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1.
Kanade’s in a field of carnation flowers.
They're beautiful; the sunset frames them in a warm, honey-edged glow. Mizuki and Ena are talking, bantering about something or another, and their light-hearted conversation lights Kanade with a warmth that makes her fingertips itch with song.
There's a hand on hers—a little cold, bony with long fingers that complement hers.
She's content. For the first time in a long while. And Kanade doesn't want anything more.
“Isn't this nice?” Kanade murmurs, turning over—
And coming to in a rock-hard bed.
It's hard to breathe, and even harder to open her eyes—Kanade struggles, pushing against the dark of her eyelids with as much force as she can muster.
“She's awake,” someone shouts from beside her, and there's a flurry of movement. “She's awake!”
Kanade makes one last effort—commanding her eyes to open, somehow, anyhow, please—and then she's staring at the stark-white ceiling of a hospital room.
She looks downward, squinting against the harsh light, and picks out the hazy figures of Mizuki, Ena, and—a blur of purple she doesn't recognize.
Kanade’s muscles tense, and she lifts herself up, rubbing her face with one weak arm. “Hello?”
“Kanade!” They all rush to her in unison—besides the purple girl, who hangs back with an odd look in her eyes.
Ena’s crying. “Don't you ever scare us like that ever again!”
“What happened?” Kanade whispers.
“Honami found you in your room, unconscious—covered in blood.” Mizuki shifts, then puts a hand over hers for a moment. It’s warm, comforting, and yet, it doesn't feel—right. “Why—why didn't you tell us? Any of us? We thought you weren't,” she coughs, and Kanade catches tears forming in her eyes, “weren’t going to make it.”
“You just made it here just barely in time,” Ena mutters. “Any later, and your lungs would have given out. You would've died.”
Kanade looks down. She hates this feeling—this feeling of pity, of being weak and useless to everyone else. “Can I know what from?”
A moment of silence passes between the group. An unfamiliar voice coughs behind her—Kanade turns her head and strands of purple hair fall into her vision.
“This kind of illness—it’s not good for the patient to know the details of, unless they risk relapse. Do you remember anything?” The purple-haired girl shifts closer, looking at Kanade with an intensity that makes her shrink away.
It feels like bad manners to interject, but the purple-haired girl seems like she knows Kanade. “I'm sorry,” Kanade whispers, “do I… know you?”
The air in the room seems to drop a couple degrees. Ena moves to grasp the girl’s shoulder, but she shrugs her away, instead kneeling down to Kanade’s level. The girl’s voice cracks slightly as she speaks.
“I’m—Mafuyu. Mafuyu Asahina.”
Kanade smiles. “Nice to meet you, Mafuyu. Are you one of the nurses here? Thank you for your help.”
Mizuki shuffles to Ena and whispers something—despite everything, she still knows—and Mafuyu looks down for a moment. “I'm a friend of Mizuki and Ena. And a roommate of yours.”
“Really?” Kanade smiles. “I think I would remember a roommate, if I had one.”
“I just moved in yesterday, when you were in the hospital. I'll—I’m here to help you in recovery.”
“Oh,” Kanade says. “Were you sent by my grandmother?”
“Something like that.”
Then, a man with white scrubs and a pinched expression shuffles in, holding a clipboard. “Good, you're awake.” He pulls out a pen, seemingly from thin air, and points it at the group. “You're her family, correct?”
Mizuki, Ena, and Mafuyu shift uncomfortably. “Something like that, yeah,” Mizuki echos.
The man raises an eyebrow. “Okay—the surgery was a success. We can discharge her today, but have her take,” he scribbles on the clipboard and hands Mafuyu some paper, “this medicine, and she should follow-up in a week for monitoring.”
They all nod.
“Be well,” and he sweeps out of the room, leaving the rest of them in silence.
Ena is the first to break the quiet. “Then—we’ll all help set you up, and Mafuyu will bring you back home, right?”
“Yes.” Mafuyu stiffens and leaves the room. Mizuki and Ena share glances. “I'll go with her,” Mizuki volunteers, and she sweeps out the door after her.
Ena finds a chair, lodged in an empty corner, and pulls it over to Kanade. “Are you feeling alright?”
“Could be better.” There's a tingly feeling of burning in her throat, and Kanade struggles to breathe past the pain.
Ena brings her a glass of water from the nightstand and sits down, giving it to Kanade to drink. It's lukewarm, but it helps soothe the prickling. “Do you remember N25?”
Kanade nods. “Our music group.”
“Do you remember who's in it?”
“Well—I compose, you work on the visuals, Mizuki works on the music video, and the lyricist is,” Kanade stops. She tries again. “The lyricist. Is. She is.”
Kanade can't remember. There's a hole in her memories, a gap where she swore someone once was.
Ena bows her head. “Damn.”
“I should know, shouldn't I?”
“Don't… don't worry about it for now.”
What sort of illness takes away your memories?
Mizuki and Mafuyu come back, pushing a wheelchair into the room. Kanade thinks Mafuyu’s face seems a little puffy, but Ena doesn't mention it, and so doesn't Kanade. They maneuver her gently into the chair and make plans to meet again.
Mafuyu wheels Kanade to Kanade’s home—only a few blocks from the hospital—and when they enter, Kanade is brought into the kitchen. “I'll make some food for us,” Mafuyu states as she pushes Kanade to the table.
“Wait, I'll help,” Kanade says. She gets off her chair, and makes it a good three steps before stumbling to the floor.
Mafuyu comes over and pulls her up. “Rest,” she tacks on after, gently placing her in one of the kitchen chairs, “you need to regain your strength. You lost a lot of blood in the surgery.”
“Thanks,” she says. She laughs breathlessly for a moment—immobilized by her own weakness, again, forcing others to help her. “I'm sorry for being a burden.”
“Don't say that.” In a flash, Mafuyu’s leaning over her, their faces so close together that their noses are almost touching. “Don't say you're a burden.” She looks terrified, Kanade thinks.
