A/N: I'm sorry, but I simply must insist that you head on over to my LiveJournal to read the real author's notes! Pretty please? You can read the fic itself here, I don't mind either way, but there's several links to images and whatnot that I need you to see in order to visualize this fic properly, but those many links with FF's annoyingness... Ugh! Plus, I explain this fic's inspiration, it's setting, cultural notes, and the answer to life, the universe, and everything! Do you want to miss that? Heck no! So go here. luc(dash)y7(dot)livejournal(dot)com(slash)17199(dot)html

Sasuke knows he’s doing a bad, bad thing. He’s not allowed to be by himself out of the Uchiha compound, and he’s certainly not allowed to miss school, without permission, without due cause. He’s scared of being out in the open, scared of being caught, and yet can’t go to school, and so he walks and searches for—something. He’s not sure yet, just has faith that he will know when he sees it, presently coming across a field of lupine flowers, sandwiched between two quiet streets, surrounded by looming, run-down apartment buildings. Safe.

He steps off cracked sidewalk and onto soil, tall grasses, a multitude of gentle purple flowers, stretching for what seems to be, in a child’s sense of perspective, forever. He paces carefully to the center of the field, trying not to trample flowers underfoot, and prepares to settle down, hidden away here, for the day. Just a day. He halts as he’s about to move to sit down, though, noticing with a start that he is not the only one to have chosen this particular field for a hiding spot. An older boy is sitting back with legs crossed, one arm behind his head—much older, judging by the mark on the gakuran he wears, which proclaims him to be an eleventh grader and the student cap which is pulled down and over his face, blocking out the light. A surgical mask pulled down from his mouth and resting on his collar. Smoke drifts out from underneath the cap, a lit cigarette dangling from his free hand, long fingers. A dragon breathing fire, and Sasuke finds himself suddenly terrified. Turns to leave, hoping the slide of his feet in the dirt isn’t too loud. But—

“Wait,” comes a slow, low murmur, and Sasuke flinches, feeling his heart nearly beat out of his chest. He glances down reluctantly, watching as those lanky fingers (to match a likewise frame) push the cap up by its rim, resettling it on his head, revealing a curiously attractive visage, the features having a mismatched quality. His left eye covered with a temporary white eye patch and a portion of a still slightly healing gash tracks onto his cheek below it. A few more wisps of smoke crawl past slightly pouting, full lips, before he brings the cigarette to his mouth and takes a long, slow drag. Then exhales. Still a dragon, Sasuke can only see that now, a beast which wants to eat him up in one gulp.

“Hey, you’re skipping, I’m skipping, no reason you can’t stay,” the intimidating teen speaks in a slightly husky voice, patting the ground next to him. Sasuke nods jerkily, sitting down on the ground with a marked distance between them. The stranger snorts, going back to his cigarette, and Sasuke gets the idea in his mind that he’s used to being feared. Silence for a short while, Sasuke trying to get comfortable on the hard ground.

“What’s a kid like you doing skipping school, though?” Kakashi ponders, breaking the stillness.

“I’m not a kid,” Sasuke protests bitterly, “I—I cut class all the time.”

“Oh?” Kakashi eyes Sasuke’s shorts, the clearly childish uniform, “Well, then. I suppose you smoke. Want a drag?” His expression is somehow wicked despite that his visible eye is neutral and his lips are mostly flat but for the slightest quirk. Something about his air, Sasuke supposes. And it effects him. He wants desperately to say no, but he finds himself nodding, sliding a bit closer and extending a hand. Kakashi passes the cigarette over, and Sasuke eyes it uneasily, plucking it up with small fingers. He’s seen Itachi smoke, seen plenty of older kids smoke, and he tries to imitate them, positioning it in his fingers like they do, bringing it to his mouth like they do. Sucking in a slow breath, and—he chokes, coughing. It’s hot. He hadn’t expected that, somehow. Smoke looks so cool and calm and flowing. But instead it burns when it hits the back of his throat, and he can’t even breathe it into his lungs, instead coughs it back up, and around the sound of all this he’s aware of gentle laughter.

He glances up at Kakashi dolefully, eyes tearing over from the burn and the coughing and partly from the sense of shame, and is startled to note that Kakashi’s expression, his soft laughs, don’t seem mocking in nature. Just flatly amused, and Kakashi’s lips twist in a wry smile.

“It’s n-not funny,” Sasuke forces out unsteadily, holding out the cigarette for Kakashi to take back, wanting it gone.

“Mm, I’d disagree. Expected, but still funny,” Kakashi reaches out but, instead of taking the small white offering, ruffles Sasuke’s hair, which makes the small pale boy yelp and duck down, dragging his fingers through his hair. Kakashi has a rather self-satisfied smile as he finally takes back his cigarette.

“Well, what’s your name?” Kakashi finally asks, frame falling into a complete relaxation, embraced by purple petals.

“Sasuke,” comes a quiet mumble, voice still a bit hoarse. He dispenses with formalities, deciding that Kakashi doesn’t need to know his last name, doesn’t need to hear the endless politeness and respect that’s engrained in Sasuke usually.

“And I’m Kakashi.” Silence laps at their ankles once more, not awkward but calming, a more relaxing day than Sasuke’s had in quite a while. Eventually Kakashi finishes his cigarette and pulls the surgical mask back up, and Sasuke wonders how anyone would ever be able to recognize him with so much of his face covered, if not for the silver gray hair. Undoubtedly the product of chemicals, and Sasuke finds it strangely—pretty. And promptly wrinkles his nose at having had such a thought about someone’s hair, an older boy’s hair no less. Stupid. This whole thing is reckless. If he gets caught, oh, if he gets caught.

