Chapter 14

Yondaime called Baki into his bedroom by messenger, conveying the message through a maid and then a member of the messenger staff of the Complex. He smiled wryly at his son. "If you expect me to stay here, expect a lot of this."

Kankuro sat next to his father in bed, both of them tucked under the covers. "That's fine. As long as you don't spend all day managing from afar. I don't expect you to be able to give up control completely and just relax. This is a process you have to work on."

His father sat back against the headboard and nodded, seeming relieved at Kankuro's leniency.

Kankuro squeezed his father's hand under the blanket. He wanted to say that he was never going to punish his father, but that was the sort of thing that was proven with time. He'd have to be patient, and take his father's behavior calmly and forgivingly, until his father knew that he wasn't going to do the things that his grandfather did. Kankuro understood; there was a lot of damage to be undone.

Baki came in and bowed, then straightened and raised an eyebrow at the sight of Yondaime and Kankuro sitting in bed together. "Reporting, Kazekage-sama."

"My son has grounded me for not taking better care of myself," Yondaime said jovially.

Baki looked from Kankuro to Yondaime and allowed himself a small smile. "Sometimes sons have to do that."

"Indeed." Yondaime grinned. He paused thoughtfully. "Take Temari and Gaara to one of the canyon side training grounds and teach them about advanced chakra control. Kankuro's control is so precise that it seemed a waste to assign such a thing while they could be doing missions, but since Kankuro has the day off…wear Temari and Gaara out for me." He smiled. "Target practice should do that effectively."

Baki bowed.

"And tell 'em hi for me," Kankuro said. "I'll be back with them. I'm just babysitting Dad for the day to make sure that he doesn't strain himself."

His father grimaced and looked at Baki with pained resignation.

Baki suppressed a smile. "I will do that."

"Very well." Yondaime grinned. "That is all, then. You are dismissed."

Baki nodded. "Hai." He paused. "And…have a good day." He bowed, and then exited the room.

Yondaime blinked, startled.

"He cares about you," Kankuro said, wondering if he really had to explain that.

"Why?" his father asked, seeming honestly baffled.

Kankuro wanted to smack his forehead. Oh, boy. I am going to have a lot of work to do. It wasn't his father's fault; but it did explain to Kankuro that caring, loving people were invisible to his father. He'd never notice without prompting. Not unless his emotional wounds were healed.

"Because he likes you," Kankuro said. "Because you were the captain of his team as a kid. He trusts you, and he believes in you…and he likes you. So he cares about you. It may have been a long time, but Baki still remembers you."

Yondaime continued to look puzzled. But he didn't dispute Kankuro's words.

Maybe it's because as a child, he always felt alone and like no one noticed him, no one noticed that he was hurt and needed help. Kankuro knew distorting thoughts happened because of abuse, and they lasted into adulthood. He knew it was hard to challenge these beliefs. Wasn't it always hard to challenge emotional beliefs? The seat of it was some traumatic event, and it was difficult to dig through all of the pain for the right one. The event that if processed, would allow his father to change his point of view.

Kankuro resolved to help his father with that. Step number one is getting him into therapy. Family therapy between him and his father was less dire now that they had worked out their major difference of opinion at home. But that had only happened because of therapy, and Kankuro wasn't about to stop going. Not when Yuna and Mafumi were so nice. And to handle his father's trauma, they probably needed still more people. We'll get as many people as it takes.

"We'll talk about it in therapy," Kankuro reassured his father. "I bet Yuna or Mafumi could explain it better than I can. Trust me: someday, you're going to realize why Baki is still attached to you."

His father furrowed his brow dubiously. "I did not mean to contest your opinion. I am merely surprised that one such as Baki would want anything to do with me."

"You picked him for our sensei," Kankuro pointed out.

"Yes…" Yondaime nodded. "It seems an appropriate reversal for Baki, and his family has been known for generations as the best teachers in Suna. I would expect no less from Baki; especially given his record."

