Cherry Blossom Flowers

He looks at him with stars in his eyes. He loves the way he moves, how he speaks, how he is. Long legs that carry him around, a long neck that makes him thinks of endless nights under the moon, songs that have yet to be sing. He loves him, as simple as this.

In that instant, with his eyes solely on him, it flops inside, falling to his blood. Tiny and small, so little he doesn't notice, but it has begun, the flowers are blooming, exploding in pale pink hues inside of his heart where they have nestled, settled in with his own feelings.

It isn't surprising for him when he rushes to the toilet, a hand covering his mouth and the sickening feeling trembling inside his core. He isn't surprised but stares, lost, at the flowers swimming in the pool, mixed with his own spite and blood. Somehow it's captivating the way their float, as if alive. He looks at them: cherry blossom petals.

When he coughs and they swirl, graciously through the air, soft and elegant he thinks about him, dancing, precise, lithe, perfect, they remind him of Seunghoon, who is so full of life and who holds a beauty that, like this, can’t be explained and that it is as simple as being in love.

It doesn’t hurt to know that he doesn’t feel the same (it’s something he has always expected, he has never held any prospects nor dream about being kissed under the trees, he is fine just like this, close enough to tell that he is the love of his life but not enough to taste his lips and memorize the contour of his face, to feel the coldness of his skin under his hands, to hold his heart as he does with his own).

It doesn’t hurt but he coughs and Minho knows; he looks at him with tears at the edge of his eyes and begs him to get threated (Jinwoo refuses because he can’t stop this feeling that has been with him since that day he greeted him in – it has been there since always and now it’s too late to get rid of it, the roots are deep inside his chest and his blood has watered these flowers, pink and soft and pretty that is escaping from his lips, like a painting, it’s captivating for an entirely different reason). He has Seunghoon and he loves him so much that not loving him feels alien, out of himself (he can’t, he doesn’t want to). It doesn’t hurt because Minho doesn’t know for who he is throwing those pretty flowers, he is unaware of the person from who he is giving up his whole life (for Seunghoon he would do so much more). It hurts, though, to think about flowers rooting on his grave, of tears falling down the face he has learnt to adore (and Seungyoon and Minho too, he doesn’t want to be the burden on their shoulders; he will, anyway, because he can’t stop, he doesn’t want to move off these sentiments that have been with him for so long – longer than Minho has been with them).

Of course Minho has to split his secret and, surely, now Seunghoon knows it too (and he tries, by all means, to convince him to get the surgery done before it is too late – but it’s too late already, he has been throwing up roots and stems covered in red and full-bloomed cherry flowers, pinkish like his cheeks after dancing). Of course, this is about his feelings and he will do, adamantly, whatever he wants with them (and he wants to keep them because loving Seunghoon makes him feels right).

There isn’t much to do but to wait; wait until his time is over and he will lay on a bed of flowers, wait until, perhaps, Seunghoon loves him back, wait for an end that will arrive at him soon because he coughs blood and the petals, before soft and pretty, now are sore climbing up his throat, as if blades scratching his vocal cords, leaving him mute, parted lips spewing cherry red blossoms. It leaves him breathless, his pale face losing its gleam, becoming sallow, his eyes are red of all the myriad of the sleepless night thinking about him, counting all the petals piled up against his mouth, over the pillows – painted in scarlet.

Seunghoon drives him to the hospital and stares at the X-Ray that shows all the flowers growing inside his chest (they are taking away all the space and the air, roots entangled around his bones and guts, making it hard for him to breath or eat because the pressure there is so much that feeding him is becoming impossible; soon he should be hospitalized, fed with an intravenous serum only until it will be, too, too much for him to handle – now it’s too late to remove them from his system, not that Jinwoo wants that, he hasn’t changed his mind, he persists, stoically, into loving that person who doesn’t love him back and that will be his end; he doesn’t care, for him he will give up his whole world).

“You are stupid, hyung” he doesn’t take it badly; he knows Seunghoon is pissed at him (he should be the angry one, after all, if he is in this situation is all Seunghoon’s fault, not that he could ever blame him). “At least tell me who that person is, so I can be mad at someone for taking you away from me,” he says, frowning, seriously. Jinwoo can only laugh and Seunghoon stares at him, puzzled.

Maybe is his intensity, his sincerity; maybe he only wants to see his reaction; maybe he is confessing because he has left a few weeks only and he can be selfish at least today. He doesn’t know why, but he tells him who he is in love with.

“It’s you, Seunghoon-ah, but it’s alright. Please, don’t be pissed at yourself because you did nothing wrong” he holds his hands and reassures him the way he knows he needs “and forget what I said and be happy.”

“I’ll be mad at myself if I want to” he parks and leaves him there. He doesn’t see him for days (he misses Seunghoon like crazy, the petals coming out slowly, in puffs of air and pink and red; it hurts because, at the end of the day, the only memory he holds into is their last fight, will this be all? He cries to sleep tonight and the next day and the other one until his days are over and he isn’t throwing up anymore: it must be the end).

He closes his eyes and waits for his grand final but the flowers that are supposed to cover his body aren’t coming; instead, Seunghoon does it. He covers him with soft eyes and peppers kisses all over his face.

“You aren’t going anywhere” he promises, holding his hands, cradling him to sleep.

Jinwoo pecks his lips and rests with him all night; the last flowers dissipating into the dark, turning into a dusty, pinkish memory.