Chapter Text
Typically, Iruka tended to remember things.
Sure, maybe it didn’t seem like it and maybe tended was a bit of a strong word, but for the most part it was true. When your parents started shoving everything they thought you needed to know through your thick, squishy skull the moment they realized that you realized that you were actually a living entity and not some blob of semi-consciousness, it was either adapt or start planning a surprise party for Death as compensation for joining him way ahead of schedule. Considering that he was a baby, and a stupid one at that, he really only had one option.
Point one: Iruka remembered how many times his mom liked to level off flour in a cup before sifting again (it was five and went in an arc from the right).
Point two: He knew how many tags it took to make a perfectly sized hole in the ground to roast a yam (surprisingly, only two —one if you’d already made a little divot— and yes, specifically a yam).
Point three: His dad only needed one line to do his eyeliner for each eye. Take a wild guess as to how he knew that off the top of his head.
Heck, he even knew how many moles his teacher had had on her face before he accidentally-but-maybe-not-so-accidentally dumped water all over her and found out they were fake!
Case in point, Iruka was usually pretty good at remembering things. The only issue was that the things he remembered were usually pretty useless and downright wrong sometimes.
So here he was. Trying and failing to not hack out a squeaky clean lung as he waded through the staggering heaps of foam coming from his washing machine that was no longer doing its job in favour of bubbling over like some messed up, live-action cartoon and absolutely ruining his day.
A horn of misery escaped his mouth. He'd only been gone for ten minutes to feed himself—ten!
Iruka had just wanted to help out while his parents were off galivanting along the village borders poking around old barrier seals to make sure they were all fine and dandy in case somebody wanted to flatten their entire village like an ant. Sure, okay, maybe he should have known that he wasn’t supposed to fill the detergent cup all the way and maybe he should’ve known that he only needed one of them, but still! When he watched his mom do it, she did two rounds. It wasn’t his fault that he didn’t realize that she did it to measure a quarter way twice to make a half! Seriously, why?
Letting out another loud noise of frustration, Iruka kicked at the foam.
Bad idea.
Iruka crashed to the floor. Hard. His scream didn't even fully make it out of his mouth before it was cut off by a pained groan. He curled into himself. Already he could feel the bruises forming under his skin, throbbing with each stupid bubble that came floating back down from where they'd exploded around him. He wasn't the smartest guy out there, was he?
Biting back the urge to sob violently into the cold, hard ground, Iruka glared daggers at the washer door, jumping and shaking merrily as though Iruka hadn’t nearly cracked his head open like an egg being laid from a roof gutter.
“Mom’s gonna replace you when I tell her,” he whispered angrily, “and you’re gonna end up in the dumps!”
Wait.
A wave of horror slammed into him and Iruka shot upright with strangled gasp, ignoring the stab of heat blazing up his spine.
“Crap,” he breathed. The world narrowed around him, his heart stuttering. “Mom and Dad!”
Iruka nearly left his soul glued to the tiles as he lurched to his feet. Barely managing to prevent another crack at the hard floor, Iruka barrelled out the room, paying no mind to his eyes burning in agony as he slid across the floors.
This was an emergency. If his parents found out, he’d be banned from the laundry room forever! What was he gonna do then? Run over to the laundromat five blocks down? Ask a neighbour if he could watch their laundry? 'Oh yeah, no worries, Miss! I'll be out of your way in an hour or so, you won't even notice me leaving!' ? No way!
Two minutes and a dozen new bruises later, he was dashing down the streets in all of his bubbly glory with nothing but a dodgy plan and a tiny flame of hope he didn’t dare let grow.
“Kakashi-sensei!”
Skidding into the clearing shouting his name, Iruka realized that maybe he should start paying attention in class because clearly all the time he had spent mapping out every route to Kakashi’s house was for nothing.
