The Raven (Naruto, Kakashi/Iruka)

Kakashi teleported into his bedroom and froze. Iruka stared back at him, a look of abject horror stuck on his face as the smoke from Kakashi’s jutsu slowly dispersed. It was dark, but not dark enough that he couldn’t tell that Iruka was not wearing his normal clothes. Too much black, which Iruka hated, and too much mesh, which Iruka never wore. It was almost club gear but not. Iruka hated clubs – too much loud music. There was something familiar about the cut of his clothes, something that niggled at his memory. He’d seen that outfit before, but what really caught Kakashi’s attention, what made him lose all conscious train of thought and voided him of emotion, was the tattoo on Iruka’s arm. The ANBU tattoo on Iruka’s arm.

Iruka reacted first. He’d paused in the midst of pulling off his shirt and now completed the action, scrunching it up and burying it deep in the laundry bag. His pants followed. Now he knew why Iruka sometimes insisted on doing the laundry, why he could be so damn stubborn about it when Kakashi just wanted to do something nice. He’d been hoping it was just a case of embarrassing underwear.

“I wanted to tell you.” Iruka didn’t look at him as he quickly pulled on a pair of plain pajama pants. “I begged Sandaime to let me tell you.”

Iruka’s hair was pulled back in a complex braid that plastered his hair to his head. It was ideal for combat, Kakashi noted absently, keeping all of it out of the way without leaving a good handhold. He watched in detached fascination as Iruka pulled a good dozen hairpins out, allowing his hair to slowly fall free. It wasn’t the same. The braid made Iruka’s hair wavy, almost curly.

Kakashi wasn’t sure if he liked it or not. He wasn’t sure if that sentiment was restricted to Iruka’s hair.

It took him a few minutes to find his voice.