info: kwon soonyoung/reader, teen+, hanahaki/dystopian au genre: angst, romance | word ct: 5k warnings: blood, gore, major character death summary: no one told her about hanahaki, no one told her about the risks, the dangers. no one told her that if she were to love kwon soonyoung she might as well be dead. notes: formerly known as if lilies were red
cross posted on ao3
She wasn’t told about Hanahaki when she was young. At least—she was never told the truth. She didn’t know what the symptoms are, how the disease would spread, nothing. All she knew was that Hanahaki was once a disease that was uncontrollable, devastating, unavoidable, and always fatal. According to her teachers it would claim hundreds of lives yearly. Eventually the government was able to find a cure and Hanahaki was effectively purged from society. The Cure was a complete success, no one worried about it anymore, and there wasn’t a single recorded case of Hanahaki since.
So when she watched her teacher cough up blood onto the floor, purple petals falling from her lips, she didn’t know what it could possibly be. She didn’t know why anyone would cough up flowers, why she tried to run, why government officials suddenly stormed the classroom and took her teacher away. And she didn’t know why her teacher denied it happening when they came back two weeks later, explaining her absence with illness.
She remembered raising her hand in the air innocently, asking a question no one had thought to ask.
“What sort of disease makes you cough up flowers?”
It was a question she would have for years, one she would never get an answer to. Whoever she asked either had no clue or told her to mind her own business. Neither of which gave her much closure on the subject. Her parents tried to convince her time and time again not to worry about it, they even made her promise never to ask the question again. Yet no matter how much she wanted to or how hard she tried she couldn’t forget those purple flowers floating in blood.
Her curiosity didn’t relent as she transitioned from a rosy cheeked child into a young woman. She did learn to be more discrete, quietly researching in her spare time. Always wondering what sort of affliction could cause petals to spill past ones lips and why no one wanted to provide the answers she sought out so desperately. Because there wasn’t a single medical journal she happened upon that could describe the illness her teacher once had. She couldn’t find evidence of it anywhere.
When she was volunteering at a blood bank she witnessed that strange disease again. She was with Soonyoung, a good friend, unloading a delivery at the local hospital. Soonyoung joked about her being weak, she stubbornly stuck out her tongue and carried on. She could remember slipping and cutting open her elbow on the floor in her hubris. He had taken her into a bathroom to bandage her up. They were laughing when it happened, they were completely naïve.
“Get away from me!”
They both froze at the sound of someone shouting out in the hallway. The person, whoever they were, sounded sick. She could hear them coughing horrendously, light splats resonating as something wet hit the floor. A part of her wanted to help him, but fear kept her rooted where she stood. Then—footsteps. Plenty of them. Loud too. They were chasing the sick person, they continued to scream until she heard a sickening crack.
Then there was silence.
Both Soonyoung and her were too startled to move at first, they had no idea what just happened. Soonyoung admitted to her later that he didn’t want to know. But as she bravely cracked open the door, cautiously peering out into the hallway, she saw the bloodied yellow petals scattered across the linoleum. Without a doubt she knew it was the same disease that plagued her teacher all those years ago.
“We have someone here in the last stage of Hanahaki.” Silence. “No sir, he wasn’t on our radar.” Silence. “That was our mistake sir, we’ll get him into the operating room now and fix this. The Cure will be administered.”
Hanahaki? She asked herself, closing the door. I thought—I thought that disease was eradicated?
Silence and fear washed over them, blanketing them in a tension that she struggled to breathe through. There was an undeniable weight on her chest, her rapid heartrate was a thunderstorm in her ears. She had never felt more terrified in her entire life. Beside her, Soonyoung trembled, neither of them knew what to do. The only thing that they did know was that if they made a wrong move their fate would be sealed.
“We need to get out of here.” Soonyoung whispered in her ear. “I don’t like how this sounds.”
