Gyuri was exhausted. She felt shattered and filthy, as if there was a layer of sage and mud over her skin. She desperately needed a shower, a comb to fix the mess off her hair, and something close to bleach to wash off the sugary aftertaste of her tongue. She wanted her bed so bad, especially as she walked herself home, lost deep in her thoughts, and she came into her house to find her parents in a hug. 

It wasn't a rare sight to her. They always thought they were discreet with their displays of affection and thought she never caught them, but she did. She grew up admiring the shared and secret smiles and the stolen kisses every morning before her father left for work quite sweet. The giggles and lighthearted conversation late at night when they talked about their day were just the sign of another good day in their family. She was used to the displays of affection. However, the silent tears they were shedding were out of the ordinary.

The sound of the door shut brought their attention back to her, and no force on earth could ever help her prevent her eyes from filling with tears as well. Her father was crying and unable to contain a sob; he walked to the threshold to wrapped her in a tight hug. 

“My pumpkin.” He cried, and the tightness of his arms around her shoulders broke her into pieces again.

Gyuri cried and cried. She let the fear take over her body, her mind, and her feelings. Caving into it, she let in the dread to devastate and destroy every hint of hope and peace she ever had. As she found herself in both of her parent's embraces, she just wanted the curse to take her body away and, to be over with it. She didn’t care. She did not even want to care anymore.

Her parents barely let her go, not even stay away from their sight for a second except for when she took a shower and got ready for bed. Gyuri ended up spending that night in their room like she always did when she was a little girl and was scared about the smallest of things. Feeling minuscule in the world and lost and gone in the dark, she cried herself to sleep between them as they cried along with her.

She must have been too drained to have any dreams or nightmares, although it wasn’t a peaceful night either. Waking up around midday, feeling just as tired, Gyuri came out to the kitchen to find her parents waiting at the table. There were cups of tea served, her father was reading the newspaper, which meant he must have asked the day off, and her mother seemed lost in her thoughts. They looked disheveled and out of place, just as she felt.

“Good morning.” She whispered, coming close to the table, and their heads turned around to her, their expressions visibly relaxing.

“Finally…” Her mother breathed out in relief, standing up, “we were getting worried.”

“Are you hungry, sweet pumpkin?” Her father said, setting the newspaper down and focusing on setting up her set of dishes on the table.

In a matter of minutes, Gyuri was seated in between her parents, having a late breakfast, and she couldn’t remember that last time she had a meal. Her father had to remind her a couple of times, stifling a laugh, that she had to slow down and take it easy if she didn’t want to choke. 

As lighthearted as the atmosphere was for a moment, it turned heavy when she finished her food. Gyuri wasn’t entirely comfortable about talking about the diagnosis yet. However, she was aware that her parents needed it. They needed to have something to hold onto.

“How do you want to handle all this?” Her father asked as he poured more tea into her cup, “your mother filled me in about yesterday’s appointment and Dr. Kim’s suggestions.”

“He even gave us some pamphlets.” Her mother added, reading through one with a deep and unconvinced frown.

“I threw up petals yesterday.” She confessed, and if the house felt already heavy and stuffy, it suddenly was even quieter, still, and desolated than before. “I guess I don’t even have six months anymore.”

Both of her parents lowered their heads, probably to hide their pained expressions, but she could hear their desolation. Listening to her mother’s muffled sobs and witnessing the subtle tremble in her father’s shoulders was more heartbreaking than she could ever imagine. Gyuri had nothing else to do but stay still, gripping her cup of tea, and waited for her parents to grief as she shed her fair amount of tears in silence.

“What do you want to do?” Her father asked after a while, sniffling as he wiped his tears.

“I don’t know.” She admitted, offering a napkin to him. “Can we keep it between us? At least until I figured it out.”

“Absolutely, pumpkin,” her father beamed, forcing a smile.

“Does that include that man?” Her mother asked, and Gyuri noticed the spite in her voice.

“Do you mean Baekhyun, mom?” She retorted, amazed at how easily her sentiments towards the guy changed.

