So, I'm trying to cut my chapters shorter, simply by cutting my story into more chapters instead of few - but long chapters. I haven't cut anything off the actual chapters. This way i can update more often :) Hope you enjoy this sweet little chapter ;)
Unbeliavable that I haven't seen his face yet. That he always manages to keep it hidden, I thought to myself.
Over the past few weeks, or to be more accurate - 2,4 weeks, I'd been staying in Kakashi's apartment. Being around him 24/7, I'd grown an increasingly stronger obsession with his face. Lately I'd also been spending a lot of time discussing with myself that I'd come to grow closer and more attached to him. I was sitting on my futon, looking over the edge of Kakashi's bed an early morning. He was shirtless and had his mask on. If I could just slip a finger under that mask and pull it down just a bit to get a glimpse of his nose I'd be more than satisfied! My eyes went to the tiny bit of his chest that was bared and up his strong arm that supported his head. His headband was off and allowed his short bangs to fall over his forehead even though most of his hair was messy and spiky at the moment. Well… He's pretty handsome, I admitted just like I'd done the day before and rested my head on the edge of his bed. I felt how I was changing towards him; I mean I'd never seen his face and yet I was telling myself that he was handsome.
"For how long are you going to stare at me?"…
I yelped when I heard Kakashi's voice and saw that he was looking at me from the corner of his red eye. I got stunned for a second by the still fascinating and foreign eye, and stumbled a bit over some sounds.
"I-I was not staring at you. I was just planning how to take off your mask." I stuttered as my eyes flickered away from his.
"Is that so?" He said and cocked an eyebrow. He moved around to face me, his chest baring all the more as he put his head in his hand so he could see me better.
"Um, yeah. What else would I be doing?" I asked, trying to act cool, my first reaction considered.
Kakashi looked effortlessly stunning in the morning light and the picture of him in itself was even more overdone when a breeze from the open window caught his hair. It was almost like taken out of a movie or a magazine. I restrained myself from making the mistake of looking away like some shy teenage girl and cursed this whole situation.
"I don't know, I can just tell that you're lying." He said and dropped his head to the pillow and puffed it up casually.
"What? How can you always tell that?" I asked, annoyed that in spite my countless tries to conceal that I was lying he actually got better and better at spotting it.
"Your eyes are lying and you stutter and you try too hard to hide the fact that you're lying." He said – "I wonder what you're hiding though." He said and looked thoughtfully away with a slight undertone of trying to tease me.
"Well, I DO really want to know what's behind that mask." I said and looked at him hopefully, hoping that he would take it off. Kakashi yawned and sat up in his bed revealing his whole upper body. I suffocated a small gasp and looked away from him, annoyed that he was able to make me feel so… so uncomfortable and curious at the same time.
"Toshi you've become so weak. He can tell every time you check him out." Eien's powerful voice suddenly echoed in my head
"Shut up you pestilence. You're disturbing me." I hissed out loud and looked upwards as if she was up in the ceiling. Clever…
"W-what?" Kakashi looked at me as if he had seen a ghost. He was always bad at handling people who was acting strange in his presence, and I mean those REALLY strange, random people you sometimes meet in the street who goes up to you and talk about weird random stuff, often people who look like they live in the street and pick trash out of the trashcans… Okay, maybe I'd been living in the street, and I'd SOMETIMES picked up trash from the trashcans… Sorry. On with the actual story.
"Oh, it wasn't for you, but for the smart and cool lioness who lives in my head and thinks she's tough." My voice was sick with sarcasm as I looked into the ceiling again, hoping Eien would hear this.
"You better show some respect little girl. Without me you are nothing. You wouldn't even have met this boyfriend of yours." She hissed back.
"What do you mean by that. You know perfectly well that he's not my boyfriend. He's my somewhat-sensei. But I know you can be kind of slow sometimes." Wait, I didn't just say that out loud, did I?
I looked over at Kakashi awkwardly and stiff. How could I keep embarrass myself in front of him? The day had yet to start!
