranger that seemed vaguely to her likeness with his book to distract him, and it was so far working well. The entire situation was tying his thoughts into knots. His mind plucked details that could help him differentiate between illusion and reality. They combed through every visual difference with scrutiny. His instinct went over every feeling he felt with cautious introspection. He was convinced this was an illusion.

She stood up, and then that's when Kakashi knew. How she moved, how she breathed, the vibrations all around her. This wasn't a genjutsu. This was real, she was real. She slowly walked over to him and offered the book to him. "It's pretty romantic. Even tasteful. Was Makeout Paradise that tasteful? Knowing Jiraiya, I can't imagine him writing like that."

His eyes widened, and he broke his silence. "Sakura."

"Yes," she answered, intelligent green connected in eye contact with his solitary one. She smiled the same smile she always had – since she was 12, since she was 16, and now, at 29. He wasn't sure why he hadn't guessed it at first. The likeness now seemed way too uncanny, way too accurate. Maybe, he just protected his mind from seeing her this way. "Surprise."

"Sakura, what is—"

"You know what I wonder? What it would be like to have a romance with an Uchiha, with the Sharingan and all. How would the Eye of Hypnotism and Insight work? I bet it would be wild. I wonder if the Eye of Hypnotism could bring out feelings out of someone?"

Kakashi started again, "Sakura, this jutsu, is this the forbidden jutsu? Is this Tsunade's jutsu?" He couldn't muster his teacher voice. For the first time with her, he wasn't the only adult in the situation. He knew deep down the Sakura he knew was before him, but it was hard to get past with the woman his age looking right at him. He felt things, and he didn't exactly have the time to sort out what they meant. He wasn't sure if he was looking at a violation of forbidden jutsu, a joke, or something even more complicated in himself.

"Is that something you've done before, Kakashi? I'm sure you've done seduction missions. Have you ever pulled out the Sharingan and seen what it could do? There were some people that said that they could, well…" she trailed off and stopped the topic cold, as if she had gotten shy what she was going to say next. "They better hurry with one. With the Uchiha being near extinction. If they're going to go for Sasuke for research, they're going to be disappointed." She smiled dryly, moving closer to Kakashi until she was merely inches away from him.

"Sakura, that's, that's not something we should get into right now," Kakashi could only gather up as a response. He didn't know what to say. Even with his brilliant mind, he felt scattered. He felt disarmed. "The jutsu, is this Tsunade's?"

"The one and only," Sakura answered, the easy smile of hers relaxed and receptive. She took his hand, which he flinched at her touch. She had placed his book in his hand because he still hadn't accepted her offer. His fingers slowly clasped it, and she moved away. But not far enough for Kakashi to gather his thoughts properly. "If you ever find one about an Uchiha, I'm an interested party."

"This is… great work, Sakura. This jutsu must have been pretty hard to master," Kakashi tried to formulate words. She was very close. He couldn't remember the last time a woman he intimately knew was this close. This is Sakura, he reminded himself. This is Sakura. This is Sakura with a well-developed woman's body. But still Sakura. Sakura, the 12 year old you were teaching a few years back.

"I wouldn't call it mastering," her voice had a melodic tone to it, and she remained locked in his eye. He stepped back unconsciously, trying to create space from her. She moved forward as he kept moving back. "There's some things I'm still working out with it. But, seems to work fine, for now."

The sun was disappearing behind the mountains and shadows shaded the clearing. The temperature was dropping rapidly but Kakashi felt as if he was on fire. Kakashi's ninken around him watched in silence as their master kept retreating step by tiny step. He had his book. The training was clearly done. Neither of them had engaged in sparring in twenty minutes. He had every reason to go home. Why was he here? Why was he enduring this? He could teleport out. Yes, that's what he was going to do. He didn't need to think of responses or dialogue. He just needed to state training was over for the day and be on his way.

"You did well," he scraped some iota of calmness in his voice. He buried the nervousness underneath professionalism. Sakura was tilting her head, the ponytail that rested at her shoulder swayed. She could swear she was hearing a stutter. "A few more rounds and you should be back in the rhythm of being out on the field."

