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It started how it ended, with a flower in Kei’s hand.
Kei never knew a single flower could look this gross. The ivory petals were covered in a film of clear mucus. The white edges wrinkled, wilting brown. His nose creased in disgust. “Orange blossom…”
“No, it’s not!” The other boy argued.
“Yes. It is.”
“But that’s not orange! It’s white!”
“Which is the color of an orange blossom. You work here, and you don’t know that?” Kei put the flower down, and let his stare fall with it.
The orange haired boy practically hopped in his huff. “I just got here—!” He shouted. At least, he tried to. His voice broke into a cough. The rasp grew into a bark a chihuahua could be proud of.
Kei fought off a sigh. “I can tell.”
The boy grabbed the counter of the greenhouse workstation, bracing himself to yell. Where he meant to form a word, instead, he coughed again. He ducked his head into his chest, and coughed up a mix of petals and spit. It would’ve been an alarming sight, if it wasn’t one Kei was used to. The guy doing it was new. The symptoms weren’t. Anyone who’d seen late stage Hanahaki was familiar with this.
From the way the other boy paled, he wasn’t that familiar himself. He pressed his hands over his mouth.
Kei walked around the counter. He grabbed a bucket and rags, and dropped them both on the counter. “When you’re done, clean up.”
Between his fingers, the guy barely managed a sound. “Wha—“
“You here to freeload, or to work? You can’t make stock. You’d have to puke better flowers.”
“I’m not puking!” The boy started to argue. His cough fought back. It won. He grabbed the bucket to heave into.
It was easier to think of this guy as a patient than a person, Kei told himself. After all, the second someone came to his brother’s shop, they’d already decided to die.
A flower shop could get a government stipend for taking in terminal Hanahaki patients. It was said to be a way to let them die with dignity and legacy. Florists had the equipment to make the most out of the composting material. Sometimes, patients even left full plants that could be cultivated, or grafted into similar flowers and left to grow.
Kei didn’t run this shop. He only helped his brother while Kei was on breaks from school. Over the years, Kei had seen dozens of patients pass through. He tried to remember them by their flowers instead of names. The flowers were faster to learn. It also let most cases blend together, since so many were the same. Camellia. Primrose. Daffodils. Morning glories. Flowers that looked beautiful, with meanings that tied to bittersweet regrets, were common.
The boy in their shop wasn’t common. For one, he still looked like a boy. He also coughed up orange blossoms. Traditionally, orange blossoms stood for innocence and faithfulness. They were a marriage flower–not typically one people saw from a hanahaki infection. The only way Kei could see the reason in it was the tie between innocence and stupidity.
If nothing else, this boy was definitely dumb.
When the patients who came here were older, Kei could understand why they were terminal. Widows and long-time lovers who lost reciprocation over time could be too physically weak to withstand the surgery. For those people, to wither away into the flowers in their lungs was dying from time just as much as the disease. The orange blossom wasn’t like that.
Unfortunately, Kei had never met another orange blossom. Even if he had, he’d doubt they would have had the hair to match. The orange blossom was as memorable as it was incomprehensible.
Orange blossom grinned like he could hear that.
Akiteru opened the greenhouse door.
The temperature seal broke. New sound crept in. Between the churn of a fan and the distant shuffle of others walking, Kei heard his brother call. “Kei! We have customers!”
“Good. You’ll stay in business."
However clever Kei thought he was, Akiteru didn’t notice.
“Can you go man the counter? I’ll help Hinata,” Akiteru asked, as if Kei had the option to say no.
Theoretically, no was an option. That didn’t mean it was a good one. Either Kei stayed where he was, and he was left to clean up the mess of a living flower fountain that was their resident charity case, or he dealt with the customers.
Kei picked the customers. He walked off in silence. The silence didn’t stay.
One man was waiting at the counter, a pre-wrapped bouquet in his arms. A simple dozen daisies rest against him. Kei wrung the roses up, and sent the man on his way.