“Neither do I.” She admitted. “But—but what do we do? If we run and they see us? I don’t want to think of what would happen to us—”
“So don’t.” He stated plainly, taking her hand in his. “Concentrate on what we can control, we’ll run only when we know it’s safe.”
Even though she still felt on edge, Soonyoung’s words calmed her considerably. After lacing their fingers together she was able to think more clearly, breathe a bit easier, her heartrate slowed until she could no longer hear the blood rushing in her ears. As the feeling of dread dissipated she was able to concentrate on what she heard.
“Soonyoung?” She asked, her face paling in terror. “What—what is Hanahaki? Like—like what’re the symptoms?”
He looked at her in disbelief. “You want to talk about a disease that was cured over a hundred years ago? Now? We’re a little busy if you haven’t noticed.”
“That’s the thing, I—” She muttered underneath her breath. “I don’t think it was cured.”
In that exact moment she had no idea how right she was.
Neither of them spoke of that day after their escape. And not from lack of trying on her part. Even though she feared what would happen to her if her search for the truth was made public, she wasn’t deterred in the slightest. If anything, the terror she felt fuelled her. There was something strange transpiring around her and she wouldn’t stop until she got to the bottom of it.
The last piece of the puzzle came to her after her grandfather passed, a grandfather she didn’t even know existed. He worked for the government on the other side of the country, and did so until the day he died. Her family gathered in the foreign town to offer condolences and also to help her uncles clear out his house. She had been lifting boxes and transporting them to the moving truck when she dropped a heavier one full of books. As they scattered across the attic floor, one caught her eye.
The Origins of Hanahaki
For a moment, time stopped. She couldn’t believe what she had just happened upon, the very thing she had been trying to find for years was only two feet in front of her. Cautiously, she looked over her shoulders, hoping that her parents wouldn’t come looking for her. Dropping to her knees she took the old text in her hands and hesitantly began leafing through the pages. Her mind soaked up every single piece of information, the tiniest detail, until she was finally enlightened.
Hanahaki wasn’t something that could truly be prevented, only cured. Everyone had the illness within them from the day they were born. And its physical symptoms are brought on by unrequited love. A bouquet of flowers slowly blossoming in your chest, the favorite flowers of the one you love, until you finally suffocate on the petals. Once someone has it there were only two ways to rid yourself of the affliction. Either move on from the person who couldn’t reciprocate the feelings, or have the flower inside of you removed. If Hanahaki went without cure, the host would eventually die.
Along the margins of the book her grandfather had written notes of varying importance. Some were corrections to the information provided, others were diagrams of flowers, and the most important of all were the notes on curing Hanahaki. What was written along the edges detailed a theoretical process in which Hanahaki was cured before it could even take root. He had written THE CURE in big red letters at the top of the page and then UNPRACTICAL in blue several years after.
Everyone, no matter how old or how young, had flowers embedded in their lungs. According to her grandfather’s theory, those flowers could be removed even before they had a chance to bloom, before a person was cursed with Hanahaki. Though it came at a cost. Removing the flowers permanently cuts off ones capacity to love. Or to feel any emotion at all, that’s why doctors initially didn’t recommend the treatment unless Hanahaki had already begun.
She was never without that book in the following years. Always hidden, never seen, but always with her. She learned everything there was to know about Hanahaki from those pages, she learned about a disease that humans would never be rid of completely. It was in their DNA, it was a part of them. Even with all of this information she still had questions, she felt as if she would always have questions. But one question eclipsed all others, the one she could never stop thinking about. How was it that there had been no reported cases of Hanahaki if the Cure her grandfather suggested never came to fruition?
Soonyoung distracted her from her overactive mind whenever they were together. Something she deeply appreciated, a semblance of normalcy in her life. They had graduated high school and gone on to attend the same university. He was her best friend, the one person in the world she felt as if she could trust. And yet—she never told him about what she learned. She didn’t tell him about the truths of Hanahaki, she didn’t tell anyone, but perhaps she should’ve. Looking back, she wished that she had dared to trust him long enough to prevent what would happen to her next.
