"That's him?" A plump civilian housewife standing at the entrance of the Academy shout-whispered.
"Yes" Another woman with ninja attire next to her confirmed.
"Poor boy. Can you imagine what it feels like?" The first woman blurted, rudely pointing with her finger to a raven-haired child, who walked with his head down and apparently trying his best to go unnoticed
The gossipy women didn't know that there was a man, -a young chunin-, staring closely at them with a fierce frown. Their comments may seem to be inspired by pity, but he knew that wasn't the case. Their words were marred with morbid curiosity. They were staring at the poor boy as he was some sort of peculiar freak.
The chunin was about to tell them off, but the deep voice of a boy called him. He stared at him, thinking of how incongruous and absurd was to hear such a deep voice from such a young person.
"Iruka-sensei, I'm done with my shuriken practice. May I go home?"
The chunin's eyes softened.
"Of course Sasuke-kun"
Iruka woke up in a daze. The curtains were drawn but no illumination but the ones from the spotlight went inside the room, indicating that the sunset had already passed. He briefly debated to close the window but decided against to, the chilled breeze of the night was like a caress to his skin.
He had falled asleep while wrapped in a blanket and watching television. The idiotic box was still on but with low volume, broadcasting an old cartoon that Iruka remembered from his childhood, one about a time-travelling blue robotic cat. Throwing away the blanket, he got up and sluggishly walked to the kitchen, putting a pot of water in the stove and patiently waiting for it to boil to prepare his dinner.
A multiple of aggressive knocks drawn his eyes away from the pot to the door.
"Iruka-sensei!" A recognized voice for him exclaimed.
Iruka frowned a bit. He opened the door to give entrance to a Naruto that vibrated with impatience.
"Naruto what are you doing here?" Iruka asked his first thought. It wasn't that late but Naruto was supposed to be in bed already to depart with Jiraiya early in the morning.
"Iruka-sensei I have something to ask you 'ttebayo. Tomorrow Sakura-chan, Baa-chan and Kaka-sensei will be there with you to see me off so I have to do this now."
"Okay. First thing first, do you want to eat some ramen?"
At such magic words, some of the unusual seriousness in Naruto's face melted away. "Yosh!"
After both of them had their bellies filled with delicious instant ramen, Iruka initited the conversation.
"Of what did you want to talk?"
Naruto fidgeted a bit. "Iruka-sensei, remember when you visited in the hospital after my fight with... Sasuke?"
Iruka closed his eyes. Yes he remembered, but mostly the blood that covered the mangled body of the blonde sitting next to him. For a terrifying moment, he thought he had lost Naruto.
"That would be hard to forget," he responded mildly.
"Well, before you came, Sakura-chan was there. And Pervy-Sage too. And he told me... he told that I was a fool for chasing after Sasuke."
"I see..."
"And I told him that I don't care! That I prefer to be a fool for the rest of my life that to ever give up on Sasuke!" Naruto said between gritted teeth. "And I meant what I said. But... what if he is right? What if chasing after Sasuke is useless and I never get him back!"
"I can't give up on Sasuke! He doesn't know what that pedo Orochimaru is going to do to him!"
"Naruto, calm down." Iruka said, but the boy didn't listen, lost in his anger as he was.
"That bastard! How dare he to just left! Can he see he has people here that care about him! But-" all righteous anger Naruto was displaying abandoned him as quickly as it came. "-what if Pervy Sage is right. What's chasing Sasuke is worthless?"
"Naruto" Iruka called him again, and this time the boy did listen. As a matter of fact based on his expression Naruto seemed to believe that whatever that was going to come out of Iruk's mouth would be as sacred as the gospels
"You are definitely cleaning that wall afterwards. But first let me clarify you something."
Iruka fixed his brown eyes on Naruto's.
"I do not think you are a fool for chasing after Sasuke. I actually commend you for it."
"Really?" Naruto said with an awed voice. The boy didn't broke visual contact, and his blue orbs were bright.
"Yes. In fact I think that if there's someone who can get through Sasuke, it's you Naruto."
Neither said anything for a few seconds and Iruka feared he had actually said something wrong. That until the blonde abruptly pounced on him like a wild tiger, fiercely tightening his arms around his neck.
"Thank you so, so, so much Iruka-sensei!" the boy said with choked emotion, conscientiously enjoying the hug for a long time before separating to leave.
"I promise I'm not going to disappoint you 'ttebayo! Next time you see me will be with Sasuke in tow." Naruto said with finality, slamming the door behind him.
"He didn't even clean the ramen off the wall," the chunin thought without heat as he was left alone.
He roughly rubbed his face, feeling sudden tiredness consume him again.
"Good luck Naruto." Iruka whispered to nothingness.
His gut throbbed in guilt. Why he never attempted to reach out to Sasuke, just like he did with Naruto?
Iruka already knew the answer to that question though. Naruto was so easy for him to understand. It was no difficult to see in him a desperate child screaming for attention, just like himself at that age. But Sasuke wasn't like that. Sasuke-kun had always been so serious, so well-behaved, so mature... that he genuinely thought things were going to be alright for him. That he was strong enough to overcome the tragedies of his past.
But how does someone recover from seeing the lifeless bodies of their entire kin?
Iruka was deeply ashamed by his own short- sightedness. How could he be so blind? In hindsight, his downfall was only a matter of time, and now that the inevitable has happened everyone is eager to blame a traumatized child without taking any responsibility themselves.
Godaime-sama, Jiraiya-sama, the Elders of Konoha Council... all of them thought of Sasuke-kun as this bloodthirsty monster, someone willing to do anything to get power. And maybe he was that way in the present. But none of them knew him as Iruka knew him. None of them had seen the boy that stayed up late to practice his jutsus 'til dawn, that smiled when his mother made his favorite dish for lunch, that laughed happily and carefree as he was píggy-rided around by his older brother...
It is selfish of him to entrust and expect Naruto to fulfill a task all the adults in the village failed to. But Iruka didn't lie when he said he thought of Naruto as the only one who could get through Sasuke. The young chunin had been a first-hand witness of the strange bond his two students shared... and although he didn't really understand it, he hoped it would be enough to bring his former dark-eyed pupil to his senses...
Besides Naruto was right about that there were many people who cared deeply for Sasuke, who would never abandon him and would love to help him in whatever he needed, even if what he needed was something as poisonous as revenge. Naruto, for starters, Sakura and Ino as well. And he might be unable to see eye-to-eye with Kakashi, but he knew no one would want the young genin back more than the grey-haired jounin did.
And Iruka cared for him too, even if Sasuke probably wouldn't ever get to know that.