Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Junmyeon has become an expert at puttering. Every morning he takes his meds, does the simple exercises and self testing his eye doctor ordered. Breakfast is easy and always the same (it has to be, to be easy). And then the rest of the day, if he doesn’t have appointments, is for puttering.

Five months of it, just about.

He has his podcast schedule, his tv schedule. Meals are at set times so he doesn’t overlook them. The only thing Junmyeon really does beside putter around is gardening. He became a keen gardener five months ago (just about. Everything has been since five months ago. Just about. He doesn’t count dates.)

It’s been hit and miss, mostly because Junmyeon’s prior experiences of gardening amount to very little. He still doesn’t know what perennial means. It drains a ridiculous amount of energy reading the enlarged text on his tablet, so he saves that for the order forms and fills his basket by colour. And he wanted it to all grow now, so every seed pack has gone into the ground regardless of the tiny printed instructions he didn’t bother asking anyone to read. Waiting for them to grow takes time Junmyeon couldn’t bare to wait for.

Kyungsoo drove them - Junmyeon, and Baekhyun with his head poking out the window like an excited puppy - to some rural area he knew of to buy supplies. It was a large warehouse with tall greenhouses outside and a pond the size of Junmyeon’s entire garden. Baekhyun held his arm and Kyungsoo loaded up the cart, and with precisely zero knowledge of how to start a garden between them (“Why do we need so much soil when the garden is already full of dirt?”), they did just that.

For two weekends Jongdae helped (well, did. Junmyeon supervised) dig the beds and pull the weeds. The only plant already in Junmyeon’s small patch of garden was a camellia bush that had been big and blooming when he moved in years ago.

Everyone was doing their best to help, but two of his closest friends are married men with more responsibilities than just Junmyeon. Until he could have his own colourful garden he could at least bring a little colour into the house - one big, bright camellia every other week didn’t seem like it would do much harm.

It’s actually the first time in Junmyeon’s life that he’s learned about something so haphazardly, and it’s almost annoying how well that’s been going. He’s just doing things his own way, his own pace. He has a gardening apron. Gardeners probably have gardening clothing, but even when he had his sight Junmyeon would have been too lazy for all that bother. He likes to go out when the mood takes him. When his knees and arms ache it means he’s been productive.

He likes how grounding it is in the evenings when he’s methodically scrubbing the dirt from his knuckles and under his nails. He imagines how it must cake into all the small creases of his palms and how the slippery sweet-smelling foam between his hands is lifting it away. It fills the time. There’s an awful lot of time between coming in from the garden and lying in bed, in the dark, pretending if he turned on a light it would be much different.



🌼



It’s been raining. Junmyeon hasn’t been able to visit his garden for two days now. During the night rain pelted his window, but this morning he listens carefully with half of his face buried in a pillow, and there’s no sound. There’s not much of anything when he looks across to his flower beds. Things are just like that sometimes. Turning back, the room doesn’t look like a cloud has descended during the night. Must be drizzle, or fog. Nothing will need watering after all this rain, but he could still go out just to check on everything.

Junmyeon never particularly liked his job as a lecturer. It was idealistic work that his heart had never been truly in after his first few let downs. He wasn’t all that good at holding people’s attention, well liked but not well respected. Some days he misses it. Usually by noon. Most days he’s starting to miss things he never thought he would by noon. But then he visits his garden again, checking everyone is still well watered and his seedlings are still just, if he really focuses, starting to poke their little heads up. If there’s nothing new to plant he sits out there with them and enjoys their company.

Retired at 26 with enough in the bank to have no sleepless nights should be a dream come true. The medical negligence compensation was easily enough to keep him well above water for years, maybe forever if his investments are good ones. But, you know, the whole medical negligence part is the catch in that otherwise idyllic setup.

Junmyeon sighs and taps his fingertips against the cold glass. Another long day of staying indoors with artificial lights. He looks down to the windowsill. At least he has-

“Oh?”

His camellia is missing from the window. The container is there, still upright. If he’s somehow knocked the flower out it should be easy to see. That’s why he likes it; the red is so stark and bright he can always see it. Even on days his sight is inexplicably worse, the way it will apparently one day inexplicably improve, he can see his favourite flower. But he can’t right now, and that’s- it’s impossible. Sure his room is cluttered, but the petals are so red.

A lot of vulnerability comes with sight loss, Junmyeon’s found. It’s just a flower, but the familiar twist of anxiety in his gut is already there. Something is going wrong. Something important. Anything going wrong is twice the concern when you so frequently need assistance.

Don’t get upset, he thinks firmly, because stress is one of the worst things for him.

But those flowers.. they’re special. They’re why he didn’t let Jongdae uproot the tree to give him a whole clear bed to work in. They’re what snapped him out of the downward spiral he was in fresh out of hospital release, what made him realise there was still something he could enjoy. Some colour and joy in this (often literally) dark time. The last five months of his life - this new, strange life - the camellia’s big round blooms have given him hope.

“Where are you, where- where could you have gone?” He scoops things from the floor in handfuls. It all feels like clothing. No flashes of scarlet anywhere. “Little flower,” he calls, lifting the duvet where it overhangs the bed and feeling under the frame. He always has one in here. He speaks to them often, when he’s looking out the window and willing himself to distinguish sections of the flower bed. It shouldn’t matter, but Junmyeon’s priorities aren’t exactly what they once were.

Fumbling in his closet for a jacket is just about the most upsettingly frustrating thing he could be doing right now. It’s dark and his clothing is dark and Kyungsoo makes a good point that at a time like this Junmyeon would really benefit from being more organised. Unfortunately his personality didn’t magically adapt the day he was classed disabled. Nothing he’s getting hold of feels like a jacket. So fuck it. Morning routine forgotten, he heads straight downstairs and pulls on his shoes.

It’s surprisingly warm outside. Despite the days of rain it doesn’t seem to be humid, just damp and fresh. Junmyeon’s shoes squelch in the wet grass. Moisture clings to his bare arms and within moments his hair is damp and sticking to his forehead.

If the only damn thing that stops him hating the cage of his home is some splashes of colour then that’s just how it is. If the only damn stupid pointless thing he can actually do for himself without calling in the cavalry is get another flower then at least he’ll have achieved one thing this week.

The ground is uneven, and it’s hard to make out his usual route with this thick fog in the air. Junmyeon’s always been a cautious person, and recently he takes everything very, very easy at risk of ending up in hospital (again. At least the fracture clinic would be a change of scenery). But right now he’s a man on a mission. He sticks out his arms for balance and walks in hard, determined steps. There’s no one to see him fumbling along. Think less of him or pity him or- none of that matters right now.

Abruptly Junmyeon steps down into soil. He’s already at the end of the lawn. But the- The camellia is old, tall and wide and a marker of the direction he has to walk in. Carefully, Junmyeon steps back onto grass and turns to look the bed up and down.

It’s gone. Logically it can’t have gone, bushes don’t just vanish. It’s hard to make out exactly where in the small patch of garden he is, but there’s red on the ground. Camellias drop their flowers all at once, Junmyeon knows, but the pool of colour in his vision looks far too small. What he can make out of it, at least. What’s with this fog? Junmyeon’s never been in any like it. He can check the news when he gets back in the warm.

Right now he just needs to do this before he loses his nerve. He can do this. He can figure out where his flower is - or more, where he is, because of the two it’s more likely he’s misplaced himself.

The grass is wet against his knees. Like he does when he’s working in the garden, Junmyeon feels his way along. There’s sticks protecting the seedlings, a fern, a somewhat out of hand pool of forget-me-nots, and- something solid. Could the bush have somehow been pulled out of the ground? Giving it a second prod, Junmyeon frowns. It doesn’t feel like tree.

“This fog,” he grumbles, and plants his hand straight into the faint patch of red. It’s soft, and kind of stringy when he closes his fingers around it. And attached to something- someone, that starts to lift up with a groan.

Junmyeon startles, swinging his arms as he sharply backs away. He crashes down onto his backside. Disoriented, the fog is so thick he can’t tell if he’s even looking up at the sky or towards the bed or his house. Wet has soaked straight through his sleep clothes, but he doesn’t even register it as another groan comes from the patch of fog at his feet.

This, this he can’t do.



It wasn’t willingly that Junmyeon let the stranger into his home. It’s just that he was so faint he couldn’t stay on his feet without assistance, and this person seemed very concerned about that. And also knew the exact route into the house. And seemingly knows Junmyeon, too.

Even disoriented, angry and trembling Junmyeon can make out that the man on the opposite couch is frowning at him.

“I thought you’d recognise me.”

“I can’t s-“

“See, I know. Well, you can a bit, you know? Enough. I’d hoped you’d recognise me,” he sighs, folding his arms across his chest. “Your camellia?”

Junmyeon isn’t sure if that tone is disappointed or indignant. Either way, “What?” Is this man involved in the disappearance? What about his camellia could be important enough that someone would climb into his garden and.. Well, considering how he found this person, it’s more likely it was a prank of some kind gone wrong. A small flush of anger rises to Junmyeon’s face. “What about it?”

“You really don’t recognise me,” says the large, naked man sitting on Junmyeon’s couch, with the audacity to sound as though Junmyeon’s at fault here. “It’s me,” his tone turns unexpectedly pleading. “You can see my colours, right? You can see it’s me. Kim Junmyeon. It’s me.”

Something about hearing his name makes Junmyeon weak at the knees, then sick with another rush of anger. Adjusting to being a vulnerable person is still something he’s struggling with. “I don’t understand.”

“Neither do I. I was.. I thought you’d know,” he ducks his head down awkwardly. Bright bright red hair. The same bloom of red that Junmyeon’s seen every day on his windowsill. “I thought you believed in spirituality,” he says, and that’s even more bewildering.

“H- Why would you know anything about what I..” Oh. The dots start to connect too quickly for Junmyeon to wilfully deny that he can see what’s happening. “You’re the.. you mean you’re its spirit?”

“That’s right!” the stranger practically leaps out of the seat. Junmyeon jolts back, pressing his shoulders against the wall behind himself for stability.

This makes no sense at all. Junmyeon’s mind is racing (how good would he even be at self-defence in this state? Could he dial for help before this person stopped him? There’s no way he could outrun someone. This man is naked. He’s really just. Entirely naked.) and the panic is starting to make him lightheaded.

