Chapter Text
Kakashi makes it very clear that he doesn’t want the Hokage mansion. Hell, he hadn’t even wanted the title, but he hadn’t had much choice in the matter. He realized Tsunade needed to retire for the rest of her life, and Naruto wasn’t yet quite old enough to take her place just right out of the war. The Copy-Nin had accepted the title of Rokudaime because it was his duty, but he thought the house was a bit too much.
It was plagued with ghosts of his past and the pasts of others. Kakashi didn’t need that kind of bad karma in his life anymore.
So, he’d said no to the Hokage mansion. The council still begged him to find better living arrangements that weren’t anywhere near the standard-issue jonin apartments that had been recently rebuilt and that had been his home ever since the Sandaime had kicked him out of ANBU up until the war broke out. Sakura and Sai, little meddlesome students that they were, assigned themselves to the desperate case that was finding him a home that satisfied both his need for comfort and the council’s need for harassing him all the time.
Sakura had amassed a lengthy compilation of the residential areas of Konoha, both present and future. Konoha was still undergoing heavy rebuilding efforts, so most of the pamphlets that his former student brought to his office on Thursdays (their designated meeting day) had been of empty lots that were going to be turned into homes in the near future. Sai, on the other hand, had made it his mission to take all of Sakura’s informational guides and point out all the pros and cons to each, scribbling down his notes around the margins so Kakashi could read through them later when he was alone. It was overwhelming at times, but he was glad his students were looking out for him.
Like everything his team did, however, it ran out of their hands.
Sakura liked researching. It came to her as easy as breathing after so many years cooped up in the library while growing up, so she always had new information to give him at any given time. It absolutely did not help that Sai liked to debunk some of her favorite options by pointing out how inconvenient they were for Kakashi’s needs, only to have the remaining options be absolutely trashed by the Rokudaime himself.
In his defense, he wasn’t being purposefully difficult. Sakura and Sai were doing good by him, but none of the places they’ve shown him (built or soon-to-be-built) had felt right. He knew he had no right to be choosy, especially since the council was running all of them ragged because they couldn’t have the supreme leader of the village living in the standard-issued apartment complexes that Kakashi liked just fine.
“Sage almighty, sensei!” Sakura whines, letting her head loll back on the couch she had commandeered in Naruto’s new apartment at the end of their weekly team dinner, “Just say yes to one already! I’m running out of options! At this rate, you’ll end up living at the edge of the village.”
The thought sounded appealing to Kakashi, so he hummed his assent. He only hoped his feelings came across.
“I have to agree with Sakura, sensei,” Sai backed her up, a small crease adorning his brow while he was pouring another one of Sakura’s leaflets, “We’re grasping at straws. Most of these latest options are less than ideal for the Rokudaime of Konoha.”
Kakashi only awards him with a grunt. Sakura throws a pillow at his face for his troubles. If it hits his head with much less force than he is used to from Sakura, he doesn’t mention it in the slightest. He does return the favor to her, however, earning him a hilarious squeak of indignation and the threat of never again buying him lunch.
“Why don’t you just pick one, Kakashi-sensei?” Naruto asks, his head in Sakura’s lap as he reaches over for one of the many pamphlets covering his coffee table, “This one looks nice! What’s wrong with this one?”
Sai picks up his head from where he was reviewing another guide, squinting at the piece of paper Naruto is holding in his hand with a small frown on his face, “Well, I jotted that one down as one of the possibles, but Kakashi-sensei doesn’t like heavily populated areas so he said no to that one and like three others after it.”
Naruto hums, tossing the paper in his hand to the floor and reaching for another one, “What about this one?”
“Sai insists that shinobi quartiers six and seven are inadequate ,” Sakura answers, a clear frown on her face, “I think they’re perfectly fine. They have easy access to the market and that particular development is furthest from the heavily populated areas Kakashi-sensei hates. I find quartier seven really charming at night.”
“Yes, but they’re also the first-generation quartiers,” Sai points out, his voice strained, like he’s given this argument a thousand times (spoiler: he has), “The council finds them inadequate, Sakura.”
“Screw the council,” Sakura mumbles, one of her hands coming to tangle in Naruto’s hair just as the boy tosses the leaflet and grabs another one. Without missing a beat, the kunoichi answers the unasked question, “Kakashi says he doesn’t like district two because the Yamanaka compound takes up a lot of space and their greenhouses give him allergies.”
