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The fight against Hanami had finished three days before, but Megumi still felt an echo, an echo with phantom roots, in his stomach.
“I already told you twice,” Shoko said. “There’s no trace of the seed. You expelled it from your body completely.”
Megumi nodded, but his hand hovered over his abdomen for another unnecessary moment. He could still feel its presence, diminished, almost imperceptible, or maybe it was just residual cursed energy.
“Thank you, Shoko-san.”
When Megumi left the infirmary, he almost ran into Itadori in the hallway, who stepped back with a smile that Megumi had learned to anticipate from him.
“Fushiguro! Is everything alright? What did Shoko-san say?”
“I’m fine. The seed came out cleanly.”
“Awesome!” Itadori said, bouncing on his toes. “Hey, do you have any plans on Friday?”
Megumi looked at him, not understanding. Itadori had that expression, the one he used when he wanted to say something but didn’t know how to start.
“Nothing in particular.”
“It’s just… Do you remember Ozawa? My classmate from middle school?”
Megumi felt a slight tension in his stomach. Barely there, almost nothing.
“I remember her.”
“Well, she and I… are going out. Like on a date,” Itadori said, scratching the nape of his neck. “I wanted to ask if you wanted to come with us. You and Nobara. It’s just so… so that I’m not alone with Ozawa, you know…”
“Oh, great. Good for you,” said Megumi, trying to sound more neutral than he was capable. “Now that I think about it… I have to check if I don’t have an urgent mission on Friday, you know.”
“Let me know, yeah?” replied Itadori with one of his brilliant smiles. “Y’know, she’s very normal. She doesn’t know anything about curses or anything like that. Sometimes that’s what I need.”
“I have things to do, Itadori, so…”
Megumi turned around before Itadori could say something else. He walked towards his room, pretending like his steps weren’t urgent. He closed the door, and only then did he let his expression fall.
Good, he told himself as he sat on the edge of the bed. This is good. Itadori deserves someone normal, someone who isn’t…
He coughed.
It was a dry, raspy cough that irritated his throat. It was probably the cold weather or the residual stress from the mission.
~*~
Weeks passed, and Itadori began to arrive late to trainings, with his phone in his hand and a stupid smile on his face.
“Ozawa says she likes dogs,” Itadori commented one afternoon, while they trained. “I showed her a picture of your divine dogs, and she almost fainted.”
“You showed my curse technique to a civilian,” Megumi stated coldly.
“Only pictures! Besides, she thinks it’s edited because, according to her, they can’t be that fluffy. She’s very pretty, Fushiguro. You should get to know her better.”
“Pass.”
Itadori frowned.
“Why are you always like this?”
Like what? Megumi wanted to ask. Distant? Cold? Incapable of being what you need?
That night, Megumi coughed again. This time, when he looked at the hand he coughed into, there was a small mark; it could’ve been saliva. It could’ve been blood.
~*~
A month after Itadori and Ozawa were official, Megumi found the first petal.
It was in the bathroom sink, small and delicate, an intense red. For a moment, he thought that someone had left flowers somewhere and the wind had blown them here.
But it was damp, and it had appeared after one of his coughing fits, which were becoming increasingly frequent.
He touched his abdomen. He could feel the cursed energy, an insignificant amount, something that anyone could ignore. Something that could easily be confused for his own energy. But Megumi knew. He knew that something wasn’t right.
The seed wasn’t completely removed.
Megumi leaned against the door, unable to do anything else. He had no strength left; even if something was wrong with him, he didn’t care.
Let the seed feed off of his desperation.
He didn’t care.
~*~
Two weeks passed before he dared speak to Itadori properly again.
“Fushiguro, are you avoiding me?”
Megumi lifted his gaze from his book. Itadori stood in the doorway to his room, with his arms crossed and a confused expression on his face.
“No.”
“It’s been days since you last ate with us. You haven’t come to the last three group training sessions.”
“I had things to do.”
Itadori stepped fully into his room and closed the door behind him.
“What things?”