Through the greenhouse doors, Kei heard his brother speaking, tending to his newest hopeless case. He had just started to eavesdrop when another customer strolled in. Kei settled at the counter. “How can I help you?”
“Uh…” The man stared over Kei’s shoulder, openly gaping through the glass greenhouse doors. They pointed through. “Is he okay?”
“No.”
Kei didn’t give the person time to think more than that. He looked them over quickly, to check the state they were in, and more importantly, to spot why they’d come.
A customer didn’t wander into a florist without something specific in mind. The ways they were dressed and held themselves made it easy enough to guess why. This man was in his 30s, and dressed fairly well. He smelled like cologne, and he wasn’t in mourning colors or upset.
“Our roses are on sale today,” Kei offered. “They’re a good choice for dates.”
It was a guess.
It was a good one.
“How’d you know?”
Because this man just told him.
Kei didn’t explain. It was easier not to. More importantly, if he didn’t, the man stayed distracted. He wouldn’t think to ask about the boy in the back.
“Whatever someone’s situation, roses work well. They’re pet safe and don’t trigger most allergies.”
“Huh…”
The man’s brow creased, thinking it through. “Roses are expensive, though, aren’t they?”
“They’re on sale,” Kei repeated with exactly the same tone.
The man clearly considered it. He shook his head, knocking his own thought away. “I don’t know. If it was you, what would you like?”
Kei struggled not to twitch. He stared straight ahead, his patience lapsing. “If it was me, I wouldn’t date you. You’re too old for me.”
The customer tensed.
“I didn’t mean, like—“
“Kei!” Akiteru’s voice broke through. “Why don’t you help in back?!”
“Because you told me to be here.”
The window between the greenhouse and the storefront was foggy. Kei looked through that fog.
Orange blossom crouched over himself, huddled on a chair and shaking. Kei’s brother watched with urgency. Whatever he was thinking, he was thinking it a lot. The customer squirmed, clearly unsettled.
Whether Kei was just that bad with customers that Akiteru had to step in, or there was some reason Akiteru wanted Kei back with orange blossom, the end result was the same.
“Fine.”
Kei left the register. He grabbed some gardening gloves on the way. If Kei was going to spend more time with barf boy, he’d be dressed for it.
Akiteru looked at the customer first. “Be right with you!” He called over. He waited until he got a nod before brushing Kei’s shoulder. “Be gentle, okay? He’s not just a coworker. Treat him like they’re me.”
The way Akiteru spoke, he meant the words to sound thoughtful. Kei’s expression only dropped.
“They’re not. When you were sick, you were responsible.”
Akiteru didn’t argue. He just gave Kei a look. Whatever it was supposed to mean, the stare was lost in translation. The mix of concerns and sympathies turned unclear. Akiteru spotted that, too.
“Kei—“ his brother started. Kei didn’t wait. He pulled on the gardening gloves and opened the door.
The orange blossom had hidden pretty well. Kei didn’t spot him right away. He did, however, see the rows of lilies were shaking. They wouldn’t do that on their own. Orange blossom must have been hiding back there.
Akiteru’s charity cases didn’t last long. They weren’t supposed to. For someone with Hanahaki to be entered into the floral retirement program, they had to be terminal. No matter how old or young they looked, the timelines never changed.
Ar first, most were helpful. By the time someone got here, they’d been in hospitals for weeks, if not more. There was a simple relief in being somewhere that wasn’t filled with beeps and wires. They were eager to move. To clean. To talk to people. If it wasn’t for the coughing fits a few times a day, they wouldn’t look sick at all. Then, they'd end up like this.
The orange blossom planted on his knees, hunched over the floor, unable to do anything but cough future compost.
Kei opened the door. Against his better instincts, he saw the name tag on the other boy’s ruined smock. Somehow, the name tag was still legible. Hinata.
Kei hadn’t meant to learn his name.
Hinata picked himself off the floor. In one arm, he held a plastic bucket. In the other, he had a shovel. He scooped the roughage he’d just made into the composter, humming away.
“You gotta eat to grow, so, go, grow, go—!”