Mafuyu blinks and she pulls away quickly, moving from the fridge to the microwave to heat them up. She places a bowl of congee in front of her. “I made it yesterday.” Mafuyu sits beside Kanade, passing a spoon over to her. Kanade tastes it—it’s warm, and slightly sweetened with brown sugar, the way she likes it.
“I'm sorry I wasn't there sooner. I was,” Mafuyu’s face turns agonizing, “with my parents.”
Kanade doesn't remember buying brown sugar, and so she stiffens, placing the spoon into the bowl.
“Is it not to your liking?”
“No, it's perfect. How—how did you know I like sweetened congee? I, ah, don't even think my grandma remembers that.”
Mafuyu shrugs. “She did.”
“Hmm.” Kanade takes another taste. But I've never told her. “So you're my caretaker?”
“Yeah.”
“You’re wonderful at it. I suppose I should tell you about my habits, then, if you're staying until I've recovered.” Kanade speaks about her work, her tendencies to stay up late, and habits of skipping meals.
She doesn't see the way Mafuyu’s face contorts bit by bit as she listens to Kanade speak about things Mafuyu already knew by heart.
“—and that's all, I guess.” Kanade shifts. “Where are you living? One of the old rooms?”
“Ah, no,” Mafuyu coughs, “I’m set up in your room.”
“In mine?” Kanade’s taken aback. “Really? Is my grandma that worried about me?”
“She wants me to monitor you closely.”
“Alright.” Kanade finishes half the bowl, managing to make some conversation with Mafuyu along the way. She goes to Miyamasuzaka Girls' Academy, plans to go into the medical field, and has a rather strained relationship with her parents—judging by the way Mafuyu speaks about them.
Kanade doesn't push it further. She gets back into her wheelchair, and they move until they hit the stairs.
The stairs.
Mafuyu elects to carry Kanade up them, rather than risk a fall—she’s very strong, Kanade muses as they move up. Before they turn the knob to her room, Mafuyu stiffens.
“Just one minute, I need to rearrange some things.” She dips in abruptly and disappears.
When Mafuyu calls her, Kanade gingerly steps in. She sees her bed, her monitors, and a nook in the corner of her room that seems little more than a blanket and pillow, placed hastily onto the floor.
“I can't let you sleep like that.”
“I'll be alright, I've dealt with worse.”
Kanade shakes her head. “No, I can’t allow that. You're a guest in my home—take my bed, if nothing else.”
“Absolutely not. You're recovering.”
“And you're taking care of me. How about this,” Kanade walks the short distance to her bed and pats the side, “you can sleep here with me until the morning, when we can erect an air mattress or something else.”
She knows it's an odd request, yet something pushes her forward, something comfortable makes the request because something about Mafuyu feels familiar—really familiar, not just a distant acquaintance, or caretaker, or friend.
Something closer.
A burning sensation appears in her lungs, and Kanade doubles over, cringing at the pain. Mafuyu quickly grabs an energy can from Kanade’s mini-fridge and comes over, flipping the tab and putting the drink to her lips. She gulps it down greedily until the pain subsides.
Mafuyu knits her brows and seems to come to a decision. “Alright, we’ll both sleep here for the night. I need to be able to watch over you in case of any emergencies.” Once Kanade straightens—Mafuyu pounding gently at her back to make sure she's okay—Mafuyu stands up and brings the blanket and pillow onto the bed.
Kanade looks at how it's arranged, pillow next to pillow and twin blankets resting stop each other, as if they were always meant to be together.
Something itches in the back of her brain, but she doesn't dare to push it further.
They settle down for the night—keeping a respectable distance—and Kanade falls into a dreamless sleep.
2.
Kanade awakens much earlier than she should.
It's barely light outside. There's some strength back in her legs, and Kanade makes a move to get out of bed and get a glass of water—but a pair of arms close around her tightly, preventing her from moving any further.
Kanade blinks. Then, she squints in the dark. She makes out Mafuyu’s sleeping face, and her shoulders, and her limbs, and realizes that they're wrapped around each other to the point where Kanade can't tell who from who.
She squirms a bit, and Mafuyu’s breathing changes. “Mmm?” Mafuyu mumbles, still half-asleep.
“Let go,” Kanade whispers, and Mafuyu sleepily compiles, opening up her arms for Kanade to shimmy past.
The light of the fridge is cold and comforting. Kanade basks in its glow for a moment, then makes it back upstairs with her water—just in time to see the bathroom door shut and its lights flicker on. Mafuyu’s up then, Kanade thinks, heading to her room and turning on her computer.
As she waits for it to boot up, Mafuyu comes back in, toweling her hair dry; Kanade observes the way her hair curls and flicks up at the edges.
“Sorry if I made you uncomfortable.”
“No, it's okay. It was nice.”
“Don't lie to make me feel better.”
“Really, I'm fine.”
“I’m gonna set up the air mattress today.” Mafuyu looks at her. “You got water. Did you have any lung pain?”
“Not really, I was just thirsty.”
“Hmm. Well, it's Saturday, so the day’s free, but I’ll have cram school tomorrow. We should probably pick up your medicine before then.”
Mafuyu fishes out the paper from before. “Do you want to come with me?”
Kanade looks at her computer screen—composing software already loaded. “No worries, then,” Mafuyu says, as if she already knew what Kanade was thinking. “I'll be back shortly, and we can meet up with Mizuki and Ena after. Will you be okay?”
Kanade smiles. “Sounds good—don’t worry about me.”
So Mafuyu heads downstairs and out of the house, while Kanade works on the last part of the song. She makes a mental note to ask Mizuki or Ena about their lyricist—she can't seem to remember anything about her. She snaps on her earphones and takes a listen.
It's—good. Flowing, and warm, with major arpeggios on the piano softening the piece at certain intervals. And yet, something seems missing. The piece, Kanade thinks, only feels happy. Flat. There's nothing else behind it.
Then, she hits an unfinished part where the acoustic guitar drops into a gooey mess of discordant harmony and Kanade gets to work fixing it up. As she tweaks, she thinks about what's missing.