Cough up petals in the bathroom at 3 A.M. Investigate if there's a way to extract the seed without dying. Try to stop feeling this way for you.
“Important things. Special missions. Do you need something?”
Itadori stayed silent for a moment. Then he sighed, and something in his expression shuttered off.
“No. I guess not.”
He opened the door, and he left.
Megumi waited until the sound of steps disappeared down the hallway. Then, he violently coughed, and three petals, stained with red, fell over the pages of his book.
He closed the book on top of the petals.
Fine, let him walk away. It’s better like this.
~*~
Hanami, the curse that loved nature and hated humanity, had left roses growing inside of him. He knew they had invaded his lungs, maybe even his stomach.
Megumi coughed up an entire rose at 4 in the morning on a Tuesday, when a particularly violent cough tore at his throat, and she felt something too large crawling up her windpipe. The pain was so intense that he had to bite his pillow to not scream. When he finally coughed up the flower, there was so much blood that he thought he was dying.
No. He didn’t have that much luck.
He cleaned it up, threw away the evidence, and looked at himself in the mirror. Pale, haggard, but functional.
~*~
“Fushiguro, are you okay?”
Kugisaki looked at him from the other side of the table during breakfast. Megumi looked at his rice without eating it.
“I’m fine.”
“You look like a grade 2 curse kicked you.”
“Thank you.”
“I’m serious,” Kugisaki said, squinting her eyes. “Are you sleeping well? Because those eyebags aren’t normal, even for you.”
“I sleep enough.”
It was a lie. Nights are the worst.
Lying in the darkness, without distractions, are the moments when his mind inevitably wanders to Itadori, asking himself if he had seen Ozawa that day, if he was kissing her, if he was happy.
Every thought brought him more pain.
Megumi had tried everything. Meditation, training until he collapsed, reading until the words on the page went blurry. Nothing worked. His mind betrayed him every night, returning to Itadori; always to Itadori.
The cafeteria door opened, and Itadori entered, phone in hand, laughing.
“Ozawa sent me this!” He showed the screen to Kugisaki. “She tried to make a cake that I taught her how to make, and look how it turned out.”
“Is that a cake or a war crime?” She said while containing her laughter.
“It’s adorable!” Itadori defended. “She tried, and that’s what counts.”
Megumi suddenly stood.
“I’m going to train.”
“But you haven’t eaten anything,” Itadori said, finally looking at him. “Fushiguro, seriously, are you…?”
“I’m fine,” Megumi interrupted.
He left before they could keep questioning him.
In the hallway, when he was far enough away, he coughed. Only one petal this time, but it came with blood.
He wiped his hand, put the petal in his pocket, and kept walking.
~*~
Itadori was happy.
Megumi could see it in every interaction, in every smile, in every moment. He shone differently, lighter.
Ozawa gave that to him — normality, lightness, an escape from the constant horror of his life as a sorcerer.
“Yesterday, we went to the zoo,” Itadori said as they walked back from an easy mission. “Ozawa loves pandas.”
Megumi made a sound that could be interpreted as a laugh.
“And on Friday, we’re going to see that famous movie. The one with the Korean director.”
“How great.”
Itadori looked at him with concern.
“Are you mad at me?”
No. I’m dying for you. Literally.
“No.”
“Because it feels like we don’t… I don’t know. We don’t talk like before.”
Because if I talk to you more than necessary, the roses grow faster.
“I’m tired. Too many missions.”
“Are you sure? Because we could…”
“Itadori,” Megumi stopped and looked at him directly. “I’m fine. You concentrate on Ozawa. She makes you… happy.”
“If you say so,” Itadori murmured, starting to walk again.
That night, Megumi coughed for a full, uninterrupted hour. The roses started arriving with thorns. Each one felt like vomiting glass.
He counted seven entire flowers before his body finally gave him a break, and he fell asleep immediately.
~*~
He needed to go to Shoko. Confess what was happening. The conclusions he had arrived at. There was probably a way to surgically remove the seed.
