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Sakura climbed out of her car, shielding her eyes from the sun with her hand. What the hell had Ino gotten her involved in?
The building in front of her would’ve been a completely typical-looking fire department, complete with bright, shiny red engine, if it weren’t for the fact that it was buzzing with people who looked like they had no business being in a firehouse. None of the fancy, artsy-looking types clustered out front looked like they belonged there. And even as Sakura watched, a harried-looking young man carrying two trays’ worth of coffee bustled past what appeared to be three men she supposed could’ve been firemen, if it weren’t for the fact that they were all shirtless and oddly greasy-looking.
And firemen couldn’t be greasy, right? That had to be a fire hazard.
Snapping out of her rather odd thoughts, Sakura returned to the matter at hand—and that was being called to whatever emergency Ino had demanded she race to the firehouse for. But looking at what was happening in front of her, Sakura was beginning to suspect that the emergency wasn’t real. Especially since there wasn’t a single ambulance on the scene.
In fact, beside the one fire engine parked to the left of the wide open, multi-door garage, there were no other vehicles. Instead, there were multiple areas sectioned off by tall temporary walls that looked to be made out of white cloth, and gigantic, bright lights everywhere.
Looking at the closest of the walled-off areas, Sakura saw a very attractive man with shoulder-length brown hair posing in a fake beach scene. He was also shirtless and very shiny-looking, like the others. However, he was wearing yellow fireman pants and red suspenders. Apparently, firemen could be greasy, after all.
Several people were gathered around a digital screen that showed several still shots of the man. At the top of the screen, “MISTER JUNE” was emblazoned in bright red letters.
A glimmer of horrified understanding, and the beginning of a headache, bloomed in Sakura’s mind. Before she could put all the pieces together, though, she caught sight of her closest friend Ino striding toward her on stiletto heels that made Sakura’s feet hurt just to look at.
Sakura had known Ino since they were both children, but they had lost touch when Sakura had gone to Suna to attend medical school. They hadn’t reconnected until Sakura had come back home for her residency at Konoha University, where Ino happened to work in administration. Now that Sakura had climbed until she was chief surgeon, and Ino managed public relations for the hospital, they still made time to have lunch together as often as possible.
What they did not do was meet up at a firehouse where some sort of thing was happening. Usually.
“Finally!” Ino exclaimed as she came to a stop in front of her. “I thought you would never get here.”
“Ino, you said there was an emergency! I don’t see any—”
“Yes, an emergency!” Ino interrupted. “There’s somebody here who needs your help.” She turned abruptly and began to stride in the other direction, clearly expecting Sakura to follow.
Exasperated, Sakura fell into step beside her. “Well, what’s the situation? Are they hurt?”
“Hurt? No. He… has a fever.” Ino approached one of the huge lit up rooms whose walls were made of white fabric.
“A fever?” Sakura asked incredulously. After all, she was a surgeon. She didn’t generally do fevers.
“Well, he’s hot,” Ino amended, flashing her a devious grin over her shoulder as she led them through the opening in the makeshift walls to what appeared to be a set with… a Christmas tree and fake fireplace?
“Ino! What the hell is this?”
“And besides, we need you to represent the hospital,” Ino continued, as if Sakura hadn’t spoken. “Let’s get you to hair and makeup.”
“Hair and makeup?” Sakura practically shrieked, only to shrink back slightly as everyone in the room turned to look at her. In a hissed whisper, she said, “If you don’t explain this to me right now, I’m leaving.”
But somehow Ino was pushing her into one of those spinning chairs they have at salons, and a very pale, very pretty man that Ino was definitely making flirty eyes at introduced himself as Sai before abruptly beginning to style her hair. By the time Sakura had given into his ministrations and turned to yell at Ino again, she discovered that she was gone. Sakura was going to kill her.
“I suppose that’s passable,” Sai announced blandly after five long minutes of doing her hair. “It would be better if you had better hair.”
“Listen, you—” Sakura began, finally beginning to snap, but she trailed off because she was talking to his receding back. That tended to really take the wind out of a girl’s sails.
Summoning up her ire again, Sakura prepared to yell for Ino until her questions were answered, but a rather odd-looking man with a glossy black bowl cut and a green spandex onesie began to dab something from a red pot onto her lips.
