Chapter Text
(I don't own any characters etc etc)
Kakashi stepped up to Iruka’s desk in the missions office, passing him a report from Team Kakashi.
“Thank you for your service, Kakashi-sensei,” Iruka greeted him, accepting the scroll.
The jonin studied him in silence as Iruka read, it, observing the chuunin nod every so often.
“Well done, thanks to Sakura,” Iruka praised it, stamping it approved. “Konoha thanks you all. Is there anything else I can help you with?”
“I have a missions request,” Kakashi said, passing him another scroll.
Iruka raised an eyebrow. “This isn’t on our formal request form,” he commented.
“It’s an…unusual request.”
Iruka looked at him for a long moment before opening the scroll and reading it.
“No,” he said, firmly shaking his head. “This will not be approved. Thank you, have a good evening.”
“Sensei,” Kakashi sighed. “Just take a second look at it.”
“I don’t need to,” Iruka said, rolling the scroll up and pushing it across his desk towards the copy nin. “Please take it and leave, others are waiting to be helped.”
Kakashi looked behind him, where there was no one else in Iruka’s line. “Really?”
“They might come in, or join my line from the other ones,” Iruka said, pulling a report towards him to work on. “Goodnight.”
“Sensei,” Kakashi began again, not moving. “Just think about it.”
“What’s there to think about?” Iruka asked, trying to not raise his voice. “It’s ridiculous!”
Kakashi sighed. “Look, Tsunade was going to send me off to Suna for like a month. I didn’t want to go, so I had to find something to say!”
“Since when do you shirk duty?” Iruka challenged.
“Do you know how long it would take to get all that sand off me and out of my hair? Forever, it would take forever,” Kakashi told him.
“So?”
“So I told her I’m early into a relationship and being away for the holiday season would be damaging to it.”
Iruka shook his head. “Don’t care. It’s not on the correct form, and honestly, it’s not a valid mission request.”
“She didn’t really buy it, not at first,” Kakashi admitted, continuing.
“As if I’m surprised,” Iruka muttered.
“Til I told her who it was.”
Iruka continued to work, not stopping.
“You.”
“What?” Iruka asked, his head snapping up. Clearly he had missed that in the jonin's written request, if that was even what it could be called...
Kakashi gave him an eye smile. “I told her we were dating to get out of going to Suna. Isn’t that great?”
“Are you crazy?” Iruka snapped. “Or just an idiot?”
“Calling a higher ranked shinobi that, I’d be quite upset if we weren’t dating,” Kakashi mused.
“Fake dating, and not even that,” Iruka reminded him.
“Exactly,” Kakashi agreed. “You just have to pretend to date me for a few weeks, and then we call it quits. Break up, or whatever.”
“No.”
“Just for a little bit?”
“No.”
“It will be fun,” Kakashi said in a singsong voice.
“Goodnight, and go away. Please,” Iruka said in a tense voice.
They stared at each other for a long moment.
“I don’t even know where you came up with it,” Iruka sighed, shaking his head.
“Ask him,” Kakashi said, nodding to Iruka’s left, where Genma sat at a desk, working.
“Genma?” Iruka asked. “What?”
“I mean, not really,” Genma said, finishing up with the shinobi in his line, waving as they left. “Not in so many words.”
“Tell me now, before I kill you both,” Iruka sighed.
“Kakashi told us of his conundrum, and a bunch of us came up with suggestions. I didn’t know he’d actually go with mine,” the jonin said, shrugging. “I mean, it was a drunk suggestion, so…”
“So you told him to say we’re dating?” Iruka asked.
“Not you, just in general. It was more like, ‘isn’t it a shame you don’t have someone in the village to tell Tsunade you want to be with this time of year, blah blah blah’,” Genma said, moving the senbon in his mouth as he talked. “I don’t know why he chose you.”
Both desk workers looked at Kakashi, who shrugged.
“I didn’t really have it all figured out when I went to tell her,” he admitted. “And when she asked who it was, I said it was a secret. You can understand that she was not impressed by that answer,” he sighed. “So when pressed, I said your name.”
“Why, for the love of Konoha?” Iruka sighed.
“That’s exactly why!” Kakashi cheered. “I had the scroll in my pocket, and you were the first face to come to mind.”