But he would wait until he couldn’t anymore. He didn’t want the whole school to find out. He didn’t want to give Itadori a reason to worry anymore, no matter how small. He didn’t want to ruin the small piece of normality that Itadori had finally found.
A week later, Itadori stopped seeking him out.
Megumi expected to feel relieved. Instead, the pain was so sharp that he coughed up flowers for hours.
~*~
Yuko Ozawa was not stupid.
She had been going out with Yuuji for two months, and, in that time, she had learned to read his silences as much as his words. She knew the difference between his genuine smile and the one he used to hide his worries. She knew when he was present and when his mind had wandered towards the world that he couldn’t talk about.
And she knew, with increasing certainty, where his mind most frequently wandered.
“Fushiguro didn’t come again,” Yuuji said, looking at his phone during their date at a café.
Yuko simply took a sip of her coffee.
“Did you text him?”
“Yes. He says he’s busy. He’s always busy lately.”
Yuuji turned his phone off, but his eyes lingered on the dark screen for another moment.
“Do you think I did something wrong?” Yuuji asked after a while.
“Why do you think that?”
“I don’t know. Before, we were close. Well, close for someone like Fushiguro,” Yuuji smiled, but it was the sad smile that Yuko had learned to identify. “Now, he barely looks at me. And when he does, it looks like it hurts him.”
Yuko put down her cup.
“Yuuji. Can I ask you something personal?”
“Of course.”
“Why did you start going out with me?”
Yuuji blinked, confused by the sudden change of topic.
“Because you’re kind, pretty, and… you help me feel normal.”
“Normal?”
“Yeah,” Yuuji shifted uncomfortably in his seat. “I mean, my life is… complicated. You’re a breath of fresh air from all of that.”
Yuko nodded slowly and took a deep breath.
“What if I told you that I think you need that breath of fresh air because you’re running away from something?”
“What?”
“Or from someone.”
The silence that followed was enough of a response.
“Ozawa, I don’t…” Yuuji started after a moment, looking like he had just reconsidered his entire life and every decision he’d ever made.
“I’m not mad,” She said, and it was true. She’d had weeks to process this. “But I need you to be honest with me, and, above all, with yourself.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“I think you do.”
“Fushiguro is my friend. It’s just that… I worry about him.”
“A worry that seems like an extreme level of concern for just a friend. Yuuji, you haven’t stopped talking about him on any of our dates.”
“Ozawa… I…”
“It’s okay, Yuuji.” She said, reaching out and taking his hand. “Really. But you need to resolve this. Because he’s obviously not fine, and you clearly can’t stop thinking about him, and I deserve better than being in second place.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t apologize. Just go talk to him, please.”
“But we…”
“We’re done,” She said softly, without any trace of resentment. “We’ve been over for a long time. It’s just that neither one of us wanted to admit it.”
Yuuji was silent for a long moment. Then he nodded.
“You’re right. I’m an idiot.”
“A little bit,” Yuko smiled. “But you’re a good idiot. Now go.”
“Now?”
“Now, before you lose your courage.”
Yuuji stood so quickly that he almost knocked over the table. He leaned over and kissed Yuko’s cheek.
“Thank you for everything.”
“Go.”
She watched him practically run towards the exit and sighed. It hurt — she wouldn’t deny it. But she knew she had done the right thing.
Some love stories were simply inevitable.
~*~
Megumi was in his room when a coughing fit started.
It had been a bad day. Honestly, every day was, but today had been particularly brutal. Every breath felt like inhaling through wet cotton. He could feel the roses pressing against his lungs, the stems coiled so tightly that there was barely any room left for air.
He was sitting on the edge of his bed, trying to control his breathing, when the first cough violently erupted.
He folded over himself, one hand on his chest and the other covering his mouth. He felt the petals first, then the stem, then the thorns, tearing their way up his throat like barbed wire. Blood filled his mouth.
He stood, tremblingly, trying to make it to the bathroom.
Another cough, stronger this time. He fell to his knees before he could make it anywhere.
