Chapter Text
It isn’t a secret to most shinobi that Hatake Kakashi has an exceptional sense of smell.
When he’d been younger and Sakumo had still been alive, the more gossipy ones in the village had entertained rumors of him being the child of an Inuzuka woman whom Sakumo had a secret affair with. (“Must’ve been some beauty,” they murmured, “for Hatake Sakumo to fall for her.” Kakashi would be flattered if he wasn’t so annoyed by the nosiness.) That Kakashi wore a mask everywhere—maybe it’s to hide those Inuzuka dog teeth—only fueled them further. Where they got the creativity and the time of day to come up with these rumors, Kakashi could hardly care less.
(The rumors only stopped when Sakumo had committed suicide. Soon, they were replaced by lingering glances and whispers of his tragedy instead, following him well into his adulthood. He would never admit to it out loud, but Kakashi much rather preferred those rumors over the pitying looks any day.)
It isn’t any wonder to most shinobi either that Kakashi has excellent skills of deduction.
But even with his keen sense of smell and his quick, battlefield wit, when Kakashi woke up to the morning sunlight streaming through his shoji screen and the stench of old, drying blood somewhere down the hallways of their house, his first thought hadn’t been to check up on anyone. He had rolled over instead, burying his nose into his pillow to counter the scent, and groaned, “Goddammit, Naruto.”
Because of course it has to be Naruto, who most likely fell into his futon face-first as soon as they came home from their last mission and forgot to put his dirty, bloodied jumpsuit in the washing machine like he promised Kakashi he would.
Not even 30 years old and already, he’s saddled with two preteens living under his roof, one of them with questionable hygiene practices, the other a late riser who sleeps until the afternoon if left alone. How did I end up like this, Kakashi thinks almost sullenly, until he remembers the ironic fact that both Naruto and Katana are adopted.
By him.
He adopted them.
Kakashi sighs. He stands up from his futon, resigned to his fate, and goes to make breakfast.
An hour later, a series of noisy footsteps reveal Naruto shuffling towards the entryway of the kitchen, probably woken up by the promise of food. “Kaka-oji-san,” he greets through a loud yawn, rubbing sleep from his eyes. His nose wrinkles in irritation. “Did you smell that in the hallway?”
“Very funny.” Kakashi scoops breakfast out of the pan and glances over his shoulder to give Naruto a flat look. “Wash your jumpsuit.”
“Wha—I did!” Naruto squawks, indignant. “I washed it yesterday before I fell asleep!”
Kakashi’s look turns flatter. “Yesterday, I heard you snoring in your room not fifteen minutes after we came home.”
Naruto stutters, catching himself, “Fine, I took a nap first. But then I washed it after, ‘ttebayo!”
“Right.”
“I did!” Naruto protests. “I washed it!”
“You didn’t.”
“I DID!”
“Alright,” Kakashi says, because this is devolving into a very pointless argument, very quickly, and Kakashi hasn’t even had breakfast yet on the one day off they get to actually enjoy breakfast. “Naruto. If neither of us is wounded, and it’s not your jumpsuit, then where is the smell coming from?”
Naruto pauses, frowning in silent consideration. He stares at Kakashi and Kakashi looks back at him in challenge, until something dawns into both of them. They turn to look down the hallway at the same time.
Kakashi tenses. “Yesterday—"
Naruto turns to him in alarm. “I didn’t know if she was injured or not, I didn’t check—”
Kakashi walks briskly to his daughter’s bedroom, with Naruto right by his heels—“you ran,” Naruto will accuse later and he will deny it to his death—and the initial worry makes him forget to knock, opting instead to slide the door open. The scent of blood becomes thicker than before, and it makes Kakashi’s lone eye damn near water. Behind him, Naruto pulls a face.
“Katana,” Kakashi begins, and then stops when he finds Katana sitting up on her futon. He didn’t expect her to be awake, not at this hour, at least, and it only serves to worry him even more. He skips the pleasantries and goes right into asking, “Where are you injured?”
Naruto yanks the door further open. “Katana-chan! Are you okay?”
“Tou-san. Naruto.” Katana’s voice is clipped. There’s a hard clench of her jaw, dark hair plastered to her sweaty face, and a white-knuckled grip around the blanket that’s pooled around her lap. She looks more deeply uncomfortable than severely hurt like Kakashi had thought, but there’s something odd about the way she holds herself stiffly. “Please leave.”
