Chapter Text
The day Naruto moved out of his foster house to start his new chapter at a fancy university was supposed to be the best day of his life.
It was a day he’d been dreaming about since he was old enough to understand that home was an impermanent, wishful word that could be ripped apart as quickly as it was promised by the very hands that offered it.
When he'd turned eighteen, the label that had branded him as a ‘temporary responsibility’ for strangers was unfastened like weighted shackles that had been holding him hostage for as long as he could remember.
He didn’t even bother saying goodbye to the couple that had been housing him for the last three years. The less he was around, the happier they were, and Naruto was equally as happy to indulge them. They were better than the previous woman, but only in the sense that they didn’t care enough to acknowledge him beyond his most fundamental needs for survival. Food, water, clothes.
That was about it, and Naruto would be lying if he said he didn’t take advantage of the freedom.
So, he'd packed up his meager belongings and left without a word. He knew the only thing they would miss about him was their monthly stipend from the government, and even that was pushing it.
You’re more trouble than you’re worth.
A sentence he’d heard from many mouths, in many houses--probably more frequently than his own name.
Twenty minutes ago, Iruka had picked him up off the front porch with an anxious smile and Naruto had shut the passenger door with no regrets, his entire life crammed into the trunk. For twenty minutes, he’d stared out the window to watch the skeleton of his hometown recede into the distance. Other than his old elementary school teacher next to him, he didn’t have any ties to it anymore.
Now, Naruto was humming absentmindedly to the radio, smiling to himself, his leg bouncing in restless anticipation. Iruka glanced over at him for the third time that minute, tearing his eyes from the road in irregular intervals that Naruto kept pretending not to notice.
They had a two-hour drive ahead of them, and he knew Iruka well enough to prepare himself for one of his heartfelt, sappy conversations he would undoubtedly initiate eventually.
They weren’t actually so terrible once he got old enough to appreciate them. And given the circumstance, Naruto imagined if there was ever a time where one would be justifiable, it would be today.
He would miss Iruka dearly. Probably more than he’d ever missed anyone before.
Anyone alive, anyway.
“So,” Iruka began not-so subtly, and Naruto turned away from the window to look at him. “How did they take it?”
There were only two people he could possibly be talking about. The two people who, in theory and constitutionally, should’ve probably given a damn about their foster kid leaving for good. Even if he wasn’t technically in the system anymore.
“Honestly, I doubt they’ll even notice I’m gone,” Naruto replied, refusing to feel sad about it. This was a good day. The best day ever, in fact.
“You didn’t tell them?”
Naruto watched his grip tighten on the wheel, likely the only reaction he’d show externally. Teachers were good at doing that…compartmentalizing their emotions to better support their students. And while his relationship with Iruka had long surpassed the conduct of typical teacher student dynamics, some of those habits were too far engrained in both of them to ever truly let go of.
“I told them four months ago,” Naruto said wryly, knowing full well Iruka would try and scold him for this. “After I got my acceptance letter.”
He’d run down the stairs, heart pounding in his ears, the letter clenched tightly in his fist like it would vanish if he so much as loosened his grip. He had never been more elated in his life. All his hard work, all the long days of school and work and soccer practice, all the internal pep-talks he had to give himself to keep going had finally produced tangible results.
He was going to college! A prestigious college, at that. On a full-ride athletic scholarship, all because of his unrivaled ambition to put as much distance between himself and the rootless existence he’d been born into.
He’d presented that letter with a smile that had threatened to split his face in two, practically shoving it under Koharu’s nose for her to read. Never mind the fact that Naruto had never seen her show excitement before, or any emotion other than forced indifference with contempt simmering just beneath the surface. He would’ve accepted anything in that moment, desperate for at least one other person to have been witness to his accomplishment.
In the end, even that’d been too much to ask for. She hadn’t even looked at it. Just raked her sunken eyes over his face, his clothes, his soul and walked away. It had stung a bit, but luckily, not even the devil himself could’ve dulled Naruto’s mood that day.
Fuck Koharu. Fuck Homura and the whole godforsaken foster care system for that matter.
Naruto had outgrown all of them.
“Well, perhaps that’s for the best,” Iruka sighed resignedly, pulling Naruto out of the memory and surprising him with his lack of disapproval. Iruka loved lecturing him, especially when he was a kid. It was his all-time favorite pastime.
Granted, Naruto had been an absolute menace back then, so he never really blamed him for it. But now, this felt almost like…recognition. Recognition that Naruto wasn’t that troublemaking, bratty delinquent anymore. That he could make his own decisions for himself and Iruka would support them.
It warmed his insides pleasantly, and Naruto grinned in satisfaction. “I’m taking that as a sign that you’ve finally realized how mature I am,” he declared, and it made Iruka’s stoic teacher face crack a bit—just enough for a small smile to slip through.
