For You I'd Bleed Myself Dry

by IntrovertedBookWorm

Summary:

(And when the vines reached my heart? I didn’t pull them out. I named them after you.)
--
Hanahaki: love that takes root where it doesn’t belong.
Neil was never meant to feel it. He wasn’t supposed to survive long enough to. But then there was Andrew.

Now Neil is coughing up flowers—blooms that carry every unsaid word, every moment he couldn’t let go. But this disease only ends in one of two ways:
You confess.
Or you die.

And Neil has always been terrible at both..

Notes:

Hi! Okay, I definitely did not put this on the list of things I thought I'd be doing instead of my dissertation, but here we are, I guess. I'm not going to lie, this started as a small idea I had where I could write some Andriel angst and give them a happy ending. This then spiralled as I was writing into an eco-gothic body horror amalgamation. So, go into this prepared that yes, there is a happy ending, but it's a wild ride of suffering and pain to get there.

Enjoy!

PS. I'm not a flower expert, so don't come for me if I mixed up a few meanings.

They say Hanahaki begins with a feeling.

A glance, a touch, a breath held too long—and something takes root.

Not in the heart, but deeper.

In the lungs. In the throat. In the fragile spaces between ribs, where words go unsaid and love festers.

The disease feeds on what isn’t returned.

It blooms in silence.

It thrives on hope.

It kills.

First come the petals—soft, harmless, almost beautiful if you don’t know what they mean. Then the leaves. The stems. Vines that curl and knot through flesh and bone, clinging to every secret.

Eventually, there’s no room left to breathe.

They call it romantic. Poetic, even.

To die for love.

But there’s nothing romantic about choking on what you’ll never have.

There’s nothing poetic about coughing up roses until your throat is raw, vomiting sunflowers in the middle of class, or bleeding out into the sink while your lungs fill with daffodils and regret.

There is no cure.

Not unless they love you back.

Not unless you forget.

Not unless you’re willing to cut it all out and live with the hollow that’s left behind.

Most don’t survive.

Some don’t want to.

And for Neil Josten—

Well.

He was never supposed to live long enough to fall in love.

***

Everything was fine. 

Really. It was. 

Neil was beyond fine, in fact. He was good. Happy. Safe. 

He had friends. He had a family. He had Exy, and—somehow—a home.

Nineteen years without any of that, and now he had it all. This past year had felt like a gift—like every mile of pain and violence had been leading to this. 

To Nicky’s laugh and warm, too-loud affection. To Aaron’s reluctant bickering that had started sounding like care. To Kevin’s presence at his side, a constant on the court. And to Andrew—undeniable, unshakable Andrew —who offered Neil a kind of strength he’d never known before.

Even after Riko. After Baltimore. After everything. The Foxes stayed. They chose him.

So, yes. Things were good.

He liked school. Loved Exy. Found peace in rooftop nights with Andrew—quiet confessions traded with the moon, harmless truths whispered to the sunrise. Sometimes, Neil let himself believe that Andrew considered them friends. They were confidants, yes. Andrew knew him better than anyone.

He was the first person Neil told the truth. The first person to give him a place to stay. A reason to stay.

Were they friends?

Neil didn’t know what that meant. Not really. But he knew Andrew mattered. Even if their relationship didn’t always exist outside those quiet rooftop hours. Even if Andrew barely spoke to him during the day. 

That was fine. Neil didn’t mind. Really. Neil would take whatever he could get.

However, just like flowers after summer, nothing ever truly lasts.

It started slow. 

A scratch in his throat. A cough here and there. Tightness in his chest that felt more literal than emotional.

He blamed it on a cold. Dorm air filters. Maybe stress.

His body, after years of living on the run, was just now realising it could get sick without dying. That’s what he told himself.

Until it became something else.

It was late. He and Kevin had just finished another brutal training session, perfecting a new offensive strategy. Andrew had skipped practice, sitting on the benches with a cigarette and a stare that burned through plexiglass.

Neil felt his gaze even then.

But as they were changing out, Andrew, having gone to wait in the car for them, Neil felt something in his throat tighten up. Warmth seemed to melt from his very bones and drip from his fingertips, leaving his body feeling empty and cold.

And then, he was choking.

Neil barely made it to the bathroom before his knees hit the tile. His throat convulsed, muscles seizing like he’d swallowed a live wire. He gagged—once, twice—nothing but acid and spit. Painful shivers made his spine tremble, feeling like they were resonating from deep within his chest.

Pathetic . He’d survived knives, bullets, the mafia for god's sake, and now he was going to choke to death on air like some overcooked rookie.

Then it came: a wet, tearing cough that scraped his ribs raw. Something fluttered against his tongue, soft and damp and foreign . He spat into the bowl.

A shudder violently crawled down his body before air finally seemed to fill his lungs, and once Neil was able to wrench his tear-filled eyes open, all he could do was stare in awe at the toilet's contents.

Flower petals.

Velvety. Pale gold. Curled in on themselves like they'd just bloomed.

For three heartbeats, Neil stared.

No.

He’d seen this before—in a Kyoto safehouse years ago, when a yakuza’s mistress coughed cherry blossoms into her silk handkerchief. The memory stank of perfume and rotting fruit.

" She’ll be dead by Obon ," his mother had said, and tightened her grip on his wrist. " Love is a luxury for people who can afford to die ."

Neil’s fingers dug into the porcelain. No. Not possible. 

He didn’t do love. Didn’t have a heart left to break. This was just—

—stress. Allergies. Just—

Another cough ripped free. Petals piled up, this time flecked with red. One stuck to his lip, velvety and warm. He peeled it off, and the smear it left behind glowed, gold pollen catching the fluorescent light like—

No.

He scrubbed his mouth with the back of his hand. The pollen clung, stubborn as bloodstains.

Scarred fingers trembled as they slowly journeyed to his throat, gently brushing over the skin of his Adam's apple. The painted tears from before turned hot and heavy as they began to steadily trickle down red, disfigured cheeks, softly pattering against the toilet's ledge once they fell. This time, what left Neil’s throat was nothing like the soft amber petals it had just produced. It was a hard, aching cry that Neil didn’t ever think he was capable of making. 

It did nothing but trigger another coughing fit, his chest itching with the need to keep on hacking out what was stuck in it.

He forced the petals out again, his knees giving out, falling to the floor. The coughs didn't stop, tears pouring out of his eyes. Petals passed his mouth easily, but then there was the wicked scratch of leaves, too. 

When the coughing fit finally let up, Neil gasped in a painful breath, and suddenly Kevin was there too, hovering worriedly over his shoulder, fingers twitching like he wanted to reach out and comfort Neil but wasn’t sure how or if it would be welcome.

For a short while, they stayed like that, Neil slumped over the toilet, panting like he had just run a marathon, and Kevin stood behind him, his bottom lip caught between his pearly white teeth. "Neil?" Kevin’s voice, sharp with Exy-fueled adrenaline. "Holy shit."

Neil didn’t turn. He watched, detached, as a final petal drifted from his lips. It tasted like bergamot and salt.

Like Earl Grey tea.

Like the scent of Andrew’s skin after rain.

“Neil?” Kevin said, at last, holding out a bottle of...something. 

Neil didn't question it as he took it and gulped down the refreshing liquid in a few gulps. It stung his throat, but it was okay. It was cool and his sore throat was soothed for the time being. 

“What-” He paused for a moment. “What is happening to me?”

The bathroom fluorescents hummed like dying wasps. Neil stared at the petal-strewn water, his reflection fractured between the blooms. Kevin's shadow loomed over him, blocking the light. 

"Jesus Christ," Kevin breathed. His fingers twitched toward Neil's shoulder before aborting the motion. "Hanahaki."

The word landed like a death sentence. Neil wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. "Hana-what?"

Kevin's throat worked. When he spoke, his voice had gone clinical - that detached, coach's son tone he used when explaining why broken fingers couldn't bench players. "Hanahaki Disease. The victim coughs up flowers when suffering from unrequited love. The plants grow in your respiratory system until—"

"Bullshit." Neil's laugh tasted like blood. "Next, you'll tell me fairy dust makes Exy sticks fly."

A muscle jumped in Kevin's jaw. He reached into his pocket and pulled out his phone with trembling fingers. The screen showed an X-ray - a rib cage filled with what looked like ivy vines. "My mother. This was three weeks before she died."

Neil's stomach lurched. The roots in the image didn't just wind between ribs - they'd grown through them, the bones splintered like dry wood. One particularly thick vine curled where a heart should be.

"The roots don't just choke you," Kevin whispered. "They replace you. They hollow you out and wear your skin."

The petal in Neil's palm suddenly felt alive. He crushed it in his fist. "So love's a parasite now?" His voice came out sharper than intended. "Fitting."

"Neil—"

"Who even says it's love?" Neil pushed past him to the sinks. "Could be stress. Or some mutated flu. Maybe I inhaled—"

"Andrew."

The name hit like a serve to the ribs. Neil's hands froze under the icy water.

Kevin's reflection met his in the mirror. "It's Andrew, isn't it?"

Another cough sneaks upon him, and he hurries to sling his head over the toilet bowl as dozens of more amber petals leave his lips. Past the saliva and other grossness, he could see the various colours on the petals. A soft, warm brown with hints of gold like- 

Like Andrew’s eyes. 

A small, tired laugh leaves him, which triggers another coughing fit. 

The petals hit the water with a sound like rain. Neil gagged—this batch tasted like Earl Grey tea, bitter and floral, nothing like the honeysuckle sweetness of yesterday's. When he wiped his mouth, his fingers came away smeared with pollen that glowed faintly gold under the fluorescent lights. For a hysterical moment, he wondered if Andrew's eyes had infected him down to the cellular level.

“Neil?” Kevin demands. 

Saying nothing, Neil drops his head back to the wall and lets his eyes droop close. Even now, when Andrew is nowhere in sight, Neil can picture the very eyes the flowers replicate. 

Those brown eyes were a million hues, so much so that Neil had spent many an hour wondering what the word ‘brown’ even means. They were the forest and the autumnal leaves, the soil in summer and after the rains. How could he ever reduce something so spellbinding to one word, when the colours invite him to marvel in their simplicity?

“Andrew,” Neil murmured with disbelief. 

He flushed the toilet and watched the petal fragments swirl down the drain. The water turned pink at the edges. "You tell anyone," he said quietly, "and I'll break both your hands."

For the first time since Baltimore, Kevin looked at him with something like fear. Not of Neil's threat - but for him. "Do you have any idea how fast this progresses? There's surgical options—"

“Is that the only option?” Neil asked. 

A sad sigh left Kevin as he stepped back into the stall and dropped to sit beside Neil, legs crossed beneath him. 

"There are options," Kevin said, pulling a water bottle from his gym bag and twisting it open with too much force. "Four, technically."

Neil took the bottle. "Enlighten me."

"First option: confess. If they reciprocate, the flowers die. Full recovery." Kevin's fingers drummed against the sink. "If they reject you..."

"The vines burst through and strangle my heart. Got it." Neil took a swig, the water doing nothing for the scratch in his throat. "Next."

"Fall out of love. Or fall for someone else. The flowers can't survive without their source."

Neil snorted. "Like flipping a switch."

Kevin ignored him. "Third option: surgery. They remove the roots completely. You'd recover in weeks." A pause. "You'd forget him. All of it."

The bottle crumpled in Neil's grip. The thought was worse than the X-ray - waking up to blank spaces where Andrew's face should be. Forgetting rooftop confessions and the weight of steady hands bandaging his wounds. Losing the only person who'd ever looked at his scars and seen something worth keeping.

Even if he wasn’t aware of it, all those hours when Andrew goes on a long drive and lets Neil tag along, letting him listen to Andrew hum to whatever song was playing softly on the radio; every time Neil itched to run away, pack a bag and disappear but Andrew spotted his twitchiness and would hold onto the back of Neil’s shirt silently reminding him that he made a promise to stay; it was the way Neil ranted and raved about something and Andrew would listen and make snide comments lips tilting into a barely-there smile but Neil noticed, he made note, he revelled and praised himself for getting Andrew to break his apathetic outlook on life for the barest hint of a second. It was nothing.

It was everything . 

“I won’t remember him at all?” 

“Not so much his face or even his name, but it will save your life.” 

Neil thought about that for a moment. Thought about all the memories he had since he got to Palmetto, thought of everyone he never wanted to forget and only then realised how many of those contained Andrew, how many of those precious memories were with Andrew at his side. Just thinking about having all of that taken away made his chest ache, this time not from the flowers that were killing him but a pain that thrummed and thrived and left him feeling a little empty. 

No. He couldn’t let those memories leave him. Wouldn't let them be taken away. Even the very first one of Andrew whacking him in the stomach with a force that winded him, or the night he was drugged. None of it. 

"Fourth option?" Neil asked, though he already knew.

Kevin was silent for only a few seconds, but it felt like aeons to Neil. He refused to look at Kevin. Instead, he kept his eyes firmly on the rouge petal that sat on the rim of the toilet. 

Kevin's exhale was shaky. "You do nothing. The flowers keep growing until..." He mimed an explosion with his hands. "Suffocation. Organ failure. Take your pick. It’s not pretty, Neil, it will tear you apart from the inside out, that’s not an exaggeration either."

Neil squeezed his eyes shut.

Death, oh death, forever I run, but it is only in your gentle touch I am caught.

It seems one way or another, Neil was destined to die before he turned twenty-one. Who would have thought it would be his emotions that were the cause of his own demise? 

This takes being suicidal to a whole new level , he thought bitterly. 

Silence settled between them, thick with pollen and unsaid words. Outside, an engine roared, Andrew threatening to leave without them. 

Neil spat another petal into the sink. This one came with streaks of gold - the exact shade of Andrew's eyes in morning light. It shimmered against the porcelain, beautiful and damning.

Neil dragged himself up off the floor, flushing the toilet, he stepped over Kevin and made his way over to the sinks where he washed his hands and splashed cold water on his face. It, of course, did nothing to stop the soreness of his throat or the sadness in his heart, but it at least cleaned off all the saliva and tears that had dried on his face. 

Kevin slowly followed him, his steps tentative and hesitant, like he was approaching a stray animal that was going to lash out and bite him at any moment. 

Arms braced on the sink, Neil caught his reflection in the mirror.

Scarred. Tired.

His fingers brushed his face.

He thought about the time Andrew helped wash his hair. Rubbed lotion into his scars.

Taped trash bags to his body so he could shower. Touched him, not with the gentleness of someone who thought Neil would shatter but with the rough, hard pushes and scrapes of someone who was trying to remind him he was still alive. 

Andrew, Andrew, Andrew . It was always Andrew. 

It was stupid. He knew that. But it didn’t matter.

Dropping his eyes, Neil glanced over his shoulder at Kevin, who stood, hovering with his hands deep into the pockets of his shorts. “How long do I have?” 

“Neil, you can’t be seri-” 

“ How long do I have, Kevin ?” Neil asked again, voice cold as ice. 

Taking a step back, Kevin lifted his hand to rub the bridge of his nose with his thumb and forefinger. “I don’t know. From what seen, the duration varies from 24 hours to years.” 

Neil nodded. “There’s still a chance. I could live long enough to finish college, I can play exy for longer, I can live a little while longer,”

Seeming to be tired of Neil’s bullshit, Kevin strode towards him and grabbed his shoulders, turning him to face the son of exy. “Are you kidding me? Neil, you have a future, you have exy, you will make court, you have a whole future ahead of you, and you’re just going to toss it away for what? Andrew? A few stupid feelings that in any normal case wouldn’t even survive past college?” 

Neil shoved him. “Fuck you.” 

Kevin threw his hands in the air. “Tell me I’m wrong?” 

“I’d rather remember than be remembered .” He put his hand over his mouth and let out a painful string of coughs, amber petals wet and speckled with red spots in his hand. This time, Kevin put his hand on Neil’s back and rubbed smooth circles on his back until Neil’s lungs finally relaxed. 

