Hatake Kakashi comes dragging out of the hospital

three months late

thirty pounds lighter

missing an eye.

Genma is waiting outside with a wheelchair.

They both puff their chests out a little, then Genma clacks his senbon between his third manibular and maxillary molars while Kakashi ignores the wheelchair and wobbles off down the street on skinny legs.

“How’s depth perception?” Genma calls to a space somewhere between Kakashi’s shoulder blades.

He lets a spindly hand drift towards the empty eye socket. “Fine.”

Genma has problems with the future tense. Kakashi is glad that he’s not the only one who prefers to stand still.

“Stasis, man. It’s where I live,” he says, the tip of his senbon glowing in the last shreds of afternoon sun.”

Kakashi thinks that sounds a bit off, but he still agrees with it.

Sakura visits on Wednesdays.

She’s bright and lovely and asks how he is. He’s tired, that can feel it in his bones, like a something slashing through the gut, leaving nothing for him but to drag around, worn and grey.

She doesn’t understand that, so she worries. He doesn’t understand her, so he wonders.

“Maybe we’d be good for each other.”

But Genma shakes his head. “You’re a walking corpse. You’re no good for anyone.”

Kakashi protests, but when she comes the next morning with her eyes bright, he stands there, threadbare and skeletal, and tells her no.

She shouts and screams and possibly breaks something, but in the end she’s gone and he’s alone again.

“With me,” said Genma.

Kakashi mumbles and shrugs and scratches his head yes.

“I feel old.”

“You look old.”

“I am old.” He decides to be indignant for old time’s sake. “You look old too, you son of a bitch.”

Genma shrugs and produces a lit cigarette out of thin air. “I wonder why we’re still haunting this place.” His voice is cracked, and it makes Kakashi think of ghosts in dry places.

Genma says something else, but the wind carries it off. The smoke from the cig rises in a straight line while Kakashi writes old names in the dust.

Kakashi can hardly be bothered to stand up when Sasuke comes prowling into his line of sight. The little shit.

Sasuke fills up the room like smoke and a loud noise.

“Sensei.”

Kakashi’s head goes to side like he’s curious at Sasuke’s mock respect, but he isn’t. Genma is behind the boy, smoking and mouthing old ANBU codewords.

Ready.

Set.

Engage.

High speed, low drag, you’re a cool-headed motherfucker. Yes, yes you is.

“It’s been ten years.”

I spy a short. You’ve got less than ten days left in the service, soldier.

Standing there, imagining the little boy he used to be, Kakashi feels his heart break with a noise like a gunshot.

He feels something else, but he’s so sure the katana has been sticking out of his gut all along and accepts it with little more than a sigh.

Genma vanishes in a puff of cigarette smoke as everyone falls.

Wednesday, he thinks with a smile.

His students are standing on him; blood on their hands, blood on his hands. They’re holding each other and crying because they can see his face now, and it’s old and sad and nothing is like they thought it would be. Kakashi wants to comfort them, but nothing’s like he thought it would be, either.

It’s alright. It passes, man, it passes.

Little boys and little girl watching him sputter and flicker and go out, smoke rising in a straight line.

Kakashi thinks that he might fall in love all over again before he dies.