“Uh, hi,” Sakura said.
“You’re going to look positively youthful in this shade!” the man announced boisterously. “I’m Gai, by the way. I’m a fireman, but I always wanted to be a makeup artist. Plus, they apparently couldn’t afford a real one after paying for Sai and the photographer.”
Sakura caught the man’s wrist in her grasp and pulled his hand away from her face. “Will you please. Tell me. What the hell. Is going on?” Sakura said, squeezing her words out from between gritted teeth.
Rocking back on his heels, Gai raised two very bushy brows. “You don’t know?”
“Obviously not, or I wouldn’t be asking.”
“Is she ready yet?” Ino said as she came from seemingly out of nowhere to inspect the work that had been done to Sakura. “Looks great!” she said after her inspection. Grabbing ahold of Sakura’s hands, Ino pulled her up out of the chair. “Let’s go!”
“Absolutely not.” Like the obstinate mule that Ino often compared her to, Sakura planted her feet and refused to be pulled further. “I’m not going anywhere until you tell me what the hell is going on.”
“Sakura,” Ino said, squeezing her hands. “You trust me, right?”
“No,” Sakura said flatly.
Ino rolled her eyes. “Fine. You want a new wing for the hospital, right?”
That perked Sakura right up. “Yes. What does this have to do with that?”
After a dramatic pause that only made Sakura scowl again, Ino finally said, “Well, I happen to have connections with the Konoha Fire Department. And they happen to think that raising money for a new wing is a great use of their time.” She sounded insufferably proud of herself.
Sakura wasn’t ready to rejoice yet. “And they’re going to do that by taking off their shirts and getting greasy?” Somebody Sakura couldn’t see called out loudly for more baby oil, and Sakura raised her brows, feeling that her point had been expertly proven.
“Oily, Sakura. They’re oily. And yes, they are taking off their shirts and getting oiled up because they are being photographed for our Hunky Fireman of the Month calendar.” Ino was beaming now. “It was my idea. And I have a ‘friend’ at the firehouse, Obito Uchiha. You remember, Sasuke’s cousin? He’s a total hottie, and he and I have been ‘seeing’ each other for a while.”
If Ino didn’t stop using finger quotes, Sakura was going to scream. “And you and Obito came up with the idea of a calendar to raise money?” she asked, desperately trying to bring Ino back on subject.
“Yeah! Great idea, right?”
“Well, I mean, if it gets us that wing, I’m behind it. But what the hell does it have to do with somebody having a fever? What do you need me here for?”
Ino’s expression turned positively devilish now. “You’re going to help us with Mr. December.”
This time, when Ino began to pull Sakura behind her, Sakura followed. She couldn’t very well say no to that kind of money for the hospital, could she? She doubted a calendar could pay for an entire wing, but every bit helped. But she didn’t trust that look in Ino’s eye. It was the look she got when she was scheming, and their lunches lately had included a lot of harassment about how Sakura needed to find a boyfriend. That, combined with Ino’s earlier mention of somebody being hot, made Sakura extremely wary.
As Ino practically dragged her away from the hair and makeup stations and back to the Christmas set, Sakura resigned herself to whatever ridiculousness Ino had planned. But the Christmas set wasn’t empty anymore—now it had its very own shirtless man.
As they approached, Sakura took him in. He was tall, lean, and muscular, making it very hard for Sakura to argue with Ino’s description of him. He looked younger than his artfully tousled silver hair would imply, but he was definitely older than Sakura. There were fine lines at the corner of his dark eyes, one of which sported a scar that bisected that eyebrow. Somebody had definitely already been going to town on him with the baby oil, because he practically glistened in the bright lights.
What was perhaps the best part of him was thunderous expression he wore, not unlike the one Sakura had been wearing only moments before. It made her feel validated. It didn’t really match the Santa hat they had him wearing, though.
“Sakura Haruno,” Ino said, as she gestured to the man with a flourish, “meet Kakashi Hatake.”
The scowl faded briefly from his face as he repeated, “Sakura Haruno? That makes you Tsunade’s successor.”
Sakura smiled slightly. “Are you a friend of hers?”
