The Importance of Being Family
PG (occasional language)
So, Konoha doesn't have child protective services. They do have a chronically tardy jounin whose aggravating pug-dog conscience bullies him into tolerating a new room-mate. Or two.
Beta: Thank you Random Flyer for editing this lovely story.
Chapter 4: Fizzle- In which Kakashi and Iruka form a temporary truce. Of sorts.
Kakashi was rudely shaken from a dark, content oblivion by the familiar swoosh that accompanies thick fabrics abruptly yanked from covered windows. The intense, mid-day light bled through his tightly closed eyes and he scrunched his face in displeasure, pulling his blanket over his head with a low, muffled groan.
"Rise and shine!"
The chipper voice was adult, male and unfamiliar. The words, although innocent and friendly in meaning were delivered with a passive-aggressive tone that Kakashi just wasn't equipped to deal with this early in the morning—er afternoon…whatever. Conveniently shelving the fact that he couldn't quite match a name and face to the intruding voice, Kakashi instead focused on the solid throbbing that was making itself known in his skull.
The painful sensation was interrupted by gentle pats to his cheek from small hands, further softened by the thin blanket Kakashi was using as a shield from his nemesis, the sun.
"Hey, hey—Iruka Sensei? Are you sure he's not dead?"
"He's not dead, he's just hung-over."
The flatly delivered words were followed by footsteps across the floor and Kakashi grasped weakly at his blanket as it was yanked roughly away from his hands. He opened his good eye, glaring blurrily in recognition at the chūnin he'd met in the market a few weeks ago. The steady brown eyes gazing at him were paired with an equally steady scowl and a stubbornly locked jaw. Kakashi growled something unintelligible…closest to "ngugughhh" and lazily threw up an arm over his face, reassured to feel the cloth of his mask under his fingers.
"I think its time for breakfast, why don't you help me make it Naruto-kun?"
Kakashi tried to roll to the right, realized he was on his couch, and rolled to the left, burying his face in the back of the couch as the unwelcome visitor invaded his kitchen. Kakashi's relief at the ninja's withdrawal was temporary—the loud clanging of pots and pans and slamming cabinet doors let it be known quite clearly that the war was just beginning—
"Naruto-kun, why don't you turn your cartoons on?"
-and Kakashi was losing, badly.
Bang, bang, bang went the pots in the kitchen…and was that the shower starting?
Kakashi grudgingly opened his good eye when he felt the chūnin pause at the foot of the sofa.
"You were my mother in a past life weren't you?"
The man with the scarred nose huffed and put a hand on his hip. "I started the shower, you reek." He gestured toward the bathroom with a wooden stirring spoon, all the righteous indignation of a highly affronted housewife etched upon his features. Kakashi thought the situation might be funnier if the subject of the chūnin's ire wasn't quickly making itself known to Kakashi. A sharp whistle from a tea kettle had him wincing and cowering further into the couch cushions.
Naruto's sensei caught him in a glare which regularly cowed school-age children and left Kakashi feeling not that much older. "It'll be quieter in the bathroom, Hatake-san."
Right. Ah well, live to fight another day…never let it be said that Kakashi Hatake couldn't accept defeat at the hands of a more cunning soldier. Kakashi rose slowly from his resting place and teetered unsteadily across the floor, past the blond brat staring aptly at the blaring—and often unused—television and the ninja—who was now, dare he say it—tapping a foot on the floor impatiently.
When Kakashi emerged from the bathroom roughly an hour later, the television was still on, but Naruto had abandoned it in favor of some crayons and a textbook which probably wasn't meant to have color illustrations. Kakashi ignored the budding artist in favor of his house guest, who was sitting at the kitchen table sipping tea and reading a newspaper. Dirty breakfast dishes sat cozily in the kitchen sink and a full plate of toast and bacon gave a warm welcome from the kitchen table. He took the second, empty kitchen chair (which didn't match its partner, having randomly popped into existence last week when Kakashi returned from an afternoon spar with Maito Gai) and cautiously prodded a piece of bacon.