Junmyeon’s just considering where the nearest, heaviest object he could attempt to defend himself with may be when the sound of a siren fills the air. He hears it every day - it shouldn’t take him quite so long to realise it’s the alarm to remind him of his meds.

They both look to his phone on the table and back to each other.

“Take them,” the man says, and Junmyeon blanches. How could he know? “It’s important,” he presses. He stretches a hand towards Junmyeon when he picks the phone up to shut off the alarm. “Give me that, maybe I can find something.”

Junmyeon protectively holds his phone to his chest. “If you’re a.. you’re a plant..spirit? How do you know what a phone is.” It seems like a fair question, but he hears him sigh heavily.

“Do you know how much time we’ve spent together, Kim Junmyeon? You visit me every day. You talk to me for hours when you’re out there tending everyone.“ He gestures for the phone again. “You stopped your friend from digging me up, and..and you bring me into here, always.”

“I do,” Junmyeon concedes. He holds his phone by the very edge as he passes it over and quickly snatches his hand back, to another sigh from the spirit.

“You always want to keep me around. Junmyeon, you’ve..” he shrugs, dropping his head down. “This is unexpected, I know. But anyway, you should take your medication first.”

“Yeah,” Junmyeon weakly agrees, and he’s not happy about it, but he turns away.


Reading the page of enlarged text is slow going. The type is red on an orange background. It’s a site about yokai that Junmyeon doesn’t have to see clearly to feel is probably at least ten years old, if not significantly more. His camellia jogs his leg while Junmyeon reads. The way the couch cushion bounces along with the motion feels real.

Junmyeon lowers his phone. “This says you’re a malicious spirit that leads people to their death in the fog.”

“That’s not-!” His camellia jolts, almost leaping to his feet. Junmyeon looks across at him and he sinks back down. “I mean, that is true. But that’s for wild camellia! I promise. It was the only information I could find, it’s just a generalisation.”

“That sounds exactly like something a malicious spirit would say.” Junmyeon’s teasing; this spirit seems particularly prone to offence. Now he’s had some time to think and considered all of his options, not panicking seemed the best one.

When he was counting out his brown and red pills he focused hard on recalling the name he’d been told by his specialist. Neither he or Baekhyun could pronounce it. Charles Bonnet Syndrome, i.e if it’s not bad enough you can’t see, you can now see things that aren’t actually there and they’re really fucking realistic. He’s never experienced a hallucination before now, but the realisation was calming. That’s what this is. It’s loud and apparently channeling some deep recess of his guilty conscious with the way it’s disappointed in him, but that’s all it is.

“Well what else do you want me to say?” his camellia counters, “Shut me back outside if you don’t trust me, but I thought I mattered to you.”

Yeah, it’s really digging into his guilt. “You do, you do,” he says a little over-earnestly. Stress is a damaging factor for Junmyeon’s day to day wellbeing, so it’s probably for the best if he doesn’t allow himself to be stressed about this. He can see the funny side to it. If it doesn’t end soon then he’ll call..hmm, maybe Kyungsoo. Either way he should call his doctor tomorrow just to report a change in condition. “You don’t have to go back outside.”

His camellia shifts beside him, a move that looks like raised shoulders and crossed arms. Familiar faces are easier to pick details from, but especially in this gloomy light it’s hard to distinguish what exactly the human form of his plant looks like. Honestly, if he’s going to hallucinate it could at least have the decency to be in focus. The mouth and nose are barely visible, but his big eyes and dark, furrowed brows are just about there. “Are you scowling at me?” Junmyeon laughs.

“Yes,” his voice is deep, loud. “How would you feel if you went to all the effort to become sentient and got treated like this?”

”I’m sorry, you’re right,” Junmyeon can’t help smiling, “I don’t normally have days this eventful,” he explains, then laughs harder. This is all so silly. He’s heard of people hallucinating all manner of things, from animals in their homes to their homes shifting shape in front of their eyes. He hallucinates a big handsome man. Could be worse.



Hallucinations don’t mean you’re losing your mind. Junmyeon reminds himself of that numerous times throughout the day. Finding clothing for his friendly, totally non-malicious (and very tall) spirit seemed a good idea, if he was going to continue appearing that opaque and realistic. His body felt solid and curved under the fabric when Junmyeon playfully tugged and patted it into place. They’ve been bickering and talking and laughing, and that’s the first sign of madness, Junmyeon seems to recall, when you talk to yourself in earnest.

Considering how anxious his health makes him it’s an uncharacteristic response, but Junmyeon’s actually kind of..not stressed. The presence of another human in his home is comforting, in a way. His friends are wonderful, but the amount of allotted buddy time they each spend on caring for him means they never have time to just hang out. Sure it would be unnerving if he let himself think about the what if of this, so he’s not letting himself. So even if it’s just his brain and mangled optic nerves teaming together to be assholes, he’s allowing it to feel good to at least replicate some company.



It’s barely 8pm when Junmyeon decides he should make a start on  the night routine if he wants to make it to bed.

“Is there anything I can do to help?” His camellia is immediately up and trailing after him as he heads for the stairs. “Junmyeon, please let me help.” He takes the stairs two at a time, waiting behind Junmyeon each time he catches him up, staring into his narrow back.

Junmyeon pauses on the landing. He slept in late today and it’s not exactly late now, but he’s exhausted. Focusing so much energy into trying to see is a bigger physical strain than he ever expects it to be. He’s really tried, when this human incarnate of his favourite bloom has been turned away or focused elsewhere. He’s willed himself more than ever to just look harder, somehow. And he’s basically just talked himself tired. Laughed himself tired. Not a sign of madness, but maybe makes a point for those support groups Jongdae mentions.

“Would you mind shutting up downstairs?” Junmyeon asks, turning back. The spirit is two steps lower and at eye level. Red, red hair and not much else. “It would save me going back down again. There’s just..tv off, phone charger unplugged, both doors locked, all the blinds down,” he recites in the order he does them each night.

“Sure,” his red hair bobs, “Don’t worry about a thing! I’ll check everything extra carefully.”

Junmyeon smiles warmly. It’s polite, even if it’s not real. “Thank you. That would help a lot.”

It’s been a disrupted day. For the first time since he drew it up, Junmyeon doesn’t follow his routine. He takes his nighttime meds with handfuls of water from the tap, then shuts himself in his room.

The flower is still missing from his window. Hallucinations like the type he’s expected to experience.. they’re visual, not auditory. He’s just asked his hallucination to complete household tasks, and from the sound of it when he walked past the stairs, he is. The twisting in Junmyeon’s gut is a hard feeling to place, noticeable even while he’s busying himself with changing for bed, digging through the blobs of colour on the floor for a sleep shirt. All day it’s been like there’s a stone in his stomach, growing heavier and heavier as the stranger in his home has failed to disappear.  

All the small talk and joking was to soothe Junmyeon’s nerves as much as it was actually kind of nice to feel there was someone there to talk to. Nothing felt out of place in how he spoke or his replies to Junmyeon’s questions about life as a plant (or his groaning at the jokes, but that’s not worth reporting on). Aside from the whole possible-malicious-spirit thing, there’s been nothing surreal or nightmare-ish about it. Junmyeon leans back against his pillows. He’s unsure if he should be worried that something serious is happening in his brain or eyes, or if he should be asking one of the guys to take him to a shrine first thing tomorrow.

He settles on neither, fishing his phone out of his pocket.

On the other end of the call the reception is bad, making the answer tinny and distorted. It sounds like there’s music. “Taozi? Do you have a moment?” Junmyeon finds he’s covering his own ear, like it’ll help him hear through the noise on Zitao’s end better.

“Junmahao,” Zitao’s laugh crackles down the line, “Wait, wait. It’s noisy!”

Junmyeon waits. Hearing Zitao’s breathy laugh sent a flood of relief straight through him. He’s not alone. Downstairs there’s a thud, then another. Maybe it’s just his imagination that the air seems to rapidly cool. Yeah, he’s really not.

The background noise is gone. “Can you hear me ok?” he asks, and Zitao just sighs. Obviously he can - he moved, after all. “Baby, I know you’re busy. I just wanted an answer to something. Super quick.”

“Super quick,” Zitao echoes, but he doesn’t sound impatient. He never really does anymore, with Junmyeon. But wherever he was he must have stepped outside to take the call; Junmyeon doesn’t want to take up too much of his time.

“You know how you’ve always been intuitive to spiritual things?” Junmyeon blinks across at the opposite wall. There’s no sane-sounding way to ask this. But it’s Zitao, who isn’t quiet about existing on a higher plane than most. So, deep breath and just say it as it is. “I’ve either..found, or I’m hallucinating a spirit. And- and now he’s in my house. I gave him a sweater? I was warned how real the hallucinations can look, but I’ve touched him several times. Anyway,” he inhales sharply. Now he’s relaying this, he’s probably made some questionable decisions today. “I’m sorry, I know this is..I didn’t know who else to ask. Without just being taken straight to hospital, anyway. I’ve never had a hallucination before so maybe it is just..but they can’t feel real?” his throat tightens as he finally voices that thought. He’s fretting again, it’s bad for him. “So I just, I trust your opinion, so I wondered what you thought.”

Junmyeon shouldn’t mind being taken to his specialist and reassured this is normal. Really, deep down, he’d have done that within the first hour if he’d believed it was that simple. He kind of wants someone else to be as doubtful as he is. “Taozi baby?” Junmyeon says into the silence, “Can you still hear me?”

Zitao finally makes a small sound. “What does it want?” He sounds terrified, so, that’s kind of reassuring in it’s own way. He’s always maintained he can sense the otherworldly, he’s never made any claims about knowing what to do about it.

“Um.” Other than sulking about having to introduce himself he hasn’t really offered much information. He’s just kind of sat around all day, being a nuisance. But he did offer to help. “He seems friendly.”

Zitao squawks at that, and Junmyeon covers his phone to muffle the sound. He’s kind of expecting his guest to float up through the floor any moment and catch him calling for help, but maybe he’s not that kind of spirit. He felt pretty solid for walking through walls.