A pained sound escaped Kevin. “Can’t you just-” 

Shrugging out of Kevin’s touch, Neil strode back over the toilets and flushed the new petals before washing his hands again. “No. Let me have this.” 

Kevin was strangely silent, and Neil was concerned that something had broken in his friend's head. But finally, he spoke. “Okay.” 

“Okay?” 

“If this is what you want, I can't do anything to change your mind.” 

Neil nodded. “It is.” 

“Okay then.” 

They both stood in silence for a few moments before Kevin finally jabbed his thumb over his shoulder. “We should go.” 

“Yeah.” 

Together, they packed the rest of their things back into their lockers before making their way to the locker room doors. At the last minute, Neil reached out and caught Kevin’s wrist. Kevin paused. 

“You can’t tell anyone about this.” 

“Neil, you're dying ,” Kevin stressed. 

“Exactly. Don’t make me waste the little time I have by batting away pity and other people’s sadness.”

Kevin contemplated this for a moment before shaking his head. “The last time I lied about you to Andrew, he wrapped his hands around my throat and squeezed to the point I lost consciousness, and then I had bruises for months and couldn't swallow hard foods for weeks.” 

Neil let go of Kevin and took a step forward, forcing Kevin’s back against the door, boxing him in. Kevin let out a surprised breath, and Neil was so close that he could feel the hot air against the skin of his face. 

Neil let himself smile, it was cold and wicked and cruel and everything Neil remembered of his father. It was how Nathan looked seconds before he knew he was going to inflict pain. Neil had spent a long time covering his mouth at the slightest twitch of his lips upwards in fear that, along with the hair and eyes, he had also inherited his father’s formidable talent for inflicting fear with something that was supposed to equate joy. 

With the look on Kevin’s face and the way he had pressed himself against the door like he hoped he could meld into it, Neil knew he had succeeded. “Remember who I was raised to be,” he said quietly. “I’ll make anything Andrew does to you look like child’s play.”

Neil’s teammate, friend and roommate swallowed thickly before nodding his head rapidly. “Okay!”

“So what are we not going to do?” 

“Tell anyone you have Hanahaki.” 

“Especially?” 

“Andrew.” 

Neil patted his tattooed cheek. “Good boy.” 

Finally stepping back, Neil rubbed his hand across his face and wiped away that awful expression with it. Kevin’s shoulder sagged with relief. 

“Now we should go before Andrew comes to drag us out himself.”

As they leave the locker room, Neil lets himself forget about the petals. 

***

The first time it happened in class, Neil wanted to die.

It wasn’t dramatic. It was just… loud . Sudden. He didn’t even try to make an excuse. One second, he was sitting with his notebook open, the professor’s voice a dull blur in the background—

And the next, he was choking.

A ragged sound ripped from his throat, sharp enough to draw every eye in the room. His chair scraped violently against the floor as he bolted, shoving past desks, ignoring startled voices.

He didn’t care.

Didn’t stop.

Didn’t look back.

The hallway blurred. His vision swam.

The restroom might as well have been miles away.

Neil collapsed halfway there.

The coughing wracked his whole body—violent, unrelenting, shaking him down to the marrow. He clawed at his chest, at his throat, desperate to dislodge whatever was inside. It didn’t help. It never helped.

Then the flowers came.

One after another. Soft and wet and wrong , catching in his throat like feathers dipped in acid.

They spilt out onto the linoleum, bright against the dull floor.

Violas. Camellias. A few others, he didn’t know the names for.

Purple streaked with red. White with yellow veins.

He stared at them like they’d betrayed him.

Sadness. Sorrow. Hopeless love.

Longing. Waiting.

His lungs heaved. His hands shook. He pressed them to the floor just to feel something solid beneath him.

All he could think was—

They know.

They saw.

They know who I am. 

If anyone walked by, he didn’t notice.

He stayed crouched there, coughing into his fist, knuckles white with effort.

He wanted to gather the petals. Hide them. Eat them if he had to.

Instead, he just stared.

Blood-soaked and breathless.

Neil hated flowers.

***

Andrew was already walking away.

No goodbye. Just a flick of his fingers over his shoulder—their version of a promise.

See you tomorrow.

Neil watched him go. Let him get far enough down the hall that the sound of his boots faded. Let the air cool around him, the silence pressed in close.

Then he turned into his elbow and broke apart.

The coughs came sharp and sudden, wet and desperate. His whole body tensed as he bent double, shaking from the force of it. It was like drowning—like something soft and terrible was blooming inside him, petal by petal, and he had no choice but to let it out.

Three clumps this time. Full blooms. Leaves still attached.

They hit the floor with a faint, horrible sound. Almost like breathing.

Neil stared at them.

Daffodils.

Of course they were.

Kevin had told him, weeks ago, with that pinched expression like he was trying not to feel anything at all.

Unrequited love.

Rebirth.

New beginnings.

Neil had wanted to laugh in his face.

There was no rebirth here.

Just this.

A hallway. A handful of petals. And a boy who didn’t know he was the reason Neil was dying.

He crouched and picked up the flowers one by one. His hand trembled as he crushed them into his fist. Pollen stuck to his skin, golden and bright and soft.

Maybe it is one-sided.

Maybe it’s killing him.

But that didn’t make it worthless.

He wouldn't let flowers decide what was real.

Not when the only thing that had ever felt real was Andrew.

***

The Maserati cut through the dark, its headlights carving tunnels between the pines. Neil pressed his forehead to the passenger window, counting his pulse against the glass— one, two, three —until the rhythm synced with the dotted highway lines. His lungs ached, a slow burn like embers buried deep in his chest.

Andrew drove one-handed, the other resting on the gearshift. A cigarette dangled from his lips, unlit.

Neil noticed. He always noticed.

The radio played static and fragments of songs. Neil focused on the white noise, the hum of tires on asphalt, the way Andrew’s thumb tapped the wheel— restless, restless, restless.

Then, without warning, Andrew rolled the windows down.

Cold air rushed in, sharp with the scent of damp earth and distant rain. Neil inhaled greedily, the pressure in his chest easing just enough to be noticeable.

Andrew still hadn’t lit the cigarette.

Neil glanced at him. Andrew’s profile was carved in shadow, his jaw set, his gaze fixed on the road like it had personally offended him.

"You’re breathing wrong," Andrew said, finally.

Neil huffed a laugh. "Yeah? What’s the right way?"

Andrew didn’t answer. Instead, he reached over and turned the radio off. The silence that followed was heavy, deliberate.

"Thirty-seven," Andrew said.

Neil frowned. "What?"

"Breaths per minute." Andrew’s voice was flat. "Up from eighteen last week."

Neil’s fingers twitched against his thighs. He hadn’t realised Andrew had been counting. Hadn’t realised Andrew paid attention like that.

"Practice hasn't gotten harder," Andrew added, like an afterthought. Like he wasn’t peeling back Neil’s lies layer by layer.

Neil swallowed against the itch in his throat. "Maybe I’m just out of shape."

Andrew’s grip on the wheel tightened. For a long moment, the only sound was the wind and the engine and the quiet, damning truth between them.

Then Andrew flicked the unlit cigarette out the window.

Neil watched it vanish into the dark.

***

It was getting harder to hide.

The coughs were constant. Rough. Frequent. His teammates were starting to notice. Andrew watched him with those quiet, calculating eyes. Wymack had benched him more than once, grumbling something about him being winded, like Neil had just lost his touch.

But it wasn’t that.

He just. Couldn’t. Breathe .

They won the home game against the Jackals.

Neil only got to play half of it, but that was fine. He didn’t mind watching from the bench. It meant fewer eyes on him when his lungs gave out.

He waved goodbye to the upperclassmen as they peeled off—Dan and Matt toward the truck, Allison flipping her keys toward her Porsche. Kevin was still mid-rant with Wymack, dissecting plays and pacing in slow, tight circles.

Normally, Neil would’ve joined them. Had opinions. Pushed for footage.

But tonight, he just wanted silence.

He wanted the drive home. Nicky’s laughter echoing in the car, and Aaron’s tired groans. Andrew, quiet beside him, a steady presence just close enough to reach for.

He nodded to Kevin as he passed. Wymack told him to get some rest. Kevin frowned, concern flickering in his eyes.

Neil didn’t look back.

The parking lot was mostly empty.

He scanned instinctively for Andrew’s car, already picturing the glint of metal in the dark.

And then he stopped.

Andrew was there—leaning against the driver’s side door, cigarette dangling from his fingers. He took a drag, blew the smoke off to the side. His blonde hair was still damp from the shower, sticking to his forehead. His arms were crossed, biceps flexed. The wind tugged at the hem of his shirt.

Neil’s heart gave one hard, stupid thud.

God, he was beautiful. It made Neil sick.

But that wasn’t what stopped him cold.

Someone was talking to Andrew.

Neil had never seen him before—tall, lean, golden skin, sun-warmed and smooth. He looked like someone who swam. Someone untouched by scars. Someone untouched, period.

Andrew was listening.

Not smiling. Not laughing. But focused. His head tilted just slightly. An eyebrow lifted in faint amusement.

Neil knew that look.

And it shouldn't have hurt.

Not like this.

He told himself it was fine. Andrew had hookups. Always had. Eden’s backroom was no secret.

Neil used to sit outside, fingers clenched in his lap, lungs tight with something he hadn’t dared name yet. He’d count seconds until Andrew returned, until the space beside him filled with warmth again.

It had always made him feel like he was choking.

Now he knew why.

It made him sick. 

Neil stood frozen, nails biting into his palms.

They looked good together. Neil couldn’t deny it.

The guy was Andrew’s type, wasn’t he? Clean lines. Quiet confidence. Unscarred. Andrew had never had a boyfriend before. Or a partner of any kind, but it was inevitable, right? Andrew was healing. One day, he’d find someone who gave him everything he needed, and Neil would be left with nothing but flowers and vines slowly suffocating him until it was too late. 

The pressure started building in his throat. Hot and sharp and crawling up fast.

Panic wrapped its fingers around his spine.

He turned—bolted—made it halfway across the lot before ducking behind the nearest building. Collapsed against the wall.

Then the flowers came.

Whole blooms. Orange. Bright and wet, flecked with red.

That’s new.

They poured out of his mouth in clumps.

Neil didn’t even gag. Just gasped, each breath worse than the last.

Marigolds.

Cruelty. Grief. Jealousy.

Neil’s jaw tightened.

Pathetic.

He hated this.

Hated that even unconscious, even this deep, some part of him couldn’t bear to see Andrew happy with anyone else.

“Holy shit.”

Neil’s head snapped up.

Aaron was standing nearby, half-hidden by the corner of the wall, phone slack in his hand.

“Holy shit,” Aaron said again, stepping forward. “Josten—fuck—wait, let me call an ambulance—”

“No.” Neil surged up, grabbing his arm. “No. I’m fine. I’ll be fine.”

Aaron looked at him— really looked at him—and for once, there was no malice. Just horror. And fear.

“There’s blood,” Aaron said. “Those are full blooms.”

Neil frowned.

“That’s two steps away from death, Neil.”

So much for those years, Kevin , Neil thought bitterly. 

“You know about—” Neil waved weakly toward the pile of petals.

Aaron gave him a look. “I’m a med student. There’s practically an entire course module on Hanahaki.”

“Oh. Right.” They stood in silence for a beat before Neil repeated, “I’ll be fine. Just no ambulances, okay?” 

Aaron sucks in a sharp breath and nods slowly.

Neil exhaled. Relieved.

He crouched to gather the flowers. There were more than he realised. Some torn. Most not.

“You don’t have to do that,” Neil muttered as Aaron dropped beside him, scooping up the petals with shaking hands.

The clean-up was quick. Efficient. Quiet.

Aaron handed Neil a tissue, and together they wiped blood from their fingers, neither looking at the other.

“I’m not going to ask who it is,” Aaron said eventually. “But I am going to hope you’re not just planning to let yourself die.”

Neil shoved his hands into his pockets. “It’s the only option.”

Aaron scoffed. “You’re an idiot.”

Neil rolled his eyes. “Have I ever claimed otherwise?”

“You should confess.”

“What?”

Aaron stood, brushing his palms off. “You should tell whoever it is. Mr. ‘I Don’t Swing.’ If you’re going to die anyway, give them the chance to save your dumb ass.”

“I can’t.” Aaron shifted so he stood straight in front of Neil. Neil took a moment to look at the Minyard in front of him. He never understood why the others couldn't tell the difference between them. Sure, they were twins and looked the same conventionally, but there were still big differences. Aaron’s face was softer, more curved and had fewer hard lines and edges like Andrew’s. Aaron had less of a divot above his top lip than Andrew did. Then there were their eyes. Andrews were every shade of brown all at once, and Aarons were darker, almost molten gold in the sunlight. They were different, and yet looking upon Aaron’s face still made his chest ache. 

“No—you won’t.” Aaron’s voice was sharp now. “Classic Neil Josten. Running away from your own feelings.”

Neil stared at the ground. His throat itched. Not from flowers this time. From shame.

Running away.

Was that what this was?

He’d told himself he was handling it. Choosing. But he hadn’t chosen anything at all.

He was hiding .

Running.

Aaron let the silence drag. His face pinched. His hands trembled again, just slightly.

When Aaron realised Neil had no other reply to that, he sighed. “I’m assuming you don’t want anyone else to know?” 

Neil nodded. “Kevin knows.”

Aaron sighed. “Of course he does.”

A beat.

“Andrew’s going to kill you.”

Neil laughed. It was a bitter, broken thing. “Yeah. He will.”

Aaron hesitated. Then, softer: “I know someone who had the surgery. She had leftover meds. They won’t fix it—but they’ll slow the growth. Ease your throat.”

Neil blinked. “Thank you.”

Aaron offered a crooked nod. “I am sorry, Neil. Even if you’re a fucking moron.”

They walked back to the lot in silence.

Back to Andrew.

Back to Neil’s problem.

Back to the one thing he could never have, and couldn’t live without.

***

The worst day of Neil’s life doesn’t come with a knife or a broken rib or a burning car.

It comes at four in the morning, in the bathroom of Sweetie’s, when a stranger walks in and finds him doubled over the sink, coughing up flowers.

He’d thought he locked the door. He’s sure he did. He remembers slamming it behind him, fumbling the latch with shaking hands before he fell to his knees in front of the basin, throat already stinging, chest too full.

He doesn’t know how long he’s been there. It could’ve been minutes. Could’ve been hours.

The sink is a crime scene—blooms of red and white and yellow piled like wet silk, their edges soaked in blood. Tulips. Camellias. Primroses. Familiar shapes. Unmistakable colors. The room smells sweet and metallic.

He should care more than he does.

But he’s still coughing—deep and wet, every inhale scraping like a razor down the inside of his throat. He’s too focused on that to panic. Too busy surviving.

The woman who finds him is older, maybe mid-fifties, dressed for a night shift or the end of one. She startles when she sees him—then softens. Doesn’t scream. Doesn’t ask.

She just kneels beside him and places a hand on his back, gentle as a whisper, and rubs slow circles through the damp cotton of his shirt.

Neil wants to tell her to stop.

He doesn’t want to be touched. Doesn’t want her pity. Doesn’t want this stranger feeling the heat of his fevered skin, the sweat clinging to his spine.

But he can’t speak. Can’t breathe.

So she stays.

He doesn’t look at her, but he doesn’t move away either.

Eventually, she disappears and comes back with a bottle of water. He drinks it in gulps between the coughs, swallowing it with the pills Aaron gave him two weeks ago—the ones he hasn’t admitted he’s been taking. They don’t help, not really. But they’re something. A gesture.

The woman doesn’t come back to the sink.

Before he leaves, she hugs him. Doesn’t ask his name. Just presses a hand to his shoulder and says, “I hope it all works out for you, honey.”

Neil doesn’t respond.

He doesn’t have anything to give her.

He returns to the booth where the Foxes are waiting, his mouth still thick with copper, throat raw and aching. No one asks why he was gone so long. No one notices the red under his nails.