There was a rasp in Hinata’s voice, the threat of a cough. The threat didn’t stop him. He swallowed, and kept going.
“Gotta go to grow, gotta grow to go. Plant power. Plant power.”
What the chant was for, Kei couldn’t guess. If it weren’t for Hinata’s smile, the song would’ve sounded like the ramblings of a madman. With that smile, Kei was sure they were.
Kei pulled his headphones down.
“Why are you here?” Kei asked the question with just enough disdain, any reasonable person would have heard it. Naturally, with the state he was in, Hinata was unreasonable.
Hinata’s hands balled into fists. “The boss said to lie down!”
“Then, why aren’t you?”
“Er–” Hinata stopped before he could speak. He lurched. His hand pressed over his mouth.
Whatever Hinata considered saying, Kei couldn’t tell. All Kei could see now were the veins in Hinata’s neck. Under his skin, where there should’ve been no bulges or colors, Kei saw roots. The brown-tan tint of a web with no blood to flow through it wove through Hinata’s skin. It was a kind of damage Kei had never seen before. He hadn't known that it was possible. It still didn’t feel possible.
“You’re young,” Kei said, trying to understand.
“No, I’m not!” Hinata argued back. “I went to high school!”
It wasn’t what Kei said. He didn’t argue. Whatever he’d been wondering, he wasn’t paid to care. Then again, Kei wasn’t paid at all.
“You’re loading it wrong,” Kei said.
Hinata stopped. “What? How?”
Hinata hadn’t finished the question when Kei opened the top. The composter’s lid popped open. Kei pointed in.
“New roughage goes in here. Then, you crank it.”
Kei turned the lever to demonstrate. From the way Hinata looked at him, Kei expected he’d crack a joke. At the end of his befuddlement, he scratched his head, instead. “What was I doing…?”
“Wrong,” Kei said, far more clearly than he should have. “You did wrong.”
“Why didn’t you stop me?”
“This is stopping you.”
Kei grabbed a napkin from his pocket. He tore it in two, then again.
“Anything big, rip it up. Then, drop it.”
Kei put the scraps into the bin. Hinata nodded. “Oh! That makes sense!”
If it made that much sense, Kei wondered why Hinata didn’t do that to begin with.
Hinata reached for the bucket. His fingers tensed on the handle, his grip too weak and shaken to hold steady. The way Hinata strained over something so light made discomfort pull at Kei’s neck. It was such an open struggle, even Kei couldn’t help but reach forward.
“Should I—-?”
Hinata shook his head to match his hands. He planted his foot down.
“I’ve got it! I’ve—“
Hinata coughed harder. The bucket fell from his grip. He all but collapsed into the composter, folded at a ninety degree angle that a right triangle would be proud of. Whatever he spit up, it dropped with an audible plop.
The coughing stopped. Hinata started to stand upright. His hands shook around either side of the compost bin. “I—“
Hinata didn’t finish. He ducked right back down. A cough twice as loud shook his whole body, and the bin along with him.
When Hinata finally resurfaced, pollen dust stuck to his mouth. If it weren’t for the roots between his teeth, it would’ve looked like he’d eaten too many Cheetos.
Kei fixed his gloves in place. He grabbed Hinata by the shoulders, forcing him to stay upright. Even Kei’s loose grip made Hinata wobble.
“Did I do it right…?” Hinata asked.
Against his better judgment, Kei looked down. “No. You didn’t.”
But, Hinata did aim.
The mess hadn’t entirely landed where it should have. There was no way to filter the plant matter out from the bile. Hinata hadn’t just coughed, he’d coughed so hard he must have puked. It was a biohazard, now.
Kei closed the lid.
“My brother told you to lie down.”
Hinata nodded. “Yep.”
“So, lie down.”
“Where would I—?” Hinata started to ask. Before he finished the question, Kei pulled up a chair. Hinata tilted his head. “I can’t lay on that. That’s a chair. Chairs’ for sitting.”
“Quiet.”