“Pumpkin...”

“He can’t know,” Gyuri stated, her voice strong and steady, despite the mess inside her.

From all the questions and doubts, the fear and anxiety, one thing was not open to debate, and that was that Baekhyun could not find out about her illness. He couldn't know about her suffering, and even less, her eventually gruesome death. If she was sure of something, it was that she could never inflict that kind of burden on him, even if he was inadvertently responsible for her pain.

“He can never know.” She decided and stood up before her parents could protest. “I’ll be in my room.”

Gyuri locked herself in her room, in turmoil and reeling with questions and doubts. Despite all she knew, she had no idea what to do next. She wasn’t even entirely sure of how she was feeling most of the time, let alone having plans for the last months of her life.

Feeling her mood somber again, she opened up her laptop to indulge herself in the arms of the internet and its fatalist disposition. She lost track of time, jumping from patients' stories forums to medical journals with the latest results on vaccine research and then to blogs with reviews on the edge technology procedures. She paid particular attention to the Gardener Ritual, which was essentially a root removal surgery developed by Japanese scientists. The more she read and dug around about it, the more convinced she felt about how hopeless her situation was.

Surgery did not work. The roots could be successfully removed, but there was proof that the recovery stage was even more painful than the actual disease. However, it only took a glance of the beloved one to make the roots grow back again, faster and more lethal than before. In a blink of an eye, all the effort and money were thrown into the garbage. Gyuri didn’t even have the small fortune needed to get the procedure done. Surgery was not an option.

Some other theories seem more feasible. Gyuri could simply confess her true feelings, but it was proven that it only triggered the disease, and people ended up dropping dead right that instant. It was like shooting herself on the chest, hoping she would miss the heart. Confessing was not an option either.

Irritated, Gyuri shut her laptop closed and sulked in her chair. Thinking about everything and anything, she realized how angry she was at herself. She was beyond annoyed for not managing to compartmentalize her fear effectively and just focus on herself to enjoy what was left of her life. So what was she supposed to do? She had heard people talk about conquering the heart of that special person, but she couldn't wrap her head around that idea.

She has always been fidgety and almost mute, fighting her anxiety most of the time. It didn’t matter how kind and sweet Baekhyun was; he would never see her as anything else other than a little sister that needed his constant help. Gyuri didn’t have the guts to just fully and head on confessing her love for her best friend. She wasn't even his type. Baekhyun liked…she didn’t know for sure, but he dated only pretty and dumb girls. He had always been attracted to outgoing people that would keep up with his antics, unlike her.

Gyuri perked up. All of a sudden, she had an idea, as though a lightbulb appeared above her head. She had been too preoccupied with her situation, worried about the pain, considering all the possible cures for the damned disease, and Baekhyun’s taste in women that she didn’t realize the implications of what the ciabatta man said. 

If he was still alive after six years of catching that nasty curse, it meant he was outliving the disease. Plain and simple. Gyuri rushed out of her room to find her purse and everything else she had with her the previous night.

“Mom, where is my purse!?” Gyuri asked out loud, skipping the last two steps of the stairs, suddenly feeling unexpectedly excited.

“I put it back in your closet.” Her mother replied from the laundry room, “and the sandwich is in the fridge.”

Gyuri halted. She didn’t order a sandwich. She barely made it out alive of that place, let alone have time to order anything. Something minuscule in her chest softened when she opened the fridge and found the same paper bag the ciabatta man placed in front of her before leaving the restaurant. She couldn’t even recall carrying it back home.

The memory of the familiarity and comfort she felt from that man only made her rush back to her room, frantically looking for the book. Gyuri found herself smiling when she finally found it on one of the shelves of her closet.  

Sitting back at her desk, she threw the bag away, and almost as if it was sacred, placed the book in front of her. After a moment, she opened it to find the man's phone number on the first page, right below the dedication, and the words filled her eyes with tears. 

“To the ones the world seems to choose as undeserving of love.”

Never such a short sentence felt as accurate as of