sumayyah (su-may-yah) | she/her| twenty-one | british indian | hijabi | law student | author | the world will carry on turning and i will turn with it | i love you, i love you, i love you | about me | buy me a ko-fi | read my novel
this is my blog. you can find a mix of poetry, short stories, things about my novel, and the random goodness we find in life
the (most frequent) tags
sumayyah’s thoughts: just little random things that pop into my head as the day goes by and I think about life and other things.
sumayyah has opinions: for my more serious posts that will usually be about any issues that i may want to speak about
sumayyah writes: for any poetry or other writing
sumayyah creates: for anything that doesn’t fit into another categories, such as web weaves, calligraphy and moodboards
the happy moments 2023: in 2022, i had a jar full of the good things that happened. it’s now a notebook
the other socials
wattpad: you’ll eventually get all of my poems in one collection as well as my other writings (including short stories) but i’m still writing the majority of them up
instagram: this is literally a highlight reel for my favourite poems that i’ve written, quote compilations and that’s probably it i guess? i don’t really know what i was thinking, i just thought it would be a bit of fun
ko-fi: there’s no obligation for anyone to donate anything, i just thought it would be nice to set up and the money it potentially makes is going to go towards costs associated with going to university (provided i get in)
the important disclaimers
all of my pieces are opinion based. we can disagree, and you can correct me when i am wrong, but i will not tolerate hate. you will be blocked.
i will also not respect anyone who disrespects mine or anyone else’s existence. that means no racism, sexism, homophobia, anti-semitism or islamophobia. if you come into my posts or asks or messages trying to spread hate i won’t hesitate to report you.
i am an adult. however, i don’t want to discuss any nsfw topics or be sent any nsfw content if we’re not mutuals or i haven’t asked. it feels uncomfortable. however, my novel is a ya romance. there are implied sexual scenes. if you don’t want to see the quotes linked to the less mild scenes, blacklist nsfwish.
the warnings
anything you need to be warned for will be. nothing is silly or ridiculous. you can send me an ask (anon is on) or a message, and i will edit previous posts and add it to the list.
some things are warned as being content warnings instead. these are tagged as cw (warning) and are:
vent, family relations
the last thing
i hope you stay. if not on this blog, then here, with the endless list of people who care about you. and if you haven’t heard it today: i love you. thank you for trying.
Max calls Henry into his office the way he has always done every year since he took over as the teacher for Heartbreaker Theory. But for the first time since that very first year, Henry isn’t sure he’s ready. There’s a pit in his stomach and his hands are shoved in his pockets so nobody can notice the way they tremble.
He thinks it’s a little useless to do that though. Max always notices these things. But still, he does it. It brings him a weird sense of comfort.
“I assume you know why we’re here,” Max says once he’s seated.
Henry nods. And then remembers that’s not how this conversation is meant to go. “Yes.”
“I’m assuming I know who it this year, but I’d still like to confirm.”
The thing is, Max doesn’t know. And that’s what makes Henry so anxious. “I’ll be mentoring Tristan.”
“Of course.”
“And Camilla.”
Max stills. “Camilla,” he repeats.
“Yes.” Henry breaks eye contact first. He always has.
“She’s new.”
“You jumped through so many hoops to get her here,” Henry says, all his reasons that he had so carefully formed long forgotten as the need to keep them all safe clouds his judgement and overpowers everything.
“We jumped through many hoops for lots of people who will be joining in the coming years, will you automatically chose them as your mentees when we have no evidence of their skills?” It’s harsh and rude and mocking and Henry wishes the door was open. But it’s weakness to try and open it.
“Camilla is special.”
“We don’t know that yet.”
“I see it in her. The mentoring is my responsibility.”
“Because I allow it to be. I hope you’re not just doing this under some misguided notion of protecting them from your fate.”
“Of course not,” he says, but it’s weak.
Max doesn’t look convinced, but he ends up just sighing. “If she sets a foot wrong-“
“She won’t.”
“How defensive. You’re losing your touch. Although, it’s questionable whether you ever had one.”
Henry swallows, refusing to rise to the bait. “If that’s all?”
Max nods, and he leaves the room calmly. Except he cannot help but worry of what life will look like in five years time after they have both graduated.
He almost wants something impossible to happen so it stops being a concern.
For several years, Ari was the first to read whatever Camilla wrote. Whether she liked it or thought it was awful, the first draft was for her and for him. He never criticised the first draft of anything, aware that the most important thing was that it existed because it could be made beautiful later. All he ever did was ask questions about small details and tell her she was awful for letting someone die or for leaving him on a cliffhanger.
And then she left, and he didn’t even know if she still wrote. But she came back, even if he doesn’t understand why (although he has his suspicions once the fire alarm goes off, and they are confirmed when he finally decides to be brave and look up the school), and he still doesn’t know if she writes. He’s heard that people don’t always want to do the things they loved after trauma.
Despite the fact that she is always dressed for school, he scans her arms and legs for signs of burns and finds none. And he wishes that he could ask, but it’s not his place anymore. And it hasn’t been for a while.
But then it becomes his place once more and she tells him everything. And more than that, she writes. It takes her a little longer to start showing it to him, but once she starts, it is like she cannot stop. And once she starts, he realises just how much of her words are for him. He sees where he has bled into her characters, and it’s an honour he cannot repay.
Except for the fact that he thinks he can. Because Camilla loves him, and he knows that. And Camilla also knows that he loves her. But there is something about the way she’s able to say it that he wants to do too.
And he thinks about the words she wrote at twelve- awkward and stitled and probably terrible. But he thinks of the way she smiled whenever someone praised her. He thinks of the way she smiles when he brings her flowers, and how it’s never been about being good. It’s about being there.
He writes her a poem. It doesn’t rhyme and he’s not sure where the flow of it is and maybe it isn’t even a poem but it’s his and it’s for her and nothing else really matters.
He wants to flee from the room when he hands it to her to read, but he forces himself to stay. He’s glad that he does. Her mouth parts when she realises what she’s been given, and then breaks into a smile. Ari has no clue if she’s finished reading it, but none of that matters because her arms are around his neck and she’s pressing kisses all over his face.
“Thank you. I love you,” she whispers.
And all he needs to do is say it back. Even though she knows.
He shouldn’t. He promised his parents he wouldn’t fall for it, and that even if someone targeted him, he would keep his head high. He would play along, because as much as everyone claims the opposite, it’s the Heartbreakers that have it worse.
But he hadn’t expected it to be Tristan who took an interest. And he had known the whole time how it would end, but it had been too easy to feel wanted and desired and loved. And he had known that Tristan would let him keep that final thing for someone else who actually wanted him.
He just hadn’t expected it to hurt as much as it did.
There’s movement outside the classroom and he tenses. When the light flicks on, he belatedly tries to hide. But it’s not a teacher. It’s a girl.
“I’m Viola,” she says, as though this is a normal meeting. “Do you need something?”
He whimpers. “I just want a hug.”
She settles beside him, pulling him close even though they’ve just met. “I want to destroy him.” It’s said so calmly that Ellias stops sniffling.
“What?”
“The system more than him, but he’s a representation of it all. If he falls, everything else comes tumbling down too. It would never work though. Even with Camilla on my side,” she sighs.
“Camilla? As in-“
“Yes.”
“Well what if it could?”
A small smile spreads across her face. “What if it could indeed?”
Ellias hides again after the police leave. Not that there are many places left where someone can hide, but this is always the part that he’s been good at. Escaping. Making himself smaller. Hiding away where nobody can find him.
He didn’t realise this would happen. Except that maybe he did. Because Tristan was falling apart when they met. Despite everything, Ellias didn’t have the full Nightingale-experience. His body shakes with the weight of his actions. If he had known, he thinks he would’ve still done it all, and he is terrified that makes him an awful person.
“You’re going to need to come back eventually. They need to speak to all of us,” Viola says.
He looks up at her. “I don’t know how to do that,” he whispers.
“One step at a time,” she says, settling next to him. “We did what we had to do.”
“I didn’t think-“ except that he did. “They disowned him.”
“They did.”
“What will he do now?”
“Live.”
Ellias thinks that they too will finally live. He bursts into tears.
When James closes the bedroom door behind him, he sees Victoria hastily wipe at her eyes and let out a shaky exhale, hands clenched into fists and resting by her side. For a moment, he lets himself hope.
“Love?” He asks, trying to be gentle.
“Have I raised a failure?” She asks, her voice wavering slightly.
Sometimes, James doesn’t recognise the woman he married. Except that he does. He knew this about her. He knew that she never wanted to be a mother, that it’s her least favourite title. He’s not sure he ever wanted to be a father. But they had an obligation to their bloodline. Hers more than his.
And now they can do what they would like. They just need Tristan to be good enough.
“Of course not. You’re not capable of that,” he says, hoping to placate her and hating that he feels sixteen again. Younger than his son. His son is so young. He suddenly feels sick. He wants to ask what happened when Tristan threw up moments after stepping through the door but the words get stuck. Ignorance is bliss after all.
“Are you?” She asks, the implications clear. Tristan is a boy.
“I’d like to think not. Victoria. He’s seventeen.”
“When we were seventeen-“
“We wouldn’t want that for him,” James snaps. He never snaps. He hates it.
“Of course not,” Victoria says, a little hurried. For a moment, it’s like she really loves him and not just the idea of him or the person he once was.
“It’ll be fine,” he promises, and it’s far from the first lie he’s told her, but it feels like the worst one.
Months later, they return to the manor again. Their son does not accompany them because he’s not that anymore. He’s just Tristan.
“You told me it would be fine,” Victoria whispers, as they stand in the room that holds all their portraits. Even when he’s been depicted by his parent’s side, Tristan still looks like an outlier.
“Because I really believed it would be,” James says. “We didn’t-we raised him to be good. At this.”
“Then what wrong?” She snaps. “At some point, our son became a failure. And I want to know why.”
“Why does it matter now? It’s not like we’re going to have another heir.”
She stares at him. “You’re just as bad as I am. You know that, right?”
He can’t even deny it. She sighs and leaves the room, and James runs a hand over a painted face, wishing he could hug his son just once more.
Tristan’s fingers trace over the scar on Camilla’s shoulder. There’s another on her stomach, a third on her knee. He presses his lips to the skin. It’s healed. It probably doesn’t even hurt in the cold.
“Do you want to know about them?” She asks, her features illuminated by the lamp. She’d switched it back on when he’d started tossing and turning in the night, and now they’re sat in a comfortable silence as they lay entwined with each other, enjoying the slowness of the night.
They’ve wasted so much time. They won’t waste anymore. He’ll kiss her a thousand times after this, and he doesn’t need to rush.
So he nods, threading his fingers through hers.
“I got this one,” she says, pointing at her shoulder, “when I wanted to impress the boy I had a crush on and fell off a skateboard. But I didn’t want to tell my parents I landed on concrete and had started bleeding because they’d told me I shouldn’t immediately start with the road. And he didn’t even like me back.”
Tristan laughs. “Well, he missed out.”
“I know. And the one on my stomach is from when I had my appendix out. It’s not funny but I didn’t realise it was that until I told mama the painkillers weren’t working and I still had period cramps. When the anaesthesia wore off, they were laughing with the other doctors about how bad my anatomy knowledge is. I felt so loved.”
She’s laughing at herself as she says it, so Tristan smiles and watches her without any shame. “And that last one?”
There’s a sigh. “I was dancing. And then I fell and I thought it would be fine but then I fell again. So.”
“I didn’t know you danced,” he says, thinking back to how she had to join the first years in their classes.
“I don’t,” she admits. “That was half the problem.”
They lapse into silence again. She traces her fingers over his skin, the touch light and hesitant as though she cannot believe this gets to be hers, but he doesn’t tense under it. The way that she touches him is gentle. Loving, he thinks. Not that he would know properly.
“You don’t have any,” she whispers.
It’s half true. There are no marks on his body. His scars are less visible and less healed.
“No.”
“There’s a mole on your leg. Have you head the theory?”
He shakes his head, even though he has, because he wants to hear her say it.
“There’s an idea that you have moles where you were kissed the most in a previous life,” she says, rolling over slightly. She presses a kiss to the area just below his eye. “I want to kiss you so much here that when I find you again next time, I’ll get déjà vu whenever I do.”
And she speaks so beautifully. He doesn’t know how to do that. So he just presses a soft kiss to her shoulder. “And I’ll do it here,” he whispers.
Camilla forgets sometimes, that what she writes is no longer contained to an audience of her closest friends and a few strangers on the internet. She forgets that what she writes can be easily found by unsuspecting strangers scrolling through their algorithm, or by someone looking for a book recommendation based on something else they liked.
She forgets that this new audience also includes her parents. She forgets that, although they don’t always like her posts, or necessarily understand why a piece of dialogue was so significant to so many of the people that read it, that they now read everything she writes.
She thinks they must be compensating. There was a time when she showed them everything she wrote, even the things about pretty boys in her class. And then she had stopped. And it wasn’t their fault, because it wasn’t anyone’s. It was just the way things had to be. Or the way she made them.
But that sounds too much like blaming herself.
So even though the expectations are different now, and she doesn’t have to, she enjoys the aesthetics of the account she keeps for her writing and book-related matters, and so every alternate post is a snippet. A short poem. A few lines that she loves.
It’s something she could automate, or get someone to do on her behalf. Those resources are now hers. But there’s a comfort that comes with doing it herself. It’s far more randomised now than it ever was before. She doesn’t post about the things she feels- good or bad.
But still. It catches her off guard when her parents ask if they can talk. It feels uncomfortable, when they ask about her feelings because she saw what she wrote. But she pushes past it, because it’s their way of showing they care. For compensating for all the years they missed out on when they just thought that she’d stopped writing and never thought to check the truth.
And it feels like an honour, when they ask who inspired the statement and she can tell them proudly and with confidence that it was them. It has always been them.
When Rafael thinks of Tristan, they think of the light. But maybe not the light that comes from the sun, blinding and blistering. Maybe the light that comes from stars stuck to the ceiling. It’s not always visible, but it is always there if you have enough patience to let it come on itself.
And Rafael has learned to be patient. With themselves and everything else.
