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Kuroo knew a lot of things.
Kuroo knew the Periodic Table by heart. Kuroo knew how to draw hexagons (thank you, organic chem.) Kuroo knew his blocking was above average.
Kuroo also knew he was in love the moment he heard Tsukishima's voice echo with pride, that one block meaning everything.
Kuroo woke on a Friday with a scratching in his throat and he knew another thing. He knew he was in love, and that Tsukishima Kei wasn't.
Tears pricked at Kuroo’s eyes and he hacked up the first of many petals to come. The glaring sunset of the petal stood out, beautiful, stark and angry on the plain covers of his bed.
He didn’t move from his spot, hunched over himself and trying to deny the delicate flower petal any power (but it had it anyway.)
Kuroo didn’t go to school that day. Instead, he coughed as he quietly asked his mother, Megumi, if they could go to the flower shop, and he gently placed the golden petal on the table. She glanced away from her busy hands and paused. She smiled at him sadly and agreed. The doctor would come later, there was only so much they could do for unrequited love.
Slowly and silently they walked in the shade.
They looked nothing alike, Megumi short and squishy and stern with her neat dark hair and fierce grey eyes to his tall, lean and messy. He got it from his mum, Kotone (and his father, he supposes, though he's never met the man). The only feature they had in common right then was their downtrodden expressions.
With solemn determination they entered the store. They were greeted with a muffled call of welcome from an employee and the previously faint smell of flowers. The smell enveloped the two, drowning them and threatening to force a sob from Kuroo.
“Sorry to keep you waiting,” said the woman behind the counter with wisps of grey in her hair. “What can I do for you today?” She looked to Kuroo expectantly, but his throat was tight and he couldn't look at anything but his hands.
“We’d like to identify a flower,” Megumi answered for her strangled son.
“Of course,” said the woman. “Let’s have a look at the petal, then.”
Kuroo threw two petals onto the counter.
“And-” Kuroo cleared his throat. “And it’s meaning, please.”
“Alright, then. Let me have a look, I’ll be done in a few minutes,” she smiled.
“Thank you,” Megumi bowed.
Just as the lady said, a few minutes later and Kuroo knew his doom.
Alstroemeria. Glowing, red alstroemeria and it’s devotion and friendship. Odd, probably more fitting if this had been a childhood-friends trope, but it made Kuroo’s heart thump regardless.
“Thank you,” Kuroo said.
He and Megumi make their way home and, somehow, he sleeps the rest of the day away with dreams of a blond boy and his soft smile and his pride.
Kuroo convinces Megumi and his mum that he’s not missing his last training camp, despite the fact that thinking about and being around Tsukishima is going to make the flowers grow faster and strangle him more. But it’s volleyball and Kenma and Bokuto and Daichi and Akaashi and Tsukki, and if he’s going to die he's going to enjoy it while he can still breathe through the roots and petals replacing his lungs and veins.
Kuroo grinned as he greeted a frowning Kenma on the Monday and hoped his shaking hands wouldn't give him away.
“Where were you on Friday, Kuroo?” Kenma asked, not looking up from his Switch as they walked together.
“Had a cough.”
Kenma hummed at him to keep going.
“It's not gone but that's fine,” he shrugged. “On another note, I learned a thing!”
“Did you?”
“Yup. Alstroemerias, which are South American lilies, symbolise devotion and friendship.”
“And why do you know that?” Kenma asked tightly. He wasn't sure he wanted to know the-
“Hanahaki.”
Kenma failed the level. He tried not to choke on his breath.
“I have Hanahaki, Kenma, and it's not going away.”
“Who?” Kenma demanded.
“You can't do anything, ok?” Kuroo hesitated.
“Who is it, Tetsurou?”
A beat of silence thrummed through them as trees rustled restlessly, waiting for Kuroo’s confession.
“Tsukishima Kei.”
“Doesn’t being with him make it worse?”
“I’ll be fine,” Kuroo said.
The second Kuroo saw the blond mop of hair hovering above his teammates, Kuroo regretted that statement and muffled a cough in his shoulder.
Kuroo’s chest tightened and tightened and it was a wonder he could even breathe when Bokuto bounded over to him after their rounds of practice to drag him off to extra practice with Akaashi.
And Tsukishima.
Kuroo manages not to immediately cough bloodied petals onto the court, but the roots were sucking the air from his lungs and he couldn’t make his legs move to jump the block. He was struggling to breathe, with a rapidly surging need to cough and splutter and choke on the flowers entangling themselves around his lungs and
crawling
up
his
throat.
