Chapter Text
To die in the arms of the one you love must be the most romantic thing that can happen between two lovers. Saying that they'll meet each other in the next life or still choosing them when they got the chance as both of them breathe their last. From the unpopular romance books to the best selling ones, you'll find a title with that particular scene present.
Yet in reality, there's nothing interesting or fascinating about it.
A purple colored petal swam in the pool of red fluid; the scent of flowers masked its coppery smell. Through his senses gradually shutting off, Amemura Ramuda could barely make out the image of another head of lilac and ash lying down with his. The red reached those silken strands, petals sticking on it as some of it dries off.
"I love Jakurai," Ramuda whispered, coughing badly as more purple petals and crimson fluid got expelled from his throat with every word he say. Just as how exhausting it is for Ramuda to speak, hearing them also drains a great amount of energy from its recipient. "Until now, I badly wish the one Jakurai loves is still me."
Jinguji Jakurai covered his mouth with his hands at an attempt to tame the pain from materializing. It failed though as red seeped through the gaps between his fingers. He gagged; yellow petals from his lips joined the purple ones. The more Ramuda expresses his feelings; the volume of flowers Jakurai coughs increases too.
Jakurai said something. It should be of consolation or pity, Ramuda knew for sure. Since those are not what he needs to hear to be saved from these flowers and his dying body, the fashion Designer didn't bother tune his ears to listen to them. Whatever he said was nothing but noise to him until all of it vanished.
The other finally turned silent.
Eyes closed, Jakurai must've given up to the pain. Maybe Ramuda should, too. Dragging his body closer to the taller man, the fashion Designer allowed the silence lull him into sleep.
Through his slipping consciousness, he realized, this isn't how one should die in the arms of the one they love.
"This is bad." Amemura Ramuda's grip on the sink tightens, begging for his thin arms to support his body in case his wobbly legs gave out. Emptying the contents of his stomach and lungs really drains whatever energy left inside his crumbling body. After having most of it out, he taps the faucet open, letting the water flow until it washes the blood off the things on the sink - flowers with small purple petals, clumped on a long stalk. His face turns grim at its meaning more familiar for the fashion Designer than he wishes it would be and to whom it is directed to.
If this can be considered bad then Ramuda has something worse than having flowers growing inside him while he's slowly withering away — it's when his friends choose to knock on his bathroom door right in the middle of the hideous fit.
"Ramuda..." Gentaro calls his name from the other side, his melodic voice distressed. Ramuda assumes the Novelist and the Gambler heard him. "Please open the door." It would be better if they leave him be for a while to at least fix his face but knowing them, Gentaro will definitely ask Dice to break the door and Ramuda doesn't want to go through the trouble of hiring someone to fix it.
With shaky steps, he approaches it. He slowly turns the knob before poking his head out of the small opening he made. "I'll... I'll be fine soon," he says with his hoarse voice, clearly contradicting his statement.
"We all know that there is not even an ounce of truth in your words." Gentaro, even with his weakest pull, easily yanks Ramuda out. He has some tissues and starts wiping Ramuda's cheeks with it. "At least let us help you clean up." Normally, he would protest yet he has no energy and let Gentaro's professional hands clean him.
Unbeknownst to Ramuda, Dice enters his bathroom while Gentaro is busy with him. He's used to seeing its blue tiles turned reddish purple and cleaning it however, there's something inside the gruesome mess that catches his attention. "Oi. There are tons of flowers here!" He yells, seemingly more concerned about the appearance of those things than how bad their leader's condition is as he lifts the ones on the sink.
Gentaro's hands stop all of a sudden. Ramuda can feel his emerald orbs focus on him, dwarfing the fashion Designer even more than he actually is. As a Novelist, for sure he came across this legendary illness as an inspiration for one of his books.
He squishes Ramuda's cheeks between his index and thumb on one hand to force him to meet his eyes while the other is on the Petite's shoulders. "You..." Gentaro is angry — very, very angry. He's 10 times scarier than Ichijiku when he's angry; even more that he's raging. "Do you really want to depart from this world so much that you contacted Hanahaki this time?"
"Hanahaki? The sickness that makes one to vomit flowers?" Dice asks as he continues to rinse the flowers then dumps them on a clean container. As to why he does that, it might be because he's thinking of selling them. Ew.
