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Introduction to HanaHaki Syndrome: From the first case being reported in the late 1800’s, Japanese doctors have detected a rare disease which comprises uncontrolled proliferation of flowering, plant-like growth in the human digestive tract. The victim's lungs were said to be filled with cherry blossom petals which eventually multiplied large enough to render breathing impossible. It was described as a painful, slow disease which developed over months. It began with the victim suffering from tingly, flutter-like sensations in the pit of the stomach; then the growth of flowers which lead to coughing up the petals, and eventually suffocation in the oesophagus.
Until recently, this rare disease community had suffered from the absence of reliable epidemiological data and lacked adequate information on its etiology and pathophysiology. Multiple investigations and experimental surgeries disclosed the disorder’s physiological process which can now be divided into three stages: (1) the birth of butterflies in the stomach caused due to the impression of a beginning of romance or falling in love, (2) growth of cherry blossoms in the stomach for the butterflies to feed on, and (3) regurgitation of petals which result in death.
Known as HanaHaki (花吐き病 - Japanese) where “hana” means “flower” and “hakimasu” means “to throw up”, this partly psychosomatic syndrome is caused by unrequited love. The diseased gut shall develop tangible butterflies, and if not tamed, will lead to the germination of flowers. The victim will cough up flower petals that spread in the respiratory system until they die. This syndrome normally affects only scorned lovers, or soulmates that suffer from either one-sided or incomplete soul bonds. As such, there is no medical cure. It is ruled to be fatal if not resolved in time. The only possible treatment is for the victim to unite with their lover, or restore the damaged soul bond.
Other symptoms of the HanaHaki Disease include weakness, uncontrollable shaking, loss of appetite, low body temperature, and hallucinations.
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Irving will always remember the first time he heard about the Hanahaki Syndrome.
He was barely nine, dressed in a black suit and starched within an inch of his life. He was sad, uncomfortable and staring at the pale body of his aunt.
She was dressed in her favourite delicate blue dress, her cheeks a soft artificial pink, lashes long and dark as they rested against her pale cheeks.
But, it was all wrong.
Her face was slack. There was no smile, no laughter, no glint of mischief in her eyes as she winked at Irving while stealing cookies from his mother’s cabinet. The life that was usually so incredibly present in her entire being was all gone.
She had looked like a porcelain doll.
Irving remembers the crying. That was what stood out most in his memories from that dark, rainy day. That, and the lack of flowers.
The church was just one big empty room. He felt like he was being buried along with his aunt, slowly getting eaten by the darkness of the large room. It scared him.
He had seen flowers at funerals on the television and remembered how it seemed to disrupt the grieving black with its colourfulness and its life. But the only colour he saw on the day of his aunt’s funeral was black; even when he looked at the casket, there wasn’t a single flower in sight.
Irving loved flowers. He used to make flower crowns out of wildflowers and put them on top of his aunt’s head. He used to give her bundles of roadside flowers, and she used to put them in her most expensive vase, displaying them as if he had given her the most lavish bouquet in the whole world.
To him, his aunt was like a bright sunflower, lighting up even the rainiest of summer days, so, therefore, he could not understand why everything was so very dark.
When he had asked his mother why there had been no flowers, she had burst into tears. His father had looked sad and taken him away while his mother had cried into her brother’s shoulder.
It was like that, on a wet, dreary Saturday outside a huge church in the pouring rain that Irving Bailiff learned that not all soulmates had a happy ending.