Title: Divagate (to wander or stray from a course or subject)
Author: Yami no Kaiba
Fandom: Naruto
Rating: PG
Pairing: Kakashi/Iruka

Summary: Kakashi knew it long before he *knew* it.
Disclaimers: Masashi Kishimoto owns all Naruto characters.
Note: For the community kakairu's "Kakairu Community Drabble Challenge: 100 Ways to Fall in Love" over here.

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Duality was the unspoken way of the Shinobi, the identity that was so precariously balanced that one misstep could easily fell even S-ranked individuals. Kakashi knew this intimately, being both killer and defender, both teacher and student, both loved and hated.

So how Umino Iruka, a teacher of Shinobi, could be so singular was beyond him. Umino was a defender not a killer, a teacher not a student, and loved not hated. This confusion of his at Umino's singular way expressed itself at their first meeting as something akin to hatred, much to Kakashi's own dissatisfaction.

But he wanted to know. This odd singularity of self that the Chuunin had, it was a stability that Kakashi had craved without knowing until he'd seen it.
This odd want slowly evolved into a personal mission of his own, as Kakashi spent an increasingly larger amount of his free time attempting to unravel what exactly made Umino Iruka tick.

More time and more careless as the frustration built, as he found out one afternoon when a kunai found itself embedded in the wood above his head, and a lock of his white hair drifted off on the wind. An ungloved hand snapped out, fingers clawing and twisting into Kakashi's vest as chocolate eyes snapping in ire stared into his own as the pony-tailed Sensei hauled him forward and off-balance.

"Stop *following* me," the incensed Chuunin growled, baring his teeth.

It was in that instant that Kakashi truly understood that he'd never know how Umino -- no, Iruka -- managed to be a Shinobi, because Kakashi'd never know how Iruka could be himself, and that, miraculously enough, Kakashi had stopped trying months ago.

And he knew why, too.

"Well," he started, eyeing Iruka with this newly realized understanding in mind. "I *could* stop, but..."

He could tell Iruka was trying to frown, but Kakashi was sure even the Sensei's youngest student would call it a pout. "But?"

He could feel a slow, lazy grin pull the material of his mask over his lower face. Purposely he stopped pulling against Iruka's hold.

A short fit of surprise and flailing limbs latter found the two of them laying spread out on the floor, Kakashi draped all-along Iruka's body. Inching up so that he could look Iruka in the eyes, Kakashi let his new found knowledge show in his eye. "But then we'd have to make-out."

--Fin.