She can't seem to put her finger on it.
Kanade works until she catches the sound of Mafuyu returning home—then slumps over, head in her shoulders. A nap couldn’t hurt, could it?
When Kanade opens her eyes again, she finds herself in a blue-tinted music store, glancing over its offerings.
On one shelf, there's brass instruments—Kanade lingers over the trumpets—and on the other, there's guitars of all kinds. She weaves through hall after hall, studying the music stands and MIDI boards and percussion sets of all kinds.
Then, she's in the back of the store. She looks down. There’s the legs of a beautiful piano at her feet, and Kanade knows that there's something—someone—seated on the bench, waiting for her.
Kanade wonders how she feels. About everything. About her parents.
About her.
With bated breath, Kanade glances up—
“Kanade.” A hand is shaking her shoulder.
“Mmm?” Kanade shuffles around, sighing before pushing her head off her desk.
“We’ve got to meet with Mizuki and Ena, remember?”
“Mm… yeah.” There’s something nagging in Kanade's brain. Something she was supposed to remember. Buy milk? She’s unsure. “Mafuyu?”
Mafuyu turns.
“Have we run out of anything in the fridge?”
Mafuyu’s head tilts slightly to the side as she ponders. “I don’t think so. I went to the store a few days ago. Do you need something?”
“Ahh—nothing. Thanks for the heads up.” Kanade mentally files it away for another day.
3.
They’re all sitting together in Shibuya Cafe.
Mizuki laughs with Ena on one side of their shared table, while Mafuyu leans down to take a sip of her spicy wonton soup.
Kanade stares down at her food—noodles with a side of milk tea—and swears she’s missing something. She mirrors Mafuyu to take a sip of her noodles—but she recoils back.
Too much…
Too much.
The Thai tea she ordered upon the waiter’s recommendation sits, heavy and cloying, on her tongue. She stares down at it, too polite to say anything but unwilling to take another sip. I guess the illness also took my diner order, Kanade scoffs to herself.
Out of the corner of her eye, she sees Mafuyu shift, looking at her for a moment before inching slowly over, mouth opening as if wanting to say something—
“Kanade.”
It’s Ena who scoots her drink of oolong tea over to her.
“Something tells me,” Mizuki looks over at Ena with scrunched brows, and Ena swats her in the face without looking, “you might like this better.”
Kanade leans over and takes a small, experimental sip.
“It’s,” and she takes another sip, and another, relishing the light, floral taste, “really great.”
Ena laughs. “We can swap them, if you like it so much.”
She reaches over to grab the plastic cup of Thai tea, and Kanade catches a glance of her fingers. Long, slightly bony. An artist’s fingers.
Kanade blinks, struck by a half-settled dream.
“Ena,” Kanade mumbles, and Ena’s eyes turn up from the Thai tea to Kanade, “I’m sorry if this is weird, and you can say no if you want—but can I hold your hand?”
Silence. Kanade sees Ena’s eyes dart from Kanade’s hand, to Mizuki, to Mafuyu. From Kanade’s vantage point—leaned over—Mafuyu’s out of view.
Ena stiffens for a moment, then loosens.
“Ah—sure.”
Kanade takes her hand.
Warm.
Not her, Kanade concludes.
She goes back to her tea, and after a moment of quiet Mizuki strikes up a story that breaks the tension and gets Ena twisting to Mizuki, poking her in the side and groaning about her longwindedness.
Kanade laughs, turns to Mafuyu to say something—stops.
Mafuyu’s eyes are cold.
Jagged, like a shard of obsidian—staring at Ena.
Kanade doesn’t understand.
Why don’t I understand?
Mafuyu’s so familiar in a way she can’t place—sweetened congee and well-fitting schedules and intense eyes that Kanade can’t place, can’t find, can’t understand. She’s here, but she’s not there, not in the patchwork of memories that seem to fade and swell every time Kanade reaches for them. She’s familiar—but she’s nowhere.
Kanade doesn’t even register the coughs slipping out from her throat until she’s hacking away, her throat seizing like something’s forcing itself up her windpipe with metal claws that whittle and slash away at her skin.
“Shit,” Ena says, pushing herself from the table, “she needs—fuck—waiter!” On the other side of the diner, a head turns at her call, and Ena races toward the figure.
Mizuki races to the counter and hastily grabs a fistful of napkins, muttering a quiet sorry to whoever has to clean up the mess.
Mafuyu—Mafuyu’s frozen next to Kanade. Kanade looks at her out of the corner of her teary eye, and catches her stare—agonizing.
She’s not—moving?
“Mafuyu! Help her!” Mafuyu swivels her head to Ena who’s yelling from across the room, other customers be damned, and Mafuyu’s suddenly scooting over, clasping Kanade’s palm with one hand and placing her other hand on the small of her back.
“Breathe with me,” Mafuyu whispers, “one, two, three…”
Kanade’s heaving, trying to follow the best she can, but there’s something forcing its way up her throat that she can’t push down.
A wad of brown shoves itself into Kanade’s vision.
“Napkins,” she faintly hears Mizuki say.
Kanade grabs them and continues coughing away. Something slimy and warm unsticks itself from her throat, moving slowly with every shake and heave of Kanade’s shoulders. With one final cough—loud and violent—an object pushes itself from Kanade’s lips and into the napkin.
Kanade’s eyes clear.
Mizuki’s talking with Mafuyu worriedly, while Ena’s pushing a glass of water toward her. Kanade fingers the object hidden in her napkin and balls it up into her fist.
“Guys,” Kanade coughs, and the group swivel their heads towards her—”I think the waiter’s kind of freaked out.”
As she says that, the waiter—a teenage boy, some distance away from the girls with eyes blown wide at the spectacle—coughs and quickly looks away.
While the other three girls get up and profusely apologize to the waiter, Kanade uses the distraction as a chance to slip the napkin with the unidentified object into her pocket. It’s oddly warm and delicate under her fingers—she has to take care not to crumple it as it slides into the pocket of her pants.
