Heya
Tw: Body horror, kinda? Fictional illnesses.

So, random thing. And I'm putting this in the DR book because I don't know what else to put it in. Anyway— There are a lot of romance fan fics that feature the "Hanahaki Disease." You've probably heard of it, but if you haven't, it's a fictional disease where Character A has feelings for Character B, but that character doesn't love them back, and Character A falls ill and starts coughing up flower petals. The character will usually continue to cough up the petals until the flowers grow from their lung all the way up to their throat and suffocate them. The only cure is to get your feelings out and/or have the character they love, love them back.
It's very sad, and it's super angsty for a romance subplot, and whatever. Fun plot. HOWEVER, I've seen this shit be done to death. TOO MUCH! To much has it been done. Also, it's kinda gross. The characters will throw up flowers, blood, and others to that like, and sometimes it's too gross for me. I get that their going for the angst, but there's so much of it. There's only one Hanahaki story that I've genuinely liked, and I think the creator took it down recently. 😭
And so the other day I was scrolling down Instagram, and I actually found something way cooler! It's called "Star Tear Disease." It's the same story of unreturned love, except the victim cries small glowing stars and golden (or any other color) liquid from their eyes. And when the victim does cry, the tears sound like crystals or make a crystalline sound when landing somewhere. I personally think it's way better and much less gross than coughing up blood and flowers. But it also Doesn't kill the character! Instead, if it goes on too long, the character begins to lose the ability to see color, or lose sight entirely (but that's more rare.) The cure remains the same, as far as I know.
It's also said to be a lot weirder on the emotional effects or the victim. Like, have you ever started crying, and then never wanted to stop? It apparently makes the character want to keep crying and crying, because crying makes them feel better, but instead, it just fucks them up even more.
Does that mean that a character could get addicted to crying??? Should that character put off telling the person that they love them, just so they can stay in the depressive and pitiable state????????
This is SO MUCH COOLER THAN FLOWERS. Right??? Im so sick of blood and flowers. Like, yeah, it was a cool aesthetic, but now I want STARS, baby!
I might try and write this in the future, but idk. Feel free to beat me too it though. This is so cooool!

But yeah, thanks for listening to my TedTalk.
- Bori

(PS: The Instagram account that brought the disease to my mind was @ feefal . They have great art, go look at them!)

_____________________________