News came from the meeting: Bobby was releasing a solo album. 

It was both exciting and sad. Exciting because this was something he had deserved for so long, and sad because a solo meant less time for them.

Hanbin knew it was selfish to want Bobby’s attention solely on himself, but he couldn’t help it – he was foolishly in love.

Well, not that it mattered anyway. He hadn’t seen Bobby ever since he was called away from Hanbin’s bed almost a week ago. It would’ve seemed like the older was avoiding him if it weren’t for the cute text messages Hanbin woke up to, wishing him a good morning, afternoon, and night with a sweet heart added at the end. It never failed to set his heart into motion, a shy flush spreading across his face and neck as he held his phone to his chest.

Sometimes he wished Bobby would lose the ability to affect him so willfully, but he craved his best friend’s affection no matter what form it came in.

He sighed, curled up in a fetal position on the couch in the living room as he repeatedly checked the slow ticking of the clock. Bobby told him he would be back from the studio at 8:30, but it was already 10 and the dorm felt empty, even with all s bustling around.

Slender fingers gently started to brush through his hair and Yunhyeong’s soothing voice murmured to him, “Come eat, Bin. Bobby’ll come back at some point.”

Hanbin shook his head stubbornly even as his stomach rumbled in protest from the lack of food since breakfast this morning. “I promised Bobby-hyung we would eat together.”

Yunhyeong paused and looked at him so sadly that Hanbin had to look away from that gaze, not wanting the pity he could practically feel radiating off the elder. “I promised,” he repeated in a softer tone, turning his face into the cushion underneath his head and closing his eyes tightly.

He heard a quiet sigh come from his well-meaning friend and felt guilt shoot through him. Everyone in iKON, except Bobby it seemed, knew about Hanbin’s love for the other rapper and they were only trying to comfort him – and all he gave in return was being a brat.

Before he could apologize, Yunhyeong leaned down left a quick kiss on Hanbin’s head, his weight lifting off the couch as he cleared his throat and patted down his clothes. “I’ll leave the leftovers in the oven and you can eat it with Bobby when he comes back, okay?”

Hanbin had never felt more grateful for Yunhyeong’s acceptance and showed it by giving him a smile full of gratitude. “Thank you, hyung,” he whispered wholeheartedly and Yunhyeong gave him a fond grin, his eyes crinkling.

“Of course, Bin,” he replied before walking away into his room as the rest of the members also slowly dispersed from the living room. Junhoe, the last one to leave, dimmed the lights down. 

He hovered in the doorway for a minute before quietly calling out to his elder, “Don’t stay up too late, hyung.” Hanbin waved at him loosely and he left, leaving Hanbin alone with the ticking of their clock.

-

Hanbin jolted awake when the front door opened noisily and a thud was heard before a voice hissed out, “Ouch! !” A few more curses and then a sigh of defeat. Keys jingled as they were placed into the bowl on the table next to their door and Hanbin slowly sat up.

“Bobby-hyung?” He asked hesitantly, squinting in the dark to try to make out the shadowy figure stumbling towards him.

“Bin?” Bobby’s voice asked him and he perked up, definitely feeling more awake now than he was a couple seconds ago.

“Yeah,” he replied shyly, trying to restrain his happiness at finally being able to talk to Bobby face-to-face instead of through text.

“What are you still doing up? It’s 12:45 right now!” Hanbin’s smile faltered when he realized Bobby didn’t remember.

“You said you were coming back at 8:30 and I fell asleep waiting for you. Yunhyeong-hyung left food in the oven, if you’re hungry.” Hanbin winced when he heard the petulant tone he accidentally used.

Bobby made a sympathetic noise and the floor lamp next to the couch Hanbin was sitting on, bathing the duo in a dim, but warm, light. “I’m not that hungry, but if you want? I broke my promise to you after all.”

The older reached down to cup Hanbin’s fluffy cheeks and fondly rubbed little circles along the area of flesh. Hanbin sighed contentedly and bathed in the affection he had been deprived of for almost a week now.

He belatedly remembered the question after Bobby chuckled in amusement at him. Hanbin looked up at him through his lashes and felt immense guilt at the exhaustion clinging to Bobby’s eyelids and the dark bags under his eyes, the want to make things up to Hanbin being the only thing keeping the older rapper up.

“It’s okay, Bobby-hyung,” Hanbin whispered, reaching up to clasp his smaller fingers around Bobby’s wrists and reluctantly pulling him off. “Go get some sleep, you look tired.”

Bobby grinned sleepily and yawned widely, stretching his arms up and groaning as his bones cracked from sitting down too long. “I’m dead tired,” he confirmed and Hanbin pursed his lips as his feeling of guilt expanded at the statement.

Bobby leaned down to kiss Hanbin on the forehead gently and whispered, “Goodnight, Bin.” Hanbin hummed in response and watched Bobby slowly stagger his way through the dorm and disappear into the hallway leading to his room.

The small smile quickly slipped off Hanbin’s face as he beat himself up. “God,” he muttered as he pressed the heels of his palms against his closed eyes, “why am I so selfish? Of course he would be tired from working so long – I’m not helping him at all by acting like this.”

He took deeps breaths, but couldn’t feel himself calming down as his yearning for more than those light touches burned through him and the sudden, but helplessly familiar, itching in his throat had him scrambling off the couch and into the open bathroom.

He yanked the toilet cover open, the last thing on his mind being the clothes that had been sitting on it being tossed onto the floor, and retched loudly.

It was harder to force them out this time, he could feel long stems refusing to move from his throat as displaced petals pure as snow fluttered out into the water below.

The hypocrisy of a color that was supposed to represent purity coming from his tainted soul startled a strangled laugh from him before he choked on his blocked windpipe.

