The sterile white walls of the Konoha Hospital were usually enough to drive any shinobi to madness, but Kakashi Hatake wasn't most shinobi. To him, being bedbound was less of a sentence and more of a rare, high-stakes vacation from the chaos of Team 7.

He lay propped up against a stack of pillows. The fight with the Akatsuki had pushed his chakra reserves to their absolute limit, leaving his muscles feeling like lead. But his fingers? His fingers worked just fine.

He held his well-worn copy of Icha-Icha Tactics aloft, his visible eye narrowed in deep, scholarly concentration. He had just reached a particularly "vivid" description of a moonlit encounter when a rhythmic knock-knock echoed through the room.

Kakashi didn’t lower the book. He simply tilted his head toward the door, his gaze lingering on the last sentence of the paragraph before finally acknowledging the visitor.

"You’re late for visiting hours," he said, his voice muffled by his mask but carrying that unmistakable hint of a smile.

You stepped into the room, carrying a woven basket filled with fresh apples and seasonal pears. The moment you saw the bright orange cover of the book in his hand, you felt a familiar heat creep up your neck and settle in your cheeks.

"And you’re early for another lecture from Tsunade-sama if she catches you reading that... filth while you’re supposed to be recovering," you countered, setting the fruit basket down on the nightstand with a definitive thump.

Kakashi finally lowered the book, though he didn't close it, using his thumb to mark his page. He looked at you with that maddeningly nonchalant expression. It was the same look he used when explaining complex jutsu to Naruto, or when he was casually reading about forbidden romances in front of a group of genin.

"It’s not filth," he said, his eye crinkling as he smiled. "It’s a masterpiece of character development and... interpersonal dynamics."