Chapter Text
So this is happening.
Kakashi adjusts the dead weight on his back, leaning forward as Obito starts to slide down. Obito isn’t heavy, exactly, but he’s solid. He’s warm all along Kakashi’s back, his head tucked up against his neck. He’s still passed out. Kakashi knows that it makes sense for him to be piggybacking Obito - it’s not like Rin could’ve done it - but he still shoots Rin a look as Obito slides down even more.
Rin helpfully turns and tugs Obito’s arms a little where they’re hanging over Kakashi’s shoulders, humming a half-familiar tune.
“Thanks,” Kakashi says, deadpan as can be as he adjusts his hold on Obito’s thighs. Muscular, firm-as-a-rock thighs.
Not thinking about that.
Kakashi tries to focus on the tune Rin’s humming instead, tries to place it in an effort to stop thinking about Obito. Something about coffee shops? He’d be able to pick it out easier if her humming wasn’t so bad. Seriously, even her humming is off-key. How does that happen.
Rin just smiles at him, sweet and deadly, like a particularly adorable snapping turtle who knows that he’s thinking-not-thinking about her best friend’s thighs and maybe criticizing her humming skills. Maybe he should just stop thinking entirely. That sounds like a good plan.
She directs him down the street and buzzes them into the apartment before making her way toward the stairs, her smile growing more evil by the second. Kakashi resolutely ignores her and heads over to the elevator. He can’t tell if her evilness can be blamed on the drinks, doesn’t know her well enough yet, but he suspects it might just be how she is.
“So,” Kakashi draws the word out as they step into the elevator. Rin presses the button for the twelfth floor and Kakashi glares at his yes-definitely-evil-maybe boss, thinking of all the stairs she would’ve made him climb. It makes his question come out with a little more bite than he had initially intended. “You two do this often? Drink until one of you blacks out, I mean, not accost random strangers to carry you home.”
Rin just laughs at him, seeming delighted by his clear annoyance. “Not at all, and you’re hardly a stranger. I know all about you,” she shakes her head, but doesn’t elaborate on that frankly disquieting statement. “Obito hasn’t had this much to drink since high school. We’ll go out together and have a couple drinks after a hard day, but I can handle alcohol way better than he can. Guess we both forgot that tonight,” she says softly as she tilts her head to check on Obito. “I just wanted him to relax a little. He finished a big project he’s been working hard on…” She trails off, lifting a hand to comb Obito’s long hair away from his face.
Kakashi’s pretty sure Obito is fine based on his steady breathing and occasional murmuring sighs, and he’s fairly certain his jacket is now covered in drool, judging by the growing patch of damp warmth on his shoulder. Gross. Kakashi wouldn’t have just left him in the street, which was his other option after Obito passed out on him, but still. Gross .
The elevator doors open with a quiet ding and Rin leads the way down the hall. She lets them into the apartment and steps into a pair of slippers, but she raises a hand before Kakashi can figure out how to step out of his shoes with Obito on his back.
“Wait there. You’re covered in Obito’s inability to hold his liquor.”
That said, she deftly scoops Obito off Kakashi’s back and into a princess carry, bearing him down the dark hallway with ease. Kakashi revises his estimation of what Rin can and cannot do. She totally could’ve piggybacked Obito home.
He shifts from foot to foot as he waits for Rin to return, talking himself into and out of leaving at least five times before she comes back around the corner, carrying something in her arms that decidedly isn’t Obito.
When Rin, she of the snapping turtle smiles and incredibly strong arms, reappears with a black plastic garbage bag that reminds him of mobsters and cement shoes, Kakashi panics. Just a little. The tiniest amount of panic.
“I swear, I wasn’t thinking about his thighs. Don’t kill me.” There is no inflection in his voice, and Kakashi’s not sure whether that makes everything better or worse.
Maybe he should just kill himself and save Rin the trouble.
Rin raises an eyebrow at both Kakashi’s words and his absolutely deadpan delivery, and waves the garbage bag in his direction. Kakashi internally applauds her wise choice to ignore his temporary insanity.
“Your shoes are filthy,” she says, which explains the garbage bag. “There’s no way I’m letting you into the apartment like that.”
“I was actually just going to head out,” Kakashi motions over his shoulder, waving vaguely at the door behind him. “You seem to have everything well in hand.”
There’s a moment of quiet as Rin’s other eyebrow rises to join the first one.
“You’re telling me you know how to clean those?” Rin asks as she points at his shoes. Her tone makes it clear that she already knows Kakashi’s answer.
“Well, no-”
“Then you’re fine with your shoes smelling like that forever?”
“It won’t just… Go away?” Kakashi asks, wincing as Rin’s eyebrows raise even further.
“Go away? No. Linger in your apartment until you throw out your shoes in disgust? Definitely.”