“She’s a good friend of Minato Namikaze. He was my mentor, and the fire chief before I took over.” Kakashi offered his hand, and then reconsidered. “Probably shouldn’t shake. I’m very slippery right now.”
Sakura pressed her lips together for a moment to hold back her laugh, but Ino didn’t give her time to reply as she butted into the conversation to say, “Great, I’m so glad you’ve met each other. Pick her up, please.”
“Excuse me?” Kakashi said as both he and Sakura gave Ino incredulous looks.
“It’s all part of Obito’s vision,” Ino said blithely, waving her hand. “Obito, over here! And bring the photographer!”
The person Sakura assumed was Obito approached them, with a purple-haired woman holding a camera following close behind. “Konan, go ahead and start setting up,” Obito said over his shoulder, before turning to face them. “Great, you’re both here. Kakashi, I need you to pick Sakura up.”
“That’s Doctor Haruno,” Sakura said icily, not exactly liking the familiarity of this man she’d never met. Especially when he was bossing her around.
“Stop being a brat,” Ino said under her breath, and Sakura shot her a glare.
“Doctor Haruno, I’m sorry that they called you here for this. I’m afraid that me agreeing to this calendar has made Obito into a monster,” Kakashi said to her.
“You can call me Sakura,” Sakura said sweetly, really just to irritate Ino, but when Kakashi smiled at her for the first time, she felt a fluttering in her stomach. Oh no.
“Excellent,” Obito said, apparently unphased by her ire. “Now, pick her up.”
“Why the hell do you want me to pick her up?” Kakashi snapped, his scowl returning as he looked at Obito.
“Oh, you know, we’re getting literal with the whole firemen-save-the-hospital narrative,” Ino said. “It was Obito’s idea.”
“Of course it was,” Kakashi said.
“You know you could have used, like, actual patients, right?” Sakura pointed out.
“Combining sick people with an oiled-up fireman shoot would be weird,” Ino said. Okay, so she had a point with that one.
“Kakashi, if you had picked her up when Ino had first asked, we’d probably be done with the shoot by now.” Obito put his hands together. “Please stop being a gigantic pain in my ass.”
Kakashi was beginning to look a bit ruffled. “I can’t just pick up somebody—” He broke off, gesturing vaguely. Trying again, he said, “You can’t just pick up somebody without permission?” It sounded like even he thought he needed a better excuse.
Ino huffed. “Just tell him to pick you up, Sakura! I swear, you’re both impossible.”
Feeling like she was going insane, Sakura looked up at Kakashi. “Are we really doing this?”
“Do you want a new wing for the hospital? Because apparently Obito’s not willing to compromise on this,” Kakashi replied, sending a rather dark look in Obito’s direction.
Sakura threw her hands up in the air. “Fine! Let’s do this!” Stabbing a finger in Ino’s direction, she said, “And you’re the impossible one!”
Before she could continue with the scathing insults she was going to come up with at any moment, Sakura felt her world spin as Kakashi abruptly scooped her into his arms. His very, very strong arms. And held her against his chest. His very, very nice chest.
Fuck.
Feeling her face heating up, Sakura looked at Kakashi, who was obviously a lot closer now. He looked apologetic as he said, “Sorry about the oil. That, along with everything else about today, was not my idea.”
Scrambling to find a nice, distracting conversation to keep her from freaking out about how close she was to this extremely attractive man, Sakura asked, “How did you get talked into this?”
“Ah, well…” Now Kakashi was beginning to look embarrassed, too. “I agreed to do it because Obito promised that he would stop trying to set me up with people.”
The pin dropped for Sakura, and she groaned. Kakashi gave her a questioning look, so she explained. “Ino keeps trying to get me to date, too. I’m guessing she and Obito have been conspiring.”
Kakashi opened his mouth to respond, but Obito stole the moment when he clapped loudly and said, “Okay, let’s get this shoot started. Kakashi, try to look like you’re saving her.”
The photographer, Konan, began to snap shots of them. Sakura whispered, “This is so embarrassing. I’m sorry.”
“It’s not your fault,” Kakashi said under his breath.
“You know, even if I can’t hear you two, I can see your lips moving,” Ino said from behind Konan. “Just can’t stop flirting even when you’re doing a job, hmm?”
