Soldier On || Part 2 ||-•-Yamato-🍃-Kakashi-• ||

Chapter 9: 1 Day to the Wedding: Introspection

The office door shut, however, Kakashi continued to stare at it. He had no hopes Tenzō would walk back in, not when he had a task to carry out anyway.

He took a deep breath. So words failed him yet again, it didn't surprise him. That was typical of him, he acted just as he expected of himself, now he could mull over all of it in his head and come up with things to say that would never be said. He looked at his palms and sank his face into them. Tired, frustrated, disappointed... How could he open his mouth to speak when he had no idea what to say? Apologise for giving him a blowjob? How weird would that be? It wasn't something to apologise for, even if Tenzō might have needed an apology. Tenzō was mad at him the moment he creeped into the apartment, and madder after Kakashi's failed attempt to show him how he felt, how he needed him in spite of his words. But if he said sorry, he would be lying again, because Kakashi didn't regret it, not really.

After they laid on the bed the night before, Tenzō turned away from him, hugged the pillow, pulled the blanket over his shoulder. Kakashi hadn't much to stare at but the back of his neck, and he did, for hours. He saw the moment Tenzō fell asleep, the moment he began to dream, when he tossed and turned, rolled to the side and faced him. It wasn't the first time he watched him like that, though he couldn't remember Tenzō being that upset with him before, but however angry, it didn't change how sweet he looked with his eyes closed, lips slightly apart, breathing heavily. Since Kakashi had a hard time sleeping back in the ANBU days, he got into the habit of observing others during missions, but he always ended up watching Tenzō most of all. There was just something about him that fascinated him back then. The mokuton maybe, or the trust Tenzō had in him, which had him go against the man who first saved and raised him. Watching Tenzō that night as he slept was equally fascinating, but for different reasons.

Kakashi's eyes kept getting heavy but he still kept them open, even though he knew that he wouldn't be seeing Rin's face that time, but Tenzō's and that... well, that scared him more than any nightmare. Not until that moment, he realised the fear of whatever happened in his past come to repeat itself was a mindless excuse. He'd thought that being loved by someone would eventually get them killed somehow — some twisted fate, if he bothered to believe in such a thing — that he would lose them as well. That thought drove him to deny Tenzō's affection, to be such a dick. It inferred that if Tenzō kept away, if he didn't throw feelings for trash like him, then he wouldn't die and make an even bigger mess in the already ragged soul Kakashi had.

What a load of shit. He told himself that for so long, it became his easy way out of anything that made him feel something. A lonely but, somehow, comfortable way of not dealing with what he couldn't express or knew how to talk about, or even to whom. In truth, he didn't know who he was if not for the pain he carried for years, that constant need for atonement that guided him, his ethics and morals. Being dark, cold, distant. Being the one people thought cool and mysterious who, instead, suffered in silence. A victim of people's misunderstanding that kept him from seeing the point in getting too close to anyone. For as long as he remembered, that's who he was and who people expected him to be. Letting Tenzō in meant losing all of that, his identity — that however painful, was still an identity — to allow himself to be vulnerable, to be seen, share the hurt, and maybe be happy, whatever that meant... As he stared at him, fighting the urge to reach out, Kakashi knew it was too late. The younger man, his favourite kouhai, little by little over the years, snuck in, planted a seed, one that Kakashi blindly watered and watched as it grew, as it took over. And now... well, now he found himself hoping the fact Tenzō was so mad at him meant he knew how Kakashi really felt, meant he was willing to wait for him a little longer rather than pretend it never happen and move on like so many did in the past. Tenzō... he was different, he understood him like no one else, not even Gai, his closest friend,... not even he saw inside Kakashi's heart and understood.