Requested: noooope!

Title: Hanahaki

JD's POV

I really had to question my entire life the first time I hacked up a rose petal in the 7-Eleven parking lot.

When I got home I did research on what it meant when that happened. I certainly didn't remember eating a flower, so why the hell was I coughing one up?

It turned out, I had a rare disease called Hanahaki. Caused by unrequited love, this disease caused people to grow flowers in their lungs and cough them up, eventually either choking to death on them or coughing out the last petal when their loved one returned their feelings.

Well, shit.

That brought me to now, a week later in my English class. I was sitting next to (y/n) (l/n), the most beautiful girl I'd ever seen and the person who brought this awful disease on me. It wasn't her fault, per say, considering I was pretty sure she didn't even know my name, so how could she possibly love me?

I turned away from her to cough, my eyes widening at the couple of petals now on my black sleeve. I needed to start bringing tissues to school, I realized. I quickly tucked them in the pocket of my trench coat, before turning back and seeing (y/n)'s concerned look from the corner of my eye.

"Are you okay? You've been coughing a lot lately." She whispered. I, unbelievably flustered, nodded.

"Yeah, just a bad cold." I whispered back.

"Oh, I get those all the time. Want a cough drop? I carry them with me." She asked, tucking a shiny (h/c) strand of hair behind her ear. I nodded gratefully, and in a flash she bent to retrieve on from her gray galaxy print backpack.

"Why do you get sick so much?" I asked quietly, vaguely aware of the teacher glaring at us, since we were supposed to be working on a paper. Not my fault I was done and an actual angel started a conversation with me.

"I'm a vocalist and I have to belt a lot, so it gets my voice weak and I get coughs then. It's kinda weird I guess." She said, an entrancing sparkle in her eyes that made my stomach twist in knots. Yep, definitely in love with her.

"No, it's not weird! I'm sure you're a great singer." I told her gently. She smiled brighter than any star in the sky at that comment.

"Man, never even heard that from my own parents. Hey, wanna come over later? You seem cool, and I have tea which can help with coughing." She offered. I nodded before she even finished speaking. "Awesome! I'll give you my number so I can text where to meet up, since I take the bus. Mrs. Glenn is gonna have our heads if we keep talking."

"You take the bus? I have a motorcycle, I can give you a ride." I offered when she turned away. She glanced back at me, grinning.

"That's so cool! I'll have to take you up on that." She said with the cheeky grin that made my heart flutter and a cough rip through my throat. I looked down, thanking any deity that could possibly exist no petal came out. I could feel it in my mouth, so I'd just have to discreetly spit it in a tissue later.

(y/n)'s POV

It was nice talking to the kinda-cute guy who sat next to me in English. He was nice, and I looked forward to hanging out today. I scribbled down my number on the edge of a piece of notebook paper in the most readable handwriting I could muster and slipped it to him, signing it as "(y/n) :)"

He quickly stuffed it in his pocket with a giddy grin. I focused my attention back on my laptop, writing out my paper. He seemingly did the same, since I could hear the clacking of his keyboard continually through the period.

The bell rang after a while, and I picked up my backpack, tucking my laptop in it's case inside it.

"I'll meet you at the main doors after school, yeah?" I asked, slinging my bag over my shoulder. When he nodded I smiled and waved.

That became a routine. Every day we'd hang out at my house, besides the occasional day when his father wasn't home and we'd go to his house.

His cough had been getting worse, to the point where every couple minutes he'd go deep pink, and even coughed into tissues. What kind of teenage guy coughs into a fucking tissue?

This was one of those days when we were at his house, and during a particularly rough coughing fit he went to the bathroom, probably for a tissue or to get water or something.

In his rush to get to out of the room, he dropped something small and pink. When I stepped closer, I realized it was a rose petal. Why did he have a rose petal with him? I'd have to ask him when he got out.

Before that happened, heavy footsteps could be heard on the stairs, since we were in the basement.

A middle aged man with slicked back, black but graying hair came into sight. His gaze immediately latched onto me, making me feel unbelievably awkward despite doing nothing wrong.

"Who the hell are you?" He asked in a booming voice. I shrunk back, folding my hands uncomfortably.

"I'm (y/n), a friend of JD's." I explained, sounding more confident than I felt under the man's scrutiny.

"Then how come I've never seen you before?" He asked smugly, reaching the bottom of the stairs.

"We mostly hang out at my house, since it's closer to school." I told him. Just then, JD came back in, looking between the two of us.

"Jason, why haven't you introduced me to this girl before?" The man asked. JD stepped closer to me, standing slightly in front of me protectively. The gesture tugged a smile onto my face.

"Well, pops, you've just never been around when we were together." He said easily. The man seemed satisfied, grabbing a beer from the fridge and making his way back upstairs.

"Sorry about him," JD apologized, turning to face me. I smiled up at him, considering he towered over me, and shook my head.

"You don't need to be sorry. Hey, I saw a rose petal on the ground earlier, what's that about?" I asked casually. He froze, as if I'd asked him to reveal his greatest secret.

"If I tell you, you have to keep this secret alright?" He nearly whispered, still looking like a deer in headlights when I nodded.

"Yeah, sure, what's wrong? You can tell me anything, right?" I said carefully, guiding him to the couch to sit.