"Uhm… " Kakashi seemed to consider his words –"I've never heard you talk with… her before." He said, thankfully not commenting the boyfriend part.
"No, she hasn't really said anything ever since the prison-break-out." I looked away thoughtfully while he did the same, except he was looking at me. An awkward silence lingered between us for a few painful minutes before Kakashi spoke.
"Well, your conversation sounded… interesting." He said and threw his cover aside, hiding something that was on his mind… I could tell.
With a shrug I threw my cover aside too, and combed my hair with my fingers absently. The heat outside was getting worse over the past days and I'd been forced to sleep in something else than a ninja-shirt. I'd taken my old and torn tank-top on which I'd been given after I'd gone out of prison. The only actual thing that was from my past. It occurred to me that Kakashi had stopped rummaging around and I looked up to see him staring at me, as if he was caught in the middle of an act. Since I got no reaction out of him, I looked down at myself to see if I looked weird, or my breast had slipped out of my tank-top or something like that. I couldn't see anything unusual, and suddenly got a bit insecure and uncomfortably self-aware.
"What?" I snapped, annoyed that he didn't say what was wrong.
"Um, you…" Kakashi replied and seemed to snap out of what-ever-state-of-mind he was in. I cocked an eyebrow at him. I'd never seen him unsure before and found it kind of amusing.
"You've just never showed that much skin before. You always wear a shirt." He said, and seemed to get it together, because he was suddenly smiling with his eyes. By the fact that he could be so calm and honest and the same time, was almost a bit annoying to me.
I looked down at myself and up.
"Well… Okay? I bet you've seen more in the hot-tubs." I said and shrugged, hiding my embarrassment as well as I could.
"What do you think of me Toshi? Do you think I'm peeping at you in the hot-tubs?" he looked a bit startled, on-purpose-startled.
"You did just now, didn't you? You men are all the same." – Not true, Kakashi wasn't like the others, but he didn't have to know that.
Kakashi scratched his neck and looked dumb-founded at Toshi.
"I guess you're right about that." He said, suddenly feeling genuinely dumb. She rolled her eyes with a smile hidden in the corner of her mouth. He liked that about her, that she always made it so obvious what she was thinking or feeling.
He couldn't tell whether it was because she was wearing a tank-top or if she just looked a tad more beautiful in the morning light. He looked back at the shirt he was holding in his hand, feeling slightly baffled about his thoughts. He knew he shouldn't check her out, not even her little finger! It was wrong, and he knew she eventually would have to stand on her own feet in the city. He shrugged – he was a guy after all, that would make a good enough excuse for his conscience to let it go. He threw his shirt aside and took one of his tank-tops while his thoughts still wandered. He had to admit that she was a beautiful girl, but beautiful girls often came with a psychotic mind unfortunately. She was definitely on the psychotic side… He couldn't find out if he liked that or not. But what he knew was, that if things were the way they were before team 7, if he didn't know her, if he had met her on the street, if she was a civilian – he would've probably would've went for a one night stand with her. But times were with team 7, he did know her, he hadn't met her in the street and she was a ninja.
Kakashi began to search for a towel. Good that she was afraid of physical contact, and good that she was a bit of a psycho. That would keep him or any other guy from forming any feelings for her, he told himself knowing that he'd never imagined his first long-termed relationship with a normal girl (if he ever was to have one). He reconsidered a bit and smiled a bit to himself when thought about the times he'd spotted her softer side.
"I'm heading for the shower." He heard Toshi say, and then turned around ripped out of his thoughts.
"No no, I'm first. I always am." He said and forgot that he always was the first one to be up. She could sleep all day of he would let her.
"Uh, no you're not." I grabbed my own towel and marched towards the door, after the long moments of silence between me and Kakashi.
His apartment was pretty messed up because of my clothes and stuff that lay around. What? I didn't have even have my own shelve. Kakashi was quick to the door and we met each other in the doorframe right after I'd slammed the door up.
