Curses and Dreams

Hurt Me

Kurenai answered her door to find you leaning miserably against the door frame with mascara staining your cheeks. You met her eyes with a look she'd seen many times before.

"Oh no. Let me guess. You and Kakashi finally talked?" She stepped aside as you entered her apartment and threw yourself on the couch, an act of dramatics she was quite familiar with.

"You could say that. More like, he talked and I yelled," you replied. "And I threw a shuriken at his head."

"I'm assuming it wasn't a happy shuriken," Kurenai said, sucking air through her teeth. "So what happened."

"He tried to apologize to me. Fucking idiot."

"Well didn't you want him to apologize?" She questioned. It was true, you had wanted that, but hearing it hurt a lot more than you'd expected.

"Yeah. I guess. But what good is 'I'm sorry' after all this time? What am I supposed to do with that? 'Thank you for being sorry about breaking my heart and giving me abandonment issues'?"

"What did you actually say to him, though?"

"What didn't I say," you groaned. "I told him everything. It all just came spilling out. I tore him a new one about leaving Naruto with nothing and me having to pick up the pieces. About how fucked up I was for the whole first year after he left. I called him a chickenshit."

Kurenai laughed at that. "Well at least you were honest."

"I told him I was still in love with him." At that, the tears started flowing again.

"Oh (y/n)..." Kurenai smoothed your hair, looking at you with empathy. You'd been best friends all your lives, and she hated seeing you so upset. How many times is she going to let Kakashi break her heart? She wondered.

Kurenai stood up and went to the kitchen. You heard the popping of a wine cork, and she returned with two glasses of red wine. "You are an angel from above and I don't deserve you," you said in fragility.

"Hush you. So how did he.... respond to all that?" Kurenai was curious, but she didn't want to push you.

You inhaled sharply. "Well, he agreed that he was a coward and that he fucked up by leaving the way he did. He groveled a bit. When I told him that I was in love with him, he said that I shouldn't because I 'had a lot of options'. He's lucky I didn't come after him with my kunai for that one." Kurenai suppressed a laugh, and nodded at you to continue. "And when I asked him if he wanted me.... he said 'I can't.'" You sighed heavily, sadly. "What the fuck does that even mean?"

"It means that he hasn't changed at all," Kurenai said plainly. "He's never known what he wants, he's always been in his head about everything. You two would have never even been together in the first place if you hadn't taken charge." She rolled her eyes and muttered, "men, I swear."

"You're right. I've always been honest with him, I told him everything that's been on my mind for the last 12 years. If he can't make up his mind about what he wants, then good riddance." You raised your glass to Kurenai's and clinked it.

We'll see about that, Kurenai thought to herself.

—

"You don't get to just run away from your problems and then make yourself feel better by telling yourself you're doing the right thing."

Kakashi played your words over and over again in his mind. Is that what he'd been doing? Convincing himself that he was some martyr to numb the shame of running away?