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In a world where love could bloom into something beautiful or spiral into something deadly, Jiwoo found herself tangled in a fate she hadn’t asked for, a love she couldn’t control, and a disease that threatened to choke her one petal at a time.
Chaeyeon had always been a natural caregiver, doting on those around her with a tenderness that made her seem more like an older sister than just a friend. She doted especially on her younger friends: Jiwoo, Hayeon, Chaewon, Soomin, Joobin, and others, showering them with love and attention. Jiwoo had always adored her, quietly basking in the warmth Chaeyeon offered, but over time, admiration had transformed into something deeper, something that twisted her heart whenever she saw Chaeyeon’s smile.
It started small, a cough here and there, a tickling sensation at the back of her throat. Jiwoo dismissed it, thinking it was nothing, just a minor cold that would go away on its own. But as the days went by, her coughs grew more frequent, harsher, until one day, something unexpected happened. She felt a sudden itch, sharp and tearing, and before she knew it, she coughed up the soft petals of a flower, white and delicate, speckled with the faintest shade of pink. It was unmistakable. Jiwoo had Hanahaki.
The disease was as infamous as it was tragic mark of unrequited love, a sickness that would only worsen the longer feelings went unreturned. Jiwoo was painfully aware of what her love meant: that she had fallen for someone who didn’t love her back. And that someone, with the bitterest irony, was Chaeyeon.
But Jiwoo didn’t want Chaeyeon to know, didn’t want her to bear the guilt. After all, it wasn’t Chaeyeon’s fault. How could she be blamed for feelings she didn’t share? Jiwoo resolved to keep her secret, swallowing down the pain even as the flowers threatened to tear her apart from the inside out.
It became difficult to hide her illness as time went on. Her coughs were unpredictable, the pain in her chest sharp and persistent. Chaeyeon, ever the caring friend, noticed immediately. She’d sit by Jiwoo, a worried frown etched onto her face as she watched Jiwoo struggle.
“Jiwoo, you should go to the hospital. This cough doesn’t seem normal,” Chaeyeon said one afternoon, her eyes filled with concern as she gently patted Jiwoo’s back.
Jiwoo forced a smile, brushing it off. “It’s fine, unnie. Just a seasonal thing, you know?”
But Chaeyeon’s worry only grew. She could tell that whatever Jiwoo was suffering from was more than just a cough. Yet, no matter how many times she pressed, Jiwoo would just laugh it off, insisting she was fine.
Chaeyeon’s concern deepened further when she caught a glimpse of a petal on the floor one day, faintly pink and unmistakably fresh. The sight had left her speechless for a moment, her mind racing. Hanahaki. Could it be? She knew Jiwoo and Yubin were close, practically inseparable, and a thought flashed through her mind—a conclusion that felt inevitable. Jiwoo had always spent more time with Yubin, laughing and chatting with her best friend, their connection clear for all to see.
“Is it… Yubin?” Chaeyeon asked tentatively one evening as she sat beside Jiwoo, her voice low and unsure.
Jiwoo blinked, a flicker of something unreadable crossing her face. She hesitated, then quickly shook her head, downplaying it with her usual smile. “It’s nothing like that, unnie. Don’t worry about it.”
But behind that smile, Jiwoo was unraveling, piece by piece. The flowers were relentless, clawing at her throat, filling her lungs with a suffocating fragrance that left her breathless. Her condition worsened, the flowers blooming with alarming speed, and each petal she coughed up seemed like a piece of herself she could never get back.
Jiwoo’s friends began to notice too. Yooyeon, her gentle and observant unnie, had seen the way Jiwoo’s face would tighten when she coughed, her attempts to hide her pain becoming more transparent by the day. One night, Yooyeon approached her, her voice soft yet firm.
“Jiwoo, this isn’t something you can just ignore,” Yooyeon said, placing a comforting hand on her shoulder. “If this is Hanahaki, you have to do something about it.”
But Jiwoo shook her head, a small, resigned smile on her lips. “Unnie… I don’t want to do anything about it. I want to keep these feelings, even if it hurts.”