“You should,” he assented, squinting at the road signs to merge them onto the highway. “You’ve come a long way these past few years,” he snuck another glance over, this one a bit somber around the edges, “and truthfully, you deserve more appreciation for it than what you got.”
Naruto crossed his arms over his chest and smirked smugly. “Then I guess it’s a good thing I’m awesome enough to not need anyone reminding me.”
Iruka rolled his eyes.
It sounded like a joke, but it wasn’t. Not really.
Naruto’s childhood had taught him many lessons. One of which, maybe the most notable, was the ability to survive on self-made encouragement--drawing strength from promises and dreams that lived nowhere but inside his own head.
He clung to the relationships he had now, simply because he’d already experienced the alternative: to be truly and utterly alone. It was a dark, desolate place he never wanted to step foot in again.
“Remind me which of your friends will be there, again,” Iruka requested, completely ignoring Naruto’s half-exaggerated, half-earnest conceitedness. “From school.”
“Well…” Naruto made a mental list in his head. “Shikamaru for sure. He’s doing International Relations, and I think Sai got into the art program.” Who else? “Oh, and Ino mentioned rooming with Sakura, so I think they’re both going too.”
A sly grin crept up the corners of Iruka’s mouth at the last bit of information. “Sakura, huh?”
Great.
Naruto completely forgot Iruka knew about his embarrassing childhood crush. He’d always been way too observant for his own good, especially in the classroom. Although…Naruto hadn’t exactly been the most subtle person in the world. Hell, he still wasn’t.
“Shut up,” he rebutted immediately, heat already creeping up his neck and face. “It’s not like that.”
“Oh?”
A knowing twinkle in Iruka’s eye sparked to life, and the sight of it made Naruto want to hide under the car seat. He didn’t even like Sakura like that anymore. She was his friend who he sometimes thought was pretty. That’s all.
Even if he had been totally infatuated by her at one point, there were only so many times Naruto could handle being friend-zoned before he turned fifteen, so he’d inevitably given up. She’d only ever had eyes for that one pretentious jackass anyway.
Naruto scoffed at the mere recollection. Thank fuck he moved away before high school. They probably would’ve killed each other.
“I don’t like her anymore,” Naruto continued to argue, and it sounded weak even to his own ears. “We’re just friends.”
Iruka’s expression didn’t change. “Still, you’re young adults now.” He raised an eyebrow. “People change a lot in college. You never know what could happen.”
Since when did Iruka even care about his romantic interests? Was this his attempt at parental advice before setting Naruto loose in the world?
He nearly laughed at the prospect.
“Are you trying to give me the birds and the bees talk?” Naruto joked, instantly delighted at Iruka’s subsequent blush. He’d be a good father someday. Maybe not now, but someday.
Sometimes Naruto wondered if Iruka considered him a trial run in that regard. He wouldn’t particularly mind if he did. He’d been considered much worse things than someone’s surrogate child, after all.
“Do you…” Iruka stuttered, his eyes wide. “Do you need it?”
Oh my God.
“Wha—no, of course not!” Naruto cackled, the sound filling the entire car. “I’m not ten years old.”
“Oh, good,” Iruka sighed, looking very relieved. Now, Naruto almost wished he had asked for it, just to hear his attempt. For starters, he was ninety percent sure Iruka was gay.
“Can you imagine?” Naruto continued breathlessly, still stuck on the thought and shaking with silent laughter. “How would you even begin?”
Iruka shot him a deadly glare that sucked Naruto right back into third grade. It shut him up just long enough for Iruka to change the subject.
“Did you remember to pack your schoolbags?”
Naruto swiftly sighed away his remaining amusement.
“Yes, Iruka.”
“Your soccer outfit?”
“It’s not an outfit,” he muttered peevishly. “It’s just a jersey and shorts.”
“Do you have them?”
“Yes.”
“Linens and toiletries?”
Now it was Naruto’s turn to roll his eyes. “I’ve lived in eleven different houses in sixteen years, y’know. I think I remember how to pack a suitcase.”
Iruka’s mouth closed, his shoulders slouching in submission. “You’re right.” Naruto frowned and felt a bit bad. “I’m just nervous for you.”
“Nervous?”
Why was Iruka nervous for him? This was the start of a brand-new beginning for Naruto. He wasn’t nervous at all.
He was so excited he could barely sit still.
“Of course,” Iruka confirmed, nodding to himself. “This is a big step for you.”
Naruto was quite certain there was nothing in the world this university could throw at him that he wasn’t prepared to handle. “I’ll be fine,” he assured, deliberately drawing out the word. “You don’t need to worry about me.”
“I’ll always worry about you, Naruto.”
Apparently, they’d already arrived at the sappy bit.