"Yes, Dice. This is an uncommon and almost fictional illness; I'm quite surprised you know it." The Gambler just hums over the sound of flowing water, too busy to pick up Gentaro's teasing tone. As if irritated with the lack of attention he receives while Ramuda still refuses to meet his anger, Gentaro looks over his leader's shoulders to yell at Dice. "Hey, don't think of selling those!"
"I'm not!" Dice definitely will, nothing can convince them otherwise. "We can get more lollipops from those pink gremlins after you, but there are just two ways to cure that plant inside you — Confess or remove it by surgery!" Wow, he even knows how to treat it. They may be clueless on how that info coexisted with all of the gambling knowledge inside Dice's brain, but it saves them the time for explaining the whole situation to the Gambler.
"It's the Doctor, isn't it?" Ramuda laughs airily albeit weak at the Novelist's inquiry, confirming Gentaro's suspicions. "Since when did it progress to this deadly stage?"
He cannot even remember when it started. He just noticed it during one of his attacks. At first he couldn't believe it. Like, how is it even possible in the first place? But when he saw them coming out of him, he will be extremely dumb if he still denies its existence.
"I... I don't know." Gentaro squeezes harder, enough for Ramuda to wince. He's not having any of the fashion Designer's aversion bullshits this time. "I'm serious! It just started like this!"
But even unaware of the time when the flowers started showing up, definitely, there is something aside from their appearance that changed inside Ramuda.
Scratch that.
Ramuda has found and picked up some old shards of himself that he kept inside him despite knowing it'll cut and make him bleed. And now he does, quite literally with some stupid flowers too.
"If there's any chance keep our leader with us longer, no matter how small it is, we will grab it for you." The Novelist voice ringing with concern tugs the Fashion designer's heartstrings; his nails digging on the smaller man's clothed shoulders loosen. "Please let's go with the easier way: confess."
"Gentaro, even if I tell him, nothing will improve. It's not like I want this in the first place. It's either I ran out of lollipops or these flowers completely fill my lungs up, I am still about to die." It's funny how Ramuda knows the cure yet refuses to take it unlike his deteriorating constitution. He doesn't want to give up but he's also painfully aware of the future set for his pitiful existence. "Confessing will just slow down or speed it up. An enemy like me will be rejected anyways, so why go through all this trouble—"
"Ramuda, can you stop yapping and man up?" Now, even Dice is also joining Gentaro in convincing him. He's been running around his whole room, grabbing some scrap fabric and papers lying around before coming back to them with a beautiful bouquet from a few undamaged flowers. The Gambler places them in his arms. "You like him so much that you're not even considering the surgery, right? I think it's worthy to give it a shot. Man, don't withdraw from a game when you can still bet on it and win."
"If he rejects you, we'll be there and force him to fix the flowers and your body too." Gentaro further reassures. Ramuda, a bit conflicted, hovers his gaze over to him then to Dice and back to Gentaro — both silently pleading to Ramuda. With them being like this, Ramuda couldn't help but think that they grew to be more dependable than the first time the three of them met.
Exclusively weak for these two, Ramuda nods then buries his face on the bouquet. He can't express yet with words how he is thankful for having the two, for accepting him, treating him as their friend and his emotions as valid.
"Dice, you're practicing on this one to sell the rest of the flowers, right?" Ramuda teases as he finally lifts his face the moment the thought his eyes wiped enough tears on the flowers to dry them. The two don't mind his cheeks tainted with tears or the horrifying scene in the bathroom that Dice hasn't finished cleaning yet, instead they give understanding stares that lift most of the pressure inside the pink-haired man's chest.
"He definitely is." Gentaro hides his grin behind his sleeve, ignoring Dice's screams of denial. The three then shares a hearty laugh — one of those genuine ones that only appears whenever they're together.
He wants to share more of himself to these two. If possible, stay with them longer and make more memories with them; there's no way Ramuda could just leave them and succumb to these flowers.
"I assume you're ready." The Novelist tugs on Ramuda's dirtied sleeve. Both Gentaro and Dice gives Ramuda an encouraging smile. "Get dressed. We're heading to Shinjuku."