“He said normally his type of spirit would be malicious, but because I’d cared for him.. you know that big bush at the end of the garden? The red one.”

“So it’s a spirit from nature? Not a ghost.” Zitao sounds considerably calmer about that fact, but then his tone turns stern, “But Junmahao, a lot of spirits are smart. Even if they’re not harmful, they play tricks on humans. Even if they’re not all that smart they like playing tricks anyway. That’s not safe.“

“I think he was being honest,” Junmyeon frowns. They’ve essentially spent a day together, and all the big lump has done is trail around after him or lie on the couch. Stress and fatigue make his sight worse; by evening he could really only identify him by his hair. Earlier in the day he’d made out those big eyes clear enough to want to believe him. Junmyeon’s had enough misfortune recently without his favourite plant double crossing him.

“So,” Zitao says, “I believe you. That it’s not just your eyes. Text me updates, that way if he kills you I’ll have proof.”

Junmyeon groans. Never one to think before he speaks, his favourite baby boy. “Taozi.”

“Or mail me! Whatever is easiest. I love you, but I have to go back.”

“Of course. Thank you for listening, baby. I feel better about it.” Junmyeon cuts the call after Zitao’s made a loud kissing sound in response. He did feel better about it while they were talking, at least. Now it’s silent again the worry is creeping straight back in. But maybe it’s partly just because anything new and unexpected worries Junmyeon these days, and anything that could signify a change in his condition freaks him out.

Would he rather be hallucinating or dealing with a spirit? Dealing with a spirit would be preferable, really. No changes to medication, no new tests, no more of those eye drops that wipe out the little peripheral vision he has. No potential for more hallucinations worse than this. His camellia has done nothing harmful other than scare the heck out of him, and even that’s only been by existing in the first place. The way his tone had softened when he’d talked of Junmyeon treasuring his flowers..Junmyeon feels a pang of guilt thinking about that.

There’s a knock on the door, and he startles so hard he drops his phone onto the bed. Knocking first doesn’t rule out that he could just walk straight through it if he wanted. “You can come in?” Junmyeon calls uncertainly.

The top of his camellia’s red head narrowly misses the doorframe. He’s very tall, Junmyeon knows from standing beside him, but in Junmyeon’s cosy attic room it’s even more noticeable. For a long moment he stays there, just looking around. Then steps in and pulls the door closed behind himself.

“There’s a hamper there,” Junmyeon says as he approaches the space between the window and the foot of bed, then, ugh, idiot. He can see just fine.

Red hair shaking side to side. “I know the layout. Just, my perspective is always from over there.” He gestures to the windowsill with his whole arm so Junmyeon can make out the movement.

“That’s an invasion of privacy,” Junmyeon mutters down at his hands, turning his retrieved phone over between them. He’s (kind of) seen all there is to see of this plant spirit, and apparently it’s seen all of him too. And god knows what else, if he’s always been aware of what Junmyeon’s doing in rooms his flowers have been, but it doesn’t really feel like it matters. He’s only 50% likely to be real.

“You’re the one that brought me in here,” he sniffs, planting his hands on his hips, “Anyway, it’s not like that. I could sense light. And temperature, some sounds, changes in the air. I could feel it,” his tone drops suddenly, soft gravel, “When you spoke to me. Plants can sense intent, you know? We grow better when nice things are said to us.”

Junmyeon’s almost struck with shyness. It’s..odd, having an inanimate object suddenly fully aware of how you feel for it. If this really is a hallucination his subconscious has got a lot to answer for. “There was a study on rice about that. At a school. It proved that the rice sample that had nice things said to it only didn’t spoil as fast because of the carbon dioxide breathed onto it.”

A heavy sigh. “Did they ask a plant?”

“I don’t think they’d take my word for it if I contacted them to say I’ve been told differently.”

Another sigh. Junmyeon can make out that he’s shifting his weight uncomfortably, trying to keep his feet off of the clothes strewn over the floor. “May I stay?” he asks, red head bowed down, “I’ve always..been here, you know? I know that you’re safe if I’m here with you.”

Maybe it’s just the fatigue, or maybe it’s because he’s really hit rock bottom with the whole isolation thing, but Junmyeon’s frustration with this situation abruptly lifts. That’s..that’s really nice. His flower looking over him, when he’s always felt so reassured by having it around. So yeah, why not.

“You can stay. And you can get the light so I don’t have to literally fall into bed for once.” He smiles at how his camellia seems to get the spring back in his step at being given another job. From what Junmyeon can make out he’s pretty cute, so. There’s worse ways to spend a night.

For a spirit he definitely seems to weigh as much as a human. He clambers onto the bed on his hands and knees and it jogs Junmyeon a little. Texting Zitao is slow work. He was missing keys even before the disruption; they keep falling away from where he aims his finger. He adds that he loves him on the end of the brief update, just in case.

In case of what, Junmyeon wonders as he sets his alarm and feels for the nightstand to leave his phone on, he’s not sure. In case he’s eaten, or mysteriously vanishes into fog, or he finds out this was just a new weird and (not) wonderful side-effect of his condition and there was no cause for spooking either of them.

“Is it strange being in a bed?” he asks, turning onto his side facing the spirit and curling up tight.

“Everything about having limbs and walking around is strange. Talking is strange. Seeing where you go between here and the garden is- ah,” his deep voice cracks as Junmyeon wriggles close. He fumbles trying to give Junmyeon space that he clearly doesn’t want, freezing with an arm raised out of the way and Junmyeon curled in a little ball against his chest. “Ok. Is this..”

Junmyeon doesn’t give him any advice on where to put his arm. Tomorrow he can call the hospital and make an appointment. Maybe he will mention that he’s concerned by how prolonged and vivid the hallucination was. Right now he’s not.

“I’d like if you were real,” he says, feeling the silly smile taking up his face. “I love my.. my garden makes me so happy. And you, you know, the camellia was what made me take it up. You’re so bright and beautiful. After all that time in hospital and then being stuck in here, you were the first thing to give me hope.”

His camellia huffs. “Well, I was. I’m not as impressive in human form, huh.”

“I can still see you,” Junmyeon pouts and pulls that fumbling arm around himself. If he’s going to hallucinate some company he’s making the most of it. “As much as I can see anything, but you’re still so bright.”

Silence follows. Total silence - there’s no heartbeat to hear in his chest. He doesn’t breathe, either, Junmyeon finds after a moment of concentrated listening. But this close to him Junmyeon can hear that the spirit makes these sounds when he moves, deep where his joints would be, like roots being pulled from the ground. This is so vivid, but wooziness is overtaking how sensibly he can even think about it anymore.

It’s not like Junmyeon had any company here before he lost his sight anyway, but somehow the nights have seemed lonelier. Maybe it’s just because his routine is so..well, routine, now with his meds and the extra time allowed for slow, cautious movements. His home is a route carefully followed. Anxiety is always sharing the bed with him, when he’s trying to sleep and more effective than his alarm for getting him up in the mornings. He rarely even relieves stress by getting off anymore, out of some paranoia that the exertion will upset his vision. Everything from lack of sleep to arguing with his mother on the phone seems to effect how much sight he’ll have for the day ahead. He never really feels like it anyway.

Junmyeon wriggles in more comfortably under his camellia’s chin. “Do spirits sleep?”

He hums thoughtfully. “It’s my first day, so I guess I’ll find out. Flowers close their petals when there’s no sun.”

“That’s true.” Junmyeon fidgets again, readjusting the arm around his waist. It’s been so, so long since he got some decent intimacy. Making the most of his brain playing tricks on him probably, sadly, isn’t his most desperate act of loneliness since he became a case of medical negligence. His camellia seems to be getting the hang of this now. He rests his cheek in Junmyeon’s hair, and Junmyeon drifts wishing he could be held like this for real.



Six hours later he realises that he is.


“I’ve been real since yesterday,” his camellia sounds like he’s pouting. “I knew you didn’t believe me. I’m real! We spent an entire day together and you really thought I was just going to disappear.”

It doesn’t help the situation that Junmyeon coughs out a little laugh, but. It’s his plant, in his bed, sulking. His heart is pounding and his hands are trembling, but it’s not like he was entirely convinced this wouldn’t happen. It just really is now, and he really has to deal with it. “It’s just..”

“You said last night! You said you’d like me to be real. And I am, so wh-“

“Because!” Junmyeon raises his voice, “I was exhausted and it’s been god knows how long since I had someone to sleep with. I was just- I just, I had a moment. It seemed nice. I didn’t really think a plant had just-“

“I’m not a plant,” he cuts in, “Not just a plant. I’m your- if I wasn’t special this wouldn’t have happened.”

Junmyeon’s still standing with his back to the closet, where he ended up after scrambling out of bed when he woke to find he still had company. Even sitting the spirit seems to nearly be eye level with him. If he really focuses he can see the downturned line of his mouth.

“You could name me. If you want, I mean. I dunno. If it’d make me seem more real. Because I am, Junmyeon.”

Augh. Junmyeon doesn’t know whether to be frustrated in return or feel bad. He didn’t ask the plant to transfer it’s spirit to a human form. “If you didn’t ever eavesdrop on a conversation about it, humans generally don’t respond well to spirits just turning up and barging into their homes.”

“I’m not haunting you,” he says incredulously, “I thought you liked having me, and I thought I’d be more use to you, and I thought you would be happier that I.. it wasn’t- it’s not easy to do this.”

Junmyeon rubs his palms over his face. The bright flash of red is still there when he takes them away. “I’m just.. I know. I know it must be really..something, to do what you’ve done. I’m just trying to get my head around it. More use to me?”

His red head nods earnestly. “I know what happened. Your accident, and the side effect of the treatment- I know your friends look after you. I know you get lonely. And I know you never go anywhere unless they take you, and I know you’re struggling with how to get back into doing normal things.” He pauses, but Junmyeon doesn’t have any argument to make with that. He folds his big hands over his chest, covering where his heart would be. “You’ve always treasured me, and that’s the greatest- the best thing, for a plant, you know? That’s the most fulfilled we can be. You said I help, I’ve- I’ve been here with you this whole time, and I just wanted to do more.”