And Naruto knew he meant that. Despite his best efforts to convince him not to be, Iruka had been worried about Naruto since the day he caught him vandalizing the school library bookshelves with stolen dry-erase markers. He might be the only one who ever was.
“Thanks,” he replied, choosing not to fight him on it. Back then, he’d been so desperate for attention—for acknowledgment of any sort. And Iruka had given it to him.
At first, he’d done it by chastising, scolding, and punishing him for every misdeed he’d ever committed, which hadn’t exactly been new. But then, after a while, Iruka had done something no one else ever bothered to.
He’d looked a little deeper. He’d made an effort to understand Naruto before he even truly understood himself.
And here he was, over a decade later, dropping him off at college.
Naruto looked down at his lap, a strange combination of guilt and gratitude churning in his chest. Perhaps Iruka wasn’t the only one feeling a bit nostalgic today.
“So, tell me,” Iruka began, already switching topics again. Naruto surmised he just wanted to keep him talking. After all, this could be the last chance they’d have to see each other for quite some time. “What are you most excited for?”
Naruto obliged him gladly, prattling on about his classes, his practice schedule, his friends, his eagerness to meet his roommate for the first time…whatever topics came to mind. Iruka lent his ear intently, asking questions, and laughing at almost all his jokes.
He really was going to miss him.
About ten minutes out from their destination, Naruto received a text on his phone. He’d accidentally cracked the screen half a year ago while attempting a new skateboarding trick, and never got around to fixing it, so reading messages had proved a bit difficult since then.
Nevertheless, Shikamaru’s name stood out clear as day along with the message asking when he’d be arriving.
Naruto grinned and replied quickly. They would be in the same building, and he couldn’t wait to be living in such close proximity to all his friends. Hopefully his roommate would get along with everyone. Maybe he’d have a group of his own and they could expand their circle.
There were just so many possibilities. College was so fucking awesome, and he hadn’t even started yet.
The campus wasn’t huge, but what it lacked in size it made up for in liveliness. There were people absolutely everywhere. Parents hauling bins of luggage, students mingling with new and old faces, wide-eyed younger siblings looking around in awe, group leaders handing out pamphlets and directing traffic.
The sun was hot but not unbearably so, and Naruto could feel a buzzing underneath his skin as soon as he stepped outside the car. He stretched his stiff muscles and breathed in the scent of his new home. It smelled like asphalt, freshly mowed grass, and endless possibilities.
Absolutely perfect.
Iruka walked with him to the front desk to check in, and Naruto’s head couldn’t turn fast enough to observe everything he wanted to. Squeals and chatter filled the air, bouncing off the walls of the antiquated, weather-worn buildings that surrounded them. Naruto wondered where his classes would be. Where the practice field was. Where Sai, Ino, and Sakura were living.
Who would his professors be? Who would his coach be? He hoped he would get along with all his teammates and classmates. He hoped he could keep up with all the work he was about to have on his plate.
“Uzumaki, Naruto.”
Naruto snapped out of his frenzy of internal questions. “What?”
Oh.
It was just Iruka telling the woman behind the desk his name. She gave Naruto a long, unimpressed look before typing what was presumably his ID into her computer. He flushed, only slightly embarrassed at his momentary distraction.
But then she clicked the last key, and her eyes widened in surprise at whatever she saw, and Naruto’s heart instantly plunged like lead into his stomach.
“What is it?”
There was a problem. Of course there was a problem.
He’d only spent…what, weeks scouring his email for any information he possibly could’ve missed? Months, even?
“It seems your original roommate submitted a last-minute request for a transfer,” she explained, scanning the information on the screen with a tight frown. Naruto could feel the blood starting to drain out of his face. “Your room is already at maximum capacity.”
Maximum capacity?
What did that even mean? He didn’t have a room anymore?
He noticed Iruka straighten next to him, but Naruto couldn’t look. He was completely frozen in place.
He’d been so close. So fucking close to having something go right for him. All for the rug to be yanked out from under his feet anyway.
The woman looked at Naruto again and was clearly taken aback by the dawning horror consuming his entire expression.
What the hell was he supposed to do now? This was it. Plan A, B, C, and D all wrapped up into one last-ditch effort. He couldn’t afford off-campus housing. He had no relatives in the area.
He had no relatives anywhere.
“Is there anything you can do?” Iruka asked, sounding far calmer than Naruto could’ve ever hoped to have been in that moment.
She nodded and turned her attention back to the computer. “I can see if there are any open spots in the building. It will just take a minute.”
Her fingers began flying over the keyboard, the noise only rattling Naruto’s head further. Iruka put a hand on his shoulder, and he tried desperately to relax. She was checking. There was still hope.
Maybe he wouldn’t have to be homeless.
“Unfortunately, this will be a completely random pairing,” the woman told him, still typing. “I know you filled out a compatibility form with your last roommate, but at this point almost everyone already has someone assigned to them.”
