"That was a mistake..." I whispered to myself, watching my breath halt at the glass of my window and frost over the unspoken words my fingertips left behind. I traced a heart beside the 'I love you' I never got to confess to him. I filled it in with the saline that stained my flesh from past tears of regret and anguish. I scratched. I raked my nails down the glass and balled my fist as I hit it down on the window pane, dropping my head into my arm to let out the sobs I had been forcing myself to choke down.
I was a liar, now. When we swore to each other that we'd never keep any secrets between us, I lied. I figured one day I'd muster up enough courage to confess, just like I confessed to Naruto Uzumaki so many years ago. But this was so different. Kiba Inuzuka wasn't the little boy I had a crush on. He wasn't the guy I'd admire from afar without ever having enough nerve to come up to him and strike up a conversation. No. He was none of that. He was the man I had fallen madly in love with after I realized how much more he meant to me than I thought Naruto did.
Kiba had been my closest friend since childhood. He was the one who'd share his food with me at lunch-time back in our ninja-academy days, insisting that I'd have to eat more to get stronger. He was the one who'd train with me, shout at me to come at him with the intention to kill, while he'd pretend like he was fighting when all he was really doing was trying his hardest to keep from accidentally injuring me. Kiba had literally been my rock to lean on through all of these years. He was the one who told me to never give up; the one who had faith in me, the one who's smilereally had saved me. Not Naruto Uzumaki.
Though...I couldn't tell Kiba how I felt. How could I, when I spent so much time being infatuated with Naruto? He'd never believe that I'd fallen out of love with the blond Uzumaki. No one would. No one would believe that after such time wasted chasing a hopeless romance, I had finally made the realization of who I truly loved, deep down, and what love reallymeant...
...Love wasn't a mere little crush. It wasn't wanting to be like Naruto; admiring his bravery and determination and strength. Hell, Kiba had all of that too! But so late did I realize it and see just how much my best friend meant to me. Maybe it was even too late. We were twenty-one now, and only a few years ago did I finally comprehend the meaning of love. Love was caring for someone enough to put your life on the line for someone. Sure, I had put my life on the line for Naruto once, but love also meant being comfortable around that special someone enough that you can be yourselfcompletely in their presence. I couldn't even speak to Naruto without fainting...What kind of love was that?
However...With Kiba...Everything was so different. I could cry in front of him. I could let him hold me tight in those big arms he had and I'd sob for hours, into his chest, and then I'd laugh softly as he'd always reassure me that he didn't care for my tears staining his clothes. I could giggle at his crude jokes. Heck, I-...I was even comfortable with them; amused my his foul language and reference to things that were sexual in nature, instead of disgusted or offended. Now that was love, because no one else was able to do that to me. Only Kiba. And-...As cheesy as it sounded, just one smile or that toothy grin, that fanged smirk from him could render me weak; melt me into mush. Sure Naruto had that same affect on me before, but Kiba never made me faint. He just made me feel warm and filled the pit of my stomach with wild butterflies.
I missed those butterflies...No matter how I had lost control of their fluttering, I still missed them. Now they were cold...Broken; frozen at the wings, softly cracking, piled one on top of the other, ready to shatter like the thinnest little shards of glass. They were lifeless. Kiba was gone, and so those butterflies were lifeless in the now-cold pit of my twisting belly. They had no one to flap their wings for. When Kiba was gone, so were all the little things that fed me life on the kindest platter. I was empty without him. I grew colder and weaker every winter day without his warm touch.
Thankfully, this was the only time during the year where he'd be gone from one to three months, where we couldn't have any contact whatsoever; not even a single phone-call or a letter written. Why? I never knew. According to Kiba, it was because he was going through intense training somewhere far away and couldn't be disturbed. Though-...I was sure that was a lie, because Kiba was never really a good liar. I already knew how to recognize false information from just his facial expressions alone. He'd lose eye-contact, blink more often, and tense his jaw; an every time he told me about his so-called 'intense training', it was obvious to me that it was untrue.
Why would Kiba lie to me? What was he hiding? I hadn't a single idea. We never kept anything from each other...Well, at least we weren't supposed to. So maybe I wasn't the only liar anymore. Maybe Kiba was a liar himself. Although...I just couldn't figure out why he'd lie, or possibly even worse, keep vital information from me. It just wasn't like him. But maybe it was for my own good, I figured, just like it was for his own good that I kept my feelings towards him little secrets of passion.
RING! RING!
I jumped and gasped to myself, clutching my chest in attempt to stop my racing heart.
RING! RING!
It was the phone; my extension of it. Why would I even pick up? It was probably my cousin, Neji Hyuga, or anyone else of my clan to check up on me and see how I was doing living on my own. I hadn't the slimmest desire to speak to any of them; at least not when my voice would sound so raw with pain. I had already been known as a cry-baby when I was younger...It was a label I didn't want coming back to haunt me as a grown woman, now.
"H-hello, you've reached Hinata Hyuga. I'm not able to answer the phone at this moment, so um-...Please leave a message and I will try to get back to you as soon as possible. Thank you..."
I was still a stuttering mess as I had always been, the answering machine having to remind me of that particular quirk.
"Hinata, it's Tsume Inuzuka. Listen, you have to come over as soon as you hear this message. I need to talk to about something serious...It involves my son."
My heart sunk, plummeting into the depths of my frozen butterflies. They shattered.
"He'll be away for a little longer, but-...Look, he's not on that 'intense training' bullshit. He's never been."
I stood from my chair and kicked it back across the wooden floor, racing towards the phone.
"I'm not supposed to tell you what's really going on with Kiba. He made me promise him that a long time ago, but I'm making the decision to tell you anyway, because it pains me to know that my son suffering like this."
I gripped the table by the edge to stop myself from running into it. My instincts commanded me to be still and hear Tsume out instead of picking up the phone and panicking.
"Please come over as soon as possible, Hinata...You're the only one who can help him in this situation. You and I need to sit down and talk about what's going on with my boy. It's not something to be discussed by telephone. We need to meet face-to-face, and you know you're always welcome here. I'll see ya soon, kid. Take care."
I was out the door with a protective cloak before I even had any time to process everything Tsume had told me. I only knew one thing: That Kiba was in some kind of trouble. There wasn't a second to be wasted on my useless worries; not when I could be running out into the snow, in direction of the Inuzuka house-hold.
