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jooheonspinky · 4 years

Text

Little too Late

Characters: Sehun x Gender Neutral Reader Genre: Hanahaki Disease, angst Word Count: 3K Warnings: Mentions of blood ────── 〔✿〕──────

You plop into a bench at your favorite café, exhausted from your days’ work. You loved coming here. The atmosphere was always quiet and peaceful; the only sound the clinking of metal spoons against ceramic cups and the hushed murmurings of the patrons as they placed their orders. The background noise and your favorite latte was what helped you unwind after a long day.

Most people would say a cup of coffee at this time of the night would only assist in keeping them awake, but for you it was different. The warmth and flavors only soothed your soul, making you forget the stresses you’d endured that day. It settled your mind, which helped you sleep better.

“Good evening,” you hear a soft voice you don’t recognize interrupt your thoughts.

Glancing up sharply, you have to remind yourself to respond as the handsomeness of the young man standing at your table momentarily renders you speechless.

“Oh, uhm…Hello,” you finally stammer out.

His gaze was so intense. The dark irises, the color akin to espresso, bore into yours through the fringe of his off center parted bangs. The tiniest of smiles quirked one side of his perfectly shaped lips. Even as you lost yourself in the warmth of his eyes, you felt a vague nudge at the back of your mind signally to you that you had seen them before, once upon a time.

“Misty told me you were a regular and you get special treatment,” he winks at you and you swear you feel your heart stop in your chest.

Blushing, you laugh, waving off his comment, “Oh, no no. She just likes to spoil me because we went to school together.”

“You went to school with Misty?” he asks a bit surprised. “I did, too, but a long time ago.”

This time you look over him, but not with the eyes of someone who was admiring his chiseled beauty. Now you take time to picture him much younger, your brows furrowing as you concentrate.

“What’s your name?” you ask as you tilt your head slightly.

“Oh Sehun,” he replies with a smile. “Yours?”

Even as you reply with your name, your brain unlocks the image of the young boy you’d adored as a preteen. He’d only been two years older than you, but to your twelve year old self he seemed ages older and so cool. You’d lived on the same street and had walked to school together. He was popular and always surrounded by both girls and boys. Even still, he had a gentle and kind heart, making sure to say hi to you, trying to always include you whenever you were around. He treated you like a sibling, though, nothing more than friendship ever having bloomed between you two.

Your heart was broken when he moved almost three years later. His father had accepted a job in his native country of South Korea and just like that he was out of your life. Of course, time has a tendency of dampening the sadness and ache in ones heart until it is not but a distant memory. A mere school crush is how you’d classified it when you would randomly remember that time.

You’re brought forth from your thoughts as he murmurs your name a few times until a spark of recognition alights in his eyes.

“Ah, yes!” his smile brightens as he snaps his fingers. “I remember you, Smidge,” he chuckles merrily.

“Huh?” you stare up at him perplexed.

“Smidge. Remember? I used to call you that because you were so small.”

“Oh, that’s right,” you mumble feeling your cheeks flush a rosy hue as you recall his pet name for you.

This brought on another chuckle from Sehun.

“My shift is over in a few minutes, do you mind if I sit with you and catch up?” he asks, his eyes filled with the hopes that you’d say yes.

“Sure, why not,” you shrug as casually as you can.

“Great, so you’re usual right?” he quips.

“Right.”

“Ok, I’ll be back in a bit.”

You give him a nod and watch him walk back behind the counter. He catches you studying him as he makes your coffee, pausing to smile widely and wiggle his fingers at you. The tint on your cheeks brightens as you awkwardly smile back and then force your gaze towards the window next to you instead.

Wah, you would never have thought seeing him again would stir up those childhood feelings you thought you had long ago forgotten. But as you stare out at the crescent moon smiling down at you from the velvety black sky, you can’t deny the rapid thrum of your heart beating giddily in your chest.

────── 〔✿〕──────

From that night forward, Sehun joins you every Tuesday and Thursday after his shift. And while in the past you had so looked forward to your nightly visits to the café for the peace it left you in, now you had an extra reason to get excited about going. You dressed nicer and made sure not a hair was out of place on those days. All the while lying to yourself that it was not all to impress him.

You both chatted quietly over your coffees for about an hour on those nights before you would say your farewells and head to your own homes. You quickly learned his personality hadn’t changed much. He was still sweet, considerate and gentle. When you spoke, his eyes didn’t leave your face, making sure you knew he was listening to every word you said. His laugh brought on tingles in your belly, his smile made your heart swell and you wished nothing would ever cause him to lose that gorgeous smile.