At that point, Naruto would’ve accepted a room with a fucking werewolf.
“That’s fine,” he managed, the sound coming out more as a strangled squeak than actual words.
She double-clicked on something and read carefully, and the silence was more daunting than anything Naruto had ever heard.
Please. Please. Please.
“I can place you here,” she said finally, and Naruto deflated with a staggeringly large exhale, his entire body sagging in overwhelming relief. “It’s a larger space initially intended for handicapped students, but it looks like only one person is currently occupying it.”
Thank the Gods. Thank the heavens. Thank every mythical creature that ever might’ve lived.
“Excellent,” Iruka exclaimed, clapping Naruto once more on the shoulder.
Naruto dragged a shaky hand through his hair and stared at the woman—his momentary savior—with wide, glistening eyes.
“Thank you so much,” he professed, hardly believing his luck. “I totally thought I was screwed.”
She smiled at him then for the first time, the corners of her eyes crinkling. “You’re welcome, and I’m sorry for the oversight. Usually, the system catches these types of changes, but we’ve been so backed up with the move-in today.”
“It’s okay,” Naruto dismissed, still overflowing with relief. “You’re my favorite person in the world right now.”
It earned him another smile—this one toothy and perhaps a little bashful. She reached under the desk to open a drawer full of folders and began thumbing through them. When she found the one she was looking for, she pulled it out and retrieved the forms inside, along with a singular key.
“Your room number is 1770 on the top floor. You’ll need to fill out this paperwork and return it to this desk before three o’clock this afternoon. There’s a campus map included.” She slid the forms along with the key to him across the surface. “This is your key. It’s a fifty-dollar charge to replace if you lose it, so try to keep it with you if you can.”
Naruto accepted the key and slipped it into his pocket, already fully aware that he would probably lose it at least once that year. Keeping track of his possessions was never one of his strong suits.
“Thank you…” he trailed off, realizing she never gave a name.
“Temari,” she replied easily, her smile long gone but her gaze wasn’t nearly as cold now.
“Thanks, Temari,” Naruto repeated, picking up the forms and turning toward the door. “I owe you one!”
Iruka followed him silently until they were nearly back at the car. “Well, that was certainly an interesting start.”
Naruto snorted and opened the trunk, carefully tucking the paperwork into his schoolbag before hauling his belongings onto the pavement one by one.
“How crazy do you think my new roommate is going to be? Be honest.”
Iruka held out his arms to take the last of Naruto’s bags, observing the slightly pitiful number of possessions he owned. At least compared to the other students they saw whose families were taking multiple trips with moving carts and bins loaded to the brim.
“Why do you say that?”
They closed the trunk together and began back toward the building, his overused suitcases wobbling on the uneven ground.
“I dunno,” Naruto sighed. “Just the fact that he was the only guy in this building who didn’t already have a roommate. Kinda makes me wonder.”
Iruka seemed to consider this thoughtfully as he held the door open for him and they stepped back inside the cool, air-conditioned lobby. Naruto didn’t even have a chance to look around properly before, too lost in his own head, but now he took a moment to. The raised level they were standing on only seemed to serve as the check in point and the access to the elevators, but down the short corridor he could see the indication of a descending staircase and a few gaming tables down below. He’d definitely have to investigate it at some point before the end of the day.
“I wouldn’t be so quick to judge if I were you,” Iruka said.
Oh, right. His roommate.
“Maybe he had a good reason for it.”
Naruto grunted in response, pressing the up arrow for the elevator. Numerous students were still flocking in and out of the doors, wandering the halls, and it vaguely made him wonder where Shikamaru was. He’d text him once he got unpacked.
They squeezed into the elevator with several other people, the space entirely too small for the current occupancy, and they had to wait for everyone else to step off on their respective levels before it finally reached the 17th floor.
Naruto didn’t want to bite a gift horse in the mouth or anything, but did he really have to be put on the very top? He hoped the view made up for it, at least.
His room was located at the end of the hallway, about as isolated as one could possibly get in a building that housed thousands of students. But the minute he unlocked and opened the door, that small irritation seemed completely trivial as he took in the sheer size of the space.
It was huge. Definitely double, maybe even triple the size of the rooms he’d seen on the university website.
“Wow,” Iruka declared behind him, taking the word right out of Naruto’s mouth. The entry way alone could sleep two people in it, and that was only the beginning. They walked through the threshold, poking their heads into the bathroom and the closet. It seemed his roommate already unpacked, but the man himself was nowhere to be found.
Every addition he’d made was neutral and practical. A hook for the bath towels. A mat for their shoes. A holder for his toothbrush.
The cleaning supplies in the closet revealed little else about this mystery person, so they probed deeper. The entry way opened up to a well-lit sitting room connected to a kitchen.
