Chapter Text
The pungent, sweet smell of flowers mixing with the metallic tang of blood was overwhelming.
Over the last few weeks, it was all she had been able to smell. To taste.
Even to feel, the weird rustling in her chest every time she tried to take a breath. At first she had barely noticed it, thought it was just her getting a cold or a tickle in the back of her throat, but after she had coughed up the first petal; she couldn’t deny it anymore.
She was in love. Unrequited, one sided love that would never bloom into the perfect relationship she wanted it to and now, because of that, here she was, trying to keep it down as she hacked up whole flowers and blood into the toilet.
God, she missed the days of just coughing up a few petals. Her throat was raw and throbbing with pain as she coughed up another flower, this time with more stem than the others.
Her stupid school-girl crush had taken over her life and now she was stuck with a fatal disease that would probably take her life because she refused to have the surgery done. She’d rather die than lose these feelings.
Because of her pathetic feelings, she had flowers growing in her lungs.
— —
“Ochako, what were you talking about with Aoyama during your match with 13?”
“Huh? Oh it’s nothing you’ve got it all wrong!”
Tsuyu had known since the start of school that Ochako had a crush on Izuku. Of course she did, the bubbly brunette was the farthest thing from subtle. With the amount of times she had turned into a bright pink, stuttering, floating mess around him, Tsuyu was surprised Izuku hadn’t caught on. He was standing right there for crying out loud, there was no way she could be any more obvious. With how many hours he spent studying every small detail about heroes, you’d think he would be more observant when it came to people. Even their most self obsessed classmate (except possibly Bakugo) Aoyama has noticed and called Ochako out on her behavior.
Really, it was a miracle no one had told Izuku yet.
Tsuyu couldn’t deny the sharp sting of jealousy in her gut as she watched Ochako start to panic over her crush, a feeling that has become all too familiar over the last few months. Momo giggled in the background and Iida lectured them on paying attention to their surroundings while on missions because they were heroes in training and being distracted by stupid comments was dangerous. Right. They were heroes. Still in training yes, but their exercises were becoming harder and harder and the stakes higher and higher.
These feelings were just a distraction, distracting her from her ultimate goal. They made her head fill up with stupid thoughts of dates and kisses exchanged when no one was looking, made her hands clammy and ache to reach out and hold Ochako’s even despite her quirk, made her heart beat more wildly than any encounter with a villain. She was being ridiculous. She prided herself on being intelligent, maybe not as much as someone as Momo or Todoroki, but she was clever. Smart. But this? This wasn’t smart. This was the dumbest thing she had ever done. Someone going into their profession shouldn’t be worrying over a silly crush - one on another hero especially. It was just a way to get hurt.
Watching Ochako flail her arms around denying her crush, it hurt more than the time she had trained with Bakugo and gotten an explosion to the face. Tsuyu’s lungs felt tight, like someone had just knocked her down and winded her, and something tickled in the back of her throat. She tried to take a deep breath, but her body wouldn’t let her. She didn’t even feel in control of what was happening to her anymore. Her chest got tighter and tighter, her lungs more and more constricted. The stuffy control room was starting to spin and god she felt nauseous. If she couldn’t breathe soon, she was going to end up passing out.
“Tsuyu! Are you ok?” Ochako cried as she reached out to touch her friend’s arm. It was almost like black magic, one minute she felt like she couldn’t breathe and the next it was gone. The feeling eased away. She could breathe again. The butterflies in her stomach and the pounding of her heart was still there (Ochako was touching her!) but she felt less like she was on the door of death.
She took a deep breath, leaning into Ochako so she wouldn’t fall on the ground as her knees all but gave out.
She smiled weakly at the other girl. “Y-yes, sorry for worrying you Ochako.”
Her eyes were full of concern and Tsuyu immediately felt awful for worrying her. “You have nothing to apologize for Tsu. I hope you’re feeling better.” Tsuyu nodded sadly. Ochako wrapped an arm around her and gave her a hug. Even though she felt guilty, she couldn’t help but lean in closer. If this is what happened every time she was about to pass out, maybe she should start doing it more.
“Would you like me to go get you some water Asui?” Iida offered in his usual over the top, robotic manner.
“Or would you like me to create an inhaler? Breathing medicine? A less tight suit?” Momo offered, ready to use her quirk to help her friend.
Shaking her head, Tsuyu turned them down. “No thank you kero, I think I’m good now. Also please call me Tsu.”
“Of course Asui!” She frowned. “Do not be afraid to ask me if you need anything else!” She had to dodge to not get hit by one of Iida’s swinging arms.
She took a deep breath and moved away from Ochako, even though all she wanted to do was stay by her side. But Ochako has already moved on to wishing Deku-Kun luck for his match! Tsuyu bit her cheek so that she wouldn’t say or do anything that she’d regret. She felt bad, she really did. Izuku was a great boy. She couldn’t blame Ochako for her feelings because as much as she referred to the other girl as her best friend, it was clear that she was closer with him. In reality, there really was no way that she could compete with him. Kind, smart, cute in that dorkish way, it really was hard not to love him. She wasn’t even completely human, how was she ever supposed to expect a girl as beautiful and charming as Ochako to fall for her.
She was selfish, she really was but just for a moment, just for a second, she wanted Ochako to look at her with those bright eyes full of admiration and desire. But deep down she knew it would never happen. Even if she was prettier and smarter, it didn’t change the fact that Ochako probably only liked men.