The roses came in waves, one after another. His body tried to cough them up all at the same time, and the pain was so intense that his vision went blurry with tears.
Breathe, just breathe.
But he couldn’t. There were too many flowers, too many thorns, too much blood.
This is how I die, he thought with a strangely comforting clarity. Alone. Drowning in roses.
~*~
Yuuji arrived running to the school.
He kept running once he was inside, through the familiar hallways. He started heading towards his bedroom, but that wasn’t where he wanted to go. Instead, he went right next door, to Fushiguro’s room.
What was he going to say? He had no idea. Maybe “Hey, it turns out that I’m in love with you, and I’ve been a complete imbecile,” or “Sorry for disappearing into a relationship that I used to run away from my feelings,” or “Please, start talking to me again because your silence is killing me.”
Probably something like that.
He arrived almost in front of Fushiguro’s door and slowed down. He took a deep breath, trying to calm himself.
You can do this, he told himself. Just knock on the door and…
Yuuji stopped dead in his tracks.
He heard a violent, racking cough coming from Fushiguro’s room.
“Fushiguro?”
More coughing, followed by a loud thump, like something falling.
Fear and urgency replaced everything in his head. Without thinking, he turned the doorknob and pushed the door open.
Fushiguro was on the floor, and there was blood splattered everywhere, on his hands, on his shirt, on the floor. Among the blood, impossibly, there were flowers — horrible, red flowers. Dozens of them. Petals, stems, and entire flowers were scattered like a crime scene.
“Fushiguro! What…?”
Yuuji kneeled above him just as another wave of coughs wracked his body. This time, Yuuji saw the rose emerge from between his lips, stained with blood so dark it looked black.
He took out his phone with shaking hands; he needed to act now. He messed up twice before dialing the correct number.
“Shoko!” Yuuki yelled into the phone when she picked up. “Fushiguro’s room! Now! It’s bad.”
He hung up without waiting for a response, and he returned his full attention to Fushiguro. The roses. The seeds. Hanami’s cursed technique hadn’t completely come out, but how…?
“Fushiguro, Fushiguro,” Yuuji repeated desperately, taking him by the shoulders, and he saw how his chest rose and fell with short and agonizing breaths. “Stay with me. Shoko’s on her way. Breathe, please.”
Seconds felt like hours until he heard a loud noise in the hallway and voices.
Shoko appeared at the door, followed by Gojo. They both stopped when they saw the scene.
“Itadori, let me,” Shoko murmured, kneeling in the blood.
“The roses,” Yuuji said hysterically, “the roses are growing inside of him. Hanami… the seeds never left.”
Shoko’s hands glowed with energy as she scanned Fushiguro’s body.
“It’s in his entire pulmonary system,” she said in a calm, professional voice. “The roots… he won’t last much longer. Gojo, I need to take him to the infirmary. Now.”
Gojo nodded with a deadly serious look on his face as he carried Fushiguro and took Shoko’s hand.
Yuuji hadn’t moved an inch.
“Yuuji, let him go.”
“No.”
“Yuuji…”
“No!” Yuuji kept hold of one of his arms. “I’m not letting him go, I'm not going to…”
“If you don’t let go, I can’t save him,” Shoko said firmly. “Is that what you want?”
Shoko’s words pierced through his panic. Yuuki let go, and when he did, they were gone.
Yuuji ran, heading towards the infirmary. Trying not to think about what he had seen. Trying not to think about everything that could go wrong.
~*~
The door to the infirmary opened, and Shoko came out, taking off gloves stained with blood. Her expression was somber.
“He’s stable, for now.”
“For now?” Yuuji felt the panic resurging. “What does that mean?”
“It means that I managed to deter the growth temporarily and clean his airways, but the seeds are still there. The roots are still there.”
“So take them out. Operate on him. Do something.”
Shoko shook her head.
“It’s not that simple. Hanami’s seed has adapted. Normally, it would grow with regular cursed energy, but this one…” She paused to take a breath, “This one found another source: cursed energy generated from the primary source. Pure emotions.”