Holy shit.
They had a kitchen.
Naruto knows for a fact that wasn’t one of the commodities listed for these rooms. This might’ve been the best-case scenario after all.
There was a television centered on a stand against the far wall facing a couch that was…also perfectly centered to face the television. In fact, as Naruto continued to inspect his roommate’s belongings, he started to notice a pattern.
Everything was poised impeccably in its place, almost like it had been staged for a catalogue shoot rather than for an actual living space. The kitchen was completely empty, aside from the appliances Naruto could only assume came with it. His bedroom was even worse—a perfectly made bed without so much as a wrinkle disturbing it with a neat stack of books and folders sitting on his desk.
But other than that, there was nothing. No color. No photographs. No decorations.
The walls had been left completely barren and honestly, with the set-up he had going on, it fit. There wasn’t even a single article of clothing in sight, probably all folded nicely into the dresser or hung up in the personal closet.
Okay so he was a neat freak. Borderline perfectionist.
That was…fine, he supposed. It could’ve been worse.
Naruto had half a mind to wonder where the hell the guy had put all his empty bags and luggage before Iruka was calling to him from the sitting room.
“Naruto! Come look at this view.”
Hurriedly stepping out of the stranger’s bedroom and dumping the rest of the stuff he was still carrying on the floor, Naruto rounded the corner to find Iruka standing on the balcony, the sliding glass door he hadn’t even noticed before pulled wide-open.
Naruto sucked in a deep breath of the outside air, the room already feeling a tad less stuffy, before he stepped outside to join his old teacher.
“Oh my god.”
This room, hell this apartment, kept getting better and better. They were so high up. Higher than almost every building in their vicinity and the skyline seemed to stretch forever. They could see everything. The whole campus, the city itself. Naruto imagined the sunsets would be breathtaking to witness from up here.
“This is amazing!” he hollered, gripping the railing with both hands and peering down at the ground as far as his neck would allow him to go. This was so much better than he could’ve ever hoped for.
And it was going to be his home.
The first place he’d ever known that would truly be his. Or, well…half-his.
“It is quite extraordinary,” Iruka agreed, sounding a bit shocked himself. “I’m so glad this worked out for you.”
“I know!” Naruto laughed. “It still doesn’t feel real.”
Iruka regarded him warmly for a few more seconds as Naruto tried to commit every inch of the view to memory. He was going to remember this moment for a long, long time.
“Should we start setting up your room?”
“Yeah!”
It was the one room in the place he hadn’t seen yet. The door was adjacent to his roommate’s and opened to reveal a very similar, if not identical lay-out as the other one. A bare-stripped bed and mattress, a propped open closet, a dresser, and a desk. There was also a pile of luggage left in the corner, almost certainly belonging to his roommate, and its presence there could’ve only meant one thing.
His roommate definitely thought he’d be living alone.
Why else would he have put his extra stuff in here, using Naruto’s bedroom as a sort of make-shift storage closet?
It prickled Naruto uncomfortably—the thought that he would have to explain why he was placed here and pray that it wasn’t going to cause any bad blood between them on the first day. Hopefully he wouldn’t mind too much.
Still, there was no use worrying about the future when they had work to do now.
He and Iruka sprung into action. They brought Naruto’s bags into the room and started unloading them one after the other. Naruto folded his clothes and hung up his jersey while Iruka dressed his mattress in the linens he’d packed.
When that was done, Naruto started organizing his desk, shoving half his school supplies into the drawers and the other half into his backpack. He put his extra pair of shoes and his cleats on the floor of his closet, leaving only the ones on his feet for day-to-day use. His ceramic frog pencil holders were arranged in the corner of the desk while Iruka taped up all his posters.
They were mainly just mementos from high school—a banner for his old soccer team, a poster from his favorite action film, a bunch of small photos from his friends accumulated over the years. As he unzipped his last suitcase, Naruto began to realize just how many little keepsakes he had. Event flyers and ticket stubs he could never bring himself to throw away, meaningless homework notes from Iruka, birthday cards, another stack of photographs. His college acceptance letter. The free school merchandise he was sent in the mail after his acceptance.
There was no way to make it all look intentionally structured, so Naruto didn’t even try. He tucked what he could into the frame of the mirror above his desk and put the framed photographs on the windowsill behind the bed. There were only two of them. One of him and Iruka after his fifth-grade graduation and one of Naruto, Sakura, and Shikamaru after Naruto had been named team captain of the soccer team his junior year.
Naruto loved that photo and the memory. They had both come to the field to celebrate with him after the decision was made and had treated him to dinner. That was the first night Naruto had ever tried alcohol, and all he could remember thinking is that it was absolutely disgusting.
Still, that was also one of his favorite days ever. He had such awesome friends.
