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Yamato blinked several times and then rubbed his eyes.
“Senpai?”
“I thought you might appreciate some fresh food and some company,” Kakashi said cheerily from behind the huge cardboard box in his hands, his visible eye closing in a half moon smile.
“Come in,” Yamato said, bemusement crowding in alongside the stuffiness that was already filling up his head as Kakashi brushed past him to make himself at home in his tiny apartment.
“I’m going to make you my famous chicken noodle egg drop soup to help you feel better,” Kakashi said, setting the box on the floor and starting to pull blankets and boxes of tissues out of it. It put Yamato in mind of a particularly mediocre magician and he snorted behind his hand. Kakashi looked up, concerned.
“Oh dear. You sound very sick.”
“I’m sure it’s just a cold, senpai,” Yamato said. “There’s really no need to trouble yourself.”
“No trouble, no trouble,” Kakashi said, finally lifting the box and upending it over the futon. To Yamato’s surprise and dismay, two of Kakashi’s ninken tumbled out.
“The dogs, senpai?”
“Clinically proven to aid in a speedy recovery,” Kakashi said, fussing with one of the dogs until its tail thumped against the cushions.
Yamato felt a great deal more tired than he had before Kakashi arrived. He’d planned to spend the day reading in bed until the worst of the illness was over with. As much as he normally enjoyed Kakashi’s company and was flattered that his senpai had visited him, he would have greatly preferred to be alone.
“You just make yourself comfortable and I’ll have the soup ready in no time,” Kakashi said, striding over to the counter on the far side of the tiny apartment. “Now, where’s your kitchen?”
“You’re standing in it,” Yamato said.
Kakashi’s visible right eye narrowed.
“You don’t have a stove?”
“Just the hot plate,” Yamato said. “And a rice cooker.”
Kakashi let out a long-suffering sigh. “It’s less than ideal, but I suppose I can make it work. Where is your cutting board?”
Yamato resigned himself to working alongside his senpai since Kakashi would presumably need to be directed to every item that he needed. He slouched over to the kitchen area and took out a cutting board and knife. Kakashi hummed in thanks.
“Could you grab me some eggs?”
“Sure,” Yamato said. “Where are they?”
“What do you mean, ‘where are they’? Your eggs, Yamato.”
Yamato blinked at him dumbly. “I don’t have any eggs, senpai.”
Kakashi stared at him until he blushed.
“What about chicken?”
Yamato shook his head.
“Green onions? Menma? Daikon?”
“I have rice and soy sauce,” Yamato said.
“Well, how am I supposed to make you anything with that?”
“I thought you would have brought the ingredients with you.”
Yamato punctuated his words with a sneeze into the crook of his elbow.
Kakashi’s nose wrinkled beneath his mask.
“I brought you blankets and dogs and now I’m expected to feed you as well?”
“You offered!” Yamato exclaimed, triggering a minor coughing fit.
“It won’t do,” Kakashi muttered, completely ignoring Yamato’s dismay. “No eggs, no green onions, no chicken. Yamato, be a dear and run down to the market for me, hm?”
Yamato stared, incredulous.
“You can’t be serious.”
“It won’t take you five minutes,” Kakashi said, reaching up to rummage through Yamato’s cupboards. “I’ll write you a list.”
“Why can’t you go?”
“I have to stay and mind the dogs.”
“Take them with you!”
“Yamato,” Kakashi whined. “I came here to make you soup. It isn’t my fault you live like a Spartan and don’t have any food in the house. How can I take care of you if you won’t take care of yourself?”
Yamato suddenly wanted nothing more than to get out of his invaded apartment and away from his senpai’s cockeyed idea of taking care of him.
“Fine. Write the list.”
When he stepped outside for the first time that day, it struck him how unwell he actually was. The sunlight hurt his eyes and gave him a horrible headache. He felt dizzy and weak as he shuffled through the market with his shopping list clutched tightly in his hand.
“Hoy, Yamato!”
He groaned out loud. Maito Gai. Exactly the sort of loud, garish presence he couldn’t stomach today.
“Hello, Gai.”
The spandex-clad jōnin peered at him. “You don’t look too good.”
“I have the ‘flu,” Yamato said.
Gai’s face creased in sympathy. “Then you should be indoors resting.”
“I have shopping to do,” Yamato said, shrugging helplessly.
Gai plucked the list from his fingers and quickly scanned it. His brows knitted together.
“This looks remarkably similar to Kakashi’s recipe for chicken noodle egg drop soup.”
Yamato sneezed three times then sniffed hard to contain the mucus that had been dislodged.