"I mean it Kakashi. I'll burst in the door if you take the shower." I threatened and pushed him into the door frame with my shoulder.
"Sorry, you can't always have it your way little princess." He said and pushed back.
We both got stuck in the door frame, both of us pushing the other, trying to take that one step out of the doorframe. He had pretty broad shoulder despite not being the most sturdy build man I'd seen.
"Stubborn idiot." I hissed with gritted teeth and placed a hand on the top of his head trying to push him back.
"Truly you are." He said and struggled a bit with the hand on his head.
"Shut it." I hissed and felt him putting more strength into his pushing, and felt him slip more and more forwards.
"No no no!" I said, competitive as I was. Kakashi stretched his neck from underneath my hand and felt how our shoulder was pushed out in a sudden release. We both stumbled to the opposite wall, Kakashi laughing the slightest before we both began to run. Kakashi had the upper hand was in front of me from the beginning and I jumped forward in desperation to be the first and attached myself around his waist. It only slowed Kakashi down a bit as he continued in a zombie-slow walk towards the bathroom. I battled to regain my foothold, my legs dragging behind me to slow him down.
"Give it up Toshi. You will never beat me. It's just a fact. Accept it." He grinned.
"You're so full of yourse—" I was cut off when smock blew into my face and around me. I landed on the floor with a bump on top of something soft. I looked at Kakashi doll, staring back at me with lazy eyes. I coughed a bit from the spicy, suffocating smell of ninja smock.
"There's no time for practicing the art of kissing with a silly doll Toshi. I'm winning." I looked up to see Kakashi waving playfully to me for the bathroom door. I felt like a big idiot.
If I moved one single muscle he would he would smack the bathroom door locked.
"Too late." He smiled briefly with his eyes and began to close the door.
I rushed to me feet and used only two long steps to get to the door and grabbed the doorknob just half a second after he had locked the door. I pulled in the doorknob like a mad person, not wanting to accept my defeat.
"Kakashi! Please let me go first!" he fumbled with the door knob to irritate him. Being the first to shower was simply a matter of principle now!
"Let!" I kicked the door.
"Me!" Kicked the door again.
"In!" and again.
I might as well just forget it. Kakashi was too stubborn. I could hear the shower now. I turned my back to the door and glad down it like I was melting and sat down turning the doorknob over and over. For I couple of moments I just sat there on the wooden floor, trying to overcome the heat in the hallway.
"It's actually quite annoying."I could hear Kakashi voice from inside the bathroom.
"Well, if you let my in I might stop and—" my hand automatically flew away from the door and a shock of electricity ran through my hand. I looked startled at the doorknob.
"Wh-what was that?" I said a bit scared and scootched away from the door. Kakashi opened the door and peeped outside.
"Will you stop now?" he asked politely.
I was up on my feet faster than before. He got weak. He opened the door! YES! I got one foot inside. Kakashi retracted his head and allowed me to swoop inside. I was about to push him aside when… When… I must've looked really stupid. I tried bravely to hold a pokerface when I basically stood face to face with Kakashi's bare chest, though he was as usual wearing a mask. I looked down trying to avoid what I was seeing, only to see the twin rope of muscle that edged below the top of the towel he wore around his waist. Nothing went through my mind except his body. I took in a deep breath discretely, resisting the sudden feeling the swelled up inside of me, and urge to touch his skin.
"Hah! Now I'm in, so I'm going first. Too bad." I pushed him away with me index finger like he was something nasty. Mentally I padded myself in the shoulder proudly. I was strong indeed. I was so cool and collected. I mean the way I just swiped him off like that were a performance worth a gold medal! I mean pff, it was no big deal really.
"You better get out Kakashi. Cause it's my shower now. If you don't get out I'll start undress, and you can't be in here when I do that! I mean, you're me teacher, right? So you have to—" wow, I didn't even listen to my own mouth anymore.
I was just babbling. As long as I did that he would have time to get out. I was facing the shower, my back to Kakashi when I suddenly felt him very close behind me.