He had taken the shortest path he knew, but by the time he arrived, Iruka felt like death impaled on two twiggy legs. He braced his sticky hands on his knees and gasped for breath. The three steps up to the door had done more to him than his ego would ever admit and shakily, he raised the bar of lead screwed into his shoulder to wipe the sweat off his face, grimacing when his hand came away soaked.
Man, he studied seals for a reason.
When his organs finally felt like they weren’t gonna jump out his throat at the slightest invitation, Iruka straightened the best he could (which was to say not much). Tried to calm his still racing heart just in case the unexpected buzzing wards around him had some freakish feature that’d zap him if it got too fast.
Listen, he didn’t know what Kakashi’s place was like. It was his first time there, alright?
(Iruka should have been panicking about that. But he wasn't. It was probably for the best that he wasn't.)
Sucking in a deep breath all the way down to his stomach, Iruka nodded sharply to himself. Okay, he could do this. He had to.
“Kakashi-sensei!” he shouted again through a cupped hand, the other pounding against the door. Almost in response, the wards grumbled even louder against his skin. Iruka ignored them. They probably weren't going to zap him. “Are you home because I seriously kinda need you to be! It’s an emergency! You said I could come over if I had one— you're not too old to remember, right? It was two weeks ago! Come on, open up! Please!"
Iruka wound his arm back to double in on his efforts when he didn’t get a response, cheeks puffed and ready to yell even louder. “Ka—”
The door disappeared and then he was plummeting into the void, Kakashi's name disintegrating in his throat.
His face never hit the ground. Instead, Iruka got a shoe in his gut and got sent flying backwards when it twisted and shoved.
It was only the wild flailing of his arms that he managed to not end up in a mangled pile of limbs at the bottom of the steps, stomach throbbing where he dug his fingers in. Shoulders heaving, he whipped his head up to send a fierce glare at his no good, very rude attacker, ears burning in indignance. "What the he—"
“What do you want?”
Arms crossed, Kakashi squinted down at him from his doorway. The disdain was clear.
“What is wrong with you? You know, maybe now I just want you stuck in a ditch on some island in the middle of—"
“Don’t waste my time,” Kakashi interrupted sharply and Iruka’s mouth snapped shut with a click, silently fuming. “What are you doing here?”
“Is something wrong with your ears, too? I have an emergency!" Iruka's eyes stretched wide in mockery, hands sweeping in the air. "But no, sure, that's fine, keep asking. Not like I've been saying that for the past forever, right?”
It took everything in Iruka to not jump up and thrash Kakashi around by the stupid, overgrown tufts of his stupid hair peeking out from under his stupid hitai-ate (seriously, who wears their gear in their own house?) when he hardly blinked at Iruka shouting at him. Instead, he just kept staring, gaze flitting over Iruka like he wasn’t even there.
Iruka was well aware that he was getting riled up. Again. Like he always did within two seconds of seeing Kakashi. Was that really his fault, though? He wasn’t the one that made Kakashi so infuriating! He did that himself! It wasn’t his fault that he couldn’t help reacting when Kakashi was always being a right jerk, acting like he was the best thing that had ever graced the world when really he was just this huge, stupid, miserable, stuck up, stupid piece of—
“I’m busy.” And then his hand on the door again and—
“Hey, hey, hey! Wait!” Spluttering, Iruka slapped his hand onto the frame in a panic. “Okay, I’m sorry, please hold on a minute! Seriously—”
Kakashi narrowed his eyes. “Move.”
“I promise, I just need your help once and then I’ll never come back again! Maybe!" Iruka made a face. "Well, actually, I probably—fuck!”
Iruka yanked his hand out from where it was smashed like a banana between the door and the frame, biting back a curse he wasn’t supposed to know when his skin scraped raw against the wood. His bones screamed with each pulse of mind numbing fire, a mini heartbeat pounding on the walls of each of his sticky fingers.
Somewhere along the edge his tongue he tasted metal.