“That’s it precisely. Kakashi-senpai is in my apartment right now, and—”
“And he sent you from your sickbed to purchase these ingredients?” Gai’s face was thunderous. “Yamato, I am appalled on your behalf! This will not stand!”
Before Yamato could protest or move or even blink , Gai had picked him up, thrown him over his shoulder and started to sprint towards his apartment building.
Kakashi jumped when the apartment door crashed open to reveal his rival and his kōhai.
“Kakashi! Explain yourself at once!”
Kakashi blinked mildly.
“Hello, Gai. What brings you here?”
Gai stalked into the room and very tenderly laid Yamato down on his futon. He tucked him beneath the blankets and, much to Yamato’s bemusement, kissed him on the forehead.
“What is the meaning of sending your poor, sweet young friend, who is deathly ill , out to run your errands for you? Have you lost the use of your legs?”
Kakashi gestured lazily. “The dogs, Gai.”
“Enough of your excuses!” Gai hollered.
Yamato moaned and put several pillows over his head.
“It was only to the market,” Kakashi said.
“Dear Yamato had almost fainted dead away when I chanced to see him!”
Yamato surfaced from his nest of pillows and blankets. “Actually, I—”
“Hush, hush, dear,” Gai cooed. “You need your rest.”
Yamato resigned himself to letting the other two argue it out. He really was very tired. He heard footsteps and then felt cool fingers against his forehead.
“You’re really sick,” Kakashi said.
Yamato coughed weakly.
“You are, of course, now and for all eternity my most beloved rival,” Gai said. “ However, I cannot help but think that you are a terrible person.”
Yamato opened his eyes and stared over at the spandex-clad jōnin. He’d never heard him speak that way before, with such negativity and his tone heavy with disgust and disappointment.
“Hey now,” Kakashi said. “I was going to make him soup. I’ll admit that I planned it poorly, but the thought was there.”
Gai harrumphed and spun on his heel.
“Kakashi, please take care of this man. I will come and visit him in the morning to ensure that he is on the mend.”
“You really don’t have—”
The door closed behind Gai and Yamato sighed and slumped back on the futon. Kakashi’s fingers found his forehead again and he let his burning eyes slide closed.
“I didn’t realise,” Kakashi said softly. “I’m sorry, Yamato.”
“ ‘s fine,” Yamato mumbled. “I just need sleep.”
“I’ll start again,” Kakashi said. Yamato heard him moving away through the room. “I’ll make some soup at home and bring it over for you, alright?”
“Mm,” Yamato agreed, already drifting into a feverish sleep.
Kakashi was as good as his word. It was dark outside and Yamato was lying in his sweat-sodden tangle of blankets contemplating whether or not he had the energy to take a shower when there was a light knock at the door.
“It’s open.”
Kakashi’s head poked around the door.
“I brought soup.”
“You did?” Yamato pushed himself to sitting. “You really didn’t have to.”
“It’s probably the least I could do,” Kakashi said. “Aside from leaving you alone completely. Which, in hindsight, is perhaps what I should have done.”
Yamato laughed, which turned into coughing. Kakashi came into the apartment, concern creasing his brow.
“Maybe I should take you to the hospital.”
“You hate hospitals,” Yamato pointed out.
“Only when I’m the one in them,” Kakashi said. “Are you hungry?”
“No, but I should eat,” Yamato said. “I don’t think I have since yesterday.”
Kakashi’s expression darkened. “I’m glad I came to take care of you,” he said.
Yamato dragged a hand through his oily hair, grimacing. “Gai would make a much better nursemaid.”
“You’re joking.” Kakashi appeared to be deeply, genuinely offended. “He’s so loud .”
“But he cares, ” Yamato said pointedly.
“I care,” Kakashi said. “I’m just not very good at it.”
Yamato blinked rapidly. “Did you just admit that you’re not the best at something?”
Kakashi shrugged, dumping soup into Yamato’s solitary pot and switching on his hotplate. “Every rose has its thorn.”
Yamato huffed and flopped back down on his back.
Presently, the soup was ready. Kakashi brought him a gently steaming bowl and helped to prop him up against the wall to eat it.
“It’s good,” Yamato said, surprised. “Really good.”
“A hidden talent,” Kakashi said. “There’s more for you to have tomorrow. And probably for several days after that.”
Yamato paused with his spoon halfway to his mouth and narrowed his eyes.
“Exactly how much soup did you make, senpai?”
“Well, my crockpot holds eight liters.”
“That’s...far too much soup.”
“I’ll help you eat it,” Kakashi said. His eyes slid sideways. “Or perhaps you’d prefer to invite Gai over.”