“Ino, you insufferable, smug pig—”
“Try not to talk,” Konan said. “If you could look up at Kakashi? And Kakashi, I need you to look at her.”
Sakura let out a huff, but she followed the instruction. Being this close to Kakashi and maintaining eye contact with him made her realize a few things. Like the fact that he had very kind eyes, and they were a deep charcoal grey, and not the black she’d originally thought. Like the fact that when he looked at her like that—like they were sharing some kind of secret—it made her feel like they were alone in the room, and like she could stare at him for hours.
She must be losing her goddamn mind.
“Sakura, put your arms around Kakashi’s neck,” Obito commanded.
Rolling her eyes a bit, Sakura put her arms around his neck, and Kakashi adjusted his grip on her so that they were both comfortable. It made her feel like maybe he was getting tired of holding her, so she said, “I hope I’m not too heavy.”
“I can pick him up,” Kakashi said, nodding toward Obito. “Easily. So, don’t worry about it. I could hold you for hours.”
As if he had heard the double meaning in his words, Kakashi began to look a bit embarrassed again. Sakura might have turned red herself, if it weren’t for the fact that she could’ve sworn that was a pink tinge to his cheeks. “Kakashi,” she whispered with a smile, “are you blushing?”
“Never,” he deadpanned. “It’s just these bright lights.”
“Okay, bring in the mistletoe,” Obito said, and before either of them could react, Ino was dangling a piece of mistletoe on a convenient pole, so that it hung right above Kakashi and Sakura’s heads.
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” Kakashi said, his voice promising a slow and painful death as he glared at Obito.
Ino was grinning. “All right, you guys know what to do under mistletoe, right? Come on, it’s part of the shoot.”
Sakura sputtered and then hissed, “We’re not going to kiss! He does not want to kiss me!” She only realized that was the wrong thing to say once it was too late.
Obito pouted dramatically at Kakashi. “Now she thinks you don’t want to kiss her. Stop being rude.”
Ino joined in. “Really, Kakashi, how could you let Sakura’s self-esteem languish like that?”
Looking back at Kakashi, Sakura quickly said, “Don’t let them bully you. It’s okay if you don’t want to kiss me.” He frowned slightly. Fuck, that wasn’t the right thing to say either.
“Is it because of her big forehead? You get used to it after a while,” Ino said unhelpfully.
“I hate you so, so incredibly much,” Sakura shot in her direction, distracting herself from Kakashi’s curious frown.
“Now she thinks you think she has a big forehead,” Obito goaded Kakashi. “You have to be the meanest guy in the department. We should’ve had her take the picture with Genma.”
“Her forehead is fine!” Kakashi snapped. His hands tightened slightly on her arm and thigh as he said it, broadcasting his irritation.
“Oh, big compliment there.” Ino had definitely joined into whatever taunting plan that Obito had. “If you don’t want to kiss her, you could at least let her down easy. Heartbreaker.”
Sakura looked at him again, removing one hand from around his neck to wave awkwardly and say, “Please don’t listen to them. It’s fine.”
His voice was low, just loud enough for only her to hear, when he replied. “Do you want me to kiss you?”
It was the last thing she expected him to say, and now her face was definitely on fire. “What? I—what?”
Sakura had no idea what was going through his mind. Hell, she barely knew what was going through her own mind. But her body was having a decidedly warm, tingling reaction to the idea of kissing him, and it seemed to have very little care over what her mind wanted.
Kakashi was still watching her, all previous irritation gone from his eyes. Tilting his head contemplatively, he said, “On a scale of one to ten, how much would you like to get kissed right now? Because that’s probably the only—”
“Ten,” Sakura blurted, her eyes widening at her own answer.
Ino and Obito were saying something to them again, but Sakura only noticed the way Kakashi’s eyes dropped down to her mouth and then rose up again, crinkling at the edges.
And that’s when he kissed her.
He just leaned in, bumped her nose with his to tip her head back, and then slanted his mouth across hers like it was the simplest thing in the world. And maybe it was, because for Sakura it only felt natural to receive his kiss and deliver it back, her hand rising of its own accord to touch that devastatingly handsome face.
He kissed her like there was nobody else there but the two of them, taking his time as he moved his lips against hers. And then, there was the moment where her lips parted, and there was the barest brush of his tongue against hers, sending a bolt of electricity licking through her body.