Kanade reaches out and grasps the sleeve of Mafuyu’s sweater—with a jolt, Mafuyu turns to look at her.
“Let’s just,” Kanade does her best to smile, but it wobbles and falls off her face, “go home, okay? I’m fine.”
Mafuyu’s eyes are wide.
Ena sighs. “Are you sure, Kanade? I mean, that looked pretty serious. I think we have to get you to the doctor.”
Kanade shakes her head. “No, I’m fine, I just need a bit of rest.” Again, she looks back at Mafuyu. “Can we go?”
Mafuyu’s lips edge into a line, and she walks forward to Kanade. “If she’s not comfortable, then we shouldn’t go yet,” she says, back to Mizuki and Ena. “I’ll give her some of the medicine the doctor prescribed, and see if her condition calms down after that. Sorry for the trouble.”
Another look passes between the three girls—Kanade hates it, hates feeling left out—and after some hurried goodbyes and meal-paying, the group uneasily separates into duos and departs.
4.
“scrunched up flower”
“flower with lots of scrunched petals”
“white scrunched up flower with fringed and scrunched petals”
White carnations. A single white carnation sits on a brown diner napkin on Kanade’s desk. Kanade plays with a petal absentmindedly as she surfs the internet, trying to figure out the meaning behind it all.
White carnations, according to Flowerpedia, mean good luck and innocence.
According to Blooming Wild Wiki, they’re pure love and new beginnings.
In The Bouq Index, they mean remembrance.
Remembrance. The exact opposite of the holes in Kanade’s mind, the dreams she keeps having with no one to recall. What sort of disease could this possibly be?
Kanade drops the carnation petal to return to her keyboard.
“gaps in mind”
“gaps in mind mentally probably not dementia”
“memory loss flowers”
“coughing flowers”
The final search brings Kanade up to an old forum. In it, two users argue about a disease. One says her brother’s been coughing up flowers, spider lilies that burn and scrape his throat as they come out. They’ve seen blood. It started after their brother began falling for a girl.
The other user laughs at them, saying such a disease isn’t real. It’s only the thing you’d find in trashy romance novels or fanfiction—
Kanade squints.
<<im being fr, it seems really serious im really scared. Should i get him to a hospital?>>
<<haha are you kidding??? ur either seeing things or ur brother is playing a prank on u.>>
<<hanahaki isn’t real lol. stop karma farming>>
Kanade blinks. Her fingers move back to the search bar.
“what is hanahaki”
<<Hanahaki is a disease where due to unrequited love, a person coughs up flower petals from their lungs and/or respiratory tract. It is only curable by confession or surgery.>>
“hanahaki surgery”
<<Hanahaki surgery involves the removal of flower growths from inside a patient’s lungs in order to prevent the bloom, and eventual vomiting, of flowers. Side effects vary wildly, with some asserting that with the removal of such flower growths, the memories associated with the recipient of such love will also be expelled.
Note: relapses are life-threatening. After a surgery, if possible, it is best not to mention the past relationship between the patient and the trigger person.>>
Kanade lets out a breath. When waking from her surgery, she remembered speaking with Ena about N25.
Ena was the artist, Mizuki was the editor—despite all the years of music and MV’s made, when Kanade thinks about the lyricist, there’s a hole where a person should be.
Kanade navigates to Youtube and checks out N25’s channel—still strong, but with a few dips in subscriptions thanks to a hiatus called around the time of Kanade’s surgery. She clicks on a random video and scrolls to the credits.
<<Composer: K. Artist: Enanan. Editor/animator: Amia. Lyricist: Yuki.>>
Who is Yuki?
The name evokes nothing in her. Not a face, not a meeting, not an exchange, not even a text. Yuki. Kanade tries the word and finds it empty and uncomfortable on her tongue.
Yet—there must be something, some sort of virtual conversation, if not in-person, that the two have had before, if Yuki’s been the lyricist for so long.
Perhaps on Nightcord.
The next tab Kanade opens is Nightcord.
The next tab Kanade is defeated by is Nightcord.
For the life of her, Kanade can’t remember her password. She remembers her username perfectly fine, but she fails password attempt after attempt, each time denied until a timeout request has her account on lockdown until the following evening.
Kanade wants to slam her fist into the table, and almost does—only stopping when she sees the carnation right below her hand, about to be crushed.
Kanade sighs. She’s so close, yet so far.
Her phone, loose at the edge of the table, catches her eye. A plan, weak and trembling, forms in her mind.
*
<<Kanade!>>
<<Hey, Ena. Hope you’re well.>>
<<Hope I’m well? I hope you’re well! Are you getting enough rest? You know you should be resting after what happened in the diner. I better not catch you composing at midnight!>>
<<Haha, thanks for the reminder.>>
<<Happy to help. So… what’s up?>>
<<Ena?>>
<<Mhm?>>
<<Do you know someone named Yuki?>>
<<...>>
<<Hello?>>
<<Why?>>
<<She’s been our lyricist since the start of N25, but I can’t remember anything about her for the life of me.>>
<<...>>
<<Ena?>>
<<She’s—I mean—they’re—fuck. We don’t know them.>>
<<We don’t?>>
<<No.>>
<<Then how have we made so much music with them?>>
<<It’s a placeholder name for—for a bunch of random people we commissioned.>>
<<Ena. Please don’t lie to me.>>
<<I’m telling the truth.>>
<<Ena. Is it related to my Hanahaki?>>
Silence. Kanade pushes her ear closer to the phone.
<<Hello? Ena?>>
Another long beat of silence, so long Kanade thinks she’s hung up.
<<It’s not my place to say. Ask… ask Mafuyu. I’m sorry.>>
The line drops.
5.
“You know, eating all that instant ramen isn’t good for you. Your grandma pays you well enough for a decent lifestyle.”
“I know, I know, but grocery shopping takes so long, and I can never carry all the bags back to my house.”
“I can come with you.”
