HarukiSakura

"Perhaps I’ve spent 17 years waiting to be needed by you. Just like cherry blossoms wait for spring!"

- Sakura to Haruki.

HarukiSakura is the het ship between Haruki Shiga and Sakura Yamauchi from the I Want to Eat Your Pancreas fandom.

Canon
Haruki Shiga and Sakura Yamauchi share an exceptionally close bond that was formed in the last few months of Sakura’s life. The two first met in a hospital when Haruki, who was waiting to get some stitches removed, found a diary on a seat next to him. He discovers that it belongs to Sakura, a very popular girl at the same high school as him, and that she has been diagnosed with a terminal illness due to her pancreas not working. Sakura witnesses him going through her diary and decides to tell him that what he read is true. She quickly found him interesting and opted to hang around with him as much as possible.

Their relationship is defined by their contrasting personalities, while Haruki is anti-social, disinterested and apathetic about people and everything around him, Sakura is very outgoing, friendly and enjoys life as much as possible. Despite this difference, they eventually become good friends, with Haruki finding Sakura a refreshing presence in his life, despite her initially being annoying to him, and Sakura finding him a sobering person and amusing to be around. Despite their close relationship, and Sakura’s flirtatious attitude towards him, the pair strictly maintain that they are platonic for most of the story, however, it appears they genuinely fell in love with each other by the end.

Initially, Haruki expressed no interest in being around her and found her a bit of a nuisance. He has rationalised his antisocial behaviour as a means to not get hurt by people, since he can imagine being friends with other people, and fantasise about being around others, without the risk of them ever hurting him. Due to Sakura’s popularity at school, other students quickly pay more attention to him and start to gossip about their relationship. While some are kind towards him, others are antagonistic and disapproving of Sakura’s choice to be friends with him, which even prompts jealousy from Sakura’s best friend, Kyouko Takimoto, as well as her ex-boyfriend, who tries to win Sakura’s favour again in order to be with her. At one point, when asked directly by Sakura if he would ever be her boyfriend before she tries to play down the question, he states he would not want to whilst being slightly irritated.

However, despite his apparent disinterest in her, he regularly gives in to her requests to go out and do stuff together, eating at various places and even going away with her for a night at a hotel. It was whilst at the hotel that a breakthrough was made in their relationship, as Haruki admitted that he had a good time with her, but also discovered the crushing difficulty Sakura is under because of her terminal illness. They both play a game of truth or dare where they dominantly answer truths to each other. In the last round, Sakura asked Haruki what he would do if she told him that she is terrified of dying, a question he was not capable of answering, and thus opted for dare instead, which led to him sleeping in the same bed with her. Once he had returned, Haruki noted that he was now passing the time until she contacted him again, inadvertently admitting that he is looking forward to being around her. When confronted by Kyouko, she aggressively informs him to not be friends with Sakura with half-baked feelings as it is unfair on her. He later reflects on this and begins to be more open towards her.

Sakura finds him amusing and could not help but burst out laughing at his blunt retort when she informs him of her terminal illness. She then inexplicably hangs around him as much as possible, waiting for him outside of school and even getting a job as a library assistant to be near him. Sakura informs Haruki that the reason why she likes to be around him is due to his indifference towards her illness, as her parents are too overly concerned and telling any of her friends would change the nature of their relationship, something she could not contend with. In Haruki, she finds someone she feels completely comfortable around who can help her enjoy what short life she has left. At one point, she tells Haruki of a myth that, if a part of your body is afflicted with an injury or illness, eating the same body part will make it better, which prompts the question if she wants to eat his pancreas. Sakura, at one point, reveals to Haruki that her favourite book is The Little Princess and, despite its popularity, finds out that he has not actually read it even though he is a major bookworm. She decides to lend him the book and he promises to read it and return it before she dies. Later, she admits that she found great joy and happiness at the fact that Haruki, who is antisocial, chose her to open up to.