And Tristan is beautiful when he shines. When he steps up to the table and their eyes meet, and there’s a soft smile before he launches into his prepared statements with hardly a glance at the notes. When he approaches the older man at the law fair even though his hands shake and speaks about the things that matter to him without worrying that he may sound wrong. When he leans into the touches rather than just allowing them, laughing and staying present and not worrying.
When Tristan thinks of Rafael, they also think of the light. But maybe not the light that comes from the stars stuck to the ceiling. Maybe the light that comes from the house without the curtains pulled closed. It’s visible, if you know how to look for it, and it’s also secret after a few moments.
And Tristan has learned to look. At everyone around them and at who they are inside.
And Rafael is perfect when they shine. When they raise their hand in class and give an answer that is right without fearing the way the words tumble from their tongue. When they reach out because they want to touch and they aren’t scared. When they refuse to hide their nails and their necklace, allowing both to be real.
They both used to say that their homes would be filled with light. And it’s funny, how neither of them had realised just how much of that light would come from them.
It creeps up on her slowly, as it always does. One day, it is December, and she is dragging herself from bed like honey falling from a spoon, trying to forget all that this month commemorates. There are no candles before hers, and even on the day she would blow them out, her friends try to avoid the incidents of the previous years.
And every time she goes home, it’s dark, the sky so blue it’s almost black. Every time she goes home, the trees are bare and casting shadows on the footpath, the only light guiding the way the unnatural illumination coming from the streetlights.
As always, her parents come to help her move her things out. They arrive on a Friday evening, and it’s only years of driving down the final roads before their house that allow her to place where she really is without blinking the tiredness from her eyes and asking her parents how long it is till they’re home. Not because she needs the bathroom five minutes after they asked her this question, but because she just wants to know. She has assignments.
The new year begins, as it always must, with fireworks lighting up the sky, the only light left. She sits by the window and watches them, wondering what may be different this year. She thinks she coped better, but she’s not sure anyone else would agree.
She’s not sure how much that matters to her though. It’s a train of thought she doesn’t want to follow, so she focuses back on the flashes of colour. No time zone in America would have reached the new year yet. She wonders if they may be thinking of her, that way that she thinks of them every time something new starts.
Once more, it’s thoughts she’d rather not have. She tries to think of what song she wishes to start her year with, since it’s an important tradition of hers. Normally, she already knows, but this time, she’s not so certain.
When she makes the decision, it feels like the right one.
She’s trying to make more of an effort with her dad. She forgets sometimes, that the things that matter to her matter to him. And whilst it isn’t easy to open up to him, he’s trying to be a better parent, even if she doesn’t need it as much anymore.
Which is why, when she checks where everyone is, and sees that he’s at home whilst her mother is at work, she calls to ask if it’s okay if she comes round to hang out because the house is quiet without Ari.
He’s excited to see her. She tries not to feel too guilty about that. Although she still has her key, it feels wrong to use it. She’s a guest of some kind now. So she rings the doorbell, smiling when her dad opens it.
“Do you want tea?” She asks, after she’s taken her shoes off. She flicks the kettle on before he can even ask.
“If you’re having some, then yes. I need to tell everyone though- my favourite celebrity is in my home, making me tea!” Baba teases.
Her smile falters for a second, and it takes her too long to laugh. “Yeah. Celebrity.”
“Did I say something wrong?”
This is the other thing. He’s far more attuned to her than he once was, and she’s not sure how she feels about that. There was a time when she all wanted was for him to admit that he could see past her lies. And now he does, but that’s more unnerving and uncomfortable than she thought it would be.
“No,” she says, and this time, it’s too quick.
“But did I say something that upset you?” He asks, because even if he can read her, he needs to hear it.
She hesitates, before her face crumples. “I don’t know. I don’t know what’s wrong with me, but when you said celebrity I just-”
Previously, her father only hugged her when she was leaving. And now he hugs her when she’s staying, wrapping his arms around her and petting her hair the way he must have stopped doing once she stopped being a baby. Although, she’s always going to be his baby, even when she has her own at home.
“You don’t need to explain,” he tells her.
She shakes her head. “I’m just scared.”
He pulls away, and sits her down. “Why?”
The kettle comes to a boil. Neither of them move to pour the water.
“I just- I don’t want people to look at who I am in ten years time and say that the me I am now wouldn’t recognise myself. I don’t want to become all the things I’ve hated and criticised. I don’t want to become someone who lets the fame change me.”
“Ten years is a long time. You’re going to change, fame or no fame,” Baba reminds her.
She rolls her eyes, still sniffling. “You know what I mean.”
“I do. But you have to remember that if in ten years’ time, you’re still famous, you’ll have more power than you do now. Which means it will be easier, won’t it?”
“And now?”
He sighs. “You need to decide what you’re willing to sacrifice. Because you’re going to make mistakes and say the wrong thing- that’s just part of life. But nothing you’ve done has ever been that deletable.”
“Deletable?”
“Yes. When celebrities do bad things, and people delete them!”
“Cancel them?”
“Oh. Yes. My point is, you are twisting yourself into knots over nothing. You’re a good person, and you are stubborn, and those are two things that I have every faith nothing will ever be able to change.”
She looks up, aware that her bottom lip is still trembling. “And you’re not just saying that because I’m your daughter?”
“I would never. Not for something like this,” he promises.
She wipes her eyes, and gives him a shaky smile. “You’ve never lied to me before.”
“And I never will,” he vows. “Now, go boil that pani again.”
When Tristan enters the bedroom, Rafael is standing in front of the mirror, turning this way and that. Their hair is the longest that Tristan has ever seen it, starting to curl around the nape of his neck. He likes it. It’s nice, to run his fingers through the soft strands, feeling it between his fingers.
Rafael had liked it too, giggling every time Tristan twirled it around his fingers or called them pretty.
But now, it seems like they hate it. There are tears in their eyes, and they’re frantically tugging on the ends of it, as though making it break free will fix everything.
“What are you doing?” Tristan asks.
Rafael turns, and whatever lie was in the middle of forming on their tongue dies immediately at the real and genuine love and concern all over Tristan’s features.
“Tristan, I hate it,” they confess.
“What?” Tristan asks, because he doesn’t know what Rafael could possibly be referring to. In front of him, stands the most perfect person he has ever known, and the reflection in the mirror has always reflected that.
Nothing about Rafael is worth shedding tears of sorrow over.
“My hair. I hate it. It’s uncomfortable, and it feels wrong and I hate, I hate looking at myself when it looks like this,” they confess.
The solution is right there. “Then cut it,” Tristan says. “I will wash it for you, and then we will cut it until you like it.”
Rafael hesitates. “I can’t.”
Tristan tilts his head slightly. “Why not?”
Rafael’s hands fist into his hair again, and Tristan rushes over to pull them away. Rafael’s nails are cut short once more, to avoid this very thing happening.
“I look too- I don’t- if I cut my hair I’m not-” they can’t form the sentence properly, but Tristan can fill in the blanks.
“You are. You are, no matter how look. Nobody can dictate what this is meant to look like, or what makes you who are you are. If your hair being short is what makes you who you are, then that is all that you have to do. You don’t have to do anything, because none of it matters outside of what is right for you.”
Rafael nods, as though all they needed was the validation. “I don’t have to do anything else,” they repeat.
Their grip in Tristan’s hands has loosened. He leads them both to the bathroom, instructing Rafael to sit on the floor and tilt their head back so their hair drops down. Tristan tests the water against his hand, only bringing it down when it’s warm enough against his skin.
Rafael’s eyes fall closed as Tristan hums a song that he doesn’t know the real lyrics too. Once he’s washed the coconut scented hair mask, he tilts Rafael forward, bringing the bin and the scissors.
“I don’t think I’m going to be very good at this,” Tristan admits. “Maybe it’s best if you do it yourself?”
Rafael shakes their head. “Want you to do it. Please?”
Tristan hesitates, before nodding. “Don’t be angry if it’s bad?”
Rafael smiles, the first once since this began. “I could never be angry with you.” And it is true. They couldn’t.
Tristan takes a deep breath, then gently takes Rafael’s hair between his fingers, and before he can think about it too much, drags the scissors across. As the sound fills the air, Rafael seems to relax.
Tristan keeps going until Rafael tugs his hand away. “I think we’re done.”
At some point, the action had become monotonous. “Oh no,” Tristan says, as he realises how Rafael’s hair now looks.
Rafael laughs. “It really can’t be that bad,” they say, standing up and once again turning this way and that, this time in the bathroom mirror, and this time, without the sadness and anxiety from just an hour before.
“I mean,” Tristan starts. Because it’s very clearly amateur and uneven.
“It’s perfect,” Rafael finishes. Because it is short, and it does not feel like they are pretending to be someone they’re not.
“Really?” Tristan questions, wondering just how bad Rafael’s tastes can be that they can say that.
But Rafael turns, their face bright and their existence completely and utterly perfect. And in that moment, Tristan can see it all. It is perfect.
When Camilla comes home for the holidays, her first since moving away to university, it takes three days before her parents announce that they’ve been invited to some old friend’s house for dinner, and her attendance is expected.
She isn’t working, and they will tell her that her assignments can accommodate one meal- which will certainly become more as the month progresses- so she doesn’t fight them in any way, and just says okay in what she hopes is a neutral enough tone before asking if anyone else has been invited and what she should wear.
As is to be expected, they have no idea about either.
On the day, Camilla’s hands reach out for a shalwar kameez she hasn’t worn since the summer, before it clenches into a fist and she grabs a dress that should hopefully still fit even though it’s a few years old.
Her parents faces do not falter when they see her, although a part of her wishes they would have. She misses the confidence she used to have, even if it was only for one night.
The dinner goes well enough. There’s nobody her own age, but she has no siblings, so she is used to being the youngest person at the table and required to socialise with adults she has little in common with.
And then.
“Oh, you’re just like your mother aren’t you,” one of the guests teases.
Camilla isn’t quite sure they know either of them well enough to make that observation, but still, now, something about it makes her feel warm inside, and she smiles. But the joy doesn’t last long.
Because Divya cuts in sharply. “No she’s not.”
Camilla’s smile drops.
Her dad coughs, a little awkward. “I suppose physically, she’s the spitting image. Although she always says that’s just because she’s a girl, and if we actually looked at each of her features, we would realise she has more of mine.”
And that is something Camilla has said far too many times, so she just lets out a slight laugh. The conversation moves on. The tension doesn’t leave Divya’s shoulders. It also doesn’t leave Camilla’s. They are just alike.
She closes her eyes on the drive home, hoping her parents are still gullible enough to believe that she’s sleeping when she actually just doesn’t want to have any sort of conversations. They aren’t, but they see what she’s doing and let her. It’s the least they can.
Divya heads straight to bed, so Camilla cannot confront her. She actually has no intention of doing so.
But then her dad goes out for something, and Camilla watches as her mother slices the cucumber for a salad in the exact same way she always does, because of her, and the words slip out.
“Is it really such a bad thing that people think I’m like you?”
“What?” Her mother questions.
Camilla sighs. “You’ve done this since I was a kid. Every time someone says I’m like you, you immediately say I’m not.”
“Because you aren’t.”
“So am I a bad person? Or is it really that bad of a thing, to be compared to me?” She asks, and she can feel the funny feeling in her throat coming. But she does not want to cry in front of her mother so soon after the most recent time, so she swallows it down.
“It’s not about me being compared to you. It’s about you being compared to me,” Divya says, her grip on the knife tightening as she refuses to look her daughter in the eye.
“What? No, because I’d love to be compared to you-”
“Well I wouldn’t want you to. When I was younger, all anyone would ever say to me was to wait until I had a daughter like myself. And then I would understand what it was like to be in their position. Then I had you, and the worst thing you ever did was make a mistake. I am not going to let you be dragged through the mud by being compared to me.”
“Mama?” Camilla whispers.
Her mother turns to her, because she would never leave her daughter when she sounds like that.
“I think the worst thing you ever did could not have been as bad as what I did. And I think those people just didn’t know how to parent. Because it’s always been an honour to be compared to you. That’s why I assumed you didn’t want to be compared to me. Because you were always so perfect, and I wasn’t.”
Hearing it from someone who is, in her eyes, still a child, changes something in Divya. She walks to her daughter, and wipes the tears from her eyes. “You are the perfect daughter for me. And those people were your nani and nana, so-”
“Don’t care,” Camilla laughs, a little watery.
“You never do,” Divya teases. “I hope your daughter is just like you,” she says, and that is not teasing.
“I hope so too. Because then she’ll be just like her nani as well,” Camilla says.
happy fourth anniversary, the heartbreaker's handbook <3
10.07.26
it’s been four years, which is weird. because if thh was a child, they’d be starting school in september. and also, so much has changed between last anniversary and this one- the main thing being the number of aus increasing, and me finding a job and still, it doesn’t matter how much changes, i always come back.
because thh is still a piece of me. i talk about it with everyone. i tell them what i think the characters would be doing now (camilla would be getting published, tristan would’ve gotten into law school, adelaide would be learning how to cope with the work she does, viola would be wondering what could be done with the land, ellias would be picking up his paints again, jonathan would be learning he made the right choice), because they’ve grown up with me.
i’ve also been working on lots of other random and private things. so there’s less bonus scenes than last year, but i’m allowing myself that. this was always just meant to be fun. and there’s also going to be some insight into their text messages, which i’m very excited for, so stay tuned.