A bitter taste filled her mouth as she thought of her future with Ochako, doomed to only be friends with the bubbly brunette. She swallowed, but her throat was dry and it hurt, almost as much as thinking about her crush. She turned one of the large screens and tried to focus on watching the match.
She wondered who on earth had been dumb enough to put both Bakugo and Izuku on a team. Realistically, she knew as heroes they’d have to work on teams with people they didn’t particularly like during missions but at this point everyone and their mother knew that these would never get along. At some points, she wasn’t even sure if they would end up passing because of Bakugo’s hostile attitude towards his teammate. And All Might wasn’t helping. She wasn’t as close to the pro as someone like Izuku but in all the time she had known, he had seen like a kind and caring teacher towards his students. But now, he was attacking them and throwing them around like it was no big deal. Granted it was a training exercise, and recovery girl was standing just to her right, but this was overkill.
She cringed in pain as she watched Bakugo get hurled into a building. This was too hard to watch.
She turned to look at her friends. Momo and Iida were murmuring to themselves, something about how unteacher like All Might’s attitude was, and Ochako was staring intently at the screen, almost as if she could will Izuku’s victory by looking hard enough. Her lips were knit into a tight frown, eyes full of determination and concern staring at the screen as she clenched her hands into fists. Her expression was so intense it was hard to believe she was just a bystander to this fight.
Tsuyu turned back to the screen. Izuku and Bakugo were arguing about something but she didn’t know what. She couldn’t pinpoint exactly why, but she felt awkward staring at her friend while she looked like this. Like she was doing something wrong, which was ridiculous, but if she had learned one thing these last few weeks it was that feelings would always be stupid and ridiculous.
Tsuyu sighed and tried to pay attention to the match. Time was getting closer to running out and it looked like Izuku was trying to explain his plan to an angry Bakugo. Tsuyu lifted her finger to her cheek as she tried to come up with her own strategy to beat All Might. She was just glad she hadn’t been assigned him as a villain, or Bakugo as a partner especially now that he was back to hurling insults. Putting Kirishima on a team with Bakugo really would have been a smarter decision by Aizawa or whoever had been in charge of separating them. He was the only one the blonde would even listen to when he was like this.
Every so often, Tsuyu would hear Momo sigh at Bakugo’s uncooperative behavior or Ochako grunt in frustration when Izuku got hurt. Iida was strangely quiet as he carefully surveyed his classmates movement. Recovery girl would also occasionally chime in with a comment or too. However, when both Bakugo and Izuku managed to escape the arena without All Might stopping them, they all erupted into cheers, Ochako in particular. She was so excited she started to hop as she cheered.
Recovery girl chuckled at the brunette’s out buddy. She hoped off her chair and waved a cane in the groups direction. “I’m off to heal Midoriya. He’s pretty injured, he’ll need time to rest. Please don’t put too much pressure on the poor boy. He’s already been through enough.”
The group nodded and Recovery girl left, satisfied with her work. Ochako wasn’t about to calm down though, she was still too high on adrenaline to stop. Suddenly, she turned to Tsuyu and interlaced their hands. Tsuyu could feel the heat rising in her cheeks and all the air leave her lungs. She felt weightless, even though she checked and Ochako’s quirk wasn’t even activated. She just hoped her cheeks wouldn’t turn too red that it would be noticeable. Class 1-A didn't need two useless crushing girl to tease at the same time.
“Tsu, Tsu! They made it!” She cheered as she started to hop up and down.
Tsuyu smiled at her, and she didn’t even need to see her face to know she must look like an idiot right now. “It’s a miracle they made it. I’m happy for them, gero.”
Of course, she was showering praise towards Midoriya who wasn’t even there to thank her and oh god the familiar sting and sick feeling in Tsuyu’s stomach was back but the way Ochako’s eyes lit up as she talked about what she just happened, Tsuyu didn’t dare interrupt the girl. Even if the pain in her chest was coming back, she didn’t want to worry her.
“Did you see the way he moved? He was so fast, it was like in the blink of an eye he was fighting against All Might and the next he was rocketing towards the doors. It was incredible! And man his punches, they just keep getting stronger. I couldn't even believe this was the same guy that couldn’t kill any robots but one during our entrance exam.” As she listened to Ochako’s babbling, a sharp pain started to form in Tsuyu’s chest. She let out a shaky breath but continued nodding along with Ochako, begging to whatever god was watching her above that it would just go away and she wouldn’t make a fool of herself again.
It was only getting worse.
“Plus his bones don’t break anymore which is such a relief; I can’t even begin to describe to you how worried I was after the sports festival. I love him, but Deku is just so foolish sometimes!”
And with those words, Tsuyu’s world fell apart. The fragile lies she had been telling herself for weeks had been broken with just three words.
It wasn’t just some passive crush anymore.
She loved him.
Loved. The utmost care anyone could feel towards someone else. And she felt that for him .
Ochako didn’t miss a beat, she carried right on with her babbling, completely oblivious to what she had just said. Completely oblivious to the fact that Tsuyu has stopped bouncing with her. Did she not realize that she had just admitted to loving Izuku out loud?
Tsuyu tried to argue with herself that she had just meant it in a friendly, purely platonic way but as she gazed over at her friend, lost in her own little wonderland of praise for Midoriya, she couldn’t even believe herself.
Tears filled her eyes and she desperately tried to blink them away. She was being stupid, so so so stupid. Of course she loved Midoriya, anyone with eyes knew that, but hearing it come from Ochako’s own mouth…
Tsuyu practically doubled over from the pain in her chest.