"Toshi, if you want to shower together, we can do that as well."
I didn't know whether it was his breath in my hair or just the very question that stiffened my body and made my mind go completely blank. A chill ran all the way down my spine as I was considering the fact that him and his tall, manly figure stood right behind me in just a towel. That picture of me and him standing in the shower together. The steam hanging around us and the hot water that sprayed my mussed blonde hair while Kakashi carefully scrubbed my back… Memories of the hot-springs hit my subconscious like a pleasurable drug. I stopped myself before thinking further, but didn't have any luck in disconnecting mind from body. I stumbled backwards, into his bare chest, knocked my head up his chin, hearing his teeth clap together. Feeling trapped between him and the shower I began to panic, and turned around quickly, meeting his eyes briefly with a –
"Sorry, never mind." Before rushing out of the door, like something important had suddenly come up. I could've sworn that I heard him mumble "can't even take I tiny joke" after I caught one last glimpse of him rubbing his cheek.
I began to cook some rice to redirect my thoughts. I didn't want to think about how embarrassing bad I was at handling situations where Kakashi was coming a bit too close. Sitting on the floor I sighed, clearly not able to redirect my thoughts as much as I'd wanted to.
"You do realize that you have some kind of weakness for Kakashi, right?" Eiens voice echoed in my ears.
"Um, no I don't." I lied to her and looked at the rice-boiler.
"Toshi, I can hear your thoughts. You can't lie to me. If you didn't have a weakness for him, you wouldn't have been acting so weird lately. I wonder what you would do if he threw away his shirt while sparring." I could feel her smirk in a crafty way.
"It's different when you're in battle, everything just shots down. You know that!—" I groaned frustrated " I don't know! It just scary that I'm changing the way that I am. I don't want to change, I want to be me and not being told what's right or wrong… At the same time, I like the way that things have turned out. Heck, I like it a lot!" I said out loud still watching the rice. Eien was silent for a moment.
"You better not screw up his trust. He's the main reason for your happiness." She said and I felt I slip away from my consciousness again.
I began to sit and ponder as I made myself a bowl of rice to eat quickly. I felt moody, confused and too stubborn to realize how good I was feeling with this new life. I heard footsteps in the hallway and soon after Kakashi stood in the door way, looking relaxed as always. I looked up at him and met his eyes silently. He suddenly looked concerned.
"What's wrong?" he asked. Great, I'd been looking worried.
"Um, nothing." I answered and put on an indifferent face and stuffed some more rice into my mouth.
"Toshi… I can see something concerns you." He said and walked over to me, and sat down in front of me, looking at me like he was going to hack all of my thoughts in a second.
I always felt a bit uncomfortable and insecure when he was trying to get into my psyche, but I was getting used to forcing myself to tell him what was on my mind, cause it always helped in the end. I had a lot of experience now in opening up even though it still wasn't easy, AND to talk instead of acting violently or aggressively to what I was feeling.
"I-I'm just, having some difficulties with accepting the fact that I feel so much better here than where I was before I came to Konoha. I guess, I'm afraid of changing, afraid of loosing myself." I paused and looked at him, hating to look into his penetrating eyes. I couldn't quite believe I was telling him this deep thing. But it felt natural. Kakashi took a bowl and beganto pour rice up.
"You're not changing or loosing yourself. You're simply evolving, that's a natural part of life. If you keep doing the things you've always done, you'll never achieve new experiences or understanding." He said and smiled with his eyes, the typical way he did that. His eyes changed and he stopped in the middle of pouring more rice up. He looked worried or just thoughtful, as if there was something he didn't tell me. But he seemed to snap out of it after a moment.
"Your personality is starting blossom and show itself. Not hidden behind all that anger." His eyes flickered to the food and then back at me again.
What he soon found out was that he'd left me completely speechless. He was right, like he usually was, but the words meant more to me than I'd ever have thought. But would "I" always be so afraid of physical contact? Would ever get close to anyone? More than friends with anyone? I'd never considered the fact that I might end up with a boyfriend some day, and that would mean that I would have to go through a lot of physical stuff. I blushed slightly about the thought.