Later, when they’re back at the house, he crawls into bed and stares at the ceiling. The pillow is warm under his cheek. Andrew lies motionless on the far side of the mattress, silent and steady, just close enough to reach for. Neil doesn’t.

His chest aches like something is still trying to grow there. Vines brushing up against the inside of his ribs, leaves shifting with every breath.

He doesn’t sleep.

***

The next morning, Neil wakes to the taste of metal on his tongue and the weight of something damp pressed to his chest.

He blinks blearily into the half-light, head pounding, throat raw.

His sheets are soaked in colour.

Flowers—everywhere.

Tangled across the mattress, blooming in his blankets, spilling down onto the floor. 

Velvet petals and streaks of red. Some still warm. Some already wilting.

He curses under his breath. Sits up too fast and sways.

The pillow is stained. His shirt is sticking to his back. His hands shake as he strips the sheets and gathers the mess—bundling it into his arms like something shameful, something that shouldn’t exist.

The washing machine hums to life minutes later. He scrubs his hands twice before realising the blood won’t come out from under his nails.

He’s never been more grateful that the twins are at Bee’s, and Nicky has early classes.

Only Kevin is home.

He passes Neil in the kitchen. Says nothing. Just looks at him. And in that look is all the knowing Neil doesn’t want to deal with.

He flushes the toilet four times before noon.

Maybe five. He stops counting.

***

Class is hell.

The lights are too bright. The room too loud. The professor’s voice needles its way into Neil’s skull like a drill.

He keeps his head down. Palms pressed against his eyes. Breath shallow.

Coughing in public is a risk he doesn’t want to take.

There’s something caught in the back of his throat—a petal, maybe, or the ghost of one. He swallows against it. Forces it down. Again. And again.

His tongue is numb from cough drops. They stopped working two classes ago.

He wants to leave.

Wants to run .

But he sits still. Pretends.

Waits.

***

He doesn’t eat lunch.

Doesn’t wait for anyone to find him.

He disappears into the bathroom on the far end of campus—the one no one uses. The one with the door that sticks if you don’t lift the handle just right.

He locks it behind him and falls to his knees.

And pukes.

And pukes.

His hands cling to the cold porcelain like it’s the only thing keeping him tethered to the ground.

Blood.

Flowers.

His throat spasms. His stomach cramps. Every heave feels like it’s going to split him in half.

He wipes his mouth on his sleeve and it comes away red.

He breathes in wet, rattling gasps and thinks—

I can’t keep doing this.

He has to say it.

He has to tell Andrew.

Not to fix it. Not to hope.

Just to say it out loud.

To unbury it.

To stop pretending it’s something else.

He can set the surgery date after.

Clean slate. Clean lungs. Get it over with.

It doesn’t matter if Andrew—

(he’s not a coward)

(he’s not a coward but—)

But—

Andrew doesn’t like him.

Andrew tolerates him.

Andrew—

Andrew hates him.

***

Neil missed the shot.

Not just missed— whiffed , his racket slicing empty air as the ball sailed past untouched. The upperclassmen groaned. Kevin swore. Wymack’s whistle cut through the noise like a knife.

And Andrew—

Andrew wasn’t laughing. Wasn’t smirking. Wasn’t even looking at him with the usual detached amusement.

No, Andrew’s stare was fixed, his arms crossed, his posture deceptively lazy. But Neil knew better. Knew the way Andrew’s eyes tracked him, the way his fingers drummed against his biceps— one, two, three—counting the seconds between Neil’s breaths.

When Neil bent double after a sprint, his lungs screaming, Andrew was suddenly there, shoving a water bottle into his hands.

"Drink," Andrew said, voice low. "Or I’ll bench you myself."

The water was cold. Too cold for the weather. And when Neil took a sip, the taste of honey bloomed on his tongue—Abby’s remedy for throat inflammation.

Neil didn’t ask how Andrew knew.

He didn’t have to.

***

 

The two-month mark comes and goes without ceremony. Just more coughing. More blood. More petals in the drain.

He’s stopped keeping track of how many.

Aaron sits him down late one night and doesn’t sugarcoat it. At this stage, there are whole plants wrapped around Neil’s lungs. Vines laced through muscle. Leaves curled tightly against the walls of his throat.

The amount of surgery required to remove them now—

Too much.

Too risky.

“Almost guaranteed to kill you,” Aaron says.

Neil just nods.

There’s nothing left to say.

There’s no going back.

Not now.

Even if he wanted to change his mind—

even if he wanted to cut it all out,

rip the roots,

take the forgetfulness and run—

He can’t.

He’s gone too far.

And he chose this.

It hurts. Constantly.

But he doesn’t regret it.

Not really.

Not even now.

Not even when breathing feels like dragging razors through wet tissue. Not even when he wakes up in the middle of the night with flowers caught between his teeth.

But he feels bad for Kevin. For Aaron.

Because they know.

Because they’re watching.

Because they have to sit with the knowledge that Neil could’ve lived—and chose not to.

They don’t say it.

But it’s there.

In the way Aaron keeps looking at the calendar. In the way Kevin pretends not to flinch when Neil coughs blood into his sleeve.

Neil’s tired.

Bone-deep. Soul-deep.

There’s no drama in it anymore.

No panic. No grief.

Just exhaustion.

A body slowly turning into a garden.

And a choice he doesn’t take back.

***

Neil’s hands grip the edge of the sink. White-knuckled. Shaking. 

His head is bowed, breath coming in short, broken bursts that bounce off the white tile and back into his ears, louder than they should be, louder than he should be. Each inhale rattles deep in his chest, hollow and grating. 

He's been there for minutes.

Maybe hours.

Maybe longer.

Time doesn’t work like it used to. 

He can’t remember the last time he stepped outside this bathroom. Out of this house. Out of his body . 

Not that it matters .

He lifts his head, slowly. The motion pulls at something sharp between his ribs. He doesn’t flinch.

A single curl is plastered to his forehead, dripping water down the bridge of his nose. It mixes with the thin trail of red that’s smeared down his throat, collecting at his collarbone.

He’s pale. Waxy. Eyes sunken and ringed with grey. 

The reflection in the mirror is unfamiliar. 

A stranger wearing his face.

It’s funny, Neil had spent so long trying to separate himself from his appearance. From his father. From his truth.

He trained himself not to see it—the shape of his jaw, the way he carried his shoulders, the bone structure he’d inherited like a brand. He looked in mirrors only when he had to. When blood needed wiping. When lies needed fixing.

Even Neil, the name he’d chosen for himself, had always been a kind of mask—softened edges, a boy without a past, one he could make into something new.

He wanted to take the Nathan out of Nathaniel.

But the mirror didn’t care who he wanted to be.

And now, stripped bare and rotting from the inside out, there’s nothing left to separate.

No disguise

No distance.

No escape.

What he sees is what he is: someone broken open by something he never meant to feel. Someone who tried so hard not to want, and failed spectacularly.

His skin is too thin. His eyes too hollow. His mouth—still stained red, even after everything—looks like it’s trying to form a question he already knows the answer to.

He stares at himself until the reflection feels like it's staring back.

And he thinks—

This is the closest I’ve ever been to honest.

(Or maybe it's just his imagination, he doesn't know. He hardly knows anything these days.)

He smiles at his reflection, and it's a pathetic little thing, but he tries.

‘Not yet.’ He whispers. The words scrape his throat. I still have time . 

He doesn’t know if it’s true. He tells himself it is anyway. 

That should be enough. 

But it isn’t. Not really. 

Because behind the forced blankness in his eyes, there’s nothing but resignation.

And underneath that—quieter, darker— hope .

Not the kind that grows into anything.

The kind that rots in place. A hope that knows better, and stays anyway.

There are no what-ifs. No maybe-he-will’s. No we ’ll-sees.

They don’t have that kind of story.

All they have are endings .

And beneath it all—under the blood, the hope, the delusion—

Fear .

Neil looks down at his hands. They’re trembling.

He squeezes his eyes shut.

Andrew can’t know. 

He can't know.

Because if there was anyone who knew Neil better than he knew himself, it was Andrew—and that’s exactly what terrifies him.

Neil had spent days imagining it. Nights. Sleepless hours spent lying still, heart hammering, the taste of copper thick on his tongue. Over and over again, he’d envisioned what Andrew would do if he ever found out—if he were to walk into their room and see the petals scattered across the floor, stuffed into trash bins, bleeding out beneath the bed. If he noticed the ones pressed to the bottom of Neil’s gym bag, the ones clogging the bathroom sink drain, floating like something dead.

None of those thoughts ended kindly. 

There were no fairy tales. No delusions. No desperate fantasies of mutual softness. Just endings. Cold ones.

You can't end something that never began in the first place.

In most dreams, Andrew reaches for his face—but not gently. Thick black smoke pours between his fingers. His voice is ice and fire, contempt lining every syllable, disgust in every sharp breath. He screams until his throat breaks, until his voice goes raw, until Neil is small again, shrinking under the weight of it.

He kicks him. Leaves him crumpled on the floor, gasping, barely conscious. As if Neil hasn’t already been suffocating, hasn’t already been dying quietly for months.

Neil has seen it,  has felt fingers wrapping around his neck in his sleep, squeezing and squeezing and squeezing—

Sometimes it’s worse.

Sometimes, in his dreams, Andrew doesn’t speak at all.

He just looks at him. Eyes flat. Expression blank.

And then he turns away.

Neil’s breath catches. 

He laughs—too soft, too brittle—and presses the heels of his hands into his eyes.

Warmth slips down his cheeks.

Unfamiliar, but not new.

He tells himself it’s not worth crying over. That he’s being dramatic.

But the truth is, that wouldn’t even be the worst of it.

The worst wouldn’t be hate. Or violence.

It would be silence. Indifference. A glance that slides past him like he was never there.

Because Andrew wouldn’t need to scream to break him.

All it would take is nothing at all.

And that isn't the worst of it, is it? That wouldn't be the thing that hurts the most because he knows, god, he knows better than anyone that there are worse things than death.

That it could be anything, from silence to averted eyes and mocking laughter, to things that could have been but never should be, to the fact that there is nothing before and there will never be an after.

He thinks about the things he never had.

A father.

A future.

A place to belong.

A boy with tired eyes and a cigarette always half-burned.

Andrew .

His chest seizes, twists, and he instinctively lifts a hand to cover his lips with shaking fingers.

God, he can't do it.

He just can't .

Neil heaves, a violent shudder wracking through his body as he hastily removes his hand to find purchase on the sink. 

He presses a hand to his mouth as his body folds in on itself, knees to tile, ribs heaving, throat already raw. He coughs. And the petals come—purple and trembling, edges stained in red.

Hyacinths.

I’m sorry. 

Forgive me. 

I can’t do this anymore. 

It should be easier now.

It’s not. It still hurts. Every time. Every day. 

It hurts just as much as it did the first time. Neil doesn't think he'll ever get used to it.

He knows he won’t. 

That doesn't stop him from pretending that he could.

***

Abby’s kitchen is too warm, too bright, too full—and Neil never wants to leave.

There’s food spread out across the table, half homemade, half takeout. Someone brought pie. Someone brought wine. Kevin is already one drink in, trying to argue with no one in particular about protein intake.

The rest of them are gathered around the table in that messy, casual way families do—Matt’s chair pulled back just enough to let Dan sit on the arm. Renee’s tucked beside Nicky, listening with a soft smile while he gestures wildly through a story about something that definitely didn’t happen the way he’s telling it.

Abby’s making more tea. 

And Wymack?

Wymack watches.

He always does.

From his spot by the sink, coffee mug in hand (probably not coffee), his gaze flicks between them, lingering on Neil a second too long, on Andrew’s rigid posture, on the way Neil’s fingers tapped restlessly against his thigh. 

Neil sits next to Andrew.

It’s easy.

It shouldn’t be.

Andrew’s expression is unreadable as always, mouth set in a neutral line, eyes flicking across the table like he’s tracking something invisible. But every few minutes, his gaze lands on Neil and stays —just long enough to be noticed. Just long enough that Neil has to look away.

Before looking back again, reminding himself that he’s allowed to be selfish, he’s allowed to look even if he can’t touch. 

His throat’s tight.

Not with emotion—well, not just .

It’s physical.

The cough has been building all morning, sharp and persistent, something pressing from the inside out. There’s blood in his mouth. He can taste it. Metallic. Warm.

But they're fine. It’s fine. He’s fine .

He presses the inside of his wrist to his lips and pretends he’s rubbing at an itch.

Dan’s trying to get Matt to stop telling the story about the time he tripped over a raccoon during a morning run. “—so then the raccoon hisses,” Matt said, pitching his voice low and dramatic, “like it’s about to drop the sickest mixtape of all time—”

Kevin is rolling his eyes so hard he’s at risk of permanent damage.

“This didn’t happen,” Kevin mutters.

“You don’t know that,” Neil says, deadpan.

Andrew sipped his drink. “Raccoons are agents of chaos. Like Josten.”

Neil kicks him under the table. Andrew doesn’t react, but his boot pressed back, solid and grounding.

“It happened,” Matt insists, grinning. “He was rabid. Or possessed.”

“Raccoons don’t possess people,” Kevin says, like he’s explaining physics to a toddler.

“This one could have,” Nicky adds. “Have you ever looked into a raccoon’s eyes? God is dead .”

“Says the Catholic.” Alison chirps in, pointing her spoon at Nicky in an accusatory manner. Nicky meets her spoon with his fork, the clash of steel across the table.

“Ex-catholic, thank you very much,” Nicky corrects. "I stopped believing in God after the second conversion camp and the electro-shock therapy.” 

The table erupted in laughter—too loud, too sharp, the kind that only came from people who’d learned to laugh at the things that should’ve broken them.

Neil’s fingers tighten around his cup. The heat doesn’t help.

Something shifts inside his chest, a sharp nudge under his ribs.

A warning.

He swipes his wrist over his mouth and tastes copper.

Still fine.

Warm. Anchored.

Andrew doesn’t say much, but now and then he mutters something just loud enough for Neil to hear, and Neil always hears.

Andrew’s voice cuts clean through the noise. “You tripped over a trash bag.”

Matt gasps, hand to heart. “It moved.”

“Wind,” Andrew says, flat.

Neil snorts into his cup. “Wasn’t the trash bag possessed then?”

“If so,” Andrew replies, deadpan, “you were outmatched.”

Dan wheezes into her drink.

Nicky throws his hands up. “This is why we don’t let you two sit next to each other.”

“You never don’t let us,” Neil says. “You just complain about it afterwards.”

“Because you gang up on us.”

Andrew raises one eyebrow. “Don’t start something you can’t finish.”

Nicky stares at him. “That’s a sex joke.”

“That’s a you problem,” Neil fires back.

Laughter breaks like a wave around the table. Kevin drops his forehead into his hands like he’s praying for divine intervention.

Neil grins—

—and chokes.

The cough is sudden, sharp, and vicious. He bends forward, pressing his fist to his mouth as heat floods his cheeks. Something slick slips against his tongue—he swallows hard. Forces it down.

Not here. Not now.

Across the table, Andrew goes completely still.

Neil glances up.

Andrew is already watching him, gaze like a knife: sharp, unreadable, locked on.

Neil grins again, smaller this time.

His throat aches.

The smile wavers—but only just.

Andrew’s fingers twitch against his glass.

“See?” Nicky says, waving his fork. “Secret language. Creepy as hell.”

“You’re just jealous,” Neil says, voice rough.

“He wishes he were this interesting,” Andrew murmurs.

“I wish I were this interesting,” Matt sighs.

Dan pats his shoulder. “You tripped over a demon raccoon. You’re plenty interesting.”

Andrew leans back, eyes still on Neil. “Josten’s got a monopoly on stupid, though.”

Neil flips him off. Andrew salutes him with two fingers.

Kevin groans. “Can we not encourage him?”

“No,” Neil and Andrew say at the same time.

The Foxes groan as one.

Neil feels the weight of Andrew’s gaze.