“Valid,” Naruto answers, tossing that one too and picking one from the bottom, as if that will change the answer, “What about this one? District four is a little further from Hokage tower, but still within walking distance. Plus, it has its own marketplace--maybe not as good as the one closest to the merchant circle but I can vouch for it.”
“It’s crowded and Kakashi-sensei wants enough patio for his ninken to run around,” Sai answers next, his expression somewhere between stoic and long-suffering, “His previous living accomodations suggest otherwise, but he won’t listen to reason.”
“You can both quit this job, you know?” Kakashi says, thoroughly amused, “It’s not like I’m paying you.”
Sakura looks appalled by this, “And miss out on the chance to hound you over wall decor? My one goal in life is to sneak in as much plant imagery into your home as I can get away with, and step one is helping you find a house.”
Kakashi turns his head towards Sai then, “What’s your evil, ulterior motive?”
“I don’t think it’s evil,” Sai muses, leaning back on his hands, finally giving up on his task, “I just want to make sure Yamato-taicho has a good bed to come back home to.”
There’s a beat of silence. Kakashi doesn’t drop Sai’s look for even a second, and although the junior ANBU seems to be processing why what he said might’ve been inappropriate (a healthy tool his therapist insists he make use of), he doesn’t avert his eyes either. From the corner of his eye, Kakashi watches as Sakura and Naruto stare at each other with twin, gleeful faces.
“And here I thought we were being stealthy.”
The silence is suddenly cut by Tenzo’s steady baritone, which startles Naruto and Sakura badly enough that they end up bumping foreheads as they try to stand up from their couch. Kakashi’s concerned for their situational awareness, and sticks a mental note to his brain about testing them on that soon. He hadn’t noticed the ANBU Commander (or Sasuke) come in either, signatures hidden after a long mission away from Konoha, but he had, at least, recognized his partner’s voice as soon as he spoke.
“Should I be concerned about your apparently subpar sensing abilities?” Yamato jokes, leaning over the couch, hands on either side of Sakura’s shoulders where she’s finally settled, rubbing the sore spot between her eyes, “Naruto, I thought we had honed your sensing abilities out of sage mode already.”
“In my defense,” Sakura starts, looking up at her captain with a grimace, “I had a 36-hour shift before dinner. Also, you’re still suppressing.”
Yamato, ever the loving father of this partnership, laughs heartily and leans down to kiss the diamond on Sakura’s forehead, “You should sleep more, Sakura.”
“Says the man coming back from a week-long mission,” Naruto grumbles, settling back down on Sakura’s lap, “Aye, bastard, Sai made onigiri with okaka. We made bentos for you and Yamato-taicho, so be sure to take them home.”
Sasuke grunts his assent from his position by the window, and Kakashi wishes sometimes his student hadn’t learned all the socially awkward things from him. He only hoped Tenzo’s good natured spirit would rub off on Sasuke eventually after all these missions together.
“How were reparations in Kumo?” Kakashi asks, just as Tenzo rounds the corner of the couch to plop down on the arm of it, “Ran into any trouble on the way?”
“Not at all. Mission went smoothly,” Yamato smiles good-naturedly at him, his hair still dripping from the shower he must’ve taken before coming here, “Sasuke made some friends.”
“Did you make use of the books I lent you before you left?” Sai asks Sasuke, eyes bright and hopeful, “They certainly didn’t help me with Naruto and Sakura, but maybe you have better common sense than I do.”
Kakashi won’t be the one to tell Sai that Sasuke is just as bad at human interaction as he was once upon a time. He thinks Sai’s efforts to resocialize Sasuke back into village life are honorable, not to mention adorable, but they’re mostly pointless. The last Uchiha seems to not want to crush Sai’s enthusiasm either, so he simply nods once in assent.
“The books were,” Sasuke begins, and stops to find the right word, “ sufficient .”
Sakura tries to hide a smile by turning to look down at Naruto, who simply pokes her ribs playfully to help her play dumb. Kakashi and Yamato both act like they didn’t see it.
“I’m glad,” Sai smiles, a gesture he’s gotten the hang of pretty recently thanks to continued exposure to a certain Yamanaka heiress who he helps on weekends at the flower shop, “Please, don’t worry about giving them back. If you found them to be good material, I’d be happy to lend you some more.”
Sasuke looks about ready to die, so Yamato interjects before the conversation can crash and burn, “So, what were you guys talking about earlier?”