“How hard is it to listen to me when I tell you to just stop getting hurt all the ti- oh I’m so sorry Tsu I’m rambling.” She scratched the back of her head in embarrassment as her cheeks turned red.
Tsuyu shook her head and tried to smile, but she didn’t have to see her reflection to know how fake it looked. “Don’t worry you’re fine. You’re right, Izuku really has improved a lot these last few months.” The words felt like thorns on her tongue.
Ochako nodded eagerly, grinning wildly back at her. “He’s incredible Tsuyu. I wish I could be more like him.” She said wistfully.
Tsuyu smiled sadly at the other girl. “You’re incredible too Ochako. You just need to have more faith in yourself.” She bit her tongue, hoping the other girl wouldn’t notice that she definitely was about to cry. From the ache in her lungs or the pain of hearing Ochako say she loved Izuku, even she didn’t even know anymore. She just wanted this whole awful day to go away.
Thankfully, Ochako didn’t seem to notice. “I guess. I’ll just have to work harder and become stronger, that way I can be as strong as Deku!”
Deku. Izuku. Midoriya. Tsuyu felt awful for wishing any form of ill will towards a friend of hers - because as much as this situation hurt her, she really was Izuku’s friend it wasn’t his fault that she has fallen in love with the girl who loved him - she wished she didn’t have to hear his name ever again. It just made her feel worse and worse the more she heard it, especially coming from Ochako’s mouth. It was like listening to nails on a chalkboard, scratching at the most important thing in her life.
Because that’s how obsessed she had become with this stupid crush of hers, it slowly crept its way into her head and now here she was, even acknowledging its place as the most important thing in her life.
The feelings in her chest got stronger, somehow, and the pain that had been there before amplified. She fell to the ground, knees hitting the cold concrete floor as she hacked up a lung in front of her friends. It was worse than last time, so so much worse. Her head was foggy, eyes filled with tears as black started to appear on the edge of her vision. She fought to stay conscious as another fit of coughing ransacked her body. It felt like someone was squeezing her torso, much more violently and forceful than any hug she had ever had and no matter how hard she tried, she just couldn’t seem to breathe . Like her ribcage was shrinking and there wasn’t enough room for her lungs to properly fill with air.
“Tsuyu!” Ochako cried as she fell to the floor beside her. She hesitantly reached out and touched the other girl, one hand touching her arm while her other gently hit her on the back in a futile attempt to help the sick girl. While last time, the contact had magically cured the coughing, this time, it only made it worse.
She lurched forward, covering her mouth as she felt something crawl up her throat. Oh god she hoped it wasn’t vomit, this was already embarrassing enough, but she’d die if she started throwing up in front of her friends. Her throat felt raw and she could taste the metal pang of blood mix with something sweet in her mouth. If she wasn’t already sick, she was about to be from the vile and bitter taste. With a final, painful heave, she coughed something up into one of her gloves. There wasn’t the usual taste of bile in her mouth, which she considered a good sign as the coughing subsided.
She gasped, finally able to breathe.
One time, when she was little, she had gone to the pool with her best friend. They had taken a dozen small rocks from her garden and thrown them into the deep end of the pool. Whoever brought back the most rocks won and the other had to buy her ice cream. A typical kids game, stupid but fun for the three minutes it lasted. Looking back on it, it was a bit unfair. Of course Tsuyu was going to win, she had the water based quirk while her friend had a hearing related quirk. But that didn’t stop them from having the challenge and when they came up for air, Tsuyu had been taken aback by all the panting and coughing her friend had done. It was her first time swimming with non frog-quirk users and while she did know not everyone had gills, it was still shocking to her that it had hurt her friend to stay under water for such an extended period of time. But at the time she didn’t question it. But now? As she panted, trying to fill her aching lungs with as much oxygen as she could, she understood the concept of non-water based quirk users going diving even less. Why purposely make your lungs burn and limit your supply of oxygen?
It was so stupid and needlessly reckless.
She shook her head and sighed, willing away the stupid memories as she tried to focus on the more pressing issue at hand. Hesitantly, she started to pull away her hands from her mouth. They felt light, not like there were any suspicious liquids inside or them, but she still didn’t want to accidentally drop a ton of frog acid on the ground.
Her gaze dropped down to her hands and she gasped.
Shit .
Frog acid? Would have been normal. Usually didn’t hurt as much but maybe she was coming down with quirk flu.
Her head started to spin as she tried to understand what was going on.
Just normal blood like the one staining her gloves? Maybe she has been hit harder than she realized during her exam. It wouldn’t be that insane, she could just go down to recovery girl and get healed.
She quickly shut her hands so Ochako or Iida or anyone else wouldn’t see what she had just cough up.
Coughing up something like a tadpole would have been more normal than this.
Even if it made her head spin, Tsuyu abruptly stood up, pushing away from Ochako and racing towards the door.
“I’m going to go see recovery girl.” She flinched at how weak her voice sounded. Ochako started to protest, her voice filled with so much worry that it made Tsuyu want to cry. She shut her eyes, taking in a shaky breath before rushing out the door before Ochako could finish. She was alone in the hallway, her sharp footsteps echoing in the empty space and god did it feel good to finally be by herself.
Once she turned a corner and was sure that none of her friends had followed her, she could finally sigh in relief. Slow down, take a deep breath to clear her head and try to apply logic to this.
