Chapter three
He felt like being alone, and so he headed towards the right wing of the building and went to the room at the end of the hall. The door was unlocked, as he'd left it.
His office was dusty, he barely spent any time there. He had never understood why they'd given him one in the first place, since he was away so much. He'd asked Tsunade but she'd never answered. He didn't have any pictures. Some writing equipment was in a drawer. He couldn't remember that he had put them there.
None of the drawers had files in them. Naturally, considering his work. When he passed away, there would be no one there to clean up the mess, simply because there would be no mess. He would leave the world in an orderly fashion, in death finally nameless.
He ran a finger through the dust on the surface of the desk. Drew a little wave and then the ANBU sign, almost rolled his eyes at the fact that the swirled logo was the best that he could do in his attempt to be artistic. He wiped off the dust so that it now instead was a clean circle in the middle. His hand was dusty but he wiped it off on his pants, a gesture he knew people found irritating but that he gathered a little pride from keeping, a little pat on the back for his defiance. Normally it was blood that he wiped off his hands.
"I knew I'd find you here."
Him again. Some people never knew how to give up.
"Why are you here?"
"Why are you so mad at me?"
He knew he had to turn around and face him. Of all the countless battles he'd fought, this was the one of the harder.
As he'd suspected, he was more upset than angry.
"I'm not mad at you. I merely told you to watch the way you speak." He tried to sound solemn, like it wasn't a big deal. It didn't go that well.
Naruto could tell he was lying but didn't know why. Kakashi saw him take a big breath, gulping in air to release whatever was nagging at him, the now broad shoulders tense, he looked grown up, finally ready to take on the weight of speaking his heart.
"Bullshit. You've been this way ever since we came back home. Tell me what happened."
You.
You happened.
"…Nothing. Nothing happened."
He glared at him, mad for not telling him, mad for not being trusted. He lowered his gaze, like the anger had vanished in a snap.
"If it's the way I addressed you, then I'm sorry."
Don't apologise.
"I don't want people to think..." He stopped, thought the better of going down that road. "Jiraiya taught you better than that."
It was a cheap shot but it worked.
He sank a little in his shoes. Kakashi felt his heart rupture beyond repair, it felt as if it had opened wide and was leaking out across the floor, endlessly flowing out from him, in disgust of causing so much pain just to save his own skin. He knew that he was making a bigger deal out of it than necessary but he had to make him back off, had to put distance between them, couldn't afford not to.
"You know, it feels like yesterday that we went to eat ramen. I can't believe he's gone."
"He cared for you very much" he said, in a futile attempt to comfort. He knew, just as well as anyone, when it came to losing a friend there were few words that would make it better, if none at all.
A gloomy silence made itself known. "How did you know where my office was?"
Naruto snapped out of it, looked around as if he hadn't really cared to before, took in the dust and the grey walls, the anonymous view through the window. "Oh, I asked if anyone had seen you."
He had wanted to see him so he had asked for him. Kakashi tried not to make anything endearing out of it. He had wanted to talk to him, that was it. Don't get ahead of yourself.
Ebisu walked past the open door, then backed up and nodded towards Kakashi. Or both. "Kakashi-san. Naruto-kun. Tsunade-sama wished to see you as soon as possible but she didn't know where you were. Did you forget that you would meet her today?
"Ah, no. Of course not." (He had indeed.)
Naruto looked puzzled. "She wanted to meet me too?"
"Yes. Are you busy?" Ebisu glanced at them both, seemingly unsure what to make of their endeavour in the old office. "It seemed to be quite urgent."
"Well we'd better go then. Nice seeing you, Ebisu."
"You too."