(and also, happy third anniversary my zerobaseone. it’s an honour to share this day with you.)
tw: implied disordered eating, please click the read more for what i wanted to say in relation to this poem
because i want to remind everyone that i am full of spite.
because i want to prove i can do it again.
because i want to run late and run for the bus or the train or whatever it is and laugh, not feel like i am dying.
because i want to walk without that burning sensation in my leg.
because i want to have a concert whilst i am washing my hair without feeling weak in the knees.
because i want to be happy.
because i get one life and one body and i did not get through everything else just to give in to this.
because i want to feel something other than irritation and tiredness.
because i want to be the friend they deserve.
because i want him to run his fingers through my hair and find it to be soft, not brittle or coming away with every touch.
because i want to dance.
because i want to look back at the photos of all the things i did because i had the strength, and not all the things i missed.
because i want to be the person i deserve to become.
because i want them to know this will always be the least interesting thing about them.
because i want to break the cycles.
because i want to change the recurring themes when i am thought of.
because i want it to become something less than a win to be celebrated.
because i want to be better than all the people i have criticised for doing this.
because i want to join in fully.
because i want to show that i am not a hypocrite.
because i want to stop being the reason they worry.
because i want to sleep without feeling empty, and wake up without that stomach ache.
because i want to listen to those cues without shame.
because i want to believe that there is more than this.
because i want to look in the mirror and see myself staring back, not a ghost that i cannot recognise.
because i want to buy new clothes when i need and want to without thinking about what it might mean.
because i want to be more than numbers and statistics.
because i want to do an infinite number of more important things.
because i want to remember that nothing tastes as good as life feels..
an incomplete list of reasons i will recover
the final line is a play on the saying that nothing tastes as good as skinny feels, because for some reason, that seems to be circulating again, despite it being a complete lie. the most important things in life must be felt, and part of feeling something is tasting it.
i want to say i only stopped posting because i had nothing to say. and partly, that's true. but part of why i had nothing to say was because i was so tired all of the time. and i was tired because i wasn't eating, and even when i was, it wasn't enough. that's all i'm going to say about my habits. i think sharing anything more than that is irresponsible. whatever i did, it's in the past, even if it was only a few days ago that i fully committed to getting better. i used to think i had no right to say that there was something wrong, because it was never that bad, and i was never diagnosed. but that doesn't matter. other people were worse and more ill than me, but other people were also better and more healthy than me.
i felt like i was thirteen again. in some ways i am, because coming home always causes me to regress. but this time, there is no moving out at the end of september. i got better whilst i was away from everything that made me worse. and now it's time for me to get better despite everything that makes me worse. i did it once, slightly, when i realised that there was no future if i didn't. i'm going to do it again, because again, there is no future without that.
i am not saying i will be perfect. truthfully, it's going to be harder now than it was then. but i don't want to reach my old age and still think the most important thing i ever did was what led to backhanded compliments about my look. i am more than my appearance. i am an artist, a writer, a smart and funny person.
like i said. i want to be able to dance. i want to be able to read multiple chapters without forgetting what's happening or losing focus. i want to be able to write. i'm admitting it got bad because it's never as scary as it seems, and i want to be the proof that it's never too late and you're never too old.
it was scary, losing my period again, and it was scary, feeling so agitated about everything.
but i have good friends that remind me i am more than this, and they are why i was able to write this. you know who you are, and i wanted to say thank you. because that's what led to this final realisation:
or, in another universe, there are flowers growing in tristan's lungs. and though they are beautiful, he cannot breathe.
tw: major character death, depictions of vomiting, sexual content
note: in this universe, hanahaki is developed as a result of extremely strong uncommunicated feelings and it is nothing to do with whether it is requited or not
the original document was called: fall in love, like petals falling around (or: there are flowers growing in tristan’s lungs. and though they are beautiful, he cannot breathe. even more clearly: tristan has hanahaki for camilla. it goes about as well as it can)
There are flowers suffocating Tristan’s lungs.
Or more accurately, flower seeds have been planted. It’s the one mercy this sickness grants people. Time. He knows that there are seeds that have been planted, because every breath feels a little more restrictive. Not a lot. Just a little.
Almost like the start of a panic attack. This sickness is supposed to remind the patient that they cannot survive like this. But Tristan has survived panic attacks. He has survived things far worse than a slight pain in his ribcage every time he tries to inhale. So he knows he can survive this too.
And that is not to be egotistical. He knows that this will kill him eventually. But not yet. And that is all that matters.
So he spits his toothpaste out, wincing slightly as he stands. His face is not red. He watches the muscles of his body as he takes ten deep breaths in and out. There will be no discomfort visible when he is dressed.
And that is what matters. There is nobody who would be seeing him in a state of undress.
Just to be safe, because he is unsure of how fast this will progress, he ignores the white shirt he had hung up the night before. He pulls a black one from the wardrobe instead. It will hide the stains better.
He tells himself the sudden tightness he feels as he remembers that it is Camilla’s favourite shirt of his is all in his head. Because that’s where everything he has felt is. And this is no different. (Except it is. Because the seeds are in his lungs).
The buttons are done incorrectly. He doesn’t notice, so distracted by the time- where had it all gone, he was sure he had more left- that he just grabs his things and runs out the door. He can’t run to work. He will tell himself it’s because of his ankle.
He arrives right on time. Late, by his standards.
“Tristan!” Camilla says, as he walks in. His breath catches in his throat as he realises just how beautiful she looks. Because everything looks pretty when you love it. She notices his state. “Is everything okay?”
For a moment, the seeds are enough to choke him to death. She knows. She knows, and she’s going to ask him who it is. She’s going to realise when he doesn’t answer that it’s her. He can see it all so clearly it’s painful. Camilla will not let him be a patient. She will ask him to be honest, even though she can’t return it. He cannot let that happen.
He starts to search for an excuse, when he realises that she’s looking at his shirt. Maybe his hair. She does not know what is wrong. Just that something is.
“Oh, yeah. It’s fine. I just- I didn’t sleep very well. Sorry. Was everyone waiting for me?”
“You say that like it’s a bad thing,” she laughs.
He wishes, just for a moment, that he could spend a day living like her. He wouldn’t survive it. She has so much love in her heart that it would- it would choke him. And there is so much bravery in her step that he would run. But existence isn’t a burden to her. It seems so beautiful.
“I don’t want to delay things,” he justifies. It’s pathetic, even for him.
She shakes her head. “It’s okay. Promise. Just- we have clients. You should fix your shirt before you go in.”
And because he was foolish enough to get sick, he does it right in front of her.
Her eyes flick down and then up. He doesn’t even notice. Because she has never looked at him like he is something to be consumed. She has only ever looked at him like he was something to admire. Like he was art.
It’s funny. He likes the weight of her eyes on him. It makes him feel like he could be something beautiful. It is also the most disgusting thing he has ever known. It makes him feel like he could be something worth saving.
Their meeting is fine. His other friends have one eye on him. When he flattens his hair, they stop looking so intensely. Only Ellias’ eyes linger. Because Ellias has been where Tristan currently sits. He knows, better than anyone, what it looks like.
When their guest leaves, nobody stands up.
Camilla lets out a giggle. “I can’t believe we did that.”
“I can,” Viola says. “We’re a group of highly qualified individuals. There was no way we weren’t getting it.”
“I know, I know. But imagine! We get to make an entire series together. It’s going to be so much fun!” She says.
Jonathan laughs. “You won’t be saying that when Ellias illustrates something differently to how you imagined it.”
She flings a pen at him. “Shut up. I respect Ellias’ artwork.”
Ellias doesn’t respond.
Adelaide looks up from the meeting notes she has just finished taking. “El? Is everything okay?”
Ellias tears his gaze away from Tristan’s chest. “It’s fine. Does anyone want anything from the café? I didn’t have time to make coffee before I left.”
Camilla chooses to not comment on the mostly full thermos he’s left on his desk. She doesn’t know whether or not she should regret that. “Can you get me an iced latte?”
He nods, and then the others give their coffee orders.
She stands up. “I’ll come with you and help you carry them.”
“I wanted Tristan to come,” Ellias says. It’s sharper than usual. And Tristan knows then. Ellias knows. Because of course he does.
Jonathan and Adelaide look at each other. As do Viola and Camilla. They all think they’re being subtle.
Ellias scoffs. “I’m not going to confess again. We’ll be fine. Nobody needs to worry.”
Tristan squirms in his seat. Camilla’s eyes lock with his. “He’s right. We’ll be fine. You can sit down.”
He can’t risk her finding out. So before anyone else can protest, he leaps from his seat. Even Ellias seems taken aback by his speed. When Tristan grabs his wrist with a gentleness that is almost enough to have him falling again, it all comes crashing down around him.
It would be foolish to believe Tristan’s flowers were for him. Especially when he was so determined to get away from the one person who had never looked at him with anything other than quiet acceptance and love.
“Does she know?” Tristan asks, as soon as they exit the office. It’s selfish. To immediately make it about himself and his concerns. But he can’t listen to Ellias lecture him about what he needs to do. He knows. He just won’t.
“Of course she doesn’t. If she did, she wouldn’t have let you come with me. And before you ask, Jonathan, Viola and Adelaide have no clue either.” His tone is harsh. The heat rises to Tristan’s cheeks as he realises it was intentional. He hadn’t even considered them.
“So how did you know?” He asks. He needs to know. Needs to be able to hide it from everyone else.
Ellias blinks. When his eyes open, meeting Tristan’s, it’s colder than Tristan has ever seen him. He hopes it never happens again. “Like calls to like. Tristan.”
Tristan swallows the lump in his throat. “El. I’m sorry.”
Ellias turns away from him. “I don’t know how many more times I will tell you that I do not want or need your apology.”
“I know. I’m- but El- it’s-”
“Please. Don’t call me that. I’m telling you that I know for my own selfish reasons. You have to tell her. It’s not healthy. Your feelings for people, no matter who they are, should never be so intense but so unknown that it makes you sick. It’s an awful thing to do to yourself.”
Tristan wishes that he could reach out and pull Ellias into his arms. That he could do what lovers would do. That he could let Ellias bury his head in his shoulder and cradle the back of his head. That he could kiss the top of his hair and whisper sweet nothings and make it all better.
But Ellias didn’t take the operation. So whilst he’s not sick anymore, the feelings- all of them- are still there. It would be crueller to comfort him.
All Tristan can do is sigh. Then let Ellias order all the coffees, smiling slightly when the barista asks if the iced latte is with oat milk, and tap his card before Ellias even has time to process what happened.
“That’s not going to do anything,” Ellias says, as they wait.
“I didn’t do it like that,” Tristan lies. It should be scary. How easily he can lie to someone who loves him.
“Didn’t you? I’m not going to tell Camilla. Or anyone else. Not right now.”
“Are you blackmailing me?” He doesn’t bother asking how he knows it’s Camilla. Of course he knows. It was part of their conversation. Back when it was Ellias vomiting the most beautiful white rose petals Tristan had ever seen.
“No. I’m letting you have autonomy. Besides, me telling Camilla wouldn’t help. It has to come from you.”
There is a tight feeling in Tristan’s throat. For one stupid moment, he wonders if the disease has spread faster. And then he realises it is nothing do with Camilla and everything to do with Ellias. Ellias, who expects that he would tell her. “I’m not- I’m not going to tell her.”
Ellias whips his head around so fast that Tristan wants to reach out and soothe the pain that must have hit his neck. He doesn’t, of course. “Tristan.”
“I can’t.”
“You won’t.”
“Ellias,” he says, through gritted teeth. “It’s my decision. It’s not like you told me as soon as the seeds formed.”
It’s a horrible thing to say. Ellias flinches away. Tristan doesn’t apologise. It’s better, if Ellias finds it easier to hate him. Before he can say anything in retaliation, the barista calls out their order. He pushes past Ellias with more force than is needed.
Their walk back to the office is silent. As they enter the building, it is strangely silent. There is nobody playing music that they all claim helps them focus, but only ever hinders their work. There isn’t even the chatter they pretend will help them design or write, but is actually just gossip about once mutual friends that only some people are still in contact with.
Ellias stops him from walking down the corridor where their current room is located. Tristan lets him, well aware of what they’re going to do. As Ellias starts putting his feet down with more force, he follows. The noise doesn’t travel enough to let them know what people are saying, but it is enough to let them know that they’re speaking.
It comes to an awkward stop as Tristan pushes the door open. He sets Adelaide and Jonathan’s coffees in front of them, smiling when they say thank you. Ellias does the same to Viola and Camilla, who are both more grateful than normal.
Ellias rolls his eyes at that. Tristan is the only one who sees. He pretends not to.
“What were you discussing? Sounded very… lively,” Ellias asks, leaning against his desk.
“Just when the best time to host auditions would be,” Viola says. It’s too smooth.
“Oh, really? When would that be?” He follows up.
Viola meets his eyes. “We were waiting for you to come back so we could discuss it further.”
Ellias looks between Viola and Jonathan. Whatever he was searching for, he finds in Jonathan’s features. He sighs. “I’m going to the bathroom. We’ll discuss it- for the first time- when I come back.”
Jonathan winces as he leaves. “Sorry.”
“Don’t be. If it wasn’t you, it would’ve been me,” Camilla says. She has never hidden her expressions. Tristan has always believed that was just as tragic as him forever hiding his own.
“So, what were you actually talking about?” He asks.
“You, obviously,” Camilla says. “We didn’t know how the coffee run was going to be.”
“You don’t need to worry about us. I promise,” he says, softening his tone, just for her.
She doesn’t look convinced. “It can’t be easy, though. For either of you.”
Tristan sighs. Something about the way Camilla never runs from her feelings makes him feel like he has to be honest. If only because he does not know how he would cope if she caught him in a lie. He tells himself that hiding is different to lying. He ignores how Camilla detests the convenience of framing something as omission.
“It’s not. But we’re getting there. We had a nice conversation about the future on the way to the coffee shop. He’s almost ready to start dating again. And I’m almost ready to stop feeling guilty.” He has no idea why he says any of that. It’s not even a lie of omission. It’s just flat out and complete untruth.
Camilla smiles. That is real and true. “I’m happy for him. And you. I get why you felt guilty. You shouldn’t have, but I understand.”
He tenses. “Do you?”
She nods. “Well, not fully. Nobody’s ever had- I’ve never been the cause. But I don’t think I’d be able to forgive myself if I was. I just- I would never want someone to go to such lengths to hide their feelings from me that they got so sick. I would never want to be the kind of person that someone else is so afraid of approaching with the truth that they just let themselves be pushed to the breaking point before they did it.”
It’s like all his worst fears have come to life. He thought that had already happened. Maybe it had. Maybe this was the thing he couldn’t even imagine because it was a form of self-torture that not even his mind was capable of.
But he’s been silent for too long, because Camilla suddenly comes back to herself. “Not that you-”
“I know, I know. Don’t worry. I know what you mean.”
She laughs. It’s a short and almost awkward sound, but it’s also the most charming noise Tristan can imagine. “You somehow always do.”