God. God, the last thing Junmyeon needs is more disruption. More to have to worry about when he already expends so much energy on routines and check ups and just trying to get through a single day without wondering if there’s any point. He isn’t prepared for dealing with a change on this scale. “I just liked looking at you. At the flowers,” he says, and the big, human incarnate of those flowers wordlessly slips out of his bed and leaves.

He goes out through the door, like a human. His footsteps are loud down the stairs, and the door that slams shut is the back one. It’s clear and sunny today; Junmyeon peers out of the edge of his bedroom window and easily spots the red blob pacing back and forth by the flowerbed.



“I’m tired.”

Junmyeon blinks his eyes open. For the last hour he’s been listening to podcasts; 20 minute shows discussing daily life in China. He didn’t register that the last one had ended, not quite asleep as he imagined visiting Zitao and his partner and seeing.. “You’re..?” he plucks out his headphones and squirms upright on the couch.

“Tired. I’m really tired,” says the blurry shape, backlit by the window. Junmyeon sets his phone aside on the coffee table, and his camellia steps around to sit opposite him.

Junmyeon watches him sink down, his form more shrunken in than it was when he’d sat there yesterday. “Understandably,” he says softly, “You’ve done a really big thing for such a small flower.”

For a moment Junmyeon hesitates, but then he reaches out. His aim often isn’t great thanks to his lack of depth perception, but his camellia meets him half way. His hair is as soft and silky as his petals, and he eagerly pushes into the palm of Junmyeon’s hand. Junmyeon gasps. His heart speeds. Slower than it had this morning, but it’s fast enough to feel pounding in his chest. Yesterday he hadn’t taken this seriously. Hadn’t really thought he was actually touching a spirit.

Yesterday the spirit had been mild mannered about Junmyeon not entirely believing he was real, in the same way Junmyeon’s panic was understated because he may well not have been. “I imagined this would go differently,” he says, head bowed, “I guess I did know that you probably wouldn’t just accept it immediately, but.”

Junmyeon frowns. He’s not normally one to apologise first, but in this case he can make an exception. It’s not every day you offend something that’s travelled between planes to see you. “I said all the wrong things earlier, and they came out mean. I’m just not good at anything happening too fast, you know? I get drained so easily. My moods are always up and down..I guess you probably know that already.”

“I know,” his camellia agrees, “And I know you weren’t thinking of me that way, but I’ve been with you for a long time. I’ve already seen how far you’ve come from the first few weeks. I was so worried about you.”

It’s supposed to be good for Junmyeon to acknowledge what happened - his recovery isn’t only physical, after all. He drops his hands back into his lap to wring them. “I was completely blind for a few hours when it first happened. They caught the swelling in time, obviously, but the first days.. It was all white? People always assume it’ll be black. I couldn’t even make out where the bed ended. For a while there was no colour at all.”

His camellia nods solemnly. His hand moves to his face, maybe rubbing the bridge of his nose. “Baekhyun, I think? Brought me in here to welcome you home. He-“

“Floated you in the kitchen sink, I remember,” Junmyeon smiles fondly. He really lucked out with the support he’s had. “And you were so bright. At that point I never imagined I’d see anything that beautiful again.”

It’s not a tense silence that follows. Junmyeon picks at a loose thread on the inner seam of his sleeve. He doesn’t really like thinking back to a phase he hasn’t progressed far from. “Ah, anyway,” he tilts his head, trying to line the most functional patch of vision up with the face opposite. “How does Chanyeol sound? I’ve been thinking about it all day.”

He snorts. “And that’s what you came up with?”

Without thinking that this is still pretty weird, and he maybe shouldn’t be angering something otherworldly, Junmyeon reaches across and swipes at Chanyeol’s knee. Yeah he did get it off a juice carton, but it sounded cute and sort of relevant to something that grew in the garden. His fingers barely graze him, but Chanyeol jolts backwards so abruptly his feet come up off the floor and his long legs flail, like he’s a bug falling onto its back.


When night comes Chanyeol scrambles up ahead of Junmyeon and wordlessly starts the routine. Junmyeon lets him. He takes his meds, throws his socks in the direction of the hamper, props up against the pillows to email Zitao from his tablet before bed.

Still alive. We argued. He was upset that I wasn’t more appreciative. It’s hard to feel as familiar with him as he seems to with me. I named him Chanyeol, he asked me to pick something. Hope you and Sehunnie are good ♡

Soon Chanyeol joins him, stumbling his way around to his side of the bed after getting the light.

“I’ll still be here tomorrow morning,” Chanyeol warns. Junmyeon hadn’t considered that just refusing to keep him could be an option. “When you wake up, you have to look at my pet- my hair, and you go ‘good morning little flower’, like usual. Ok?”

“You were much quieter when you lived on the window.”

“You were much quieter when I lived on the window,” Chanyeol counters.

Junmyeon tuts and turns onto his side. He always uses his phone as an alarm rather than the tablet, but his accounts are all linked. He opens the mail notification after setting his usual alarm. Zitao’s replied with two lines.

we’re good xxxxxxx
once you name something it never goes away



🌼



Chanyeol is still tired the following morning. So much so that Junmyeon struggles to get out from under the arm thrown across his chest. When did that even happen? Junmyeon ensured Chanyeol knew that first night was strictly because Junmyeon hadn’t realised there’d be a morning after. For a plant he seems to weigh just as much as a human. A big human, at that.

“Good morning,” Junmyeon yawns. Habitually he first looks to the windowsill. The container is still there, standing empty. If he really screws up his eyes he can make out the outline of it. Chanyeol’s lying on his back, flat out like he’s been dropped there. It feels kind of stupid and embarrassing, but after a long look at his hair, Junmyeon adds, “Little flower.”

No response. Fine, he tried being nice.

“Chanyeol, come on.” Junmyeon nudges him gently. Plants don’t sleep, so Chanyeol said, but he’s doing a good impression of someone who’s out cold. “Chanyeol, it’s morning,” he raises his voice and pushes hard at Chanyeol’s shoulder. It’s not like he couldn’t just get up and go downstairs without him, really. This is all so-

“Don’t,” Chanyeol finally responds. He sounds hoarse. “Don’t push.”

Junmyeon crosses his arms around himself. “You weren’t doing anything, it was starting to worry me. You’ve done plenty enough of that already.”

“I don’t have any energy.” With a groan Chanyeol eases himself up against the pillows. He’s still wearing the sweater Junmyeon forced him into, the fit a little too small and the fabric pulling across his shoulders as he slowly sits upright. “I don’t understand.”

Junmyeon doesn’t insult him by asking if he needs anything mortal for sustenance. Though he doesn’t really know what else to offer an otherworldly being. Well, other than.. He is a plant, after all.


“I didn’t realise I’d need to do anything like this.” Chanyeol’s gulped down three glasses of water already. Junmyeon guiltily refills it for him each time. He’s an idiot, and he hadn’t even thought to offer Chanyeol anything while he was so wrapped up in all of this happening. “Thanks,” Chanyeol takes the slippery glass from his hands with care, “You know, like, more spirit than plant? But I guess we all need something to give us energy.”

That’s true. There’s no easy way to go about eating humans, if those are mainly what your diet consists of. Maybe malicious spirits are just doing what they have to do, Junmyeon considers as Chanyeol drains his fourth glass.


After the disrupted start to his morning, Junmyeon’s busy puttering, as he always does. Finding things to shift from coffee table to bookcase and limiting his daytime tv consumption only to shows he actually has some interest in, so his day has some semblance of productivity. When he completes his circuit of the lower floor of his home it’s to find Chanyeol taking up the entire couch, curled in on himself but still so large.

“I thought you didn’t sleep.” Junmyeon can’t really make out Chanyeol’s expression, but the black smudges of his eyes don’t look the right size to be open. He has a date with the tv for right about now and Chanyeol’s where he needs to be. Honestly, he just materialises and takes up as much space as he wants.

“Not sleeping. I still..” Chanyeol’s been out of the ground for two whole days now. Watering him seemed to be the solution, but it’s only been an hour and he’s wilting again. “I didn’t have the energy to stand.” He couldn’t even swallow most of the food Junmyeon offered alongside the water.

“I don’t know what to suggest,” Junmyeon admits, sinking to his knees beside the couch. Chanyeol turns towards him. His movements are slow and stiff like his body is seizing up, like a stem turns hard and brittle. In human form he’s big and he’s annoying, and Junmyeon’s still struggling to associate this stranger with something he’s loved so dearly. But Junmyeon’s taken good care of him all these years, both the bush in the garden and the flowers he’d bring indoors. He rests a hand on Chanyeol’s shoulder. “How are you feeling?”

“How I imagine catching mites feels,” Chanyeol mutters, looking down at Junmyeon’s hand on him. It’s a damn sight warmer than Junmyeon has been towards him so far. “I thought you were good with plants. Don’t you have any ideas?”

Junmyeon laughs, ducking his head down. “I’m really not. I enjoy it, but I don’t know what I’m doing. Unfortunately.” He squeezes Chanyeol’s shoulder. He’s solid, but not in the same way flesh and muscle feels under hand. More like a bag filled with sand. “I’m sorry if I seemed more competent than I am.”

“I’ve never felt like you didn’t know how to care for me.” Chanyeol drops his head back with a long sigh. “I didn’t do this just so you’d continue having to.”

“Well,” Junmyeon says, then gives Chanyeol a pat before pulling his hand back and standing. Chanyeol was evasive the first time he asked, so he still doesn’t know exactly why Chanyeol did do this, but if he wants to find out he needs to focus on keeping him on this plane of existence first. “I’ll think of something. I’ve always managed so far, right?” So far he hasn’t had all that many garden disasters doing things by intuition and hope.

Junmyeon grabs his tablet from the coffee table and sits on the arm of the couch. The end where Chanyeol’s feet are, so he can look over the full form of him now and then to make sure he’s still all there.

It would be insensitive to ask his tablet camellia dying out loud, so he slowly types with one finger. While it loads he wonders if things would just go back to normal if Chanyeol ran out of energy in this form. Maybe that makes him an awful person, hoping this will end so he can go back to his routines and focusing on his recovery. Slow as that’s going. About as slow as his stupid wifi.