Stunned, he couldn’t do anything except stare at the closed door before him, wide eyes darting between it and his hand cradled close to his chest, already blooming into deep reds and purples around his knuckles. He felt vaguely faint at the sight, ribs knitting around his lungs.
What?
It wasn’t until he felt the tears prick in the corners of his eyes that everything fell into place. Wetness flooded down his cheeks and the familiar coursing heat crackled inside of him again, steam rising as bubbles popped and sputtered.
“You are—the biggest—asshole in the world!” Clenching his jaw, Iruka banged on the door again and tried his best to stifle his choking sobs. It didn’t work. “Even more of one than my grandpa and I know he sucked! You just suck more!”
Silence.
Iruka knew better than to expect anything else by now, but it didn’t stop him from glaring even harder as he furiously scrubbed his face clean with his shoulder, raking in ragged breaths.
“Fine!” he snapped, “Mom's never gonna like you back, anyways!”
If anybody asked, Iruka would vehemently deny that he jumped at all when the door slammed back open, hitting its frame so hard it nearly closed again.
For what might have been the first time ever, Kakashi looked at him with something akin to horror, what little of his face showing twisted in such a transparent display of sheer disbelief for him that Iruka was almost scared. He didn’t know he had the facial muscles to do that.
“What?” Kakashi said slowly.
Swallowing down his apprehension, Iruka shoved away the voice in his head that sounded suspiciously like his dad begging him to double back and drop it. He puffed out his cheeks indignantly.
“You heard me,” Iruka said. He poked Kakashi in the chest with a finger and a glare that belied his internal screaming. “I saw how you looked at her at the shop. She’s married, you know. And too good for you.”
That’s right. Iruka still remembered that because he remembered things.
Upon hearing that, Kakashi finally managed to wrestle control back from whatever had possessed him and his human skin fell away to reveal the cold, robot panel beneath it complete with two roughed up rocks for eyes. Good. Iruka was gonna start bawling his eyes out again if Kakashi looked human a second longer.
“Are you stupid?” Kakashi smacked Iruka’s hand away with enough force he almost checked for more bruises. “Don’t tell me that was your emergency.”
“Huh?” Iruka's eyes widened. “My emergency!”
Ignoring Kakashi’s grumbled ‘shit, you really are stupid,’ Iruka grabbed him by the arm, paying no attention as to how Kakashi tensed under his touch.
“Kakashi-sensei, I’ll explain on the way, but I really, really, really do actually need your help,” Iruka pleaded, previous anger stowed away for another time. He could swallow his pride if it meant he could keep his laundry room privileges. “Just once. I’ll never bother you again if you do, pinky promise! I won’t even say anything to Mom!”
The effect was immediate. Face plummeting back into its familiar scowl, Kakashi ripped his arm out of his grasp. “Piss off. I’m not going to—”
Iruka swung his legs where he sat on the counter, an ice cold towel wrapped around his bruised hand. Absently, he flexed it before stopping with a wince. Yup, still hurt.
“Does your washing machine break a lot, too?” he asked to distract himself. He watched the other mop up the floor, the worst of the bubbles already gone from the salt (salt!) he had sprinkled everywhere. Behind him, the machine was up and running again with a steady gurgle, no longer threatening to tear a gaping hole through his walls. “That was pretty quick.”
Kakashi didn’t pause in his mopping, didn’t even look up, but Iruka saw the way he rolled his eyes either way. His—Iruka's—slippers squeaked against the floor. “I don’t need to be stupid enough to overload mine to know how to fix one.”
Iruka’s leg shot out to kick at Kakashi without second thought. Kakashi slapped it back down just as quickly. “Go away. If you don’t want to do it then hurry up and just hand it over.”
“Don’t ruin my work.” The end of the mop shoved its way dangerously close between Iruka’s eyes. Beyond the splintered nub, Kakashi gave him a look. “Sit still. I’m not cleaning up your mess twice.”
“Whatever, butt fac—ow! Can you stop that?”
