Work Text:
Commissioned Art by Ere (Tumblr linked)
Kokichi corners Kaito one day. All bright eyes and sweet smile.
“What do flowers taste like?”
Kaito doesn’t bluster. He doesn’t act confused. He doesn’t deny it. If anything, Kokichi sees something resigned come over him. Like he had been waiting for this.
“Blood.” Kaito says after a while.
Kokichi frowns. “Boring.”
-
Kokichi spends a few days threatening to expose Kaito. Mocking him in groups. Asking him pointed questions in front of the others. What’s your favorite kind of flower, Kaito? Iiiiis it cactus’? No?? Iiiiiiiiis iiiiiiiiiit sunflowers? Ooooh, wouldn’t it suck if your favorite was sunflowers? No? One more guess, one more guess!!
Is it carnations?
Kaito gets annoyed at Kokichi’s taunting, especially as their friends look more and more confused. They can tell Kokichi’s being mean, but they can’t figure out how. No one else has seen Kaito’s coughing. The blood spots. The flowers, wet and mangled and wrapped in tissue paper and buried in the closest trash bin Kaito can find. Kokichi had never actually seen Kaito spit up the plants either. He had found the carnations searching through the trash, searching for what Kaito had just dumped. Don’t ask why. It was gonna be a great prank. But Kaito was always careful to spit them up when he was alone.
Kokichi wondered how he managed it.
Did Kaito just hold the flowers in his throat? Smiling like nothing was wrong, while the inside of his throat was torn to shreds, blood coating his tongue as stems pushed up through his wind-pipes, pushing forward and forward white, thick flowers with red edges to their petals. All tinted pink, but Kokichi guessed that was more from having come from inside Kaito, than what the flowers were actually supposed to look like.
The flowers are big. One was the size of Kokichi’s fist.
Kokichi wonders how Kaito didn’t choke on it.
-
“Why don’t you just confess to whoever you’re in love with?” Kokichi asked.
Kaito was working on the school’s garden. Pulling weeds from the flowers. Kokichi thought it was ironic, that Kaito was trying to keep flowers from choking, while choking on them himself.
“Just drop it, Kokichi, I don’t want to talk about it.”
“Just gonna roll over and die instead?”
“It’s not killing me.”
“Ooooooh,” Kokichi said, an exaggerated innocence coming over his face, as he touched lightly at his bottom lip, “And here I thought hanahaki was the deadly flower disease. I must have gotten it confused with the totally harmless version of plants growing in your lungs! Nee-heehee, that’s my bad!”
“I’m fine.” Kaito said again, “I’m taking medicine.”
“Wait, you’ve been diagnosed already?” Kokichi asked, tilting his head curiously, “How long have you had this?”
Kaito didn’t answer. He just went back to weeding the flowers. Cutting the stems with expert care.
-
“Is it Shuichi?”
“Shuichi?” Kaito frowned, “Why would it be Shuichi?”
“Pfffff, seriously? The way you fuss over him, constantly seeking him out? Ruffling his hair all the time, hugging him whenever you have a chance, you couldn’t be more obvious—”
“Shuichi loves me.” Kaito said. “We’ve been best friends since middle school. You really think Shuichi would be capable of breaking my heart to the point spores can get in?”
“…no, wait, that’s dumb. Are you just in denial? If the guy you love, loves you back—”
“Loves not an exclusive feeling, Kokichi,” Kaito said, going back to his textbook, the two tucked away in the library as Shuichi went to find the book he needed, “And it’s not always romantic.”
Kokichi sneered, “The kind that can kill you always is.”
“You’re so naive.”
-
Kokichi doesn’t talk to Kaito for a few days.
Let the dumbass choke on his denial.
-
“If it’s not romantic love, then what, are your feelings for Maki, like, some weird pseudo brother thing?”
“Maki loves me.” Kaito said, resting against the fence and wiping his face with a hand towel, keeping an eye out as Maki went to run another lap. “Just stop guessing. I’m not dying.”
“You stopped vomiting flowers?”
“…” Kaito sighed, “I’m fine. I’m lucky. It’s manageable.”
“I looked up the mortality rate for hanahaki disease. It’s a 98% mortality rate.”
“There you go,” Kaito said, shrugging, “Two whole percents to work with.”
“Whoever you love is killing you, Kaito.” Kokichi said, his expression blank. “If you don’t confess, you’ll make them a murderer.”
“Not if I don’t die.” Kaito said. Pushing off the fence to go rejoin Maki’s run.
-
Kokichi corners Kaito at the school dance.
He pins a carnation flower to Kaito’s suit.
“Grim.” Kaito said quietly. Letting him do it.
“It’s a shame,” Kokichi said, looking up at him. “They really do suit you. Big and dramatic. Just like you.”
“Sounds more like you.” Kaito said. Face rosy and warm.
“It kind of does, doesn’t it.” Kokichi said, standing on the ends of his toes, pulling Kaito down by the collar.
Kaito let him.
“You’re a coward for not just saying it.” Kokichi whispered against Kaito’s lips. Tasting blood.
“You’re still so naive,” Kaito whispered back.
-
Kokichi doesn’t understand. Watching in stunned disbelief as Kaito pulls a thick, full carnation out of his mouth, his face turning blue as he struggled to get in breaths through this latest batch. It’s the first time Kokichi’s seen him do this since they’ve gotten together. He really doesn’t understand.
“I told you I loved you.”
“And I love you too.” Kaito sighed, staring miserably at the flowers. “But I never said you were the reason. You just decided that on your own.”
“Then who…”
“There’s no fixing this, Kokichi,” Kaito said softly, “I can’t change. I’ve tried. I already know all the things you’re going to say. I’ve heard them my whole life.”
Kokichi wants to say that Kaito can’t possibly guess what he’s going to say when Kokichi doesn’t know what he’s going to say. What he actually says is, “Your whole life?”
“I can’t help loving her.” Kaito said softly. Spinning the carnation gently in his hand. It was one of the drier ones that had come up. It actually was very pretty. “The doctors all told me my love would fade as I got older. That I just had to hold on. Maybe it’s still true. You don’t cough up flowers.”
Kokichi’s lips tightened. “…I never knew them.”
Kaito looked away. “…I knew mine. They told her the feelings would come, after she bonded with me. They told her it wasn’t entirely unheard of, but that instincts would kick in and save me. But for a little while, I just needed medicine. And then surgeries. And as time went on, more and more people grew angry with her. Demanded to know why she couldn’t fix it. Punished her. And every single thing I brought into her life made her hate me more and more.”
“…I know that because it’s the last thing she told me before she left.” Kaito said, wiping some blood from his jaw. Unknowingly pushing off a petal he hadn’t noticed clinging there. “I was thirteen. She tried for thirteen years… you have to give her credit for trying. She put in the time…”
“You don’t have to give her any credit, Kaito.” Kokichi said. Eyes wide and blank. “Giving her credit is literally killing you.”
“She couldn’t make it start,” Kaito said, “I can’t make it stop. But it’s okay. I’ve had this my whole life. This is normal.”
“Now who sounds naive.”
“Yeah,” Kaito said, looking out the window. “I’ve heard.”