She looked down at her tightly closed hands again. She was scared to look inside. Maybe she had been hallucinating inside the control room. It was stuffy in there, her adrenaline had been high and she had been about to pass out. The probability that she had just had a hallucination was higher than the chance of he lungs turning into a flower garden. But as she opened her hands to reveal the perfect pink petal sitting inside her bloodied glove, the proof was right there for her to see. What practically thinking could see apply to this?
How on earth could she turn to logic when she was coughing up petals?
—
Quirks.
Obviously the logical conclusion to come to in a world like there’s. People didn’t magically grow a garden in their chest, there had to be some sort of outside interference that was making her sick.
She hadn’t coughed up petals since the final exam, which she took as a good sign. A weekend of rest and relaxation later, and aside from the slight tickle in the back of her throat, she felt as fine as ever. (That was a lie, her muscles were still aching from the physical exertion of the exams - but at least her lungs seemed to be fine.) The effects from the quirk must have finally worn off. She would no longer have to worry about coughing up a flower while participating in class.
Although, maybe, that would have made class a little more exciting.
Class had been exceptionally slow that day.
The sweltering summer heat combined with summer camp being just around the corner, almost no one - even the more diligent students like Iida and Momo - could focus. Even the usually eccentric and loud teachers like Midnight and Present Mic were more quiet during their lessons. Tsuyu couldn’t say she blamed them, she was sure being in hero costumes like theirs during this kind of weather must be exhausting. Everyone just wanted the day to end and to go home.
During lunch, she had gone and sat across from Ochako who was sitting with the rest of the girls instead of with Midoriya like usual. A nauseating feeling filled her gut as she remembered the pain she had felt seeing the other two together during the exams. She took a deep breath and looked over at Ochako, who was busy excitedly blabbering to Ashido about her plans for the weekend. She had to move past her own jealousy and focus on being happy for her friend.
“Say, why don’t we go to that new fancy crepe shop that just opened outside of campus this weekend?” Yaoyorozu’s soft voice broke Tsuyu out of her thoughts.
“Oh that’s such a good idea Yaomomo!” Ochako smiled, clapping her hands together.
“Can you even afford that Ochako?” She cringed. She hadn’t meant to sound so rude, she just couldn’t find any other way to avoid the question. Talking to Ochako made her intelligence and fluency drop faster than Kaminari’s when he had overused his quirk.
If the other girl was offended, she didn’t show it. “Probably not, but we should at least do something to celebrate passing our exams and I’ve been craving crepes lately.” Tsuyu laughed at her response.
Ashido pouted and playfully shoved Ochako. “Hey, no need to rub your victory in my face.” Ochako stuck her tongue out at her.
“I can't even remember the last time I did have crepes.” Jirou said, smiling happily as she looked over at Yaoyorozu.
Ochako nodded. “To get the money I could always bet 500¥ with Bakugo that I’d win against him in an arm wrestling contest again.” Ochako laughed.
Tsuyu smiled fondly at the memory. She did always enjoy watching the absolute chaos that was Bakugo and Ochako during training. “Didn’t you lose last time?”
She cringed. Again. She must seem so rude to Ochako right now.
“Hey no need to remind me.” Ochako rolled up the sleeve of her white blouse and started to flex her biceps. Tsuyu could feel her cheeks heating up and her heart beat faster. “It was a really close match and I’ve been training really hard lately, I’m sure I could take him.”
Tsuyu instinctively brought her finger up to her cheek. “If you don’t you’ll be down 500¥ and we really won’t be able to get crepes,” She said.
Ochako sighed. “You’re right Tsu, but I still want to go.”
Ever the angel, Yaoyorozu stepped in. “I’d be willing to treat you guys. It was my suggestion after all, so paying would only be fair!” She giggled, a soft blush growing on her cheeks. Yaoyorozu really was perfect.
“Going to get crepes sounds so fun, I’m in!” Hagakure said, waving her arms enthusiastically. “Nothing’s better than a powdered sugar crepe with whipped cream and loads of strawberries.”
“I’ll still come even if I failed both parts of the exam, I could never pass up the chance to get a Nutella crepe,” Ashido grinned, nudging Ochako.
“We should invite Kendo and Shiozaki to go too.” Ochako suggested, leaning against Ashido as she reached into her pocket to pull out her phone.
She couldn’t be exactly sure, but Tsuyu thought Hagakure nodded. “Good idea, I’ve wanted to get closer to the 1-B girls.”
“This thing is going to be so much fun!” Ashido cried, wrapping an arm around Ochako’s shoulders and pulling her ever so slightly closer.
Ashido was a friendly, overly affectionate sweetheart. She had little to no concept of personal space and frequently touched everyone, including Bakugo, even though he usually shoved her off and threatened to kill her but it never seemed to deter her. Hugging people, linking arms with them even cuddling them during sleepovers - it was just how she showed affection. Tsuyu has grown used to this after a few weeks, but seeing her and Ochako like this, a small, nasty part of her wanted to shove the pink haired girl away and tell everyone that Ochako was hers!
Which was stupid and she immediately felt guilty for. She couldn’t own one of her friends, no matter what her jealousy told her.
So she pushed the awful feeling down and smiled and nodded her head. “It sounds great, kero.”
Ochako’s bright happy smile was as blinding as always. “I’m just really excited to hang out with everyone.”
Tsuyu hummed in agreement, coughing a bit into her arm to try and get rid of the feeling in her throat. It felt she had just swallowed a handful of dry hay. She could also faintly smell roses and briefly wondered if anyone was wearing perfume and if that might be the cause of it.
Over the loud ruckus of the U.A cafeteria, the distant bell that marked the end of their lunch period rang. Everyone groaned as they started to clean up their lunch trays.