He was struggling to breathe and Tsukishima was right there .
Tsukishima was right there, frozen, because Kuroo was on the ground coughing up petals and Akaashi was trying to help him breathe and Bokuto was running off to get help and Tsukishima was frozen.
Tsukishima knew a lot of things. He knew this was Hanahaki, he knew about the flowers that tangled the lungs of victims of unrequited love until they choked to death. Theoretically, he also knew they hurt.
But he had never seen it.
There was so much blood. So much blood and it was Kuroo’s, and Tsukishima wanted to punch whoever didn’t love Kuroo the way Kuroo loved them.
Akaashi was trying to get Kuroo to sit so he could try and drink some water so he could stop coughing but the wet, aching shudders of breath were echoing in the gym.
Unfrozen, Tsukishima knelt, hand shaking as he cupped Kuroo’s face and told him to hold because they were getting someone to help. For a moment it seemed like the coughing had stopped and Kuroo was going to say something but he vomited another lot of petals and oh god there were more. Kuroo wasn’t coughing up petals anymore, he was coughing up blood-soaked, furious flowers.
Tsukishima heard Akaashi swear and the door slam open (Bokuto was back, thank fuck, Kuroo’s coughing up flowers , thank fuck Bokuto was back.)
Ukai, as it turned out, was the first adult Bokuto had found. Ukai pulled Tsukishima away from Kuroo, and it was a wonder Tsukishima didn’t fall with the way his whole body was shivering.
Was Kuroo dying? It looked like someone had murdered him, with all that blood.
After another eternity of shuddering coughs scraping his ears, Tsukishima guessed that Ukai had called an ambulance because the next thing he knows he’s being asked something by a paramedic and Tsukishima almost vomits on the guy.
Almost, but doesn’t, because the coughing has stopped and they’ve given Kuroo something to knock him out and he’s being placed on a stretcher and a mask is helping him breathe and they’re taking him.
“Hey, kid? Can you hear me?”
“Kuroo?” Tsukishima’s voice scratches out and hopes the question is understood.
“He appeared to have late-stage Hanahaki Disease, but we’re taking him to the hospital to check him over more thoroughly,” the paramedic explained. “I have to talk to Ukai now, so why don’t you go sit with the other boys over there?” He pointed to where Bokuto was huddled against Akaashi.
Kei nodded numbly. There was nothing else to do. How long had Kuroo had Hanahaki? Surely a while, since it was late-stage? Did late-stage mean he would die? Wasn’t there a surgery? Would that save Kuroo?
There were so many things Tsukishima didn’t know and there were flaming orange flowers swimming in blood taunting him.
While Tsukishima was scared, Kuroo was glaring at the doctor. The only thing stopping him from throttling the woman was the sedative keeping him sluggish. There was a surgery and this doctor was telling him he had to have it.
Or he could die, but his mothers didn’t seem very thrilled at that prospect.
“Thank you, Doctor Yamawaki,” Kuroo Kotone nodded at the doctor. “We’ll let you know what we decide.”
Yamawaki nodded and left the three alone in the stark room.
“Tetsurou, we understand that you don’t want to have the-”
“I don’t want to forget him.”
“You won’t-”
“She just said I could! That taking the flowers would get rid of anything I feel for him, ever, and it might make me forget him! I can’t do that, I can’t,” Kuroo’s voice was choked, but not from flowers.
Megumi sighed and sat on the bed next to her son. “He doesn’t love you back, Tetsurou. I know it hurts. Really, I do. But getting rid of the flowers means that it won’t hurt, and you’ll be alive.”
“I would prefer it hurt than to feel nothing . ”
Kotone shuffled onto the other side of his bed, her short and tangled hair sticking to the pillow. “Yamawaki said you had, at most, a month, unless you have the surgery." Or he loves you back.
“I know.”
“So. You can go to the last day of this camp, but until then, you have to stay here and proceed with plans for surgery.”
“But-”
“No buts! You can go explain to him on Friday that you’re getting the surgery because you don’t want to die. ”
Kuroo frowned but nodded. “It hurts.”
Kotone kissed his head. “We know baby, we know.”
His mothers go home for the night, Megumi promising to be there tomorrow and Kotone saying she’d be in after work. The week crawled and all Kuroo could think about was Tsukishima and his hand on his face and how soft it was and that if felt right and that it was perfect and that Kuroo would never feel like that again.