Sakura takes the hook quickly, leaning against Tenzo’s side, “Kakashi-sensei won’t choose a house and Sai is worried you might have to come back to his dingy, little apartment for the rest of your life.”
“It’s a practical apartment,” Kakashi sighs, “Gai makes do with it. Kurenai makes do with it. We all make do with the standard jonin apartments. I don’t know why the council insists I have to move.”
“Gai-sensei and Kurenai-sensei have been living in the new housing sector in district five for the past ten months ,” Sakura shoots back, “I literally helped set Mirai’s room with Shikamaru in September and helped organize Gai’s housewarming party with Tenten. You were there, sensei.”
“Was I?”
Sakura makes a sound between a whine and a sigh, burying her face in Yamato’s black shirt as her former captain presses a hand to the side of her head with a small chuckle.
“I think you all have had enough of Kakashi’s living dilemma,” Tenzo announces, “What’s on today’s recreational schedule?”
Naruto shoots up from his place with renewed energy, shooting off from the couch to his room in the back of his apartment with a loud cackle. Sakura knows a chance when she sees one, so she scoots over to give Yamato some room and then slots herself between his arm and shoulder with no reservations. The Mokuton user laughs, adjusting their position until they’re both comfortable, and kissing the top of her head because he knows she appreciates physical forms of affection despite them not being his forte. Kakashi growls jokingly at Sakura when the kunoichi looks at him dead in the eye and sticks her tongue out at him. He promises retaliation when she least expects it.
Naruto comes back with a board game. Sasuke tries to jump out the window to avoid this particular recreational activity, but is stopped by the potted plants out in Naruto’s balcony as they grow to create a barrier with the outside. The last Uchiha turns on his heels and shoots equally unamused looks at both Yamato and Sakura. The two possible culprits don’t meet his eyes, turning to each other with bright grins on their faces.
When Naruto finally gets Sasuke to sit down in the living room to play with them, Sakura is already asleep in the safety of Tenzo’s arms. Kakashi watches what is left of his team while they work through the instruction manual and try to make sense of the rules of the game. He already knows they won’t make good on their promise to their captain to not wake Sakura up, as Sai is always overly competitive and Sasuke can’t help but match his spirits, which pulls Naruto into the mix as well. Kakashi couldn’t care less about winning or losing, and the boys always found it worthy of indignation that he half-assed his way through the boards and still managed to be decent at it. Yamato usually served as a buffer between all of their explosive behaviors, but since he was currently busy being Sakura’s pillow, Kakashi was sure he wouldn’t be taking part in the festivities tonight.
So, Kakashi enjoys the little moments while they last. He appreciates Sai’s quips that drive Sasuke up a wall, and Naruto’s aborted whoops everytime he wins something but remembers Sakura is still asleep. Sasuke doesn’t comment much, but his extreme concentration over a board game is a welcomed sight in comparison to his overly rigid self nonetheless. Like this, he looks more like the twelve year old that was once put under his supervision, and Kakashi’s heart aches in his chest with the memory of yesterday.
But then, he takes one long look at Sakura pressed against Tenzo’s side, and he looks at Sai’s smiling face as Sasuke has to pay more of his bright colored bills for yet another in-game infraction. The scene is homely, familiar, and while Kakashi had lost his family very early on, he reckons this is what it felt like being around his father on the better days. His family wouldn’t be complete without Yamato by his side, and without Sai learning to be a real boy with the help of Sakura and Naruto.
None of the kids he’d passed as Team 7 were the same anymore, either. Sasuke, perhaps the most changed of the bunch, was still finding his way towards light again, trying to redeem himself from his sins of the past. Naruto was more mature, and yet Kakashi was thankful that he kept some of his innocence even through all the tragedy he’d fallen prey to. Sakura, the only heir to the legacy that was Senju Tsunade, a civilian girl he hadn’t given a second thought to back when she was still twelve and held the stars in her eyes, but she proved him and everyone else wrong by becoming exactly who she was always meant to be. The path that destiny had woven for them all had been cruel and full of hardship, but they all came out better by the end of it.
Kakashi came out better by the end of it. He had his family with him.
A thought crosses his mind, and then, suddenly, shinobi district one didn’t sound as unappealing as it had at the beginning of this week.
//
Sakura and Sai won’t let up on their mission, so when Kakashi let’s them know he might’ve found a place he’s interested in moving into, they’re the first ones to volunteer to go canvas the area with him. Yamato tags along because it's Cat’s turn to guard the Hokage, but he doesn’t wear his ANBU uniform and Kakashi appreciates that.