Kei looked at Hinata, his own silence a challenge, daring Hinata not to speak. Hinata squirmed. His mouth stayed shut. At the end of the silence, Kei relented.
“…I’ll get a bucket.”
“Oh!” Hinata’s silence snapped. He raised his hands. “I’ve got one!”
The pail Hinata had been carrying threatened to slosh. Kei held back his own disgust.
“Different bucket. That one’s full.”
Kei took the dirty bucket. He emptied it into the trash, rinsed it out, and came back like it was a new one. He also brought a rag and water to clean up.
Hinata started to look up. Kei stopped it. He pressed the rag against Hinata’s forehead. There wasn’t pressure in the gesture. Hinata winced anyway. “Ow—“
“That didn’t hurt.”
“It did!”
“No. It didn’t. You’re not hurt. You’re surprised.”
Hinata opened his eyes slightly. His mouth opened far more. “What makes you know that?”
The way Hinata asked, he clearly didn’t expect a good answer, if an answer at all. Kei didn’t leave room for an answer. He pushed the rag harder.
“Ow—!” Hinata’s eyes snapped shut. His hands flew towards the rag, struggling to catch it.
“Because that’s what you sound like in pain,” said Kei. “Sit.”
“I’m already sitting—!”
“Sit better.”
“Ugh–!”
Hinata’s groan broke into a cough, and the cough into another. Hinata grabbed onto the bucket. His arms shook, his grip breaking, as all of the strength left in Hinata’s body sent him leaning deeper down. He heaved and heaved. Nothing came. The only thing Hinata dropped was the rag.
The heaves slowed. Hinata reached back into the bucket. He pressed the damp cloth to his forehead. “Ow…” From the way his voice cracked, Hinata seemed to think he was being quiet. He wasn’t. His eyes snapped shut, closing in pain. The more Hinata held still, the more clearly Kei could see him. The more Kei tried to focus, the less of Hinata there was to see.
Under the pale of Hinata’s skin, his veins had the wrong color. The inside of his wrist, where any line should have looked blue, was green. What should have been a red flush of blood was more a yellow brown, a leak of chlorophyll seeping into his tone.
Hinata was dying. It wouldn’t be long. However much he tried to hold himself like he was fine, his arms were covered in the signs. He wheezed with each breath, his throat as clogged as his lungs were. It came and went in waves, the way that all symptoms did, but he was in the last stages. Kei had been through enough sick people to know. The way people sounded and looked at the end was the same as Hinata.
How long must he have been hiding he was sick, to be this close to his body being consumed completely? Normally, patients sent to the flower shop didn’t look like this for weeks. They had more time. Time for Akiteru to learn their names, and nag Kei that he hadn’t. Time to write in the guest book and reminisce about who they’d been. To press their flowers and leave something to sprout behind. Whatever people did here didn’t change their ending, but those touches gave them solace, as ridiculous as it was. By the end of their end, most people found some peace. They couldn’t be well, but they could be better.
The way Hinata smiled, he made it look like there wasn’t ‘better’ to feel. It made it all the more bizarre. The people Kei and his brother shared the flower shop with were supposed to be ghosts in the making, hacking up plants along the way. They weren’t supposed to be happy.
Kei held onto the cloth.
“What’s wrong with you…?” Kei asked, just quietly enough that it could have been to himself.
“Me? I’ve got Hanahaki disease. I thought you knew…!” Hinata raised his hands. He spoke a little too loudly, and far too quickly, to have bothered listening before he went on. “Don’t worry. It’s not contagious!”
“I know.”
Kei spoke as clearly as he could. It wasn’t clear enough. Hinata tilted to one side. “Then why’d you look like that?”
What ‘that’ Hinata was referencing, Kei didn’t ask.
“It’s my face.”
“It is?” Hinata’s brow creased, still thinking. His head slanted that much more. “…Do you barf when other people do? You look sick.”
“I’m not.”
Hinata looked up. His eyes found new focus. Whatever frustration there had been in his gaze before, it gave way to an idea. “Then, are you busy…?”