“I’m sorry,” Chanyeol says, and Junmyeon jolts in surprise. “For worrying you. I know it’s bad for you to get stressed about things.”

It’s instinctive to dismiss him and say it’s fine, but it’s really not. The last thing Junmyeon needed at a time like this is even more to fret over. He hums, holding the screen closer to his face and focusing very hard on the lines of text that have loaded.

“And scaring you, I really didn’t mean to scare you. And..and just assuming I could stay indoors. You’re.. shit, I’m sorry.” Chanyeol rubs a hand over his face and up through his hair, “You’re the same to me as always, but I didn’t think through how weird it would be for you to see me in a different form suddenly. And I-“

“Getting upset just makes your health worsen,” Junmyeon cuts in. That’s all..yeah, he appreciates the apology. But how he feels about having his favourite plant gone and this big lump of a human in its place is irrelevant right now. He taps away from the search and hovers over his mail app. Maybe this is more of a spirit issue than a plant issue?

It’s not like Zitao actually knows anything useful about this stuff, but he knows it’s happening and doesn’t think Junmyeon’s gone insane. But mailing him to ask what to do could leave them waiting hours with Chanyeol deteriorating, and he probably wouldn’t have an answer. It just feels like it would help, because Zitao looks at things simplistically and doesn’t worry too much and always seems to get good results.

Junmyeon folds the case shut over his tablet. The simplest way to look at it is that Chanyeol needed water, so it’s a plant thing. And he’s out of the ground, so he’s not getting nutrients anymore.

“Oh.” Junmyeon stands so fast he nearly overbalances. “We’ve been thinking about this too hard. Chanyeol, we’re idiots.”

Chanyeol lifts his head. His neck creaks the same way Junmyeon had heard when Chanyeol held him the first night, like roots being pulled from dense earth. But loud enough to hear in the room, which..that can’t be good. “We are?”

“We really are.” Junmyeon puts his tablet back on the table and gives Chanyeol’s knee a reassuring pat. “I’ll be right back. I know exactly what you need.”

The plastic sack resting against the side of the house is a new one. Jongdae only brought it over two weeks ago, slit the top for Junmyeon and then with this bad weather he’s barely used it. Junmyeon rolls up his sleeves and digs both hands into the opening of the sack, scooping out full handfuls of soil. He hurries back inside, dropping specks of dirt in a trail along the rug. Junmyeon doesn’t go anywhere at a great speed anymore, and the knock his elbow and knee take on the doorframe and coffee table is a good reminder of why. Stupid peripheral vision, stupid depth perception, stupid idiot human not realising why Chanyeol felt so ill sooner.

“Are you alright?” Chanyeol looks up at Junmyeon in concern. Then Junmyeon’s small, dirty hands come into his line of vision. “Is that..?”

“I’ll live.” Junmyeon presses the sides of his palms together and opens his fists. More dirt spills out onto the floor. Some is dry and powdery, some dark and clumped from rain getting into the bag. “Eat it,” he says. Chanyeol doesn’t move. “It’s your favourite. It’s the same kind I always use, you’ve always liked it.” Junmyeon moves closer. A clot of soil large enough for him to see hits the couch and breaks, scattering powdered dirt. “You’re a plant, Chanyeol, just eat it.”

And so he does. One hesitant pinch of soil, a relieved groan, and then he’s leaning over the side of the couch, catching Junmyeon’s wrists in one big hand to pull him in closer. Pressing his hungry mouth into Junmyeon’s palms.

Going from zero human intimacy in months to this all in five seconds twists in Junmyeon’s gut. He focuses on the throb in his knee instead, then Chanyeol’s tongue presses into the dip between his fingers.

“We need to get you a bowl of your own,” Junmyeon says weakly. Chanyeol’s petal-red head bobs in agreement. His mouth is too full to speak.



🌼



“He feels guilty,” Chanyeol says, and Junmyeon snatches his phone back.

“He did not say that,” Junmyeon waves the screen at Chanyeol to remind him that the font is by far big and bold enough for Junmyeon to see himself. “I asked you to read his text out to me, not decipher it.”

Chanyeol tuts. “Your guilty friend Kyungsoo says he’s going to the import store in town and wondered if you’d like to come along. And he can pick you up in ten minutes, if you wanna go. And he’s offering because-”

“Can you see what other people are doing? Like, can you sense things from a distance?”

This time he rolls his eyes. Junmyeon can’t see, but he can sense it. Little shit. “I just exist, Junmyeon. Honestly. I’m just here, I don’t do any of that spooky stuff.” He actually does quite a lot of other stuff. Around the house. Just nothing of the unworldly variety. “I just know he feels guilty because you’ve been stuck in the house in the rain for days. And it was his turn to visit and he didn’t have time.”

Junmyeon squints down at his phone. He doesn’t like how that makes it sound as though his friends slot visit Junmyeon into their schedules alongside walk the dog. “I don’t think I like you knowing so much about what I do. But you can still text back for me,” he pushes his phone into the vague direction of Chanyeol’s hands. Chanyeol fumbles to get hold of it before Junmyeon lets go. “Tell him I want to come.”

“I only know because you told me.”

“I didn’t know you were listening in,” Junmyeon reminds him for maybe the 80th time. For a moment he watches Chanyeol typing in slow, determined prods with his middle finger. They probably type as slowly as each other, but at least Junmyeon’s less tired at the end of it when Chanyeol obediently does it for him. He should maybe ask if Chanyeol will be alright here on his own, but he also doesn’t want to give the impression that he cares what Chanyeol does.

Chanyeol hits send and passes the phone back, not letting go until it’s safely in Junmyeon’s grip. “What’s an import store?”

“A place that has food from around the world. Kyungsoo likes cooking, he buys ingredients from there. They have the real thing,” Junmyeon explains as he makes his way down the hall. He skirts the wall with his fingertips for balance, and Chanyeol tails along close behind like a spook. He doesn’t really give off an aura or a cold chill or anything, but Junmyeon’s coming to just get a sense of when he’s right there like a second shadow. “Things like dairy, chocolate, wine. We produce our own, but it uses different techniques and ingredients. It’s twice as expensive to buy European chocolate. That’s why Kyungsoo only lets me go there a few times a year.”

“Oh,” Chanyeol says in feigned understanding.

He probably didn’t even know Junmyeon’s street isn’t the entire world, and Junmyeon doesn’t have the energy to explain that it’s funny. You know, how he has so much money in the bank now, but Kyungsoo still lays down the law about how many chocolate seashells he’s allowed to waste it on.

It’s on the tip of Junmyeon’s tongue to ask if Chanyeol wants anything. Not because he will - he can’t eat, alcohol would probably poison him, and he’s certainly not having any criminally expensive soap - but, it’s just what you do when there’s someone else at home. But Chanyeol’s big mouth has outweighed any endearment Junmyeon was feeling towards his company, so he just wedges his feet into his sneakers.

Normally Junmyeon waits on the stairs until the bell rings, but at risk of Kyungsoo seeing Chanyeol, he figures today he can wait on the path. It’s sunny again, it’ll be nice. “Behave while I’m gone,” he warns, “Don’t forget to eat.”

“I will. I won’t,” Chanyeol says cheerfully and takes two long steps into Junmyeon’s space, cornering him against the door. Junmyeon looks up at him, and it’s the first time he’s seen him this close in good light. He’s probably very good looking. The overall shape and placement of his features seems to be, from the fuzzy fragments Junmyeon can make out. It’s like if he could just turn a dial and bring the sharpness of his focus in a little better..

Chanyeol ducks in and pecks his forehead. If he could see better maybe he’d have seen that coming. As is he startles, elbow knocking against the door. Ow.

“What is it you say when people leave? There’s a thing you say, right?”

“You just injured me,” Junmyeon protests. Chanyeol starts fussing with straightening the hem of his jacket and getting the folds of the hood sitting just right. “Hey- you can’t-“

“Take care! That’s it,” Chanyeol’s all hands and his big, loud voice, and Junmyeon just gives in and lets himself be organised. “I remembered.”

“You’ve already hurt me before I even left,” Junmyeon points out, raising his elbow. Stupid big thing going around kissing and fluffing people up without even asking.

“Have fun with your friend,” Chanyeol says brightly.

“You’re behind on water,” Junmyeon replies for lack of anything better to say. He shuts the door behind himself without looking back.



“So who was the murderer?”

The lines in the road blur together into one long, winding trail. There’s a good contrast between the black and white. “Hm?”

Kyungsoo tilts his head nearer so Junmyeon can hear over the sound of the radio. “The murderer in that podcast. Didn’t you say it was an episode away from the reveal?”

Oh, that. “Yeah, I haven’t gotten around to listening yet. You’ll be the first to know when I find out.”

“Everything been good this week?” Kyungsoo sounds puzzled. Rightly so - Junmyeon listens to his updates religiously (productivity, routine), especially when the weather doesn’t lend itself to gardening.

It hasn’t been bad as such. He can’t say his time has been kind of taken up by the fact his plant is now a human, and is probably lying on the couch playing Crossy Road as they speak. It’d be hard to explain without sounding crazy, but Chanyeol’s really not alarming once you’re used to the concept. He just kind of exists, munching on soil and complaining about everything from Junmyeon’s lack of organisation to the tone of his friend’s texts.

“Just been really tired, I didn’t have the focus for it.” Junmyeon touches his fingers to his forehead, then focuses back on the road.


It’s just routine now that Kyungsoo walks around to the passenger door, standing beside it like he’s some bodyguard. Junmyeon makes it out safely, as he has done for the last few months. It was only the first shaky few outings that he struggled with his feet and the sudden lack of depth perception. Still, no one wants him falling.

“It’s been a while since we’ve been,” Junmyeon smiles, and maybe Kyungsoo’s expression turns concerned at how he speeds ahead on his own. He doesn’t want anyone to worry that he’s going to fall. He doesn’t want anyone to know there are people worried for him.


It’s frustrating, because Junmyeon usually loves coming here. He loves just getting out of the house for a while and in new colours and sounds and different air to breathe, but what Chanyeol said is weighing on him. They wouldn’t all be sacrificing their time to help Junmyeon if it weren’t for how close they are. The strength of their friendship has never been an issue, it’s just..none of them had really found that time for each other until this happened. Scheduling him in.