Kankuro hesitated, and then took a chance. "You don't remember much of teaching him do you? That was around the time when you were still being hurt by your dad. So I bet chunks of you are missing." He hastily corrected himself, wondering at his choice of words. "I mean, your memories are missing."

"No, you are correct to say there is 'me' missing," Yondaime said. "I have been aware of that…without knowing what it meant. Other than it is a pain." He gave Kankuro a rueful smile. "I am missing all but the first two years of my training from genin to jonin. I do not remember more than one or two things from the first team I led. Baki's team – the one that included Junnosuke – is a treasured time in my life that I nonetheless only remember the latter part of. I remember Junnosuke's death, and being there for Baki at the funeral, speaking to Baki's parents about the difficulties ahead for Baki in adjusting to life without his teammate. I remember Tsumi being injured, and then withdrawing to ANBU. I remember the war being over, and no longer having Baki as a student." He sighed.

"But that doesn't explain at all how you formed the bond you had with Baki," Kankuro said. "Not at all."

His father bowed his head. "I know."

Kankuro hugged his father, concerned. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to make it sound like it was your fault. If I did, I'm sorry. I don't want you to think it's your fault you can't remember these things. Because it's not."

Yondaime smiled sadly and hugged Kankuro in response. "I feel very…tired."

"Then go to sleep some more," Kankuro said immediately.

"I don't want to," Yondaime said.

"Then let me just hold you," Kankuro said. "I'll hold you, and love you, and you can get some peace that way."

"Okay." His father's voice wavered only the slightest bit, but Kankuro caught it.

Kankuro positioned himself resting against the headboard, and his father lay down and rested his head in Kankuro's lap. Kankuro stroked his father's head. This was the most intimate position in their culture; in classic scroll paintings, samurai or ninjas were depicted resting their heads in their lover's or their wife's lap, receiving much needed comfort. To be a warrior was a tough job. Every soldier, no matter what the nation, needed a comforting person to come back to.

They stayed this way for an indeterminate amount of time. His father fell asleep, and Kankuro was left with his own thoughts. He cycled through the usual thoughts: puppet designs, plans for drawings, what Temari and Gaara were doing right now. Then he came to thoughts of his father. How beautiful his father was, how he wanted to know his father inside and out, and be known inside and out.

By the time lunch came around, Kankuro was hard.

He was happily distracted by the maid coming up and serving them lunch. When she knocked, Kankuro gently shook his father awake, and Yondaime joined him, sitting up.

"How is your health, Yondaime-sama?" she asked politely.

Yondaime gave her a smile. "Fine, fine."

She bowed and left, closing the door without a sound.

They ate lunch in near-silence. It was a maki salmon roll each, and a serving of chicken yakisoba. After an appropriate amount of time, the maid came back up to collect their dishes. Yondaime thanked her.

Then, they were left alone.

Yondaime sighed and stretched, his arms above his head, and his back arching.

Kankuro took in the graceful, catlike posture and decided not to say anything. Although, it made him want to paint his father more than ever.

His father dropped his arms with a sigh and rubbed his head. "I should get up."

"Relax." Kankuro stroked his father's arm.

"It's after lunch," Yondaime said.

"So?" Kankuro challenged. He gave his father a look. "The whole day means the whole day. Not the morning."

"Really? You want me to stay in bed all day?" His father looked disbelieving.

"I'll stay with you," Kankuro said quickly.

His father stared at him for a moment, then looked away, resting against the headboard with his back propped up by a pillow. "This isn't just luxurious, it's sinful," he murmured. "I should be doing something productive. Work."

"If you want to do something that's productive, help me with a problem," Kankuro suggested.

His father looked relieved. "What is your problem, son?" He reached out and squeezed Kankuro's shoulder.

Kankuro grinned. "I'm hard and have no way to relieve myself without you watching."

His father blushed madly. "Go to the bathroom," he choked out.

"If I do that, you're going to sneak away," Kankuro teased.

"I will not," his father protested. "You can trust me. Now go, please."

