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It’s chilly out, but Iruka’s fingers are warm threaded through Kakashi’s. Kakashi had convinced Iruka to stop for yakitori earlier and he can still smell the savory aroma lingering on their clothes; they’d stood close to the grill at the roadside stall to help keep warm in the brisk evening air.
Lights are winking on in the houses around them as they walk, and he can hear a mother calling her children to take their baths before bed. The streetlamps blink and suddenly the road is painted with pools of yellow and rivers of shadow.
Iruka watches a cat as it slowly stalks along the top of a fence ahead, and Kakashi watches the way the lights play over Iruka’s face, sliding dark shadows under his eyes, glinting off his hitae-ate. It’s as if Iruka’s expression is changing moment-to-moment, happy… angry… sad… content.
Iruka catches him staring and now there’s no doubt as to the emotion, even as the shadows slide across his cheek, highlighting the curve of a smile, the slow blink of his eyelids.
Kakashi smiles back, and although it’s obscured beneath the fabric of his mask, he feels the press of fingers tightening against his own. He brings their clasped hands to his face for a brief moment, pressing the back of Iruka’s hand to his lips, the mask’s fabric soft between them.
When their hands drop again to their sides Iruka is once again watching the road ahead, but this time when the shadows slip off his cheeks they reveal a flush of color they hadn’t previously held.