The electric silence between words.

The unspoken: I see you. I’m here.

Against the world.

Always.

Nicky pointed between them. “This. This is why we can’t have nice things.”

“We have nice things,” Dan said, gesturing to the disaster of a meal. “We just also have them .”

Neil’s mouth twitched. “You love us.”

“I tolerate you,” Dan corrected, but she was smiling.

Wymack snorted. “That’s a goddamn lie. You all enable each other.” He pushed off the counter, refilling his mug from the pot Abby had left out. “Josten, eat something before you pass out.”

Neil blinked. “I’m fine.”

“You’re skinny,” Wymack said, like it was an accusation. “Even Kevin’s got more meat on him.”

Kevin scowled. “That’s not—”

“It’s true,” Allison said, smirking.

Neil almost forgets about the blood in his mouth, the petals in his lungs, the rot curling inside his ribs.

Because there’s only this.

Neil rolled his eyes but reached for the nearest dish—some kind of casserole, half-demolished. He forked a bite into his mouth, chewing mechanically. The food tasted like nothing.

Andrew’s knee bumped his under the table.

Eat , that touch said. Or I’ll make you.

Neil chews. Swallows. Takes another bite.

Wymack exhaled, satisfied, and dropped into the chair beside Neil. “See? Was that so hard?”

“Yes,” Neil deadpanned.

Wymack smirked. “Smartass.”

The conversation rolled on—Nicky’s wild college stories, Allison’s latest telenovela, Renee’s quiet interjections that somehow cut through the noise. Neil let it wash over him, the warmth of it, the rightness.

He could almost believe it would last.

His lungs twinged again. He swallowed hard, forcing down the itch in his throat.

Andrew's ankle locked around Neil's.

Wymack noticed. Of course he did.

“Josten,” he said, voice low, just for them. “You good?”

Neil nodded. “Peachy.”

Wymack’s eyes narrowed. “Bullshit.”

Andrew’s knee presses harder. 

Breathe.

Neil exhales slowly. “Just tired.”

Wymack studied him—really studied him—then sighed. “Kid, if you’re gonna lie, at least make it convincing.”

Neil’s chest ached. Not from the flowers. From this—the care in Wymack’s voice, the way Andrew’s jaw clenched like he was biting back words.

He should’ve run.

He should’ve lied better.

Instead, he said, “I’ll live.”

Wymack grunts. “Damn right you will.”

Neil wishes he could believe him.

Matt slammed his hands on the table, declaring, “Okay, but hypothetically—if the raccoon was possessed, what’s its villain origin story?”

The Foxes erupted.

Andrew leans closer. Their shoulders brush.

“You’re an idiot,” he mutters.

Neil grins. Blood on his tongue. “Yeah.”

And for now— just for now —it was enough.

But the warmth catches onto something darker.

Because this? This isn’t what Neil was supposed to have.

Not this seat. Not this family. Not this ache . 

He’d spent so long not looking.

His mother made sure of that.

She’d seen something once—barely a glance, a twitch of interest in the wrong direction—and her reaction had been swift. Violent. A slap that didn’t land on his cheek, but in his mind.

 I see it. Don’t think I won’t cut it out of you

He got the message.

He’d spent years convincing himself he didn’t swing either way.

Didn’t swing at all.

Not until him.

He sips his water again. It tastes like metal.

Renee leans over and presses a napkin into his hand. Says nothing. Abby’s refilling a mug at the sink. She glances back at him.

Her eyes linger.

But only for a second.

She doesn’t ask.

Because this is Neil Josten. Because bruises don’t shock her anymore. Because no one thinks this is what he’s hiding.

He looks at Andrew again.

Neil looks at him—really looks.

He’s been doing that more lately. Letting himself. He doesn’t think Andrew’s noticed, but maybe he has. Maybe he always does.

His curls are a little messy today. There’s a fading scrape across one knuckle. His eyes are soft at the edges, like he hasn’t slept but isn’t tired. He’s drinking something black and sweet, probably something Kevin would throw a fit about.

And Neil—

Neil wants to touch him.

Not like sex. Not like the feral want he used to mistake for need.

Just touch.

Just reach.

He doesn’t.

And it doesn’t matter anymore. Not the pain. Not the flowers. Not the breathless nights.

Every cough.

Every petal.

Every broken breath.

He’d do it all again.

For this. For Andrew.

***

Neil doesn’t remember the drive back.

He remembers flashes.

Andrew’s elbow brushed his on the gear shift. The buzz of the radio was turned down low. The streetlights flickered through the windshield like a pulse. Somewhere behind them, someone laughed. The sound didn’t belong to them. It was too alive.

He remembers Andrew’s hands on the wheel. The tension in his knuckles. The way he blinked slowly at red lights, like even his eyes were tired of watching Neil fall apart.

Neil didn’t speak.

He didn’t need to.

At the dorm, he moved through the motions. Shower. Change. Breathe. Or try to.

He lay in bed long after Andrew shut off the light, staring at the cracks in the ceiling like they might offer answers.

Andrew’s bed creaked once. Settled. The soft inhale and exhale of sleep—or something close enough.

Neil closed his eyes.

He pressed both hands flat to his chest, like that might keep the flowers down. Like maybe he could hold himself together by sheer force of will.

He stayed like that for a long time. Listening.

He used to count the days he’d survived.

Now he counts Andrew’s breaths.

Each one is soft. Steady. Real.

Inhale.

Exhale.

Alive.

Alive.

Alive.

Alive .

He rolls onto his side, facing the far wall.

The room is quiet enough to feel haunted.

He wants to say something— anything . Wants to call across the dark and ask Andrew what he’s thinking, what he dreams about, if he still hates the color yellow, if he notices when Neil’s not at breakfast.

Instead, he whispers:

“Don’t take this from me.”

To the ceiling. To the dark. To the universe.

There’s a tickle in his throat.

He swallows it. Pushes it down.

Not now.

Not yet.

He doesn’t care if he coughs himself to death tomorrow—he just needs one more night.

Just this one.

The sound of Andrew breathing. The weight of the sheets. The feel of being seen and still allowed to stay.

He curls in tighter.

His fingers brush the inside of his wrist.

Still sore. Still hiding bloodstains.

He presses his face into the pillow and thinks:

Just a little longer. Please.

Let him stay. Let him breathe.

The next day, the universe answers him.

And it says no.

***

Neil knew the secret was out the moment the edges of the court started to blur.. 

It was a game. Just a game.

He was having fun.

The Foxes were twelve points ahead.

Penn State was floundering.

Only thirteen minutes left on the clock.

They were winning.

Neil was flying.

He ran. 

He cut sharp around a striker.

He leapt for a high pass, grinning as Andrew launched the ball three-quarters of the way down the court and straight into his net.

He caught it.

He sprinted.

He laughed.

And then—

He stumbled.

His chest seized.

The air was gone.

Not now. Not now. Please, not now.

Neil dropped to his knees, the stick slipping from his grip and skittering across the court. The ball rolled, forgotten, bumping into an opponent’s foot.

He reached for the clasp of his helmet with clumsy fingers and yanked it off. The world tilted.

Something clawed its way up from the hollow of his ribs—hot, ragged, blooming too fast to stop.

His hands flew to his mouth.

Too late.

The flowers came hard and fast.

They didn’t flutter—they burst .

Wet petals hit the court like raindrops. Blood followed. Neil coughed again, and again, and again, his entire body curling in on itself as primroses spilt out of him in waves.

There was no relief.

Only choking.

Only panic.

Only the growing pile of yellow and white blossoms, some already soaked through with red, spreading across the court like a garden built on a battlefield.

He couldn’t stop it.

He couldn’t breathe.

He couldn’t hide.

The noise hit him all at once.

Screams. Shouting. Someone is yelling for a medic. A whistle blown far too late.

His teammates moved in fast, forming a wall around him. He felt hands on his back, his shoulders, someone tugging at his gloves, trying to peel away the padding.

They were touching him.

They were seeing him.

The flowers. The blood. The truth.

This wasn’t how it was supposed to happen.

He was supposed to control this. To choose how it ended.

And then—Andrew.

Andrew was there.

Fists shoving hands away. Curses cutting through the noise. A sharp, furious, familiar voice dragged Neil back from the edge.

Then a hand—warm and steady—on the back of his neck.

Then German, low and grounding:

“It’s okay. You’re okay. Just get it all out.”

“...paramedics… on their way…”

No.

They couldn’t.

There were rules.
No hospitals.

No check-ups.

Don’t let Andrew find out.

Neil started to recite the rules in his head as his eyes started to feel heavy and his head started to hurt.

“Oi junkie. Don’t pass out. They’re taking you to the hospital now.” 

He started to recite them like a prayer, blinking slow as the floor tipped under him.

No hospitals. No check-ups. No Andrew. No hospitals—

"Oi, junkie. Don’t pass out."

Andrew’s voice. Sharp. Angry. Close.

“They’re taking you to the hospital now.”

No.

Neil tried to sit up. If he could get to his feet, if he could just move , maybe he could convince them he was fine. Go home. Sleep this off. Pretend it never happened.

But his body wouldn’t listen.

“Neil, stop fucking moving.”

“I’m fine—” he rasped, though the words were thin and his throat was shredded raw.

Still, he tried to rise.

No hospitals. No check-ups. No Andrew.

No hospitals. No check-ups. No Andrew.

He could still run. Still fix this. If he could just stand—

A hand wrapped around his wrist. Another pressed to his chest.

“Stay down.”

Andrew again. Closer than ever.

His scent, his heat, his voice—too much.

Neil’s breath hitched.

His eyelids were too heavy.

The noise around him blurred.

“Stay down.” 

Dan’s voice, breaking. “Neil—Neil, stay awake.”

Abby—“Get the oxygen. Kevin—call ahead—”

Wymack, barking orders.

A chorus of panic.

And in the middle of it, anchoring him, a single firm hand holding his.

Warm. Solid. Real.

Andrew.

Then the world tilted sideways.

And everything went black.

***

The air is cold.

Not hospital cold, not clinical or sterile—

but clean. Fresh. Late-night rooftop kind of cold.

Palmetto wind against his cheeks. Concrete warm beneath him.

He knows this place.

He’s barefoot. Hoodie sleeves pulled down over his hands.

His breath fogs in the air.

Beside him—Andrew.

Silent. Still.

Legs stretched out, arms behind him like he doesn’t care if the roof bites. He’s staring out at the sky like it hasn’t disappointed him yet.

Neil doesn’t speak.

He doesn’t need to.

The silence is full of the things they never say.

He looks at Andrew’s hands. The cigarette between his fingers. The slow, lazy drag. The way his jaw ticks when he exhales like he’s thinking about something and won’t let it win.

He looks at Andrew’s side profile—sharp and calm and stupidly beautiful in the way bruises are. Something sacred in all that restraint.

Neil closes his eyes.

Just for a second.

The wind tugs at his hair.

This is where he always wanted to stay.

Just like this.

Just this quiet.

No flowers. No blood. No lungs pulling themselves apart from the inside.

No one asking him what hurts.

Just him.

Just Andrew.

Just the stars.

He turns to speak—to say something real, something soft. He thinks about asking a question that matters. Thinks about saying his name.

But the moment he opens his mouth—

He coughs.

Petals fall into his lap.

Bright. Orange. Blooming.

Blood hits the roof like rain.

Andrew turns, slowly, eyes narrowing—

“Neil,” he says.

And Neil, with the last pieces of himself, smiles.

***

When Neil opened his eyes, the first thing he saw was movement.

Nicky, Aaron, and Kevin sat in the corner of the hospital room, voices low, huddled around something on Kevin’s phone.

On the other side, the girls were pressed close—Alison had both arms around Renee, Dan’s hand steady on her shoulder.

Everything was still. Too still.

Like a wake. Like mourning.

Neil tried to speak. Only a rasp escaped. A cough followed, jagged and dry.

The others turned sharply.

“Neil!”

“Hey—” He forced the word out through the sting in his throat. “Hi.”

Another cough wracked through him. His whole body ached.

Nicky stood abruptly. “I’ll go get Wymack.”

Aaron ran a hand over his face, exhaling like he’d been holding his breath for hours. “Forgive him. He’s just worried.”

“We all are,” Dan said softly.

Silence followed. Heavy. Pressing.

Neil didn’t ask if they knew.

How could they not? After the flowers on the court. After the blood. After the way he collapsed like a broken puppet in front of everyone he cared about.

Awake, surrounded, and treated like he was dying.

Because he was .

There wasn’t an “if” anymore.

Wymack entered with Nicky and Abby trailing behind.

Neil couldn’t look at them.

He didn’t know which hurt worse—the disappointment in Abby’s face or the fire in Wymack’s eyes.

“Just what the hell were you thinking?” Wymack barked, arms folded at the foot of the bed.

Abby made a sound, gentle, hesitant. “David, he’s—”

“Don’t.” Wymack didn’t look away from Neil. “The moment you coughed your first petal, you should’ve come to me. Or someone.”

Neil swallowed. His throat felt like it was lined with splinters.

“I was handling it,” he croaked. “I didn’t want to worry anyone—”

“Well, you did exactly that.”

Neil looked down. Humiliation crept up the back of his neck, hot and useless.

He’d made his choice. He didn’t regret it.

But how could he explain it? That ignoring it felt easier than naming it. That shame had roots deeper than anything the disease could grow. That being seen— truly seen —was worse than dying.

He said nothing.

There was noise outside the door. Voices. Heated. Neil blinked toward the sound, vision hazy.

“I don’t care,” someone snapped.

“But Coach said—”

“Boyd. Move out of my way. I will not ask again.”

Then the door swung open.

Andrew.

His expression was carved from stone. Wild blond hair still mussed from the rain or the ride over, brows furrowed, eyes locked on Neil’s the second the door cracked.

“Minyard,” Wymack said, tone warning. “I told you to stay in the dorms.”

Andrew didn’t blink. Didn’t answer. Didn’t even look at him.

He was already moving.

He crossed the room, snatched a sheet of paper from the nearby table, and slapped it down over Neil’s lap. A pen landed a second later.

“Sign it.”

Neil blinked. “What?”

Andrew pointed at the line with a jerk of his hand. “Sign it.”

“That’s not how it works,” Aaron said. “He has to be coherent. He has to understand—”

Realisation hit Neil like a punch. Oh. 

“It’s the surgery,” he said.

“It is,” Renee said quietly. “We were going to wait for the right time—”

“The right time is now ,” Andrew snapped.

His eyes burned into Neil’s. Wild. Controlled. Terrifying.

“Sign it,” he said again.

“No.”

Andrew went still.

The tension in him tightened like a live wire. His hands curled into fists at his sides.

For a second, Neil almost wanted him to pull his knives. Violence made more sense than this.

“What?” 

“Get him out of here,” Wymack said quietly.

“I’m not going anywhere until this fucking idiot agrees—”

“Andrew,” Abby tried, gently. “Let’s step outside.”

“ No .” Andrew’s voice cut like broken glass.

He turned back to Neil, every ounce of restraint hanging by a thread.

“Sign the fucking paper and let’s be done with this.”

Neil didn’t blink. He met his eyes and held.

He’d rehearsed this in his mind a hundred times.

This is why I didn’t tell you.

This is why I couldn’t.

“I’m not getting the surgery,” he said. Quiet. Certain.

“Neil—” Abby began.

“I don’t want it. I want to know how long I have. That’s all.”

No one moved. No one spoke.

They weren’t surprised. Not really.

Maybe they’d known, just like he had, that he was never going to take the out.

But Andrew—Andrew was a different story.

He looked at Neil like something had broken behind his eyes. Maybe it had. 

Kevin and Aaron both stiffened like they were preparing to stop a murder.

“Neil,” Andrew said, barely a breath. “I’m not repeating myself.”

“Good,” Neil said. “Because I didn’t ask you to.”

More silence.

Andrew exhaled through his nose. Looked up. Looked anywhere but Neil.