They grab a shopping tote from her house—Kanade doesn’t have much other than cardboard boxes in the way of item carriers—and head over to a local convenience store. The fluorescent lights are pale and oppressing, the rows and rows of food are bright and disorienting, and Kanade feels the exact same as she has felt on all her previous shopping trips—dismayed.
The one thing that keeps Kanade from walking out the store, grabbing a pack of instant noodles and calling it a day, is the firm hand in hers and the voice that walks her through all the things to get.
“Rice is always a good staple. I’ll grab some assorted vegetables—hm, pork is 25% off today. I’ll get that too. We can make some food, then box them for heating up when I’m not at home to cook.”
“Sure.”
Kanade squeezes her hand and they squeeze back—they make quick rounds through the store, gather up the groceries, and start the walk back to Kanade’s house.
Kanade smiles. “It’s nice having someone else around.” She blinks. Someone else?
The buildings of Shibuya distort—wobble, reminding Kanade of looking at stars through an open flame. The hand in Kanade’s hand is smooth then suddenly rough, cracked and callused then smooth and clean again—switching between sensations in high-speed motions that leave Kanade dizzy.
“Kanade,” and the voice is broken up, high-pitched but cracking low and back up without any semblance of tone, “who am I?”
“You’re.” Kanade knows. “You’re.” She knows, doesn’t she?
Kanade dares to look up, to peer into her face—
Kanade startles awake to the scrape of her front door.
“Mafuyu?”
“Hm?”
“Are you going out?”
“Yeah. Do you need something?”
“I'm alright for now.”
“Okay.”
Kanade hears the door swing shut before she can muster up anything else to say.
*
In the dining room, there's a thick blanket of silence that settles over the table.
Mafuyu’s buried in school books, noise-cancelling headphones on. A bowl of congee lays untouched next to her. Quickly, Mafuyu scribbles a few sentences down on a piece of paper, then puts the pencil up to her lips while looking at a book on anatomy. Kanade watches as she begins to chew at the tip absentmindedly.
Cute.
A violent cough flies out from Kanade’s lips.
Mafuyu blinks and looks at her. “Are you alright? Do you need water?”
Kanade shakes her head. “Ahh, I'm alright.” She takes a sip of the congee in front of her, demonstrating that her throat still works. After, Kanade fidgets with the spoon, watching as the ladle submerges into the congee. “Um, Mafuyu?”
Mafuyu takes her headphones off. “Hm?”
“Do you—um. I have a question.”
Kanade sees Mafuyu's fingers tighten on her head phone's earcaps. “Yes?”
“It's about this music group—N25.”
Mafuyu stands up—the table rattles at the sudden movement. Kanade jolts away from the sound.
“I'm sorry, I need to record something for this assignment. I'll go into one of your spare rooms.”
“W—wait! I can help!”
“No, you should eat and rest. Leave the bowl on the table, I'll clean up the rest soon.” Mafuyu gathers up her study materials and in thirty seconds flat, whisks herself out of the dining room.
Kanade’s left alone, staring at the two bowls of food on the table.
*
That's not right.
Kanade’s fingers ghost over her computer, tweaking melody lines. On a whim, she adds a bass line, hoping that it will ground the composition more. She clicks the play button and listens, before sighing and falling back.
The delete button is thick under her fingers as she presses, deleting the track. Still flat.
“It's time to go to bed, Kanade.”
Mafuyu is set up in an air mattress next to the bed, glasses on and reading a book. Her eyeglasses frame her face perfectly.
Kanade shakes her head. “Just one moment.” She presses a few more buttons, adding a guitar line instead. Maybe that will add more tension? A bit of keyboard under it for greater effect? She adds the instruments and listens again.
Flat.
“Kanade, you're still recovering.”
Kanade sighs. “Just give me a little longer.”
“Kanade.”
Kanade turns from her computer to Mafuyu’s cross face. “You're still healing,” Mafuyu says.
“From what?”
Kanade sees a shadow cross over Mafuyu’s face. “You don't need to know.”
Kanade’s lips purse. “Why not?”
“I'll tell you later.”
“Tell me it's Hanahaki?”
Mafuyu stiffens. Kanade sees the truth, fragile and fleeting, swirl in her eyes before it disappears under a thick layer of forced calm.
“It isn't.”
Kanade sighs again—louder this time. “Why are you keeping this hidden from me? I know it's Hanahaki.”
Mafuyu takes off her glasses and places down her book haphazardly, laying down in bed faced away from Kanade.
“You won't talk about N25 either,” Kanade continues.
Mafuyu flinches.
“Do you know who Yuki is?”
Mafuyu’s voice is harsh, spoken through gritted teeth. “I don't know who that is.”
“Are you sure? Because you're one of the few people I can't seem to recall. Yuki as well. Ena keeps trying to convince me that it's the people we commissioned.”
“Ena again.”
“What’s wrong with Ena?”
Mafuyu’s figure is motionless. “Seems like you like her a lot.”
Kanade blinks. Something's not right. Mafuyu occupies her life so familiarly, but she doesn't remember speaking to her at all before the surgery. Yuki, who’s been working with N25 for years, is a blank spot in her mind.
“Mafuyu.”
Kanade’s not sure if she can believe it.
“Mafuyu, are you—”
Blood. There's blood on the computer screen and keyboard, and there's flower petals falling from Kanade’s throat and she's coughing, vomiting up carnations dyed red in numbers Kanade’s never thrown up before.
They claw up her throat and pool in her mouth in droves that push violently against Kanade’s mouth, forcing her to open her lips and let a stream of throat tissue and blood-speckled carnations out.
Kanade’s in the worst pain she's ever been in her life, worse than the nights of sleep deprivation and hunger and thirst from working at the keyboard. This pain is sharp and piercing, stabbing and pulling at Kanade’s throat like a pack of wolves pulling at the carcass of a dead animal.
A stream of tears, thin and steady, flow from Kanade’s eyes. In the background, she can feel herself being moved into a trash can to expunge the rest of the carnations.
“Breathe, Kanade, breathe.” But she can't, and Kanade shakes her head once before she heaves over the trash can again and expels another stream of petals.