It would be so easy. He could do it, regardless of the audience that have started whispering to each other in an attempt to make it seem like they’re not eavesdropping. He could do it, regardless of the rejection that would ensue.
But he doesn’t. Because he cannot. “Yeah. I guess.”
Ellias chooses to open the door at that very moment. That moment, because he had been waiting outside. It was not his fault that none of them bothered to wait for his footsteps to go outside earshot before they started speaking.
When Tristan looks grateful, he turns away. He does not want anything from Tristan.
Least of all his gratitude.
There are flowers suffocating Tristan’s lungs.
Or more accurately, roots have started to form around them.
He hasn’t told anyone what’s wrong. Ellias knowing does not count, because Ellias was not told.
Normally, at this stage, there would be a doctor’s appointment. A consultation about the three available options. First, they would discuss the merits of telling someone, heavily glossing over all the things that could go wrong.
A life that could be lived. The security of knowledge. Potentially returned feelings. If nothing else, if everything fell apart, they would be alive, and not everyone could say that. It was a slow suicide, to avoid confession. Harsh doctors would say that dying because of uncommunicated feelings for another person was a pathetic way to go. The ones that were training whilst Tristan was in school had been softened. Now they said that the guilt that the other person would feel should be enough to make them change their mind.
Tristan would have rather been told he was a disappointment than be told that Camilla would feel guilty. Of course, this isn’t a prevalent issue for him. Given that there is no doctor’s appointment planned.
Then, the operation was mentioned. It was never recommended. Having to go into someone’s mind, and remove the very part of the brain that created feelings so strong they could cause such serious sickness, was invasive. There was a chance that, alongside the feelings for the individual, other feelings would be ruined. That whilst they may never experience anything for the person making them unwell, they may never experience anything for anyone who came after. It worked, when the feelings were of intense rage. It was less beneficial, when it was love.
In the worst cases, it wasn’t just the feelings for the person that had to be removed. It was the association with other items. Tristan was not delusional. Not about matters related to Camilla.
Everything reminded him of her.
When he saw the way the sunflowers turned to the sky, he would think of how he always managed to turn and face her, even when someone else was speaking. He would hear that someone in the coffee shop ordered a latte with oat milk, and he would remember when Camilla spat coffee on her laptop because it had been made with almond. He would buy strawberries in summer, and as the taste exploded in his mouth, he would think about how he would need to give them up if Camilla ever kissed him. It would be easy. He would give up anything if it meant Camilla’s mouth met his. He would live, and Camilla would find a way into his every move.
He thinks, that if he were to take the operation, they would have to remove his association with everything in the world. He would need to start life over. What a tragedy it must have been, to live an entire life, and never once meet her.
But obviously, there would be no operation. Because Tristan was a master in the art of suffering without showing. Unless people knew exactly what they were looking for. He would learn, soon enough, that more than a few people did.
The last option was death. This was always glossed over. Even the harshest of doctors would not find the silver lining there.
Tristan could see it quite easily. He wouldn’t have to live to see a changed relationship with Camilla. Unfortunately, the one person who knows and understands what he’s going through, does not quite agree with the sentiment.
Ellias has been pushing him to tell Camilla. Tristan is going increasingly frustrated with this. And like all things, he too reaches a point where there is no more room for growth. Instead of imploding, as he had hoped he would, he explodes.
“You of all people should understand why I don’t want to confess to someone who doesn’t love me back,” Tristan yells. He should have known, when Ellias invited him so they could get some extra work done for the show, that they wouldn’t be working. He should have left, when Ellias opened the door and nobody else was there- not even Viola, who was always the earliest. He should have told Ellias to stop discussing the matter because he simply couldn’t handle it when Ellias sat him down to eat dinner, not even bothering to pretend that they would work.
He should have, he should have, he should have.
He should have stopped himself falling in love with Camilla. Because that was what he had done. Like the way the leaves were falling from the trees, like the way he fell asleep, he had fallen in love with her. Slowly, and then all at once.
He should have been honest with her, instead of losing his temper with the only person who could understand.
But he didn’t. And he did.
Ellias takes two steps back. For a moment, there is undeniable sadness and hurt. Then his face hardens. “Get out.”
Tristan’s heart cracks. It does not break. Because for it to break, it would have needed to work in the first place. And for it to break, even if he does not want to admit it, the words would have to come from Camilla.
“Ell-” Tristan starts.
“No. I don’t want to hear it.”
“Ellias. You can’t keep telling me what to do. I’m not you.”
“I’m telling you, because I am trying to help you. Nobody else gets what it’s like. I do. I made the mistakes that you are making, and look at me now. I’m just trying to help you.”
“Stop,” he begs. Except, it does not sound like begging. It sounds like a command. The truth is that he cannot hear Ellias talk about how he will suffer if he doesn’t do the one thing that will save him. But he will not hear it. He can’t.
“Fine,” Ellias says. “Die. Or lose everything. See if I care.”
He doesn’t mean it. How could he mean it? At one time, one that may not have ever finished, Ellias loved him. And Tristan knows, better than anyone else, that if you ever love someone, you will wish for a thousand curses. But you will not wish for death. But the words process at the same time. They cannot be taken back.
Tristan crossed the line first. But Ellias crossed it without being able to turn back.
The door slams. They both cry.
The office is quiet the next day. Ellias and Tristan refuse to speak and pretend that they can’t see their friends worrying. The tightness in Ellias’ lungs is a phantom reminder of what had happened just a few months ago. The tightness in Tristan’s is worse than the opening notes of a panic attack. He tells himself it is nothing more than a physical ache caused by the argument with Ellias.
But he tires more quickly. It sometimes hurts to laugh. And he knows, that because of Ellias, and because his friends love him, that it is only a matter of time before everyone else realises what is wrong with him.
Adelaide and Viola are the first to confront him. Ellias is in a meeting with someone who is involved with the show. Jonathan and Camilla have gone to go and get them all coffees. It’s almost funny. Ellias confessed on a coffee run. At one point, everyone thought Jonathan would have too. And then they realised that it was a purer form of affection than love, what he had for her.
“You’re unwell,” Viola states. She has never shied away from anything in her life. She probably never will. That is where her and Camilla differ, despite how similar they sometimes are. Camilla always falters when she has to look someone in the eye. Viola wavers even less with someone starting back at her.
He wants to deny it. But he has no leg to stand on. “Yes.”
“Do you know what you’re going to do?” Adelaide asks.
“I’m sure you have opinions on that,” he says.
Viola raises an eyebrow. “You can’t hide it forever.”
“Does she know?” He asks. That’s the thing. People are incapable of seeing the bigger picture. But whilst they can see enough to still be happy and content with their lives, they often miss the things that are right in front of them. Which means that whilst everyone else could see the love that made Tristan’s eyes sparkle whenever they fell on Camilla, she always assumed it was a trick of the light.
Adelaide shrugs. “Yes and no. She has a suspicion that something is up. But she doesn’t know who for, which means she has no idea it’s for her.”
He nods. “Good.”
Viola sits beside him. She had been standing before. He knows that means she’s about to say something she knows he won’t like. She does that. She gets on people’s levels, and she treats them like she loves them, and then she says the one word they do not want to hear. “She’s going to find out eventually.”
“Not if I get my way,” he says.
Before either of them can retaliate, the door swings open. Jonathan is carrying half the coffees. His face says he knows exactly what was happening before they came in. But he’s not like the rest of them.
He lets Tristan come to him first. It’s that trust that makes Tristan go to him that same day. Or more accurately, he calls Jonathan to his.
“I have Hanahaki Disease. Because my body cannot physically take the weight of my lack of confession,” he says, once Jonathan sets his mug down and stares at him expectantly.
It’s strangely freeing to say it. Because, finally, he gets to tell someone. He is doing it on his own terms. And Jonathan, for better or for worse, trusts him. To make whatever decision he wishes to. Even if he disagrees.
Jonathan nods. “I was waiting for you to tell me.”
And Tristan knew this, but he’s still curious. “Why?”
“Because it’s your sickness. It’s up to you to decide what you’re going to do, and when. And all that includes who you tell, and when.”
Tristan fights back tears. “Jonathan.”
“You don’t need to have all the answers right now. But I know you, so I think I might know what you’re going to do.”
Tristan nods. “You do know me. Better than anyone. So I think you may be right. But I may-”
“You don’t need to lie. And I don’t know you better than anyone. That privilege goes to Camilla.” He’s not being sarcastic, when he calls it a privilege. And he’s not angry. He’s glad actually. That weight would have crushed him.
Tristan laughs. “She doesn’t know how much I love her.”
Jonathan’s smile turns sad. “That’s the first time you’ve admitted it.” He doesn’t need to say it may be the last.
Camilla notices the smallest things about Tristan. She notices when it’s the day before he’s going to wash his hair, because it will seem less fluffy than usual. She notices when his smile doesn’t quite reach his eyes. She notices when the old ankle injury he has from a swimming incident he never discusses is acting up because he always subconsciously crosses his feet at the ankles and taps it. She notices when he fell asleep with his glasses on because of the lines on his face, and when he looked at the screen for too long without them because of the way he rubs his forehead. She notices when his joy is only because he doesn’t want to worry them, and when his anger is there to mask his sadness.
But the thing about noticing the small things is that sometimes, the big things slip by.
Which means she is the only one without knowledge of his condition. Despite the concerned glances everyone has been exchanging every time Tristan coughs, she still hasn’t realised. She still doesn’t know that it’s all for her. That he has always been hers.
Until.
“Is Tristan unwell?” She asks, randomly, one day, whilst he’s in a meeting with the sponsor for their show.
“What makes you ask that?” Jonathan asks, eying Ellias, whose face remains passive.
“Don’t be stupid. We’ve all seen him.”
“Have you tried asking him directly?” Ellias asks, tone cold.
Camilla rolls her eyes. “Like he’d tell me himself.”
“Did you give him the opportunity to?”
“Oh come on Elli, like he’d ever-”
“What’s going on?” Tristan asks, walking into the room, even though he’s almost completely certain he already knows.
“Camilla wants to know if you’re sick,” Ellias reveals, a little too gleeful.
Her head whips around. “Ellias.”
“I was going to tell you,” Tristan says. It’s slightly pathetic.
“Everyone else knew?” She asks.
He nods, even though it’s clear she doesn’t really the need the confirmation. Refusing to react just felt condescending.
“Okay,” she says quietly. “What is it?”
“You know what it is,” he says. Because he has said it once. He cannot say it again.
She swallows. “How far?”
“Roots,” he says. It all feels more real, now that she knows.
“What are you going to do?” She asks. And the thing is, when Camilla asks, Tristan suddenly realises that she doesn’t know it’s her. She’s not just being polite. She genuinely does not know. And because she does not know, she does not have an answer in her mind. She has a fear and a hope, but not an answer.
“I’ll tell them,” Tristan lies. Because he doesn’t have to look at her whilst he says it, because she is not looking at him.
She looks up from the floor. “Thank you. And I’m sorry they made you feel like that.”
He shrugs. “It’s more me than them.”
She shakes her head. “You’re not a coward.”
Except that he is.
She leaves to go to the bathroom, and comes back with eyes that are red. He apologises for not telling her a few more times, but on the third time her acceptance comes with enough force that he knows he needs to give it time.
And by time, he turns up outside her apartment door that very evening with her favourite sushi. He knows that she wouldn’t have eaten, worried sick for him. But not so sick that there would be flowers growing in her lungs. Never that sick.
He lets himself in. The spare key is in the place she told him it would be, all that time ago.
“Tristan?” She calls out. Her voice sounds distant.
“Yeah,” he answers.
She exits the bedroom, already dressed in a mismatched pair of pyjamas he knows she’s had since she was in college. She’s just as beautiful as always.
“What are you doing here?” She asks.
“I brought sushi for dinner,” he says, even though that’s not a real response.
“I’m not hungry.”
“You need to eat something.”
She stares, as though she wants him to question why he thinks he would be entitled to say that to her. He just stares back until she sighs and gets two glasses and two plates from the kitchen and sets them down on the living room coffee table.
He divides the portions evenly. She doesn’t pick any up, even after Tristan eats two rolls to encourage her.
He breaks the other pair of chopsticks and holds it out to her. “Eat.”
She takes it. Once she’s swallowed, she stares at his hand for a few seconds. “I didn’t know you’d learnt to use chopsticks.”
It had been because of her. The time she had been unwell and unable to stomach any warm food, he’d been the one to bring her sushi. In her sickness, she’d been refusing to eat. And Tristan knew it wasn’t just to be difficult. It was because she was scared. But he couldn’t use the chopsticks, and every roll fell apart on the fork. So he’d fed her by hand. And afterwards, it took days to try and forget how her mouth felt around his fingers.
“I figured it was time I learnt,” he says.
She nods.
“I’m sorry for not telling you,” he whispers.
“Then why didn’t you?” She asks, a little harsher than she intends to. “I’m sorry. It’s just that, everyone else knew. How come I didn’t get to know? Do you not trust me as much? It’s okay if that’s the case, I just thought-”
“I do trust you!”
“Then why?”
“Because it was embarrassing to admit to you. Ellias, Adelaide didn’t even let me tell her and Viola was there too. They worked it out and confronted me. Jonathan is- he’s Jonathan. But you’re you. I wanted more time to work it out. Because I knew you would blame her- the other person. But they’re not in the wrong. It’s me.”
Camilla focuses on the fact he did not want her to. “Half our friends worked it out themselves? So they worked it out and didn’t say anything?”
He wants to tell her it was all of them. But that would be cruel. And he has done enough to her already. “I didn’t want them to. And you would have noticed. I just- I didn’t want you to. Because you were the only other person who would have given me the grace to tell you when I was ready to tell you.”
“Did I take that from you? Today?”
The truth is, she did. In part. If Tristan had gotten what he wanted- which is something he’s never had, no matter how many times he came close- she would have never discovered the truth. But seeing her, here and now, he can understand that would have been unfair. “Not really. No. I was going to tell you today anyways.”
She doesn’t seem convinced, but she nods. “Okay.”
It’s silent for a few moments. She takes another few bites of her dinner. More than half her plate is still left.
Tristan watches her. Like always.
“What would someone vomit? If it was you?” He asks. He needs to know. Needs to be sure that when the time comes, they will be beautiful to her.
