It wasn't his story to tell, or maybe it was.
Others had known them too. Aunts, uncles, parents, and everyone else in between with memories of their own. And in between, he felt disconnected as scenes played and replayed as they often did every time he came here.
What if's of another reality that would never exist for him or the people lying six feet underground all because of him and the decisions he had taken that day.
But the faint dust that seemed to coat the top of the stone slab as small words, names engraved in stiff precision reflected the missing past to him in white light and red blood seeming to say enough about the pathetic state he felt after all these years.
It had been a while since he'd last been here and a part of him thought he should have come back later, put this off until he was in a better frame of mind.
But it had already been a few hours since the sun had begun shining again and the spontaneous side of him had thought, why not?
It wasn't like he needed to see any of his students at the moment, not this early, and none of the usual tension of rivalry that he cared to deal with yet again crossed his mind.
No. Because his heart was beating to the sound of troubled thoughts and unspoken feelings as his mind repeated Kinstugi's own words in a fuddled loop of conflict.
The walk back to the lone hospital room didn't really help either as the faint wisp of wind only reminded him of the smoke that had come off her body in small waves of air, her face a picture of confusion and passing anxiety as she had fallen unconscious in his arms.
Today just seemed to remind him of her.
And even though these days he denied himself anything more than what passed as mild friendliness, he imagined a reality where he loved and where other people loved him.
But knowing love had made him feel lonely.
Lonely because those that had given it to him, were no longer alive, and looking at Kintsugi reminded him of how fragile his emotions could still get, how fragile his thoughts became at the semblance of something more.
More so as he heard her utter that four-letter word to him.
Whether out of exhaustion, smoke inhalation, or whether she truly meant it, he didn't know and his mind hurt to think of it as anything more than temporary deliria.
Deliria, because he felt himself crazy for thinking too much about what she had said, if she had really meant what she had said, or if he had imagined her saying those words to him further proving how pathetic he had become after all.
And looking at the curve of her lips pulled into a tight line, his heart seemed to pull in a direction he wasn't sure bothered him all that much.
"You should take it easy," he glanced down as his eyes moved across the expanse of her body in a gentle sweep.
"Mmmm, no, I think not," she groaned, finally awake as she tried to sit up before being stopped by a relatively firm hand on her shoulder.
"Let me say that again...don't get up," Kakashi ordered, eyes scrunching in mild irritation as he watched her drop back onto the hospital bed in a huff. "I may have let the whole kid under the water thing slide more than I should have, but your whole house was on fire by the time the village shinobi got there...and you...you were passed out. If that's not a cause for concern, I don't know what is."
"Ugh, could you not? Like, not right now," she muttered dragging a hand across her tired face before smelling the faint scent of smoked ham and brown sugar, her stomach responding in an outspoken eagerness at the thought of food despite the overabundance of anything smoked for the past 24 hours.
"Stay here," he pointed, lifting a brow in amusement as he watched her roll her eyes, her head tilting to the side in annoyance.
Kintsugi had always had a dislike for water. Rain to be more precise and as the faint tapping of the water started to hit the window of her hospital room echoes and shadows of her surroundings rippled unwantedly and uncontrollably through her mind as Kakashi silently shut the door.
The machine beeping incessantly next to her, the chair with a rumpled blanket next to the door, the old man in the restroom behind the front wall of her bed, the faint figures in the other room eating their own food, and more vividly, Kakashi's as he seemed to grab a plate of food in one hand and an apple in the other.
"Oh look, it's raining," Kakashi stared out the window once he had returned.
"Yeah, just lovely isn't it? I'm glad they put me in this room, gives me a really nice view of everything. I mean look at those trees, and those...clouds, so...blue. It's great," Kintsugi added in a serious tone, sarcasm evident as she gestured in the direction of the wide window.
"Clouds are actually white, the sky's the one that's usually blue although they're both a little gray right now," The irony of his words wasn't lost on Kintsugi as she glared with what she hoped was a menacing scowl. "Okay, okay. I get it," he sighed in half a smile beginning to slice the apple into small pieces.
"Is Yami okay?" She whispered once they had settled into a comfortable silence, or at least for Kakashi. Kintsugi was still trying to filter through what kept appearing in her mind, her right hand unconsciously gripping the thin hospital blanket as her feet ached to touch something solid.
She already knew Yami was okay because of Itachi, but Kakashi didn't know that there was more than a woman and dog living in her house.
"You should really stop getting into these kinds of messes if you want to keep that dog alive," Kakashi muttered, "but he's fine. He stayed with me last night. A little anxious but I've worked with dogs before."
That, she didn't know.
"I'll pick him up later then. What'd the doc say?"
"Upstanding bill of health besides an unexplainable mild concussion."
"Can I leave?" She asked, not bothering to care about the mild concussion part even if she could feel a splitting headache coming on.
"Depends."
Kintsugi ran a hand through her hair, only now noticing it had gotten a bit longer, and no longer the dull uneven, short mess it had originally been when she had first gotten here.
