I don't own Naruto - just as well...

AN: This fic came from a very sketchy source - a dj. In fact, the point of inspiration is rather bizarre - I really must admit to it. I saw a clone of a tiny Kakashi in Iruka's classroom - and then it lost the romance and gained a whole bunch of angst. And so this story was born. Hope you enjoy! And review (of course)!

Restless Memories

Memories are seconds that pass. They pass – present as time – timeless. What are memories but sensations of the past – felt by you alone with countless others – or you alone.

Memories are seconds that pass. They pass – as untouchable as the wind – and as unstoppable. And once they pass, they lay dead – unfixable – revisited only in dreams and in the mind.

The dead have ghosts – but memory is a graveyard from which sensation and experience do not return.

Or so I thought.

When I looked up from my desk, I paused. There was a visitor in my room – who had entered, catching me unaware. He wasn't a bother – but a shock.

The rest of my class quieted down at the sight of my shocked face.

How crazy they must have thought me when I shouted 'Kai!" as if to dispel a genjutsu.

But memories can't be banished that easily.

And what about memories that aren't your own?

No. The little white haired boy wasn't genjutsu. Neither was he real. He sat in the far back, on the far right, struggling to write in his book – but he was so young – to young to be here in class. Why was he here?

Was this a ghost?

The face looked familiar – no. Not the face. There was no face.

The mask was all too familiar.

Kakashi-san.

Was he dead?

The next day, the boy was still there, writing away – he appeared when the kids entered the class room. He was very quiet. Too quiet. And his writing was chicken scratch.

How young was he? He looks no more than four.

What kind of a family sent a four year old to a ninja academy?

I didn't know what to say.

During lunch, he didn't leave. Instead, he sat and looked out the window – still as a statue. Alone. So alone.

And I wanted to walk over to him and hug his hunched shoulders.

Sometimes he would write in his battered journal. I wondered what he was writing.

I wondered why I saw him there in the first place.

Two days after, a Thursday, he left for a little while – to go swing out on the swing under the tree. I watched it rock back and forth – to the others it was the wind playing again. But he was there – just watching – in a sort of hopeless way.

His eyes said 'Be my friend' – but nobody could see him. I wondered if he had ever been noticed. Probably not.

His book invited me to look closer. I knew it was wrong – but I had to see.

There were three short entries in the diary – the writing was straggling and badly misspelled.

The first entry said, "Made eggplant soup again. Burnt it. Father didn't eat again. Will he get better?"

The second entry said, "Father's gone. When's he going to come back? I miss him. But I miss Mama more."

The third entry said, "Father came back but people are mad at me. Akira and Riu don't want to play with me anymore. They call me coward. Father seems sad.

What did I do wrong?"

I couldn't turn the page – it was merely memory. And I was trespassing – so I backed away and read more from my survival training textbook. This wasn't my business – but it gave me the chills.

What kind of family sent a four year old to ninja school? What four year old made supper? And what was wrong with his Father?

That night, after manning the mission desk, I visited with some Chuunin friends at the Ramen Shop. I asked after Kakashi-san. I felt like an idiot asking after a man I didn't even really know.

"You know him?" One fellow teacher said.

"Well… I only talked to him for a little while…" I mumbled.

Argued to be more truthful.

"What was he like? Jounin-crazy?"

"I heard he's one of the weirdest ones of the lot."

"Kinda like Ibiki-san."

"Except he wears a mask all the time."

"What's up with that?"
"Where does he come from anyway?"

As I sat and listened to them, I realized that in reality – we never really know each other – each one of us live our lives – cling to our few circles of loved ones – but there are those who have none to cling to, and they die alone.

I wondered who Kakashi-san had.

Did he have some one precious to protect? And those memories – if that is what is in my class room – are a past he perhaps has not shared with anyone?

I felt suddenly very lucky. I had friends and Naruto – I had made my own family.

The next few days passed – and every now and then, I'd see a small white-haired boy walk down the street. Always alone.

I mentioned off hand to the Kage, Kakashi – and wondered on his whereabouts – since his team had disbanded and he no doubt had returned to the Jounin ranks.

Tsunade-sama was very vague – which unsettled me to say the least.

The word 'classified' is always unsettling. I worried for his safety.

A week after I read the journal – a week to the day – young Kakashi left the room again – it seemed like a ritual. I wondered what would happen if I reached out – if I spoke to him – would he hear me as I saw him?

The pages had been turned and had been written in them – all over.

Entries like: "Today Father was very sick. He wouldn't get out of bed."

Or: "Today my sensei got angry. He called my dad a bad name. I hate them all."

Or: "I hope I will pass the exam – I want to leave this class. Maybe Father will be happy then."

And then: "I passed."

I thought I would never see him again.

A week passed by and I never saw him again in my classroom. Memories – like ghosts – come and go – there's no arguing with them.

But memories seemed to have a deep hold and while Kakashi risked his life for Konoha on unranked missions – his past haunted me – if it was him I saw.

If it wasn't a ghost.