“That’s not funny. They wouldn’t. I wouldn’t let them,” she says, with a little too much sharpness.
“Camilla,” he whispers.
And for a moment, she lets herself dream that the way he says her name really is like a prayer. She lets herself dream that this conversation is taking place just a few moments before Ellias stopped vomiting magnolias. And then she brings herself back to the moment, where Tristan is just curious and trying to distract himself. And Ellias stopped vomiting magnolias well before.
“If they knew me- like really knew me properly- forget-me-nots,” she says. “They’re impossible to get into a bouquet on their own. That’s why I tell people my favourite flowers are lilies. So they won’t go after something they can’t find.” She stands and walks to the kitchen with both plates. She cannot look at him and say that they were her favourite when she realised his eyes matched them perfectly. She cannot look at him and say they still are. Not when she knows she doesn’t love him anymore. And certainly not when he’s so sickly in love with someone else.
There are flowers suffocating Tristan’s lungs.
Or more accurately, flowers have started to blossom there.
He knows this, because there are petals lining his sink.
They are the dreadful white of a blooming lily. And not the perfect blue of a forget-me-not. He knows there must be more seeds growing. That the disease preys on what lies in your mind and shows you that every good thing can be turned awful if it festers. He cannot help but be angered by the sight of the petals. He was supposed to know everything about her. He was supposed to know her the best.
If Camilla found out, she would reject him. Not simply because she made him lose his breath. But because he couldn’t do it correctly.
Tristan had been angry with Ellias. Not because Ellias loved him so much the weight of it crushed his lungs. But because the flowers that bloomed proved what Tristan had always feared. That Ellias loved the version of him that was more unwell and more desperate and more in need of saving than any person should have ever been. That when Ellias turned and looked at him, he saw Victoria’s son before he saw Tristan.
Camilla is too good to be angry. She will just be sad that Tristan ended up so unwell over someone he did not know properly. And disappointed that even the person who loved her the most could not identify her flower.
He does not vomit anymore that day. Not even when he sees Camilla’s hair has been tied with a scrunchie that is a blue that matches his eyes.
But he vomits the next day. Twice before he leaves, and twice when he returns. He knows that Ellias knows what is happening. And he knows it is only a matter of time before everyone else discovers it too. He swallows too frequently, knowing it will just be worse later. But there’s so little time left for him. He must make it worth it.
The third night, he hardly sleeps. Camilla’s birthday is in December- like his. And so every year, they buy her a bouquet of roses in a different colour. Every year, she dries half of it and puts it in a vase she keeps in her bedroom. In an interview, she said it was one of the three things she would rescue in a fire.
Her favourite ones were the pale pink ones. And he knows this because he handed them to her, so aware of how intensely she smiled as she received them. He does not know it was because she knew the person who chose them was the one who handed them.
And now, in addition to the white of the lilies, there is the pink of the roses. He wonders if Camilla would take the petals to decorate her room with. If she would realise the truth if he said the flowers he got to brighten up his apartment wilted, and he wanted her to have the memories. He wonders if Ellias would paint them in the morbid way he always did.
In his dreams, there are petals stuffed down his throat. The autopsy shows them all. Camilla calls them beautiful, even though she hates him for what he has done to all of them.
He wakes up sweating.
He vomits without even moving from the bed.
There are only rose petals.
The sand starts to sift even faster than before.
He forgot, at the start, that Hanahaki is obvious. That it causes tension. That it creates problems. He has to leave the room a few times whilst he’s at work. Every time, somebody almost stands to go after him. They are becoming aware of how fast it is progressing. They are unaware of the proper timeframe. Their one experience with Ellias ended long before Tristan’s stage.
Awfully, Tristan wonders what else Ellias would have vomited had he not confessed when he did. If it would have been his favourite asters, or if it would have been the tulips he hated since Stefan ruined his life. He thinks it would have been tulips. Because Ellias liked him when he was breaking. And nothing before Camilla had broken him quite as much as that.
It is Ellias who leans against the sink when Tristan leaves the stall to wash his hands and rinse his mouth out. Tristan wants to say something incredibly crass about where Ellias stands. But he has told enough lies.
“What are you doing here?” He asks. His unspoken question, of how much Ellias heard, is one he is too proud to ask.
“The thing that nobody else wants to,” Ellias says.
“You’re not going to change my mind,” Tristan says.
Ellias rolls his eyes. “That’s not where I’m here to do. Open your mouth.”
“Excuse me?”
“You heard me.”
Tristan does as he’s asked, even if he feels ridiculous. Ellias makes a non-commital sound. “It’s going to start having a long-term impact if you don’t speak something. You know they prescribe soothing medication. So the repeated vomiting doesn’t completely wear you down.”
“I’m not going to the doctors,” Tristan reminds him.
Ellias acts like he hasn’t heard. “But sometimes the medication can have side effects, so you should really follow the instructions that come with it to avoid it making things worse.”
“Ellias,” Tristan says.
He finally looks up. “What?”
“You can’t ask me to go to the doctors. Not when they’re going to try and save me.”
“You’re not supposed to die for love,” he says. “You’re supposed to live for it.”
But he’s missing the point. There is no love for Tristan to live for. He doesn’t look at Ellias as he washes his hands. He is too much of a coward to do so. Ellias sighs, once, loudly. “Do you honestly think this is the best course of action?”
“It’s the only course of action,” he says.
Ellias hits him. It’s a light touch. Barely there. But Tristan is weaker now. For a range of reasons. He stumbles back slightly. Ellias hits him again, but his hands are trembling. Tristan knows he needs this. Needs to know that Tristan is still there as a solid thing for him to take his rage out on. Needs to know that he hasn’t gone anywhere yet.
Ellias’ hits get weaker as his cries get louder. “I hate you,” he sobs, but his fists are balled in the fabric of Tristan’s jumper.
And Tristan was never meant for Ellias. But Ellias is in his arms, showing the greatest amount of emotion he has shown in months. It is somewhat comforting to know that the person with the greatest number of reasons to hate him will mourn him when he is gone. It is somewhat dreadful to think of how he will cry when that happens.
But he’s not gone yet. So he strokes Ellias’ hair until his breathing starts to even out.
“They’ll give you palliative care if they need to,” Ellias whispers. For a moment, Tristan thinks he’s dreaming. But even in his dreams he would not be given this much mercy.
“What?”
“It’s a little bit hard to find, and you have to really show the doctors that you’ll- that nothing else will be done, but it’s out there.”
“Elli-” it slips out, because Camilla always says it like that.
“Don’t. I made my choice, and everyone had to accept it even if they didn’t agree with it. It would be unfair of me to not accept yours.”
It is a painful thing for him to say. Tristan would apologise, but he’s not sorry. Not really. This is the only thing in his life he has ever felt certain about, aside from how much he loves Camilla.
And like clockwork, Adelaide comes. Viola does not. This makes sense. They could confront him about his sickness together, but this, now, they are too different.
“I don’t want to lose you,” Adelaide says.
They are sitting in his living room. They had been in awkward silence until that moment.
“I’m not going anywhere yet,” Tristan says.
“But you will be. And when you come back, you won’t feel anything for any of us because that is how sick you are,” Adelaide snaps.
For a single second, he is convinced it will be his last breath. His chest feels tighter than ever before. And the only explanation is that the stems of the flowers are wrapping around his body until he cannot move.
But it passes, even if there are petals all over his carpet. She stares at them, before looking back up at Tristan. “You’ll come back, right?”
Because despite everything, Adelaide has always believed people would come back to her.
“I don’t-” he starts.
She pales. “What?”
“I don’t know what I’m going to do. Ellias told me- there are places. They make you comfortable before you-” he can’t finish the sentence.
Adelaide is not going to grieve. Not right now. Because grieving would imply that he was gone, and he wasn’t. He wouldn’t be going anywhere.
“You’re not going though. You’re going to confess. Or take the operation. Right?”
He is silent for too long.
“Tristan.”
“Adelaide.”
“Is this worth dying for?” Really, genuinely and truly, is it worth dying for?”
“Addy. It’s love. That she does not return.”
“So? She still loves you in all the other ways she can. We all love you in the way we can. And someone else will come along. And even if they do not, think about her. If she is truly the only one you think about, think about what this will do to her. Does she even know it’s for her?”
He shakes his head. “And she won’t.”
“Tristan! You’re supposed to love her. If you love her that much, why are you not staying alive?”
“Adelaide. Please. It hurts. I am tired. I don’t want this anymore.”
She is silent for a few moments. “Do we really mean that little to you?”
“It’s not-”
“It’s not the same? I know. You’re not the only one to ever love someone who didn’t love you back.”
“Why do you all keep saying this? I won’t be the only person whose sickness-” and he still can’t bring himself to say it.
“Because you’re not alone! People die from this because there’s nobody to help them through it. People get the operation to stop them from raging at the harm inflicted by another. You’re not supposed to- people don’t- not when they’re like you.”
He can’t bring himself to look at her. “Leave.”
She sighs. “No.”
“Leave,” he repeats. It is the angriest she has ever heard him, and he didn’t even raise his voice.
She doesn’t say goodbye.
It is uncomfortable in the office the next day. Camilla doesn’t ask anyone to come with her to get the coffees, and it is too late for anyone to chase after her by the time they realise. Everyone is thankful when she comes back, but her smile is strained. It does not brighten her eyes the way it is supposed to.
Tristan takes his drink and sips it without questioning anything. It is not his usual order. She is already looking at him when he turns to look at her in confusion.
“It should help soothe your throat. The baristas send their-” she hesitates, “- condolences and well wishes.”
He nods. “Thank you. For the drink.”
She tries to smile again, but it comes out as a grimace. He can’t really blame her.
Viola asks him to go for coffee. It’s for his sake. He knows that she wouldn’t shout at him to begin with, but it is even more unlikely for her to raise her voice in public.
She orders for both of them. It is his usual coffee order. It burns his throat as he swallows, and he wishes it didn’t.
“There’s no chance of us convincing you to change your mind, is there?” She asks. He’s not quite sure why she is. It is clear she already knows the answer. And she’s not a cruel person. She tries her best to make sure that nobody ever has to say the things that they don’t want to.
Tristan thinks of Adelaide, who still hasn’t spoken to him outside of what was truly and strictly necessary. And he thinks of Ellias, whose acceptance had come too quickly to be anything other than forced and fake so their last weeks together could be untinged by the resentment inevitably felt once-
“I don’t think so,” he says.
She nods.
“I am sorry,” he tries.
She just nods again.
He knows her well enough to know when she’s planning something. He doesn’t let her know this, because then she will start hiding things from him.
“How are the legal things going with the show?” She asks, once he’s taken exactly five sips of the coffee. It doesn’t burn as much now, but his throat is so dry he’s concerned about what will happen when he inevitably excuses himself to vomit.
He understands what she’s trying to do, and he responds in the way that is completely normal for him. He then asks her about the costume design, and she gets lost in describing the fabrics and the colours.
It would be strange to take a photo of her, and he would not be able to look back on it anyways, so he just smiles and tries to commit everything to memory. Because that is how he wants to remember them all. Talking about the things they love, and not how much they have grown to hate him.
“Do you have a date for your operation?” Camilla asks him, two days later. Ellias had sent the two of them to get lunch. His gaze had lingered on Tristan’s back. His touch had stayed for a few seconds too long as he handed the company card over. Camilla noticed both of these. She had drawn the wrong conclusion.
“Not yet. I’m still… deciding,” he settles on.
“They’d need to operate either way, right?” She asks.
He’s not actually sure. But she believes that he has spoken to a doctor numerous times and she believes in him, and her faith is such a beautiful thing that Tristan cannot destroy it just yet.
“Yeah. They’re just picking a date.”
She looks slightly concerned.
“It’ll be soon enough,” he says. “It’s for the best. We all know I can’t do anything without the time pressure.”
He isn’t wrong. But. “Why aren’t you saying anything to them?” She asks.
It’s such a child-like question that he almost confesses, because there are no simple answers to give. “I don’t want things to change,” he settles on.
“They’ll change regardless. Don’t you want to have some control over it?”
“The operations are safe,” he reminds her, in the same gentle tone he would use to draw a cat over so she can pet it.
“I don’t want you to come back different,” she confesses.
“Camilla.”
“I’m sorry. It’s not about me.”
Which is ironic. Because it is.
“I’ll do my best,” he says, because it is the best lie he can muster.
She doesn’t even bother trying to smile.
He bites the bullet that night and invites Jonathan around for dinner the next day.
But as Jonathan moves around the kitchen with practiced ease, he cannot disrupt the atmosphere like that.
They eat. Jonathan doesn’t enjoy speaking during meals.
And so it’s only once Tristan has poured them both glasses of wine that it even becomes feasible to discuss the matter. But it still won’t come to him.
“We don’t need to speak about it if it makes you uncomfortable,” Jonathan says, sounding far too neutral.
Tristan hates that this is what he has done to his closest and oldest friend. “No. You deserve to be aware. Just as much as everyone else does.”
“But not Camilla?”
“What?”
“Doesn’t she deserve to know what you’re planning on doing even more than the rest of us?”
“I can’t tell her. Not yet.”
Jonathan nods. “You’ll have to. Eventually.”
“Please. Not right now.”
He stares expectantly.
“I want it to end with my dignity intact,” Tristan confesses. He cannot speak beyond that.
“I don’t think it lets you do that,” Jonathan says. It’s not intended to be cruel. And it isn’t. It’s just a fact, said with as much care as possible.
Tristan turns away.
Jonathan knows when he is not wanted.
Everyone knows that Jonathan is aware. They are waiting for him to tell Camilla. And Camilla knows that once again, everyone is aware of something that she is not. The resentment bubbles inside, but she keeps telling herself that it is not about her. So she continues to bring him teas and reminds him he can speak to her whilst watching everyone else for any hints. There are none, which means whatever is being hid is deliberate.
And Tristan knows that she is frustrated. But it does not matter. Because she does not know.
Whilst she is in a meeting, he excuses himself three times.
The third time, nobody even bothers to pretend they hadn’t been discussing him.
“You need to say something to her,” Jonathan says. His eyes are wide. He hadn’t realised until now just how bad it was getting.