Yamato let out a long-suffering sigh.
“I don’t like Gai more than you, senpai.”
“Hm.”
“You can share the soup with me,” Yamato said.
Kakashi seemed placated. He wandered back to the pot to dish himself up some soup. He explored Yamato’s cupboards and then turned to him with a frown.
“You don’t have another bowl?”
“I live alone,” Yamato said. “Why would I?”
Kakashi narrowed his visible eye. “That’s not a good answer.”
“I’m sorry,” Yamato said. He slurped his soup.
Kakashi flounced back to the futon with a coffee mug full of soup. He tugged down his mask and took a dainty sip.
“I don’t suppose you bought any crackers?” Yamato asked.
Kakashi lowered his mug with a long-suffering air.
“You put crackers in your soup?”
“Only when I’m sick,” Yamato said.
“This isn’t soup out of a can. You can’t sully it with soggy crackers.”
“You eat them before they go soggy. That’s the point.”
Kakashi returned to his mug of soup. He was pouting.
“You eat worse than my dogs,” he said.
Yamato coughed weakly and his expression softened.
“Tomorrow, I’ll bring crackers.”
Yamato looked at him warily. “You’re coming back tomorrow?”
“I’m staying the night,” Kakashi said.
“Senpai…”
“You’re very sick and you need someone to look after you.”
“This is because of Gai, isn’t it?”
“I came to visit you with my dogs, I brought you blankets and made you soup. Gai didn’t do any of that.”
Yamato thought that Gai hadn’t done any of those things because he knew better than that, but he kept it to himself.
“I appreciate the effort, but if you stay here you’ll get sick as well.”
“Impossible. I never get sick.”
“Your mask is down right now,” Yamato pointed out. “You’re breathing in my germs.”
“I won’t get sick.”
Yamato didn’t have the energy to argue so he just finished his soup. When he was done Kakashi took his bowl away and he almost immediately slipped into a light doze. His dreams were fragmented and strange but after some time, Kakashi’s voice began to feature in all of them. It wound itself through his mind until finally Yamato snuffled awake.
“...took his turgid arousal into her small, warm hand. Sato let out a deep and masculine groan of pleasure and—”
“What are you doing?”
Kakashi blinked. “I’m reading to you.”
“What? Why?”
“Because you’re sick,” Kakashi said as though it was obvious. He’d stretched out on the futon beside Yamato with his legs crossed neatly at the ankles and a familiar orange-jacketed book open in his hand.
“You’re reading me Icha Icha ?”
“It’s all I had to hand.”
Yamato groaned and slumped further down on the futon. He grabbed a pillow and stuffed it beneath his head, rolling onto his side away from Kakashi.
“Your mind must be a horrible place.”
“Isn’t it nice to have somebody to read to you? I don’t see Gai coming over here to do it.”
“ Kakashi .”
“Now, you fell asleep but we’re right in the middle of a chapter. This is the part where the heroine, Ieri, has run away from her wicked father to find the travelling warrior who so captured her heart the month before.”
“Please stop. You’ll make me even sicker if you carry on.”
“Shush,” Kakashi said and resumed reading aloud. “Sato let out a deep and masculine groan of pleasure and swept Ieri into a passionate kiss. His big, rough hands wandered over her smooth, pale skin as she—”
“Too many adjectives,” Yamato muttered. “This is bad writing, senpai.”
“You’re not giving it a chance, Yamato.”
“If I pay you, will you please stop?”
“His big, rough hands wandered over her smooth, pale skin as she caressed his hard and eager length until he could take it no more and lifted her into his arms and in one motion impaled her.”
“Ouch.”
“Shut up! Ieri screamed in pleasure—”
“Double ouch.”
Kakashi sighed and finally set the book aside. “Fine. I was only trying to be nice.”
“By reading me bad pornography?”
“Tasteful erotica.”
“ Tasteful ?”
“Yamato,” Kakashi whined. “You’re being a terrible patient.”
“You don’t need to read to me,” Yamato grumbled. “I’m not a child, senpai.”
“You’re my precious kōhai and I insist on taking care of you,” Kakashi said. “Tell me what you want and I’ll do it.”
“I want to sleep and I want to shower,” Yamato said with no hesitation. “They’re the only things that I want.”
“Really?” Kakashi looked downcast. “You don’t need an ice pack or a heat pack or some herbal tea? Nothing medicinal at all?”
“It’s the ‘flu, ‘Kashi,” Yamato mumbled, pressing the heels of both hands into his eye sockets. “I just have to sweat and sneeze and puke it out.”