“Just as things were starting to get fun.” Ashido groaned as she stood up, grabbing her garbage to throw it out. Tsuyu couldn’t deny that she felt just the tiniest bit relieved when she moved away from Ochako.
“I’m glad everyone liked the idea though.” Yaoyorozu said as the girls started to grab their things. “Would everyone like to meet up here tomorrow after class and we could all walk down to the shop together?”
Everyone nodded.
“Alright then!” She clapped her hands together. “It sounds like a plan.” She grabbed her bag off the cafeteria floor and walked over to Jirou. She smiled at her friends one last time and waved goodbye. “See you in class everyone!”
“See ya.” Jirou said as she gave them a peace sign. The duo started to walk out the doors of the cafeteria.
“Bye Yaomomo, Jirou!” Ashido called out after the two before turning back to the remaining four. “Ugh, I don’t want to go back to class. If I have to translate one more English paragraph I think I’m going to scream .”
Hagakure patted her on the back. “I feel you girl. My head hurts just thinking about conjugating English verbs.”
“English class is already over though. You guys won’t have to worry about English verbs until you do the homework tonight.” Tsuyu pointed out.
This just prompted another prolonged sigh of frustration from Ashido. “You’re right but the homework looked so hard, I think I’ll just not do it.”
“I’m going to get a head start on the homework for tomorrow,” Ochako explained, “That way I won’t have anything to worry about when we all hang out.”
“You’re so diligent Uraraka, this is why you’re one of the smarter people in the class.” Ashido exclaimed, nudging the blushing brunette.
“Huh? Me? I’m not! I’m only like, 13th out of everyone. Tsuyu is 6th, she’s much smarter than me!” She scratched the back of her head in embarrassment, looking away to avoid eye contact. Tsuyu found it almost amusing how flustered the girl got whenever anyone complimented her abilities.
“Yeah but we have Yaoyorozu in our group, I’m far from the smartest one.” Tsuyu said. “I struggle with English too, although it’s a lot simpler than Japanese.”
“I think that if my quirk was like Yaomomo’s I would have given up being a hero. There’s no way I could remember all the fancy chemical equations and stuff. I can barely remember two plus two.” Ashido swung her bag over her shoulder. Tsuyu nodded in agreement. Yaomomo really was brilliant to handle such a complicated quirk.
“Oh don’t say that Mina,” Tsuyu felt a small tinge of jealousy as Ochako called Ashido by her first name. “You may not be as smart as say Yaoyorozu, but you’re still strong in your own right. Like athletics, and Kirishima and Sero mentioned once that you’re good at dancing too? That’s really impressive!”
Ashido looked like she was ready break out into a mess of happy tears as she ran towards Ochako and hugged her. Ochako practically wheezed as the other girl barreled into her. “Ochako, you’re so kind! God we really don’t deserve you and Yaomomo!” She cried into the other girl’s shoulder. Ochako looked down at her, shocked.
A burning feeling started to form in Tsuyu’s chest. She winced in pain and clutched her abdomen. She let out a pained gasp as she leaned against the table for support. She could feel her legs start to tremble.
“It’s just the truth.” Ochako was saying as pat Ashido on the back sympathetically but Tsuyu couldn’t focus on Ashido’s confidence issues anymore. She was too busy trying to bite back a pained cry. She opened her mouth to excuse herself when the tardy bell rang. Shoot. She was going to be late for class.
“I don’t care, you’re still too nice ‘Chako.” Ashido linked arms with the brunette and the invisible girl on her other side. They started to rush towards the door. “Now come on! I can’t get another tardy. Onwards, ladies!”
Tsuyu could hear the blood pounding in her ears. The cafeteria was just too noisy. Students around her were clanking their lunch trays together, shouting across the room to each other and the teacher’s incessant yelling trying to calm the crowd of students down was just making it worse. Her vision became more blurred and the floor seemed to sway below her feet. The smell of roses was back and stronger than ever. It was overwhelming. Everything was. The smell, the noise, her pounding headache. She felt like she could pass out.
Ochako turned, reaching back for Tsuyu to join them when she noticed how ill her friend looked. She stopped moving. “Tsu, are you okay?” She called back and it became too much for Tsuyu.
She almost fell to the floor as she started to cough, the violent heaving ransacking her small body. In what felt like the distance she could hear Ochako’s panicked “Tsuyu!” But she was up on her feet and sprinting away before she knew it.
With one hand safety clamped over her mouth, she pushed past the crowd of people and towards the closest bathroom. She wanted to look behind her to check that no one was following her but every time the coughing seemed to stop, it would start up again and twice as bad as the last time. She could barely breathe as she managed to shove open the door to the first floor girls bathroom. She was in too much of a panic to check if anyone else was else was in any of the other stalls as she slammed the doors to her’s shut.
Her eyes were shut tightly as she started to heave into the toilet of the stall. Her lungs were burning, her throat was raw as she coughed up spit, stomach acid, blood, and who knew what else into the toilet bowl.
When the coughing subsided, she practically cried in relief.
She paused for a moment, gulping in air like she had just been drowning as she finally dropped to the floor and checked to see who else was in the bathroom. Thankfully - no one it seemed.
She sighed in relief and looked up at the ceiling, glad her version was no longer spinning. Disgusting as it was, she used the back of her hand to wipe whatever was on her mouth and chin away. She didn’t care, she could just wash her hands afterwards.