Sasuke shifts his position, pulling his knees to his chest and resting his chin on them.

“Why are you here?” he asks cautiously, pondering on his own reasons, secretive. Kakashi turns his head to look at Sasuke, quirking an eyebrow, pondering for a moment how to respond to this.

“To smoke, look at the sky, and the flowers,” Kakashi answers plainly, the straightforward reasoning, knowing full well that it is not what Sasuke had been looking for.

“No, I, I meant, why aren’t you in school?” Sasuke tries again, beginning to get that Kakashi is the sort to edge around any attempt to pin him down, will grasp at any loophole or vagueness.

“Ah, yes, that.” Kakashi’s eye curves up slightly, and though Sasuke can imagine the dry smile, it is not the same as seeing it; he dislikes the mask already. Kakashi thinks on it again.

“Well, you see, in high school, there are roving gangs of delinquents in the halls. You be sure to watch out for them once you’re older. They did this to me,” Kakashi points to the eye patch, “And I’m sure they’ll jump me again if I show my face anytime soon.”

“I don’t believe you!” Sasuke blurts, oddly bothered by the shameless storytelling.

“My brother—” he hesitates, hating that he brought up Itachi without meaning to, “My brother is in the high schooland he’s never said anything about gangs, and I know he would have told me about it if there were.”

“Maybe he just doesn’t want to scare you, mm? And what’s his name, then?”

“Nothing, forget about it,” Sasuke mutters, frowning down at the ground. Bring up Itachi’s name and the unremitting comparing will begin. Maybe not obviously so, maybe not voiced aloud, but he knows. He always knows. Kakashi gives Sasuke a side-ways glance, before gazing up at the sky once more, shrugging softly. So the brotherly bond is a touchy subject. Kakashi has plenty of sore spots himself, and can respect such a thing. Though he dances around them with much more grace than Sasuke. He slides the mask down once more, Sasuke’s eyes darting to watch the small motion, and lights another cigarette for no particular reason other than boredom.

Well. Kakashi certainly is less bored than if he had simply lied here in the lupine field all day and stared at the sky and chain smoked. Sasuke is entertaining somehow, cute in his own ways. He’s grateful, in a sense, for the first company in a while that isn’t a doctor or a nurse fussing over his eye. Today, supposed to be his first day back in school. But he had the constant sense that morning, pulling on the uniform for the first time in a couple of weeks, the cap, his eye patch, the surgical mask that he’d started wearing constantly when he was thirteen and an obnoxious little punk (still is, really, he’s just taller), and starting on the familiar walk to school, a crushing sense that sitting in a classroom all day would drive him stark raving mad.

It was too soon, he still hadn’t processed the flood of emotions and images and thoughts cramping his mind, and. And so he’d veered off of his proper path and found this field to lie in, and then unfamiliar footsteps had startled him, almost frightened him, but he forced himself to just lie still instead of bolting. And glad to have done so, for Kakashi was brought a pale, quiet child, hiding secrets of his own no doubt. Clearly the first time Sasuke’s ever done something rebellious like this, and though Kakashi is sure Sasuke has reasons, the whole thing bothers him. He finishes his cigarette, thinking on solutions

“Are you hungry?” he asks, foot tapping in the dirt.

“I guess, lunch would be good,” Sasuke speaks a bit confusedly, raising his eyebrows. It was an unexpected question, such a mundane sentiment, domestic.

“I’ll treat you to something, but only if you promise not to cut class again,” and Kakashi’s eye shuts in an utterly cheery curve. Sasuke lets out a laugh, unable to help himself. A bribe?

“Well, how would you find out either way?” he shoots back instead of giving a proper answer, stalling, still thinking on it.

“Oh, I would find out. And if I found out you did skip, I will cut your face up to match mine.” Kakashi gives Sasuke a mock evil eye, and Sasuke chuckles helplessly once more, this entire thing seeming ridiculous to him. Kakashi just met him, how could he possibly having anything invested in Sasuke? Just a strange boy, probably seeming immature to Kakashi, Sasuke would bet, intruding on his private relaxation time. But yet. He hadn’t really been planning on doing it again anyway. Too risky. Too frightening. So it is easy to agree to Kakashi’s terms.

“Mm, yes, lunch would be good,” Sasuke nods, and he finds himself glad that Kakashi wants to willingly spend several more fleeting moments together. A brief encounter, but one Sasuke doubts will be slipping his mind anytime soon. Kakashi just finds pleasure in imagining that Sasuke will never have a scar like his, on his face or his mind. He can only hope, though the optimism is strained and frail. Kakashi stands, stretching out his lanky frame, sore from lying on the firm dirt. He offers a hand to help Sasuke up, and they stand for a moment with the tall purple flowers surrounding them in an ocean of petals and blue sky. A moment, a day, a brief reprieve from crushing reality.

And then they start to walk, Sasuke’s mind preoccupied by worries over being spotted, worries over going home, worries over the next day, the next week, the next year, his future. Worries. But eased, by a day spent with a stranger, when familial bonds exist seemingly only to make him tense. And Kakashi’s mind, a tangled web, knots and snags everywhere, he hasn’t had enough time yet to begin putting threads back into place, but yet he thinks he shall have the strength to go to school tomorrow. If Sasuke, a thin and quiet and pale boy, can face the next day, then certainly Kakashi can. He readjusts his cap, more perk to his lanky step than there’s been lately, and they forge ahead.