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Cough. Constant, irritating, worrying.
Countless red petals left his lung every day, he needed to sweep his dorm almost all the time to throw them away, everywhere there were flower petals, no matter how many cigarette packs he smoked, they didn't die.
He barely remembered when it had started but it must have been in childhood, he spent sleepless nights spitting and coughing dozens of reddish petals, he knew what it meant and it made him sad, even though he knew he had a reason not to be reciprocated.
He and Reiner hated each other, they didn't get along, they never got along and there was no real reason for that unnecessary hatred at first, the big problem was that Porco was always someone who refused to admit when he liked someone and got on his nerves. of the person until he can no longer.
Braun didn't understand and didn't even know it, he thought it was just Galliard's desire to pester him all the time, so he was always genuinely angry when he came to tease him - and honestly, he wasn't wrong - and made them fight for real, resulting in true hatred that made the redhead's situation worse.
It took years to finally get used to it, with the routine of always having to sweep the house and throw away bags and bags filled with hundreds of flowers. He could easily open a flower shop with the amount of flowers that came out of him every day, it was ridiculous to be in love with someone he said he hated and who hated him back.
After he had been gone for a few years, things had improved slightly for him, he coughed less often and fewer flowers came out of his chest, he was considerably better than before in fact.
Until Reiner comes back. He didn't even need someone to warn him of his arrival or for the boats to make noise in the harbor, his body did him the favor of alerting him.
He woke up running to the bathroom, throwing up an entire bouquet from what he could see, it was terrible, the fact that all the feelings he'd been holding back and thought were fading came back the same moment he stepped into the damn city.
It was four more years of pure torture for him, he was angry with Reiner for letting his brother die, for taking his place in the warriors in childhood, for occupying a giant space in his heart and for indirectly torturing him until his dying day without even realize this.
On the day he died, he took courage to-indirectly-confess, smiling sadly and relieved to finally get rid of that big weight in his chest, but he would never live long enough to know if one day he could be forgiven and maybe reciprocated. Through the hole in his head, everyone nearby could see the flowers sprouting from his wound, a perfect bouquet of Hibangana and red roses, Reiner's favorite, petals dripping with his blood.
Well, he knew that at some point, love would kill him, suffocating in his own feelings.