Kakashi glances down at his shoes with a hangdog look on his face. “These are my favorite shoes,” he mourns, his face falling further as he realizes that he never replaced his only other pair of sneakers after Akino tore them to shreds. These are the only sneakers he owns.
“Then give them here!” Rin shakes the garbage bag at him. “Socks and pants too.”
Kakashi reluctantly toes out of his shoes and slips them into the bag. He eyes Rin warily as he strips off his socks and stuffs them in as well, avoiding the small puddle his shoes left behind.
“Pants?” He questions, hoping Rin won’t push.
“Your hems are disgusting.”
Kakashi looks down again. Urgh. He looks up at Rin again, a little reluctant to strip in front of the woman who might become his boss in a few days.
She huffs at him and sets the bag down, turning to walk further into the apartment. “I’ll get you some shorts, hold on a minute.” She disappears around the corner of the hallway, and Kakashi is left to wait again.
Since it’s clear he isn’t leaving any time soon, Kakashi might as well look around. He’s not going to move into the apartment, since Rin would definitely murder him if he got her floors dirty, but the apartment is pretty open, and his eyes have fully adjusted to the darkness by now. There’s quite a bit to see, even from the doorway.
The kitchen is directly beside the entryway, open and airy, a wide counter offsetting it from the rest of the room. There’s a dining room table and chairs just visible past the kitchen, and a coffee table and couch across the wide stretch of hardwood flooring, but it’s mostly empty. The whole apartment would feel barren if it wasn’t for the massive series of windows stretching up to the ceiling all along the far wall. Instead of feeling barren and lonely, the room feels like an observatory or an auditorium, and the furniture almost seems to be intruding on the empty space instead of the other way around. The windows also provide enough light that Rin really didn’t need to turn on any lights, but not enough to be annoying. They’re nice windows.
Kakashi can see the city lights beyond the glass, and he wonders if he could see the stars, even with Konoha’s lights. Oddly enough, there’s a hand railing stretching all the way across the wall, just beneath the wide windows. The apartment must’ve been converted from something. That had a railing beneath windows. Yes. For lack of a better explanation, Kakashi’s just going to go with it.
There’s an open door across from the kitchen in front of the entryway, and Kakashi can see the back of what might be a computer chair. Office, maybe? Obito’s room is apparently around the corner, or maybe he and Rin share? Not that that would bother Kakashi, except that oh gods maybe he’s been hitting on his sort-of-future-boss’s man and that is bad that is worse than the usual dumpster fire that is Kakashi’s life.
Wait. Wait. Why would Rin have literally shoved Obito into his arms, if that was the case? Why would Obito have smiled up at him like that? That doesn’t make sense. Roommates. Roommates makes much more sense. Kakashi decides to go with that until he finds out otherwise. He’s resolutely not remembering how adorable Obito was, grinning up at him with his gorgeous face and his stunning smile and his sweet, sweet words. He’s not thinking about that at all.
Of course, that’s when Rin reappears, a pile of clothing in her arms, and it takes all of Kakashi’s willpower not to a, scream, or b, blurt out how adorable Obito is. He forces his mind to latch onto c, the first non-Obito thing it can, and his brain offers up a vine, of all things.
“And they were roommates,” Kakashi says. Very clearly and concisely. To Rin. His probable boss.
Rin looks at Kakashi with the most dead look in her eyes and answers, “Oh my gods, they were roommates.” Then she laughs at him and shoves a pair of soft black shorts into his arms. Her next words completely derail Kakashi’s surprise and confusion over Rin finishing his impulsive vine reference. “Here, my shorts should work for you to sleep in. Obito’s booty shorts wouldn’t cover much more than whatever underwear you’ve got, and there’s no way you’re fitting into his pants, your legs are way too long and skinny.”
Kakashi hasn’t heard a word past “booty shorts”.
“Booty shorts?” He manages to squeak out, valiantly trying not to picture Obito in only those. It wouldn’t be right. Obito’s drunk. And passed out. And they haven’t actually met. Kakashi’s pretty sure Obito passing out in his arms doesn’t count, and Kakashi checking out his ass as he stalked past the glass doors of Rin’s office definitely doesn’t count. What an ass, though… Kakashi shakes himself back to awareness to see Rin smirking.
“He did ballet,” she says, like that’s an explanation and not an invitation for Kakashi’s brain to send him reeling through images of Obito and his phenomenal ass dancing elegantly across a stage.
“Nnrg,” Kakashi replies. Any further responses are cut off by Rin tossing a shirt at him. Thankful as he is for the rescue, he looks at the shirt in confusion.
“You carried him home, Kakashi, your jacket and shirt are pretty nasty too. In fact, you should just take a shower. I can smell you from here.” Rin’s nose wrinkles as she points down the hallway, “Bathroom’s at the end of the hallway. I put towels on the counter for you already.” That said, she pointedly turns her back to him.