Naruto frowns. “But you’re hurt.”
“I’m not.”
“Yes, you are,” Naruto insists, deeply concerned. He points down at her blankets and Katana flinches. “You’re bleeding!”
Kakashi blinks, confused. He follows the line of Naruto’s arm, follows where he’s pointing, until he sees the large, red stain painted on Katana’s sheets. Even with his famed intelligence, it takes Kakashi a full minute before something in his brain clicks. When it finally does, the worry in his chest is quick to go away. (Dread replaces it.)
“Ah.”
Kakashi feels very faint, all of a sudden.
Because all he has is his excellent sense of smell and his intelligence and a borrowed Sharingan and more than 20 years of field experience, and none of those have prepared him for how to properly deal with a young girl getting her first period.
They don’t teach that in ANBU.
His gaze slides to Naruto. Kakashi has a feeling they don’t teach it to boys at the Academy, either.
Katana must realize this too, somehow, because she presses her eyes shut and hangs her head low like she’d rather have the earth swallow her whole than be here where she is. Her hold on the bloodied sheets becomes impossibly tighter—if she applies anymore pressure, Kakashi thinks, she might actually rip the blanket.
“What?” Naruto demands, oblivious. He glares up at Kakashi like it’s his fault. “What is it?”
Kakashi clears his throat. “Well,” he begins, and then stops, mind coming up blank. 20 years of shinobi training and experience, and this is what he has come to. Kakashi tries a second time. “Well.”
Naruto looks at him like he can’t believe Kakashi is this dumb. (It’s all the more offensive, given the fact that it’s Naruto.) “Well what?”
“Please leave,” Katana breathes out, cutting off their conversation. Humiliation makes her voice tremble, and Kakashi swiftly forgets to be embarrassed by the awkwardness of it all when he sees his child struggling. Katana hunches over herself, face scrunched in agony. Something in Kakashi aches a little at the sight. “Please.”
Kakashi tugs Naruto away by his shirt and steps back. He closes the door.
“Kaka-oji-san!”
“Naruto,” He says before the blonde boy can react violently, and Kakashi drops his voice to a grave tone. “I need you to do something very important. For Katana-chan.”
“I…Okay.” Naruto looks uncertain and downright suspicious, but he nods earnestly nonetheless. “What do I need to do?”
Kakashi considers of all the women he knows. It’s not a big number, but he readily scratches Mitarashi Anko out from the list. Sakura is just a kid herself, so he scratches her out too. And Yugao, Kakashi thinks dryly, might not react well to her former ANBU Captain asking this personal favor from her. Finally, he says, “I need you to find Kurenai and bring her here.”
Naruto frowns. “Kurenai-sensei?”
“Yes. Tell her it’s a kunoichi emergency.”
That makes Naruto blanch. “Is—Is it a girl thing?”
“I’ll explain later,” Kakashi tells him, although judging by the expression on Naruto’s face, he’d rather not hear any explanations at all. “Tell her to bring supplies.”
“O-Okay.” Naruto looks half terrified to death, half like a man on a mission, and Kakashi would find amusement in it if he didn’t feel the exact same thing in his bones. Naruto waves, jogging away. “I’ll be back!”
Kakashi watches the front door long after Naruto has gone. He takes a deep breath—regrets it as soon as he gets a lungful of the smell of blood—and breathes out slowly to get his bearings. It’s almost silly, he knows. Even S-Rank missions didn’t get him nervous. (But parenting is more difficult than S-Rank missions, Kakashi knows as well. Messier, more complicated. More room for error. More things to lose. Kakashi keeps trying anyway.)
He approaches the door again. Taps lightly against the shoji screen and calls out, “Kat-chan.”
“No,” comes the muffled answer. Then, more vehemently, “Go away.”
“Kat-chan, it’s just me. Let me help.”
“No.” Katana sounds beyond mortified, and Kakashi winces. “Leave me alone, Tou-san.”
“You can’t just sit there all day as you bleed.”
“I’m—I’m not bleeding!”
It’s such an automatic, childish answer that Kakashi almost snorts. His daughter is usually more thoughtful about her responses. As it is, he presses his lips together instead, tamping down his grin. He has a feeling Katana wouldn’t appreciate him laughing right now.