“I’m working,” Kei answered instantly. “So are you. We’re a florist. Not charity.”
In a way, it almost was. It may not have been a charity, but Hinata’s presence was government sponsored.
Florists were equipped to handle plant waste even better than hospitals. If a flower shop volunteered to take on assigned patients, they were paid. The florists got a stipend. The afflicted got a peaceful passing. The only cost to anyone was the florists endlessly watching people choose to die.
Some of the people who they cared for, Kei understood. Elderly patients, who were too old or too unwell to safely survive the surgery, made sense. Widowers who’d lost the loves of their lives and couldn’t bear the loss, so the flowers grew to let them join them, made sense.
The orange blossom didn’t make sense. Hinata was young enough to fight it. If the roots were extracted, he’d be strong. He had the spirit, if he’d tried to—and the kind of smile that made Kei wonder how Hinata could have a love that wasn’t returned in the first place.
Hinata looked up, smiling away. If Kei didn’t see the extra veins along his neck, he’d never guess this guy was sick at all. “Hey! I’ve got an idea!”
“That’s possible? I didn’t realize you could.”
Hinata either hadn’t heard Kei, or ignored it. “Let’s play volleyball! I’ll show you!”
“No. You won’t.”
“Of course I would! It’s easy! First, you get a ball. And—“
Kei cut him off. “I know what volleyball is.”
The way Kei spoke was harsh enough, it should have stopped most people short, and Hinata was short enough already.
“Oh! That’s even better! Then, you know how to play!” Hinata’s eyes lit up, his hands balling into fists so tight, they couldn’t stop shaking. “There’s not a net here, but we can bump the ball around! I brought one. Since I got here, I’ve only been passing to myself. With a friend is way better!”
In the slurry of Hinata’s excitement, Kei almost didn’t catch the word.
“Friend…?” Kei repeated, clearly skeptical. He drew out the word enough for Hinata to catch it.
“Whoops. I mean, coworker!”
“For what work? You don’t do any,” Kei said, dry as ever. “You’re not listening.”
Hinata breathed heavily. He bent into himself. “I just have to lie down…” From the way Hinata spoke, it was clear he hadn’t heard Kei. He hobbled off to do just that, muttering. “Yeah. Yeah. I’ll be fine…”
The way Hinata spoke made it clear.
“You’re delusional,” Kei said, sure it was true.
“Isn’t everyone? That’s how people get dreams.” The way Hinata spoke, he didn’t expect an answer. With how heavily he breathed, Kei barely expected Hinata to speak at all.
“That’s for being asleep. Dreaming,” Kei said, just as sure. “When you’re awake, there’s no point.”
Hinata fought his own weakness. He shook his head. “That’s not the same! Dreams and dreaming. They’re different.”
“No. They’re not. Dreams don’t happen. You just think they do.”
“Of course they don’t happen. You think they won’t, so you’re not trying,” Hinata argued right back. “You’ve gotta believe you can dream before you’d call them dreams, right? If you don’t think dreams exist, you’d call it hallucinating.”
The more Hinata spoke, the more Kei knew they were talking about different things. No matter how persuasive Hinata meant to be, Kei could see the strain. The web of roots stretched through Hinata’s throat. Every word made them sway. The color changed, his skin too pale to hide them, yet Hinata spoke so easily that Kei couldn’t help but ask. “Who were they?”
“Huh?”
“The one who doesn’t love you. Who were they?”
It was the kind of question Kei usually knew not to ask.
If a widower came to the store, Akiteru always asked them who they loved and why. It was their favorite thing to talk about. Anyone else would either shut down, or they’d blather. In every other way, Hinata seemed like a blatherer. For once. Kei wanted to know.
There was someone out there in this world who made this idiot love them so much, Hinata would give up on living to not lose them. What kind of person was worth dying for, if they didn’t even love you?
Hinata’s hand tucked under his chin. He paused, thinking. Where Kei expected him to blather, Hinata barely spoke at all. He looked down, locked in doubt, until his voice trailed off completely. At the end of the thought, all he could share was “Uh… I don’t know.”