A day came when I took a wrong turn – I was so deep in thought on the growth of Naruto under Jiraiya's tutelage. I had heard news of him from Tsunade-sama. I hoped Kakashi wouldn't feel too bad.

Sakura herself, they said, was blossoming as well.

But then, they had firm foundations to build on, if I may say so.

I fell into the Dead Town, the Old Town, where the large clan compounds lay – Uchiha, silent and still, now that Sasuke was gone. Hyuuga – always very quiet people to begin with. Sarutobi, ditto. Morino, also abandoned.

And Hatake.

And there he stood leaning against the metal gates, a bit taller now – as if memory and time had lapsed forward. He was older now, with a vest around his skinny frame, a mask and a tilted hitae ate. Behind laid (beyond the bars) a dilapidated house, a tree, a broken swing and several outhouses – and a wild garden – so beautiful. No other compound had a garden like that.

Hatake.

Their heart lay with the land.

And he was there, standing in the wasteland – a skinny scarecrow fighting off the birds of time and death and extinction. The ravens of fate.

I felt sorry for him – I tried to meet his eye.

But my gaze fell instead on a journal at his feet, which had flopped open. Only two words stood out. ANBU's invitation.

"They're all dead you see," he said.

I jumped.

His voice was younger – a little higher in timbre than now.

He turned and met my eyes.

"Mother. Father. Little brother. Obito. Rin. Sensei."

He picked up the journal and placed it in his sack.

His backpack, which was placed beside a bed roll, another pack, and a bone white mask.

"It's not like I have anything to lose."

And he jumped away – and I couldn't follow.

Several days later, Kakashi-san, it was rumored appeared in town – much worse for the wear – mission completed. He had supposedly killed twenty men.

I didn't think it was true. But then I thought of his bone-white mask and then thought…

Perhaps…

A hospital visit, either way, was in order.

When I got myself into his room, under Tsunade's watchful care, I felt rather silly. He sat there, unmoving, staring at the ceiling and when he turned his head toward me – there was nothing in his eyes. No surprise. No shock. No anger. No welcome.

But behind the apathy – I thought I could see the boy who sat alone on the swing and whispered a long-dead woman's lullaby.

"I hear it's been eventful for you, Kakashi-sensei."

"Hmmm… You could say that…" His voice was a little rusty from disuse.

I stared at him – looking for any sign of the boy in my classroom.

He stirred restlessly – still tense and paranoid no doubt from his mission.

"What?"

"Nothing."

"You were staring at me. Do I look so bad?"

"You look like a mummy."

"Hmph."

Silence.

"Still haven't answered my question, sensei." His humour was very dry.

I smiled.

"I was wondering what you looked like when you were very young."

"You never knew me back then – we moved in different circles, huh…"

"Yeah…"

Another pause.

"Did you wear a mask?" I ask.

I can't help myself.

"Yeah."

He is surprised.

I can tell.

"And a small tanto blade on your back?" I ask again.

I can't stop myself.

His eye widens. His body stiffens.

"How did –"

He frowns.

"Was somebody blabbing? Or somebody going through my stuff? I was gone a long time…"

"No."

Another weighty silence in which his eyes attempted to interrogate me.

"No. I saw you in my classroom."

The truth only seemed right after all.

He blinked.

"Eh?"

"I don't know… you were in my classroom. You were a quiet one. You sat in the back bench on the right. And wrote in a brown, battered notebook all day. And once a week, on Thursdays you went out to swing on a swing. You graduated that year… and later on, you became ANBU – I saw you at your house's gates."

Kakashi shrank away from me. I could see he hated being trapped with uncomfortable situations like this. Human interaction wasn't his greatest forte, after all. Who could blame him?

So I smiled.

"You were really cute, you know? And I realized that you and I have a lot more in common than we think – so I thought maybe – well, ramen one night or something like that? When you're better? We could talk a ton – I've heard some news on Naruto – and Sakura's doing well… I'm sure they won't be putting you into another unranked mission for a while."

I'm babbling and I know it – but I can't really stop myself – I'm that nervous.

But then, underneath your mask, you must have smiled because your eye crinkled up in a smile – and for once, I think it was genuine.

It wasn't a patronizing, 'It-will-be-okay-Sakura' smile or an annoyed 'I-won't-even-go-there' smile or a 'You're-so-dead' smile.

It was something I wanted to see on the face of the little boy. And suddenly, I wanted to gather up Kakashi's skinny frame (he had lost too much weight) and give him a hug. But I refrained – and merely beamed at him another smile – and hoped it would be enough.

I never saw those memories again.

But often times I pass the gates and wonder if one day I'll see the ANBU lay down his mask – or better yet – one day, see the garden tended once again.

And when it's my turn to watch the kids on recess, the swing sometimes blows in the wind and something tells me he's still there – damn, right – it's Thursday.

Memories are seconds that pass. They pass – but hope still grows – because new memories can always be made. There is always a chance for us to change.

Memories are seconds that pass. They pass – happiness can be relived again – all we have to do is shut our eyes and see the blue sky, the garden blooming and a white-haired child again.