When she realized lunch had ended almost five minutes ago she started to panic. Cemented was nice, but very strict. There was no way he could he would just be fine with her showing up this late to his class. She briefly wondered if she even should bother going back to class if she was sick. Although now that the coughing fit was over, she mostly felt fine. But still, she knew it would be better to stop by Recovery Girl’s office just to make sure everything was okay and maybe get some headache medicine.
Plus she still needed to collect her stuff that she had left in the cafeteria.
Taking a deep breath, she started to push herself off the ground, leaning on the stall walls for support. Even if she wasn’t coughing anymore and her chest didn’t hurt, the pounding headache was still there.
She was about to walk out of the tiny stall and tidy herself up at the sinks when she noticed the bright pink splotches in the toilet water.
Her blood went cold.
Panic shot up her spine and she nearly fell over.
With a shaking hand, she reached over to the wall to steady herself as she gazed down into the water.
There, laying in the water amidst blood and spit was four rose petals.
—
Her original hypothesis that this was the doing or a quirk had been wrong. While some people did have more flower-oriented quirks, there was another reason behind the flowers growing in her chest.
After hours of research, Tsuyu had discovered that there was a name for what was happening to her, which despite the fear of what would happen to her in the future, gave her some semblance of comfort.
Hanahaki.
A disease that preyed upon the painful feelings of unrequited love. Once someone fell in love and their feelings were unreturned, a flower would start to grow inside the chest of the person. They’d cough up flower petals, and if it worsened, even whole flowers until finally, it grows so large that it suffocates the unfortunate host to death. The disease was extremely rare, with very few recorded cases of it and none where the victim survived. There was a medicine in the works, but with no recent cases of the disease to test the effectiveness of this new pill on, doctors had no idea if it would actually work.
A controversial surgery had been attempted on the last recorded case, over twenty years ago, but the patient had lost too much blood during the procedure and died on the surgery bed.
Tsuyu quickly shut her laptop. She was done with her research for today. Every new thing she read about this hanahaki disease filled her with more dread and panic. She glanced over at her alarm clock. With the light from her computer gone, the eerie red light of her alarm clock made her skin crawl. She took a deep breath and leaned back in her chair.
Deep breaths, deep breaths. Trying to relax, trying not to cry as she rubbed the tears out of her eyes.
Faintly, she could hear the snoring of her siblings in the room over from hers. Normally, she’d curse out the thin walls, but tonight she was just thankful for the reminder that she wasn’t alone.
Ever since she was little, Tsuyu had always watched after her younger siblings. She’d been there for them when they lost their first tooth or fell on the playground and needed a band aid. She wasn’t claiming to be perfect by any means, even she had gotten sick of hearing her brother cry about how he wanted to eat one more cookie before dinner, but she liked to think that she was a pretty good sister. And being such a good sister, obviously she had helped her siblings get through their fears. One of the more ridiculous fears she had had to help with was her brother Samidare’s paranoia that if he ate a watermelon seed, a plant would start to grow in his stomach and he’d be forced to live with a watermelon inside of him forever.
It had taken him months before he started to believe her that no, no watermelons could grow in your stomach because the acid inside said stomach would kill the seedling before it could ever start to grow. All logic and facts pointed towards it being impossible that a watermelon plant could ever grow inside a human.
But now that flowers were growing inside of her lungs of all places, Tsuyu couldn’t be so sure. She’ll probably have to tell Samidare to start removing every seed from any slices of watermelon he ate.
She’d also probably have to tell everyone in her family she’d love them and watch over them in the afterlife because who even knew if she would be there long enough for summertime and watermelon season. With how things were going now, the chances looked more and more slim.
At least she hadn’t coughed up another petal since lunch. It must mean that despite everything she was still in the early stages of her feelings. There was still a constant tickle in the back of her throat but she preferred that over whole flowers raining out of her mouth.
She looked over at her window sill where the original petal from the final exams was sitting, illuminated by the pale moonlight flooding in from the window.
Out of context, she would have considered the petal pretty. Fading from a darker pink to an almost white baby pink with a very sweet smell, had she not been ill with the flower she would have loved to have a garden full of them. Pink roses had always been one of her favorite flowers and it was a bitter irony that they would most likely be the cause of her death.
Even though it and what it stood for terrified her, she hadn’t thrown it out after the exams. Hidden in the pocket of her uniform, it had burned a (metaphorical - unless maybe one day they’d actually start to become boiling hot and kill her by burning a hole in her lungs. At this point, anything was possible) hole in her pocket for the rest of the afternoon until she got home.
She should throw it out, for the sake of her peace of mind she knew that, but it felt too important. Like throwing it out would worsen her condition. So she had placed it on her windowsill and prayed that maybe the wind would take care of it for her. Sadly it hadn’t.
Now, the petal represented a much bigger issue she would have to deal with.
Namely, what was she supposed to do now.
According to the internet, prolonged periods of contact with the subject of your affections only worsened the disease. And with someone as touchy and kind as Ochako, Tsuyu was sure that’d she’d be coughing out whole bouquets by the end of the next day. How she hadn’t already was beyond her. Ideally, someone infected by hanahaki was supposed to stay away from their crush for as long as possible until they had moved on from the feelings or been given medical care.
Tsuyu had mixed feelings about getting medical help. For one, the medicine was extremely rare and hard to come by, so even if she did talk to her doctor about what was happening, there was no guaranteed chance she’d even get the proper treatment. Even if she did, it would surely cost an astronomical amount she didn’t want her parents to pay for. They already had to worry about sending her two younger siblings to college and paying for UA’s high tuition, she would feel beyond awful if they had to buy her expensive medicine too.