"Aww…" Kankuro looked at his father speculatively, his gaze half-lidded. "Are you sure you don't want to watch the show?"

His father's blush deepened further. Kankuro imagined that if this were a manga, spurts of blood would be coming out of his father's nose. He grinned broadly. "It's one of my fantasies, you know."

"Fan…Fantasies?" His father practically squeaked the word.

Kankuro nuzzled his father's ear, scarcely believing he had this much courage inside of him. "I imagined…touching myself in front of you, Tousan. That you would come into my room, and there I would be, sitting on top of the covers, my pajamas pants pulled down to expose me…and I'd be touching myself. Caught. And I would be embarrassed…but then you would say…" His stomach tightened. "'It's okay, son. Everyone does that. Want my help?'" Kankuro felt a pulse of arousal at admitting that.

He pulled away to study his father's face. "And I'd say yes."

His father looked awed. "Really?"

Kankuro suppressed a laugh. "Yeah. Ever since I was eleven, really. You were so sweet to me, so kind about my going through puberty…I developed a crush on you. That's natural, isn't it? You were always there for me, and you never made fun of me. You're the only person I'm comfortable showing my body to…because I know you love me and would never think bad things about my body."

"I guess that makes sense," Yondaime mumbled, wide-eyed. "I was just trying to help…Of course I love you, you're my son."

Kankuro kissed his father's cheek. "Really? You have no feelings of your own you'd like to divulge?"

Yondaime swallowed convulsively. "W-Well…"

Kankuro hugged him. "We're alone for the whole day. If there's something you want to try, Tousan, you just have to say so."

"I am not going to turn this day into a sexual escapade," Yondaime protested.

That's what you think. Kankuro gave him a steady, half-lidded gaze.

His father chuckled at his expression. "Oh, well, that would hardly be restful. Would it? I'm supposed to be resting." He slid down in bed and tucked the covers up to his chin.

Kankuro had to laugh. "You don't have to be shy. I think you're gorgeous. And if you don't want to do anything, that's okay." He slid down to join his father, lying beside him. "Let's just talk about our fantasies. We can do stuff later."

His father flushed, staining pink even out to his ears. "I'll let you go ahead."

Kankuro grinned. I have permission! "Okay."
Yondaime looked startled, and then smiled, blushing. His expression warred between exasperation and fondness. "Took that literally, did you?"

Kankuro chuckled. "Yup."

"I won't stop you from confiding in me," Yondaime said, putting on a calm demeanor. "I am your father."

Uh-huh. Kankuro flicked his gaze at his father, then looked up at the ceiling. "Well, I suppose it really started when I was eleven, like I said. Lots of these things are from then. I just elaborated on them over the years as I learned more about sex. About what people do in bed. I've read lots of manga…"

His father cleared his throat. "I see. Am I going to have to raid your room for a collection of dirty manga?"

Kankuro laughed. "No…not unless you want reading material."

His father blushed deeply.

Kankuro grinned at him for a moment. Then Kankuro redirected his gaze to the ceiling. "Anyway…I imagined first that you would come find me in one of the sitting rooms, one of the ones with bay windows, and you would ask how I was feeling. 'Crappy,' I'd say. And you'd ask me why, and I would tell you, and then you would cheer me up with a kiss."

"I think that's very normal," Yondaime said softly. "Karura used to do that for me. It was nice to come home to someone who cared that I had a bad day and wanted to make it better. That is so important, I think…I always tried to be that for you and your siblings, even if it wasn't in a romantic sense. That was something that was missing from my childhood. Very much." He looked up at Kankuro. "The only person whose bad days mattered in that household was my father."

"That was wrong," Kankuro agreed softly. He wrapped an arm around his father and hugged his father to his side. "I'll always be here to listen to your bad days."

"And I will never stop listening to yours," Yondaime assured him. "We will be equals."

Kankuro kissed his father gently. "I'll kiss it better whenever you want me to. Like this morning."

