When he figured it out after so many years Iruka was

angry

. His soulmate laughed about it of course because he always did think these kinds of things were funny. Iruka did not. It was just confusing. Confounding. The biggest mystery he 'd been trying to figure out since he was a child when he first noticed the pattern. How could there be so many signs that his soulmate was in the same village and yet he 'd never touched a single doorknob? A strange thing to notice, possibly, but once he did it stuck out like a sore thumb.

More than half the people in the village could see the color of the doorway which led to the room where shinobi came to sign for new missions. Iruka had heard many people describe it as dark brown wood with a faded brass knob. To him both looked like different shades of grey. It wasn 't that he couldn 't imagine the colors because he could. He had

seen