“She said yes!” He exclaimed one day. “Jimin actually said yes!”
The girl Soonyoung was referencing was one he had an ungodly crush on for the longest time. He gushed about her daily, fawned over her fair looks and sweet voice, and no one heard more about her than his best friend. She didn’t mind, she was happy for him. She was happy that he was moving forward with his life. Even as she told him those exact words easily, she couldn’t deny the ache she felt in her chest. That ache only grew stronger and more tenacious in the following weeks until it disappeared almost overnight.
She was completely unaware that it was already too late.
When Hanahaki first presents itself you start by coughing horrendously. The flowers begin to emerge from the lining of your lungs and the irritation causes an immense pain in your chest. It’s mostly overlooked in the beginning, writing it off as just a bad cough. Most people don’t even know that there are flowers blooming inside of them until the bloody petals spill from their lips. She was no different.
The first time she coughed up flowers she was at home, thankfully. In the middle of the night she could feel something making its way up her throat and in her lethargic state she barely recognized what was going on. Quickly she ran to the bathroom, practically tearing the door of its hinges as she collapsed onto her knees and emptied the contents of her stomach into the toilet. Wiping off the corners of her mouth with a towel she noticed the blood stained lilies floating around in the water.
Shock hit her almost instantly, followed shortly by denial. She couldn’t believe her eyes, she refused to. She shook her head back and forth, covering her mouth as quiet sobs wracked her body. In all of her studies, in her search for the truth, she never imagined that Hanahaki would affect her directly. The idea that she would be afflicted with the disease never crossed her mind. She cursed herself for being so foolish as she plucked petals from between her teeth.
Despite her situation, she did her best to continue on like nothing was wrong. Mostly to no avail. She couldn’t help it, couldn’t shake the anxious feeling coursing through her. Everywhere she went she was afraid someone would see her cough up petals into her handkerchief. And more afraid of what would happen to her next. She didn’t go to the doctors, she tried not to go out at all if she could help it. Mostly she spent her days working from home doing her best to remain hidden until she overcame whatever unrequited love she was apparently enduring.
The thought occurred to her to tell the authorities, to go to the doctor to have the flowers permanently cut out from her lungs. Surely the procedure still existed, Hanahaki wasn’t something that was going to go away just because the government said it would. She didn’t know who caused the flower to bloom in the first place, it wasn’t as if cutting off her emotions would’ve brought her any sadness. It was a viable option, one she cast aside almost as soon as she thought of it. The idea of never being able to experience happiness, love, it wasn’t worth it.
Soonyoung stopped by when she offhandedly sent him a text saying that she was “sick”, hoping it would keep him away. He didn’t need to know about her disease, didn’t need to be troubled by her silly mistake. That didn’t stop him, few things could. When he set his mind to a task nothing could get in his way. It was one of many things that made her happy that he was her best friend.
“Hey sicky.” He smirked, poking his head in through an open window suddenly.
Startled, she backed away instinctively and let out a shaky laugh. “Holy shit, Soonyoung. You can’t just scare a girl half to death like that!”
“Apparently I can.” He continued to tease her. “Why aren’t you answering my text messages?”
“I already told you.” She sighed. “I’m sick.”
He narrowed his eyes at her suspiciously. “Is that so? The best friend that I know and love is completely glued to her phone whenever she’s sick. Can’t get her off of it. Isn’t that strange?”
Blushing, she discreetly coughed into her hand. “Okay, fine. I’ve been ignoring you, I’m sorry.”
“You better be sorry!” He exclaimed matter-of-factly. “I even knew that you were ignoring me and I still came here to cheer you up.”
She shook her head in disbelief. “We’re already aware that you’re a far better friend then I am.”
“That’s true.” He grinned proudly. “I even considered giving you the cold shoulder—but I couldn’t. I’ve just missed you so darn much.”