They make careful conversation, filtering out the fun in their lives so Junmyeon won’t feel he’s missing out. Not that he wants a family like Jongdae, or a big wedding overseas like Baekhyun. Sure he’d love his boring, tiring job back and sometimes wants to climb the walls because it’s not viable, but that doesn’t mean he isn’t rooting for Kyungsoo in his work.

“Interested?” Kyungsoo’s voice suddenly comes from beside Junmyeon.

He jolts, eyes darting over the labels of the bottles he’d been zoned out in front of. They’re all heavy dark green glass with bold white text on the labels. Junmyeon’s flustered and can’t get the clearer patch of vision to centre on anything useful.

“Fancy oils,” Kyungsoo taps a finger against one and pauses just long enough for Junmyeon to correct him. He doesn’t. “Says it’s light and flavourless. For that price you’d want it to taste of something..”

“Ah.” Junmyeon purses his lips. He could have read it if he’d had time to focus. But he can’t focus his sight or his mind right now. That little rise of panic starts to come up into his throat when his surroundings are hard to get firmly grounded in. He gets a little dizzy sometimes. Sometimes he wonders if Baekhyun’s partner really doesn’t mind that they link arms.

He doesn’t like second guessing all of these things. When his sight was at its worst and the appointments and test were unrelenting they’d practically got a rota for who’s turn it was to take him. Because they’re good friends and they want to, and he’d have done the exact same thing had it been one of them. But he has a lot of time for dwelling, and now he also has Chanyeol acting as an audible intrusive thought.

Kyungsoo’s juggling three containers of herbs to compare the labels and figure out where the difference in cost is when Junmyeon snags his sleeve near the elbow.

“I’m sorry you have to do this.”

“What?” Kyungsoo looks back to him for a long moment before returning the boxes to the shelf. He turns fully, and Junmyeon’s trying really hard not to feel like he should just disappear. “Junmyeon, no. Don’t even think about that, you know we’re all happy to help out with anything you need. It’s no problem.”

“We never just..” Kyungsoo’s hand rests warm on his forearm, reassuringly firm. “Do normal things together anymore. We don’t get to just be friends without you having to do more,” he says, because that’s as close as he can get to being honest about his ugly feelings. Their lives continued. Everything drained from his. He just sits around waiting for someone to pay attention to him, and that’s not what their friendships should be.

“We will,” Kyungsoo leans close, voice low. This aisle is practically empty, but they both like their privacy. “Don’t be too hard on yourself. You can’t rush this.”

“But-“

“It’s barely been any time at all, Junmyeonnie. Remember when..” There’s a sound just behind them, reminding Junmyeon of where they are. Kyungsoo’s strong hand squeezes tight, then drops away. “..when Baekhyun had to use crutches? And we all had to wait on him and hold doors for months? We didn’t mind.”

Junmyeon misses his touch already. He nods, folding his arms around himself.

“Give yourself more time,” Kyungsoo says, gentle gentle. He picks one of the boxes back up from the shelf and places it in with his other items. He can be heavy handed with people, but he’s always careful and methodical about his cooking from start to finish. “We’ll be here, however you need us. Ok?” he nods, and Junmyeon finds himself returning it.

There’s a bench just outside, tucked out of the way in the shadows between pools of lights from the stores either side. Junmyeon waits for Kyungsoo there, ankles crossed and swinging his feet. Disappointment weighs heavy on him, adding to the exhaustion of processing so much colour and sound. Whether he’s disappointed he didn’t say what he wanted or hear what he wanted he’s not sure. He closes his eyes and thinks of red flowers floating in his kitchen sink.


Kyungsoo offers to walk him to the door like always, but Junmyeon, a little frantically, waves his hands. It’s really fine, Kyungsoo’s taken enough time out of his day. He tries not to sound suspicious, like he’d tried to play off breaking his podcast routine.

Kyungsoo blinks owlishly. “It’ll take a few seconds?”

It’s very nice of him - of all of them - to be so considerate. But who knows what Chanyeol might be doing. Junmyeon’s got images of Kyungsoo opening the door to find a six foot tall spirit sitting on the mat waiting like a puppy. “I’m not rushing things,” Junmyeon smiles. Kyungsoo’s features shift in concern. “But I’m never going to start making progress if I can’t even walk that far by myself, right?”

“Right,” Kyungsoo agrees slowly. He waits until Junmyeon is as far as the door before leaving. Junmyeon’s relieved he didn’t have to jab the key at the lock so many times with the sound of the engine reminding him he was being watched.


Chanyeol is not-asleep on the couch again like he was two days ago, but lying comfortable and lazy this time. He has Junmyeon’s tablet on his chest and the sweater bunched up around his ribs.

“Welcome home,” he says, and Junmyeon makes out the movement of him craning his head back to watch as Junmyeon approaches. “I did the dishes! And checked your food to make sure it wasn’t bad. You never check on it, you know? You need to in case it makes you sick. It’s kind of weird for me that you eat vegetables, they’re sort of like relatives? But they’re super good for your health, so..”

While Chanyeol rambles Junmyeon narrows his eyes and takes a long look at the exposed stretch of skin, but there’s not really anything defined about it, even with him focusing. He wills himself to focus just that bit harder, but nope. Doesn’t work in eye examinations, doesn’t work on tummies. “What are you doing?” he asks, curling up on the opposite couch.

Chanyeol wriggles upright, and if Junmyeon’s obviously staring at the soft folds of his belly he doesn’t seem to mind.

“I was researching human anatomy. I don’t really know much about it. I don’t think I even have any of the inside stuff? Do you know how much intestine fits in a body? Weird. Super weird.” Chanyeol shudders at the thought, patting his tummy and then tugging the sweater back down.

“I suppose you wouldn’t. Have it.” Junmyeon blinks and finally looks away. Male bodies are so good. He hadn’t realised how much he’d missed taking an interest.

For a moment Junmyeon’s distracted with that thought, but then Chanyeol asks how his trip out was, and all of the insides he has that Chanyeol doesn’t feel as though they turn to lead. Kyungsoo will probably text the others about what he said. It always kind of feels as though he’s slightly on the outside.

“What if,” he says, then presses his lips back together so hard they turn white. He doesn’t talk about these things. Not to people. The only place he ever had to get his thoughts out was.. well.

“What if?” Chanyeol leans closer, elbows rested on his knees. Camellia red hair, petal soft. A little flower that isn’t all that little at all anymore.

What if, Junmyeon thinks, scratching at the back of his hair where it’s beginning to grow out long, and unclenches his jaw to let the rest of the thought out. “I know life will never go back to how it was. Back to normal will..you know, it’ll be a different normal, to what my old normal was. But when it happens, what if it’s ruined the things I had before? What if they can’t just be normal friends after having to care for me. They’ll always treat me differently. Everyone will, won’t they. Everyone I meet in the future. I’ll just be th-“

“You won’t ‘just’ be anything,” Chanyeol interrupts, “You’re still you. And in time you’ll be more confident, so your friends won’t need to worry like they do now.”

That’s not how this works. Junmyeon’s features set hard again. He shares his worries with the flowers because they don’t answer him back. They care, evidently, or this one wouldn’t be here saying things he doesn’t want to hear. “Why am I even asking you,” he mutters down at his feet, “You’ve only been human a few weeks.”

“I know,” Chanyeol agrees hesitantly, “But I’ve understood your situation and your concerns about it for a lot longer. That’s why I’m here, because you n-“

“You don’t understand! You’ve never lived a human life, Chanyeol. What do you know about how people would treat me?” Junmyeon stares searchingly over Chanyeol’s features. He’s leaning close enough to see that his mouth is hanging open. And good, that’s good. Maybe shocking him into realising this isn’t something that’ll just get better because he’s turned up will stop him being so annoying. “Do you know how people with disabilities get treated? Do you know what people think- what people say if they see someone like me?”

Chanyeol’s linked his hands between his knees and is fidgeting with his fingers. “I know you have friends that love you,” he offers, and Junmyeon can’t help but laugh. Chanyeol winces.

“Listen, Chanyeol,” the laugh carries into his voice. That’s how he used to deal with his classes when he had a whole room full of unreceptive listeners. When it gets hopeless, laugh. “I’m useless now, ok? No one is going to see me and think, oh, what a loved person, are they? They see a burden. Someone that can’t-“ contribute to society anymore, like his mother used to say. Those poor people, what’s the point in them? Junmyeon sucks in a breath. “You don’t even know what society means, why am I even having this conversation with you.”

“Because you need to talk about how you feel,” Chanyeol urges.

Junmyeon focuses very hard on the patterned arm of the couch. He tries to forget someone is looking at him. He imagines burying down between the couch cushions and never having to talk to anyone ever again.

“Alright.” Chanyeol leans back into his own space. His tone seems flatter. Junmyeon looks up. “It’s because you want me to agree. Your friends are always nice and you just want me to say bad things about you so you can believe them.”

The sun is still sinking low in the sky when Junmyeon goes upstairs, slams his bedroom door, and climbs into bed. It’s uncomfortably warm under the covers in his clothes, but safe in this blanket cocoon is the only place he can bear to be. It makes it worse that people care for him. It’s worse that no one is willing to let him hate himself, or openly worry about his future and what the point of him still taking up space is. All the while he was doing something with his life and pursuing finding a meaning to it all he felt worthwhile.

Chanyeol’s not wrong - he has three amazing friends right here for him. He has Zitao, who visits, and Zitao’s partner still yet to meet. Jongdae’s children, Baekhyun’s husband and their dogs, Kyungsoo’s business. Hot air fills Junmyeon’s mouth as he chokes back a sob. He’s just here, dropping things, tripping on things, barely able to distinguish his friends’ features at times. He doesn’t want to be envious of the lives they have ahead and he doesn’t want to only ever experience having a life vicariously through them. He doesn’t want to only ever experience anything again if someone is having to use their own energy to guide him through it.

However much Junmyeon fills his head with podcasts and languages and information about flowers, none of it drowns out what’s always playing on his mind. He’s disabled, he’s vulnerable, he’s functionless. He’ll never work again, never travel again- fuck, he’ll probably never even kiss again, let alone date. That first night had been pathetic, when Junmyeon wasn’t sure if Chanyeol was real and had just enjoyed the company. Just told Chanyeol to hold him. It had been so nice, so stupid, so so stupid..