“Whatever,” he said finally. His voice was hollow. “Die. See if I care.”

And then he turned and walked out.

The door clicked shut behind him.

Don’t cough now. Don’t. Cough.

***

Neil lay on the hospital bed, staring at the ceiling like it might blink back.

He couldn’t sleep.

Couldn’t stop thinking.

“Give or take three to four months.” The doctor’s voice echoed inside his head, soft and clinical and final.

Three to four months.

It wasn’t long.

But it was something.

Considering he’d already spent the last four coughing petals into sinks and napkins and his fist—he’d expected less. He thought maybe he wouldn’t wake up here at all.

So… this was good.

A timeline.

A deadline.

Four months to get everything in order.

Four months to play Exy like it still mattered.

Four months to say goodbye to the people who changed him.

Four months to say goodbye to him .

And that—that was the problem.

Because Neil didn’t know how to say goodbye to Andrew.

He’d never been able to.

Not when he almost ran. Not when he walked into the Nest. Not when death was a certainty and Andrew had asked him to come back. Even then, Neil hadn’t been able to let go.

And now he had to.

Now he had to find a way to leave—on purpose.

He exhaled, shallow and shaking.

At least I’ll die being Neil Josten.

Because if there was one truth left to him—one thing he wouldn’t compromise—it was this:

Neil Josten was in love with Andrew Minyard.

Utterly.

Irrevocably.

Disastrously.

If there was a choice between dying with that love or living without it—he’d already made it.

And maybe that made him stupid. Maybe that made him selfish.

But it also made him real .

Because Neil wouldn’t be Neil without it.

Without him .

He’d rather die loving Andrew than live forgetting him.

Quite literally.

***

It’s a bad night.

Neil wakes to pain.

Not pressure. Not discomfort.

Pain.

A coughing fit hits him like a bullet train. Sudden. Sharp. Blinding. His ribs scream. Three of them crack—he hears it, feels it, something shifting inside with a sickening pop—and two more threaten to give with every breath he sucks in.

If you could call it breathing.

It’s not breath. It’s drowning.

His body convulses again. His spine arches off the bed, his fingers clutching at the sheets as blood floods his mouth. Flowers are long gone, but the aftermath hasn’t stopped.

He’s still coughing.

Still retching.

Still bleeding.

And it’s not stopping.

A nurse appears. Then two. Voices blur above him. A second transfusion line is hooked into his arm. Cold fluid surges into his veins. It doesn’t help.

His lips are stained red. His gown is red. The sheets are soaked, and someone’s shouting for more gauze, more suction, more time.

But time is running out.

The monitors beep faster.
He goes hypovolemic somewhere around hour three. The room spins out of focus, colour leaching from the edges of everything. He can feel his pulse slowing.

He’s dying.

He knows it.

He’s known it.

But this—

This catches him off guard.

He thought he’d have more time. A few weeks. A game. A rooftop. A goodbye.

A moment.

But there’s nothing clean about dying like this. No last words. No warm lights. Just blood and beeping and the bitter taste of metal in his mouth.

He’s shaking. He’s cold. His skin sticks to itself. His chest is too hollow and too full all at once.

I don’t want to die here.

Not like this.

Not without—

His head lolls to the side. The room doubles. Blurs.

There’s a shape in the doorway. A flash of gold. Familiar eyes.

He tries to speak, but his throat tears on the attempt. He closes his eyes.

Andrew .

***

The next time Neil wakes up, he’s alone.

Or at least he thinks he is—until he hears the quiet rasp of a lighter being flicked on. Then off. 

On. 

Then off. 

The scent of cigarette smoke curls through the hospital room, undercut with something earthier. Damp soil. Fresh petals.

Neil’s eyes flicker open.

Andrew sits slumped in the chair beside his bed, elbows braced on his knees, an unlit cigarette dangling from his fingers. The bags under his eyes are so dark they look like bruises. That isn’t what makes Neil’s breath catch, though.

No—it’s the flower in Andrew’s other hand.

A primrose, its stem pinched between Andrew’s thumb and forefinger. The petals are a soft, unblemished yellow, so vibrant against Andrew’s pale skin that Neil’s chest aches. He’s coughed up dozens just like it, but they’re always tinged pink with blood, their edges wilted from the acid in his throat. This one is perfect.

He picked it , Neil realises. Somewhere, somehow, Andrew went out and—

Andrew notices Neil’s gaze. He lifts the flower, twirling it slowly. The motion makes the shadows under his eyes look even deeper.

“Primrose,” Andrew says. His voice is rough, like he’s the one who’s been coughing up thorns. “Do you know what they mean?”

Neil shakes his head. He doesn’t trust his voice.

Andrew leans forward, just slightly. The flower brushes Neil’s cheek—feather-light, barely there—before Andrew pulls it away.

“‘I can’t live without you.’”

Neil’s lungs seize. Not from flowers this time, but from the way Andrew’s gaze burns into him, gold-flecked and furious.

“So,” Andrew says, low and deliberate, “who is it?”

The flower trembles in his grip. Neil can’t tell if it’s Andrew’s hand shaking or his vision blurring.

“Who’s worth this?” Andrew’s voice cracks on the last word. He stabs the primrose toward Neil’s chest, where the roots curl around his ribs. “Who’s so fucking special that you’d rather die than—”

You , Neil wants to scream. It’s always been you.

His fingers twist in the sheets. He can feel the petals rising in his throat, but for once, they don’t choke him—they bloom, unfurling like they’ve been waiting for this moment.

“‘Drew,” he whispers.

Andrew goes utterly still.

For a heartbeat, Neil thinks—hopes—Andrew will understand. That he’ll see the truth in Neil’s ruined lungs, in the way his hands reach even when he tells them not to.

Then Andrew’s face shutters.

“You’re pathetic,” he says, but there’s no bite to it. Just exhaustion.

Neil laughs, and it tastes like pollen.

 “I thought you didn’t swing.” Andrew’s jaw tightens.

 “I don’t.” A pause. “Not for anyone else.”

The words hang between them, fragile as a spiderweb. Neil doesn’t dare breathe.

Andrew stands abruptly. The primrose falls from his fingers, landing on Neil’s chest. Its petals brush his collarbone, soft as a goodbye.

Then Andrew walks out.

The door clicks shut.

Neil lifts the flower with trembling hands. The stem is thornless, the leaves smooth. He presses it to his lips—and chokes.

This time, when the petals come, they aren’t primroses.

They’re hyacinths.

I’m sorry. Please forgive me.

Neil crushes them in his fist.

***

Neil wasn’t getting any better. The doctors, Kevin and Aaron had told him that the symptoms would only get worse as time went on. He knew that but was still surprised when Neil scratched his forearm and the skin peeled back like damp paper, revealing not muscle or blood, but something fibrous and pale—mycelium threads weaving through his flesh like lace.  

Hallucination , Neil thought, pressing the flap of skin back into place. His fingertips came away glittering with spores. Stress. Sleep deprivation. Not real.

He clawed his way out of the bed, straight into the bathroom.

The mirror blinked at him.  

Not a trick of the light—a proper lidless blink , his reflection’s pupils dilating into black pits before the irises bloomed outward like morning glories, swallowing the whites of its eyes. Neil recoiled, and the reflection didn’t follow. It smiled , lips splitting at the corners to reveal thorns where teeth should be.  

"You’re rotting,” it whispered in his voice.  

Neil smashed his fist into the glass.  

Shards rained into the sink, glittering and bloodied, but when he looked up—  

—the reflection was still there, now framed by broken glass. A vine slithered from its nostril, probing at the cracks.  

Neil gagged, doubling over as something shifted inside his chest. He coughed, and it wasn’t petals this time but a clump of damp moss, live roots wriggling like nematodes as they hit the porcelain. The stench hit him—loam and necrotic tissue, sweet as overripe peaches left to ferment in the sun.  

"This isn’t happening." He dug his nails into his sternum, trying to claw out the itch beneath his ribs. His skin tore too easily, peeling away in fibrous strips, but the pain was distant. Muffled. Like his nerves were packed with sphagnum.  

A sound behind him.  

A wet, organic crack .  

The shower curtain twitched, though there was no breeze. Something pressed against the other side of the plastic—not fingers, but tendrils , their outlines visible as they groped blindly along the vinyl. Neil watched, paralysed, as the silhouette grew—a hunched, spore-dripping thing with too many joints, its head lolling on a stem-like neck.  

"Andrew?" The name slipped out before he could stop it.  

The silhouette stilled.  

Then the faucet turned on by itself.  

Water gushed out, but it wasn’t water—it was sap, thick and amber, flooding the sink. The moss he’d coughed up began to grow, spreading across the counter in a vibrant green wave. Tiny white flowers erupted along its surface, their centres pulsing like throats.  

Neil stumbled back, his heel slipping in the pollen gathering on the tiles. His lungs burned. His ribs creaked.

A sound like green wood splitting under its own weight.

It reminded him, horribly, of a storm-scarred pine he’d watched collapse in Alberta when he was fourteen. He’d been hiding in its shadow for two days, listening to it breathe—creaking and shuddering as the wind worked its fingers into old lightning wounds. When it finally fell, the sound had been almost human: a drawn-out, splintering scream as roots tore free of the earth.

Now, as he pressed a hand to his chest, he felt that same terrible tension. His ribs bowed inward with each cough, cartilage fraying like rotten bark. A wet crack echoed through his sternum—not the clean snap of a bone breaking, but the slow, grinding failure of a tree yielding to gravity.

"I’m the tree," he realised, blood bubbling at his lips.

And Andrew—

Andrew was the storm

When he looked down, his shirt had risen, exposing his abdomen—and beneath the thin membrane of his skin, he could see them:  

Roots .

Not just veins anymore, but fat, gnarled roots, twitching as they burrowed through his muscle. They spelt something, the same way ivy climbs a trellis, forming letters along his diaphragm:  

A N D R 

Neil screamed. Or tried to. What came out was a spray of chrysanthemum petals and something worse—a sound, high and keening, like wind through dead branches.  

The lights flickered. The thing behind the shower curtain moaned, a wet, vegetative noise. The reflection in the broken mirror reached through the glass, thorned fingers curling in invitation.  

And Neil—  

Neil splintered .

Was this real? Had the hyphae reached his brain? Was he still in the bathroom, or had he finally coughed up his own mind, left it sprouting in some hospital bed while his body bloomed without him?  

His hands found the primrose in his pocket—the one Andrew had given him. It was warm. Alive. The only thing that didn’t smell like decay.  

He clutched it like a rosary.  

The door burst open.  

"Neil-"

Andrew’s voice. Andrew’s hands. Andrew’s smell cutting through the rot—cigarettes and mint and something fiercely, unbearably human.  

The hallucinations wavered.  

The roots in his chest screamed .  

And Neil—  

Neil chose .  

He let himself collapse into Andrew’s arms, the flower pressed between them, its roots finally, finally still.  

***

Neil didn’t see Andrew for another week.

Until the doctors called it recovery. Stable enough to be released, they said. Stronger medication. A new list of side effects. Pity in their eyes, like they were already mourning him.

Neil didn’t return their sympathy. He didn’t want it.

Yes, I’m dying.

Yes, it’s my own fucking fault.

No, I’m not going to do anything about it.

He’d lived his entire life on borrowed time. Why would now be any different?

They insisted he be wheeled out.

Neil protested.

He lost.

Matt pushed him through the hospital in a wheelchair, cracking jokes he didn’t mean. Neil laughed once, weakly. It hurt.

When they reached the car park, Neil stood too quickly. The world tilted. His knees buckled.

He didn’t hit the ground.

A strong arm caught him around the waist, steady and warm.

Andrew, his brain supplied, even before his eyes confirmed it.

Andrew didn’t say much. Just muttered something too low to catch, then guided him to the team bus like it was nothing. Like it hadn’t been a week of silence.

Neil’s thoughts blurred. He barely remembered the ride back—only the heat of Andrew beside him, the press of his thigh, the way their arms brushed every time the bus hit a bump.

It wasn’t the flowers that would kill him.

It was this.

Andrew.

The weeks that followed were quiet. Strange in how normal they felt.

He still coughed up flowers—but they came smaller now, more manageable. The medication dulled the ache. His throat didn’t burn as much, and he only woke up gasping a few times a week instead of every night.

It felt like a mercy.

It wasn’t.

Andrew moved Neil into his bunk. He didn’t ask.

“It’s inefficient,” he said when Neil looked at him. “You keep waking me up.”

So that was that. They shared a bed.

Andrew against the wall, hands resting on the pillow in front of him, expression unreadable. Neil, on his side, watching the rise and fall of his chest. Mapping the lines of his face in the dark. Memorising every breath like it might be the last one he ever got to hear.

Andrew rarely left his side.

It was subtle, but Neil noticed it in everything:

In the way Andrew waited for him after practice, helmet under one arm, gaze unreadable but fixed. In the way he sat beside him on the couch during movie nights, passing him the popcorn without comment. In the way he drove him around Palmetto when the pressure in Neil’s lungs got too sharp to bear, windows down, silence between them sacred.

On the roof, they sat closer. Talked softer.

Truths were still rare—but honesty had become easier.

Andrew didn’t say things like stay or don’t go , but Neil heard them anyway.

In the quiet.

In the way Andrew never looked away.

Neil found himself staring too much. Not intentionally. Just—thinking. And then his eyes would land on Andrew, and they wouldn’t move. He should’ve stopped. Should’ve looked away.

But he never did.

Andrew never said anything, only gave him that familiar dead-eyed glare and shoved his face to the side.

Neil smiled every time.

He’d fallen for the one person who’d never try to stop him from doing something self-destructive.

Of course.

And somehow—somehow—the flowers hurt less when Andrew was near.

The ache dulled.

The pressure eased.

Neil entertained the idea, once, that maybe the disease was sentient. That maybe it could tell. That maybe the roots in his chest knew , and being close to Andrew soothed them in the same way it destroyed him.

It didn’t make sense.

None of this did.

But it felt true.

That night, on the couch, Neil fell asleep with a smile on his face.

The movie flickered in front of them. Everyone else was gone. Just him and Andrew. Blankets bunched around their legs. The quiet between them deep and comfortable.

His head fell against Andrew’s shoulder.

Andrew didn’t move.

He only tugged the blanket higher and closed his eyes, slow and steady, like he might actually sleep.

And Neil—

Neil let himself believe that maybe this was enough.

Even if it wouldn’t last.

—

3:17 AM

The cough didn’t erupt—it violated .

It ripped through Neil with the force of a car crash, a detonation that buckled his spine and snapped his body into seizure. Something inside him split, wet and meaty. He pitched forward, chest clenching around a scream that couldn’t get out. He barely got his face into the pillow before it came up—it, everything —in a wave of slick, choking heat.

His body heaved .

Convulsed.

Wrenched .

It was wrong .

Petals burst from his mouth in a flood—soaked and tangled, thick with mucus, rotting sweet. Dahlias. Too many. Too fast. They coated his tongue, clogged the back of his throat, spilled through his fingers as he tried to claw them free. Crimson, gold, blackened at the tips like they’d bloomed from an open flame.

They were still warm.

His lungs weren’t lungs anymore. They were soil . Mulched and broken and packed with roots. Something lived in him, and it wasn’t him. It curled tighter with every breath, fed on his blood and marrow and hope.

He choked on another mouthful, spat into his hand—then gagged again, deeper this time, and something wet slid up behind the petals. Thicker. Heavier .

A vine.

Oh god.

It was in him. Crawling up his throat, pulsing. He could feel it dragging against his insides—rough and fibrous, searching for air. He could almost hear it, a slick, vegetal slither beneath his skin. He tried to swallow it back down and nearly vomited.

Let it end.

The thought came not like a whisper but like a scream from inside his skull. It sounded like relief . Like a lullaby. Like an invitation.

He could end it. He could tear this garden out by the roots. Take the whole fucking body with it.

He wanted to.

