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Sometimes, when Kakashi wakes up, he forgets everything that has happened. He gets about 15 minutes of peace in which the memories of Obito’s death don’t affect him, if only because they aren’t there.
Then it all comes flooding back, and it’s like it all just happened. It’s all ten times worse than on the days his memory doesn’t fail him, because it feels new. The clock turns back, Kakashi becomes his younger self once again, nothing but a tiny kid trembling with guilt.
And then he remembers Rin and it all goes to hell.
Kakashi crumbles, falls to his knees thinking of everything at the same time. Flashes of his friends’ deaths pass through his head and before his eyes so fast he can barely understand them. Now he feels like he’s sixteen and nothing matters anymore.
He calms down slowly, realizing all that has already passed. He remembers he’s twenty seven, remembers his tiny genin team, Gai, his eternal rival who really cares for him, and Asuma who he always drinks and smokes with.
Still, Kakashi spends the rest of the day debating his guilt. On one hand, he feels like he doesn’t feel guilty enough; like he isn’t even close to paying for his mistakes, for the lives he took. On the other hand, he ponders if he isn’t being selfish by punishing himself. Right after Obito’s death, Rin had told him it was self-centered to wallow in guilt. That Obito would have never wanted that. She said that since Obito gave him his eye so he could see the future with Kakashi, and the least he could do was make it as bright as possible.
When Rin died their sensei had told him she deserved to be mourned. That Kakashi couldn’t waste his time hating himself and instead he should focus on loving them. On making sure their dreams for the village came true.
And everyday of his life, for the past twelve years, he has done just that. If he was living for himself his life would have ended years ago. But even if he tries to stay strong the people he has to mourn, love, miss and live for keep piling up, and he isn’t sure if he can carry all the weight anymore. He has seen too many corpses of loved ones, has been to too many funerals, to believe for even a second he deserves to be here. Obito deserved this, though. He deserved all the happiness, the bright smiles, the beautiful sunsets and he could only see that through Kakashi.
When Kakashi looks at the clock, he realizes he is three hours late. That means he has half an hour to take a shower, get dressed, have breakfast and still get to the training ground at the time he’d normally arrive. But instead he lies still. He can’t bring himself to move no matter how much he tries to. The last time this happened was when Minato-sensei had sacrificed himself and Kakashi had finally lost everything. So he lies in bed the whole day, staring at his ceiling. He recalls meeting Obito and the storm of feelings that came along with it. He thinks about Obito’s smile, his laugh and his stupid goggles. Then he starts thinking about all the stuff Obito did wrong. His lack of abilities and dedication, the way he didn’t mind being late for the most ridiculous reasons, even the way he cried constantly. And he missed all of that. In fact, he probably he missed the bad stuff the most.
All his musings come to a halt when someone knocks at his door. He knows it’s either Gai or Asuma because they’re the only ones who ever come to his house and he knows it’s serious because otherwise they would have just barraged in through the window. He tries to get up but he feels like there are a ton of rocks forcing him to stay in bed. He starts thinking if that’s how Obito felt in his lasts moments and immediately he feels like the weight of the imaginary rocks has doubled. When his door opens and two people come in he is momentarily surprised. If the two of them came together than they must be really worried. The weight of the rocks triple. He closes his eyes and swears he can feel his lungs crash.
“Kakashi, wake up.” Gai says and Kakashi can’t stand how serious he sounds. That’s not how he is supposed to talk, it feels like it’s someone else speaking.
“I’m up,” he responds “What are you guys doing here?”
“I found your team alone in the training ground and they said you hadn’t showed up,” Asuma trying, and failing, to sound as light as possible “They were really worried.”
“I’m fine. I must have forgotten to set up the alarm or something.” A very obvious lie.
There’s a reason why Gai and Asuma managed to get closer to him than anyone else who was currently alive. They knew when to leave him alone. Most of the time at least.
So after an offer to join them at the bar so he could, in the words of Gai, “Meet up with Genma, Raidou, and everyone else! Have some fun, y’know” and his, already expected, refusal, they leave. And that’s when he starts feeling trapped, like his small apartment is shrinking and will, at one point, compress him to death. So he runs, jumps through his window in pajamas and bare feet and starts roof hoping, hoping the fresh air will allow him to breath. The sun is setting and he’s sure it’d look beautiful if he wasn’t occupied trying to convince himself that he’s glad to be alive.
While he didn’t plan to, Kakashi isn’t surprised when he ended up in front of the memorial stone. Ever since Kannabi Bridge, he finds himself coming here, almost on instinct. He looks at the blue stone and does what he has been doing for years now, Kakashi starts talking to Obito.
“Obito… It’s been a while,” it hasn’t. Kakashi comes here almost everyday but it still doesn’t feel like it’s enough. “I’ve been feeling quite ill today, even missed training! Can you believe that? That means I can’t tell you what Minato’s kid has been up to, but I’m sure not a lot has changed since last time we’ve talked.” Not a lot changes in 24 hours, after all , Kakashi thinks.
“He’s a lot like you, y’know? All smiles, energetic, dreams of being hokage, can barely walk a straight line,” he chuckles, remembers Obito tripping over himself every time he saw Rin, hopes they’re happy wherever they are “but most of all, he’s kind. Thinks he can save everyone, that with hard work you can achieve anything… yeah, Naruto is definitely the kind of boy who would save a comrade from a falling rock.” He takes a deep breath. He doesn’t want to say it, but he forces the words out. “You’d have been a great uncle. I think,” he pauses, swallows the lump in his throat like every other time he said it. “Rin would’ve loved him and I regret every second I stayed away just because I was told to.”
Kakashi remembers standing there talking about seeing Naruto’s first steps. From far away, like the third hokage told him to. Remembers apologizing for choosing to be a good little soldier instead of a good uncle. He hopes he can be forgiven.