It shouldn’t have mattered. What Hinata chose to do could have meant nothing. Kei understood what nothing that should have meant to him.
Kei’s expectations snapped. He snapped with it. “Then, just get the surgery.”
He didn’t yell. He didn’t raise his voice. The fury and judgement that flowed through Kei was more pointed than that. He spoke like his words could stab straight through Hinata.
Hinata shook his head, unbothered. “Nope. Can’t risk it.”
“What risk? You don’t even know what this love is for.”
There was no reason for Kei’s insides to churn. They did, anyway. He sneered. “Get the surgery. Live. Fix it.”
“I can’t.”
“Yes. You can.”
It should have been simple. To any reasonable person, it was. It was better to live. At least, Kei understood it that way.
The way Hinata looked at him, it didn’t seem simple.
“People lose love all the time, don’t they? It’s the first warning before the surgery. The doctors cut your love out. You can’t do it anymore! I love volleyball. Like, it’s part of me. Whatever I love, having that makes me… me. If I lost that, who am I?”
Kei couldn’t pick whether to scoff or sigh. He settled for a sneer.
“If you keep it, you’re dead.”
“If I lost volleyball, I’d be dead, too,” Hinata said just as plainly. “If I lived without volleyball, that’s not me. I’d die either way, so, I’d rather die as myself, with what I love, than to end what makes me and keep living.”
It shouldn’t have mattered what the orange blossom said. Everyone who came to the florist was terminal. Before he knew Hinata’s name, Kei knew Hinata would die.
The more Kei heard, the more his temper thought the true terminal state was stupidity.
“Hobbies don’t make Hanahaki. It comes from loving people. You’ll still have a stupid ball. Leave. Wake up, and get the fucking surgery. You—“
Kei stopped. Kei’s pulse set in his ears, and every part of him shook with the pressure of something he had no way to stop.
There was no point in snapping. There was no point in any of this. Whatever Hinata did or didn’t do, it wasn’t Kei’s decision. It should have been clear from the second they’d met that anything reasonable Kei had to say didn’t matter. It wasn’t supposed to matter. The people who came here weren't supposed to be people to him. By the time Kei met anyone here, the patients his brother cared for had already chosen to be planters, then composting, then bodies buried in the yard.
Hinata looked at Kei clearly, like Kei was a person—and Hinata was, too. It took a second in that state for Kei to notice that Hinata wasn’t smiling.
It was the first time Kei could think of where he’d seen Hinata without a smile.
The orange in Hinata’s hair wasn’t enough to make the rest of him look bright. If anything, it was so vivid, it made him seem that much more flushed. His skin was the same shade as the flowers he expelled, the slightest bit darker than white.
Hinata reached out. His hand turned over. His veins and his roots both showed through his skin, green and blue intertwining. When he grabbed onto Kei, his grip was so loose, he barely touched him at all.
“You wouldn’t say that, if we played,” Hinata insisted. “You wouldn’t—“
Hinata’s touch barely existed. It still pulled Kei under, to make him both sink and explode.
“You—“ Kei started to snap. He didn’t make it through the second word.
Akiteru shouted through the door. “Kei! I need a hand! Can you come?”
Hinata’s hand pressed against Kei, barely present at all. The touch was so faint, Kei could tell himself it wasn’t real and almost believe it.
The question was open ended. It had an easy answer. Kei ignored the easy answer. He turned away.
“Sure,” Kei told his brother. “Coming.”
Kei stepped away. He didn’t take Hinata’s hand away from himself. All he did was move himself. The touch broke on its own, too weak to stay. Where there was nothing else left of Hinata, Kei heard him breathing.
“You should try it, Tsukishima. When you have time,” Hinata labored through each word. “Let’s play. A match, after shift. Let’s try volleyball.”
Hinata wasn’t pleading, but he was close. Close enough that Kei could hear the strain where he fought to make each word.