“It’s my life,” Tristan snaps. His throat aches, and he doesn’t actually know the name of the tea Camilla always get now, so he cannot even go and buy something to make it better. A part of him doesn’t want to find out. He does not want to make himself better.
“You’re being selfish,” Ellias spits.
“You’re not a saint either,” Tristan says. He doesn’t know why he’s ruining the few relationships he has left, but he’s just so angry that nobody seems to trust him to make his own decisions or respect his wishes.
“Tristan. You know that Camilla deserves to know, regardless of everything else. She’s already upset because she was the last person to find out that you were unwell, and she knows that you’re hiding something. That we all are. Imagine how she’ll feel if and when she finds out that it’s all been for her. Imagine how much it will hurt her.”
“And what about me? What about the fact that her finding out will hurt me?” He says, trying so hard to not speak the way his mother always did and completely failing.
“It’s not the same. And if you won’t tell her, I’ll do it,” Adelaide threatens.
“You wouldn’t,” Tristan whispers.
“Except that I would,” Adelaide challenges. And Tristan is sure she would. It was Adelaide who told his father the truth all those years ago. She knew what would happen. And she did it anyways, because she wanted him alive.
“Adelaide.”
“I’ll tell her, and then she’ll know. And you won’t have any other choice but to give her what she wants, even though you couldn’t do it for any of us. Because every single time she asks something of you, you give in like some pathetic dog running to its master and-”
“Adelaide!” He shouts.
The door swings open. Jonathan and Adelaide look at each other. Ellias looks down at the floor. Viola looks straight ahead. Tristan doesn’t even realise that everyone has frozen. His ears are still ringing. And then, clear as dawn.
“Why is everyone shouting?” Camilla asks.
Tristan freezes. And then he turns around. His chokes on the breath he tries to take.
Forget-me-nots land on the floor at her feet. When Tristan presses a hand to his mouth, it comes away blue. His knees are where her shoes are. He had no idea he’d sunk that low.
She looks down in confusion. “Why are there forget-me-nots?”
“Camilla,” he whispers. “Don’t make me say it.”
Another cough. Another handful. In another life, and if they weren’t stained with his blood, he would have gathered them in a bouquet and handed them to her. But this wasn’t a different life. And they were blue mixed with the most disgusting red he had ever seen. His own face twisted in horror. That hadn’t happened before.
It matched the expression on hers. Funny. Lovers were often said to take on the others expressions when they had been together for long enough. “You- it’s because-”
Viola steps forward.
Camilla looks up as her shoe hits the ground. Her eyes widen. “You knew. You all knew. That’s the secret. That’s why none of you look surprised right now.”
There is no point in denying it.
With strength he did not realise he still had, Tristan crawls to her. It should and does feel completely humiliating, but she is shaking and he cannot help but reach out for her. He can still fix things.
She yanks her hand away as soon as his skin brushes hers. “Do not touch me,” she shrieks. “You didn’t tell me!”
And the thing is, it doesn’t even scare him. She is angry, and she is hurt, and he still isn’t hurt. Because it’s her. She won’t hurt him. But the same could never be said of him.
“How was I supposed to?” He shouts back.
He doesn’t mean it the way she hears it. But that’s the tragedy. He cannot change that.
The shock morphs into hurt before she can stop it showing.
He shifts back. He can’t look at her. He can’t look at himself.
Viola comes closer. “Camilla,” she says, as though she’s dealing with a wild and scared animal. It’s not far from the truth.
“Don’t defend him. Don’t defend yourselves. You knew. You all knew and you let me believe-” she suddenly stops. “You were never going to tell me, were you?”
Tristan can’t speak. Camilla looks down at him and then up at the people supposed to be both their friends.
She turns on her heel and runs.
Tristan, despite, or maybe because of, his stupidity, tries to stand to go after her.
“I guarantee that you are the last person she will want to see right now. I’ll go,” Ellias tells them all. He leaves before anyone can protest.
Tristan collapses to his knees again. When Jonathan reaches for his arm, he bats him away. He doesn’t want to be seen. It’s all over anyways. Camilla knows. She knows. And now, nothing will ever be okay again.
Ellias has a sneaking suspicion he knows exactly where he would find her. And when he comes across the one room that does not have a window anywhere, with the door slightly ajar, he knows he’s right. When he pushes it lightly, it starts to swing open. Before it goes the whole way, he grabs the handle and opens it much more gently.
“Camilla?” Ellias whispers. He wants to flick the light on, but if she’s hiding in a dark room, there is a reason.
She sniffles. “Elli?”
The last time she called him that, there were flowers still fighting their way up his throat and tears streaming down his face. He flicks the light on. Some things must be done in brightness. “Yeah. It’s just me. Nobody else.”
Her eyes are sparkling. She looks beautiful. Or she would, if it weren’t for the silver lines running down her cheeks.
“Oh, Camilla,” he says and he locks the door and settles beside her. Camilla feels everything so much. Ellias is jealous of this sometimes. Then he remembers that to feel joy so strongly, the sadness must be felt just as heavily. And then he is grateful he does not allow himself to feel so intensely anymore.
“I just- I don’t know why I can’t do it,” she says, the words coming between breaths that feel too short and remind him of trying to breathe around blossom.
“Do what?” He asks, rubbing her back gently, trying to ground her in the moment.
“Love him back,” she whispers.
He stops touching her, and all the sympathy he felt for her vanishes. “That’s not what this is about. You know that. That was just a myth, made up by people so they didn’t have to confront their own cowardice. And you do love him back.”
“But not in the way he wants. If I could just- he’s a good man, and if I could just love him the way he loves me, he would confess and he would be fine.”
“He’s not the only person whose ever had to confess to someone who didn’t feel the same,” Ellias snaps. He’s so tired. And Camilla is there.
She winces. “Elli, I’m sorry.”
“Do you know what happens? If you confess after the flowers start blooming but before they’re fully done?”
She wants to say that of course she does. This is one of the first things they were all taught about in schools. And it’s one of the few things that was on the science curriculum for every single year. But- “Nobody ever told us.”
“Exactly. Because if you confess when the seeds have been planted, they dissolve and leave without you noticing until you can breathe easily. And if you confess when the flowers are blossomed, they’ll operate to remove them. But if you confess in between then, they’re too big to go easily and too small to remove through an operation. So you’re left. To vomit reminders of the person who had you feel so strongly that you started dying. It’s worse than rejection. So, so much worse.”
“We should have been there,” she whispers.
She isn’t wrong. But. “I didn’t want you there. I don’t know why I even told you about it happening. It’s not going to change anything.”
“No. It’s not.”
Ellias knows, very well, when he’s not wanted. He turns and unlocks the door, sure to close it properly when it’s behind him. He leans against it for a second. When the sounds of Camilla’s sobs start to feel too much like acceptance of the inevitable, he walks back into the room where everyone else is.
“How is she?” Adelaide asks.
“As well as someone can be in a situation like this,” he snarks.
Tristan hasn’t moved.
“Nobody is going to get any work done. We should all go home. Tristan, fix this,” Viola says.
A part of Adelaide wants to stay until he leaves. But Jonathan is keeping a watchful eye on him. And her phone has buzzed three times. There is only one person asking for her.
Adelaide comes when Camilla calls. She would come if any of them called. But Camilla wouldn’t usually be the one doing so. Camilla calls- Tristan. Adelaide will accept being the second choice.
She lets herself in. Camilla keeps the spare key hidden well enough that only those that have specifically been told where it’s been kept have any chance of finding it. Tristan was the first one to find out. He’d gone over to her when she’d been too sick to come into work. He’d never told them where it was. He’d let Camilla say it.
Adelaide doesn’t want to think about him. But she’s seeing Camilla. It’s impossible. One cannot exist without the other. That has always felt truer than fact. She won’t let herself dwell on the implications that has for the future. She knows what Tristan will choose. She knows what Camilla will force him to do. She does not know what impact that will have. But for the moment, she shakes her head, as if that will stop her thinking, and she slips her trainers off.
Camilla lifts her head at the sound. Adelaide smiles slightly as she walks over. Even though she’s hardly taking up any space to start with, Camilla moves over slightly. Adelaide sits closer than she needs to, and guides Camilla’s head into her lap.
She lets herself play with the strands that have come loose from the elaborate hairstyle it had been tied in all day. Adelaide is saddened by that. Camilla had been so excited to try something new with her hair. And now it would be tainted.
“How are you holding up, baby?” Adelaide asks. She uses the endearment deliberately. It had started as a joke, with everyone calling everyone that. But then Camilla had gotten flustered, and they’d realised she genuinely liked it. But where everyone else used it to tease, Adelaide used it to comfort. She understood. It was nice to feel like someone was there.
Camilla shrugs. “I’m not the one who’s sick.”
It’s at odds with what she had said a few days earlier. Adelaide chooses to not remind her of that. She will, if it’s necessary, because she would rather be written as the villain than as the bystander on the wrong side of history, but for now, she will wait until Camilla confesses the reason for calling her. And until that happens, she will separate the pieces of her hair and detangle them with her fingers.
“No. You’re not. But-”
“But we all know what I said.” So Adelaide doesn’t need to mention it herself anyways. “Yeah.”
“You didn’t do anything wrong,” Adelaide says. Because sometimes, Camilla needs to hear it. Even though she claims she doesn’t. It is silent for more than a few moments. Adelaide allows herself a moment to hope that all Camilla wanted was a few minutes of company so she could settle. And then her breath catches and she stutters through the first few words of her sentence, and all the realities come rushing back.
“I need you to promise that you won’t tell anyone this,” Camilla says, pushing Adelaide’s hand out of her hair and sitting up.
Adelaide swallows the lump in her throat. Because there have been three occasions where someone has told her that. And on all three occasions, she has told someone. “I can’t promise that baby. You know that.”
Camilla looks at her. She doesn’t have a sister. And neither does Adelaide. She thinks this is the closest she will ever come to knowing what it means to be looked at by one. “Addy.”
“If I think that you will survive without me saying something, then I won’t. That’s the only promise I’m willing to make. Okay?”
She nods. “You won’t need to tell anyone. I swear.”
“It’s okay if I do,” Adelaide says.
Camilla pulls her hand away. The words don’t come immediately.
“Take your time,” Adelaide whispers.
“I was in love with Tristan.”
“What?”
“I think I loved him.”
“No. No, repeat what you said properly. Were you in love with him, or did you love him? Because you know the difference. I know you know the difference, because you are the one who taught it to him.” She wants to be patient, but this changes everything. Or, it could have. Camilla only uses the past tense when she’s sure it’s never coming back.
“I was in love with him,” she says, her voice breaking.
“What changed?” Adelaide asks, her heart sinking.
“Ellias had flowers growing in his lungs because of him. And I just- I couldn’t accept it.”
“Oh. My baby,” Adelaide says. Because Camilla’s father isn’t there to call her babu. Her mother is not there to call her name with the gentleness only good mothers could. And so it is Adelaide’s calling now.
“Maybe I should confess. We deserve each other now. More than before,” Camilla says. And it’s clear she’s just saying that may fix the situation. Because she knows, just as well as the rest of them, that Tristan won’t confess if he knows she doesn’t feel the same. But.
“You can’t just say it because of this,” Adelaide reminds her.
“People don’t develop Hanahaki because the other one is a good person,” Camilla says. “He didn’t know I loved him when I did. He won’t realise that I don’t love him when I say I do.”
She looks concerningly determined. Adelaide feels sick as it dawns on her that Camilla is genuinely considering her plan.
“Hanahaki doesn’t just develop because of uncommunicated love,” she says, as though she’s reminding Camilla of what she just said. “You will get sick. And he will find out. And everything will fall apart again.”
Camilla looks at the photo on her coffee table. It’s of all six of them on a random day. They’re not particularly dressed up, and there is no special occasion that it commemorates. But it was before people started to vomit magnolias and forget-me-nots. “I think it’s already fallen apart so much that once more would hardly amount to anything.”
Adelaide follows Camilla’s gaze. She thinks about how there is no Tristan without Camilla, and no Camilla without Tristan. And she realises, that no matter what Tristan chooses, and no matter what Camilla does, she’s going to lose both of them.
Tristan doesn’t come into work the next day. It’s always been an option- for them to work from home- but nobody ever utilised it that much. They had never been traditional colleagues to start with. Ellias had taken the time, a few months ago. Tristan knows why. Ellias does not know that he knows. Tristan also knows that Camilla must be aware now as well, if her messages to the group chat are any indication. Even when Ellias deliberately designed something that contradicted what she had asked for, she agreed without hesitating.
The day he returns, Camilla works for home.
It’s easy to work out who told her. The one person who knew he was coming back.
The same person who suddenly offers to drive home at the end of the day, even though they live in completely opposite directions.
Ellias takes them to a park. “Humour me,” he says. It’s like he’d read Tristan’s mind. About how much like a date it was.
Tristan can’t do much else. He has no idea where they are. “Okay.”
They choose a bench away from the families watching their children play.
“What are you going to do?” Ellias asks, keeping his tone neutral and his eyes on the lake.
“I think you know,” Tristan says. After all, it was Ellias who made the recommendations.
“You haven’t- you’re not changing your mind?”
“Ellias, why would I do that?”
“She knows. It’s not so scary. All you have to do is say it. They’ll need to operate. You won’t need to be sick again. But you’ll still be here with us.”
“I thought you had accepted my choice,” he says, and it’s harsher than he wanted to be, but he doesn’t care because it makes Ellias swallow.
“That was before.”
Tristan turns. With the way Ellias fixates his eyes on a tree in the distance, he knows.
“Before what?”
“Before she found out. She already knows it’s for her. Nothing more will change,” Ellias says.
Tristan rolls his eyes. “You have been where I’ve been. You should know-”
“Except I haven’t. It hadn’t progressed as far, so I still had to-”
“Vomit up the petals. I know. I heard you. Once. The day you came back because you thought it was over, but it wasn’t actually.”
That is what it takes for Ellias to look at him. “You knew?”
“Of course I knew.” He says it calmly.
Ellias stands. “Camilla was wrong. You are a coward.” He walks away.
Tristan relaxes. Ellias will realise later what he was doing. And then he’ll be forgiven.