She didn’t even consider the surgery an option. She’d rather let her feelings kill her than have a doctor botch up her insides and cause her death.
That’s if her parents even believed her though. Someone coughing out flower petals? It sounded like something straight out of a fairy tale, if she hadn’t been the one suffering from it, who knows if she’d even believe in it herself.
She’d also have to tell her parents that she was in love with someone. Not just anyone, but also a girl. That she was gay and would never be able to give them the grandtadpoles they had always wanted. The thought of coming out to her fairly conservative family on normal terms already filled her with dread, but the idea of also telling them that her love for another girl was killing her at the same time? Made her feel sick to her stomach.
Leaving her with one more option.
Avoid Ochako. Pretend to be mad at her. Fake having the flu and not have to go to school until she had worked her feelings out and she saw her only as a friend. Turn down every invite to a sleepover and distance herself from her best friend until she could finally look her in the eyes again and not have her heart beat out of her diseased, flower infected chest.
Her overly kind and dedicated best friend. Who laughed at her every joke, comforted her whenever she was feeling down and profusely thanked her whenever Tsuyu took the time to help her with lessons. Who never got weird or stopped touching her whenever she could after Tsu had told her she liked girls and made sure to make her feel included in every conversation. Who braided her hair and had stupid conversations with her at 3 AM on the phone because they both were too scared of the nightmares that came in their sleep.
Tsuyu didn’t trust herself. Even if the other girl didn’t notice her cough up flowers, she wouldn’t put it past herself to accidentally blurt out her feelings during a training or studying session.
Unshed tears stung in her eyes as she pictured Ochako’s uncomfortable face as she tried to nicely turn Tsuyu’s feelings down. She could already hear her awkward chuckle and see her nervously playfully mess with her hair as she avoided eye contact while listing off the reasons she loved Tsuyu - but as a friend and nothing more. Never anything more. She could already picture her avoiding her and leaving her to talk with Iida and Midoriya whenever she could because Tsuyu has messed up their friendship and made it weird.
She glanced over at her clock, the bold red 12:37 glowing back at her. It was getting late, she needed to get some sleep for class tomorrow and the crepe hang out. She still had no idea what she was going to do about that. Pushing in her chair and turning off her lamp, she felt the full weight of the day hit her. She was exhausted- both mentally and physically. Her body was still hurting from her exams, her stomach hadn’t quite fully recovered from the regurgitation yet and her tongue was sore from stretching so much. She was worn emotionally too, stressed from the fear of failure and finding out she had a life threatening disease. She just wanted the day to end already.
Her worn felt like heaven as she finally laid down. Nothing in the world had ever felt as soft as her comforter as she curled up in the blankets. Just as she was about to doze off into sleep, she heard her phone vibrate on the nightstand next to her.
She reached over, lazily trying to grab her phone without leaving her comfy safe haven. Instead, she knocked the phone to the ground. She groaned.
Peeking her head over the edge of the bed, she could barely make out what the notification was. A text from Ochako.
She should have turned away and gone back to sleep. Ochako was understanding, she could have just said she was asleep. She should be asleep, she still had to get up early the next day, but she knew that if she didn’t answer she’d feel horribly guilty about it in the morning.
[Ochako Uraraka] at 12:43 AM: Hey, sorry to bother you so late at night, but I wanted to text you and make sure you’re okay. You seemed really panicked after the exam today, everything alright?
Tsuyu sighed. Ochako really was too nice.
[Tsu Asui] at 12:44 AM: Thank you for checking in Ochako. I’m fine, just think I’m getting sick with something.
[Ochako Uraraka] at 12:44 AM: Oh, sorry to hear that. I hope you feel better soon Tsu ❤️
Tsuyu smiled sadly to herself as she read the last message again. She sent back a heart and turned her phone off. Darkness filled the room again. Slowly, as if the phone should shatter if she placed the phone down too hard, she set her phone back down and curled up in the blankets again.
She closed her eyes and felt a tear slip out. She hugged her pillow tightly as more tears came. She felt ridiculous, out of all the things that had happened that day, this really was the dumbest thing to cry about. But that didn’t stop the hot, frustrated tears from spilling onto her pillow as she tried to muffle the noise she was making as to not wake anyone else.
The pain in her chest was back, and god it was still the early stages of the disease, but she was sick of feeling like she was choking slowly from the inside.
In the morning, she tried to ignore the two new rose petals that had appeared on her pillow overnight.
—
As it turned out, avoiding Ochako was hard.
Really, really hard.
So hard, that if she were more like her ill tempered blond classmate, she would have even said it was fucking difficult.
She had tried her very best to avoid the brunette, turning off her phone that morning so she wouldn’t read any texts and even showing up late to class and enduring Aizawa’s scolding for it. Ochako had tried to throw her a note during class, but thankfully Iida has caught it and handed it right back to her, lecturing the poor girl about paying attention in class and subsequently drawing all the attention to them and distracting everybody. It took all of Tsuyu’s self control not to turn around and throw Ochako a supportive smile as Iida went off on a tangent.
The rest of the morning went by fairly uneventfully. The normal teachers came in, gave their lecture, assigned much too much homework for Tsuyu’s liking and left only to be replaced by another one of their colleagues. It was mundane, familiar but Tsuyu wasn’t complaining. At least they didn’t have hero practice that day and she wouldn’t be forced to turn down Ochako when the other girl asked to be partners for that days exercise.