Eyes widening, she was suddenly overcome by a coughing fit. This one was worse than those that had come before, she couldn’t even stand up straight as she felt a flower make its way up her throat. Quickly she ran to the bathroom, spitting the lily into the toilet before Soonyoung had a chance to catch up. She was able to flush it just in time for him to appear in the doorway, worry creasing his soft features.
“Is that—” He swallowed nervously. “Is that blood? Have you seen a doctor yet?”
Wiping the warmth from her chin, she nodded. “O-of course I have. What sort of person doesn’t see the doctor when they’re sick?”
He offered her a reassuring smile. “Stubborn people. Which you might be from time to time.”
Snickering weakly, she splashed some cold water into her face. “Did you only come here to make fun of me and call me names?”
“I wish.” He joked. “I brought you some flowers on Jimin’s request. If you were really sick I thought you could use some cheering up.”
Watching him reach into his jacket, her heart warmed considerably. Soonyoung truly cared for her even if at sometimes it was hard to see. He always knew what to do or what to say to make her feel better. Unfortunately for her, no amount of kindness from her best friend could heal the illness she was plagued with, only she could.
She paled when she saw that he had brought her lilies, the flower she was more than acquainted with, but she quickly plastered on a fake smile. “Thank you so much, Soonyoung. Did Jimin pick these out?”
“No.” He chuckled as he shook his head. “I did. They’re my favorite.”
When her knees suddenly gave out and she vomited into the toilet, it wasn’t because of Hanahaki.
It never crossed her mind that she could possibly be in love with her best friend. Never. In hindsight it probably should’ve been her first guess. They had been friends since they were kids, they did everything together, knew everything about each other, it only made sense. Soonyoung was the person she could turn to for anything and often did. He was there for her when she needed him most, and evidently the one person to seal her fate with nothing more than a beautiful white flower.
The day she feared for her life came shortly after when she stepped out for a moment to get groceries. She was eyeing eggs, checking to make sure none of them were cracked when she heard two older women whispering about a missing co-worker. Writing it off as office gossip, she approached the counter and paid for her food. She was at the door when something she heard stopped her in her tracks.
“They say he had Hanahaki.”
“What? That’s impossible!”
“You and I both know that Hanahaki has never been cured. Only hidden.”
“I know that’s—we shouldn’t talk about this here. We don’t want to disappear like he did.”
Her suspicions had been correct all along, the government was hiding Hanahaki’s presence by taking anyone who presented symptoms. They were probably forced to undergo the procedure that cured them if her memory of that one dreadful day when she was hiding in the hospital was correct. The thought made her stomach sink like a rock, she couldn’t tell anyone. She was going to wind up dead one day and no one would know why.
When days bled into weeks, weeks into months, her disease only got worse. It became harder and harder to keep Soonyoung away. As he was actually a doctor he insisted on caring for her, persisted even. She had to refuse, she had to stay away from him. Because each moment she spent near him she could feel the flowers in her chest multiplying, like she was even in love with his presence. Why she didn’t tell him about what he was doing to her, why she didn’t finally tell him about the innocent petals that were slowly killing her, she would never know. He was the one person she could trust above all else.
“How’re you doing?” Soonyoung asked cautiously over the phone. “Any better?”
“Loads.” She lied easily. “I’ll be back in fighting form in no time. Just you wait.”
He sighed. “I really have no idea why you won’t let me take you to the doctor. You obviously need medical attention.”
“You know why.” She reminded him. “I’m—I’m terrified of doctors.”
“It would just be me!” He exclaimed, clearly frustrated. “I’d get you in and out of there quickly, no one would even know!”
Coughing and spitting a bloody petal into a tissue, she had to remain strong. “I’m sorry Soonyoung. I know you’re worried about me I just—I can’t.”
“Then let me take care of you at least.” He continued to push. “Let me stop by a couple of times a week to monitor your breathing. There’s no way this can be mono, I don’t care what you say.”