The land where the Hatake compound had once stood is still guarded by the ancient wards, placed there upon the settling of the clan in Konoha’s early days. He’d received notification of it when the first reconstruction efforts started, but had decided not to do anything before his mind could clear up a bit after the war. There had been no time afterwards, when Tsunade had passed the mantle onto him and his responsibilities had doubled overnight. Now seemed like a good time as any.
There were no traces of the compound, of course. Konoha had had enough invasions and had just come out of a war--no other compound had survived and his had been no exception. He hadn’t come back to it for decades, but he could still imagine the gardens and rows of houses neatly organized inside this piece of land that had been the Hatake’s for a long time.
Kakashi hadn’t wanted the Hokage mansion, with its ghosts and its bad karma, but these were ghosts that needed to be taken care of. Kakashi’s life had been shaken until nothing was left, and if he could salvage something from the past that he could revindicate, then he couldn’t think of anything better than the Hatake compound. He had a new family, and while the loss of his own would never disappear from his heart, moving on didn’t sound as frightening as it had once upon a time.
“I thought you didn’t want to come back here,” Tenzo is the first one to break the silence stretching among the members of former Team 7, as Sakura and Sai wander away together, “Are you okay with rebuilding here? I know you had been postponing the request the civil engineering team sent you months ago.”
Kakashi takes in a deep breath, grey eyes following pink and black hair as his students move away from where he and his partner still stand. Now that they’re further away from Kakashi, he notices them talking, whispers shared between each other as they start imagining what they could do with so much space. He pictures for a second what the Hatake symbol would look like between their shoulder blades and discards the thought as quickly as it came.
“I guess I’m ready to let go of the past,” Kakashi answers Tenzo, turning to grab his hand and twine their fingers together like the ANBU Commander wasn’t on duty and he wasn’t the Hokage, “And move into the future.”
Yamato smiles at him, fingers squeezing his in the space between their bodies, “What made you change your mind?”
Grey eyes find Sakura and Sai again. Sakura’s hair is getting longer, brushing past her shoulders to graze the edge of the Haruno merchant circle on her back. Sai is taller now, and he’s begun wearing brighter colors around the village. His kids are growing up. His kids, who were never afraid of tomorrow, even when they had lost and struggled. They had ushered in an era of peace together--a future forged by their bonds and their hard work.
“They have their ways to make an old man change his mind,” he says. “It’s hard not to think about the future when they’re growing up so fast.”
Yamato hums in assent, “It’s certainly difficult to ignore. We have good students.”
Kakashi thinks Tenzo might have wanted to say something different. He knows what it is even if his partner won’t say it.
“Yeah,” he answers, “we do.”
The rest of the evening is spent trying to figure out what to do with the extra space of the Hatake compound. Kakashi chooses to limit the main house to a smaller portion of the land, and with the help of his students, manages to adjust the wards’ restrictions to refit around the smaller section. He asks Sakura and Yamato to create the foundation for a house, using a stick to draw the general shape in the loose soil at his feet, but doesn’t ask them to build anything other than that. In seconds, there are pillars and floor boards that mark the general outline of a home, but no walls and no details to bring it all together.
“Kakashi-sensei,” Sakura asks, as she sits on the wooden deck they’ve just created and takes a bottle of water Sai hands her thankfully, “I don’t mean to be nosy, but are you planning on asking the construction crew to come help with the rest of the house?”
He doesn’t mention that she’s his most meddlesome student, even if she is. Instead, he goes to sit next to her, crossing his ankles in front of him as he leans backwards placing his hands behind him on the ground to stare at what will be his new home.
“Maybe,” he says, “for now I just want to start building this myself. I’m just one man, so I might need help, but like I said ten months ago, I’m not going to exploit yours and Yamato’s talents. That would be selfish and unreasonable.”
“I’d be happy to do it, though,” Sakura says, a small crease between her brows, “I can ask Shizune-senpai for a week off and we can come build little by little, if you’re worried about chakra exhaustion. I can take care of myself.”
He chuckles and ruffles her hair, “I know that you can, pup,” he tells her, “I guess it’s more of a symbolic thing. You’re welcome to come help me whenever you want, but we’re doing this the hard way, yeah?”
She looks conflicted about it, but realizes she won’t be winning the battle, so she nods and shuffles until she’s pressed to his side, “Alright. How will you manage Hokage duties and construction, though?”