"I have a good deal of faith in you." He said and planted a comforting hand on my shoulder that I wanted all the more to lean into.
He was being so good to me and it wasn't fair. It was too easy to choose a life when he got close to me like this. I wanted to give him a hug of gratitude and melt into his safe, comforting chest. It was so obvious to me how afraid I was of letting him down. I forced my eyes away from his. I weird silent mood had set upon us.
"Thanks." Was my only reply.
"Um, not to change to subject, but I would like to take my shower now." I said and put my bowl down and stood up.
"Fine, I'll be having some paperwork to do today." He said and smiled with his eyes.
It was nice to have the privilege to bath in a private shower. I was nice to let the hot water spray my broad shoulders and delicate back. Sensetive to the drops of water that ran down my body, I enjoyed the feeling of something caressing on my skin. It was like I could relax and let my thoughts just wander when I stood in the shower and the outside world seemed far away. When I was done I wrapped towel around my body which was starting to look healthy and muscled. I dried the mirror of dew so I would see myself. I looked back at my green eyes with no thoughts running through my mind. I scanned my face, eyes, lips, nose. Not even I single scar was evident nor a hint of roughness. How could my parents possibly have looked like? I turned a bit to take a look at my back. It still looked rough but luckily there was not so many scars which I'd been fearing. I turned around to stare at my face again and saw how my eyebrows slowly furrowed. I bit my lip when a sudden chill ran over me… Did the kids care about me? If I died would they grief me? The memories of my arrival to the town hit my like kunai; the dark, rainy sky: A confusing, dark, painful blur. I'd been so cold and so mean in the beginning, would they ever forget that? I felt a ball of shame climb into my stomach and quickly brushed a tear away that was forming in the corner of my eye. I shook my head stubborn and grabbed some of the new clothes I'd been taking along. I'd never get used to the fresh smell of newly washed clothes right after a bath, and inhaled the sweet scent of my sports-bra before I took on a tank top and some regular ninja pants.
I found Kakashi still busy with his paperwork when I entered the apartment, still drying my hair with a towel. Having a hair dryer wasn't a luxury a was blessed with (and it also ruins your hair). With a sigh a plumed down at his bed and threw the towel on the floor. I looked out the window at a sunny day and with activity in the streets. I looked at Kakashi's back while he crouched over his paper, writing with inhuman speed like it was the most normal thing in the world.
"Kakashi… What was that strike of electricity before?" I asked, absently forgetting that he was in the middle of something.
"Hn? What?" he replied but continued before I could repeat the question.
"You don't know about my chidori?" he stopped writing and looked over his shoulder to see if I was joking.
"Your what?" I asked. But before we could continue our conversation my body tensed up and I felt someone coming near. With no fair chance to react an ANBU Black Ops stood in Kakashi's window, the mysterious mask glaring into the room with empty eyes.
A signature spiral tattoo was evident on his right arm, indicating that it was a man behind the mask. The same tattoo as Kakashi's…
"Kakashi-sama, the hokage has sent words for you. He wants to see you now." The ANBU said. I could feel his gaze on me briefly, and felt suddenly nervous about this.
"I understand. Thank you." Kakashi said, polite as always when in a serious situation. The ANBU disappeared in a second and me and Kakashi was left to ourselves once again.
I gulped; "What could this be about." I said, hoping deeply that this wouldn't have anything to do with me. I hadn't spoken to the hokage since the prison-break-out. This would probably be an unpleasant visit.
"Easy Toshi, I haven't even gotten up from my chair and you're asking me already. Like I know what the hokage wants." He said in a calm tone, but looked clearly more serious than he sounded. I wasn't stupid. I knew that Kakashi knew what the hokage wanted to talk about.
"And you're coming with me. Let's go." He said and hopped on to the window frame and jumped out.
"Changing his attitude in a matter of seconds. I thought it was only girls." I muttered to myself before jumping after him…