His brain stutters for a second before finally giving up on making sense out of any of this situation. It’s been a very long day, starting with Bull knocking over a tray of Genma’s seedlings. The less said about the awful photo shoot with that demon cat Tora the better. And then the restaurant Gai had recommended had lost his reservation, and he’d had to wait an hour before being seated - an hour filled with Konoha’s sketchiest businessmen sneering at him as they proceeded to their own reservations with the help of a few bills to the maitre d. The only bright part of his whole day has been running into Obito. And even that…
Kakashi sighs as he gives in and starts stripping, taking his phone and wallet out of his jacket pockets. It isn’t really Obito’s fault, he decides as he tugs his pants off. He doesn’t know whose fault it would be otherwise, but it isn’t Obito’s. Nope. Maybe it’s Rin’s fault, but Rin’s terrifying and he’s not going to accuse her of anything, ever. Hmm. That statement says good things about his future work environment. Minato’s there though. He can probably rein Rin in. Probably.
Kakashi stuffs his clothes into the garbage bag at his feet before tugging on Rin’s pajama shorts. They fit surprisingly well, and Kakashi refuses to consider any conclusions he could draw from that. It’s been way too long of a day for body image issues. He’s just going to shut off his brain now and hope for the best.
“Thank you, Rin.” Pretty good for a shut-off brain, Kakashi nods to himself.
Rin waves a hand in acceptance, stepping past him without looking at him to pick up the bag.
“So you know how to get the smell out of my sneakers?” He asks as he makes his way down the hall, still not thinking about anything at all, definitely not about how relieved he is Rin didn’t see his scars.
“Nope,” Rin says as she shoves her feet into her shoes.
Kakashi blinks and turns, his brain roaring back to life in outraged confusion, but before he can ask why he’s almost naked in their apartment if she can’t wash his clothes, Rin opens the front door. Kakashi instinctively clutches her shirt to his chest, hiding his scars from the sudden influx of light from the hall.
“But I do know an excellent twenty-four hour dry cleaners!” She laughs at his expression. “Straight down the hall,” she reminds him as she starts to walk out. “Oh!” She stops, laughing at herself. She motions to the door beside the entryway as she says, “This is our guest room. The sheets are clean, just head to bed after your shower.”
Kakashi nods, too tired to put up a fight. Sure. Sleep here. Why not? He’s already wearing her shorts and going to take a shower in their bathroom. It’s Friday night and he doesn’t have anywhere to be tomorrow. Why not just sleep here? He turns away, only to hear Rin’s voice float softly down the hall.
“Kakashi?” Her tone of voice stops him in his tracks. “Straight down the hall. The door to the right at the end is Obito’s. If you bother him, there will be consequences.”
Consequences. The word should sound like a mother scolding her children. It doesn’t. The hair on the back of Kakashi’s neck is rising, and it’s all he can do to turn his head back to look at Rin. The front door’s already shut and Rin has clearly left the apartment, but Kakashi can’t stop himself from answering, “Yes, ma’am.”
He shakes himself after a moment and continues down the hall, unlocking his phone and thumbing through his contacts as he walks. He finds the beaming smile he’s looking for and calls.
“Gai?” Kakashi murmurs as the line connects, hoping that keeping his voice low will keep Gai’s voice low through some kind of desperate osmosis. He doesn’t want his friend to wake the entire house, after all.
It never works. “My eternal rival!” Gai bellows, and through the ringing in his ears Kakashi can hear a sleepy grumble in the background. “Ah, my apologies, dearest gem of my heart! I will speak in the other room!”
“It’s fine, I’m awake,” Genma mutters, and Kakashi can hear sheets rustling through the phone as Genma takes it from Gai and puts Kakashi on speakerphone. “Where are you, Kakashi? We were getting worried. Did Gai’s restaurant poison you?”
“Ha ha,” Kakashi says softly. “No, I’m staying the night at someone’s apartment-”
“Say no more!” Gai yells, and Kakashi winces for his phone’s speakers. “I am so pleased to hear that you have taken a lover!” Kakashi pulls the phone away from his ear, staring at it in disbelief. Unfortunately Gai is loud enough to be heard anyway. “Mark my words, my hip and cool rival! Even in this I shall not lose!”
Kakashi’s eye starts twitching at the implications, but before he can hang up the phone, Genma laughs and says, drawing out the vowels into a seductive drawl, “You have my most sincere thanks, Kakashi.” There’s movement and Gai’s laughter in the background, and Genma continues in a more normal tone. “We’ll take care of the dogs until you get back, so go have some fun.” Genma drops his voice again to promise, “I know we will!” He laughs and hangs up.
Kakashi whimpers in horror. A shower might be nice after all. He’ll have to see if Rin and Obito have any brain bleach he can borrow.