He could crawl to the bathroom. Even now. Even like this. His legs still worked. His hands, too, shaking and slick and red. The razors under the sink—he’d seen them. Felt them in his palm before. Cold, clean, merciful.

One deep slice across the neck. A real one. No hesitation. Let the blood and blossoms pour together—let the roots come loose, let the thing inside him die screaming .

He could imagine it. Picture the way the sink would fill, petals floating in a slow spiral as his vision narrowed. Golds and reds and pink foam. Beautiful. Grotesque.

Or he could take the pills. All of them. Stuff his mouth with them until he couldn’t swallow anymore, until they bubbled back up and turned him inside out. Let them burn their way through his stomach. Let them hollow him out .

He imagined the stillness that would follow. The quiet. No more coughing. No more pain. Just cold tile beneath his cheek and the fading scent of lemon cleaner. A bloom of color as the flowers bled out onto the floor beside him.

Let it all go.

His body was no longer his. It belonged to the disease, to the petals, to the rot crawling up his throat and wrapping around his ribs like a vice.

He twitched toward the edge of the mattress. His foot hit the floor.

Do it. Do it now. Before you have time to think. Before you lose the nerve.

No one would stop you.

They’d find him in the morning. Too late. Too quiet. Maybe Andrew would feel relieved—no more watching him fall apart. No more mess. No more need .

A noise.

The sheets.

Neil froze.

Across the room, Andrew’s silhouette stood frozen. Not asleep. Not breathing. Just listening.

You’re awake.

You heard me.

Help me. 

Neil’s throat spasmed, something still caught in it—another petal, or a sob, or a scream. He couldn’t tell anymore.

His body was trembling, twitching, starving . Not for food. Not even for breath.

For contact.

For mercy .

He lifted a hand, reached into the dark space between their beds—

—then yanked it back, his fingers curling hard into his palm until he felt something snap. A knuckle. A nail. He didn’t care.

He was disgusting. Filthy. A dying thing. A rotting husk stuffed with flowers and loneliness.

He wanted someone to touch him. To kill him. To hold him.

He didn’t know the difference anymore.
The bed creaked.
Neil squeezed his eyes shut. He couldn’t bear it—being seen like this. He wanted to scream, to disappear, to vomit every last petal out of his lungs until they were just empty .

He wanted to rip them out with his own hands, root after root, petal after petal, tear through the soft tissue of his throat and dig into the wet ruin of his lungs, claw the stems from his ribs, peel every vine from the inside of his chest like rotten wallpaper, crush them in his palms until his fingers bled and the flowers stopped blooming and his body was empty, clean, his again, his, just his, or nothing at all, or maybe not even that, maybe just silence, just stillness, no more petals on his tongue or in his teeth or behind his eyes, no more waking up choking on colour, on feeling, on—

—on something that wasn’t supposed to be real, not this way, not like this, not so beautiful it hurt, not so ugly it was beautiful, not—he couldn’t—he didn’t—he wasn’t—

make it stop make it stop makeitstopmakeitstop—

he wanted to cut it out, to burn it down, to scream it away until his voice gave out and his lungs collapsed and that would be fine, that would be better, that would be good—

—except it wouldn’t, would it, because even if he tore every last flower from his chest, he’d still feel it, still ache with it, still want—

—still want—

—still want—

—still want him.

Thud .

Neil opened his eyes.

Andrew stood there, shadowed by a nightlight Nicky left before he went to stay with Kevin in Matt and Aaron’s room. 

Backlit and terrible.

A grim reaper in sweatpants. His arms were crossed. His jaw clenched tight enough to crack.

And in one shaking hand: a glass of water.

Neil stared. Couldn’t look away. Andrew never trembled.

And now he did.

Something deep inside Neil—something black and hollow— cracked .

Andrew didn’t say a word. Just held out the water like it weighed a thousand pounds. Like it was a choice. A question. An offering to a broken god.

Neil reached.

Their fingers brushed.

Andrew’s skin burned.

The water was ice-cold. Lemon-bright. Real. It sliced through the raw meat of Neil’s throat and for a moment—just a moment—he felt something other than pain.

He drank like it might stop the petals. Might drown them.

When he lowered the glass, Andrew hadn’t moved.

Still watching.

Still shaking.

Their eyes locked.

And in Andrew’s gaze, Neil saw something terrible —not pity, not revulsion.

Recognition.

The fury.

The fear.

The ache.

Neil wanted to scream.

To touch him.

To die in his arms.

But he said nothing.

Andrew turned and climbed into bed with him.

The glass sat on the nightstand, beaded with condensation, trembling faintly where Neil had set it down.

Neither of them slept.

***

The rooftop air was cold enough to bite, but Neil barely felt it. He exhaled slowly, watching his breath fog between them, and tried to ignore the agony crawling up his throat.

Andrew flicked ash over the ledge, the ember of his cigarette a tiny, dying star in the dark. He didn’t look at Neil. He hadn’t all night.

That should have made it easier.

Neil clenched his jaw, swallowed against the pressure behind his ribs. He could hold it back. He’d done it before—breathed through the burn, waited until he was alone to let the petals tear free.

Then his lungs spasmed.

He turned his face into his sleeve too late. The cough ripped out of him, wet and ragged, and he felt the tell-tale scrape of leaves against his windpipe. His eyes watered. He didn’t need to look to know what was in his palm when he pulled it away.

Silence.

Andrew’s cigarette hit the concrete, crushed under his boot. When Neil dared to glance up, Andrew was staring at him with a look that wasn’t blank at all.

“You’re worse,” Andrew said.

Neil wiped his hand on his jeans. “I’m fine.”

"Yes or no?" Andrew’s voice was flat.

Neil blinked. What?

Andrew didn’t repeat himself. Just waited, his gaze fixed somewhere past Neil’s shoulder, like he couldn’t bear to look at him directly.

Neil understood.

Andrew was asking if he could touch him. Even now. Even like this.

The word no lodged itself in Neil’s throat, sharp as a thorn.

He wanted to say it.

The vindictive, wounded part of him—the part that still flinched from touch, still expected betrayal—wanted to wrench his wrist away and watch Andrew’s face shutter closed. Wanted to punish him for the silence, for the anger, for the way he was looking at Neil like he was already something half-gone, half-dead.

Say no, the voice in his head hissed. Make him let go. Make him walk away. It’ll hurt less when he does.

But—

Andrew’s fingers hovered in the air between them, waiting. Always waiting. Never taking.

And Neil—

Neil was a coward.

His lungs burned, his ribs ached, and the flowers crowding his chest were proof enough that he was already dying for it. For him. For the way Andrew’s hands were steady even when his voice wasn’t, for the way he asked yes or no like it mattered, like Neil mattered, even now.

(Even though he didn’t. Even though Andrew had told him so a hundred times—you are nothing, you are no one, you are a pipe dream—)

Neil’s breath hitched.

He could lie to himself all he wanted, but the truth was this: he had never been able to say no to Andrew. Not when it counted. Not when Andrew looked at him like this—like he was seeing him, really seeing him, even when Neil was nothing but scars and secrets and borrowed time.

(And wasn’t that the cruellest joke of all? Spent your whole life running, and the one time you let yourself stay, let yourself want, it was killing you?)

The petals in his chest shifted, their roots tightening around his ribs like a vice.

Say no , they seemed to whisper. It’s not too late to run.

But Neil was so, so tired of running.

So he swallowed the no, let it dissolve like petals on his tongue, and whispered:

"Yes."

Andrew’s fingers pressed against his pulse point, warm and sure.

Neil’s heart stuttered.

(He wondered if Andrew could feel it—the way his blood rushed under his skin, the way his breath caught, the way he was breaking under the weight of this, of them—)

Then Andrew let go, and Neil’s wrist felt cold where his touch had been.

"You’re worse," Andrew said again, toneless.

Neil curled his fingers into his palms, his nails biting into his skin. "I’m fine."

(He wasn’t. He was drowning. He had been drowning for months, and Andrew—Andrew had been the only thing keeping him afloat. )

Andrew’s laugh was hollow. "Liar."

Neil said nothing.

(What was there to say? That every breath felt like glass in his lungs? That he woke up every morning choking on the weight of everything he couldn’t have? That he was terrified, not of dying, but of the way Andrew looked at him sometimes, like he was worth something—)

“You’re going to die,” Andrew said.

It wasn’t a question.

Neil curled his fingers into his palm, hiding the petal stuck to his skin. “Everyone dies.”

Andrew made a sound that wasn’t quite a laugh. “Not everyone does it on purpose.”

The words hung between them, sharp as a knife balanced on its edge. Neil could have denied it. Could have pretended he didn’t know exactly what Andrew meant.

Instead, he looked away.

Andrew exhaled sharply through his nose. When Neil risked another glance, Andrew was already walking toward the edge of the roof again, shoulders rigid.

Neil’s traitorous body lurched forward—just an inch, just a stumble. He caught himself. (Pathetic. He was pathetic.)

 But not before Andrew saw, not before those gold-flecked eyes flashed with something raw and ruined. Neil wanted to carve it out of him. Wanted to live in it forever.

“Andrew—”

“Don’t,” Andrew said, without turning around. "Go to bed."

Neil didn’t move. "Are you mad at me?"

Andrew went very still. Then, without looking back: "Yes."

The word hung between them, sharp as a blade.

Neil exhaled. "Okay."

(He deserved that. He deserved worse.)

He left Andrew standing in the dark.

***

They were at Eden’s the next time it happened.

The Monsters were scattered around their usual booth, flushed and laughing, drinks clinking, voices too loud. Everyone was drunk. Everyone but Neil.

He nursed his drink, letting the rim press cool against his lip. Letting himself watch .

Nicky’s head tipped back mid-laugh. Allison knocked into Dan with an affectionate shove. Kevin was arguing with someone about tactics again. They were alive. Radiant. His family.

Neil let it sink in.

He shouldn’t be here. His family was adamant he couldn’t go but they wouldn’t come without him and Neil had been doing better. Maybe it was Andrew’s constant proximity. Maybe it was the fact that Andrew looked at him and no one else. 

Until tonight. 

Across the room, Andrew was at the bar. Blond hair catching the flicker of neon, shoulders square and still even in a crowd that refused to stop moving. He was waiting on drinks, leaning one elbow on the bar—Roland standing across from him.

Neil might’ve looked away. He should’ve.

But then Roland laughed. Head back, mouth wide, loud enough that Neil heard it over the bass pounding through the floor.

That sound carved straight through him.

Neil looked away.

Too late.

His stomach twisted first. Then his chest. Then the flutter .

He pressed his hand to his mouth, already shaking. Panic bloomed in his throat alongside the roots. He couldn’t stop it.

Couldn’t even slow it.

The flowers were coming.

He bolted.

Pushed past Kevin. Past Nicky. Through bodies and light and heat, past the beat that thrummed like a second heartbeat beneath his skin.

“Neil?”

“Hey—what the hell—Neil!”

He didn’t answer. Couldn’t.

He barely made it to the lot before his knees hit asphalt, and he doubled over.

The first petal came with a choked sound that might have been a scream.

Then the rest followed.

They poured from him in waves—red, white, yellow, pink—so many that it felt like they’d been waiting . Like they’d been lying in wait for something to break.

A stem tore from his throat. He gagged. Blood followed.

He tried to breathe around it, tried to beg his body to stop—but it didn’t care. It just kept going. Kept blooming.

Marigolds this time.

Deep orange. Edges curled like fire. The taste of burnt sugar and salt on his tongue.

“Cruelty and grief,” Aaron had said last week.

Now there were dozens.

A whole bouquet of jealousy clawing its way out.

Neil pressed a shaking hand to his chest.

The vines throbbed with every sound of Roland’s laughter still echoing in his head.

He barely registered the people gathering behind him.

Hands on his back. Voices frantic.

“Neil?”

“Oh, fuck. Not again—”

“Go get Andrew! Now!”

He tried to open his eyes. Didn’t remember closing them.

There was blood on the ground. Too much. It coated the petals, painting the white ones red.

He didn’t even have time to panic—his body lurched again.

More petals. More blood. His own breath turning against him.

Tears streaked down his face. He didn’t care. Couldn’t.

He was choking on what he couldn’t say.

Someone caught him when his legs finally gave out.

Strong arms pulled him in. Held him too tightly, like he might slip between their fingers.

He couldn’t see who it was. Could barely think .

But for a second—just one second—he let himself imagine:

Andrew .

Andrew holding him.

Andrew’s voice, sharp and trembling.

“Neil. Open your eyes. It’s not time. You’re not ready yet.”

The hands around him tightened. Large. Familiar. Terrified.

Whoever it was—

—Neil let them hold him.

***

There is no bed.

No floor.

No room.

Just rot.

Just bloom.

Just Neil.

His body has liquefied—no, melted into something viscous and sprawling. He’s spread out across the floor like oil, like syrup, like sap. Thick. Sweet. Unmoving except for the twitch of something deep beneath the skin. The petals no longer come in bursts—they grow now, slow and confident, pushing up from his throat like a field waking under sunless skies.

His jaw is unhinged. It has to be. The stems need room.

He gurgles. Not in pain. In awe.

Something is singing inside him.

It’s not a voice. It’s the sound roots make as they split stone. The groan of earth cracking under something divine and ancient. His ribs have snapped open, ribs that were once bone but now flex like bark—his sternum peeling back, a blooming cage of blood and wood. Inside: not lungs. Not organs.

A garden.

A screaming, weeping, pulsing garden.

He tastes chlorophyll and copper. His eyes are blind but filled —with colour, with light. He sees fractals where thought used to be. Spirals of vines, threads of gold winding around bone. Language is gone. Identity a rumour.

Neil is not a name anymore.

It’s a seed.

It was always a seed.

He twitches—tries to move an arm and watches it split at the elbow. Petals pour from the fracture, velvety and slick. They’ve grown mouths now. Tiny teeth. They’re laughing. Or crying. Or praying.

You are the altar , they whisper. You are the knife.

He doesn’t scream.

He can’t.

He’s past screaming.

His voice has turned to nectar, and every breath is a sacrifice.

The ceiling is a sky. Not a metaphor—he sees it, endless and black and bleeding starlight down on him. Galaxies churn overhead like pollen caught in a storm. Time is gone. Clocks drip down the walls like wax. Memory has been eaten by the roots.

He can’t remember his name.

But he remembers the ache . The reaching.

He opens his mouth, and this time, a flower with his own face unfurls from his throat.

It speaks in a language only the dying understand:

"Let me out. Let me out. Let me out."

The vines answer. They wrap around the blooming Neil-face, crushing it gently. Sweetly. Like a mother silencing a child.

There is no out.

There is only down.

He goes.

He sinks .

Into himself. Into the soil he has become. Through layers of meat and memory, root and ruin. He sinks until his body is a rumour and all that’s left is the heat. The growth . The god that has been waiting in his chest this entire time, crouched and patient.

It unfurls now. Slowly. Terribly.

And in its breathless blooming, Neil becomes.

Not boy. Not broken.

But myth .

A caution. A prayer. A plague.

Somewhere, above or below or nowhere at all, a thousand blackened dahlias bloom in sync and turn their faces to him.

He does not weep.

He does not laugh.

He simply opens his mouth

and exhales seeds.

 ***

Abby’s living room is too small for this kind of grief.

The Foxes are spread out like a broken constellation, each of them pulled by the gravity of Neil’s failing body in the next room. He’s asleep—or unconscious. There’s no difference anymore.

“I’m calling a surgeon,” Allison says, voice sharp as shrapnel. “We can’t wait for him to die.”

“You can’t force surgery on someone who’s mentally competent,” Abby counters, trying to sound calm and sounding like she hasn’t slept in days. “And we all know Neil. He’ll walk into the flames smiling if it means keeping his secrets intact.”

“He’s not competent anymore,” Kevin snaps. “You saw him. He doesn’t eat. He doesn’t sleep. He talks like he’s already buried. That’s not sanity. That’s a death wish.”

Renee speaks up, soft but firm. “We cannot take that choice from him.”