It seems to take a long time for his mind to stop racing and sleep to finally weigh on him. Junmyeon doesn’t let himself wonder if Chanyeol is worrying. He remembers in fragments how his father cried and cried for everything the family had lost. They still have one son. He’s not sure if anyone’s ever said that to him in as many words, but he feels it in how distantly they speak to him. This is a kind of disappointment he’s powerless to stop being, wasting his past efforts at always finding respectable work, staying closeted, cutting his hair short and neat. He’d have liked it red like Chanyeol’s when he was younger. So red.. maybe he’s always had some affinity with it. Finally, he’s drifting.



Junmyeon wakes up overheated, sticky and alone. He pushes the covers back and checks the windowsill, but he doesn’t see anything bright red until he’s counting his meds out into the palm of his hand.

Morning drags on. He doesn’t spot Chanyeol easily and doesn’t look for him. Maybe he’s left, but it’s hard to wonder too much about where he could be when Junmyeon’s barely making it around his own damn kitchen unscathed this morning. His sight is more fragmented and foggy than it’s been in weeks. That’s what he gets for being so worked up - not allowed to feel emotions these days.

Junmyeon doesn’t want to go looking for Chanyeol, but the knot of anxiety in his stomach won’t loosen all the while he’s in the house wondering where the spirit might be. If he’s even still here. Where would he go? Would he just turn back into a flower?

There’s reassuring familiarity to the routine of preparing to go out in the garden, at least. Junmyeon wraps the cords of his gardening apron around himself once and ties a neat bow at his front, slow and methodical. He fills a can with water and carries it down the garden with both hands, careful not to let it spill. There’s still an empty space where the camellia bush once was.


“Can I help?”

Junmyeon’s shoulders hunch in surprise. He’d been so focused on tending to his not-so-little-anymore seedlings he hadn’t even heard Chanyeol approaching. So he’s still here. Junmyeon ignores the warm little soothe of relief and keeps tugging at the roots of a weed. “I like doing this by myself.”

“I know,” Chanyeol mumbles, “Can I pass you things?”

“Then I still wouldn’t be doing it myself, would I?” Junmyeon turns towards Chanyeol without looking up. His feet are bare. They step nearer, and suddenly everything is dark. “Chanyeol. What are-“

“Shading you from the sun.”

“I need the sun so I can see what I’m doing.” In exasperation Junmyeon throws the limp weed in his hand at Chanyeol’s leg. He is relieved that he’s still here, but it’s. A complicated emotion.

Chanyeol steps away again, and for a moment his foot taps against the ground like an annoyed rabbit. “Fine! Fine.” He folds his arms across his chest and sits, right behind Junmyeon so he’s entirely out of his vision.

“Now you’re sulking.” Junmyeon rolls his eyes. He leans back into the flowerbed and starts tugging at another weed. Behind him Chanyeol makes some kind of affronted snuffling sound.

“I am not sulking, Kim Junmyeon. I’m protecting you from bugs.”



Junmyeon eats instant noodles with a handful of spinach thrown in to wilt. Vitamins, and it doesn’t really taste once it’s stirred in. Chanyeol scrapes around his bowl of soil. Yesterday he mixed the water into it until it was thick and muddy, just for some variation. It was good, but Junmyeon hadn’t been here to see the mess yesterday.

Junmyeon has a good imagination and bad peripheral vision. He finds if he tries really hard he can just about forget Chanyeol is even here. Eating alone, staring at the wall, wondering what pointless activity to do next to feel like he has some sense of purpose. That’s what he wanted back, right? But the rise of panic in his throat is so strong he sets his food aside. Being alone was..it’s not like he’s particularly enjoyed this company, but he hasn’t thought about not existing all the while Chanyeol’s been here.

“They offered me counselling. I said no.” Junmyeon glances across to the blur of Chanyeol sat beside him. “It was too soon. I couldn’t have talked to someone about how this made me feel. I was still in shock, you know? Anything I’d had to say wouldn’t have made sense.”

“I don’t.. counselling? Sorry.” Chanyeol frowns and stabs his spoon into a clump of soil. “Haven’t heard that before.”

Right. Junmyeon rests his elbows on the table and presses his palms over his face. “Kind of like a doctor, but for your mind. You tell them what you’re worried about. And what hurts in your head..in your heart, in your memories. And they talk it through with you and tell you how to feel better about it.”

“Oh. Well, obviously you said no,” Chanyeol shrugs. Junmyeon lowers his hands to scowl across at him. “You’ve told me all of that stuff for months, then as soon as I look like a person you won’t do it anymore,” Chanyeol explains, gesturing between them with the spoon.

Junmyeon whines and pushes at his arm. “You’ll get soil in my food.”

Chanyeol threatens to get closer before he draws back. “How do you know you don’t like it if you’ve never tried it?”

“I’d probably catch some disease and die.”

“It’s so nutritious! It would do you good,” Chanyeol argues, and Junmyeon can’t help laughing. Chanyeol smiles at the sound, but then he slumps a little in his seat. “Yesterday,” he starts cautiously. Junmyeon quickly sobers too. “I didn’t mean to..”

Junmyeon shakes his head. “Don’t. Chanyeol, don’t apologise. I shouldn’t have talked to you like that.”

“I know you don’t mean to,” Chanyeol says quietly. “There’s a lot you’re frustrated about. And it all just..” he raises his hands. It boils over, overflows.

“It doesn’t make it ok.”

“I’m a plant.” Chanyeol shrugs. “If you need to, it’s better you do that to me than your friends. It’s better for you to say it than just keep it to yourself. Anyway,” he shifts a little, tugging at the sleeve of the sweater until it’s covering his knuckles, “I like when you share your feelings with me. It’s what helped me to grow.”

Guilt sinks heavy in Junmyeon’s chest. It tastes bitter in his mouth. Of anyone this could have happened to, he’s really not done much to earn it. “You came a long way to be here and I haven’t exactly been grateful.”

“Just from your garden,” Chanyeol smiles, but it’s tone that Junmyeon goes by. “You should finish eating. Your medication is too strong without food.”

“I take the..”

“Sunday pill. The half hour one that stops the others hurting. If you take it. You always get grumpy about not being able to eat on time even if you don’t like eating breakfast.” Even if he can’t entirely focus, Junmyeon takes the hint that Chanyeol’s going to stare him down until he picks his food back up. Chanyeol scoops up more of his own encouragingly and nods, pleased, when Junmyeon turns away from him to slurp up more noodles. “You can’t get around me, Kim Junmyeon. As long as I’m here you have to look after yourself properly.”

It’d just be more uncalled for frustration, getting annoyed when Chanyeol only knows these things because Junmyeon has told him. It’s no less of a surprise each time he realises just how much he’s had to say. And Chanyeol makes a good point.

(About the talking thing. And the medication thing. Not the soil.)



🌼



At least, everyone always says, it wasn’t all of your sight. Small blessings. Could be worse - could be something to actually complain about. Junmyeon responds graciously for the sakes of those who have lost the entirety of their vision, not the ones who curiously cover an eye with their hand and decide it’s not so bad.



🌼



Junmyeon’s resolve to not take his frustration out on Chanyeol lasts a record number of three days. A personal best, if you’re a terrible person. Which Junmyeon is, which is why he just wants to be left the hell alone.

Junmyeon’s home is comparably large to the apartment he lived in back when he lectured in a big city, but it feels like there’s no space Chanyeol isn’t taking up. Why he’s here has been playing on Junmyeon’s mind ever since he appeared, and Chanyeol’s never exactly given a straight answer to it. Junmyeon asked in frustration, because it’s a bad day and he’d really like to just be on his own.

“I’m here to help you!” Chanyeol’s bare feet thud heavy on the wood floor. Junmyeon asked, rhetorical and angry. He’s doing his best to get away from Chanyeol so he doesn’t have to hear. “I can help with anything. That’s why I’m here. I clean, don’t I? I make the place nice and safe.”

Junmyeon’s already pulled the back door open. Ironic, going out in the garden to get away from a plant. He pushes it shut and turns to Chanyeol. “You did..whatever it is you did, just to clean.”

“Not just that.” Chanyeol’s hands are balled at his chest. He’s trying not to tower over Junmyeon, not let his human voice come out as loud as it naturally does. He can’t help it. He’s not one of those miserable white camellias; passion is the language he was born into. “I could do anything. It’s just, you haven’t asked, so I haven’t yet. But I can make sure it’s safe if you want to cook, or anything else you’re worried about. And I can help you with, with like, when you can’t find things you need?”

Junmyeon leans back against the wall. It’s not like he hasn’t read some entirely ridiculous folklore on the bizarre things spirits have been reported to do, but you don’t expect to have it happen to you. You don’t expect to lose your sight in your mid-20s and just get sent back to a home full of obstacles like nothing has happened. Misreading his silence as a good sign, Chanyeol continues.

“I probably should have said all this when we first- the first day, I know. It was all kind of confusing, so it never seemed the right time.” He opens and closes his fists, flexing his fingers then squeezing his knuckles white. Anxious reflex; human energy. “But we could do whatever you like. I can take you out! So you don’t have to wait for your friends to be free anymore. We can go anywhere you want. I mean, I can’t drive and I don’t know how the subway works, but if you tell me I can-”

“I don’t want you to help,” Junmyeon cuts in, “I’m doing this in my own time, the way I need to do it.” That’s pretty fucking reasonable after what happened, he thinks. Anyone should understand that something like this is a personal journey. But Chanyeol lacks human contexts, and he doesn’t think anything about Junmyeon is all that personal if he happened to overhear it when he was petals and leaves. Chanyeol’s angling himself up to stand his ground, and Junmyeon feels his temper flaring before Chanyeol’s even said anything.

“But you’re not doing anything. You’re just letting yourself get isolated,” Chanyeol’s voice is deep with the way he’s trying to keep the volume down. “You’re not incapable of learning how to adapt. You’re super smart and you work really hard, and you’re just.. just not letting yourself. You’re just scared.”