Kei put his hand on the door. His own touch felt that much more steady.
“Fine. After shift.” Kei gave in. He pretended he didn’t know why.
A second of sunlight started to shine through Hinata’s eyes. His shaking hands raised, new determination rising. “You won’t, regret it…!”
The odd pause in the middle was one Hinata hadn’t meant to make. Kei chose not to hear it. He closed the door.
A short but steady line had formed by the counter. Akiteru was at the register. He looked up just long enough to wave and catch Kei’s eye.
“Can you gather some bouquets? We need hydrangea and babies’ breath.”
The customer at the front waved towards themselves. “And daisies, daffodils and tiger lilies!”
“If we have tiger lilies,” Akiteru cautioned. “We may not have them in stock.”
Kei looked back to his brother. “Which color ribbon?”
“That’s your call. I trust you,” Akiteru said, plenty sure. “I trust you.”
He shouldn’t.
“How was Hinata?” Akiteru asked, caring as ever.
“The sprout? Chatty.”
Kei wished he didn’t remember that Hinata had a name. He pretended he didn’t. He looked to Akiteru, waiting for a sign that wouldn’t come.
“He wants to play volleyball,” Kei added, as if it didn’t matter.
Akiteru lit up like it did.
“He does? Sounds fun. I’ll call some friends from the rec league, we could find people to—“
“Don’t,” Kei cut in.
Akiteru stopped. “Why not? You don’t want to?” There was no judgment in how he asked, only innocent concern. It felt that much worse for it.
Kei didn’t say anything. The silence spoke for him.
“Oh,” Akiteru said, understanding. “You just want the two of you?”
“No,” Kei said far too quickly.
Whatever light there’d been in his brother’s face, it faded instantly. “You’d tell me if you’re in trouble, right?”
“Sure,” Kei said plainly, knowing full well it was a lie. “Be right back.”
Akiteru’s posture straightened. His expression dropped into concern.
“Wait. Why?”
“We’re out of daisies.”
Akiteru turned, trying to check. “We are?”
Kei didn’t stop to let Akiteru notice the lie. He walked through the door.
“Excuse me?” A customer called. “I need to check out!”
The shout let Kei do the same.
Akiteru turned. “I’ll be right with you! One sec—“
Kei didn’t leave the time to hear the rest. If his brother would have followed him, Kei didn’t give him the choice. He left and shut the door. His brother’s silhouette stayed steady, locked behind the other side. Kei hadn’t tried to listen. He heard plenty clearly.
“Sure. What kind of flower?” Akiteru asked, the same as ever.
Kei turned his back to that, too. He walked past the greenhouse, through the hall, and down an alley, where he could be alone.
The second Kei was alone, he felt an itch.
Kei tried to clear his throat. The clog deepened. Each time he tried to breathe, it sounded like someone else–like dozens of other people he’d met before. He coughed into his sleeve.
A single, pink petal fell from his mouth, into his hand. The scrap curled around itself, the center of the flower darker than the rest. Kei knew the shape. It was a geranium petal, the flower for stupidity–and Kei knew just which idiot to blame.
The treatment for hanahaki, for most people, was simple. All you did was confess, and convince the other side to care. To convince someone took persuasion. More than that, it took time.
If there was anything Hinata lacked, it was common sense. Then, height. After both, it was time. Even if Kei didn’t deny it. Even if he went about this the right way. Even if Kei was someone worth loving, Hinata didn’t have time to love him.
It was Kei’s luck that he’d get stuck like this, with the dumbest kind of fondness, and nowhere good for it to go. There wasn’t hope for this to go anywhere but to end. The only choice Kei had left was to shut it down.
He could hide it, for a while. A while could be long enough. If Kei acted fine, it was close enough to being there. The sprout could die, loving volleyball and a stranger, and whatever dreams that gave him. Then, Kei would find what to do. Hinata didn’t have to know. Knowing only made this harder.
Kei kept his back to the wall. He pulled the petal into his palm.
It ended how it started, with a flower in Kei’s hand.