To an outsider, it now looked somewhere between a mullet and a wolf cut and for a moment Kintsugi considered shaving her head again to improve her aerodynamics when she practiced her airbending, before realizing that that's what Rashaan would have wanted.
"Are you going to start talking about what happened or will we have to do this the hard way?"
Kintsugi sighed, her mind already preparing the lie of a fake reality.
----
"Why do I feel like I said something I regret?" Kintsugi muttered all of a sudden as she pulled down the long-sleeved shirt atop her hospital gown that Kakashi had brought her.
She had given him a rather long and rather detailed story as the rain had continued, sensing the way his eye started to twitch in boredom halfway through the part she talked about the intricacies of cooking with the right kind of pork fat and the delicate balance between al dente and overcooked eggs.
Kintsugi was sure he was now just as versed as her in all the various ways you could cook unfertilized chicken spawn, the nutrients they provided, and the chemical reactions that were caused when cooking them with a spicy homemade sauce, courtesy of one of Itachi's many morning question-and-answer cooking lectures.
She had surprisingly found them interesting, especially with all the different edible creatures that existed in this world.
Kakashi stiffened and even though Kintsugi sensed his presence, sensed the way his breathing hitched the slightest bit, she didn't notice the way his face seemed to cringe in embarrassment, lost in her thoughts at that pestering thought of having missed something crucial.
It wasn't that he felt embarrassed for her or because of the fact that she was unashamedly changing in front of him, though that did add the slightest tint of the faintest pink to appear on his cheeks as he had quickly looked away.
But it was that a part of him that had held on to the thought that she remembered what she had said and had chosen to not say anything about it to him.
Until now.
"Telling me you're whole egg mishap story feels like a big regret to me, or what did you have in mind?" he tried to play off as his mask of calm, cool, and collected came back on.
"I don't know, but I feel like I did," she paused as she nibbled on another piece of smoked ham, her eyes naturally lowering in concentration as she moved her bare feet to the cold hospital floor, her bottom still resting on the edge of the bed as she finished changing. "Or...I don't know...maybe not regret...but...-"
"Uncertainty?" He offered, handing her another apple slice before turning to open the window curtains again.
"Yes! Uncertainty," she grinned appreciatively as she took the slice, now standing completely up. "That's the word."
"If it makes you feel any better, you didn't really have the opportunity to talk to anyone when I brought you here. Just me really, but you were mostly in and out of unconsciousness...."
"Oh," she sniffed, wondering what it was she was missing, what this sudden pressure in her chest was, and hoping it wasn't anything too important.
----
"I told you she would be fine. Look at her, she's even laughing."
Itachi didn't answer.
He only stared at the way Kintsugi's left brow crinkled in amusement at whatever Kakashi had just told her, stared at the way she stumbled around a bit, stared at the way the shinobi's stance seemed to slightly lean towards the younger woman from the hospital window ready to help, stared at the way Kakashi's hand seemed to rest a fraction too long on her lower back unafraid of who saw him as he unknowingly led her out the room out of the two Akatsuki's view from where they hid.
Itachi recalled the same expression when she had sat down with him by the kitchen table one night to list all the other names the Akatsuki could be called and after explaining to her that no, neither the Comfy Cartel or the Cloud Gang (after telling her what design was on their clothes) were very good replacements for a violent and very guilty group of individuals.
Not even changing his alias to Sparky Sparky Boom Man was enticing, to her offense.
The rest of the night had been spent in quiet conversation about food preferences, but in their brief pauses, they had talked about their childhood, vague descriptions providing a reclusive cover to the truth of its ugliness.
Despite the truth, he would deny it, even to himself, that he had quietly observed every expression she had given him in response to his own thoughts, curiosity, and appreciation coursing through his mind at the way her eyes, brows, and lips would move in a private show just for him.
It had been...nice, he remembered thinking.
"We want the same level of care given back to us but that doesn't always happen, not to us," Kisame spoke as he glanced down at Itachi's face.
He'd been around Itachi long enough to know that this was bothering him.
"What are you talking about? I don't care."
"I thought Kintsugi was the blind one Itachi. You think I've been living in my own world while I've been living with the two of you these past few months? I am Akatsuki as much as you and as annoying as this fling of yours is proving to our missions, I tolerate it. Because unlike you, I can admit that I am quite fond of that girl and...she's got the money we need. A means to an end that we must tolerate. Nothing more, nothing less." Kisame breathed deeply, his hand resting against his forehead as he rubbed away the memories of Kintsugi's body writhing in pain amidst the flaming fire.
"Enough." Itachi monotoned, but Kisame continued.
"It would be a shame...but I won't hesitate to kill her if she jeopardizes us or becomes more of a liability than she already is. Will you?"
Itachi didn't answer. Couldn't answer as he turned, silence filling the spot he had once stood in as he left Kisame in the dark alley.
----
A/N: Another one! Made it a little bit longer since writing my other story and I'm feeling inspired so I might post the next chapter soon...er. Maybe.