His view of the chūnin was obstructed by the newspaper, the only movement the fluttering of the pages being turned every few minutes. The silence should have been comfortable, but wasn't, and Kakashi found himself slightly put off at being intentionally ignored in his own home. He cleared his throat.
"Ah…chūnin-san, not that I don't care for the breakfast…but, why are you here?"
The newspaper was shuffled into one hand as the man across from him reached down to take a sip of tea. And then it was fully opened again and Kakashi found himself unintentionally reading about the daimyo's most recent affair. He took a moment to cast the genjutsu which let him eat without removing his mask—he was not perturbed by his companion's continued non-responsiveness—and nibbled thoughtfully on his bacon.
He coughed, politely, "Chu—"
"I'm sorry did you say something," the sharp snap had Kakashi's words dying in his throat as the chūnin leveled narrowed eyes at him from over his paper, "I'm trying to let the atmosphere of condemning silence soak in a bit longer."
Kakashi did not shrink back into his chair as the paper was raised once more. He idly munched on some toast and considered the article about the daimyo's infidelity in a manner that would not be best described as sulking.
At the end of a half hour, Kakashi gave on decent conversation and entertained himself by flicking crumbs toward the living room, awarding himself points in an amount which increased in correlation to how close the flicked crumb came to resting in a blond mop of hair.
"Naruto was worried."
One gray eye cut left to the paper barrier (which had to have been read three times over by now, really). His house guest folded the thin sheets and set them down neatly on the table.
"Apparently, Hatake-san, you left to go 'somewhere for big-kids only' last night, and didn't return until early this morning…dropped unceremoniously on the doorstep by a loud green monster of youth with shiny teeth."
Kakashi regarded the chūnin apathetically, unconcerned…though part of his mind sighed as the likelihood of having committed himself to spending time with Gai in the near future rose exponentially.
"Naruto-kun, answered the door and dragged you inside, but was a bit worried when all you would talk about was how 'its ok, you can win this time, I'll catch the broad with the bigger tits on the next go-round' and then you promptly threw up in the bathtub before passing out in the bathroom doorway."
Well, Kakashi thought, that both explained and made more confusing some blurry memories of the previous night.
"Anyway," and with this, the man began to punctuate his irritation by stiffly grabbing Kakashi's empty dishes, stacking them, and moving to the sink, "after removing you from sleeping in the pool of your own vomit, the six-year old ran by himself across the village at two am in the morning in the dark on a night with no moon to my place, banging on my door—loudly hollering and requesting advice on what to do with inebriated morons." The last bit was accompanied by the bitter clanking of roughly scrubbed dishes.
"Now," began Kakashi weakly, "That's not true, I'm confident inebriated isn't in his vocabu—"
Kakashi was cut off as the chūnin whirled swiftly toward him, waving the dish sponge under his nose. "You were so dead to the world that you didn't even recognize my chakra when I invaded your home, dragged you to the couch, and put Naruto to bed last night. And don't give me the 'I would've detected malicious intent' speech because I promise you I wanted to rattle your head to make sure you still had a brain in there last night just as much as I do this morning."
The chūnin stood, posture locked with aggression, and Kakashi absently noted that the improvised dish-sponge weapon was dripping dirty soap suds on the floor. Suddenly, the chūnin threw the sponge into the sink and called for Naruto. He grabbed his paper and headed for the door.
"I'm taking Naruto with me for the day. Come and find us when you've sobered up enough to realize that you are the adult in this household, not the impulsive teenager."
Naruto dropped his crayons and scrambled into the kitchen, giving Kakashi a hug around one knee and sharing a sentiment along the lines of "glad you aren't dead yet" before rushing out the door.
The door slammed shut behind the two, then opened again as the chūnin's head popped into view. "By the way, Naruto wants to know what tits are…I convinced him you meant ticks. I'm trusting you to use this time of reflection to come up with a reasonable explanation as to why you were chasing after tick infested women." The door slammed shut for a second time.
Though it perhaps wasn't the ideal reaction, Kakashi decided a nap was in order before giving serious thought to the morning's events. Most likely, the moral of the story was that Kakashi was socially retarded, which was as common a headline to life's events as the daimyo's affairs.