“Naruto, do you want to hang this up too?”
Iruka held up the flag with his university’s logo—one of the freebies the university had sent him.
“Yes, hang it all up.”
The room was already looking better but Naruto wanted it covered. He didn’t have nearly enough stuff to make that happen, but he was going to do whatever he could to make this place come alive.
They spent the next thirty minutes doing just that, and by the time they finished, Naruto was so ecstatic he could hardly think straight.
His personality was everywhere. On the walls, on the desk, in the corners, hell even on the ceiling. Iruka had surprised him with a LED light strip that changed the whole room’s color, and even though it looked kind of poorly installed with the blue tape peeking out behind the wires, Naruto loved it. Iruka’s second gift for him, hidden in a box that Naruto didn’t even notice him bring in, was a bit more practical, bringing out the teacher side of him.
It was a large, mountable white board with spaces for him to write down reminders and fill in his weekly schedule. He’d even bought him a pack of multi-colored markers to go with it.
Naruto almost cried.
They hung on the one remaining empty wall space together and Iruka wrote a small message of encouragement on it to start him off. They stepped back, just admiring their overall efforts. The space was a bit chaotic, a bit crowded, but it was so far from lonely Naruto didn’t care at all. It was his.
“Thank you,” Naruto exhaled, feeling like he was floating out of his body. His eyes stung as he continued to stare at his room, just letting it all sink in. He couldn’t have done this without Iruka.
Not this room. Or, well that too but that isn’t what he meant. He couldn’t have gotten here. He couldn’t have made it here without Iruka.
“You’re welcome,” Iruka replied, turning Naruto to face him. He wore a fiercely genial expression that Naruto couldn’t quite place. “I’m proud of you, Naruto.”
Oh.
It was pride. Iruka was proud of him.
The tears welled up and spilled over before Naruto had a chance to stop them, the emotion too potent to contain. He stepped forward and trapped Iruka in a sound embrace that spoke more words than any expression ever could, and Iruka returned it without hesitation.
He was really here.
For the first time ever, Naruto was free.
“You’re going to do great, kid,” Iruka added, patting him a few times on the back before releasing him. Naruto wiped his eyes with his sleeve and smiled brightly, realizing suddenly that Iruka would have to be leaving soon.
He almost didn’t want him to go.
“Call me if you need anything, alright?” Iruka’s tone suddenly turned serious. “College is hard. You’ll have new responsibilities and expectations, and it can get overwhelming at times, but you’ll always have people in your corner to help you.”
“I know,” Naruto nodded, committing his advice and warnings to heart. He’d be alright, no matter what. “I’ll keep you updated on everything.”
Iruka’s eyes softened. “Good.” Then he turned and walked toward the exit, taking one last look around the room before he stepped out of it. Naruto trailed after him, determined to see him out. He patted Naruto again on the shoulder as he pulled open the front door, shaking his head with something that looked a lot like admiration in his gaze. But instead of something inspiring, all he said was, “try not to get kicked out during your first week.”
Naruto rolled his eyes, a smile already pulling at his lips. “I haven’t been expelled from anywhere in years, Iruka. Have a little faith.”
He’d never said anything so unnecessary. Iruka did have faith in him, and he always had. Maybe more faith than Naruto deserved.
They both laughed, bid each other goodbye, and then Naruto was left alone.
And it was the least lonely he’d ever felt.
The first thing he decided to do as an independent college student was to remove his roommate’s belongings from his bedroom. Not quite sure where to put them, he opted for leaving them just inside the door of the other room, the sterile ambiance hitting him harder than the first time he walked in here. He figured the guy would decide what to do with them himself once he returned.
The next thing he did was text Shikamaru, asking where he was, and the reply back was instantaneous.
Naruto: dude where r u?
Shikamaru: Room 1110. The door is open.
Naruto didn’t need any other incentive. He leapt off his bed, eyes catching on the note Iruka had scribbled on the whiteboard before he left.
Remember to buy groceries. Not just ramen. -Iruka
Naruto chuckled and knew full well that the amount of ramen he was going to eat that term would probably put Iruka in a coma. Still, there was no way he was ever going to erase the reminder.
He rode the elevator down to the eleventh floor, heart thrumming with anticipation. He hadn’t seen Shikamaru in months because of how busy he’d been working to save up for this year.
The eleventh level was a lot busier than the seventeenth, and Naruto had to squeeze past several families just to make it to his room. The door was wide open, just as he had said, and Naruto walked right through it.
In seeing the format of a standard-issue room, Naruto started to realize just how absurd his own was. But before he could dwell on it, Shikamaru appeared in front of him.
“Hey, Naruto.”
“Shikamaru!” Naruto exclaimed, his face splitting into a grin. His friend looked exactly the same as always; hair pulled back in a tight, spiky ponytail with a prominently disinterested expression on his face. Although today he seemed a bit wearier than usual. “Have you finished moving in?”