“Soonyoung—” She started, only to be interrupted by the flower crawling up her throat. “You really don’t need to do all that, I’m—I’m going to be fine!”
“I’d rather stop by and be completely sure.” He insisted. “Please, please let me do this. I’m practically tearing my hair out over here because I’m afraid that if I don’t hear from you for a day it’s because you finally coughed up a lung. Do it for me, do it so I stop driving Jimin crazy.”
She winced at the sound of her name. “Soonyoung, I don’t—I don’t think—”
“Please.” He begged her. “I love you and I don’t want to lose you.”
You’re going to anyway. She reminded herself morbidly with a sad smile. “I love you too. So—so if you want to stop by for a few minutes—”
“Thank you.” He interrupted. “Thank you thank you thank you thank you. I’ll be right there!”
Letting her hand drop into her lap, she couldn’t stop the tears that she had kept bottled inside. She loved Soonyoung, she loved him so much. The pain of Hanahaki didn’t compare to the ache in her heart. Sometimes she wondered how soon it would claim her. She had been suffering from Hanahaki for several months now, almost a whole year. And while some people had lived for a whole decade after they first noticed symptoms, others had passed in as little as three months. Where she would fall was a complete mystery, probably sooner than she hoped.
The next few weeks while Soonyoung examined her were perhaps the hardest yet. With him being so close to her, the vase of fresh lilies he brought with him resting peacefully on her nightstand, it was hard for her to breathe. Countless times to had to swallow a stray petal that threatened to expose the truth she was so terrified of. Her body was rebelling against her, the flowers he had given life to within her were desperate for him. It was a strange feeling, like they were actively reaching for him as if he were the sun.
“I brought you more lilies.” He said each and every day as he offered them to her. “They always seem to make you happy.”
Soonyoung smiled and her heart ached. It always did. He reached out for her and she could feel a lump forming in her throat. She could feel the flowers that blossomed within her chest threatening to spill forth and unveil her lies. But no matter how much it hurt, how much it pained her to keep this secret, she didn’t dare mare the beautiful lilies that Soonyoung loved so much.
“I love them.”
Eventually, with time, she was able to hide her symptoms better. She started going out in public, hung out with friends, things were almost halfway normal. Every now and again she’d have to excuse herself, the uncomfortable tightness in her throat got to be too much. But, other than that, she was fine. Soonyoung stopped worrying about her as much, life carried on. She even dared to hope that her condition was improving.
Apparently childish whims weren’t beyond her.
She collapsed one afternoon out on the busy street. Her lungs had either filled up with flowers or one had cut off oxygen to her brain. She only lost consciousness for a moment, but that was long enough for someone to call an ambulance. Hunched over, she coughed up a handful of lilies and immediately sprinted towards a dark alley. There was no way she was going to the hospital, she wasn’t going to give anyone the chance to remove the flowers from her lungs.
Sometimes she could swear she was beyond delusional. The notion that she’d rather keep the seeds of unrequited love in her chest than live a full life was absolutely ludicrous. Every day she reminded herself of this fact, logic and reason screamed at her to make the right decision. Still she refused. Because every single time her mind tried to convince her to save herself, her heart would ache thinking about how Soonyoung would never be able to make her smile again.
Her love for Soonyoung was more deep and more profound than she initially thought. It took time, but finally she realized how pivotal to her life he really was. He was the light that woke her up every morning, the star in the night sky that watched over her in her dreams. With just a smile he could lift her spirits, his laughter dried her tears. There wasn’t anything she wouldn’t do for him, nothing she wouldn’t give. Soonyoung was, and will always be, the keeper of her heart. And the man who would kill her in a little over a year.
She tried to keep up appearance as best she could, but her condition was getting harder and harder to hide. The face mask she wore would often be spattered with blood, she could leave a meadow of lilies in her wake, she didn’t have much time left. And yet, despite all of that, she decided to stay by Soonyoung’s side. She continued to be his best friend until her very last breath.