He hacked and hacked until he became so desperate for oxygen, he forced his fingers into his mouth and ripped the flowers out, tiny whimpers and sobs of pain escaping him as the stems that were being dragged out seemed to go on endlessly.

He could feel warm blood mixing in with the saliva covering his mouth and fingers and beautiful, red-stained white orchids emerged from him like a bloody offering, the damp petals and vibrant green stems tainted by his traitorous love.

He let go and they splashed into the toilet bowl below as he leaned his head on his crossed arms and took as many gulps of fresh air as he could, ignoring his screaming throat that had been scratched raw.

A few seconds later and Hanbin was so out of it, he barely heard the horrified, “Hyung!” until the thud of someone landing next to him made him jump weakly in shock.

Broad hands hugged him tightly as a warm body pressed against his back. Junhoe’s panicked voice filtered into his ringing ears, “Are you okay?! What’s going on?! , there’s so much blood, wait here, I’ll call the ambulance –”

Hanbin interrupted with a sharp, “No!” and heard Junhoe take a deep breath in protest. “This isn’t something a hospital can fix, Junhoe-yah.”

He could practically feel the confusion wafting off his younger member and reluctantly moved away from where he had been covering the opening of the toilet, letting Junhoe take in the crumpled flowers with their broken stems and the red water they were submerged in.

“This is impossible,” was Junhoe’s only response and Hanbin let out a hoarsely bitter laugh.

“I could only wish it was,” he rasped out and Junhoe shook his head before reaching for Hanbin and pulling him up, deciding that helping Hanbin took priority over this – flower puking that was supposed to be a myth – thing that was going on.

Hanbin leaned against the younger heavily and he weakly flushed the toilet, tilting his head up to tell Junhoe, “I need to clean the blood up.”

The hollow tone his leader said it in made Junhoe come to the daunting realization that he was used to throwing up beautifully harmful flora.

“I’ll do it,” he said insistently, swooping Hanbin up into a bridal hold and rushing to his room, where he deposited his pliant leader. “Be right back,” he tossed back as he went in to deep clean the bloody bathroom.

He picked up his clothes that had gotten splatters of blood on it and dumped it underneath his laundry basket, making a note to shower tomorrow.

For now, someone owed him a good explanation as to why they were vomiting flowers. Or, more specifically, who they were for - even if he already had a very good clue.

-

Junhoe asked him one simple question when he had come back into the room, locking the door and crawling under the covers to feel Hanbin’s pulse with his fingers. “Is it Bobby-hyung?”

Hanbin flinched before slumping down in defeat, already knowing Junhoe would see the blatant lie if he said no. “I think it’s pretty obvious,” he answered back and Junhoe clenched a fist.

“This was just supposed to be a silly myth, not an actually disease. I mean, how could flowers grow out of you because of unrequited love?” Hanbin smiled, but it wasn’t kind nor happy.

“It’s very much real,” he said flatly and Junhoe winced in apology. Hanbin let out a soft cough and Junhoe’s eyes flew to his in alarm.

A single petal drifted out and Hanbin sighed, picking it up with the tips of his fingers and crushing it, releasing the cloyingly sweet scent. “Don’t worry,” he said to Junhoe, “this was just a leftover.”

Junhoe his lips in nervousness, swiping his thumb across Hanbin’s pulse point every few seconds. “You sound very familiar with this pattern, hyung,” he ventured cautiously. “How… how long has it been happening?”

“Almost three months now,” Hanbin murmured with glassy eyes, looking as if he was reliving a painful memory.

Junhoe tugged on Hanbin’s arm to bring him back to reality. “Is there a cure? Have you met anyone like you?”

Hanbin hummed as he rolled what he wanted to say through his head before nodding slowly. “I have met someone who went through this before. He was an idol from a disbanded group.”

He was more hesitant to add, “There are only two ways to cure this. Either they return your love or… or you remove it.”

Junhoe lit up, “Then, can’t you just get rid of it?”

Hanbin shook his head. “It’s not that simple, Junhoe. If I remove it, I forget everything about that person – my feelings, my memories… everything. And I can’t let that happen.”

“So, what?” Junhoe asked incredulously, “You’re just going to keep coughing up bloody flowers until Bobby-hyung falls back in love with you? That could take years, we all know how dense he is!”

“I don’t think I’ll live that long,” Hanbin admitted sardonically and Junhoe in a sharp breath.

“It’s killing you?” He asked in quiet horror and Hanbin nodded, feeling like trash for putting such a distressed look on his pseudo-brother’s face.

He couldn’t do anything right, could he? First he acted like a spoiled child with Bobby and now he was hurting Junhoe so deeply.

Maybe it really would be for the best if the flowers over took him. It would be a horrifyingly beautiful death.

His boys would be okay. He had decades worth of songs in his studio and the only other person besides him who had the key was… Bobby, ironically enough. Key to his heart, key to his studio.

Junhoe saw Hanbin’s slowly darkening thoughts and said lightly, “I guess your interest in flowers was a little deeper than what you told us, huh?”

Hanbin let out a quiet, choked laugh even though it wasn’t even that funny. He kept laughing until it slowly evolved into hysterics as he started crying, the physical manifestation of his deep-seated longing for someone who didn’t love him back.

Junhoe clutched Hanbin closer to him and curled his larger frame over his leader’s, who suddenly seemed so much frailer and weaker than he had ever been in all the years Junhoe had ever known him.

He swore he would protect Hanbin if it was the last thing he did.

———

White Orchid: (Loneliness: Wistfulness) I miss you

-

This Just In: Hanbin has a horrible sense of self-worth :)

He’s worth more to his boys than the songs he can provide, but my dumb little baby doesn’t know that. :/