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midnightdiddleA ficlet! Wow! Like, omgosh!
And, uh, it might be KakaGai. XD (p.s. Loren, if you like it, consider it your birthday fic)
Kakashi's mother read romance novels.
Or rather, if current events were to be taken into account, she had read romance novels.
Either way, romance novels and Kakashi's mother had gone hand in hand, all the way up to the day she didn't wake up. She was burned and the novels were packed up in cardboard boxes, put into storage as the house was closed up, boards over the doors and windows, sheets over the furniture.
Kakashi never understood the point of romance novels. They were pointless. He lived his life on facts, searching between levels and levels of meaning until he found the perfect spot, the perfect line-between-the-lines. His mother had been different, flippant and careless and as empty as the wind, slipping and sliding between his fingers like so many grains of sand.
His mother had always dreamed of a castle by the sea, of a princess looking out a window, of a prince standing in the surf.
His mother had been a silly woman, through and through.
x
When Kakashi first picked up a romance novel, it was with the whole intention of delivering it to his mother, along with his bruised and bloody body, back from a mission. He remembered, some twenty yards from the house, that his mother wasn't around anymore, so he turned around and went to his apartment instead.
A few weeks later he had time to waste, down from a hairline fracture in his arm that had become inexplicately worse, and so he sat on his bed and picked up the novel, reading a few pages in an air of something between melancholy and masochism. Thirty pages of bad prose and horrid puns in, and he wondered what it was his mother had always dreamed of. Seven chapters in and he didn't wonder anymore. He was in a fairytale dream come true, something so absurd and impossible that he half-wanted to half-believe in it.
He finished the book late that night, long past the time Konoha went to sleep, and the next morning, half-past ten, he went back to the bookstore.
That time, he bought a few of the novels.
x
Maito Gai was an odd character. Kakashi could vaguely remember him from the war. The memories of Gai were a little grainy, like old film, and mostly involved children's faces looming out of the mist. Try as hard as he might, if asked, Kakashi would never have been able to put a voice to Gai.
The day Gai challenged Kakashi, Kakashi had a new memory of Gai. It was half reality, half daydream, and Kakashi would never be able to decipher which was real and which wasn't. Gai's speech was flowery, full of allusion and illusion. It was full of bad prose and horrid puns, and twenty minutes into the declaration of adversary-cum-competitor Kakashi had the peculiar feeling he was living in one of his mother's books.
In truth, the feeling wasn't particulary bad.
If Kakashi was hard pressed to tell, he might even admit that he liked it.
x
Somewhere between the twenty-ninth challenge and the thirtieth, during which Gai's score rested at an easy fifteen and Kakashi's was teetering at a fourteen, something peculiar happened.
It started the way all peculiar incidents do. With a peculiar feeling, residing low in the belly.
Kakashi, sure it was indigestion, invited Gai into his apartment, with the full intention of taking something to help his stomach, and then taking a short nap through Gai's newest speech of Passion, Springtime, and Challenge.
Half way into his doze, however, another peculiar thing happened. As peculiar things are want to do, it struck when he was least expecting it. Between one eyeblink and another Gai proclaimed his Love, as it were. From that point, the peculiar thing turned into the peculiar thing that happens to teenage boys, when they are in a fit of loneliness, unconfidence, and their perpetual state of sexual tension.
In short, there was sex.
It certainly wasn't marvelous sex.
If hard pressed, it might have been considered good sex.
But then, for teenage boys, any sex is good sex.
In short, all in all, Kakashi was pleased, if a little confused.
x
Between ages twenty-three and twenty-four, Kakashi found a new romance novel. It was a bit different from the rest, in that its prose was a little more purple, if that was possible. It was particularly bad with plots, blatantly stealing devices from every classic of literature within the history of Konoha and the surrounding villages.
Kakashi was well pleased.
Mindless drivel comforted him, put him in a state where he felt almost safe. To feel safe was a strange thing for a ninja, and very rare besides. For Kakashi, there were two times when he felt safe. One was when he was reading romance novels, with all of their bad prose and horrid puns. The second was when he was near Gai.
The first he decided was a reaction from his childhood. His mother had always effected a sense of comfort, mostly due to her complete lack of recognition of the real world. She had no concept of time or place, of money or security or even death. Sometimes Kakashi wondered if she even realized that she was alive. His mother had made him feel safe, with all her flippancy, because nothing as serious as the world could come into the house where she dreamed away the days.
The second reason he felt safe, that being Gai, Kakashi never quite thought on. Mostly, he occasionally gave the thought a mental jab reminiscent of a slap upside the head, and left it be, smoldering in the back of concious. After all, there were always more important things to think on.
Like the newest romance novel to peruse.
x
When Kakashi hit thirty-five, it was with the time-honored sigh of a life well lived. He was old, as far as ninja were considered, and he considered himself well lived. True, there were a few things he had missed out on. He'd never seen his friends get married, and he'd yet to stand in the surf, sand falling out beneath his toes.
