The Only Soul

"If it's all in history books, then why do we have to memorize it," Kiba asked himself as he made his away across the college campus to his dorm. He had decided to major in history, but he constantly wondered what he was thinking when he declared it. He pinched the bridge of his nose in frustration. For him, the last class of the day was over and the sun was letting the last rays of daylight shimmer on grass expanse separating the heart of the campus from the student housing. Even though he was well into the spring semester of his sophomore year, he still felt new. Every time he looked out the window of his apartment onto the football field, he felt like it was his first day all over again.

Having passed the seemingly endless line of freshmen playing ultimate Frisbee, Kiba came to the door of the complex. The sounds of cheers and a TV could be heard before one even opened the door. Kiba had to fight the heavy oaken door for a second before it forfeited and allowed him entry to the boys-only dorm. Straight in front of him was the commons, where most of the occupants played pool or watched the game in-between classes. Kiba, however, was not one such occupant. He found himself constantly exhausted after every day of classes, and the hours of homework weren't all that refreshing either, so he usually came home and slept for an hour or two before he made his brain reboot and attempt the mounds of work that he had received from the guys he was paying thousands of dollars a year to make his life a living hell, or professors to you and me. Having to climb seven flights of stairs to reach the apartment wasn't all that much fun either. After what seemed like an eternity of walking and it always did he came upon apartment 709. He sighed a mental sigh of relief and turned the knob. He immediately dropped his backpack on the floor and stumbled over to the bedroom where a single bed could be found. He collapsed on the left side of it and had gathered a sufficient amount of comfort from adjusting his body on the mattress to start to doze off when the door to the apartment slammed open. Kiba grunted in anger at the pillow as he turned over and tried to get back to a comfortable position, but knowing who had made the noise, he wondered why he even bothered.

A short second later, a large mass jumped on the other side of the bed, next to Kiba. Another short grunt of frustration was followed by a voice shouting, "what's up, Kiba?" Kiba absentmindedly gave the source of the voice the finger, hoping that it would silence it for long enough to let him get a short nap in. But, once again, he wondered why he even bothered. "Someone's grumpy," the voice half-shouted right in Kiba's ear. Sometime Kiba felt that he did that on purpose, just to piss him off. Kiba constantly warned him that that was no way to get into a man's pants, but Naruto proved time and time again that that was wrong.

"Come on, let's get some lunch!"

The boy had not grown up at all in the past three years. He was still as loud, obnoxious, and thick-headed as he had been on the first night they had made out. "Naruto, if you don't get the fuck off of the bed, I'm going to kick your ass," Kiba threatened, though seeing as how he half-mumbled it into a bunch of blankets, he felt like it probably didn't come off as that frightening.

Despite all the things that Naruto couldn't do to save his life, manipulating Kiba into getting him to do what he wanted was not one of them. The blonde lightly kissed his grumpy, brown-haired boyfriend. "I 

don't think you've eaten yet, today," Naruto argued, "and besides, how bad could it be sitting on your ass, eating, and enjoying some good company for an hour?"

While it was true that Kiba had skipped breakfast that morning, it was the thought of staring at Naruto's drop-dead sexy body for an hour that enticed him the most. Not to mention that the waitress at the campus diner liked them, and always gave them a cup of free ramen, supposedly to share, but who was she kidding?

"Maybe you might get some good company when we get back too," Naruto flirted as he placed a hand on Kiba's waist and playfully moved it along the length of his tired roommate's leg.

Kiba mumbled something about being manipulative as he got up and stretched. Naruto was running down the hall to the staircase as Kiba lazily followed behind him, dressed in a gray sweatshirt and matching pants. By the time he made it to the bottom of the dorm he did not envy the idea of having to climb up them again in an hour Naruto was standing at the exit tapping his foot exceptionally loudly, earning some demands to stop from the group in the commons, which he ignored.

"You are so slow!"

"You didn't sit through an hour and a half of memorizing the order of the signatures on the constitution."

"Why'd you pick such a hard major then?" Naruto continued to bug Kiba as they walked to the diner, but despite the act he put on, he enjoyed every second he could get with him, regardless of the situation or of the consequences.

-A Hop, Skip, And A Jump Later-

Naruto busted through the door of the small restaurant and yelled, "Hi, Hinata," as loud as he possibly could. The timid waitress spun around, almost tripping over her own foot. She embraced the orange-clad student, still holding a coffee pot in her hand. He gestured for her to sit, waved another waitress over and ordered a Coke. Kiba laughed at the scene before him.

'Since Hinata is a waitress, shouldn't she be getting the Coke?'

'That's what's funny dumbass.'

'You're a dumbass.'

'Why am I constantly surrounded by morons?'

'Cause we all inhabit the same brain, dumbass.'


'If I had a hand, I'd be giving you the finger right now, you dick!'

'Muahahaha...'

Kiba casually took a seat next to Hinata. He had learned the hard way that if you sat next to Naruto while he was talking, you were liable to get a few smacks in the face from his flailing hands that danced around the air as he talked. Kiba was never one for words, so watching someone like Naruto going at it as enthusiastically as he did was really a spectacle. Tuning back into the real world, he realized that Naruto was recounting the story of how his appendix had suddenly burst three years ago and how he had to stay in the hospital for a week, and how that was when he had fallen for Kiba.

Kiba knew, that he was recounting the story of how he had to be rushed to the hospital when the beating he received from his father had caused massive internal hemorrhaging. When he was taken to a psychiatrist to talk about it, she found that he had replaced those memories with ones that his brain had made up. Kiba was there, sitting next to Ms. Uazumaki as the doctor explained that it was called suppression, and that it was a way of the brain protecting itself from extremely stressful memories and experiences, and that as long as his belief in the new memories were never questioned, then it was unlikely that he would ever have to cope with reality. Only Naruto's mother, uncles and aunt all on his mother's side and Kiba were in on it. They had all vowed to protect the poor boy from the truth, and Kiba, being Naruto's boyfriend, bore much of that responsibility, which he received more than openly. Mr. Uzumaki's trial had been a secret from Naruto, as had the fact that he had been sentenced to ten years in prison without the possibility of parole or a shortened sentence.

