Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto or the characters. If I did than Haku so wouldn't have died.
"I just wish we could go back one more time and begin it; back before I lost myself somewhere in it."
~Marianas Trench~
The People We Meet
That boy, she had met him before. Before all of this, before Kakashi killed him, before the battle on the bridge, even before he had pretended to be a hunter nin. Haku, she knew Haku. She used to spend time with him in fact, when they were both much younger. He was one of the few kids, around her age, that didn't make fun of her, not for anything. Even if she would accidentally trip, or stumble, there was no laughter. He held only soft concern in his eyes.
Once she had gone to him – in tears. She had just lost her best friend, all over a boy; a boy that she had only pretended to have a crush on because all the other girls did. She was supposed to like him, right? So she said she did, and vowed that she would be the one to win over his heart. Ino was less than pleased about that and so, she lost her best friend over something that wasn't even real.
Haku had comforted her with gentle words and kind eyes. Eyes that, when you looked into them you got the sense that this boy had lived to see 100 lives. He knew what you were going through, he could sympathize because he had lived through the worst that mankind had to offer. Sakura was never completely sure as to why she knew that – he never spoke of himself unless directly asked, and she didn't have the right questions.
Once, she almost ran away – almost left with him. She didn't want to be in the village anymore. She had no real friends – save for Sasuke and that had only been when they were younger. As the years passed he grew more and more distant. She couldn't even say that she really knew the Uchiha anymore. But, she knew, it was her fault. She just couldn't seem to put an end to the charade of being hopelessly in love with the boy and her act, the one that Sasuke himself didn't know – still doesn't know – was all an act, it drove him away from her.
No one knew that, even though she claimed to be in love with Sasuke Uchiha, she was really in love with Haku. Her dreams did not consist of the ebony haired Uchiha, no. They were filled with vision of warm brown eyes and long hair the same shade as milk chocolate. Her dreams – sleeping and waking – were of Haku.
When she first encountered him again, with her team, she didn't know that it was him. The voice, it was familiar, but she couldn't quite place it – so she wrote it off as a coincidence. And then, on the Naruto Bridge, his mask cracked and Sakura was barely able to hold back her cry of recognition and horror. Haku, her darling sweet Haku, was fighting against them. She should have felt betrayed – rightfully so – but she didn't. All she could do was stand there, frozen in shock, and pray to whatever god was listening that Haku survived.
But no one had heard her prayer because Kakashi, her sensei, killed the one she loved. What was even worse was that she couldn't show the effect it had on her because no one knew, or was supposed to know, about her and Haku's friendship. 'It could have been more…' So what did she do? She took all her pain and anguishes for Haku's death and translated it to Sasuke. She made it look like she cared more than she really had. It wasn't that she hadn't cared at all that the ebony haired boy could have been dead, but he wasn't Haku.
And even now, years after Haku had been cruelly ripped away from life and from her, she still hadn't stopped her charade. What was the point in throwing it away now, when she no longer had the chocolate haired boy with his kind brown eyes?