“That’s disgusting.”
“You don’t have to be here,” Yamato said with as much emphasis as he could muster.
“Hm.”
Yamato moaned weakly as Kakashi roughly heaved him onto his shoulder and clambered to his feet.
“I’ll bathe you, then. Come on.”
Yamato was intensely grateful that the previous apartment owner had installed a bench in the shower. He slumped there, half asleep, as Kakashi rubbed him with a loofah.
“Better?”
“Hnngggh.”
“That’s a yes.”
He had to admit that it did feel good to be cleaned, even if his senpai wasn’t the most gentle. The steam was also clearing his sinuses and the heat was helping him to sweat out the fever. After a few minutes under the hot water, he felt more lucid.
That was when he really took stock of the fact that Kakashi was naked with him in his shower. He blinked water out of his eyes and poked Kakashi’s belly.
“Why’re you here, ‘Kashi?”
“I couldn’t leave you to drown in the shower,” Kakashi said, matter-of-factly. “Honestly, Yamato.”
It was far from the first time they’d seen each other naked, although never before had it been under these specific circumstances. In the past they’d either been showering in the ANBU locker rooms when both of them were too exhausted and filthy to care much, or they’d been having sex. Neither circumstance had happened since Kakashi had left ANBU four years previously. Yamato forced his eyes open to watch hazily as Kakashi switched to washing himself with his hands. He thought that Kakashi had filled out a little since their ANBU days when he’d been, in Yamato’s opinion, bordering on dangerously thin. He was still devastatingly toned and his stomach was washboard flat, but there was more padding over his ribcage and his hipbones didn’t stick out as starkly as they had done.
He reached out and prodded Kakashi again, just below his belly button. Kakashi smiled down at him.
“Like what you see?”
“Yes,” Yamato admitted shamelessly, still too delirious to be self-conscious.
Kakashi didn’t reply, turning away to rinse out his hair.
Back in the living room, Yamato sprawled out on the floor like a starfish while Kakashi stripped the futon and made it up with clean sheets. His senpai was, inexplicably, getting better at playing nursemaid.
“All done,” Kakashi announced proudly. Yamato pushed himself to sitting but could get no further. Kakashi tsked and hauled him up by his armpits and all but tossed him onto the futon. His stomach lurched ominously and he let out a belch that tasted of chicken noodle soup.
“Thank you for everything, senpai,” he said, his voice thick. His mouth felt stuffed with cotton wool.
“I’m still staying here,” Kakashi said. He was wearing only his undershirt with the sewn in mask and a pair of white briefs. He settled onto the futon beside Yamato.
“You’ll get sick.”
“I won’t,” Kakashi insisted.
Yamato coughed weakly. He tried to sniff but his nose was thoroughly blocked. He had to resort to breathing through his mouth which dried his throat out even more. He made an agonised noise like a dying porpoise.
“Senpai,” he finally managed to gasp out. “You really shouldn’t sleep here.”
“But you enjoy my company so much,” Kakashi protested.
Even as sick as he was, Yamato’s skeptical expression was impressive.
“To say that I tolerate you would be a vast overstatement.”
“Cruel,” Kakashi returned. “Heartless and cruel. Luckily, I don’t believe you for a second.”
Yamato’s eyes widened when Kakashi rolled over and settled his weight on top of him.
“W-what are you…?”
“Hm, I may have gotten a little excited while I was reading to you earlier,” Kakashi confessed, squirming on top of Yamato in a way that he could only assume was intended to be erotic. “And then in the shower. I thought maybe we could rekindle our old arrangement.”
“I...yes, Kakashi, but maybe not—”
“Don’t hold out on me, Yamato,” Kakashi all but purred, sliding up his body to get to his mouth and planting a sensual kiss there.
Yamato let out a soft moan that was as much frustration as it was pleasure. He’d thought a lot about Kakashi over the last four years. He couldn’t deny that he still wanted him as much as he ever had. He also couldn’t remember the last time he’d had sex or even who it had been with. The mission in Shimo, perhaps? What year had that been?
Kakashi’s mouth pressed more insistently against his and he couldn’t breathe. Kakashi’s weight on his stomach was making acid bile rise up his throat. He batted weakly at Kakashi’s shoulder, trying to signal to him what a horrible idea this was but Kakashi ignored him in favour of digging beneath the blankets to slide a hand up inside his t-shirt.
Gods, but he really was sick. He felt awful and he couldn’t breathe and he was too hot and he was going to be sick if Kakashi didn’t—
Yamato hit Kakashi harder and his senpai finally got the hint and pulled back enough to let him drag in a desperate breath. It made him cough violently and then belch and finally sneeze, all directly into Kakashi’s face.