Yuuji looked at her without comprehending.
“It means that the seeds are using Megumi’s negative emotions as fuel. Not only his cursed energy. But the way in which they grew…”
Yuuji’s brain worked furiously. Emotions. Of course, Fushiguro had many negative emotions, but that never… never…
“They’re feeding off of suppressed emotions,” Shoko said softly. “Something that he feels so intensely that he’s suppressing it, generating constant energy, making the seeds grow inside of him.”
“How long?” asked Yuuji.
“Sorry?”
“How long has he been like this?”
“Based on the amount of growth, I would say at least two months. Probably more.”
“This is my fault,” Yuuji said. “He was dying, and I was going out on dates, eating cake!”
“Listen to me.” Shoko took him by his shoulders. “It’s not your fault. Megumi chose not say anything and suffer in silence. It wasn’t your responsibility.”
“But I could’ve…”
“Itadori,” Shoko said firmly, “I need you to concentrate. I can remove the seeds surgically. But, as I said, it’s not that simple.”
Yuuji forced himself to breathe deeply and nodded.
“The roots are so intertwined with his body that I’d need to do a deep cleaning, and to do that, I need the seed to detach itself. To weaken its hold.”
“How?”
Shoko looked at him intently.
“Eliminating the source. The emotional suppression needs to stop.”
Yuuji frowned.
“I need you to solve this when Megumi wakes up,” Shoko continued.
“Solve what?”
“Yuuji, for someone who is so perceptive in battle, you are incredibly dense in other situations.”
“What…?”
“Megumi loves you,” Shoko said bluntly. “That’s what he’s suppressing. He loves you, and he thinks that you’re happy with another person, and he decided that dying in silence is better than interfering with your happiness.”
Yuuji looked at her, processing the words one by one. Megumi loved him. Him. And he was dying because of it.
“No,” he whispered, “no, he doesn’t… he never…”
“Never what? Never showed that you matter to him more than anyone else? Didn’t he save your life?”
Yuuji thought about Megumi saving him from being executed. Though about Megumi training with him until they were both exhausted. In the way that his eyes softened when Yuuji smiled.
The way those same eyes had been slowly dimming in the last months.
“When he wakes up,” Shoko continued, as if she hadn’t dropped a bomb, “tell him the truth, all of it. Because I know you love him, too. And if he knows it’s requited, the fuel for the seed will run out. Enough for me to be able to surgically remove it.
“And if it doesn’t work?”
“Then I’ll have to do an emergency surgery anyway, but there’s a very high possibility that the seed will take his feelings with it. When he wakes up, he won’t remember that he once loved you. He also won’t be able to love that way again, neither you nor anyone else.”
~*~
The hospital room was completely silent.
Yuuji dragged a chair closer to the bed and sat down, with his eyes fixed firmly on Megumi. Without the constant tension he’d recently been carrying, Megumi looked younger and terribly fragile. There were tubes in his nostrils that helped him breathe.
Yuuji took his hand; it was ice-cold.
“You’re an idiot,” Yuuji whispered, voice trembling. “You’re a stubborn and self-destructive idiot. Dying in silence? That was your plan? Leaving me without even telling me why?”
Megumi’s chest rose and fell with difficulty. Every breath was a reminder that the roses still grew inside of him.
“I’m also an idiot,” Yuuji continued. “Ozawa told me so. Basically told me that I was using her to run away from you. And she was right.”
He squeezed Megumi’s hand.
“I was scared, y’know? Of what I felt. Because you’re… you. Cold and distant, always acting as if you don’t need anyone. I thought that if I said anything, you’d move away from me, that I’d lose you. So I looked for someone safer, someone who didn’t make me feel like my heart was about to explode every time they looked at me.”
Megumi still had his eyes closed.
“And meanwhile, you were dying. Because you thought I was happier without you. Because you decided that my happiness was more valuable than your life.”
Yuuji leaned forward, resting his head against their clasped hands.