Once he can school his expression into something a little less amused, Kakashi opens the door. Katana glowers at him as he steps inside but it doesn’t do its intended effect, not when there are beads of sweat running down the sides of her face from what looks like immense discomfort and her shoulders are slouched inwards as if to hide herself. Kakashi tugs his mask down as he takes a seat next to her futon, facing her. Katana’s hands twist roughly around the blanket as she glares back, going for annoyed and failing by a mile as shame reflects off of her grey eyes.
Kakashi offers a strained smile. “Not a great start to your day, is it, Kat-chan?”
Katana purses her mouth, looking down at her lap. Her hair falls forward, hiding her face like a curtain. “No,” she says, voice small and defeated. “It’s not.”
“It’s okay,” Kakashi says, and prays to whoever that he’s saying the right things. “We can still make it better.” He reaches out a careful hand, slow enough for Katana to stop should she choose to. She does no such thing, however, and only sighs heavily when Kakashi gently brushes her hair away from her damp face. “How are you feeling?”
“Uncomfortable,” Katana answers immediately, and Kakashi makes a sympathetic noise. “Disgusting,” Katana says next, in a whisper. “Like I woke up in a nightmare.”
“Are you,” Kakashi hesitates, “in pain?”
“No, it’s—” Katana swallows with difficulty, glaring down at the stain Kakashi knows is there. “It’s humiliating.”
“I know you feel embarrassed,” Kakashi begins in a stilted tone, internally fumbling for the words. He phrases his next sentence carefully. “But there is nothing to be ashamed of with what’s happening right now. This is also part of growing up.”
“I know.” Katana clenches her jaw. Whether it’s physical pain that she’s feeling or it’s Kakashi’s horribly awkward presence that’s causing it, Kakashi can’t tell for certain. “They taught us, in the Academy. There were special lessons for the girls. They said—they said it’s our duty, to…to know when this will happen. To deal with it.” Katana grimaces like she’s disappointed in herself. “They told us it’s uncomfortable for men to know about it.”
…Ah.
At once, Kakashi curses himself for being the world’s biggest idiot—Katana (and Naruto) has no one except him. No mother to ask for help, no older siblings to turn to. Situations had been simpler and easier to solve when she’d been all but five, but Kakashi had known it wouldn’t be easy forever. Even if he hadn’t, this was something he took upon himself the minute he adopted her.
This, too—the messy and the awkward and the uncomfortable—is part of being a parent.
“Katana,” Kakashi says, voice soft with apology. He waits until his daughter turns to look at him before Kakashi speaks again, surer of himself this time. This is not about his discomfort. Not right now. “You can talk to me about anything, no matter how uncomfortable it is. You can ask me for help. Nothing is too uncomfortable for me,” Kakashi promises with all the sincerity he can muster, “as long as I know you are okay.”
Katana blinks at him. Once, twice, and then her lower lip wobbles.
She drops her head to hide it away, voice breaking when she clears her throat. Tension bleeds out from her drawn shoulders. “Okay,” she whispers, and lets Kakashi pet her hair as she gathers her composure. When Katana looks up again, Kakashi is relieved to see only a little bit of hesitation on her face as she asks quietly, “Can you help me walk to the bathroom? I…I want to clean up.”
Kakashi smiles. “Come on.”
It takes a bit of maneuvering, but Kakashi eventually figures out a way to wrap the sheets around Katana so that it covers her lower half. He catches Katana scowling through it all, and the red flush on her face is telling.
“It’s alright,” he reassures once more. “It can happen to anyone.”
Katana’s face pinches. “It won’t happen to you.”
“If it does,” Kakashi says sunnily, “I’ll be sure to tell you.”
Katana shoots him a sharp glare, but it makes the corners of her mouth twitch ever so slightly and makes her grip on the blankets relax a little.
Kakashi counts it as a win.
He holds up the sheets for her as Katana pulls out a set of fresh clothes, and then they make their way to the bathroom, Kakashi looking on with sympathy as his daughter winces with each careful step she takes. “I can take it from here,” she tells him once they reach the bathroom doorway, looking utterly relieved. “The futon—"
Kakashi steps back with a nod. “I’ll take care of it.”
