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Josefumi coughed again. It was probably only an illness he had caught without knowing, a flu that came when he didn't expect it and thus he paid it no mind. He went to his university anyway, he wasn't feeling so bad yet (but maybe it was a good idea to talk with Kira-san later — maybe he would know something that could help Josefumi feel better again). However he would go later, now he had a class he needed to focus on or he would have a problem when the test period started.
He coughed again, that time it drew attention from some of the other classmates and Josefumi tried to stop the cough as soon as it started. He couldn't and it only got worse.
"Secchan,'' Karera poked his back, worry in her voice when she spoke again. "Are you okay?"
"Yes… it's nothing." He answered her trying to sound as good as he could and also trying to suppress another cough. Damn it, what does he have to be like this? He wasn't the type to be unhealthy often...
The classes finally were finished. If it were another day, he would stay a little in the university, talk with others and see what they wrote down and things like that. Today, however, he decided to go to the TG Hospital. He was not well and as soon as he could discover what he had, soon he would be back to normal — or it was what he expected.
On his path, he coughed again . That time, he felt a strange feeling of pain in his lungs and when he looked at his palm to see if there was blood or something — which would make things worse and him more worried — there was nothing like it. Only a petal, bluer than the sky above him, was there.
"Is… is it a blue rose petal?" He looked at it carefully and it was indeed it. "But… How did it come here? I didn't touch any of them today."
Strange, really strange. Though they didn’t even exist in nature, Josefumi was cultivating some. It was for classes, of course. A project developed by his university where they tried to grow some of them, it was almost impossible years before, but now the advance of the technology made it a bit easier (but still there were few and they hoped they would survive out of the laboratory, or their work would be for naught).
He coughed one more time, the petal falling down from his hand when he used it to cover his mouth again. He sure needed to wash it as soon as he got to the Hospital…
"A… another?" he was shocked, where there was only one petal before, now there are five more. Five . He didn't expect it and was dumbstruck for a second, even the idea of going to see Kira-san and Holly-san now appeared to be… less effective.
He just coughed petals of flowers. It wasn't something normal to do and as far as he remembered there were no recordings of other people having a disease like that. Was him the first? What should he do now? Go to the Hospital and get help or… don't say anything about it?
He looked at the petals again as if they would tell him what to do or at least explain to him why they were there. But there were no answers and he stayed in his place, in the middle of the sidewalk, only to wake up in his state of thinking when someone hit him, making him almost fall.
So… hum… the Hospital is… is the best idea. I expect.
As always, the TG Hospital was busy, with a lot of people entering the building and going out. Apparently, a confrontation between the police and thieves happened that day and because of that many doctors were running from one place to another with their patients, trying desperately to save as many people as they could.
That made Josefumi hesitate. He didn't want to be a hindrance at a time like this but before he could go back to his home he had to stop to cough another bunch of petals and, as he was throwing them away, a person called him.
"Josefumi?" It was Kira Yoshikage's voice, he would never mistake it. "Are you ok, kid?"
Josefumi turned around way too fast and his heart skipped a beat. Stupid heart that never knew how to behave. He started blaming his mind also, going to his house in the first place would've been a better choice than coming here. He only hoped Kira-san hadn't seen the blue petals.
"Hum yep yes I'm absolutely fine. Wonderful, have never been better in my life. And you?"
Kira lifted an eyebrow, not convinced by this disastrous answer. However, he was not the type to make unnecessary or unwelcome questions — he did them only when he wanted to see the discomfort or to seek information in someone and it wasn't the case now.
"I'm ok." was his only answer.
No one talks anymore and it was like there was tension in the air. Why it was like this, Josefumi didn't know. He tried to think of something to say, maybe lie and tell he just passed by to say hello and was about to go back home, but something — and he couldn't explain what — didn't let him.
He wanted to stay there, looking as much as he could at Kira's face. Kira Yoshikage was a good looking guy, he was sure, an young face, a straight nose, eyes as blue as the sea (and the petals he kept coughing), black hair and the strange habit of using a orange gloss that in some ways made him more like him than if Kira wasn't using it.
"Josefumi?" Kira was now talking with him, Josefumi could see the movement of his lips but he wasn't registering the fact that what he was saying was his name, or the fact that he stopped talking and was looking at Yoshikage with a dumb look at his face. "Hey, what are you doing?"
"Er… I am… uh, nothing. I need to go." Josefumi said it all fast and before Kira would stop him (or even understand him), he ran away.
Coughing, Josefumi opened the door to the little apartment he was living in. Kira-san, when he knew he didn't have a fixed place to stay, offered his old room at Holly-san's house for him. Josefumi couldn't accept and he still lived there, a place where he almost had no space to move freely but the sum he paid for the room was little, so he just accepted it.
Cough after cough and petal after petal. His throat started burning and then, there it was… a blue rose. A normal blossom, like the one he gifted Kira when he was showing him his school work. Josefumi picked it up, looking bewildered.
It was weeks ago, Kira met with him to talk about something his sister asked him about the "art" of growing plants. Josefumi happily explained what Kira wanted to know and even offered to show him some of the flowers they were cultivating in the university.
Kira accepted with a bit of reluctance. As he said, there was work at the TG hospital, his mother waiting for him to come back. Something, however — and Josefumi probably would not know but it was the disappointment that clearly his face showed — made him agree and stay.
They looked at the blue roses, there were only three of them that could be seen from afar, the other ones stayed at the laboratory in constant analysis and observation. Kira appeared somehow fascinated by the flowers, they were rare after all and seeing one, even if you could not hold it in your hands, was a spectacular experience. Josefumi thought he would never forget the way Kira looked at the roses and how well they appeared being looked at by his eyes — almost bluer than their petals.
Now there, in his dark room all alone he still couldn’t stop thinking about blue… Blue petals, blue sky and blue eyes.. It appeared as if he was surrounded by blue, untouchable blue that he hardly could see or touch. Coughing one more rose and holding it between his fingers, Josefumi thought bitterly that at least his university research wasn’t a waste.
Wait… research?
He stood up and started running in his apartment, looking where he had left it — a book, a real old one, that had many things about breeding flowers in past times on it. When he found it, he passed the pages fast, stopping only when his eyes caught what he was looking for. Hanahaki, the flower disease. His fingers ran the page and so did his eyes and when he finished he almost pulled out the page.
He was suffering... suffering for unrequited love? Does love really have the power to kill someone? But he… he liked no one so how could this happen? It must be wrong, it was something from old times after all and such disease didn’t exist or he would know it already.
He convinced himself, but not for much time. He saw a photo, standing on his desk appearing to have been taken in another life than this one. He was happy there, but Kira’s eyes captured his own and immersed in them Josefumi realized. Everything now made sense and he knew even without a word that there was no escape.
Kira never would love him back. Why would he? Josefumi had nothing to offer more than more problems. Even if there was a chance, a remotely possible one, it would not stay long. He would never be enough and the flowers were already making him their home. It must have happened slowly, little by little, but then his end came faster than he expected and in his last breath his lungs and throat hurt, but his heart hurted more.
Love had indeed the power to kill those who were not wiser to see its silent and yet dangerous threat.