“So what, we let him die ?” Nicky explodes, pacing like he might throw something. “Jesus, Ren, he’s coughing up flowers. He choked last night. I thought—I thought he was gone.”

“No one is saying we let him die,” Aaron mutters from the corner. “We’re saying… we don’t get to decide .”

Abby’s hands are trembling. Wymack hasn’t spoken. He’s leaning against the kitchen counter, eyes hollow, a bottle unopened in front of him. His silence is an accusation.

“I’ve lost too many of you already,” he finally says. “If you think I’m just going to stand here while another one bleeds out in front of me, you’re out of your goddamn minds.”

“Even if he forgets everything?” Renee asks, voice almost a whisper. “Even if we lose the person he’s become? The choices he made?”

“Better hollow than buried,” Kevin grits out.

Silence hangs.

Then Andrew.

Still as stone. Sat by the bedroom door like a dog guarding a tomb.

He says nothing.

He hasn’t said anything in forty-one hours now.

Aaron glances at him, then looks away fast. “Doesn’t matter. He’s not going to consent to the surgery anyway. Not unless he says who it’s for. We can’t trick Hanahaki.”

“It’s not like cancer,” Abby says quietly. “It won’t work unless he admits it. Unless it’s true. And if he won’t—”

“He can’t,” Nicky interrupts, eyes flicking to Andrew. “That’s the whole point, isn’t it?”

And still, Andrew doesn’t move.

***

Neil is fading.

The room—the world—exists in pulses now. Light. Dark. Pain. Numbness. Breath. Silence.

In the gaps, he dreams.

The garden again, blooming from the cracks in him. Not metaphorical anymore. Real. As real as the way his lungs have collapsed around the stems.

He doesn’t know where the garden ends and he begins. Maybe he is the garden now—lush and rotting and full of impossible, useless love.

The petals come gently here. No choking. No blood. Just colour.

He follows a path that curls like a memory, down and down and down.

He sees the hands he once held. Faces he left behind. The pieces of him that never had time to form into something whole.

Then—

A shape in the distance.

Not part of the hallucination. Not woven from his grief.

Andrew.

Standing just beyond the garden’s edge, arms crossed, jaw tight, eyes unreadable.

In the real world, Andrew’s kneeling beside the bed, too still, too silent.

Neil’s pulse is thin under his skin.

He’s disappearing.

“Who is it?” Andrew asks, flatly. Like it doesn’t matter. Like he won’t shatter no matter the answer. “Who the fuck are you dying for?”

Behind the numbness, something in Neil aches. But he says nothing.

The petals in his throat are too thick. He coughs, and more of them fall.

Andrew watches the flower drop onto the blanket..

“I’ve been trying to figure it out,” Andrew mutters. “You won't say. You won't look at anyone. But you chose this. You knew what it was.”

He thinks Neil is in love with someone else. Someone unreachable. Someone safe to die for.

Not him .

Never him.

“You should’ve told them,” Andrew says, colder now. “Told her. Him. Whoever it is. You didn’t have to—”

He stops.

Swallows hard.

“You don’t get to leave us like this.”

His voice is sharp now. Angry. A blade trying to stay straight.

“You don’t get to turn yourself into a fucking tragedy for someone who doesn’t even see you.”

Neil coughs again. His body jerks, and a fresh bloom slips between his lips. Renee catches it, gentle as ever.

Abby is at his side. Wymack stands at the door like a man about to drown. The others wait outside, shadows pressed to the hallway walls, breaking without words.

Only Kevin dares speak the truth aloud.

“If we don’t do something, he’ll be dead within the week.”

“But it has to be his decision,” Abby snaps. “Or we lose more than just his life.”

Andrew’s fists clench.

“You’re all standing around watching him die.”

Renee looks at him. Really looks.

“Would you rather he forget?”

Andrew doesn’t answer.

Because he doesn’t know. Doesn’t know the shape of the thing killing Neil. Doesn’t know who it’s for.

And so he can’t imagine it might be him.

Because no one has ever bled for Andrew Minyard.

No one has ever stayed.

***

Inside the garden, Neil kneels.

The ground beneath him pulses with heartbeat warmth. The flowers curl around his shoulders like a crown, a shroud, a final confession.

He sees Andrew in the mirror of the dream.

Not real.

Not his .

Not anymore.

The hallucination speaks with Andrew’s voice:

“You should’ve run. You should’ve burned it out of you when you had the chance.”

Neil closes his eyes. Presses his forehead to the soil.

And says nothing.

Because this is enough.

This is worth it.

Even if Andrew never knows.

Especially if he never does.

***

 

Neil exhales a wet, rattling gasp. A trickle of blood slips from his mouth, followed by a petal that flutters soundlessly to the blanket.

Abby’s hand tightens around his wrist, checking his pulse.

“We’re losing him.”

“Then tell me what to do,” Kevin says. “Tell me what the fuck we’re waiting for.”

Andrew’s jaw is clenched so tight it looks like it might crack.

“He won’t say,” he mutters, finally, breaking his silence like glass.

Everyone turns to him.

“Say what?” Wymack asks.

Andrew doesn’t look away from the door. “Who it’s for.”

His voice is hollow. Empty.

“He loves someone enough to die for them. But not enough to tell them.”

He sounds disgusted. Not with Neil—with himself.

As if even saying it aloud makes him vulnerable.

“He must think she’s better off not knowing,” Andrew adds, tone sharp. “Or he knows it won’t be returned.”

And in the room behind the door, Neil curls tighter into the hallucination—surrounded by everything he can’t say. Everything he’ll never let go of.

***

Neil walks through the garden, trailing blood. His body is a cage full of roots. He can hear them growing.

Every step is a struggle. Every breath is a war.

And yet—there’s beauty here.

There’s peace in the pain, because it’s his.

He gave it willingly.

He suffers because he loves, and Andrew will never know, and that is the most sacred part of it.

In the garden, a flower blooms from his chest. He plucks it gently and lays it at Andrew’s feet.

The Andrew who never sees him.

The Andrew who never could.

***

I didn’t know how to tell you that you were the only reason my lungs kept breathing. Not the kind of reason that’s sweet or poetic—the ugly kind. The kind where I’d wake up choking on my roots, and there you’d be, shoving a glass of water into my hands like it was a fucking insult. The kind where I’d cough up petals stained with blood, and you’d stare at them like they were a problem you could solve with your knives.

You couldn’t stop the flowers. But you made the choking mean something.

For me, love has never been soft. Love was my mother pressing my fingers to a hot hair straightener because my sticky fingers would get us caught. Love was my father’s favourite knife pressed to the webbing between my fingers—"Count faster, Nathaniel." Love was swallowing my teeth and being told to smile through the blood because pain was just another language for staying alive.

Then you.

You with your "yes or no?" and your hands that could snap my neck but chose to press bandages to my wounds instead. You, who watched me cough up petals and didn’t flinch, just lit another cigarette and said, "Stop dying, it’s annoying." Like my lungs weren’t full of thorns. Like my ribs weren’t splitting open like overripe fruit.

I wanted to hate you for that.

Wanted to carve the hope out of my chest with my own fingernails when I caught myself waiting for you—for the rasp of your voice, the burn of your stare, the way your fists clenched when I choked on another fucking daisy. 

Sometimes I dream about my father cutting the flowers out of me. I wake up screaming—not from fear, but because I begged him to finish the job.

But the flowers grew anyway, roots knitting through my ribs like stitches, and I—

I let them.

Because if love was supposed to hurt, then this made sense. Because if I was going to drown, better it be in something that finally didn’t taste like lies.

(And when the vines reached my heart? I didn’t pull them out. I named them after you.)

***

The end is nigh. Neil knows it. 

He can feel it—in the way his chest rattles, in the way every inhale is an act of violence. The flowers come slower now, but deeper. Rooted. Anchored. Each one tears him apart a little more.

He’s stopped fighting it.

This is the end. He feels it curling up inside him, something final. A conclusion written in petals and blood.

The pain crests, and crests, and crests—

And he knows.

This is it. This is the last one. The one that takes him.

He should be scared. He’s not.

He’s tired. Bone-deep. Soul-deep. Quiet.

He’s dying. He knows it.

And yet—

There’s still something left. A single thread anchoring him in the dark.

A voice he hasn’t heard yet. A hand he hasn’t felt in hours.

He sways. Slumps.

Some part of him is still trying to breathe, but it’s too late. The vines have wrapped too tight.

His vision fuzzes.

The world narrows.

And then—through the haze—he hears a voice.

Firm. Furious.

“Neil.”

He doesn’t lift his head right away. It’s too heavy. His limbs too sluggish. But his fingers twitch against the sheet.

“Neil, open your eyes.”

Andrew.

Even now, even here, that name gives him something to hold onto.

He forces his eyes open. Light blurs. Shapes swim.

But Andrew is there.

A blur of gold and fury, motionless by the window.

Neil swallows against the burning in his throat. Pushes himself up on shaking arms. The monitors protest. Abby makes a soft, alarmed sound—but no one stops him.

“An…ew,” he rasps.

Andrew’s head tilts. Just slightly. Shadow against blinds. A man carved from silence.

Neil’s voice cracks.

“Yes or no?”

The world holds still.

Then Andrew moves.

Three strides. Heavy boots on linoleum. A weight like gravity. He stops at the edge of the bed.

“What?” he says, flat. Dangerous.

Neil doesn’t flinch. He holds Andrew’s gaze, even as his heart flails inside his chest.

He doesn’t have the words. He’s never had them.

So he doesn’t try.

He reaches out, slow, shaking, and hovers his palm over Andrew’s chest. Right over his heart. Not touching. Never touching. 

Andrew goes completely still.

Neil’s fingers curl into the fabric of his hoodie. He can feel it—the beat beneath. Steady. Reluctant. Alive.

Andrew breathes in, sharp.

Then: “Yes.”

Permission.

Neil exhales, everything inside him unravelling. His hand drifts upward, tentative—tracing the line of Andrew’s collarbone, the slope of his neck, the hinge of his jaw.

Mapping him. Remembering him. Like he’s memorising the shape of something sacred.

His thumb brushes the corner of Andrew’s mouth. Andrew doesn’t move. Doesn’t blink.

Neil leans in.

Their foreheads touch.

His eyes close.

“I just wanted to be a bit selfish,” Neil whispers. “Just once. Just with you.” 

That’s all I have left. Just you.

But it’s enough. Andrew hears it.

You’re the reason.

You’re the root.

You’re the thing I couldn’t cut out.

Andrew’s breath hitches.

His hands rise, gripping Neil’s wrists too tight. Like he’s afraid Neil will vanish if he doesn’t hold on hard enough.

“I hate you,” Andrew breathes. But there’s no venom in it—just grief, and awe, and something like fear.

Neil laughs. It tastes like pollen. “Yeah.”

Andrew’s thumbs press into Neil’s pulse points.

“Say it.”

Neil’s smile fades. He opens his eyes. “I don’t know how.”

“Try.”

Silence.

Then Neil coughs. Ragged. Wounded. A single petal slips past his lips and lands on Andrew’s sleeve—deep red, blood-spotted, fragile.

Poppy.

Remembrance.

Sacrifice.

Death.

Neil is shaking.

“I chose this,” he says. Voice rough, breath catching on each word. “I’d choose it again.”

“Why?”

Neil breathes through the pain.

Because you asked me to stay.

Because you gave me something to come back to.

Because your silence is the only one that doesn’t hurt.

He looks up, eyes full and blinding. “Because it’s you.”

And Andrew—God, Andrew —

He just stares at him. Like, Neil is speaking in tongues. Like Neil just bled starlight into his hands.

He doesn’t say anything. Not at first. His expression doesn’t change.

But the line of his jaw softens.

His eyes flicker. Like everything is clicking into place.

The memories. The patterns. The nights Neil got worse when Andrew had other plans, other people . The way the flowers slowed when Andrew pulled him close. The rooftop. The drives. The couch. The breath Neil could finally take.

It wasn’t the drugs. It wasn’t luck.

It was him.

It was always him.

And for the first time in years—maybe ever—Andrew lets it in.

Lets the truth land.

Lets it hurt.

Neil chose him.

Loved him.

Is dying for him.

And the flowers—

—the flowers stop.

Not completely.

But they ease .

Just enough.

Neil doesn’t notice at first. He’s still breathing like it’s a war.

But Andrew feels it.

The shift.

The quiet.

He lets go of Neil’s wrists just long enough to wrap both arms around him and press their foreheads closer, tighter.

“I’m here,” Andrew says. It’s the closest he’ll come.

And Neil—God, Neil—

He lets himself believe it.

***

Something shifts.

Not just in his lungs, though that’s the first place he feels it. The pain softens, like someone’s cut the thorns from the inside of him. He takes a breath and— God , it’s not clean, but it’s full. His ribs expand without splintering.

But more than that, something shifts in him .

In the place where the garden lives.

The one no one sees.

The one grown wild beneath his ribs—feral, overgrown, fed on silence and longing and love he was never meant to hold.

It’s still there.

But now the vines loosen their grip.

The blooms unfurl instead of choke.

The petals stop falling like funeral confetti.

And for the first time, the garden inside Neil doesn’t feel like a graveyard.

It feels like hope.

Because Andrew is still here.

Still touching him. Still real.

Still saying: yes .

And Neil?

He lets himself believe.

That maybe the garden can stay.

As long as Andrew does.

***

He wakes slowly.

The world comes back in pieces—light too sharp through half-shuttered blinds, the sterile scent of antiseptic, the low hum of machines. His throat feels carved out, raw and unused. There’s a pressure in his chest that isn’t panic, but something close.

He blinks.

Abby’s face swims into view beside him. She’s sitting at his bedside, hands folded tightly in her lap. Wymack stands behind her, arms crossed, shadows under his eyes.
Neil tries to speak.

Nothing comes out.

He tries again. A sound scrapes loose from his throat—something rough and broken.

Abby’s face softens with something like grief. “Don’t try to talk yet, sweetheart.”

Wymack steps forward. “You’ve been unconscious for four days.”

That hits like a fist to the gut. Four days. He looks down, sees the pale of his hands, the tape at his wrist, the faint yellowing bruises from IVs. There’s tightness around his ribs—bandages, maybe.

He opens his mouth again.

“What—” It’s barely a whisper. It doesn’t sound like him.

Abby leans in. “Your voice will come back, some of it. But it won’t ever sound quite the same.”

Neil swallows hard. His throat aches. So does everything else.

She continues, quiet. “Your lungs are scarred, Neil. You’re healing, but it’s going to hurt. Probably for the rest of your life. Breathing will feel different. Running will take work again. And your mind…”

She hesitates.

Wymack finishes it for her. “It’s been through hell. Give yourself time. This kind of survival leaves marks.”

Marks. Scars. He’s always been covered in them. A few more won’t make a difference. 

Neil blinks slowly. Processing. Testing each word in his mind like he’s trying them on.

He’s alive.

That should mean something. He doesn’t know what yet.

His voice is rough when he asks, “Andrew?”

They both freeze.

Something cold settles in his chest.

“Where is he?”

Abby glances away.

Wymack sighs, rubbing a hand down his face. “He left.”

Neil stares. “What?”

“He drove you here. Barely slept. Didn’t speak. Then he left.”

Neil doesn’t realise he’s gripping the sheets until they rustle under his hands.

“He left.” It’s not a question. It’s a confirmation. It tastes bitter

He sinks back into the pillow.

Of course he did.

Of course.

The edges of his vision swim again.

“He hates me,” Neil says, voice hollow. “I knew he would.”

“No, Neil.” Abby’s voice cuts through the quiet. She leans forward, fierce in a way he’s only ever seen her when someone is hurting one of her own. “If he hated you, you wouldn’t be alive right now.”

Neil blinks up at her.

Wymack’s voice is quieter. “If Andrew Minyard hated you, he would’ve let you die.”

He heard the words that weren’t said. 

At the Nest, in Baltimore, in this room.

That lands somewhere deep. Somewhere dangerous.