“Oh.” Katana falters. “Tou-san, you don’t have to—”
“Maa, it’s just blood, Kat-chan,” Kakashi says and has to pause at how true those words ring. He’s seen a man’s flesh burn right off the bone once, on a mission. The stench of it had been ten times more revolting than any bloodbath. “I’ve seen worse.”
“Okay,” Katana concedes. She looks up at him with stormy grey eyes and swallows down the lump in her throat before she speaks. “Tou-san,” she says, hushed. “Thank you.”
Kakashi’s expression softens. “Anytime, kiddo.”
///
Not ten minutes later, when Naruto arrives back home with Kurenai in tow, the other jounin sensei gives Kakashi a brief, sympathetic smile, just before she prompts, “Katana-chan?”
“Down the hall, third door on your left.”
Kurenai strides into the house with a heavy paper bag in hand even before Kakashi is done giving directions, ever the straightforward, no-nonsense kind of person. Kakashi blows out a silent breath through his mask. He figures he at least did something right by asking Kurenai to help.
“This is gonna happen every month?”
Kakashi whirls around to stare at Naruto, eyebrows raised. Naruto flushes and scowls.
“Kurenai-sensei told me what’s going on,” he mumbles, embarrassed, but his blue eyes are serious and unabashed when he looks up at Kakashi. “Is Katana-chan going to be hurt every month?”
“That depends,” Kakashi says, feeling just a little proud at Naruto’s maturity about the situation. The blonde boy never fails to surprise him every time. “I think it’s more painful for some, less painful for others.”
“Oh.” Naruto frowns. “That doesn’t seem fair.”
“Things in life hardly ever are.”
“I guess so, but Katana-chan’s so cool for staying calm,” Naruto remarks with an aggrieved sigh, crossing his arms. He huffs. “If I had to bleed every month, I’d kick everyone’s ass, ‘ttebayo!”
Kakashi smiles a little. He brings down a warm hand to ruffle Naruto’s hair fondly. “That makes two of us. Let’s hope Katana-chan doesn’t lose her patience with us today.”
///
Breakfast has gone cold and is in the process of being reheated by Naruto when Kurenai takes her leave. “You should stay for breakfast, at least,” Kakashi invites casually, walking her to the front door, and Kurenai turns it down just as easily with a polite, apologetic smile. “Fine by me, but you’re going to be missing out on my special scrambled eggs.”
“A shame, really,” Kurenai says with a laugh. “Maybe next time, when I don’t have errands to run.”
Kakashi hums all too innocently. “How is Asuma these days?”
“I wouldn’t know.” Kurenai’s smile grows just the tiniest bit sharper, and Kakashi almost regrets the good-natured teasing. “You owe me one, Kakashi.”
“Probably won’t be the last favor I’ll ask, honestly,” Kakashi sighs. He takes a second to look properly grateful. “Thank you, Kurenai.”
Kurenai’s face turns kind. “Don’t worry about it too much,” she tells him, just before she walks out the door. “You’re already raising them better than most parents I know.”
Kakashi forces himself not to think too hard about Kurenai’s words. He closes the door instead and shuffles back to the kitchen, where Katana has taken a seat at the table, nodding along as Naruto explains something loudly and with great enthusiasm. Kakashi leans against the entryway, listening in, and he blinks when he realizes what they’re talking about.
“—Kurenai-sensei told me it’s supposed to expand and stay in place when you put it in, and then it’s gonna soak up all the blood—”
Tampons.
They’re discussing tampons, at breakfast.
Despite everything that’s happened this morning, this makes Kakashi snort. The sound of his laughter makes Naruto stop, and both kids turn to Kakashi.
“Oi, Kaka-oji-san!” Naruto yells. “Don’t interrupt!”
“Shh, Tou-san.” Katana says. Her smile is exhausted, but the shine of her eyes is bright with mirth, and there’s no shame to be found. “Naruto’s giving me important advice.”
“Sorry, sorry,” Kakashi wheezes, trying to wave his laughter away. “I’ll listen.” He lets Katana drag him to a seat next to her, lets Naruto pile up reheated breakfast food high on their plates. Kakashi eats, quiet as Naruto and Katana discuss how ginger tea can relieve cramps. Kakashi smiles through it all.
His chest feels warm and full.
It’s a good day.