Rubbing at his face, Iruka had never wanted to hit Kakashi more. This whole time he'd done nothing but gripe at him, acting even fouler than usual. Listen, Iruka got it, he was a disgrace to the human mind. How many more different ways could Kakashi tell him that? Did he have weekly meetings with his teacher to add some more pages to the Insulting Iruka Manual or something? Jot down new phrases, cross out tired ones? They probably had tea together, those stupid jerks!
He gnashed his teeth together. If Kakashi hadn't skittered out of his reach like some coward, he definitely would have hit him.
They stayed like that for a long time, Iruka grumbling but ultimately behaving as he iced his hand while Kakashi pointedly ignored his existence with each punctuated stab of his mop until the bubbles were all gone and back came the shiny floor.
So here they were. Just… waiting for the cycle to finish running. In silence. A lot of silence.
After a long moment of debating with himself, Iruka begrudgingly snuck a glance at Kakashi. He wasn't sure what he was expecting. Kakashi looked like how he usually did. Moody. Gloomy. Broody. Maybe even more so. No surprises there. He’d stowed the mop back into the corner and was currently leaning against the far wall, hands deep in his pockets like somebody scouting a place to rob.
A button scraped against the side of washing machine.
Iruka twitched. Shifted on the counter, a little to the right and then back left when he went too far.
A zipper this time, clanging as it caught on the bumps. Gone a moment later, tangled in a shirt.
He didn’t want to be the first to say anything. If he said something he was practically admitting that he crumbled first like some loser like Kakashi and he wasn't a loser no matter what Kakashi said.
But he did. Really bad. Enough that it felt like his skin was gonna crawl right off his bones with how much the urge itched and scratched at it, tingling static buzzing so incessantly in his ears that it blinded him.
In his pockets, Kakashi’s nails picked at his skin with a tiny muffled snap, his pants snagging the light with each tiny jerk.
Iruka forced his attention away, bit down on his lip to stop the words from spilling out. He wouldn’t be the first to fold. He wouldn’t.
Snap.
There was a crumpled sheet of math in his bag that was due Monday that he hadn’t even written his name on yet.
Snap.
If he didn't finish it, his teacher was definitely going to yell at him.
Snap.
But maybe he could just draw her on the sides instead. She was going to yell either way at some point of the day. At least this way he'd know what she was going to go on about. He was notoriously bad at drawing. The worst in the class, really.
Snap.
“Why do you do that?” Iruka blurted out.
Why. Why.
Immediately, the picking stopped, frozen mid movement. Kakashi didn’t look up, just continued staring at a spot between the tile cracks like nothing concerned him. “I’m not doing anything.”
Iruka ticked at the clear dismissal in his voice. “Yes, you are.”
Prickly as ever, Kakashi rolled his eyes again and Iruka wanted to march on over and pull his mask up over them, too, but when nothing else came from him other than the smallest clench of his jaw, Iruka deflated.
“Sorry,” Iruka finally managed after a long, grueling minute. Fidgeted with the hem of his shorts, folding it into itself like it was the most interesting thing in the world. “I didn’t know what to do.”
Heavy. That was what his gaze felt like as it flicked up to rest on Iruka for the first time since the mop had given him another fresh new bruise. It lingered like the mist after the first rain of winter, and he tried to shake the feeling of his scar aching the same way as if it were.
When Kakashi just turned away again and shrugged, half-hearted and stilted of all things, Iruka felt his jaw set. What was up with him?
Yes, he knew that Kakashi didn’t want to be there, knew that he had all but dragged him across the village to help him against his will, but that was why he was apologizing! Iruka wasn’t looking for forgiveness. Heck, he didn’t even want it, but he at least expected some sort of response, not that tiny demure shrug. Kakashi had been so aggressive all day, sneering at Iruka every chance he got, and now that Iruka was trying to be civil he backed down just like that? Face turned away like he was better than him? What, was Iruka not worth his time?