The world shifts a fraction to the left.

Neil stares at the ceiling, heart thudding out a rhythm he doesn’t quite recognise. His ribs ache with every breath. His throat burns.

But something else is burning now, too.

Hope.

Slow. Reluctant. Real.

Because if Andrew didn’t hate him…

If Andrew gave him that yes—

Then maybe— maybe —he needs to find him.

Talk to him.

Say what he couldn’t say before.

Neil turns his face toward the door.

“I need to see him,” he whispers.

***

It takes Neil another week to be discharged.

He leaves the hospital with a duffel bag slung over one shoulder, a scar like wildfire across his lungs, and a mouth that still tastes like copper and roses. He still coughs—quiet, shallow fits that leave red stains on napkins and handkerchiefs Abby pretends not to see.

But the flowers have stopped.

Not entirely. He still wakes some nights breathless, the ghost of vines curled under his ribs. A rogue petal now and then. A phantom bloom in the back of his throat. But they don’t strangle him anymore. They don’t try to bury him alive.

Because the garden inside him finally understands.

Andrew cares.

That was all it needed. Just that. Just enough .

So now, when Neil breathes—even when it hurts—it’s with lungs that want to stay open.

And that’s something.

He knows where Andrew is before anyone tells him.

He knows because the bed has been cold. Because Wymack looked at him like he was a loaded gun every time Andrew’s name came up. Because Renee pressed a hand to his shoulder the day he was released and said, “Go.”

Columbia.

The house is half-empty when he gets there, borrowed and unfamiliar. The door's unlocked, but Neil doesn’t go inside. He follows the smell of cigarette smoke through the side yard and around the back—until he sees him.

Andrew.

Slouched on the back porch steps, hoodie sleeves pushed to his elbows, boots unlaced, arms braced on his knees. The pack of cigarettes is nearly empty. There are five butts crushed beneath his boot.

Neil doesn’t speak.

He watches him for a second longer—Andrew’s jaw tight, eyes fixed on some middle distance as if he just glares hard enough, the world will fall in line. His other hand is curled into a fist, resting against his thigh like he’s trying not to break something. Like he already did.

Neil takes a breath. It pulls, raw and familiar in his chest, but it works .

He steps forward.

Andrew doesn’t look at him. But his shoulders go tense, his hand stilling mid-flick of the lighter.

“You’re late,” he says flatly.

Neil lowers himself onto the top step beside him. Not touching. Just there.

“Those things will kill you, you know.”

Andrew snorts. “It’s not my lungs we need to worry about.” He puts the cigarette out anyway, bats the smoke away from them. 

Neil stares ahead, at the line of the horizon breaking between trees. “Yeah.”

Silence.

Smoke drifts between them. Sharp and acrid. Neil breathes it in.

“I thought you hated me.”

Andrew’s response is immediate. And vicious. “I do .”

That stings. More than it should.

Neil swallows. “I know." 

“You let it happen.” Andrew’s voice is flat. But his hands are shaking. “You fucking let it happen.”

He’s stands up and over Neil, chest rising and falling like he’s just sprinted through a warzone. Maybe he has. Maybe he still is.

“You chose it.”

It rips out of him—low and sharp and guttural. Not loud, but it hits, like something tearing loose from the inside.

Neil glances down at his hands. They’re thinner than he remembers. His nails were still stained with faint yellow and red

“You chose me.”

Like it’s a crime. Like it’s the worst thing Neil’s ever done. Like he can’t believe it even now.

His hands curl into fists, then uncurl, like he doesn’t trust himself not to break something.

“You could’ve stopped it. You could’ve said something. To anyone. To me. But you didn’t. You let it grow. You let it dig in and consume you and you just—what? Watched it happen?”

He’s pacing now, short agitated movements like he can’t contain the energy boiling under his skin. Like he wants to put his fist through the nearest wall and knows it won’t be enough.

“You lied.”

The words are shredded. Ruined.

“You looked me in the face and let me believe there was someone else.”

He stops. The stillness of a live wire.

“Do you know what that did to me?” His voice drops to something that sounds almost like disbelief. “I saw you dying, and I thought—fuck, I thought it was your past coming back for you. Or some idiot mistake. Or the fucking cigarettes.” A harsh laugh, bitten off at the edges. “And all this time? It was me.”

He gestures to himself like it’s some kind of accusation. “I was the one killing you. And you knew. You knew, and you didn’t say anything. You let me stay close. Let me touch you. Let me watch you choke on something I could’ve—I would’ve—”

His voice cracks, suddenly, and he stops. Swallows hard. Tries to keep himself from unraveling.

“You made me think I was safe.” Barely more than a whisper now. “That I didn’t have to watch where I stepped. That it wasn’t dangerous to be near you. That I wasn’t the reason.”

His hands tremble at his sides, nails digging into his palms.

Repeated: “You almost died.”

A prayer. A wish. A heartbreak. 

He looks at Neil now, really looks. There’s blood in his eyes and war in his throat.

And beneath it—devastation. That’s what it is. Not just anger. Loss.

“You almost fucking died, and I didn’t stop it. I didn’t even see it. Because you made me think I didn’t matter enough to be the reason.”

A beat. His mouth twists like he’s trying not to throw up the truth.

“And the worst part?” His voice drops to a whisper. “You chose that. You chose me. You thought I was worth dying for.”

He takes one breath. Just one. 

“You’re a fucking idiot, Josten.”

And it doesn’t sound like an insult.

It sounds like grief.

Neil’s hands twitch in his lap.

Not from pain—though there’s that, always—but from something heavier. Something nameless, until now.

Andrew’s words still hang in the air, smoke and ash and fury. And Neil?

Neil breathes it in.

He looks up, slow and steady, eyes shining too bright in the low light, like he’s already half-transparent, like he could be gone any second. Maybe he already is.

But he still speaks.

“I didn’t lie.”

His voice is hoarse, wrecked, but sure. Steady, like his ribs aren’t stitched together with regret.

“Not about you.”

A pause. A breath. His throat works around it.

“I didn’t say anything… because I didn’t know how.” He lets the words settle, then adds, quieter—“Because if I said it out loud, it would be real.”

His hands open, palm up, empty.

“And real things don’t last for me.”

He laughs. It breaks halfway out of his chest. “They get stolen. They get ripped out. Or they get used against me.” He looks at Andrew like he’s memorising him again. “But you? You never took. You never asked. You just—were. You let me be.”

He shrugs, helpless.

“So yeah. I chose it. I chose you.”

Another laugh, smaller now. Tired.

“I was already dead. The flowers just made it honest.”

He reaches for Andrew’s hoodie—slow, careful, asking. When Andrew doesn’t pull away, he holds on, not tight, just there. Just enough.

“You think I did this to you?” A breath. “No. I did this for you.” And then—his voice, cracking open— “Because if I was going to die for something…”

Neil looks at him like the rest of the sentence is obvious. Like there was never anyone else it could’ve been. “…it was always going to be you.”

His grip tightens. Just slightly.

“And maybe that makes me stupid. But I never said I was smart.” A ghost of a smile. “Just selfish enough to want you. Just brave enough to bleed for it.”

He tilts his head.

“Still think I’m a liar?”

Andrew doesn’t speak for a long time.

He doesn’t blink either—just stares, like Neil’s turned into something unrecognizable, something impossible. Like if he looks long enough, he’ll find the lie tucked behind Neil’s ribs.

But there’s no lie. Just bone and blood and truth.

The kind that tastes like iron and sounds like a death sentence.

Neil’s still holding on the the fabric around Andrew's wrist. Loosely. Like he’d let go the second Andrew asked.

Andrew doesn’t ask.

Instead, he moves—slow, precise, like every part of him is on delay. Like he’s dragging himself through molasses. Like belief is a battlefield and every step is a wound.

He sinks back to the step, curls his fingers into Neil’s shirt, right over his heart, then speaks—quietly.

“You almost died.”

Not like an accusation this time.

More like a statement of fact he still doesn’t know what to do with.

“For me.”

He says it like it’s poison.

Like it makes him sick.

“You shouldn’t have.”

Neil just watches him, eyes wide, unwavering. Doesn’t speak. Doesn’t argue.

Andrew’s mouth twists.

“People don’t…” He stops. Tries again. “People don’t choose me, Neil.”

His voice is raw now. Bone-deep. “They use me. Fear me. Need me. But they don’t—”

He can’t finish it.

So Neil does.

“Love you?”

Andrew flinches. A blade to the ribs.

Neil softens. Not in pity. In understanding. “I didn’t mean to.”

Then, quieter: “I didn’t want to.”

Andrew closes his eyes. His fingers tighten in Neil’s shirt.

Neil leans forward, lets their foreheads touch. Lets the silence between them bloom like something sacred instead of something cursed.

Then Andrew whispers—almost too quiet to catch: “But you did.”

Neil exhales, shuddering.

Andrew opens his eyes.

And then, as if the words cost him everything he has left—

“Okay.”

Just that.

Acceptance.

Permission.

A beginning.

And maybe—just maybe—something like home.

“You were supposed to be temporary.” His voice is lower now. Quiet. Worn thin at the edges. “Just a side effect of the drugs. A dumb junkie with fast feet and a death wish.”

Neil laughs once, sharp and brittle. “Yeah, well. I’ve always been good at disappointing people.”

Andrew looks up.

His eyes are wild—burning gold, bloodshot and rimmed with exhaustion. “You’re a fucking martyr, Neil Josten."

Neil doesn’t flinch. “You gave me a reason to stay. I gave you everything else.”

Andrew goes still.

Andrew’s voice is a whisper now. Barely there. “I didn’t think you meant me.”

“You never do.”

They sit like that for a minute.

Just breathing.

Andrew pulls out another cigarette, puts it between his lips. Drops it. Crushes it under his boot with the others. 

Neil reaches for him.

Not his hand. Not his face.

Just the space between them.

He turns his palm up.

A quiet question.

A breath held.

A prayer.

His fingers tremble slightly in the cold, but he doesn’t pull away. He can feel his heart in his wrist, in his throat, in the hollow spot under his ribs where flowers used to bloom unchecked. Where pain used to root itself, like it belonged there.

He thinks of the garden.

The one he carried inside himself like a leech. Wild and choking and full of unspeakable things. Every petal a secret. Every thorn a truth he wasn’t brave enough to say out loud.

He lived in it for months. Tended it like a coward. Let it consume him like he deserved it.

Because love—this love—was always going to be a punishment, wasn’t it?

Because he thought he wasn’t allowed to want things. Not good things. Not this boy.

But Andrew —

Andrew was always the exception.

Andrew, who said yes once when Neil begged him to make him stay. Andrew, who stayed when Neil didn’t know how to. Andrew, who pulled him back every single time he tried to disappear.

And now here he is again.

Doing it again.

Dragging Neil back from the edge of something too final.

Always.

Neil stares down at their hands, his own still outstretched, wondering if this is the moment he finally gets left behind.

Then Andrew moves.

Not dramatically. Not like a confession. Just… moves.

His hand hovers, then drops, pressing against Neil’s with no fanfare at all. No curled fingers. No comforting grasp. Just contact.

Palm to palm.

Skin to skin.

Heartbeat to heartbeat.

That’s it.

But it sends a crack through Neil’s chest so wide that there might as well be a gaping hole there. 

And the garden?

The garden stills .

It doesn’t bloom.

It doesn’t strangle.

It doesn’t ache or tear or twist in him like a punishment.

It rests.

The roots stop thrashing.

The petals go quiet.

The soil inside his chest, for the first time, is just… still .

Because it’s safe now.

Because Andrew said yes.

And maybe he didn’t say the words.

Maybe he never will.

But he doesn’t have to.

Not when his hand is here. Not when the weight of him is here. Not when everything in Neil finally knows what it feels like to be chosen.

Andrew exhales beside him.

Ragged.

Like he, too, has been holding his breath for months.

Neil turns his head, eyes meeting Andrew’s.

“Can I stay?”

And Andrew—fucking, Andrew—he looks wrecked. There’s no armour on his face. Just open space, and fury, and grief. And something that might, might, be the shape of love if Neil let himself name it.

But he doesn’t ask.

He doesn’t need to.

Because this?

This is enough.

Neil leans in—barely, just enough for their foreheads to almost touch—and closes his eyes.

He’s still breathing.

Still sore.

Still broken in a thousand ways.

But he’s here .

And Andrew is too.

Together. Again.

And for now, that’s everything.

***

The porch step was cold beneath Neil’s thighs, the wood rough through his sweatpants. Andrew’s palm against his own was warmer than it had any right to be—dry and calloused and real , like an anchor in the storm of Neil’s ribs.

Andrew exhaled sharply through his nose, then stood in one fluid motion, pulling Neil up with him. His grip didn’t loosen.

“Come inside,” he said. Not quite an order. Not quite a plea. Just— now .

Neil followed, his lungs aching with every step—not from flowers now, but from the weight of something worse: hope. The kind that dug its roots deep and refused to be torn out.

The living room was dark, the only light bleeding in from the streetlamp outside. Andrew shoved him against the doorframe, hands bracketing Neil’s hips, close enough that Neil could count the flecks of gold in his eyes.

Neil laughed, and the sound tore at his throat. A cough rattled loose—not the bone-deep hacking of before, but something smaller, quieter. A single petal, pale yellow and fragile, landed on the couch between them.

They both stared at it.

Andrew crushed it in his fist. Then for the last time: "You almost died.” 

Neil grinned, all teeth. “Funny. The only time I ever wanted to live was when it started to kill me.”

Andrew’s hand slid to the back of Neil’s neck, fingers pressing into the scarred skin there. Not gentle. Not cruel. Just there, like he was anchoring himself too.

“Don’t say shit like that,” Andrew muttered.

Neil’s grin wavered. “Then ask me something better.”

Andrew’s fingers tightened. “Yes or no?”

Neil’s breath caught. “It’s always yes with you.”

Andrew kissed him like he was trying to rewrite history—lips bruising, teeth sharp against Neil’s mouth. Neil arched into it, hands locked in front of him, but Andrew caught his wrists and dragged them up himself, guiding Neil’s fingers to tangle in his hair. Not pulling. Raking. A silent command: Here. Like this.

Andrew’s other hand splayed over Neil’s waist, thumb digging into the jut of his hipbone, while his other hand stayed locked around Neil’s throat, fingers curled just shy of choking. Neil could feel his heartbeat hammering against Andrew’s palm, wild and alive .

When they broke apart, Andrew didn’t let go. Their foreheads touched, the space between them thick with breath and silence and everything they’d never said out loud.

Neil was breathless. 

“Still breathing, junkie?” Andrew asked, quieter now. Like the words hurt.

Neil laughed, the sound shredded at the edges. “Barely.”

Andrew’s hand found his again. Twined their fingers together—not like a promise. Like a fact.

“Good,” he said. “Then keep breathing.”

Neil didn’t argue. Not this time.

Andrew pulled him to the couch. No ceremony. No warning. Just presence. He dropped beside him, close enough that their knees knocked.

Outside, the wind shook the trees. Somewhere, a car door slammed.

Neil closed his eyes.

Andrew’s heartbeat was steady under his ear.

The garden in his chest stayed still.

***

Neil dozed off sometime after midnight, not fully asleep—never fully asleep—but wrapped in the warmth of a body that didn’t leave.

And in the half-light before dawn, when he stirred, throat sore and lungs tight but clear —there were no petals in his mouth. No vines pressing up his spine.

Just Andrew.

Watching.

Alive.

Still here.

Neil looked at him, tired and real, and thought:

I think I could do this.

I think I could live.

Not for forever. Not for safety. Not even for hope.

But for him .

And that—that was enough.

***

They say Hanahaki begins with a feeling…

And maybe it ends with one, too.

Not silence. Not death. But something louder.

Choice. Trust. Touch. A voice in the dark saying: Stay.

Love—bloody and sharp and real.

And for once, he doesn’t have to bleed for it.

Series this work belongs to:

• Part 1 of Hanahaki AU