Naruto hasn't always known there is something wrong with him. The villagers were always cold and angry and spiteful towards him, but, not knowing anything other than that, he didn't think too much of it. Mostly, he supposed that was just the way things went.
He is four when it occurs to him that angry stares and distrustful expressions and thinly-veiled threats aren't what other children his age get when they go to the park to play by themselves, because no one would play with them. But he's never done anything to them, has he? So why do they hate him?
He is twelve or maybe thirteen when he finally finds out the reason for it, when he finds out about the Nine-Tails. After that, the demon's presence, formerly so well-hidden he hadn't even really known it was there - with the exception of a few nightmares - suddenly becomes undeniable, unmistakable, unforgettable. Unavoidable.
From then on Kyuubi's chakra seems unable to stay trapped inside the boy's body for more than a few months at a time and the demon's presence turns into a burning weight in the pit of his stomach and an empty feeling in his chest and, rarely, one or two snide remarks in a gravely voice inside his head. But the demon, for its part, chooses to keep its distance, to ignore its human vessel as if the teenager's body was nothing more than a life-sucking concrete prison, probably because it is.
And despite his loneliness and pain and touch-deprivation, Naruto's grateful for it. Because he can never quite forget what Kyuubi is, what it did before it was trapped inside his body. And sometimes, the boy - the man - thinks he couldn't keep his skin-deep composure if the cursed fox actually tried to act civil towards him, because that's just not what murderous demon foxes do.
So the distance between the human prison and the demon prisoner grows and grows and grows some more, until the blond can almost forget that he's not alone inside his own body, and he feels even emptier than that one time when he was seven and caught the flu and couldn't even think of food for a week without throwing up. Sometimes, he wonders what he would have to do for the villagers to acknowledge him. Mostly, he thinks that not even dying protecting them would be enough, which is kind of ironic, seeing as with the way things are going, that's exactly what's going to happen.
But, at the end of the day, maybe the Nine-Tails isn't the only arrogant fool with too much pride to admit that things could be worse.
And Naruto is alone at least until the fox lets go of the tight reign it usually keeps on its feelings, and then the shinobi is only too aware of the fickle nature of the seals that separate them and of the demon's desperation, its hopelessness, its rage. But the blond doesn't ask about it, doesn't want to know, because as fond of hurtful lies as Kyuubi is, it is even fonder of the devastating truth. And sometimes, in the heat of the battle, when it is let out to play and maim and torture and kill, the demon thinks that it is more human than some humans are, and more alive than it has ever been, but it would kill all life on earth - even the boy, especially the boy - if that would bring it freedom and power and immortality... (Companionship has not softened the Nine-Tails, merely made it more adaptable, more cunning.)
There is always distance between Naruto and Kyuubi, always some sort of irreconcilable difference that remained even when the vessel is out cold and the demon takes over his body. But distance is not the same thing as absence, as both of them eventually (grudgingly) acknowledged.
And, sometimes, on cold winter nights but more often on hot summer days, when the sun is shining brightly in the sky and there is no cloud in sight and Naruto feels emptier than his wallet when he was thirteen when the blond can feel his soul shivering inside his own body, two sheets to the wind, he puts on his most cheerfully clueless obviously fake smile and concentrates on Kyuubi's presence, on its heat and rage and flickering light, so tempting in the wasteland that is his mind, and he hopes and prays and despairs that that which warm him are not the fires of hell.
Sometimes, he really regrets not being better at lying to himself.
So, I figured that since this was already edited I'd just post this fic and stop agonizing about the way the first paragraph doesn't sound quite right, no matter what I do. *deep breath* Yeah, reading this over kind of makes me want to re-write it completely, but I don't have that kind of time or motivation right now, just some slight OCD tendencies, so I'm just going to leave it here for a few years to gather dust and maybe some kudos.
Anyway, thanks for reading and hope you enjoyed it!