The next day, Camilla is still working from home. Tristan knows that she gets frustrated not going into the office as often as she can, and he knows that everyone is going frustrated with his incessant vomiting because Ellias was right- it is just three words that Camilla already knows. So he tells everyone he’s going to work from home and tries to not let it hurt too much when Camilla doesn’t ask any questions in the chat because she’s asking them in person.
Adelaide comes that day.
“Are you to tell me that I should tell her?” He asks as soon as he opens the door. He knows what he needs to do. And he knows that he needs to do it quickly before she sees through him. Because she always does.
“Of course I am,” she says.
He laughs. “I see. So know she knows, you’re switching sides?”
“I was always in favour of you telling her,” Adelaide says, but she sounds uncertain.
“Did you ever ask yourself why?”
She hasn’t even taken her shoes off. He hasn’t given her the moment to do so. “Because it’s the right thing to do.”
“I think you want me to tell her because it’ll make you feel better.”
“How-”
“Because you are the kind of person who someone would develop Hanahaki for,” he says. And he is grateful that his voice did not shake. Because if it had, she would have noticed. She would have realised. But it didn’t. So she doesn’t. She just stares at him, horrified by what she has heard and so desperately wanting to believe it wasn’t real.
He doesn’t take it back. She turns and leaves. It is only once she is sure he won’t come after her that she tells everyone what happened. That they are right. She hates that the chat they have for Tristan’s birthday has come to this.
Camilla reads the message, but does not reply. Adelaide is not surprised. She must know by now that Tristan would never treat her the way he treats everyone else, even when she is the sole reason for the flowers that are slowly choking him.
Viola comes two days later.
He hasn’t had time to think about what he will say to her.
But he lets her in, knowing that it has to be done.
“Ellias and Adelaide told me what happened,” Viola says.
“Of course they did,” he remarks.
She doesn’t take the bait. “They do have a point though. You know that, right?”
“I’m not stupid,” he says.
“Of course you’re not. You’re just in love with someone. And that’s okay. And it’s also okay that she doesn’t love you back like that. But Camilla does love you. And so do we. And I think it would do you some good to remember that as well.”
“Seriously?” He doesn’t know what else he’s meant to say. He’s not even sure there is anything else.
“I’m just reminding you,” she says. It’s too calm and too diplomatic.
He knows what to do. “I haven’t felt it. Not from you. Not since this started.”
She frowns. “What?”
“Loved. I haven’t felt loved by any you since all of this started. Especially not you.”
He doesn’t see it, but she braces herself. “Oh?”
“You of all people should accept my decision. Especially given how willing you have always been to let me go.”
It’s not as far as both of them know he can and will go. But she does not want to hear anymore. She leaves. The petals land where her shoes had been, and where they would have stayed if he was not so fond of ruining everything he had.
When Jonathan comes the next day, it is with fear in his eyes and pizza from their favourite place. He’s brought his backpack, even though he’s come from his apartment and not from work.
Tristan lets him with a small amount of anxiety. Jonathan must notice this. “I don’t know how much time we have left. I just want to be with you. Nothing else.”
And this is his Jonathan. Who has always been able to lie, but has never done so to him, because he has never wanted to do so.
So Tristan just nods, and motions for Jonathan to put the pizza boxes straight onto the carpet so they can eat on the floor, without any cutlery, as they used to when they were in college. When things were simpler. When Tristan did not know Camilla.
Jonathan’s backpack is filled with games. They play at least one round of each. It is only when it is getting so late that Tristan’s eyes have started to droop does Jonathan sheepishly start to pack up. He hasn’t brought his things to stay the night. And Tristan knows he will be spending the night trying to clear his lungs, having tried for too long to keep it down so the illusion would not be broken.
The earlier words come to back to him. None of them know how much longer they have left.
“You’ve always been a good friend to me. Thank you for that,” he says.
Jonathan swallows. It’s like he’s working out whether the damage his words will do is worth it. Tristan braces himself, but does not force Jonathan through the door. He does not want to do it. But he will if he must.
“I don’t have to stop. None of this has to stop. Not even your feelings,” Jonathan says.
“I thought you weren’t here for any other reason,” Tristan says, and he is scared of what he will say if Jonathan does not stop speaking, but he cannot help pushing.
“You knew I was, even if you didn’t want to admit it,” Jonathan counters.
Tristan sighs. “Why can’t you leave me to make my decision?”
“Because we love you. We all love you.”
“Well. That’s not good enough, is it?”
Jonathan does not cry. “You were the one that always said that just because something is true, it doesn’t mean it needs to be said.”
The next day, Tristan barely moves from his bed. He detests the scent of lilies.
The day after that, he sends a message to the group chat, apologising for his absence. He does not say anything about what happened. When nobody replies, he knows Jonathan said something. Camilla’s typing bubble appears numerous times. Nothing ever comes through.
He is not quite sure what happens that night, but he wakes up feeling dizzy. His mouth tastes like copper, and for the first time since he got sick, he is struck by the fear of uncertainty. He knows what it will be like, but he cannot understand it. He won’t. Not until it is too late.
When he looks at the date, he realises it has been a month since everything started. And as messages start flooding the group chat, he realises Ellias must have told everyone. Nothing comes from Camilla. He switches his phone off, only switching it back on the next day when he needs to be sure nobody is coming.
They are not. Because they do not want him to say anything else. They know how he will feel later. But they are still messaging. And she is still silent.
So Camilla does not come. Not immediately.
But the day he opens his phone to see a deleted message from Viola, his doorbell rings in the evening.
He answers it, even though he knows who will be standing there. Because he is in no state to be going out, and she will wait for hours. Even after everything, he cannot be that cruel.
“Hi,” she says. As though it’s a standard meet-up.
“You should leave,” he says.
“And what will you do if I don’t?” She asks, and it sounds genuinely curious.
But he’s tired. “What?”
“Are you going to say something to make me run away? That’s not going to work. It was never going to work. Ellias walked away because he didn’t want to say something hurtful back. Adelaide because she didn’t want to cry in front of you, not after so long of not doing it. Viola because she wanted you to think you’d succeeded to give you some peace. Jonathan because he really did think he’d be the exception.”
“You’ve always been more sensitive than the rest of us,” he says, but it’s weak.
She doesn’t move. “Say it. The thing you want to. And then we’ll see.”
“You’ve been avoiding me,” he says.
She falters for a single moment before she speaks. “I’m here now, aren’t I?” She snaps. She sighs. “I’m sorry. I’m not angry at you.”
He doesn’t look convinced. She can’t really blame him.
“I’m not. I’d be a hypocrite if I was. And I’m sorry for avoiding you. I just didn’t know what to say to you. And I knew that if I did see you, I would say something that I didn’t mean. That was meant for me, but it would be directed at you, and even if we both knew it, the damage would have been done,” she says. It’s like she’s trying to say something to him without actually saying it, but he can still hear it.
“And now? What’s changed?”
“I’m not angry. Not really. Not at either of us. I’m just tired,” she says. He waits for her to say that a message from one of their friends made her realise just how dire everything was, but she doesn’t. She just swallows uncomfortably. “I can leave. If you want.”
He should say yes. But Adelaide was right. He is like a dog running to its master when it comes to her, no matter how badly he was hurt. “No. Stay. You came all this way.”
“It’s not far,” she reminds him.
“But still,” he says, because he won’t say what he really means. She hears it anyways. She always does.
She takes her shoes off, leaving them next to his. They look like they belong there.
And as she sits on the sofa like everything is completely normal, he can almost kid himself into believing she’s there just to spend time with him. He knows she will eventually ask him. But if he is a dog, she is the overly generous owner that never practices discipline.
“What now?” He asks.
“Have you eaten?” She asks.
He doesn’t say anything. It’s difficult for him to eat most food. He doesn’t want to buy too much of anything new.
“I’ll make soup.” She stands up and goes to the kitchen before he can stop her. His fridge is embarrassingly bare.
“Don’t-” he starts, stopping once he realises she’s already started rifling through the freezer to see if there is anything frozen she could throw together. It’s scary. Not being able to cover the distance from his living room to the kitchen without feeling like he’s losing his breath.
“Do you have the strength to come to the supermarket with me?” She asks.
He doesn’t. Not really. But he swallows the petals in his throat, and he nods.
She drives them there. She doesn’t say it, but she doesn’t trust him to keep them alive. He wouldn’t trust himself either.
He goes to take the trolley from her. She lets him. He is certain the strangers around them believe he is doing something nice for his girlfriend, who is throwing too many fresh ingredients in for him to be anything but uncomfortable. They do not know it is her doing him the favour. The trolley makes him feel normal. It lets him stay upright.
“Camilla, just buy the packet stuff,” he pleads. He fears he sounds too desperate.
“It’s not the same,” she says. An elderly couple nod at her, and she looks away in embarrassment. She doesn’t put anything back though. She actually walks straight past the aisle where it would be found.
She even adds snacks.
Tristan hopes the vegetables have gone off by the time they need to look inside his fridge. He makes a mental note to turn down the power. He does not want to waste food, but he thinks it will be worse if they feel obliged to take them and use them.
When they get back, Camilla drags a chair to the kitchen and tells him to sit down. She fits in, moving around his kitchen and chopping up various items so she can chuck them in the saucepan.
“You’re very good at this,” he observes, as she adds a perfectly diced onion to the pan. Her eyes aren’t even watering.
She laughs. “It’s soup.”
She sits them both down at the table to eat. Her eyes are wide as she watches him take his first bite. “Is it good?” She asks.
He thinks it’s the best thing he’s ever had. “Of course it is.” It’s actually soothing his throat. Something he didn’t even know could still happen. “Thank you.”
She ducks her head slightly. “It’s not much.”
“Still. If you hadn’t been here, I don’t even know what I would have eaten. Everything’s been hurting.”
She doesn’t even bother trying to smile. “How is it?”
“It hurts,” he says. Because it does. And because he has told her enough lies. It is time to be honest. Because they both deserve it.
Camilla sighs. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s not your fault,” he says. He wants to say that he is sick of trying to comfort everyone else in his worst moment, but when he thinks about it properly, nobody has made it about themselves. All of their desperate attempts were to keep him alive because they believed he had something worth staying for, even if it wasn’t them.
They had been so selfless. And all he had done was hurt them.
“Except that it is, isn’t it?” Camilla snaps him out of his thoughts.
“You’re the only person who ever blames the other side,” he tells her, as gently as he can.
“Because it has to be their fault,” she says, almost like she’s trying to convince herself.
“Sick people aren’t completely irresponsible. Not when it comes to this.”
She goes quiet.
He stands up. “We’ve had a lovely meal. It can end here. You can remember that I ate your soup, with fresh vegetables you left in my fridge. I’ll remember that you looked after me when I needed it most.”
“I don’t want it to end,” she says, also standing.
She is not just referring to the moment. “Camilla. It’s going to. It has to. And I think you are the only person that has not accepted it yet. For my sake, would you?”
“Tristan, I can’t. Nobody can. You don’t know what it’s going to be like, because nobody does. Because there’s nobody to describe it. But the other things- there’s a reason we know about what happens.”
“Camilla. I don’t want to talk about it.”
“But we have to. We don’t know how much longer we have. And you wouldn’t listen to anyone else but-”
He is not going to let this go on for longer. “You don’t get to be special this time.”
In his dreams, Tristan deserves to kneel for Camilla. He sinks to his knees in front of her, and she smiles at him. Her hands, always so warm on his cold skin, brush his cheek. It is comforting.
But his life has always been closer to a nightmare. Because only in a nightmare would it be Camilla, falling to her knees before him, clasping his hands in hers and looking up at him with fear and not love in her eyes.
“Please,” she whispers.
“Camilla.”
“Just tell me,” she begs. “I already know. If you just say the words, then it can be all over. You won’t be sick. I won’t be the reason you’re dying.”
He shakes his head. “Camilla. I can’t.” And it’s not even a lie. He has tried, so hard. So many times. Even before he was sick. When the flowers started to grow, and he realised he was running out of time, he would open a photo of her and try and force the words out.
They always got stuck. The only thing to ever come out would be more flowers.
“You can,” she says. She sounds so desperate. “Tristan, nothing is going to change. Just tell me.”
“Isn’t that the entire issue?” He laughs. It hurts. Too much inhaling, too much exhaling. But then, everything hurts now. Even Camilla.
“What?” She sounds so lost. It is too honest.
“Nothing will change. You don’t love me back.”
“Ellias-”
“What? He confessed and we were fine? Sure. Except, oh! We all look at him with so much pity that he hates us. Everyone will look at me the way they look at him, including him. Including you.”
“I wouldn’t,” she lies. It is the only lie she has ever told him.
“You would never be happy if I say it. Ask me when the last date I went on was.”
She doesn’t want to. But he is sick, and no matter what Ellias or anyone else says, it is her fault. “When?”
He doesn’t answer.
“When was the last date you went on?”
“Two days before Ellias told me. And you are a better person than I am.”
She hates what the implication of his statement is. And she hates that it is correct even more. “Then get the operation.”
He wasn’t expecting her to say that. “What?”
“Get the operation,” she repeats.
“You can’t ask me to-” he starts.
“To what? I have no idea what you feel for me. That’s why we’ve ended up here. Because you won’t tell me,” she says, raising her voice as she grows more desperate.
“I’d lose-” the rest of the sentence won’t come. “I’d lose all feelings for you. You know that. All of them. They would wipe any emotion from every memory I have of you. And then they would make it that my brain cannot respond to you. You would lose me.”
She has always been a better person than him. “I would. But that is the price of everyone else keeping you. That is the price of washing my hands of your blood.”
He swallows. He cannot be honest about his feelings. But he can be honest about this. “They can’t.”
She looks confused. “What?”
“They can’t keep me. Not if they wipe my feelings for you.”
“They can,” she pleads.
He shakes his head. “Camilla. It all comes back to you. It always comes back to you.”
“That’s not- that can’t be true. There must be something. There has to be something. You can’t possibly- feel that strongly.”
“Camilla. Sometimes it feels like my life didn’t start until I met you. Which means I have been choking on my feelings for you my entire life. Let me die how I lived. Let me have this. Everyone in my life has made me feel helpless. Even you. Because we cannot help how we feel. But the helplessness you cause in me is the good kind.”