“I’ll think of something,” Kakashi says, “Don’t worry too much about it. I’ll let you know when I begin so you can come if it makes you happy.”
“It would make me happy to participate, as well, Kakashi-sensei,” Sai pipes up, coming to sit on his other side, “I may only excel at drawing, but I’m sure I can be of some assistance.”
“Of course, Sai, you’re welcome to come help as well.”
“Are you sure you don’t want me to use the Mokuton for this?” Yamato insists, still standing by one of the pillars he and Sakura had created for the foundation, “It seems like a difficult project to undertake manually.”
“Well, the village is being reconstructed at a steady pace,” Kakashi says, “If I didn’t allow both of you to help with anything that wasn’t essential in the village, then I will not ask for you to help with my home. What would the people think?”
“That would easily be solved if you let us help the village,” Sakura pokes his ribs playfully, “Then Konoha would be restored in about a week and you could move into your house tomorrow.”
He shakes his head, looking at Tenzo and hoping his eyes convey how important building his own home was to him more than his words, “This is something the village, and I, must do on our own.”
//
Kakashi knows Sakura and Yamato were helping restore smaller residential areas in their free time. They think they’re sneaky about it, but he’s the Hokage, and they’re his precious people, so he knows all of their tells when they’re hiding something from him. He’s known it since his term as Rokudaime started, but has thought it unnecessary to say anything since they still left room for the civil engineering team to do their job. He had pulled them from the reconstruction efforts very early on because Tenzo kept getting sick after using his Mokuton for large quantities of time, and Sakura was becoming exhausted during her hospital shifts. Both maladies had been rooted in something different, he knew, but if he could help them take better care of themselves, then he’d do it even if it was a small effort.
Still, he knew he couldn’t avoid their involvement. He’d never been able to control Sakura in any way, shape, or form, and Tenzo was just as bullheaded if not more so than their kunoichi student was. It made him happy to know that Yamato seemed more comfortable with his Mokuton nowadays, and was proud of Sakura for catching up with what she had cheerfully dubbed the fake Mokuton, but he still worried about them.
Which is why he kept a close eye on them while they worked on the reconstruction of the Hatake main house. They thought he wouldn’t notice, but he knew they were replenishing their wood whenever their supply started thinning, and he knew they were using their respective jutsus to do some smaller, cumbersome jobs to speed up the work.
Nevertheless, the house was coming along nicely. Naruto and Sasuke had come in to help as well, in the times that they could, and although they spent most of the time bickering with each other (or with Sakura and Sai, respectively) their help was still very much appreciated. Some of the newly dubbed Konoha 13 had come around to lend their expertise on different topics, often bringing food and beverages, but they never stayed more than a couple of hours. They recognized this team effort, whatever it was, was for Team 7 and Team 7 only.
“Your lease is almost up, right?” Kakashi asks Tenzo during one of the construction days, when the kids have taken over the building materials and tools, forcing both their team leaders into break time.
They’re sitting in the shade under one of the newer trees, those that Yamato and Sakura insisted they needed to grow inside the compound. Kakashi knew most of them were the offspring of the older trees that had once stood in the compound, which his partner and student had nurtured enough to make them big and healthy. Some others were the older trees themselves, healed by Sakura’s hand and Yamato’s strength. They were lovely, and Kakashi appreciated the sight of them more than he could express with words.
Yamato doesn’t turn to look at him, still making sure none of the kids were getting into too much trouble, but he answers, “Yeah, probably by the end of this month. I’ll have to talk to the landlord about resigning my lease.”
“What if you didn’t?” Kakashi asks, without missing a beat, “The house is almost done, structurally speaking. There’s space for two--more than that, honestly.”
This makes Tenzo turn to look at him, eyes wide, looking much younger than Kakashi ever remembers seeing him, “What?”
“The house,” Kakashi repeats, almost nonchalant, but his insides are a mess and his heart is about to slam out of his chest, “I know you’ve been cheating with the building and so has Sakura, so it’ll be only a couple more days before it’s finally finished. We’d only have to work on the minor details, but it’ll be livable soon.”
Yamato stares, eyes blinking owlishly at his former commander and current Hokage. After the war, when the rubble had settled, and Sakura and Sai had come back with Tenzo in their arms, Kakashi had forgotten all the inhibitions and limitations he had set for himself, the ones that had stopped him from ever telling his junior how he really felt about him. In the aftermath of the massacre that was the fourth war, Kakashi had finally admitted to himself that Tenzo was more important to him than he had let on all those years working with and without him. He had then enlisted Sakura’s help to find a way to tell the other man.