"Can you say something?" He frowned. "Why are you so quiet?”
“What is it to you?" Kakashi let out a hollow huff, head bowed, jaw feathering. Where his sleeves didn't cover his arms, the tendons strained under pale skin. Freckled. "Not everybody needs to hear their own voice every second of the day.”
“I’m just trying to talk to you!” Still turned away, always turned away. Shoulders stiff, Iruka felt his voice climb higher, rise until he was almost shouting. Across from him through shaky lenses, he saw Kakashi tense. “Why do you always have to be such a jerk about it?”
“Maybe I don’t want to talk to you!” Kakashi exploded, a near snarl in the back of his throat. He pushed off the wall. Eyes, dark and burning like ice, ripped towards him, and Iruka couldn't stop his flinch. “Have you considered that? Or do you just expect everyone to bend to whatever the hell you want every damn time?”
Fingers digging into the edge like it was the only thing keeping him upright, Iruka stared back, stricken. His mouth opened to defend himself, tongue already curled around the sharp words in the back of his throat, but nothing except air came out.
Another pulse, another push.
Nothing.
So Iruka just closed his mouth and swallowed them back, too difficult, too large for something that held no real weight. He swallowed them back and suddenly, Iruka didn’t want to hear anything at all.
Between them, the washing machine kept spinning.
He looked away.
(The eyes. It was always the eyes.)
Kakashi didn’t leave.
Why didn't he leave?
Iruka had thought that that had been it. He had thought that Kakashi would have shoved his way past him and out his house, maybe grab him by his fraying collar and curse in his face instead of under his breath. Or maybe he wouldn’t have said anything at all and let the silence drown him. But he hadn’t.
Instead, he had returned to his position against the wall, fists shoved so deep back into his pockets that his waistband dragged low on his hips even with his belt, eyes tightly squeezed closed as though it’d shut out the world. Maybe it did. Or maybe it just needed to shut out Iruka.
The picking didn’t continue. Iruka didn’t know whether or not he should’ve been grateful for that.
When the washer slowed to its end, Iruka hadn’t stopped Kakashi from grabbing the clothes hangers hanging overhead and swinging the latch open. He’d only found the strength to slide off his seat to hold one out to him when Kakashi began flinging the excess water from the clothes, stomping down the ugly gurgle of confusion and nerves churning inside of him. Iruka wasn’t going to let him do everything, even after that. Especially after that.
Traitorously, the feeling surged right back up and painted his stomach a deep shade of nausea when Kakashi paused, head tilted towards him every so slightly. Iruka held his breath, not daring to make a noise.
Kakashi took it.
Iruka exhaled and pretended that his hand wasn’t shaking, that his heart wasn’t pounding furiously against his ribs and inching further and further up into his airway.
The sun was beating down on them when Kakashi finally spoke, foot on the wheel of the drying rack they’d rolled out to the backyard. The clothesline split them, gleaming mockingly in the light.
“Don’t touch anything,” Kakashi said, hooking a shirt onto the wire. “You’d probably tear something trying to reach.”
Iruka startled, lips parting in surprise. He stared at the other's back, waiting for some kind of hint as to what to do, but Kakashi simply grabbed something else—a pair of pants this time—and hung that up, too, all traces of his outburst wiped clean from his slate. Steady and methodical and giving absolutely nothing away.
Gods, he seriously hated this.
Coming to a decision, Iruka reached for the rack. “I can still help.”
Fingers wrapped around his wrist before he even got close, cold and rough, the tips thinly callused. Iruka jolted, breath coming out sharp through his nose as his head snapped towards him.
Something cracked in Kakashi’s face. His grip tightened almost imperceptibly, shoulders jerking, before he hastily let go. Iruka’s arm dropped like a stone.
“Don’t touch anything,” Kakashi repeated forcefully, eyes flitting over his face before falling away, and Iruka had to press his lips together at the order.