It ripped him apart to lie to Naruto, but it would hurt more to tell him the truth. In the end, it was better to lie to the man he loved in order to protect him from the harshness of reality, which very few had the opportunity to escape. Hinata had managed to escape from the vacuum that was Naruto's talkative personality and get back to work. Kiba was pretty sure that she had a crush on Naruto, so he did his best to sugarcoat the fact that he was already spoken for.

-A Short Time Later-

The table was strewn with plates covered in crumbs, napkins covered in sauce, and glasses with ice melting in them. Kiba handed the check to the waitress along with his credit card as Naruto sipped out of an empty cup. Naruto had been oddly quiet throughout the meal. A few minutes after Hinata had left, he had just shut-up, not that he was complaining, but it was just odd. Naruto never kept his mouth shut, and for the past hour he had hardly said two words. Kiba warranted it important enough to investigate, as it would at least be something to talk about.

"Hey, Naruto?" He waited, no response. "Hello?" He noticed that the boy's eyes were fixated on something behind Kiba. He turned around to look out at the sea of people. The usual crowd, nothing out of the ordinary. There was one unfamiliar face, probably a transfer student or something. Kiba followed 

the blonde's line of sight and found that he was in fact staring at the new face. It was a man who looked about their own age with light skin and black hair. He was wearing white shorts and crossed his ankles under the table. "Who's he?"

"Don't know," Naruto responded, still staring, his brows furrowed.

"Well then why have you been staring at him for the past hour," Kiba questioned, slightly annoyed.

"I think I've seen him somewhere before, but I can't remember where."

Kiba looked again. He did remind him of someone, but he couldn't put his finger on it. The waitress returned, putting the check on the table and thanking them for coming. They stood up and walked out, all the while both of them had their eyes fixated on the man as they walked out the door.

They walked back home in silence, which was odd enough, but when Kiba looked over at Naruto, he found that he was staring at the ground, apparently deep in thought, and that was something to be scared of. "It'll come to you," Kiba said, staring at the horizon.

"I just know that I've seen him somewhere before."

"The human brain works on problems on an unconscious level long after you have stopped actively thinking about it. That's how you have an epiphany, your brain suddenly realizes something and alerts you to it."

"Really?"

"Yeah," Kiba surprised himself. He hardly ever payed attention in Psych. class.

"So you're telling me that if I thought about how to grow wings and then stopped, I'd eventually figure it out," Naruto asked, a little more serious than was expected.

Kiba sighed to himself and responded, "Yes, that's what it means."

"I wish someone had told me about that before," Naruto pouted as he kicked a pebble. "Maybe we can look him up in the student files or something," Naruto suggested as he continued kicking the pebble.

When Naruto got his mind set on doing something, although that wasn't very often, he didn't stop until he got it. Most people would call that stubbornness, but most people wouldn't be able of loving the silly blonde boy. So it was only natural for Kiba to see it as determination. "Alright..." Kiba said submissively.

They headed towards the administrative building as the sun began to set. Kiba had some pretty odd turn-ons, at least he thought so. For instance, looking over, seeing Naruto's face staring at the ground 

deep in thought, with the sun bouncing off of his tan, square jaw as his spiky blonde hair danced in the April wind made him want to jump on top of the boy and let the animal in him completely take him over. That was about the only difference between the two. Kiba would never do something as impulsive as that, he always had to calm himself down and convince himself that that was not a good idea. Naruto, though, would have been all over the brown-haired boy, digging his tongue further and further into his mouth, taking in every hint of flavor that made up the unique taste that only Kiba had. It was the same taste of the sweat that ran down his neck when he came home from his daily jog around the school. It was the same taste of the air around him when he was really mad or upset about something. As far as kinky turn-ons, well I doubt anyone would be surprised to find that Naruto considered it completely part of the norm.

"Matthew McConaughey," KIba randomly yelled out, getting some glances from the students walking around them.

"What," Naruto asked, obviously puzzled.

"That guy back there, he looks like a young Matthew McConaughey, doesn't he?"

"Not really... But, Matthew McConaughey is hot, isn't he?"

Kiba gave Naruto a sharp look indicating that he was starting to get jealous, which was not something that Kiba was prone to.

Having finally reached the small brick building, dwarfed by the massive science building, the duo walked inside, and Kiba let Naruto go in front of him, this was, after all, his crusade. Kiba put his hands behind his head and closed his eyes until only small semi-circles of brown could be seen. Naruto marched up to the counter, a little more dramatic than was necessary, and hit the bell, a little more often that was necessary. A petite woman with red hair and a soft look in her eyes came up to the counter and asked Naruto how she could help him.

"I was wondering if you could release information about a new student to me, just his name," Naruto asked.

"We're not supposed to do that," she responded quietly. However, she must have seen the small fire that Naruto got in his eyes whenever he was determined to find something out. It was very dramatic at this point in time, but a little odd when he had asked for the show-times at a movie theater, almost giving the poor boy working the counter a stroke. "But, I guess if it's just his name, then there's no harm in that," she continued, obviously intimidated by the intimidating, albeit attractive, form in front of her. She quickly returned with several files. "These are all of the male students that have enrolled since the beginning of the semester."

"Who was the most recent," Naruto asked impatiently.


The woman fumbled through the files, finally finding the correct one. Let's see, the most recent male student to enroll was," she paused as she scanned the folder for his name, "Sasuke Uchiha...