To say the least, things hadn’t worked out the way either of them expected them to work out, but they’d eventually figured it out.
Then, Kakashi had become the Hokage, and Yamato had been appointed ANBU Commander by Tsunade before she had stepped down officially, which meant that their relationship had to be kept under wraps for the sake of the village. Their team knew, that was true, and Kakashi was certain Gai and Kurenai had something to say about it as well, but the general public was none the wiser. Yamato hadn’t necessarily liked it that way, but he held a position of power in the village and his partner was the supreme leader of Konoha. He was rational enough to know it was for the best.
Except living together had always been out of the question, because some things were just difficult to keep under wraps. It was true that Yamato often snuck into Kakashi’s apartment when he came back from missions or always remained closer than any other ANBU guard in the roster, but the public didn’t need to know about those things. Living together was admitting that they were in a relationship, and Tenzo hadn’t known Kakashi was ready for that kind of level of commitment.
“Tenzo?” Kakashi calls, a crease in his brow, “Are you okay?”
It snaps Yamato back to attention long enough for him to say, perhaps a little too loudly, “I would love to move in with you.”
“ You--what ?!”
Sakura catches Naruto by the back of his black t-shirt before the boy topples over and off the roof where they had been working since that morning. The blonde boy is stunned out of his mind, but still scrambles to get his feet under himself before he kills himself and Sakura in the process. Sai exchanges a look of confusion with Sasuke over the stained glass window they had been trying to finish installing by the front porch, but he’s only met with a stony face and an open mouth.
“Is it so surprising to you that someone wants to live with me as a romantic partner?” Kakashi asks, holding a hand up to his heart like he’s wounded by Naruto’s disbelief.
“No!” Naruto answers, almost immediately, and then adds, “Well, actually, yeah, a li--”
Sakura shuts him up with a hand over his mouth, and instead says, “Congratulations, Yamato-sensei! Does that mean I can crash on Kakashi-sensei's couch now?”
Kakashi’s brows meet in the middle, “I’m sorry? Why is that your first conclusion?”
Yamato laughs, cheeks dusted with a pink shade similar to Sakura’s hair, “She sleeps on my couch after long shifts, usually.”
“And this is a transferable thing,” Sakura says, looking too proud of herself, “so, since Yamato-sensei is moving, then my naps are moving with him, too.”
“No,” Kakashi says, an air of finality about his tone, “they are not. You have an apartment.”
Sakura pouts. She looks ridiculous still up on the roof.
“Don’t give me that look, pup,” Kakashi continues, “you’re not going to break into my home. I don’t care how cute you think you are.”
Before Sakura can answer with a whine, Sasuke’s low voice breaks through the conversation, effectively cutting her short.
“I’m sorry,” he says, “let me get this straight. Yamato and Kakashi are dating ?”
Sai breaks into a smile, probably pleased over having gotten a social cue faster than Sasuke had. Kakashi just thinks it’s ridiculous that Sasuke possesses what is considered to be the most dangerous dojutsu in existance and still managed to miss his ANBU captain and his old sensei being together.
“Sasuke, they kissed after the war,” Naruto says, like he can’t quite believe what Sasuke is asking, “Where the fuck were you then?”
“In a tent. Missing an arm.”
“No, I’m pretty sure they kissed in said tent,” Sakura continues, looking thoughtful for a second, “because my plan backfired and Kakashi ended up saying something stupid.”
Yamato laughs again, “I thought it was romantic.”
“You’d think a trashcan on fire was romantic if it was Kakashi lighting it up,” Sakura shoots back, matter of factly, “You’re not a reliable source.”
As his team descends into chaos, Kakashi can’t seem to chase away the warm feeling that’s steadily growing in the middle of his chest. His team, as they have always been, and yet so different from what he ever thought they’d be, surrounding the home that was once and will be again thanks to them. He notices, with no small amount of pride, the more natural wooden formations on his doors and window sills, products of Sakura’s not-quite-Mokuton, in contrast with Yamato’s smoother details engraved into the door frame and the underside of roofs. The brightly colored windows depicting the happy events of Kakashi’s life that Sai had made for him, shining under the receding sunshine. Naruto’s bright smile and Sasuke’s still stunned expression while he tries to catch up.
He leans back on the tree trunk and sighs. He’s home.