Junmyeon really doesn’t have to listen to this. Walking away would just mean shelving this frustration for another time, though, and it’s not fair that Chanyeol thinks he can just turn up and tell Junmyeon how he feels. Even if he’s not entirely wrong. “So what if I am? What does it matter if it takes me time to build up enough courage to be independent. This is a big fucking life changing deal, Chanyeol, I can’t just dust myself off and keep going like nothing has happened.”

“It’s not that,” Chanyeol says, and Junmyeon throws his hands up. “You’re scared of people seeing you. I know you, Junmyeon, you’ve spent months talking to me. You keep struggling to try and do things the same way as before so no one realises. Have you ever even tried using that white cane the hospital gave you?” he asks, and a flash of surprise cuts through the anger on Junmyeon’s face. “You just don’t want people to see you. All that stuff you said about, about society and whatever people think of you outside of here doesn’t mean you can’t learn how to make other things nicer and easier for yourself.”

“So you had this idea of how I should be behaving and I was being such a letdown that you had to come and tell me?” A soft no comes from Chanyeol, almost a whimper. His form is all hunched up again, arms drawn in tight. Junmyeon is trembling. “This has nothing to do with you. I didn’t ask you to do any of this.”

Chanyeol unfurls again, reaching for Junmyeon. He gently touches a hand to his elbow. “You needed-“ Junmyeon pulls away. “You needed someone, and I love you, Junmyeon. As much as you love me. I wanted to return the care you’ve given me.”

“I only loved you as a plant,” Junmyeon snaps. He doesn’t hear himself say it, doesn’t really register what he’s said until Chanyeol sharply withdraws. And then it hits him, like all of those worry stones he’s carried in his belly have piled up at once. Chanyeol’s right, and Chanyeol did this out of love, and Junmyeon’s done nothing but reject, reject, reject. When Chanyeol replies, “So I shouldn’t have done this?” he’s already sinking under the weight of it.

“It’s hard. A lot of change, it’s really hard. I know.” Junmyeon hears the wetness in Chanyeol’s voice and bites on his lower lip. “This was my choice. I mean, it wasn’t your choice that your life changed, so no, I don’t understand what it feels like entirely. But I understand being in the same place but it’s all different, and how you navigate it being different, and being different yourself. Did you even think about that?”

God, does Junmyeon ever really think about anyone but his own miserable self these days? He shakes his head, focused on Chanyeol’s bare feet on the floor tiles.

“I know you’re a nice person,” Chanyeol says. Junmyeon scoffs and turns away, fists clenched tight at his sides. He was, maybe, before his entire personality got taken over by this. He’d always imagined himself as the kind of person who could take on anything, doesn’t let anything set them back. The anger and fear erodes even the best parts of him. “And I know there’s a lot you’re worried and angry about, and that’s why you can be so mean. But we’re trying to help you, and you just keep getting angry and pushing us away. Every time you make a tiny bit of progress you get scared again and blame us for trying to help.”

That’s not right. Junmyeon appreciates everything his friends do for him. “I don’t-“

“You do.” Chanyeol doesn’t mean to raise his voice, but as one of the people going out of their way to see Junmyeon progress, he’s entitled to his opinion on this. “You get angry with me because when I offer to help it means you’d have to accept you can do things you’re scared to do. ‘n you get angry with your friends for being sensitive. We’re all trying to show you that things don’t have to be impossible but you’re too busy insisting they are.”

Chanyeol’s tears started as drizzle and are turning into a downpour. His shoulders hitch, and Junmyeon’s looking there now, Chanyeol’s hands in his sleeves and his sleeves pressed to his face.

“I miss being in the ground,” Chanyeol says. “I miss how you used to hold me.”

Junmyeon stares at him, for all the good staring at anything ever does. Dread slides cold and prickling from the nape of his neck down. Somewhere along the line he apparently also lost the ability to not momentously fuck everything up.

“Chanyeol,” his mouth is dry. On the table Junmyeon’s phone begins buzzing. His fists are still held tight. He doesn’t take his eyes off the shape of Chanyeol hidden behind his sleeves. It rings off, then it calls again.

Chanyeol’s nearer and peers over at the screen. “It’s Baekhyun.” Which means it’s just going to ring and ring until it gets answered.

With a last glance up at his face, Junmyeon steps past Chanyeol. “Hey, now isn’t-“ he gets as far as saying before there’s disturbance on the line.

“There’s literally no reason for now to not be a good time,” Jongdae’s loud nasal voice replaces Baekhyun’s. “You’re in your pyjamas watching that show where they make over restaurants.”

“Right,” Junmyeon replies, then, “I mean, no, not today.” His mouth and his brain feel like they’re full of dirt. In a way he’s not surprised at all - Chanyeol loves him. Of course he does, or he wouldn’t be here. Spirits don’t just do shit like this for fun, and he certainly hasn’t ever given the impression that’s what life with him would be.

“So are we coming over or what?”

Junmyeon turns back to Chanyeol. However many times in the past five months he’s wished he could just fucking see is nothing to right now, unable to make out his expression. Can’t see if he’s still in tears. “I actually have, uh,” He doesn’t like to lie, but Jongdae would ignore excuses and turn up with medication, or an alibi, or ready to fight a fire if need be. “A home visit. Today, so.”

The sound goes distant. Jongdae and Baekhyun seem to be conferring. Junmyeon paces, then sits on the couch and jogs his feet against the floor. Then Jongdae says that’s fine, maybe next week. He hangs up, and Junmyeon starts crying with his phone still held to his ear.

The weight in Junmyeon’s gut doesn’t ease up when he curls in, screwing his little body up as small as possible. He presses himself tight to the back of the couch and remembers wanting to slip down between the cushions. He could just fall down the back like loose change. Not noticed, not missed.

“Talk to me, Kim Junmyeon.” Chanyeol’s voice sounds close and strong again. He’s beside the couch, probably on his knees to be at eye level with Junmyeon. “You can close your eyes. Pretend I’m still a plant.”

And Junmyeon doesn’t have it in him anymore to flare up and refuse. Telling Chanyeol how he really feels stings in the back of his nose. The stone in his stomach comes up to stick in his throat as he says what he couldn’t even say to the big bright flower that filled his whole palm. He doesn’t want to be helped. He wants to be forgotten about, left alone to rot.

“You’d be nutrients for the soil,” Chanyeol’s voice is gentle. His hand in Junmyeon’s hair is, too, not cautious of him anymore. “That’s nature. You grow, you bloom, you die. You rot, go back to the earth and others live through you. Happens to everything when it’s time.”

Junmyeon presses his palms to his wet face. It hurts. It’s crushing.

“You’d still serve a purpose. But it’s definitely not your time yet,” Chanyeol soothes, “And plants can grow through concrete, so don’t argue with me about not understanding how hard some obstacles can be.”

“I don’t want to be a burden,” Junmyeon says when he’s been able to draw in a deep breath. “Or get treated like a child. Or be pitied, or have everyone think what a waste of space I am when I spent so long trying to figure out how to make something of myself.”

Chanyeol frowns. “But it’s not your fault this happened. Junmyeon, there’s nothing you need to be ashamed of. Even if there’s bad people out there who would be unkind, you have us. And- and I know that doesn’t stop people from thinking or saying bad things. But I’m sure there’s a lot of important things ahead of you that don’t concern them.” He pauses. Junmyeon’s shoulders are narrow, and when he rubs his back one hand spans blade to blade. “You can still make something of yourself. Just, something new to before.”

For a long moment Junmyeon doesn’t- can’t respond. He feels like he’s dissolving under the warm pressure to his back. No one has ever asked about these things. Everyone insists it’ll be like nothing has changed, eventually. Having any life back is what matters, right? Quantity over quality.

“So that’s really why you..” Junmyeon wets his dry lips, tasting salt. It’s stupid to even ask - Chanyeol obviously had no ulterior motives - so he rephrases, “Why would you do that for me?”

Chanyeol smiles. “Because I wanted to be here for you. I wished and wished and wished. I didn’t even know if it would work, but..something in the universe must have known it was important, huh.”

“It knew you’d be able to put up with me long enough to say what I needed to hear?” Junmyeon manages a laugh, and Chanyeol’s hand moves back to combing through his hair. “There was so much I was angry and worried about, I didn’t even..I didn’t really know what it even was until I told you. Or..until you told me. I’ve been too scared to even try and imagine a future.”

“Universe made me wise, I guess,” Chanyeol says.

“It must have. I can’t believe you really did that just for me.”

“Don’t flatter yourself, Kim Junmyeon.” Chanyeol’s voice is weak and wet again, but Junmyeon hears the smile in it. Feels it, when Chanyeol presses his lips to Junmyeon’s forehead for a long, long moment. He pulls back and thumbs away the wetness on Junmyeon’s face, and Junmyeon finds himself gratefully leaning into the touch. “I’m very sure I’m not the first spirit to become human for love.”

That’s true. A tale of a flower coming to life only to be resigned to playing on a tablet all day wouldn’t really be one for legend. “I’d understand if you wanted to turn vengeful after how I’ve treated you.” Junmyeon’s only kind of joking.

“Why would I want to lead you to your death if you’re finally going to stop being so difficult?” Chanyeol says, “I want to enjoy you being nice to me first.”

“Chanyeollie,” Junmyeon tries, laughing and wiping his wet eyes with the heel of his palm, “I can’t guarantee I’ll stop being grumpy. Or stop getting sad and angry, but I’ll try my best not to be difficult anymore.”

Chanyeol shakes his head. “You should feel everything you need to feel. But you can tell me. I know I won’t understand everything, but you saying it is the important part. You can feel as many bad things as you need to, but you’re not allowed to keep it to yourself anymore.”

“Ok,” Junmyeon says. “I won’t.” Even if that’s not an easy promise to make, he owes it to Chanyeol to try. Who knows, maybe in time he’ll even want to do it for himself. “You may not be the first spirit to have done this, but maybe you’ll be the first ever spirit counsellor.”

There’s a long pause. “Was that a joke?” Chanyeol sounds so puzzled Junmyeon can’t help laughing, eyelashes still wet against his skin. Chanyeol leans to press their foreheads together, and Junmyeon thinks maybe he wouldn’t fit down the back of the couch anyway.