Yondaime nodded slightly. Then he hesitated. "There might be a lot of kissing better."

Kankuro grinned. "You have no idea how happy that makes me."

His father blushed.

Kankuro stroked a lock of his father's spiky auburn hair. "Will you kiss it better for me, too?"

His father blushed harder. "…Hai."

Kankuro smiled and kissed his father again, a gentle, chaste kiss.

"What other fantasies do you have?" his father asked quietly.

Kankuro felt a pulse of warmth pass through him, tingling in his stomach. His father asking the question in that quiet, peacefully solicitous voice turned Kankuro on. "I imagined showering with you, and helping wash your back…"

Something that was normal in most households in Suna. Sharing bath time was important because even with the oases and wells Suna drew water from, water was still precious. Showering off quickly and using the bath to soak once they were clean saved water. Family members traditionally used the same bath water after getting clean, or even joined each other in the bath. Kankuro's household was one of the only ones he knew where bath times were completely private; no one showered off together, and someone had to abdicate the bathroom for the next person to get in the tub. Kankuro suspected now that such rules had to do with his grandfather.

Kankuro realized he'd trailed off. "And then you would silently, somehow, signal me to wash your front. And you'd be hard, and I would stroke you, and you would make these sounds of pleasure, and I would finish you, and then we'd kiss." He cleared his throat, a little embarrassed at how unrealistic that fantasy was. "Sometimes the kissing would go on for a while. Sometimes you would return the favor on me, with your mouth…and then we'd just hold each other and lie in the tub, in the warm water."

When he got up the courage to look at his father, he was surprised to find tears in his father's eyes. "That's beautiful," Yondaime whispered. He stroked Kankuro's shoulder slowly. "What a wonderful imagination you have. So…poignant. And beautiful." He stroked Kankuro's cheek. "Were there any words to go along with this fantasy? Was there anything we would say to each other?"

Kankuro shook his head. "In my head, it was always silent. Because I had no idea what we would say to each other at a time like that."

Yondaime smiled. "Let me see if I can find the words."

Kankuro blushed. "Oh…kay." His insides squirmed pleasantly. He wondered what his father would come up with.

Yondaime closed his eyes for a moment, smiling softly. Then he nodded and opened his eyes. His gaze found Kankuro's. "I think…" He stroked Kankuro's cheek again, lightly caressing. "It should go something like this." He dropped his voice into a husky whisper. "Thank you, son. You did such a good job with my back, I need some attention up front. Would you help me once more?"

Kankuro felt a thrill of electric tingles. He gasped faintly. The feelings shot straight to his groin, making him half hard. His cheeks pulsed with heat once he realized his father was waiting for him to reply. He licked his lips. "Ah…hai."

"Thank you," Yondaime said softly. "Let me turn around and show you."

Kankuro imagined standing in the bathroom, his father turning around, exposing the aroused condition of his lithe body. His heart skipped a beat. "Oh…I see the problem. Let me take care of that."

"I'd appreciate it if you did," his father whispered silkily. "I think it's a problem only you can solve."

Kankuro's blush ratcheted up another couple notches. "I think you're right." Almost of their own accord, he reached out and stroked his hands down his father's chest, underneath the covers. He met the fabric of his father's sleeping yukata, but that did not impede the fantasy.

Yondaime moaned and let his head fall back. "Son…that is very good. That feels good."

Kankuro swallowed. He was all the way hard now. "I'm not finished yet. The best part is still to come."

"Oh, god," his father moaned. "You said the word 'come'."

Kankuro felt a jolt. His erection twitched. "Ah…um…yes. That's the word for it, isn't it?"

His father blushed madly. "Oh, hai. Yes, it is."

Kankuro slid his hands down his father's stomach, and crested them over his father's hips, running his hands over the contour of his father's body. He was shocked to feel a hard-on underneath his father's clothing. Shocked and thrilled. Oh my god…he's hard like me. We're hard.

"Dad…may I?" He hardly realized his own voice.