She moved closer. Why is she moving closer? He stepped back. This was a good time to tell her that they should be heading out for dinner, and good night.

"Thank you, I have a patient sparring partner."

Silence passed between them. The closeness created a nervousness that Kakashi was spending too much energy controlling. He was an adult man, and he was acting childishly. He demanded that his words come out to say good night, but they never came.

"Kakashi," she said softly, the smile of hers never leaving. He watched how she smiled at him and he wondered if she had ever smiled at him like that before. How she said his name so softly, like the fall of a snowflake. It felt warm, inviting, frighteningly dear. As he moved away from her to make a teleportation jutsu, he found himself so nervous, he nearly tripped over Shiba. In the seconds he steadied himself and looked up, Sakura was right on him. She was not as tall as him, barely a 5'4" to his 5'11", but it did not stop her. She reached up and Kakashi's eye went wider than it had in a long time.

There was contact on his mask, and his mind shot at the speed of light. The time slowed, and the law of entropy began its chaotic breakdown of his senses. He could feel her skin against the fabric, opening against where his lips were. His parted slightly not to return the kiss, but out of sheer shock. It was then that Sakura heard a sound that she never heard Kakashi make in a long time – a shortness of breath. His face full of wildfire, glowing red even at his ears, and his hands and arms reacted before his brain could process their faces had connected. He had pulled her off immediately, thrusting her forward as if she had committed a heinous crime.

"Oh, I," she laughed nervously, having been used to rejection like this before. The force of his push surprised her. It was as if she had attempted to stab him. She had anticipated some bad reactions but this one was not one of them. He was older than her, so she figured the worst he would have done is laugh at her attempt. Balking her like this was felt foreign from the calm and collected Kakashi Hatake. Sasuke had been good training for rejection, but she was not prepared for the intense jerk that Kakashi had. "Guess you're not into it. I get it."

Kakashi was flustered but night kept his pride in tact. He desperately tried to regain his calm, find proper words. A joke, even, to put emotional and physical distance between them. He closed his eye in that familiar crinkle, and gathered the discipline to steady his voice. "You are a great student, Sakura. You've grown a great deal under Tsunade. The jutsu you've refined with your chakra is exceptional. It feels very real. I can only imagine that your medical skills put this one to shame." He was composed, and his nervous jerks before could be easily construed as surprised, but gentle dismissal. Kakashi's emotions were mixed now – he was trying to think of anything that wasn't about almost kissing his student. His student – he reaffirmed the word. His entire mind was a mess but he wasn't going to act it. "I'm proud of you. This certainly was a surprise and you got me."

"Yeah, glad you like it," she said casually, walling herself from feeling the rejection. It stung, how he seemed unaffected by her appearance or her bold advance. The only surprise she got out of him was that she managed Tsunade's signature jutsu – or so she thought. He had not reacted to her in a way that was conflicted with desires and confusion. He was fooling her perfectly. "Definitely got you with this one."

Kakashi gave a nervous chuckle and nodded. "Game's over for the day?"

"Game is over for the day," Sakura repeated. "Guess Sukea will have to be another time."

Kakashi refused to open his eye because if he did, his revelation of what she intended with Sukea would have roused another reaction. He kept it at its traditional crinkle, even though the smile he had under his mask was rehearsed. She waved to him, grabbing her red jacket, and utilized a teleport jutsu to leave the field.

Kakashi stood in moonlit grass, opening his eye to its usual half-lidded look. His heart was running a marathon in his chest. He had touched the wet spot that was on his mask, right on his lips. Did she kiss him? Did Sakura kiss him? He felt the wet again, and his mind made acrobatic stunts to justify anything else but Sakura kissing him.

Some melted snow fell there. His tongue may have come out. Maybe sweat. It could be anything but Sakura's soft, wet lips.

"Boss," Pakkun had started, breaking the silence of the ninken, "You doing okay?"