Shikamaru nodded and beckoned him further into the room. “Yeah, my parents left an hour ago.” He sighed. “It was a drag.”
Naruto continued observing the shared space, noting all the little additions they had made to it. He was honestly surprised Shikamaru got it all done in one day. He was the laziest genius Naruto had ever met.
“It looks great,” he attests, following Shikamaru into the main area. There was another man sitting on the couch snacking on an open bag of chips who Naruto didn’t recognize.
“This is Choji, my roommate,” Shikamaru introduced as Choji looked up to see who he was speaking to. He was a larger fellow with long, messy brown hair and round cheeks. “Choji, this is Naruto. We went to high school together.”
“Hey!” Choji greeted warmly, lifting a hand. “It’s nice to meet you.”
“Yeah, likewise,” Naruto replied easily. Their room was so much warmer than his, both in temperature and in aesthetic. It rattled his nerves a bit, thinking back to his own anomaly of a living space.
“Have you met your roommate yet?” Shikamaru asked as if reading his thoughts.
“Nope,” Naruto snorted, dropping onto the armchair opposite the couch.
Choji glanced back up from his chips in surprise. “Really?”
“Really.”
“That’s strange.”
“Tell me about it.” Naruto sprawled farther into the chair, grateful to be off his feet. “The guy moved in before me, but he wasn’t there when I got to the room.”
“What floor are you on?” Choji asked.
“The seventeenth.” He hesitated to divulge further details, but actually…now that he thought about it… “I think there was some kind of mistake.”
Shikamaru narrowed his eyes. “Why?”
“Because it’s huge.”
Choji laughed. “How huge?”
“Like, apartment huge.”
That got both of their attention instantly.
“What?” Choji blinked, setting down the chip bag.
“We have a kitchen.”
“You have a kitchen?” Shikamaru repeated, and Naruto tried to suppress the smug grin creeping onto his face. He didn’t get to be smug. His roommate was probably a total control freak.
“And a living room. And a balcony with a crazy sweet view.”
As opposed to this area which pretty much made up the entirety of their space, their bedrooms directly connected to entry way.
There was a brief silence as Naruto’s words stewed.
“Naruto,” Shikamaru said flatly, “that’s not a dorm.”
He frowned. “It is too.”
“That sounds nicer than my cousin’s house,” Choji added and Naruto snickered.
“Right? That’s what I’ve been saying.”
Choji shook his head in disbelief as Shikamaru seemed to process this new information.
“You’re so lucky.”
“Yeah well.” Naruto rubbed the back of his neck, feeling weirdly self-conscious all of a sudden. “I almost got screwed over first.”
He quickly explained the housing mix-up as best as he could. He still didn’t fully understand it if he was being honest.
“So, they stuck you with whoever was left?” Choji paraphrased for him.
“Pretty much.”
“That sucks.”
“Yeah.”
“What are you going to do if he’s awful?”
“That’s what I’m worried about.”
Shikamaru sighed, his first input in nearly five minutes. “You’re already assuming the worst aren’t you.”
Naruto sat forward in his seat, intent on making him understand. “You don’t get it. His room is terrifying.”
That earned another intense pause.
“Terrifying?” Choji repeated dubiously.
Naruto split his attention between the two of them, eyes flicking back and forth. “Okay, listen.” He held up a finger. “Not a single decoration.”
Choji interjected automatically. “A lot of guys don’t decorate.”
Naruto shook his head. “No, but that’s not even the weird part.” A second finger joined the first. “Everything is perfectly organized.”
Choji shrugged and Shikamaru just continued to stare at him unnervingly. “So?”
“No. Perfectly organized.”
“A lot of people are neat.”
He wasn’t grasping the gravity of this at all so Naruto pointed dramatically at the floor. “The shoes have a designated spot.”
Shikamaru blinked.
“The towels are color coordinated.”
Choji was trying—and failing—not to smile.
“His books are stacked by size and aligned with the edge of his desk.”
“You’re making that up.”
“I’m not!”
Shikamaru’s expression grew increasingly strange, but Naruto kept going.
“The bed looks like it was made for military standards.”
“Hm.”
“The couch is centered.”
“Hm.”
“The TV is centered.”
“Hm.”
“The coffee table is centered.”
Choji finally laughed—a loud, boisterous sound. “What kind of psychopath notices that?”
“The kind who has to live with him!”
Shikamaru sank onto the armrest of the couch, his posture tight. Then something thoughtful flickered across his face.
“Did you happened to see his name?” he asked.
Naruto frowned. “No.”
“What does he study?”
“I don’t know.” Although, he did catch a title off one of his textbooks. Legal Reasoning, or something. “He might be pre-law, actually.”