“Fuck—one, two, three, breathe. Please, Kanade, please.” Mafuyu’s voice is thick and heavy.
Kanade focuses as much as she can, tries to get out everything trapped in her airway, and bit by bit the flowers start to slacken and fall.
“One, two, three. One, two, three. One, two.”
A final steam of blood leaks out of Kanade’s lips. They stay like that for a bit, Kanade leaning over the trash and Mafuyu next to her, until Kanade musters up the energy to push herself away and force her head up to Mafuyu.
“Thanks, Mafuyu.” Kanade coughs. “I—”
She stops.
Mafuyu’s face is white, wide-eyed with lips chewed almost down to drawing blood. Slowly, she backs away from Kanade, one step after another until she's back against the door, away from Kanade.
“This,” Kanade barely captures the whisper that ghosts from Mafuyu’s lips, “this—is my fault.”
“Mafuyu?”
“I—I have to go. Water’s on the counter, take some of the pills the doctor gave you. Schedule an appointment as soon as you can.”
“Mafuyu.”
Mafuyu opens the door. She gazes into Kanade’s face and Kanade is struck by how heartbroken her eyes look.
“You're relapsing. And it's my fault. Please—have a better life. Without me.”
The door slams shut behind her. To Kanade, it sounds uncomfortably like a coffin slamming shut.
*
After one long, excruciating moment, Kanade moves sluggishly over—not thinking about Mafuyu, not thinking about what just happened, not thinking about it lest the pain in her throat and the confusion comes again—and grabs her phone, half walking and half crawling her way to the door.
Her doctor’s number is in reach. If she just schedules a quick thing today, saying it’s an emergency, he should be there. He said to schedule for follow-ups. She should schedule. In fact, why hadn’t she scheduled already?
Kanade opens her phone, dials the number, gets ready to make the call and put this whirlwind of confusion, of lost notes and half-buried pain behind her—but downstairs, Kanade hears speaking.
Not speaking as much as rambling—it’s a voice that’s husky, filled with pain and tears that pushes at Kanade’s throat and gets her fingers to hitch away from the call button.
It’s Mafuyu’s voice. Crying.
And some fragment of her, dreamlike and forgotten, pushes the phone aside to listen.
<<Mizuki.>>
<<Mafuyu! Are—are you okay?>>
<<I… can’t do this anymore.>>
<<What? What happened? I’m coming over right now.>>
<<Don’t. Please. You’re at work, right? I don’t want you to take off from it.>>
<<I can ask Ena?>>
<<No. It’ll startle Kanade. She’s scheduling a follow-up with the doctor.>>
<<That’s right, it’s been a week or so, hasn’t it?>>
<<Yes. I urged her. She’s—relapsing.>>
<<...Did something happen between you two?>>
<<No—hic—yes. I think she’s figuring out the pieces, and I know I told you guys not to tell her anything in case this happens and that I’d find her another caretaker soon enough, but…>>
<<...>>
<<Damnit. She’s just—I can’t pretend anymore.>>
<<Mafuyu.>>
<<I’m hurting her by being there—I know—but some part of me can’t bear to leave her behind. I never got to tell her anything before—before she was rushed into surgery.>>
<<You know that wasn’t your fault.>>
<<Yes, but—Honami was the one who found her, who brought her to the hospital. She was going to die, Mizuki. And I wasn’t there to help her. I’m so selfish. By being with her, I’ve hurt her—I’m still hurting her—but I can’t leave her. She’s relapsing. And it’s all my fault.>>
A stilted laugh.
<<And guess what? I couldn’t even tell her the truth—my truth—before Kanade left. And now, she’s forgotten me entirely.>>
Kanade can’t breathe. Her head begins to cloud, struck with glimpses into a past that boil over, shards of long purple hair and half-set smiles and warmth that crash into her in waves and burn off, leaving her on the ground and gasping away. She can feel her lungs tearing themselves into pieces.
Three memories come to her as she lies prone on the ground:
A picnic amongst carnations at sunset. There’s a hand in hers, and when Kanade turns, she sees Mafuyu’s face, warm against the fading sunlight.
A music room. Kanade glances at the trumpets, looks to the guitars, swerves around the music stands and writing utensils and finds that all there’s nothing else she’s thinking but Mafuyu, Mafuyu, Mafuyu.
A grocery store. “You're Mafuyu.” Mafuyu tilts her head and blinks at her, her eyes glimmering in a way that makes Kanade want to latch onto her collar and pull her in, taste her lips and feel her breath on hers.
Each memory brings about a painful jab in her lungs that makes Kanade wheeze. When she brings herself to open her eyes just a crack, Kanade sees dark blood, along with red-speckled carnations, splattered against the floor. On the sheet music, too, she thinks hazily. I’ll need to clean that up later. Another cough rattles Kanade’s throat and a thin rivulet of blood spurts out from her lips.
Mafuyu. How could she have forgotten?
Her lyricist. Her partner. Her friend.
Someone who’d never love Kanade—useless as she is, weak as she is, stupid in love as she is—back.
Something dark buzzes in the corner of Kanade’s vision. After a few moments of prolonged buzzes, Kanade reaches out—sluggishly, like pulling her arm through pudding—and touches the item. Her phone. She tries to grab it once, but her fingers don’t obey her.
The second time, she makes it and switches it on. Mafuyu’s caller ID—light purple with a snowflake, exactly Yuki’s profile—flashes.
With great effort, Kanade moves her finger to the green button. She misses. Once. Twice. She coughs, and another spittle of blood flies from her mouth and onto the floor. Finally:
<<Mafuyu. Yuki.>>
<<Kana—>>
<<I know the truth. It’s you. It’s… always been you.>>
Kanade coughs, and this time the carnations come in droves, pulling themselves out of Kanade’s mouth and onto the ground. Hazily, Kanade notices that the flowers have grown stems.