Kakashi frowned.
“That...was disgusting.”
Yamato wanted to weep from frustration.
“What part of ‘I’m sick’ do you not understand?”
Kakashi drew back and knelt by his feet. He wiped his face with his arm and then slipped his mask back up.
“You really want me to leave, don’t you?”
“Yes!” Yamato shouted as loudly as he could manage, triggering another bout of coughing.
“Oh.”
Kakashi looked remarkably melancholy all of a sudden.
“I’m sorry. I just wanted to take care of you for once. You’ve been spending so much time with Gai lately and then when he brought you back here I just thought…”
Yamato pushed himself up onto his elbows, focusing on keeping his heavy eyes open.
“You didn’t have to mark your territory, Kakashi.”
“I did,” Kakashi said firmly. “We’ve barely seen each other in the last four years, but I...I didn’t forget about you, Yamato. I didn’t even want to leave ANBU.”
A soft smile took over Yamato’s face.
“I know.”
“But I’ll let you rest. This was stupid.”
Before he could stand, Yamato grabbed his wrist.
“It was sweet. And I meant what I said: I like you better.”
“Than Gai?” Kakashi’s eye looked hopeful.
Yamato nodded.
“When I’m feeling better, I’ll show you exactly how much.”
He could see the stretch of Kakashi’s mask that meant his senpai was grinning underneath.
“I’d like that.”
“Yeah, me too.” Yamato sneezed twice into his hand and groaned as he flopped back down. “But right now I really need to sleep.”
“Okay. Don’t forget the soup in the fridge.”
To his surprise, Kakashi tenderly kissed his cheek before departing with a promise to check up on him the next day.
As disrupted and aggravating and exhausting as his day had been, Yamato fell asleep happy.
A week later, Yamato was making good on his promise to Kakashi with a great deal of enthusiasm and Kakashi’s moans were indicating that he was just as interested.
“Oh, mm. Yamato. Don’t stop.”
Yamato redoubled his efforts and Kakashi’s heels dragged against his shuriken print sheets.
Suddenly, his senpai was taken over by a violent sneezing fit. Yamato sat up, wiping his mouth.
“Are you sick?”
Kakashi shook his head vehemently.
“I never get sick. I told you not to stop.”
As Yamato was about to resume, Kakashi started to cough.
“You are sick.”
“I’m not,” Kakashi insisted. It was rather undermined by his bloodshot eyes and the snot leaking out of his nose.
Yamato scrambled off of the bed and started to get dressed.
“Hey!” Kakashi protested, stretching a weak hand out towards him. “Where are you going?”
“If you taught me anything last week, senpai, it’s that the best thing a nursemaid can do for their patient is to leave them the hell alone.”
“No, Yamato,” Kakashi whined. “You can’t leave. I don’t have any soup. Who will help me shower?”
“Why don’t you call Gai?” Yamato suggested innocently as he fastened his trousers.
Kakashi’s expression darkened.
“Don’t pretend you’re not happy to see me like this.”
“Oh, I wouldn’t dream of it,” Yamato said gleefully. “Goodbye, Kakashi. I hope you got what you wanted because you certainly have gotten exactly what you deserved.”
The words ‘you’re a horrible kōhai’ drifted out of the apartment after him as he left.
He took a minor detour to drop in on Maito Gai and inform him that Kakashi was very sick and he’d specifically requested the company of his beloved rival to nurse him back to health. Gai’s face lit up and Yamato smothered a laugh behind his hand.
“Yosh! It would be my greatest honour to tend to Kakashi!”
“Don’t be put off if he acts like he really doesn’t want you there,” Yamato added, feeling especially malicious. “You know how proud he can be. Honestly, he needs you to stay there with him and help him with everything. I wouldn’t trust him to use the bathroom alone.”
Manly tears sprung forth in Gai’s eyes.
“Do not fear, my youthful friend! I shall not leave Kakashi’s side for the duration of this most accursed ailment!”
“Oh, and please take him this,” Yamato said, quickly scribbling onto a blank scroll and sealing it closed. “My most sincere well wishes for a speedy recovery.”
“You may count on me, Yamato!” And with that, Gai raced away towards Kakashi's place in a cloud of dust.
Several days later, when Gai had finally left him alone for longer than ten minutes at a time, Kakashi opened Yamato’s scroll hesitantly, anticipating a booby trap of some kind. Instead, all that it contained was the following message:
“Don’t hate me for this. You would’ve done the same.”