Something in Shikamaru clicked. His eyes widened for half a second and Naruto knew him well enough to realize he just figured something out.
“What?” Naruto demanded.
Did he know something? Did he know who his roommate was?
“Nothing.”
“Shikamaru.”
“Nothing.”
It was a lie.
Naruto knew it was a lie. Shikamaru knew it was a lie. Even Choji knew it was a lie.
He narrowed his eyes, his pulse increasing slowly but surely. “Do you know who it is?”
Shikamaru’s mouth twitched. “No.”
That twitch told Naruto everything he needed to know. “You do.”
“I don’t.”
“You totally do!”
Shikamaru looked away and Choji started studying him. Then he noticed the unmistakable glint of amusement in Shikamaru’s eyes and immediately started grinning too.
“Oh no,” Choji said.
Naruto stood, pointed an accusatory finger between them. “What? What does that mean?”
They were keeping something from him and Naruto didn’t even know why. What about this situation could possibly be so funny to them?
“Nothing,” Shikamaru repeated, and Naruto wanted to tackle him to the floor. His friend was a sadistic bastard.
“You both suck.”
---
Naruto was back in his room after a gruesome thirty minutes trying to pry information out of Shikamaru to no avail. He was annoyed and frustrated, and his roommate still wasn’t back yet.
At least Shikamaru’s roommate was normal. He seemed like a cool guy.
Shikamaru on the other hand…
Naruto sat down at his desk and decided to complete the forms he was supposed to turn in within the next hour. It was just general personal information they probably needed to have on file, so Naruto tried his best to make his script as legible as he could. At the prompt, he wrote down Iruka’s address instead of Koharu and Homura’s. He doubted they would appreciate being sent any information regarding his whereabouts.
Or anything about him in general.
He also took a minute to study the campus map he was provided, vaguely noting the position of his own building in relation to the others. In the end, he stuck it to his whiteboard next to Iruka’s note and made his way his down to the lobby with his completed paperwork.
It was starting to clear out now. Most of the parents had already left, so all that remained were mingling groups of students chattering animatedly. In observing them, Naruto decided he would call Sakura as soon as he got back to his room. Seeing her, and maybe Ino, would be the perfect cap to this day.
He turned in his forms and started the ascent back up the elevator, ringing Sakura as soon as he stepped out of it. She answered after only a few seconds, her delighted voice crackling out the speaker.
“Naruto! Hey, where are you?”
He smiled and clamped the phone to his ear, walking down the deserted hallway feeling lighter than air.
“Hi, Sakura. I’m in the freshman building. Top floor.”
“Wow, I bet that’s something.” There was a brief scuffle on the other end. “Ino and I are on the sixth. It’s a girl’s floor.”
Naruto didn’t even realize the genders were separated by levels, but it made sense. “Cool!” He pulled out his key and fiddled the lock on his door with one hand. “Am I allowed to come visit you?”
She laughed and it made Naruto feel a bit fuzzy inside as he pushed open the door. “Of course! We’ll be here until six.”
Plenty of time. He’d even be able to go grocery shopping first.
“Great.” Naruto smiled and kicked off his shoes as he stepped further into his dorm, shutting the door behind him. “I’ll come down soon. I still haven’t met by roommate yet, but—”
The sentence died on his tongue as Naruto rounded the corner of the sitting room. There was someone standing outside his bedroom staring into it, the door flung wide open.
He was tall with dark hair wearing a black t-shirt and jeans. He could only see the back of his head, but he could tell he was examining the sight before him. The posters. The photographs. The LED lights. All the clutter that had appeared over the course of a single afternoon.
Then he turned around.
And the world promptly stopped making sense.
The phone nearly slipped from Naruto’s hand as he stared.
It was all he could do.
Dark eyes.
Sharp features.
Black hair that somehow looked exactly the same as it had four years ago, as if time had politely skipped over him and moved on to everyone else.
No.
No, no, no.
“N-Naruto?” Sakura’s voice on the call cut through the silence. “Are you still there?”
Naruto barely heard her.
Because standing a foot away from his bedroom—looking just as shocked as Naruto felt—was the last person on Earth he ever expected to find here. The last person he wanted to find here.
“…Uchiha?”
Across the distance, Sasuke blinked.
Then again.
Like Naruto might disappear if he gave it another second. When he didn’t, his gaze flicked past Naruto’s shoulder to the rest of the dorm as though he was checking he hadn’t accidentally walked into the wrong unit.
When he looked back, his expression had shifted from stunned disbelief to something far more familiar. A look Naruto probably could’ve drawn in his sleep from the number of times he’d received it at school.
Annoyance.
“Why,” Sasuke said slowly, his eyes narrowing dangerously, “are you in my apartment?”
Naruto was wrong. This was not the best day ever.
He would’ve preferred a werewolf.