#adoring.hinata

Your waste bin overflowing, your desk in total disarray, and your floor a mess as well.

Then again, it wasn’t like you intended to fall for Hinata, you muse, picking up one of the red-tinged petals you coughed up only moments ago. Using the sleeve of your sweatshirt, you carefully wipe off the blood that’s collected at the corner of your mouth. You grimace when you pull your arm away from your lips and see how crimson now stains the material of your sweatshirt. You’ll have to toss it into the wash later with all of your other blood-stained clothing.

The wooden frame of your bed digs into your back as you lean your head against your mattress. You wince at the sharp pain in your chest when you accidentally take a deep breath and begin to shallow your breathing so as to not further aggravate the flowers blooming in your lungs. Pity how something so beautiful only grows in such unfortunate circumstances. If you didn’t feel like absolute shit at the moment, perhaps you’d be able to admire it.

Hanahaki disease. The physical manifestation of unrequited love.

What a load of shit.

It’s rather dramatic in your opinion, and quite frankly rude. How dare your body betray your true feelings when the object of your affections so clearly does not feel the same way?

A tired grin crosses your face at the thought of Hinata: the man who’s been one of your closest friends ever since high school. Reflecting back, it was truly only a matter of time before you fell for him. While the two of you attended Karasuno, you were able to chalk up your feelings to those of friendship, but as time progressed, they evolved and soon enough morphed into romantic ones.

In high school, you successfully fooled yourself into believing your feelings were platonic.

At the time, Hinata was strictly your friend. You weren’t blind, you could appreciate that he was cute, in a boyish sort of way, but you were more preoccupied with things you deemed more important: schoolwork, managerial duties for the boys' volleyball team, and worries about your future.

But Hinata had somehow inserted himself in your life and stuck.

He was hopeless in school and the moment he found out that you scored relatively well in comparison to him, he begged you to tutor him. You were a bit skeptical at first, but you eventually relented. You were pleasantly surprised to find that Hinata was eager to learn the material and attentively listened to what you had to say, even if it was only because passing his exams was the only way for him to attend the Tokyo training camp.

You admired Hinata's tenacity and often stayed behind after practice had ended in the gymnasium to help him run drills over and over. He was determined to be the best he could be, and you didn’t mind helping him achieve his goals even if you weren’t exactly well-versed in volleyball. He would seek out your input and if you had any critiques or advice for him, Hinata would take it to heart and incorporate it into his next play.

Soon you began to spend time together outside of tutoring sessions and volleyball practices. You’d hang out with Natsu together and indulge in her whims and desires: weaving friendship bracelets, painting rocks, playing volleyball, and more. Your presence in the Hinata household became normalized, to the point where you could show up at their front door unannounced, and Natsu would simply throw the door open and exclaim, “big sibling!”

You’ve always been the greatest of friends so you’re not entirely sure when the change occurred.

Maybe it was when he left for Brazil. While Hinata was continents away playing volleyball, you remained in Japan attending university. It was easy to distract yourself with schoolwork and internships, but at the end of the day, you missed Hinata terribly. You two did your best to keep in contact with text messages and facetime, but with the time difference, it was difficult. It wasn’t the same and no amount of homework could fill that Hinata-shaped void in your life.

Up until that point, you didn’t realize just how much Hinata had weaseled his way into your life. It wasn’t like your life had ever revolved solely around Hinata, but you had grown accustomed to his presence. No matter what, you could always count on him to be there for you with a bright smile and some silly, but encouraging words.

It was when Hinata returned from Brazil after two years abroad that you realized you were completely and utterly fucked.

He had grown into himself in more ways than one. He carried himself with more confidence than he did before and his features weren’t cute in a boyish way anymore. He had matured and to put it bluntly, Hinata got fucking hot. His skin was sun-kissed, a beautiful golden tan, and he had grown a few inches taller in his time away. The muscles that lie right underneath his skin were strong and corded, and it didn’t go unnoticed how the muscles in his thighs were especially prominent. There was no doubt that Hinata had changed greatly in his time spent in Brazil, but then again, some things never really change. He still had that same old grin, which would brighten your day no matter the circumstances.

The two of you were able to pick up your friendship right where it left off.

That’s when the flowers had started to bloom.

You were unlucky even in comparison to others who suffered from Hanahaki disease. Most of the time, the growth of the flowers in one’s lungs would be gradual. However, in your case, it was accelerated. The first time you experienced a coughing fit, you filled your waste bin to the brim with bloodied petals.

You suppose it was because the realization that you were in love with Hinata had hit you like a freight train.

You did your best to conceal that you had Hanahaki disease. It would do no good to worry anyone with it, especially Hinata. Being in love with someone who didn’t love you was one thing. Being in love with an idiot who didn’t love you was another. If Hinata learned that you had Hanahaki, his first question would be “Who’s responsible?” and it would take everything within you to not scream that it was him.

So you crafted the perfect facade. You would plaster on a smile in front of others and act like everything was completely okay even if behind closed doors, blood-soaked petals were beginning to pile up. If anybody seemed to suspect something was amiss, you would wave aside their concerns and assure them that you were just feeling a little under the weather.

It hurt that Hinata didn’t love you back, but what hurt most was that he didn’t love someone else. There was no other person that was the object of his affections. There was no one that you could blame and point to as the reason why Hinata didn’t love you in return. The fact that Hinata just didn’t see you in any other way than a friend hurt more than the flowers killing you.

Alstroemerias. Those were the flowers that were filling up your lungs. A hollow laugh filled the air when you looked up the meaning of them: friendship. How cruel of the world to make the flowers blooming in your lungs represent the only relationship you would ever have with Hinata.

But, you’d rather have Hinata as a friend than not at all.

So you take care to maintain the smile that’s beginning to strain and ignore the sharp pain in your chest when Hinata tells you that you’re the best friend he could ever have.