Kuroo didn’t know why Tsukishima did that. But it wasn’t love, or he wouldn’t have Hanahaki.
Honestly, Kuroo didn’t even get what constituted ‘unrequited’ but he wondered (hoped) that ignorance to one’s own feelings counted because people don’t just caress the face of someone they don’t love.
(do they?)
Friday afternoon he’s discharged to tell Tsukishima he’s removing any capability of having emotions for him, about him.
Kuroo plans to avoid Tsukishima, actually, but the universe is cruel and of course Tsukishima is the first person who comes to talk to him, all glowing and golden in the setting sun.
“Hey,” Tsukishima mumbled and fiddled with his fingers (like when he came to ask about why volleyball is important and Kuroo almost can’t breathe again because he’s about to never feel this clench again and he doesn’t want that , it’s not fair. )
“Hey,” he said instead, and grinned lopsidedly though it didn’t reach his eyes.
“Are you, um, are you getting the flowers removed?”
“I might. I don’t want to but, my mums don’t want me to die, which is fair.”
“When did they start? The flowers?”
“Wow, who knew you cared so much Tsukki,” Kuroo laughed.
Tsukishima didn’t.
“Friday. They started last Friday.”
“You’ve only had... it for a week? It’s already at a late stage?”
Kuroo just shrugged. “I love him a lot.”
Tsukishima’s face burned and he looked away from Kuroo, suddenly much more fidgety than earlier. “Maybe you shouldn’t, if he can’t see how amazing you are.”
Kuroo hoped he was not about to fuck up.
He put a hand on Tsukishima’s shoulder and kissed his cheek. “I think he just doesn’t know he loves me yet.”
“I hope he figures it out soon.” Tsukishima’s face was redder than the sunset silhouetting him.
(Kuroo thinks he messed up oh god he messed up maybe he was wrong
Wrong
wrong)
But the panic didn’t show on his face as he grinned again and agreed.
“Oh! Kenma!” He shouted as he ran off to the rest of the teams.
Tsukishima had no idea what happened.
Kuroo kissed him? But on the cheek so was it as friends? Did friends do that? He hadn’t ever received or given a kiss to Yamaguchi but they never really had the same kind of friendship as everyone else seemed to. So maybe friends did that? Tsukishima had no idea.
For whatever reason though, he couldn’t get Kuroo out of his head. Kuroo and his smile and laugh and his stupid dumb jokes that are really actually smart and Tsukishima always has to physically make himself not laugh.
Kuroo. (and his smile)
Kuroo. (and his jokes)
Kuroo. (and how amazing he is)
Kur-
Oh.
Tsukishima bolted upright in his chair on the back of the bus.
Oh.
Tsukishima decided he’s an idiot as he dumped his shit onto Yamaguchi, who flailed in confusion as Tsukishima almost fell down the stairs.
“Kuroo-san, wait I, uh.” Tsukishima stuttered and attached his hand onto Kuroo’s arm.
“‘Sup Tsukki? Miss me already?” Kuroo taunted, though it sounded kinda half-hearted.
“I, um. I didn’t think this through at all. I just. I think I love you?”
Kuroo stared blankly.
“I mean. Um.” Tsukishima frowned and seemed to be cursing himself for not knowing how to emotion. “I love you.”
“I love you too, idiot.” Kuroo laughed and his voice
Didn’t
Scratch.
The flowers don’t go away straight away. Unlike stories and movies where the flowers go away the moment the protagonists say the words ‘I love you,’ it takes time.
Kuroo’s surgery did get cancelled, though, and he might have kissed Tsukishima (properly, on the lips, and he couldn’t breathe but it was fine because he could kiss Tsukishima) at nationals, under the stairs, after the battle of the garbage dump.
Tsukishima leant back in his seat as he lazily watched MSBY huddle for the time out. He felt a soft tap on his shoulder and looked up to see Kuroo grinning sheepishly.
“Sorry love, I lost track of time at the lab.” Kei rolled his eyes fondly.
“Uh huh.”
“I did!” Kuroo whined.
“You’re lucky I’m forgiving.”
“Yeah, I’m really lucky I have the best fiance in the world.” Tetsurou grinned and kissed Kei’s forehead.
Kuroo knew a lot of things.
As he sat down, he knew he was in love and that Tsukishima Kei loved him too.