“We’re getting engaged!”
When Soonyoung and Jimin invited her over for dinner, she didn’t expect to hear those words spill from his lips. She expected anything but. The pain she felt inside of her was different than before, it was—it was almost final. And she wasn’t sure if it was because her heart was breaking or because Hanahaki was about to overtake her. She did her best to smile as her ears began ringing uncontrollably and the room starting spinning. Her heart was racing, she was getting lightheaded, another handful of seconds ticked by and she collapsed to the ground. Soonyoung’s worried cries were the last thing she heard.
By the time she woke up, she was in Soonyoung’s car. She was splayed out on the backseat, blood pooled from her mouth and dripped onto the upholstery. Everything was a blur, she could barely see anything, her head ached terribly, and trying to sit up was perhaps the most agonizing thing she attempted in her entire life. Her body was revolting against her, she rolled onto her side and coughed up perhaps a dozen lilies all perfectly intact. All drenched in her blood.
“I need you to keep the drop off clear.” Soonyoung said to someone on the phone. “I have someone who needs treatment for Hanahaki now.”
Her heart skipped a beat, then two. Three beats later and she wasn’t completely sure if it had stopped entirely. She had to get out of the car, she had to run away. She wouldn’t be cured, she didn’t want to be. Mustering up all the strength she could, she reached for the door handle, her bloodied hands slipping against the cool plastic. Tears streaked her face, tears of desperation and fear, betrayal and heartbreak. Soonyoung was going to rip out her emotions without batting an eyelash. She found herself kicking the door in anger.
“Holy shit!” Soonyoung swore, clearly startled. “You’re—you’re awake? Oh thank God, are you okay?”
“Don’t take me to the hospital…” She begged him. “Please Soonyoung, don’t do this to me...”
“What the hell are you even saying!” He exclaimed. “If you haven’t noticed, you’ve been coughing up blood for the past hour! Of course I’m taking you to the hospital!”
She clenched her jaw when a large flower began pushing its way up from her lungs. “I—I don’t care… I can’t go to the hospital…”
“I’m not letting my best friend die from Hanahaki!” He shouted angrily. “Why didn’t you tell me that this was happening to you? Obviously you know that coughing up flowers isn’t natural!”
“I know…” She muttered weakly, her throat sore from her illness. “How do you—how do you know about Hanahaki? All of the information on it was destroyed…”
“I’m a doctor.” He halfway explained. “We know that Hanahaki wasn’t really cured, only prevented. I’ve—I’ve seen people with Hanahaki before, you don’t know how bad it can get. Watching someone’s chest ripped open and—it’s not something I ever want to see happen to you. I’m not going to let it happen. You need a doctor.”
She shook her head in defiance. “I don’t want to see a doctor, Soonyoung.”
“That’s only because you don’t know what’s about to happen!” He persisted. “You don’t know what it’ll do to you, what it’ll—”
“I know all about Hanahaki, Soonyoung…” She all but whispered. “I’ve—I’ve always known.”
Soonyoung eyed her in disbelief through the rearview mirror. “You’re telling me that you’ve known that you’ve had Hanahaki this whole time and you’ve done nothing about it? The procedure—”
“Isn’t worth it.” She interrupted bitterly. “How could you even think that?”
“And you think it’s worth dying for someone who doesn’t love you?” He offered in a snide tone. “Do you really love them that much?”
“Of course I do.” She answered with a sad smile. “Isn’t that obvious?”
Running a hand through his hair he sped through a red light. “I’m going to be honest with you, as your best friend, if they don’t love you then they’re not worth it. Don’t let some asshole end your life like this!”
“If he were an asshole it would be easier…” She offered quietly. “But I couldn’t see myself loving anyone else.”