All in all, though, he was pleased with himself. He had students to be proud of, and now they had students, too. He had a few friends who'd survived into this old age with him, and they seemed as nearly content in life as he was. He had romance novels to read at his leisure, between days spent sleeping in the sun and days spent sleeping in the shade. And, of course, in that cunning way life plays out, he had Gai.
Gai was still the same, a face on grainy film that spouted nonsensical words of Passion and Springtime and Challenges, but mostly of Love. It was, in truth, a very wonderful thing, as fickle and peculiar as it was want to be.
And sometimes, between one competition and the next, when Gai was a steady two three four points ahead, there'd be fights, magnificent rows of magnificent proportions. When the smoke cleared, figuratively and literally, and the rumble was swept away, there'd be some sore spots, residing low in the stomach like a feeling of peculiar warning, but all in all, these feuds were small and inbetween.
And, of course, between the feuds was sex.
It wasn't magnificient sex, because nowadays Kakashi felt too tired and Gai felt too pained, but it was still good sex.
Then again, to two men surviving all the way into their thirties in a hidden village, any sex was good sex.
And so, even if their not-so-cozy apartment, between being rebuilt from one magnificent row and another, wasn't quite a castle by the sea, that was alright.
All in all, Kakashi was pleased.
Even if he was a little confused.
I think I just killed myself with cute. *sheepish grin* Ah, well, what can ya do?
And, uh, it might be KakaGai. XD (p.s. Loren, if you like it, consider it your birthday fic)
Kakashi's mother read romance novels.
Or rather, if current events were to be taken into account, she had read romance novels.
Either way, romance novels and Kakashi's mother had gone hand in hand, all the way up to the day she didn't wake up. She was burned and the novels were packed up in cardboard boxes, put into storage as the house was closed up, boards over the doors and windows, sheets over the furniture.
Kakashi never understood the point of romance novels. They were pointless. He lived his life on facts, searching between levels and levels of meaning until he found the perfect spot, the perfect line-between-the-lines. His mother had been different, flippant and careless and as empty as the wind, slipping and sliding between his fingers like so many grains of sand.
His mother had always dreamed of a castle by the sea, of a princess looking out a window, of a prince standing in the surf.
His mother had been a silly woman, through and through.
x
When Kakashi first picked up a romance novel, it was with the whole intention of delivering it to his mother, along with his bruised and bloody body, back from a mission. He remembered, some twenty yards from the house, that his mother wasn't around anymore, so he turned around and went to his apartment instead.
A few weeks later he had time to waste, down from a hairline fracture in his arm that had become inexplicately worse, and so he sat on his bed and picked up the novel, reading a few pages in an air of something between melancholy and masochism. Thirty pages of bad prose and horrid puns in, and he wondered what it was his mother had always dreamed of. Seven chapters in and he didn't wonder anymore. He was in a fairytale dream come true, something so absurd and impossible that he half-wanted to half-believe in it.
He finished the book late that night, long past the time Konoha went to sleep, and the next morning, half-past ten, he went back to the bookstore.
That time, he bought a few of the novels.
x
Maito Gai was an odd character. Kakashi could vaguely remember him from the war. The memories of Gai were a little grainy, like old film, and mostly involved children's faces looming out of the mist. Try as hard as he might, if asked, Kakashi would never have been able to put a voice to Gai.
The day Gai challenged Kakashi, Kakashi had a new memory of Gai. It was half reality, half daydream, and Kakashi would never be able to decipher which was real and which wasn't. Gai's speech was flowery, full of allusion and illusion. It was full of bad prose and horrid puns, and twenty minutes into the declaration of adversary-cum-competitor Kakashi had the peculiar feeling he was living in one of his mother's books.
In truth, the feeling wasn't particulary bad.
If Kakashi was hard pressed to tell, he might even admit that he liked it.
x
Somewhere between the twenty-ninth challenge and the thirtieth, during which Gai's score rested at an easy fifteen and Kakashi's was teetering at a fourteen, something peculiar happened.
It started the way all peculiar incidents do. With a peculiar feeling, residing low in the belly.
Kakashi, sure it was indigestion, invited Gai into his apartment, with the full intention of taking something to help his stomach, and then taking a short nap through Gai's newest speech of Passion, Springtime, and Challenge.
Half way into his doze, however, another peculiar thing happened. As peculiar things are want to do, it struck when he was least expecting it. Between one eyeblink and another Gai proclaimed his Love, as it were. From that point, the peculiar thing turned into the peculiar thing that happens to teenage boys, when they are in a fit of loneliness, unconfidence, and their perpetual state of sexual tension.
In short, there was sex.
It certainly wasn't marvelous sex.
If hard pressed, it might have been considered good sex.
But then, for teenage boys, any sex is good sex.
In short, all in all, Kakashi was pleased, if a little confused.
x
Between ages twenty-three and twenty-four, Kakashi found a new romance novel. It was a bit different from the rest, in that its prose was a little more purple, if that was possible. It was particularly bad with plots, blatantly stealing devices from every classic of literature within the history of Konoha and the surrounding villages.
Kakashi was well pleased.