Nakyoung, the ever-playful unnie who often teased her, was devastated when she found out. She’d known Jiwoo’s heart was tender, but she had never imagined her dongsaeng would be dealing with something as serious as Hanahaki. Nakyoung tried to persuade Jiwoo, her usually teasing tone replaced with genuine worry.
“Jiwoo-ah, you don’t have to suffer like this. Think about everyone who loves you. Please, just consider surgery,” Nakyoung pleaded, her eyes filled with desperation.
But Jiwoo’s resolve was unyielding. The idea of erasing her love, of wiping away every memory and feeling she held for Chaeyeon, felt like a betrayal. Her love for Chaeyeon was a part of her, as inseparable from her as her own heartbeat. She would rather live with the pain, the slow decay, than let go of those cherished memories.
Her other unnies, Seoyeon and Sohyun, tried as well, their hearts breaking as they watched their friend suffer. Each one of them urged her, begged her to reconsider, but Jiwoo only smiled, grateful for their love yet unable to let go of her own.
Days turned into weeks, and Jiwoo’s health deteriorated. Her laughter grew softer, her smiles more strained, and even her voice, once so vibrant, became quiet, almost as if the flowers had stolen it from her. She became a shadow of her former self, and yet, she endured, holding onto her memories of Chaeyeon with a fierce determination.
One night, after another particularly harsh bout of coughing, Chaeyeon found Jiwoo doubled over, gasping for air as petals spilled from her lips. Panic seized Chaeyeon as she knelt beside her, gently lifting Jiwoo’s head and brushing the stray petals from her cheeks.
“Jiwoo, please… you need surgery,” Chaeyeon’s voice cracked with desperation, her hands trembling as she held Jiwoo close. “You don’t have to live like this.”
Jiwoo looked up at her, her eyes filled with a mixture of sorrow and fondness. “Unnie, I… I don’t want to lose these feelings. Even if it hurts, I want to remember… you.”
Chaeyeon’s heart twisted painfully, her mind reeling. She had always thought Jiwoo’s Hanahaki was for Yubin, but in that moment, as she gazed into Jiwoo’s tear-filled eyes, a realization dawned upon her—a truth so simple yet so devastating that it left her breathless. She was the cause. She was the reason Jiwoo was suffering, the unrequited love that had taken root in Jiwoo’s heart and blossomed into a deadly disease.
“No…” Chaeyeon whispered, her voice barely audible as the weight of guilt crashed over her. She hadn’t known. How could she have been so blind?
But Jiwoo only smiled, her hand reaching up to gently touch Chaeyeon’s cheek. “Don’t blame yourself, unnie. This was my choice.”
As the weeks passed, Jiwoo grew weaker, the flowers inside her flourishing even as they drained her life away. Chaeyeon remained by her side, watching helplessly as Jiwoo’s condition worsened, each day bringing her closer to the inevitable. The thought of losing Jiwoo tore at her, but no matter how many times she pleaded, Jiwoo remained resolute.
The end came one quiet evening. Jiwoo lay in Chaeyeon’s arms, her breathing shallow, her face pale. The flowers had taken everything from her, leaving her a fragile shell of the vibrant girl she once was.
Chaeyeon held her tightly, tears streaming down her face as Jiwoo’s trembling hand reached up, brushing a final petal from her lips.
“Unnie,” Jiwoo whispered, her voice barely a breath. “Thank you… for everything.”
And with that, Jiwoo’s hand fell limp, her eyes closing as she drifted away, the flowers finally claiming her as their own.
___
The days following Jiwoo’s death were a blur of grief and regret. Chaeyeon felt hollow, haunted by memories of Jiwoo’s laughter, her bright smile, the way she’d light up whenever Chaeyeon was near. Yubin had been the one to tell her the truth, confirming what Chaeyeon had feared—Jiwoo’s Hanahaki had been because of her, the unspoken love that had bloomed into a disease.
The funeral was a somber affair, a gathering of friends and family, each one mourning the loss of a bright, beautiful soul taken too soon. Chaeyeon stood by Jiwoo’s grave, her hands clutching a bouquet of white flowers, her heart heavy with guilt and sorrow.