The first real major problem came during lunch. Instead of going out to the cafeteria with everyone else, Tsuyu was planning on staying behind and working on homework during the break instead. Hopefully everyone would be so caught up in discussing what Lunch Rush had cooked up for them that day they wouldn’t notice Tsuyu staying in the classroom.
Much to her dismay, that didn’t happen.
The minute the bell rang to signal the start of lunch, Ochako came bounding up to her desk.
“Hey, you feeling any better from yesterday?” She asked, hefting herself up to sit on the other girl’s desk. “I was really worried when I saw you come in late today.”
Tsuyu smiled awkwardly. “Uh, yeah I’m fine, gero. Just slept in late on accident. Sorry for worrying you.”
Ochako frowned at her. “Oh that’s fine. Sorry if I’m being paranoid, just want to make sure you’re okay.”
Tsuyu looked down to avoid Ochako’s worried gaze. It just made her feel worse. “Thanks for caring so much, gero.”
“Of course I care silly, you’re one of my friends. It’s only natural for me to be concerned about your health.” Tsuyu looked up at her and saw the blinding brightness that was Ochako’s smile. Her heart really couldn’t handle this.
Tsuyu tried to smile as naturally as she could back at her, awkwardly trying to nonchalantly move her hand further away from Ochako’s when it looked like the girl might reach out and take it in a form of reassurance.
If Ochako noticed, she didn’t mention it.
“I’m really excited for the crepe thing today after school today. Momo’s so sweet, paying for all of us.”
“It was very nice of her.” Tsuyu agreed, hoping the topic would be dropped. Of course, it didn’t.
“I’ve been daydreaming about what crepes to order all day during class! I’m thinking strawberry banana whipped cream? Would that be good?”
“You know I’m not strawberry fan Ochako.”
The other girl laughed. “Sorry you’re right! But what do you think you’re going to get?”
“I don’t know if I’ll be well enough to go.” Tsuyu forced herself to cough. “I’m still kind of sick.”
“Do you need a cough drop?” She jumped off Tsuyu’s desk and walked over to her own, grabbing her bag and starting to rummage through it. “I think I still have one in my bag somewhere…”
Tsuyu tried not to groan in frustration. She was really hoping Ochako would get the hint that she didn’t want to talk soon and leave.
“Found it!” Ochako said, holding up the candy-like medicine victoriously. She handed it to Tsu, their fingers brushing. The ache in Tsuyu’s chest for worse.
“Thanks Ochako.”
“No problem.”
At least Tsuyu knew now that the taste of roses and mint-honey didn’t mix well together.
Would it be stupid if she interpreted that as a sign?
After a moment of silence as Tsuyu started to suck on the medicine, Ochako finally spoke up again. “Hey, I know you’re sick and maybe I’m misinterpreting this, but if you don’t want to go out, that’s fine y’know? You can just tell me.” Even though she tried to smile reassuringly, Tsuyu could see a flash of pain in her eyes.
Hurting Ochako was the absolute last thing she had wanted to do.
Tsuyu’s heart felt like it was going to burst.
“Of course I want to hang out with you Ochako. I just,” A trailed off, unable to find the right words to explain what was going on to Ochako without accidentally blurting out her feelings.
“Just what? Are you mad at me?”
“No, I’m sorry, I’ve just been feeling kind of off lately. Must be stress.”
Ochako didn’t look like she believed her. “I’m here if you ever need to talk.” She said quietly.
Tsuyu’s breath caught in her throat. “I know,” the rest of her words died on her tongue. “I know.”
Ochako looked at her intently, like she wanted to say something. She started to open her mouth, but shut it again. Tsuyu flinched. This felt so much worse than any words ever could.
Pain seared in her right lung. Tsuyu bit her cheek to stop herself from releasing a surprised cry from the pain. The ‘cramps’ of sorts from the flowers just kept getting worse each time they happened.
But they served as a painful reminder that even if she wanted to - and god did she - she couldn’t go on this “crepe date.”
She started to feel the familiar pressure building in her diaphragm and the itch starting to crawl its way back up her throat. Her breath hitched and she bit down a little too hard on the cough drop. The harsh taste of the medicine made her gag.
She let out a shaky cough, praying Occasional hako would move further away from her out of fear of getting sick. But the other girl was too busy putting her bag back at her desk to notice.
And then, the worst thing possible happened
As Tsuyu brought her hand away from her mouth, a petal flew out, landing on her desk. She reached down to quickly grab it and hide it but Ochako had already noticed it.
She reached over and picked it up from the desk. “A rose petal? What’s that doing here?” She glanced over at Tsuyu, “Do you have a bouquet in your bag?”
She abruptly sat up, covering her mouth. “I’m sorry Ochako, I don’t feel well again, and I don’t want to get you sick. I have to-“ Quickly, she covered her mouth with her elbow as a cough escaped her mouth. “I have to go.”
Instead of insisting that she come along with like the last two times she had ran away from her, Ochako nodded and let her go. “Of course. Feel better soon Tsu.”
The pain in the other girls eyes made Tsuyu’s diaphragm lurch again. The cough was stronger, much more of a dry heave this time. She tried to cough out her thanks but it sounded more like struggled breathing that intelligible words.
Even as she hurried out of the room, she still noticed the hurt in the other girls eyes as she watched her friend go.
It took all of her willpower not to turn back and collapse in Ochako’s arms, sobbing as she begged for her forgiveness for being such a bad friend .
But she knew she couldn’t.
In order to survive maybe just another day, she’d have to cut Ochako completely out of her life.