"Oh, hai," Yondaime said fervently. He pressed his hips gently into Kankuro's hands.

Kankuro's entire body buzzed with arousal. His nipples were achingly hard, his erection leaking in his underwear. Oh, my god. Oh my god. It was easy to part the thin folds of his father's sleeping yukata and run his hands over the front of his father's boxers. The cotton material was damp. Oh, god.

"Just…rub?" his father said, pleading and uncertain.

That broke Kankuro's stunned paralysis. "Yes. I can do that." He gently rubbed with one hand, feeling the outline of his father's hard-on. It wasn't overwhelmingly big; it was kind of Kankuro's own size. There was something comforting about that.

His father let out a ragged moan and shifted. "Good. So…good…"

Kankuro swallowed. His own erection was burning and tingling. "I love you," he whispered.

His father rolled onto his back and lay still, his legs slightly parted.

Kankuro shifted as well, pressing himself against his father's side. He stroked his father through the boxers, getting them damper and damper. When they were soaked through in front, Kankuro picked at the waistband of his father's boxers hesitantly. "Do you want to…?"

His father nodded, his eyes closed and his lips parted in bliss. He wiggled, squirming out of his boxers.

Kankuro helped pull them off. He shoved them under the blankets at the foot of the bed, not wanting to expose his father's underwear in a room where someone might come and see them. He was glad they were both under the covers for this. That way, if they were startled by an interruption, no one would discover what they had been doing.

He wrapped his hand around his father's erection blindly. It was hot in his hand. The skin was soft, and the tip of his father's erection was wet, leaking beads of moisture against Kankuro's fingers.

There was something satisfying about that.

Kankuro stroked slowly, pausing frequently to rub the tip of his father's erection. He felt some wetness getting on the blanket and didn't care.

Yondaime was silent except for occasional gasps and soft moans.

Kankuro wished his father would be louder, but he was also wildly turned on. My father…is letting me touch him this way. His erection pulsed.

"Kankuro…feels good," his father whispered.

"I'm here," Kankuro said, wondering why that was what he wanted to say. "I'll always be here. And you'll always feel good."

Eternity seemed to hang in the room as time passed. It was as if they were a perpetually suspended grain of sand in an hourglass. Everything was sharper and softer at the same time. His father's breaths grew loud.

Eventually, his father pulled him in for a kiss. They mouthed each other's lips with passionate, tender slowness, memorizing, moving against each other, with each other. Yondaime's tongue ended up in Kankuro's mouth, and Kankuro's in Yondaime's, exchanging intimate caresses. The feeling of specialness, of significance, grew so large in Kankuro's chest he thought his heart would burst.

Then his father let out a sharp cry into his mouth and came.

Kankuro moaned, overcome himself. He withdrew his hand from his father's pulsing erection and stroked himself, slipping his hand into his boxers. He came in short order, jerking his hips against his hand and moaning out a soft wail. "Father…"

Then he lay still, heart pounding, tears in his eyes. Slowly, he withdrew his hand.

His father lay next to him, stunned and peaceful.

Kankuro slowly turned his head, looking at his father's face. He traced every curve, took in every shade of color, every intricacy of shadow and light. His father was glowing; eyes luminous, cheeks flushed, hair mussed. He wanted to see his father this way forever. Now this would be a portrait.

His father slowly reached up under the covers and held his hand; squeezing gently. "You are remarkable," his father whispered. "And I love you."

Kankuro closed his eyes and snuggled up, feeling validated. A feathery lightness unfolded inside of his chest. He imagined a white bird soaring against the blue sky. Cloudless sky. He felt a smile curve his lips. "I love you, too."

They lay for a while in silence. Peaceful warmth enfolding them. Breathing the same breaths, the same glorious, sweet air. Everything was miraculous. Kankuro listened to the maid vacuuming the living room downstairs, a distant, familiar hum, with a new sense of wonder. They were alive. There was a saying, 'The ordinary is beautiful'. Wabi sabi.

This was wabi sabi.