<<Kanade—>>
<<Come up and let’s talk. Please. I… haha—I don’t think I can hold up for much longer.>>
Kanade closes her eyes and memories continue to fall around her in a slow wave. She doesn’t find the idea of dying too terrible. Not if it’s for her, anyways.
Mafuyu—forgive me.
1.
An aquarium. The light is blue and calming. Kanade puts her hand against the glass and watches a small group of fish—around seven or eight—swim around in little circles. After a moment, they disperse as quickly as they came, followed by a massive whale that takes up Kanade's entire view. The whale stops—Kanade feels like its eyes fixate right on her—then bellows a long and soothing tone.
There’s a presence next to her. The voice that speaks is dark and lilting.
“Is this how you want it to end?”
Kanade, without looking, presses her hand harder to the glass, watching how the smaller fish dart under the whale to gather around her fingers, curious and observing.
“I’m not sure. But in terms of endings…”
Kanade turns her head. Mafuyu, clad in her cardigan and brown pants, looks back. Her expression is empty.
Kanade breaks into a soft smile. “In terms of endings, I don’t mind this one.”
“You don’t mind?”
“I won’t burden you anymore with my rotten feelings. You can be free now. Free and away from the person who held you back.”
Mafuyu’s face does not change.
“I’m selfish, you know?” Kanade scoffs quietly. “I’m weak. And hanahaki on top of that—I must have worried you all so much. It would be easier…”
Somehow, for all Kanade means them, the last few words don’t leave her lips. They stay stuck in her throat, still and quiet until Kanade makes another effort to spur them on.
“It—it would be easier to just let me go.”
Mafuyu walks up to her. Slowly, with one step, then another, and another, and another until she’s pressed Kanade against the aquarium.
Kanade coughs at the contact, tries to wriggle away, but Mafuyu grabs her arms with her hands and presses them harshly against the smooth glass, scaring the fish away.
“And who will make songs then?” Mafuyu’s voice is low, razor-like and thin.
“I—”
“Who will help Ena with her art projects? Who will help Mizuki find inspiration for her videos? Who will guide N25?” Mafuyu continues, leaning in until she’s nose to nose with Kanade, speaking in a tone that’s close to threatening.
“Who will live with me? Who will sit next to me in Shibuya Diner? Who will speak with me to my mother?” Mafuyu's eyes are bleak and terrifying. “Who, Kanade—who will save me?”
Mafuyu lets go. Kanade’s arms slump down. Neither of them move. “You say you’re burdening me with your feelings—but have you ever considered what I might think?”
“I do, that’s why—”
“No. You’re unfair, Kanade,” and Kanade catches the beginning of tears near Mafuyu’s eyes, “you’re so unfair. You pour into others without thinking once for yourself. And when you finally feel for yourself—you shut yourself away, assuming you’ll be a burden on others.”
Tears fall freely from Mafuyu’s eyes. “Wake up, Kanade. Please.”
Has Kanade been sleeping? She looks past Mafuyu, out to the corridor, and there’s a blue glow of light beyond that pulses. It seems so appealing. “I think—”
“No. You’re not going there—not yet.”
Mafuyu walks forward, pulls Kanade into a hug.
“I’m sorry to do this,” she whispers, her face in Kanade’s jacket, “but this is the only way.”
Suddenly, Mafuyu squeezes as hard as she can around Kanade’s waist. The flowers, immobile in Kanade’s lungs, lurch violently at the movement, and Kanade coughs, falling to her knees and vomiting again and again and again and again—
Waking up to Mafuyu’s face, pale and terrified.
*
<<Come up and let’s talk. Please. I… haha—I don’t think I can hold up for much longer.>>
Mafuyu sits at the foot of Kanade’s stairs, immobilized.
Kanade figured it out. And so quickly, though it wasn’t like Mafuyu did her best to hide it.
Mafuyu could have concealed it better—could have removed all trace of her from Kanade’s home the day Kanade was checked into the hospital, could have moved back in with her parents, could have said her goodbyes to N25 and spent the rest of her days buried in her studies and avoiding Kanade like the plague—but she didn’t.
And now Kanade’s upstairs, coughing on the blood and flowers that Mafuyu forced from her. Choking on feelings that Mafuyu pushed onto her.
For all the textbooks that Mafuyu’s read, she’s never encountered one that mentions Hanahaki in great detail. How could they? Most of them were dusty books written by old men who thought it a myth. But—Kanade’s illness came about because of her. It worsened because of her.
The first step of recovery is removing the problem. How can Kanade still want to look at her—speak to her, after all Mafuyu’s done?
No. Mafuyu shakes her head, descending from her place on the stairs. I’ll call an ambulance. They’ll take Kanade away, make her better, and I’ll use that time she’s in the hospital to leave. Truly leave. I refuse to hurt her again.
<<...selfish…>>
Mafuyu freezes. Her phone, left at the bottom of the steps, displays Kanade’s Caller ID—still there, still present, with the time still running. She hadn’t hung up.
<<...weak…hanahaki on top of that…worried you all…much.>>
Mafuyu swipes up the phone, shoving it against her ear.
<<...easier to just let me go.>>
And that’s the problem, isn’t it?
It would be easy to let her go. Mafuyu could call the hospital, run away, and never speak to her or N25 again. That—that would be easier than steeling herself, climbing the stairs, and facing the music. It would be easy to leave Kanade, gasping for breath in her home—alone. Again.
It would be easy to run away.
But before—and now, even after all this time, after the surgery and the forgetting and the pain—Kanade still looks at her, still smiles at her, still treats her with warmth and kindness and understanding. How could Mafuyu have considered fleeing, leaving Kanade alone in the night in flowers and blood to await roaring sirens and impersonal hospital lights?
Mafuyu’s legs start moving before her mind catches up—ascending the stairs two at a time, wheeling around the balustrade and racing down the corridor and slamming open Kanade’s door to see Kanade lying on the floor, covered in blood and red-stained flowers.
She falls to her knees and pulls Kanade into her arms, ignoring the blood that starts to cling onto her clothes. When she presses her finger into Kanade’s neck, she feels a pulse—faint—but Kanade’s eyes are shut, only fluttering momentarily open to whisper quiet words that fail to reach Mafuyu’s brain.