And then they broke the kiss, and the world began to turn again.
Blinking and feeling more than a bit stunned, Sakura looked over to where Ino stood looking smug. Obito was already walking Konan to the next room, and everyone else on the set seemed to be working on breaking it down.
“You didn’t even take the shot?” Sakura bristled, straightening, and Kakashi helped her to slide to the floor. She was so mad she didn’t even get embarrassed about how much contact she had with his slippery body on the way down.
Ino was unrepentant. “Oh, we got the actual shot about five minutes ago. It’s going to look great in the calendar. Thanks so much for your time, Kakashi,” she said, oozing sweetness.
And then, while Sakura stood there with her mouth hanging open, Ino turned and walked away, adding that extra swing to her hips that she always had when she was feeling good. The absolute bitch.
As she sputtered to come up with something to say, Sakura flashed a look at Kakashi to see if he was as angry as she was. But he had the audacity to look amused.
“Don’t start,” Sakura warned.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“You look like you’re going to say something smartassed.”
“I have never once made a smartass comment in front of you.” He didn’t mention that they’d only known each other for a few minutes, so he hadn’t had a lot of opportunity.
“No, but I can tell that they’re just in there, lurking.” Sakura narrowed her eyes at him, refusing to show him how charming she thought he was.
“I think your friend is gone,” Kakashi said, nodding in the direction Ino had gone off in.
Sakura definitely noticed that he didn’t deny that he had lurking smartass comments. Because he knew she was right, of course. But that wasn’t important at the moment. What was important was figuring out where to go from here—'here’ being the aftershocks of what was most certainly the best kiss she’d had in recent memory. Possibly ever.
“She’s more of a pain in the ass than she is my friend,” Sakura lied, in place of saying deeper things. But her mind was racing a mile a minute.
“I know what you mean.” Kakashi glanced darkly in the direction Obito had gone. But his expression cleared as he shifted his attention back to Sakura. “Listen, I—”
“If we go on a date, Ino and Obito are going to be insufferable.” The words just rushed out of Sakura’s mouth to her mounting horror, which was not helped by the slow smirk that was crossing his face. Oh god, she was continuing. “I mean. Not that we shouldn’t. But it’s going to be awful. Not that you asked me out. Because you didn’t. Maybe I’m asking you out?” There was a high-pitched noise in Sakura’s ears, like the sound of a nuke getting dropped on her ability to flirt properly.
Kakashi’s smirk had grown into a full grin. This time, she noticed the dimples. Oh no. She was too busy panicking to properly listen to him when he said, “They don’t need to know.”
Holy shit, Sakura didn’t even know what he was talking about. “They don’t need to know—” she began leadingly, hoping he was going to make things easy on her.
“About the date… that I am definitely asking you on.” The way his eyes crinkled when he smiled was utterly devastating. Sakura was in so much trouble.
And it was the kind of trouble that she desperately wanted to be in.
“Oh, you mean the one that I’m definitely saying yes to?” Sakura’s attempt to sound casual crashed and burned.
Kakashi didn’t seem to mind. “Exactly. Let me give you my phone number.”
Sakura fished her phone out of her coat pocket and typed Kakashi’s number into her phone. And then, because he was too slippery to pull his own phone out, she sent him a text so he’d have hers, as well. She bit her lip as her thumbs flew over the screen.
[Sakura:] Promise me that you’ll kiss me like again that next time.
“What are you typing that’s taking you so long?”
Sakura flushed under his amused gaze, and then gave him a smile back. “You’ll just have to wait until you’re de-oiled to find out.” Sliding her phone back into her pocket, she said, “It was nice to meet you, Kakashi. I’ve got to get back to the hospital and do actual work.”
He gave her another of those increasingly charming, eye-creasing smiles and waved her off, and Sakura walked all the way to the parking lot feeling like she was floating.
The drive to the hospital was long enough that her racing heartbeat finally slowed down, but there was a silly smile on her face that refused to go away. Sakura couldn’t remember the last time she’d been so excited about meeting someone. Maybe she’d take Ino out for drinks. The bitch.
It wasn’t until she was pulling into her parking spot at the hospital that he texted her back.
[Kakashi:] Count on it.