“I'm sorry, Jiwoo-ah” she whispered, her voice cracking as she knelt beside the grave, her tears falling onto the cold earth.
But fate, it seemed, was not done with Chaeyeon. In the days that followed, she began to notice an odd sensation in her throat—a faint tickle at first, but it soon grew sharper, more insistent. She tried to brush it off, assuming it was her grief manifesting in strange ways. But the coughing came more frequently, and with each cough, she felt something rise in her chest, a painful scratch that left her breathless. And then, one day, she coughed, and a single white petal fluttered from her lips.
Chaeyeon stared at the petal in horror and disbelief. It couldn’t be. Hanahaki was for unrequited love, a punishment for feelings that went unreturned. But Jiwoo was gone, her love with her, buried under the soil where Chaeyeon could never reach. Yet as more petals fell, Chaeyeon realized the truth, her heart breaking all over again.
She had fallen in love with Jiwoo.
The memories they shared, the warmth Jiwoo had brought into her life, all of it had buried itself so deeply in her heart that only now, in her absence, did Chaeyeon realize how much she had loved her. Each petal was a reminder of what she had lost, a reflection of the emptiness that now filled her world. The flowers bloomed within her as if in cruel mockery, blooming not from joy but from pain.
The unnies, Yooyeon, Sohyun, Nakyoung, and Seoyeon, who had been by Jiwoo’s side through her suffering, watched with mounting horror as Chaeyeon began to suffer the same fate. They tried everything to convince her to seek help, to go through the surgery and save herself from the disease that had already claimed one of their own. But Chaeyeon, like Jiwoo, was stubborn.
“I can’t,” Chaeyeon whispered one night as she sat with Yooyeon, the familiar sensation of petals pressing against her chest. “If I forget her, then it’s like she was never here. I can’t erase that, unnie. I can’t lose her twice.”
Yooyeon’s heart broke at those words, her own memories of Jiwoo flooding back, the laughter and smiles they had shared. She wanted to reach out, to somehow pull Chaeyeon back from the edge, but she knew there was nothing she could say to change her mind.
Days passed, and Chaeyeon’s condition worsened, mirroring the slow, tragic decline that Jiwoo had endured. Each cough brought a fresh shower of petals, each one a painful reminder of a love that had come too late, a love that had bloomed only in memory. The other members tried to comfort her, but there was a distance in Chaeyeon’s gaze, a quiet acceptance that left them helpless.
Nakyoung, ever the one to tease and joke, tried to lighten the mood, hoping to bring a smile back to Chaeyeon’s face. “You know, Jiwoo would hate seeing you like this,” she said one day, a forced grin on her face. “She’d probably scold you for being so dramatic.”
Chaeyeon managed a weak smile, her hand reaching up to catch a falling petal. “Maybe… but I can’t help it. She’s everywhere now, in every memory, every moment.”
Sohyun and Seoyeon exchanged glances, their own grief etched into their faces. They had watched Jiwoo slip away, helpless to save her, and now they were watching Chaeyeon follow the same path, a tragedy repeating itself in the most painful way.
One evening, as the sun set and cast long shadows across the room, Chaeyeon sat alone, her fingers tracing the outline of a photo of Jiwoo. Her heart ached with a depth she couldn’t put into words, the weight of regret crushing her with each passing moment. She could feel the flowers spreading, their roots wrapping around her heart, squeezing tighter with every heartbeat.
Her eyes grew heavy, her breathing labored as she closed her eyes, sinking into the memories of Jiwoo. The warmth of her laughter, the softness of her touch, the way her eyes would light up whenever she was near. In her mind, Jiwoo was still there, smiling at her, alive and full of life.
With one last breath, Chaeyeon felt a strange calm wash over her. The pain faded, the flowers finally stilling as if to offer her peace. And in that quiet moment, she whispered to the memory of Jiwoo, her voice soft and filled with longing.
“Wait for me, Jiwoo.”
And then, as the last petal fell, Chaeyeon drifted into the darkness, her heart finally at rest, reunited in spirit with the one she had loved too late.