Still, he listened. He wasn’t going to ruin this tentative peace just because he wanted to be stubborn.
Taking a few paces back so that he wouldn’t be in Kakashi’s way, Iruka plopped down onto the grass, making sure that his towel was still secure around his injured hand before he flung his limbs out, basking in the warm sun. It would have been perfect if he couldn’t hear the quiet rustle of Kakashi moving around wordlessly, sliding the hangers back and forth, little by little, like he was trying to find the perfect spacing between them.
Confused didn’t come close to describing the mess floating around in Iruka’s head. Flabbergasted, maybe. Bamboozled, discombobulated, baffled.
Seriously, what was going on with Kakashi? What was going on with them?
Every time Iruka thought that they were actually becoming friends of some kind in the same way that all bowls were technically plates but not all plates were bowls, something had to happen.
He would have thought that after Kakashi had given him his address, they were good. Their fight? All forgiven. They were best of pals now, yup.
Nope.
Worst thing about it? Normally, this wouldn’t even bother Iruka all that much. He had kind of expected that they’d go back to sniping at each other before too long. If anything, it would’ve been wrong if they didn’t.
But the way that Kakashi had blown up today scared him. Really, really scared him.
From the moment he had appeared from behind that door, Iruka should’ve picked up on something, anything at all, because Kakashi had freaking crushed his hand with it! Kakashi! Kakashi, who had never actually tried to hurt him because even if he was a little rough, he wasn’t cruel.
But Iruka hadn’t thought twice of it. He’d cried for a bit and then the rails in his mind had immediately redirected back on the path of his emergency right after he’d cleaned his sorry, snotty face. Kakashi had had to practically shout himself hoarse before he realized anything was wrong and by then it was too late. The damage had already been done, had been steadily chipping away at Kakashi since Iruka had shown up demanding help. Maybe even before that.
That was just the problem, wasn’t it?
Iruka clenched his teeth. Kakashi had said it himself. He really was selfish, always caught up in his own world. The fact that he hadn't ever considered it was just more proof of it.
Gods. He was an idiot.
Something nudged him in the knee. “If you keep making that face, it’ll get stuck like that. You can’t afford to look any stupider.”
Iruka’s eyes shot open, hadn’t even noticed that they had shut in the first place. There, blocking out the sun, Kakashi stood over him with a cocked stare, and Iruka was viscerally reminded of the last time they’d seen each other as he searched his face—a river where there were old plank fences, birds chirping where there were murmured conversations flowing in from the streets.
“Are you okay?”
The words slipped out of him before he could think better of it and Iruka watched Kakashi recoil as if to take a halting step away, fingers twitching at his side, and his eyes, wide and dark rimmed and off-guard—
How could Iruka not have seen him until now?
“Did you hit your head?” Kakashi asked.
I might as well have, Iruka grimaced internally. At least then I’d have a reason other than being some stupid moron.
Letting the obvious jab wash over him like water, Iruka pushed himself to his feet. “I said, are you okay, Kakashi-sensei?” At Kakashi’s heavy silence, he quickly back tracked. “I mean… you don’t have to tell me anything! But if you wanted to. You can. I’ll be quiet, swear.”
“… Don't flatter yourself. I’m fine.”
The response came too late, too slowly for someone who couldn’t control the stuttered flicker of his gaze tracing a path on Iruka’s face like he was searching for something hidden buried under his words, waiting to bolt at the slightest hint of more.
Liar, Iruka wanted to say, you shouldn’t lie if you’re so bad at it.
“Okay,” he said instead. “Can we go back inside? It’s too hot.”
Another glance, and then a nod.
When Kakashi turned to grab the rack, empty now, Iruka released a sigh of relief, a hand over his heart as they made their way back in.
Great. Now he just had to not screw up anything else.
“You know,” he said from behind Kakashi, “I wasn’t really gonna tell her. My mom,” he clarified when Kakashi looked back at him blankly.