Turning off the kitchen light and the television playing children's cartoons, he slipped behind the screen partitioning the living room and dropped gratefully into the small, single bed…where he had trouble falling asleep when he realized that his bed no longer smelled like dogs, but had a wilder, untamed scent that his brain wanted to associate with foxes…and was even more disturbed that his brain was registering that as strangely comforting and normal, not odd.
Much later, in the evening, Kakashi spotted a familiar pair of heads enjoying dinner at the local ramen bar, and quietly slipped into the neighboring empty stool.
Murmuring an acknowledgment to the gleeful greeting of an excited child, he nodded along, half-listening to a tale about kunai and "duck-butt haired bastards" and something to do with neon paint as he ordered his own meal. Surprisingly, the chūnin from this morning seemed subdued and a bit embarrassed.
As Naruto was distracted by the proprietor, Kakashi took a deep breath "Ah, I wanted—"
"Hatake-san—" The brunette ninja started speaking at the same moment and caught himself.
"—I wanted to—"
"—I should tell you—"
The chūnin threw his head back with a laugh, "You first, Hatake-san."
Kakashi felt a bit awkward, "Ah, well, er, chūnin-san—"
"Iruka."
Kakashi blinked. Apparently he was going to have to get used to being interrupted.
"Its Iruka Umino…but you can call me Iruka. I have a key to your house, you can call me Iruka."
"Right. Iruka-san." Kakashi nodded firmly and gazed at his mostly uneaten noodles.
"I should tell you I'm sorry, Hatake-san."
This interrupting thing was really getting old—wait, what? Kakashi's head shot up and he looked at the chu—Iruka, in confusion.
"It really wasn't my place to judge you this morning." The man tapped his chopsticks on the rim of his bowl. "I don't approve of your evening activities, but I also understand you have a very high-stress career, and I'm sure I don't have any comparable experiences to understand what drove you to your actions last night."
Kakashi's mind momentarily short circuited—filling with visions of a laughing girl with marks on her cheeks and a boy with flimsy goggles, a man with silver hair bleeding on a hardwood floor looking just as a peaceful as a blonde man resting next to his too-still wife and squalling child as a black stone rose somberly, encompassing them all—stop.
Kakashi swirled his noodles restlessly. "…No, really. It wasn't…I shouldn't have done that. You were right, at the very least, my behavior put Naruto and myself in danger."
The chu-Iruka, turned quickly toward him, pushed back his own bowl, "No, you were, really—You were in the village, you shouldn't have to worry about danger here—"
"No, you were right, I do. I have too much of a history in ANBU and the brat has his own enemies. I shouldn't have left us that vulnerable. It was irresponsible."
The pair sat quietly for a few moments as Naruto's continuous chatter washed over them and the ramen stand owner's doe-eyed daughter refilled their beverages and gave the youngest of the trio another bowl on the house.
"Do you want to talk about it?"
Kakashi blinked away darker thoughts. "What?"
"About whatever drove you to drinking last night?"
Kakashi started when he realized his companion was giving an earnest invitation to have an unpleasant conversation, and then relaxed his shoulders and gave a smile that didn't reach his eyes and, as such, probably went unnoticed. "No, not really. But thank you for the offer. Maybe later."
Kakashi caught the eye of the waitress and motioned for a doggie-bag, Naruto could have the rest of the meal for lunch tomorrow. "I do promise to find a better way to deal with my ghosts next time Iruka-san. Thank you—for your assistance."
"Its really no problem, Hatake-san—"
"Kakashi." It was much more enjoyable to be the one interrupting, for a change. "You spent the night cleaning up my vomit on the bathroom floor. You can call me Kakashi."
Iruka flushed and scratched at the back of his head in a nervous gesture. "Ah, well, er no trouble—well, it was only a little trouble."
Kakashi laughed, "I'd say I'd repay the favor one day, but I can't say I really want to." And with that he tucked the paper doggie bag into his vest, swept a squealing midget onto his shoulders, and headed home…turning left to take the shortcut through the alley and wondering how long it would take Iruka to realize that he'd been left with the bill.