Mindless drivel comforted him, put him in a state where he felt almost safe. To feel safe was a strange thing for a ninja, and very rare besides. For Kakashi, there were two times when he felt safe. One was when he was reading romance novels, with all of their bad prose and horrid puns. The second was when he was near Gai.
The first he decided was a reaction from his childhood. His mother had always effected a sense of comfort, mostly due to her complete lack of recognition of the real world. She had no concept of time or place, of money or security or even death. Sometimes Kakashi wondered if she even realized that she was alive. His mother had made him feel safe, with all her flippancy, because nothing as serious as the world could come into the house where she dreamed away the days.
The second reason he felt safe, that being Gai, Kakashi never quite thought on. Mostly, he occasionally gave the thought a mental jab reminiscent of a slap upside the head, and left it be, smoldering in the back of concious. After all, there were always more important things to think on.
Like the newest romance novel to peruse.
x
When Kakashi hit thirty-five, it was with the time-honored sigh of a life well lived. He was old, as far as ninja were considered, and he considered himself well lived. True, there were a few things he had missed out on. He'd never seen his friends get married, and he'd yet to stand in the surf, sand falling out beneath his toes.
All in all, though, he was pleased with himself. He had students to be proud of, and now they had students, too. He had a few friends who'd survived into this old age with him, and they seemed as nearly content in life as he was. He had romance novels to read at his leisure, between days spent sleeping in the sun and days spent sleeping in the shade. And, of course, in that cunning way life plays out, he had Gai.
Gai was still the same, a face on grainy film that spouted nonsensical words of Passion and Springtime and Challenges, but mostly of Love. It was, in truth, a very wonderful thing, as fickle and peculiar as it was want to be.
And sometimes, between one competition and the next, when Gai was a steady two three four points ahead, there'd be fights, magnificent rows of magnificent proportions. When the smoke cleared, figuratively and literally, and the rumble was swept away, there'd be some sore spots, residing low in the stomach like a feeling of peculiar warning, but all in all, these feuds were small and inbetween.
And, of course, between the feuds was sex.
It wasn't magnificient sex, because nowadays Kakashi felt too tired and Gai felt too pained, but it was still good sex.
Then again, to two men surviving all the way into their thirties in a hidden village, any sex was good sex.
And so, even if their not-so-cozy apartment, between being rebuilt from one magnificent row and another, wasn't quite a castle by the sea, that was alright.
All in all, Kakashi was pleased.
Even if he was a little confused.
I think I just killed myself with cute. *sheepish grin* Ah, well, what can ya do?
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no subject
Date: 2006-05-17 11:13 am (UTC)"Then again, to two men surviving all the way into their thirties in a hidden village, any sex was good sex."
Loved that line, anyways, I should tell you this, that everything you write is good. I worship thee!!!!!!!! Take me as your disciple! Or marry me, or whatever! *clings*
no subject
Date: 2006-05-17 02:56 pm (UTC)oh man, this was JUST what I needed right now. SO MUCH LOVE OMG. ♥
no subject
Date: 2006-05-17 04:11 pm (UTC)And there's no angst! Whooo-ee!
no subject
Date: 2006-05-17 05:15 pm (UTC)lol, that's alright. KakaGai isn't one of the favorite pairings out there, but I like it. Then again, I like very odd pairings, and very controversial pairings. *shrug*
But I'm glad you liked it! And I'm so flattered and flustered! <3~ I'm glad you like my stories so much. :)
no subject
Date: 2006-05-17 05:16 pm (UTC)I'm muchly glad you liked it. Like, you're also the voice on what's KakaGai or GaiKaka, and- *rambles*
So yay! <3~ I'm glad you liked it!
no subject
Date: 2006-05-17 05:18 pm (UTC)And so much yay, because oh, I'm just so happy when you like something, and yeah. *hugs*
And no angst! *more shock* Yay!
no subject
Date: 2006-05-18 03:12 am (UTC)His mother had always dreamed of a castle by the sea, of a princess looking out a window, of a prince standing in the surf.
His mother had been a silly woman, through and through.
I love that. You captured the image so well...I think I'll just shut up now...
no subject
Date: 2006-05-18 05:26 am (UTC)Thank you! And wow, I'm just so happy and flattered, and this has seriously made my night. Thank you!
no subject
Date: 2006-05-19 02:34 pm (UTC)Yay~ *hugs* of course, your stories deserved to be liked coz they're awesome ^^ Keep up the good job, eh?
no subject
Date: 2006-05-24 07:54 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-07-15 07:03 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-09-10 12:22 pm (UTC)Seriously, this has become one of my favourite fics... how did you manage?
I loved your justification as to why Kakashi would like romance novels, and Icha Icha in particular... and make that the same reason he would like Gai.
It makes so much sense it's scary. Of course, Gai doesn't *quite* look like the hero -or the damsel in distress- in any romance novel, but he is still as close as you could get to one. Either or them.
I particularly loved the parallel you drew with how they thought the sex they had was good both when they were teenagers and when they were "old" shinobi.