Wrong move. Iruka had only brought it up to clear up anything else that he had done to piss Kakashi off, but the clarification only seemed to bring Cranky Kakashi back in full swing, that careful impassiveness snapping into a glare. He sped up, just shy of stomping. “There is nothing to tell. You’re seeing things.”
Iruka’s hands shot up in a panic, heart already spluttering out of rhythm as he chased after him. Seriously? He had one job! One! “Okay, okay! I’m just saying that if you did—if! Not saying you do!— I wouldn’t have said anything. I get it, Mom’s real nice and she’s pretty and—”
“I don’t—”
“—I like her, too, just obviously not in that way—”
“I don’t like your mom.”
“—because you know—What do you mean you don’t like my mom?” Iruka demanded, stopping short of his rambling. This jerk!
“Do you want me to?” Kakashi asked incredulously, coming to an abrupt stop to whip around. Didn't even flinch when Iruka nearly slammed into him before he caught his footing.
Iruka shuddered at the mere thought.
“Of course not! But everyone likes my mom!”
“Not like that!” Frustration seeping between his teeth, Kakashi rubbed at his temple, looking around like he was waiting for someone to pop into existence and put him out of his misery. When no one did, he groaned. “What is wrong with you people? I don’t like anyone. Not your mom, nobody.”
“Nobody is a lot.”
The look on Kakashi gave him was positively withering. Iruka was surprised he didn’t shrivel up like a raisin and die right there. “Nobody.”
He swallowed thickly. Held his hands up defensively again because what else was he supposed to do? Iruka really had to stop causing these situations before his head came rolling off.
A deep breath. Okay. If it was nobody, then it was nobody. He’d back off, no more questions. Iruka knew how to take a hint, it was just whether or not he caught it and best believe that he caught this one.
“Cool. That’s cool.” Feigning nonchalance, Iruka made a clumsy thumbs up and shrugged. “I don’t like my mom either.”
The thumbs up went down.
What.
Red burned thick trails into his face with how Kakashi eyed him, making it abundantly clear that he thought that Iruka was—in every definition of the word—stupid, and Iruka definitely had to put reconsidering all of his life choices on his to-do list now, but the taut edge in his shoulders softened slightly. Had Iruka valued his life any less and reached out to brush against him, he would’ve felt it slip away beneath his fingers.
Inexplicably, he felt his own slump.
Great. Now what?
With how they were staring at each other, Iruka could see the same question clear as day on Kakashi’s face, the deep line between his brows only getting deeper with every passing second. The loss of their shouting left the air around them stiff and empty, felt it in the raised bumps on his skin.
Kakashi broke away first.
Iruka didn’t notice that they’d made it all the way to the door until Kakashi unlocked it. Alarm shot through him and protests burst out of his tongue’s surface like invasive weeds. He was leaving already? Had Iruka said something wrong again? What could have set him off? His face? His thumbs up? Gods, was it his breathing? Did Iruka breathe funny?
Kakashi was halfway through sliding his own left shoe back on when Iruka finally found his voice again.
“Sorry,” he blurted out before it was too late, before Kakashi disappeared again without a trace. He had to say it. Iruka ducked his head to rub at his scar and pretended he didn’t see Kakashi stiffen before he carefully slid his other shoe on. “And thanks. Mostly sorry, though.”
Back turned to him, Iruka didn’t know whether or not he had crossed that invisible border between them again. There was always some kind of barrier that wavered in its depth, ever changing. One that Iruka could sink through one moment and get buried whole in the next.
The door pushed open.
“Learn to shut up,” Kakashi said, the breeze nearly whisking his words away. He resolutely remained facing forward, fingers flexed around the handle. A long pause, and then, “Change the towel when it’s not cold anymore.”
The door closed in Iruka’s face with a sense of finality that made him wish that he’d thought to at least include a goodbye in there, too.