"Y-yeah," he managed. Then cleared his throat. "Just surprised. Nothing to be seen here."

Pakkun nodded, unconvinced. The ninken seemed to reflect the same mood. "Uh huh."

"Let's head home."

The following week after, Kakashi turned the kiss in his mind. It followed him everywhere and lurked in his thoughts like a fever dream. When at the grocery store picking out produce, wet droplets against his skin reminded him of the melting snow. He analyzed her eyes and how she had looked at him, how she moved towards him without fear. As he stood in line for the cashier, his mind focused on the smooth colors of nightly blue on her pale skin, on her lips, and how soft she spoke. How her sense of vulnerability was as open and pristine as the moon bathed meadow. How different she was from what he was used to. Was this the Sakura Sasuke got to see? Before he knew it, he was carrying groceries in the snow thinking about how soft her pink hair had looked across her shoulder.

It played in his thoughts even during boisterous events. Gai insisted they build the most magnificent snowman together and Kakashi went along with it in a daze. Gai had clustered enough snow to make an entire army of snow sculptures. He rambunctiously started making a snow Hokage, and required Kakashi's skills to help him build the gargantuan piece. Gai chattered wildly as Kakashi listened, absolutely disconnected to his reality.

Did Sakura have any other interests other than Sasuke? How come he never noticed it before? Naruto clearly loved her. Hinata was obvious. Ino was obvious. Kiba was obvious. Asuma was obvious. Kurenai was obvious. Many of them, obvious. Sakura, was a blank.

Kakashi used his discipline to stop thinking about it for a moment to land a gigantic sharpened log on a large snow face. It wasn't a mountain carving, but it was something – a 8 foot three-tiered snowbeing with a log for a nose and gigantic boulders for a smile and eyes. Then a lightning thought shocked him. Was he her first kiss?

It followed him at work. When Tsunade started to schedule his missions around his holiday, he wondered what she was doing that day. As Tsunade went through the paperwork with him, her finger dancing on the page in lines of sentences, Kakashi got lost on the feeling of her soft lips. He had thought about it all so much, he was slowly warming up to imagining other scenarios. He wondered if he had returned it and let it go further. Maybe she would have answered any of these questions that had been haunting in his head for the past month. He wondered where she was now, and if he could bump into her somehow.

Then there were the worse curiosities: what did she taste like, how did she feel against his bare skin, what was she thinking when she said his name like that, so softly, so tenderly.

Tsunade was showing photos and maps now. She kept going with her description of the spying mission. Kakashi nodded and had perfected his act of paying attention. He remained an impeccable soldier and ninja; he had not broken out of character. Even though his mind was a tangle of these thoughts, he remained just as relaxed and put together as always. He had been used to compartmentalizing his emotions. The series of horrific traumas that was his life gave him plenty of practice to do that.

The Fifth Hokage had rolled up the maps and was now saying something else about objectives. Kakashi made a mention that the objectives may have overlapping conflicting interest, and she started to elucidate the avoidance of it.

Sakura had made it clear she was not a child anymore, and that had changed absolutely everything for Kakashi Hatake.

At last, his boss and superior had finished her briefing and handed him the contract. He signed. The days flew by and he kept thinking about that kiss. The missions came and went, and in small, quiet moments, he found himself daydreaming. When he got placed in squadrons for his missions, he often found himself wishing she was with him.

And it was reliving the kiss that, for many nights since, was preferred over Makeout Paradise or Blackout. In his more honest fantasies, the kiss deepened, and something would stir in his chest for the first time in over a decade.

As the winter months exploded in light and festivities, Kakashi's imagination grew bolder and entertained the idea. When the snow melted, and spring was drawing near, Kakashi became open to seeing and touching her. On a muggy, spring evening, his thoughts intermixed scenes of Blackout with himself and Sakura. He found himself wanting. In the quiet of the rain he came to the decision. If the time was right and the reasons good enough, if she brought it up again or initiated, he knew this time, he would allow it. The longing in his heart stirred as if it were alive, and for once, Kakashi was content such a thing existed in him.