“Don’t do that again. There’s no happiness for me if you’re not there. There’s not.”
A small movement in Megumi’s fingers startled him. Yuuji lifted his head.
“Megumi?”
Megumi’s eyelids trembled. They opened slowly, revealing his eyes, clouded by pain and confusion.
“...Itadori?”
“No, don’t talk,” Yuuji said, squeezing his hand again. “Shoko stabilized you.”
“The roses…” Megumi’s voice was weak, raspy. “You saw…”
“I saw everything. Shoko told me everything.”
The little color in Megumi’s face vanished.
“You shouldn’t’ve… You didn’t need to–”
“–know that you were dying?” Yuuji’s voice was harsher than he had intended. “That’s what I didn’t need to know?”
Megumi broke their eye contact.
“It wasn’t your problem.”
“It was completely my problem!” Yuuji exploded. “You stubborn, obstinate idiot, you’re dying because of me!”
Megumi tensed.
“It’s not your fault, it’s mine. My weakness, my…”
“Your love.”
Megumi looked at him in terror.
“I don’t know what you’re–”
“–I told you that Shoko told me everything, including this,” Yuuji interrupted. “The seed was feeding off your love, which you believed was unrequited.”
“Itadori…”
“How long, Megumi?” Yuuji used his name deliberately. “How long have you been feeling like this?”
“No, Itadori, I don’t want your pity,” Megumi whispered.
“Pity? You think this is pity? That I spent months thinking about you while I was with someone else, out of pity? You think that my heart breaks every time you look at me, out of pity?”
Megumi froze.
“What…?”
“I love you, idiot,” Yuuji said abruptly. “I love you, but I was so scared to admit it because I thought that if I did, you’d end up pushing me away. I thought that you only tolerated me. So I ran away, looked for someone safer. And you were drowning in flowers because you thought the exact same of me.”
“No… you can’t–”
“–Can’t what? Love you? It’s too late; I already do. I’ve loved you for months, and I know that when I saw you on the floor, covered in blood and roses, I thought that you were going to die.”
“I thought you were happy with her. I thought that you finally had something good and normal, that I would only bring you more pain, more death, more curses. Ozawa could give you the light that you deserve. I only have shadows and darkness.”
“You’re a fool,” Yuuji said, voice softening. “A stupidly handsome and self-destructive fool. Did you know that you give me light? You. Your sarcasm, your loyalty, the way you pretend you don’t care about anything, yet you’re always there. You’re my light, Megumi. You always have been.”
Megumi coughed slightly, wet with tears and emotion. Yuuji tensed, ready to call Shoko. But only a single petal fell from his lips and fell over the white bedsheets. None followed.
There wasn’t any blood. There was only a solitary red petal, like a last breath from the curse.
“Is that…?” Megumi touched the petal. “It’s stopping?”
Megumi’s breathing had turned deeper and more regular. Yuuji could almost see how his lungs expanded again, filling with air and not with flowers.
Because inside Megumi, Hanami’s seed had stopped receiving fuel.
The door opened suddenly, and Shoko entered, smiling.
“I see that he’s stabilized. The seed is weakening.” She looked at Yuuji. “Good job.”
“Were you spying on us?”
“A little, but that’s neither here nor there. I didn’t hear everything,” Shoko smiled.
“It doesn’t matter. Can you take it out now?” Yuuji asked.
“I can. It’ll be a delicate procedure, but without the seed being fueled, I can remove the roots without them regenerating.” She moved closer to Megumi. “Are you ready?”
But Megumi didn’t immediately respond. He looked at Yuuji.
“Will you stay?”
“I’m not going anywhere.”
Megumi nodded towards Shoko.
“I’m ready.”
While Shoko was distracted preparing everything for the surgery, Yuuji leaned over and, for the first time, kissed Megumi. Softly, barely a graze of lips.
But it was enough.
When they separated, Megumi had a tiny smile on his face.
“Idiot,” he murmured.
“Your idiot,” Yuuji responded.
And for the first time in months, Megumi breathed without pain.