“No. No. There are- Tristan, there are so many people who love you. They love you. Their love is greater than your fear. And it’s more important than me. It always has been, and it always will be. And it has to mean something.”
“It’s not the same,” he says, desperate for her to understand. Because she must, deep down. She has been in love with people before. She has been broken when they left. And she has built herself back up, reshaping her heart around that missing piece, but it’s still a missing piece. And his heart has always been hers. Without her, there is nothing to rebuild.
“No, it’s not. But it is something. It is more than other people have.”
“Camilla. I would have spent my life with you. What is left if you won’t do that?” He snaps. It is the first time has ever been mean to her.
And it would be cruel for her to be honest. But she thinks of Ellias, vomiting magnolias even though he did the right thing. But she thinks of Viola, so convinced that Camilla would be enough. But she thinks of Adelaide, gracefully accepting what she shouldn’t have to. But she thinks of Jonathan, so firm in the knowledge that he was not enough. But she thinks of Victoria and James, who would not know that their son was dying unless they invited them to the funeral. But she thinks of her own parents, whose biggest fear had always been burying their own child.
“I would have done the same. If you had said it to me before Ellias did to you, I would have told you forget-me-nots are my favourite because they remind me of your eyes, and I would have told you that every poem was for you and it was always for you, and I would have told you that I loved you.”
Her last sentence takes the breath for him.
He opens his mouth. To say what, he doesn’t know. He thinks it will be the words that fix everything.
It isn’t.
Because he doesn’t speak.
Flowers erupt from his mouth. It’s forget-me-nots and roses and lilies, and they are all coated with his blood.
His throat aches. More than his heart. His heart has been aching for as long as he’s been able to understand pain. His throat only started to ache a few days ago. He should speak to someone. He should tell his parents. He should force Camilla, who is standing there trembling, to leave.
“Go,” he croaks out. “Please.”
“This is what I do to you,” she says. For a moment, he allows himself to think of a life in which that statement is tinged with awe and not horror.
“This is what I did to myself. And I don’t want you to see it,” he says, even though it is too late.
Camilla thinks of all the days he was dying for that she avoided him. “I wasted so much time,” she whispers to herself.
And Tristan knows that she has not accepted his decision. That she probably never will. But when he leaves, he wants her to remember him as fondly as she could. All she wanted from the evening was to be with him. And selfishly, he wants that too. Even if he has not succeeded in making his friends hate him, they still must think he has. They won’t be interrupted. “You still have some left. Stay. I’ll do my best.”
She allows herself a moment to hope that he will tell her the truth. Tristan sees it on her face. He doesn’t say anything. He lets Camilla bring the broom and the wipes from his kitchen, almost shocked that she knew the location of both. But of course she did.
She hesitates before she starts to clean up.
“I can do it,” he tells her, placing his hands on top of hers, if only to feel that warmth.
“It’s not that,” she says, not taking her eyes off the petals and not moving her hands. “They’re so morbidly stunning. I get it now.”
“Get what?”
“Why they always told us that the flowers that bloom are beautiful, but they mean you cannot breathe. Breathing is supposed to be easy. Especially when you love someone.”
She says it like it’s nothing. In some ways it is. Of course Tristan loves Camilla. He knows, deep down, that he would love her in every universe. Even if he had to run from his feelings until they drowned him like those waves might have. Even if he had to watch as someone else brought her flowers. Even if he had to lose her.
And of course, he still cannot say it.
Camilla looks up as she finishes speaking. Tristan looks away.
It’s to be expected. They somehow always missed each other.
Except this time- this time, Camilla reaches out. And this time, Tristan doesn’t run from her. He lets her fingers brush his jaw, and when she guides him into turning towards her, he goes without complaint.
“What are you doing?” He asks.
“I think- it’s not a mistake, is it? To want this?”
But she is doing more than wanting it. She is trying to take it, as though greed could save them both.
“Of course it’s not. There are many mistakes in life. This-” still, even now, he won’t call it what it is, “will not be one of them.”
Her other hand reaches out. He closes his eyes as she runs her thumb across his cheek. “Can I kiss you?”
He nods. But she doesn’t move any closer. “Please. Kiss me.”
Tristan opens his eyes to watch her lean in. He closes them as her lips touch his. He doesn’t want to see something so vulnerable. Doesn’t want to give himself a reason.
When she realises why he won’t move, she moves her hands to loop around his neck and pulls him closer. He puts his hand on her back before it can touch the floor.
“Wait,” he tells her.
She immediately lets go. He whines at the loss of her touch. “Yeah?”
“We- it’s not a mistake to want this. But this is- this isn’t wanting.”
“We’re going to run out of time. Just once. Just for tonight. We deserve to know what we could have had. Don’t we?” She has never sounded like this. But Tristan can understand. She is offering him everything he wanted. And he will give her whatever she asks for.
“We do,” he says, but it feels like signing a death sentence.
She kisses him once more. He cannot help but bring his hands to her waist, trying to bring her even closer.
“I want to do this properly,” he says to her.
She pulls away slightly, her breath uneven. “What does that look like?”
He pushes her off of his lap, as gently as he can. He stands up. He stacks the dishes and takes them to the kitchen. She follows, watching him as he washes up. It’s only once he’s done that he walks over to where she leans against his fridge.
“Let me kiss you this time,” he says.
She nods, and he takes her hands. He presses a kiss to each knuckle. Then her forehead. Her eyelashes flutter as he kisses each cheek, her lips curving upwards in a soft smile at the sensation of his skin against hers.
And then he kisses her on the lips. She has never been patient. When he pulls away to breathe, she starts to trail kisses down his neck. His jumper is tugged down slightly as she leaves bruises on his collarbones that nobody will see. Maybe not even her if they keep to their promise of for only one night.
When she looks up at him, he takes her hand, and he leads her out and past the threshold. A part of him had wanted to carry her. The bigger part had been too worried that he wouldn’t be strong enough. That he would start choking, and the moment would be ruined. But Camilla doesn’t know that. She just pushes him down and brushes his hair off his forehead. He has nowhere to hide like that.
“Please,” he begs. It’s too vulnerable and too desperate. He does not know if it makes him a disgusting person. That he has imagined this a thousand times before. He does not care. Not when Camilla’s hair tickles the bare skin of his shoulder. Not when her hands are all over him, worshipping places he thought she would never come near. Not when she is there.
“Hmm?” There’s a teasing lilt to her voice, and he closes his eyes. He cannot look at her and see her taking their roles that seriously. She is not acting like he’s leaving. She is acting like this is normal. Like it’s real.
“Please,” he says again, even though he’s not certain what he’s asking for. It is easier than trying to form sentences.
She takes mercy on him at that point, guiding his hands. He can’t help but open his eyes, so convinced she would do this herself. But she smiles, gentle and encouraging, and he cannot deny her anything. He cannot deny himself this either.
She doesn’t let him turn his head. She does not let him close his eyes or bite down on his lip. Not even when she presses a gentle kiss to his hand and then moves both of his hands to hold her waist.
When she swallows the sound of his noises with her mouth, he wants to sob. When she buries her head in his neck, his hand rubbing her back in an attempt to be soothing, he lets the tears start to fall. She wipes them away, as she has always wanted to.
“Pretty,” she comments, and he laughs at her breathlessness.
She kisses him again. The corner of his mouth. And she whispers words without thinking. Tristan doesn’t quite hear them, but he watches the shapes her mouth forms.
He almost says them back.
Almost.
It’s the sound of Camilla crying that wakes him up. He hates that he has learned to recognise the different types of cries she has. She’s trying to be quiet. She doesn’t want him to know. She is embarrassed, and she is determined to hide, and it’s all because of him.
Without saying anything, he sits up and puts his arms around her. Her breath shakes, and her cries become less repressed. And it should be scary. But this is Camilla. His- although not really- Camilla. She feels, with all the pain and joy that causes.
“I’m sorry,” she manages to say, although her breath still comes out ragged.
“It’s okay,” he tells her.
He wants to tell her to not cry, but he doesn’t. Because he is worth her tears. He always has been, and he always will be. Because it is not his place to tell her what she can cry over. It is for her to decide what will be worth grief. And in some ways, it is morbidly comforting. To know that when he is gone, he will be missed.
“I don’t think I can accept it,” she says. It is the most honest she has been since he became sick.
“I don’t think I can ask you to,” he says.
She puts his arms around her. “Just- let’s just stay like this. Just for a few more minutes.”
“I want to apologise to our friends. It’s what they deserve.”
“They’ll forgive you,” she whispers.
“I know. I want to tell them what I’m going to do. Properly.”
Camilla nods. “Do you want me to ask them to come?”
He shakes his head. “I won’t let myself be a coward. Not about this.”
She doesn’t say anything to that.
Eventually, she pulls herself from his embrace. She takes some of his clothes from the wardrobe and changes into them. When she makes them breakfast, she doesn’t use the vegetables from the night before.
When their friends arrive, they do not comment on the clothes Camilla is wearing. They do not even tease Tristan when he unzips his hoodie slightly. They can’t. They won’t.
He apologises for what he said. Their forgiveness feels too easy. He cannot blame them. He tells them what he will do. They nod, because they knew. They’ve always all known, even if they tried to pretend otherwise.
As they embrace him, eyes sparkling and tears falling, he wonders, just for a second, if he’s making a mistake. But as he ducks his head, not wanting them to see it on his face, he knows they are looking at each other. He does not want to see what that means. And he does not want to doubt himself.
Not after everything.
They stay. They all stay.
Camilla kisses him once more before she leaves. By that time, everyone else was gone. She is convinced she smelt flowers as he held her closer for the last time. Tristan remembers the smell of oranges and the taste of peaches.
It is quickly overpowered by the smell of blood and the taste of rotting petals.
He is glad. That they do not have to see him like this.
There are flowers suffocating Tristan’s lungs.
Or more accurately-
Ellias screams. It is rage and love and hatred, and worse of all, it is closure.
Adelaide laughs. It is hollow and sounds more like denial than anything.
Viola breathes. It is shaky, but it is unrestricted, and for that, she is grateful.
Jonathan speaks. It is weak and uncertain, but enough to resolve the immediate issues.
Camilla weeps. It is ugly and distressing, and it is tinged with a never-ending guilt.
flowers used and their meanings: yellow carnations- disdain, disappointment, rejection / white chrysantheum- truth / daisy- i'll never tell / forget-me-not- true love memories, do not forget me / purple hyacinth- sorrow / marigold- grief / sweet pea- goodbye / zinnia- thoughts of absent friends / peony- shame / dark crimson rose- mourning
You wouldn’t know this, but when I was in grief counselling they told me that sometimes you need to imagine yourself having a conversation with the person you’re grieving. And I know you’re still alive, but I’ve lost you. I won’t ever have you the same way I used to ever again. So, I am going to treat this as though we are having a conversation.
I think I’m a bad person. I like to think that you would tell me I’m not, but you weren’t moral either. But you at least had a justification. I hope you’ve understood how problematic everything was. For all of you. Us. I don’t know if I can be considered one of you. It never felt like I was, even when they gave me the crown. I don’t want to talk about that.
I don’t think I’d change any of it. That’s why I think I’m a bad person. All of it led to us. I know it was only once. I know that everything had fallen apart beforehand, and then everything fell apart again after, but it was everything. I’ve never seen you do anything because you wanted it. Aside from that. You looked beautiful. I hope you know.
Mr Carter sent me a photo. It’s of us at the dance. I’ve never seen myself look like that. I actually resemble my mother when she was my age. I’ve never understood the comparison. She’s so beautiful. Anyways. You’re looking at me like I’m everything. I’m surprised I knew how to handle it. Well, no, I’m not. In that moment, I was still so paranoid about everything. I didn’t even process what was happening. It feels like a different life. And now that I’m home- coming back made me realise I was always supposed to leave, one way or another- it almost is. He also gave me your message. I cried. But my mum hugged me. She’s… not done that in a while. It’s my own fault. I keep pushing her away. She won’t stop trying with me though. I hope someone eventually does that for you. I’m sorry it couldn’t be me.
Something you said has been sticking with me. When you told me you loved me, you said you couldn’t do it more poetically and that you were sorry for that. There’s a poem in there somewhere. When I can write without feeling like something is fundamentally wrong with what I’m saying, I’ll work it. I never wanted poetry from you. I just wanted honesty. You gave everyone these flowery and beautiful and lovely declarations and none of them were real. I knew you weren’t lying because it was hesitant and awkward. And it was perfect. I hope you know that. I hope you don’t remember my own confession too well. It was embarrassing. In the way that it was just too much and it probably sounded so bad out loud. But it was all true. There’s a saying, that the centre of every poem is the fact that you have to deal with the fact that you loved someone. That’s why I can’t do anything other than write a letter I can never send. I’m still dealing with it. I think I always will be.
There’s so many things I want to say, but I can’t even remember half of them now. I’m imagining your face. I think that’s why. Your eyes are dead. I don’t mean that as an insult, even if it sounds like one. Because I’m exactly the same. There are photos from when I was younger and I can’t even stand looking at them. There are photos from now and I don’t understand how nobody has noticed. My eyes don’t look dead in the photo of us. They’re sparkling the way people say they do. Thank you for that.
How are you handling flames? It’s quite embarrassing- we had a fire drill, and I started crying. You probably wouldn’t have. You would’ve just grit your teeth and left, even if the ringing took you back to a different time. You’ve always been an amazing performer. I really do hope you become a lawyer. You were made to be like those lawyers in the American crime shows we all love. Maybe I shouldn’t bring those up. Viola loved them.
In another life, I don’t even write this. Because I don’t need to. I say it to your face like someone who is brave. Or like someone who didn’t lose you. But I am a coward, and you are gone. I hope we find our way back to each other. I hope that one day, you will look me up and see that I wrote a perfect story about people who aren’t us but are and that they end up together. I hope that in ten years time, I’ll look into what you’re doing, and you’ll be at law school.
I wish you’d kissed me when I asked you to. Then I would have one more for the memory. I’m afraid I’m going to forget how it felt, having you against me. I think it’s already fading. I want to believe it’s for the best but I can’t. I should stop.
I love you and I won’t say more than that,
Camilla