“Then you can think of me when you go back upstairs and tell her the truth. I won’t be a part of this and get in trouble myself.”
“You won’t,” Kakashi reassured him.
Iruka glared at him. “Lying to the Hokage? Yeah, that screams ‘deceit of the highest level’ and a one-way ticket to T&I. It practically feels like treason.”
“Or, you join me and it’s not a lie.”
“We’re not dating, nor are we fake dating.”
“Yet,” Kakashi posed.
“Ever,” Iruka told him. “And anyway, it’s already well into the holiday season, so you’re already done.”
“But it’s still not over,” Kakashi argued. “Sensei, wouldn’t it be nice to have a boyfriend this time of year, to do all sorts of seasonal stuff with?”
“I,” Iruka began, stressing that word, “am far too busy to care. I have a lot of shifts here, plus work for the academy before we go on winter break. If I cared about having a boyfriend for the holidays, I would have already been dating and looking for one. But I didn’t, so I don’t, and I won’t, and I just don’t care.”
They fell into silence again.
“Goodbye,” Iruka said, again, as he moved to pick up a new report.
“For now,” Kakashi told him. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”
“No, please, no,” Iruka sighed, but the jonin left in a swirl of leaves, and he was talking to no one.
“You could have volunteered,” Iruka said to Genma, frowning.
Genma returned his frown. “And have Raidou kill me for cheating on him? No way!”
“Fake cheating,” Iruka reminded him. “And I’m going to kill you for planting this idea in him!”
“Killing me still won’t get you out of this that easily,” Genma laughed.
“Don’t remind me,” Iruka sighed. “Maybe this is just a bad dream, and I’ll wake up from it…”
_______
Iruka thought he was in the clear as his next morning was uneventful. No unhinged jonin popping up on his walk to the academy, nor during morning classes. But his luck ran out at lunchtime, when Kakashi waltzed into his classroom while his students were outside. Winter weather or not, they wanted recess!
“Hello, Iruka,” Kakashi greeted him.
“Iruka-sensei, please,” Iruka corrected him.
“Ah, surely we’re far too intimate for formalities?”
“I think not, Kakashi-sensei,” Iruka spat at him.
“But we’re dating!”
“We’re not dating, nor fake dating, nor even thinking about either,” Iruka reminded him, shaking his head as he graded papers.
“But I brought you lunch?”
“I already ate.”
“I cooked it myself.”
“Then I’ll assume it’s drugged so that I’ll agree to your crazy scheme,” Iruka commented.
“No, just made with love,” Kakashi purred.
“Fake love?”
“I don’t have to admit to anything,” the jonin said, placing a bento box on Iruka’s desk. “So! We should talk about how this will all go.”
Iruka looked up at him. “You will leave through that door, and not bother me about this again. I’ll not go to Tsunade to blow your cover right away. How’s that sound?”
“Terrible,” Kakashi scoffed. “Not at all what I was thinking.”
“I don’t think even you know what you’re thinking,” Iruka muttered.
“Anyway,” Kakashi began, leaning on the desk. “We make some plans now, put some dates and times aside to hang out, and start working on a holiday bucket list. Plus, I should get to know more about you so it seems real.”
“Why don’t you just tell the Hokage I’m mad at you, and then it will seem genuine?” Iruka suggested. “Then we don’t actually have to do anything.”
Kakashi paused to consider it. “That’s not a bad idea, but then I’ll probably have to do more work to make it up to you, and I’d rather not.”
Iruka shook his head but didn’t say anything, instead getting back to work.
“Come on, Iruka, I need to make it believable.”
“Believe me when I say no to all of this,” Iruka said, continuing to work.
The copy nin leaned his head back and sighed, reminding Iruka of one of his students.
“Fine,” Kakashi finally said. “I’ll do more of the groundwork myself. I’ll learn about you from others, and I’ll pull all my Icha Icha knowledge together to make a list of what to do. Keep the winter solstice festival open, and Christmas eve and/or Christmas day, plus New Year’s eve,” Kakashi said, as he turned to leave. “At a minimum.”
“Or not,” Iruka called out as the other man left, leaving him to shake his head. “Maybe I need to ask for that mission to Suna instead?”