Mafuyu shakes Kanade once, twice, thrice. No reaction.
“Damn it,” Mafuyu whispers. “Wake up, Kanade.” But no matter how hard she tries, Kanade stays quiet and unmoving.
“Fuck.” Maybe there’s something else she can do. “I’m sorry, Kanade,” Mafuyu pulls Kanade into a hug, feeling for her ribs, “this—might hurt.” By pressing on her ribs, and subsequently her lungs, Mafuyu forces the flowers in Kanade’s body to move, up Kanade’s throat and past Kanade’s lips in one violent motion that causes inky liquid to fly from Kanade’s mouth onto the back of Mafuyu’s cardigan.
Kanade’s eyes fly open. “Mafu—Mafuyu?”
“I’m here, Kanade.”
“You came.”
“And I’m not leaving you.”
Kanade’s eyes well up with tears.
“The ambulance should be on its way by now. I’ll stay with you the entire time.”
“Will they take the flowers out again?”
“If they can—I don’t know the success statistics about relapses.”
“Will I forget you again?”
Mafuyu's eyes knit together. “I think so. You should, if the surgery is a success.”
Kanade shakes her head. “I don’t want it.”
“What?”
“No.” Kanade’s voice is tinny and hushed. “I remember it now. All of it. Every moment we’ve spent together—every time we’ve laughed, every time we’ve cried, every time we’ve done nothing but chores around the house together. I don’t care if my love is rotten, I don’t care if it’s unrequited,” with all the strength left in her hand, Kanade reaches up and cradles the side of Mafuyu’s face, memorizing the texture and feel underneath her fingertips, “I don’t care.”
“Mafuyu, I love you. And I won’t forget you again.”
One beat of silence.
Two. Mafuyu’s eyes steel into an emotion Kanade can’t place.
And three:
“Then you better remember this,” Mafuyu breathes softly, her hands framing Kanade’s face, before she leans in.
Kanade’s heart leaps into her throat. Mafuyu’s lips connect with hers, and it feels like a million stars colliding in the sky, like a weight released from her shoulders that she had been entirely unable of remembering.
Mafuyu laughs a little, a tiny vibration that Kanade can feel in her own chest. When they pull away, Mafuyu’s eyes are shining.
It’s a while before Kanade can speak again, her head feeling like it’s about to fly away from her body. She lets out a soft chuckle. “I can’t believe it.”
Mafuyu’s eyes crinkle, then they widen. “Wait. Your voice.”
Kanade’s voice, quiet and hushed from the flowers clogging her throat, now sounds clean and full. Kanade takes a breath and it's clean and painless—no hitching of the throat or seizing of the lungs. Kanade can’t believe it.
She’s free. Well and truly free.
She laughs—fully and boisterously—and Kanade and Mafuyu fold into each other, Kanade’s arms over Mafuyu’s shoulders and Mafuyu’s arms over Kanade’s chest. The sounds of the ambulances, approaching the door, do nothing to dampen their spirits—away from the pain, away from the tears.
Together.
_____
“I can’t believe you landed yourself in the hospital again,” Ena says, shaking her head.
Kanade scratches her head. “Haha… sorry?”
“Ena, that’s insensitive.” Mafuyu, in a chair next to Kanade’s bed, turns and glares daggers into Ena.
Ena stumbles two paces back. “I’m just joking, I swear.”
“Apologize.”
Kanade squeezes Mafuyu’s hand, intertwined in hers. “She doesn’t need to do that. You don’t need to do that, Ena.” Mafuyu, uncharacteristically clingy, slings an arm over Kanade’s shoulder and pulls her in.
Mizuki strides over, carrying a tray of oatmeal and orange juice and placing it down on a nearby table. “Jeez, you lovebirds are all over each other.”
Kanade smiles. “To be fair, we both went through a lot before we ended up like this.”
Mizuki shakes her head. “Miscommunication is the devil.” She walks over and pats Ena’s head. “Good thing we aren’t like that.”
Ena gnashes her teeth. “You,” she grits out, “are the devil.”
“That’s not what you called me last night—”
“Shut it.”
Kanade turns to Mafuyu. “It’s funny that we ended up back here, right?”
Mafuyu shrugs. “Sure, the flowers receded, but they still had to patch up your internal damage.”
Kanade sighs. “I know.” She looks back out on the scene—Mizuki and Ena fighting, Mafuyu sitting beside her with their hands twined together—they may be in the hospital, but Kanade feels a sense of contentment that flows throughout her body. Mafuyu brings a sense of melody, dark and simmering, but contrasting beautifully with the harmony of the scene. All together, the song of N25 is perfect.
She leans into Mafuyu’s shoulder. “I’m sorry for your cardigan.”
“I have many more at home.”
“Maybe we should keep it—keepsake?”
Mafuyu shifts uneasily. “I’d rather not.”
Kanade looks past her to her nightstand, where a bundle of flowers rests upon the table. Carnations from N25 and Honami. Funny.
“I’m happy.”
“Even with you in the hospital?”
“Even so. I’m happy I’m with you, Mafuyu.”
Mafuyu sighs, settling into the crook of Kanade’s head. “Me too. But don’t scare me like that again.”
“I’ll try my best not to.”
“Oi, Kanade!” Mizuki flashes a grin. “If you ever get sick of Mafuyu, you can always hang out with me and Ena instead—ow!”
She crumples to the floor, Mafuyu looming over her with a glare like a red-hot sun firing directly into her face. Mafuyu’s eyes turn stone cold. “Ena—do you agree with this?”
Ena shakes her head rapidly, stepping away from Mafuyu until her back hits the wall and she slumps down, hands protectively covering her head. “Nah, nah, she’s joking. I’m good. Spend as much time together as you want, you guys.”
Kanade laughs. Against all odds, she’s alive—alive and well, surrounded by people she loves.
She’s happy. And she wouldn’t trade this ending for anything else.