He exhaled a frustrated breath, pinching the bridge of his nose. “Fine, you love him. You don’t want to get the procedure. I just—I can’t figure out why the fuck you didn’t tell me! I thought we were friends, best friends. I could’ve helped you through this!”
“I had my reasons…” She tried to deflect, tears stinging her eyes. “I—I had my reasons…”
“What reason is worth dying over!” He shouted, slamming his fist into the steering wheel. “I can’t believe you right now, I really can’t.”
Swallowing nervously, the pressure inside of her chest was almost too much for her to handle. “I’m—I’m sorry Soonyoung, I just—I know you love lilies. I didn’t want to ruin them for you.”
“What?” He questioned, obviously confused. “What the hell are you even saying—”
He was interrupted by the gut wrenching scream that escaped her lips.
“Oh no…” He muttered, realizing what that sound meant. “Fuck! I don’t care what you say, you’re getting the procedure. I’m not losing you because you keep deciding to be stubborn!”
“No!” She managed to shout through the pain. “Soonyoung, please! I can’t—”
As she lifted herself up, leaning over the center console just slightly, a dozen bloody lilies rose up from her lungs and spilled all over the arm rest. One after another they made the same sickening splat against the upholstery, one after another Soonyoung’s eyes contorted in a heartwrenching sadness. Because just one look at them and he finally knew the truth. He knew why she never confided in him. He knew that he was the one who was going to kill her in the end.
“Why…?” He asked no on in particularly, tears dripping from his chin as he pulled off the road. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
Wiping off her mouth, she still smiled. “I couldn’t put that burden on you. I—I know how much you love Jimin, I didn’t want my predicament sway you to do something stupid…”
“Like refuse treatment for a disease that is completely curable?” He seethed through his teeth. “I can’t believe this is happening, I can’t believe you would fall in love with me!”
She offered a weak laugh. “You can’t be surprised, you’re everything I’ve ever wanted.”
Putting the car in park, he pressed his palms into his eyes. “Please—please let me take you to the hospital. Please don’t make me the murderer of my best friend! I’ll—I’ll do anything! I’ll tell you that I love you, I’ll—I’ll—”
“Soonyoung…” She whispered, crawling into the front seat and taking his hand in hers. “I’m not asking you to love me, I would never do that to you because I know you never will. This wasn’t your fault, it’s not your fault that you are who you are. I don’t care that you don’t love me, I’m just begging you not to take away the love I have for you.”
His lower lip quivered as he looked at her. “I want to love you… I—I want to save you, but I—I—”
“Not everyone can be saved.” She gritted through her teeth, gripping his hand tighter than expected. “All you can do—all you can do is try your best.”
“I—” He practically whimpered. “I can’t let you die like this... I just can’t…”
As she rubbed her thumb against the back on his hand to comfort him, she could feel her ribs splintering. Like something was crawling out of her chest. It was like nothing she had ever felt before from Hanahaki, the pain was unbearable. She knew she only had minutes left.
“You’ve done everything you can.” She somehow managed. “I’ve—I’ve done everything I can. I tried so hard to move on from you—hngh!—I did everything that I could. Nothing I did made a difference. I didn’t care that it would kill me, I’d rather die than stop loving you.”
He reached out for her suddenly, pulling her back into him and wrapping his arms tightly around her. This was their goodbye, the goodbye she had been dreading for months. He sobbed freely into her hair, never letting go of her hand while despair shook his shoulders. In his arms she had never felt more at home, and more like a stranger. The one place she always wanted to be but the one place she never belonged. It was her last comfort.
The last thing she heard before she died was a sickening crack. It was instant, almost painless as the flowers he had planted in her lungs finally burst forth. His cries would’ve deafened her if she could hear. Her chest opened up, several dozen bright white lilies blossoming from her breast, and she was dead. The flowers that cursed her were positively breathtaking even as blood soaked the edges and poured from the open wound. She was beautiful, beautiful in a way no one wanted to admit. Even in death love made her beautiful.
He made her beautiful.