"Ok, here we go. There's this disease called hanahaki, and you get it when you're so in love with someone who doesn't love you back, that a flower grows in your lungs. You cough it up, and it grows until you choke to death on it, or they eventually return your feelings and the last petal gets coughed up. I've had it for three weeks or so." He explained. I creased my eyebrows, nodding along as I listened.

"Whoever you love is an idiot if she doesn't like you back." I scoffed teasingly. Some pinprick in my chest hurt at the thought of him loving some lucky person, but I suppressed it. I surely didn't have a crush on him. Nope, no way.

"No, she's pretty great actually." He said with this starry, dreamlike look crossing his face.

"Damn, you're real smitten. What're you gonna do?"

"What can I do?" He snorted, studying my face.

"You can win her over, or try to move on. I'm sure it can't be hard to get her to like you. You're a total package." I explained.

"As if." He laughed, as if he couldn't even entertain the idea of the girl liking him.

"I'm serious! Look, you're smart, funny, super cool, and a really sweet guy, JD. Plus, and I say this as platonically as possible, you're pretty hot." I told him, slapping his arm playfully.

"And yet, this girl is very far out of my league." He said wistfully, only half joking.

Just then my phone buzzed in my hoodie pocket, and when I got it out I saw a text from my mom that she wanted me home.

"Oh, looks like I gotta motor. The birth giver wants me home. Later!" I told him, giving him one last punch on the shoulder.

"Need a ride home?" He asked, getting up at lightning speed.

"Nope, it's pretty close and it's a nice day, I wouldn't mind walking. See you in English!" I said, pummeling up the stairs and carefully avoiding JD's dad as I left.

The next week or so, JD was continually getting worse and worse. Now he'd heave up multiple petals at a time, always dappled in blood. His voice was now a bit raspy from the coughing and the thorns constantly in his throat.

We'd started going to 7-Eleven a lot after he revealed it was his favorite place ever, and that the cold slushees soothed his throat.

We were now in the convenient store's parking lot, with me nibbling a Red Vine and him drinking a cherry flavored slushee, his favorite.

"So, have you made a move on this girl yet? It's been a month, how is she not absolutely smitten?" I asked, bumping my shoulder with his. He leaned into the contact, being extremely touch starved.

"At this point, I've accepted my fate. I'm gonna die pining for her, but at least I got to know her in my lifetime. I'd rather die loving her more than anything, rather than live without her." He stated. My heart ached at the very thought, so I grabbed his hand comfortingly.

"Goddamn are you trying to break my heart? Don't talk like that, idiot. She's going to fall for you. I just know it." I told him. I'd now accepted that I had a small crush on him, but it didn't matter because he was absolutely smitten with someone else.

"Careful, you keep talking like that and I might believe you. I've come to terms with it, (y/n). Don't try to get my hopes up. I know you-" he was interrupted by another coughing fit, and I was alarmed at the deep shade of red his face went, and the solid minute it took to hack up the bloody petals. There were 3 of them, connected by some awfully thorny stem.

"This is bullshit, JD. This chick doesn't know what she's missing. And I'm gonna be really selfish here, because now that we're friends I don't know how I'll live without you." I said, realizing that even through his coughing, his hand was still wound around mine. I squeezed it gently, looking up into his eyes.

He looked at me for a moment, so close that of either of us chose to lean in our lips would connect. I shrugged it off, scooting a bit away for good measure.

That was the moment I fell in love with him. I loved a dead man walking, the boy who made me laugh and melt at the same time. In the shitty 7-Eleven parking lot of all places.

"Hey, I should go. I have rehearsal in like an hour. I'll see you tomorrow though?" I asked awkwardly. He nodded, leading the way to his motorcycle. We rode it a lot, but climbing on and clinging to his waist felt different now after realizing this.

My life was a whole bunch of crap, huh?

He dropped me off at my house with that smile that was so soft and kind, and if never seen him give it to someone else. It made me kind of hope it was me he loved, but it couldn't be. And I also didn't want to put him through that much pain.

A couple days later we were at my house, lounging on my bed and the desk chair lazily.

"Ya know, I haven't heard you coughing much the last couple days. You hiding something, JD?" I asked tiredly, not bothering to lift my head and look at him. It had been a long week, and it was finally Friday.

"Nope, I've been getting better, actually." He corrected, with a knowing tone in his voice. I could feel him staring at me, so I looked up to see his soft and loving face once again.

"Did you get over her? Ready to move on, play the field, sleep with everything you see?" I asked playfully, swinging my legs off the bed to sit up.

"No, I'm still very much into her." He said quietly, getting up and moving to sit right next to me. We were close enough that our hips touched, but neither of us pulled away.

"Well lucky you." I whispered, my eyes flickering down to his lips. I saw him smirk, and looked up. I always imagined how soft they were, and I had given up on finding out.

"She's amazing, you know. She takes my breath away every time I look at her." He whispered, leaning closer. I smiled, and I saw him glance down at my lips, just fueling my smile more.

"And who might she be?" I whispered, leaning impossibly closer so our noses were touching.

"Her name," he took a pause, moving a hand to brush some hair from my face. "Is (y/n) (l/n)."

That was enough prompting for me to lean forward and finally connect our lips. My eyes fluttered shut, and somehow my hands found his hair and threaded themselves in it.

I was right, his lips were incredibly soft.

When we pulled away, he chuckled, looking at me with so much love and adoration I felt like I could burst.

"Those damn bloody roses were so worth it." He whispered. I laughed, making him laugh too.

God, this was the dork I loved.

(2361 words)