Their friendship suffers slightly when, after being invited round to Sakura’s house, she decides to hug him from behind which causes an intimate moment between the two. Sakura then appears to go in for a kiss and Haruki does the same, only for her to then turn away and brush off the moment as just her joking, as one of her wishes before she dies is to do something ‘naughty’ with a boy. Despite his usual stoic demeanour, Haruki is greatly annoyed with her for toying with his feelings and momentarily pins her down on her bed before running out of her house. However, their relationship recovers when, whilst outside in the pouring rain, he is confronted by Sakura’s ex-boyfriend who has grown jealous of how close he is to her and assaults him. Sakura then turns up and tells him to leave and comforts an injured Haruki. She then apologises to him for her actions and expresses her need to have him around, causing Haruki to forgive her and happily continue his friendship with her.

At this point, the two are very close and regularly banter with each other about her illness. They spend more time together and go out frequently. Such is the closeness of their relationship that Haruki visits her in hospital, unannounced, when she falls ill, but is amused to find she is perfectly fine and is instead dancing in her hospital room. They then play cards together before Sakura cuddles him and states she enjoys the warmth of his body. He leaves when Kyouko shows up but not before Sakura happily waves goodbye to him whilst preventing Kyouko from accosting him. She decides to sneak out with Haruki to go see a firework display she has been wanting to see. Whilst there, Haruki expresses genuine worry that she is going to die sooner than expected due to her being hospitalised and openly stated that he desperately wants her to live. Hearing this makes Sakura extremely happy and she promises to let him know when she will die. During the fireworks display, she opens up for him to hug her and the two embrace each other, with Sakura pulling Haruki back in when he tries to leave their embrace.

Their relationship ends prematurely when, whilst Haruki is waiting for her at a cafe after she had been discharged, Sakura is stabbed and killed whilst on her way to meet him. Just prior to this, the two were texting one another, with the last message Haruki sent to her saying, “I want to eat your pancreas”, without a response from her. He waits for her to arrive all day and eventually decides to go home only to discover her murder on the news, devastating him. He does not attend her funeral, due to his antisocial nature and the trauma of losing her, and laments that they both failed to keep their promise to each other. He decides to read the book he had borrowed from her, The Little Princess, and proceeds to visit her shrine at her mother’s house where he admits to her mother that he was fully aware of her illness and how she did not wish for anyone else to know. It is here that its revealed that Sakura had made plans with her mother for her diary to be given to Haruki, as Sakura had correctly predicted he would visit her shrine and reveal that he was aware of her illness.

Whilst at her house, he decides to read the diary and discovers Sakura’s perspective of the time they had together. She express genuine joy at the time she spent with him and that she would even cry after he had gone home as she wished to be around him. She reveals that she had noticed him well before their first encounter at the hospital and found him interesting due to his distance to others and always reading a book. In her final letter to him, she reflects on the nature of their relationship and how she believed she had fallen in love with him, but that their relationship is too complex for something as simple as love. As a stand in to “I love you”, she instead writes “I want to eat your Pancreas”, which then prompts Haruki to ask Sakura’s mother if he could access Sakura’s phone, he flicks through her text messages and discovers that she had read his final message to her, “I want to eat your Pancreas”, before she was killed, prompting him to break down in tears knowing she died fully aware he felt the same way.

Following her death, Haruki decides to change his ways and to try and make an effort to be more social. Throughout their time together, Sakura had mentioned that she wished for him and her best friend, Kyouko, to be friends. He decides to contact Kyouko and reveal to her the full extent of his relationship with Sakura, which upsets her. However, when she leaves angrily he decides to chase after her and admit that he wishes for them to be friends and, even if only a little at a time, hopes she will forgive him for keeping Sakura’s illness a secret. It is later revealed, a year after Sakura’s death, that he and Kyouko are now good friends and are seen visiting Sakura’s grave.

Quotes
"Perhaps I’ve spent 17 years waiting to be needed by you. Just like cherry blossoms wait for spring!"

- Sakura to Haruki.

Fanon
Haruki and Sakura are an exceptionally popular pairing due to them being the centre of I want to eat your Pancreas and for having developed an extremely close bond that arguably goes beyond that of love. They have no rival ships since the story entirely focuses on them.

Fans of the pair tend to also ship Kousei Arima and Kaori Miyazono from Your Lie in April due to the similar plot and characters.

Trivia

 * Sakura's name, in Japanese, refers to cherry trees whilst Haruki's name is a reference to spring, which is the season where cherry trees blossom, a fact noted by the characters themselves,