I stood, fighting the tears with every ounce of strength I could muster…I looked at the end of my childhood, the end of playful childlike hopes…and took in the cold reality. Aya was on her knees in front of Eric's gravestone, Kiba was next to her. Mom was knelt down next to Aya along with Tilee trying to comfort her. Sori was weeping from the side, I wanted to comfort her…but there was someone else who needed me. Not for the same comfort as Sori needed, but for the strength to pull through. I walked into the woods, and found Haru just out of site of the others. I slowly walked over and placed my hand on his shoulder. He spun around to face me, the trails from a few lone tears on his cheeks. His body which had become ridged at my touch un-tense when he realized it was me and not one of the others. I simply wrapped my arms around him, for I didn't know what else to do. He buried his face in his hands and leaned his head on my shoulder. His shoulders trembled slightly as he began to cry. I simply held him, there were no words to ease this pain. And despite wanting to be strong, tears began to slip down my own cheeks. We had all been so close to Eric, and his departure had been so sudden. Every warning and apology he had ever giving me played in my head. His smiles, his innocence…..and it was gone now….
"It's my fault…" Haru whimpered.
"No…" I said quietly, "It wasn't you." I felt like my voice would crack at any moment. Suddenly unwanted memories of Eric's death crept into my head. He and Haru had been paired against each other in the chunin exams. The boys would put up a good a fight I knew, and I sat in the crowd with Sori cheering them on. But suddenly Haru changed, and I don't mean personality. There was a huge black wolf in the place of the boy I loved. The wolf went at Eric…and he was gone, just like that. Sori hardly had time to scream, and neither Aya nor I could jump from the stands fast enough. The wolf changed back to Haru, who passed out instantly. Aya ran towards Eric, so I ran to Haru's side. Eric's blood was on his hands like it had been on the wolf's paws…and I knew something was terribly wrong. There was no way that Haru had been in control. The medics came to take Haru and more on protective instincts than anything I snarled at them. They backed off and Uncle Azash came over and picked Haru up. Suddenly Sori's cry pulled my attention to the other side of the arena. I saw her fall to her knees, and noticed Aya weeping against Kiba's chest…I didn't need to walk over and see them, I knew now without a doubt that Eric was dead. My heart sank and my stomach flipped and tied in knots causing me to become nauseated. I followed Azash, I couldn't bear to see Eric's body. Azash cleaned the blood off of Haru and then laid him in one of the rooms at in the stadium, I told him I would stay and for him to go back. He nodded and left. The moment the door shut I burst into tears. I fell to my knees next to Haru's bed and wept for several minutes. During that time my hands found his and locked around them.
"Shh…" Haru's voice brought me out of my thoughts. I realized things had reversed, I was crying and he was now holding me.
"If I had only been faster…" I whispered
"There's nothing that you could have done…" He said wiping several tears away with his thumbs. We stayed in the woods quite a while, simply holding one another and crying. The others left before us, so we went to stand by the grave…this brought a whole new wave of emotion and tears. I had never truly lost anything up to this point, and this sorrow was almost more than I could take. I squeezed Haru's hand, and he did the same to mine in return. This made it final, we weren't children anymore…and we would never be the same again.
Authors notes:
Okay, disclaimers. Tilee and Sori are Ti-chan's, Destiny and Elinor are mine and then all the other RPC's belong to Aya, Also Kishimoto gets credit for anything that is his. this one is kinda self explanitory...It's Eric's death through Elinor's eyes.