It’s not until a month passes… maybe just a little over a month, that Sehun slips into the bench across from you, that sparkling smile slipping into an expression you hadn’t seen on him before. The change in his demeanor is so foreign to you that it takes you a few moments to decipher it.

Sliding your hand across the table you wrap your fingers around his, looking into his eyes with concern as you ask, “What’s the matter, Sehun?”

He looks down at your joined hands, sighing despondently as he gives your hand an appreciative squeeze.

“It’s Destiny,” he says softly, sadness lacing his words.

Your heart stutters, fluttering roughly in your chest.

“What’s destiny?” you ask, concentrating on keeping the tremor from your voice.

Releasing your hand, he encircles his mug as if trying to draw strength from it. You straighten, taking a sip of your own coffee as you wait for his response.

“Not what…who,” he clears his throat, now leaning back in the bench. Flicking his gaze up to yours, he adds. “Destiny is my girlfriend.”

You instantaneously feel your heart lurch, your blood running cold at his response. A tickle in your lungs startles you, causing you to let out a few coughs. Your eyes water as you suck in a shaky breath.

“Ow!” you groan your face scrunching in pain.

“Jesus,” Sehun stands coming over to your side to pat your back. “Are you ok?”

Shoulders hunched, you hope he can’t see your fisted hand rubbing circles over your chest as you try and soothe whatever that had been.

“Yeah, yeah,” you manage with a grimace. “I think the coffee just went down the wrong pipe.”

He had a girlfriend? What was he doing chatting it up with you until ten? God, how did you always end up in situations like this? Were you truly that bad at reading people? You had felt so comfortable in your talks with Sehun and he had appeared interested… But maybe he was just being him. Always wanting people to feel welcome and at ease around him. Ugh! How could you have been so foolish? He really did only see you as a friend now just like he had all those years ago.

“You sure you’re ok?” he asks again as he brushes the hair out of your eyes and pats your wet cheeks with a napkin.

Taking the napkin from him none too nicely, you brush him off, “Yes. Yes. I’m fine.” He hesitates as he stares at you pensively, but then he finally accepts your words. Wanting his focus to shift from you, you say, “I’m sorry. You were saying?”

You try to bring the conversation back to what you had been talking about, but the coughing just won’t subside.

“I’m so sorry, Sehun,” you finally say between fits of coughing. “I’m gonna go.”

You swiftly stand, gathering the few items you had.

“Wait, are you sure you’re ok?”

He follows you as you head towards the exit with brows furrowed, but you don’t reply as you dash out into the buzz of the night. Not looking back, you hop into your car, speeding off as you continue to attempt to catch your breath. Once at home, you rush to your bathroom, your cheeks flushed as you glance in the mirror.

Splashing water on your face, you try to sooth the heat in hopes it would calm the coughing, but another fit ensues. Your eyes widen as tiny red and pink spots speckle across the white porcelain of the sink. You cough again and it’s as if whatever had been caught in your throat is dislodged. You spit into your hand and feel fear grip your body.

A bloodied torn blue petal lies in the center of your palm.

“No!” you whisper roughly.

It couldn’t be! You take a few deep breaths and force yourself to relax as you focus on the fact that you finally feel relief, the tightness in your chest gone. Even the tickle in your throat is no longer there. You throw the petal away and wash your hands, rinse your mouth and clean the sink.

All the while your heart still races, terrified of what this all means. You are quick to shower and slip into bed, hoping the next day will reveal that what you believed this to be was not actually it.

────── 〔✿〕──────

Despite knowing Sehun had a girlfriend, you found yourself returning to the cafe. It was painful sitting across from him knowing there would never be anything more between you, but not seeing him or hearing his voice seemed to hurt even more. So you still showed up twice a week as usual and he still sat with you after his shift.

At first he filled you in on the fact that things were getting a bit rocky with his girlfriend. But then he stopped bringing it up and you assumed they had worked things out. After all, he had said he’d had no intentions of leaving her.

And so the coughing persisted, the petals still coming up. You did your best to hide any evidence from him, but he only grew more and more concerned.

“It’s just a cold,” you would try and reassure him, but you could see the doubt in his eyes.

He finally convinced you to get checked out.

You sit in the chilly room of the doctor’s office. He had not liked the sounds in your lungs and had sent you to have X-rays done in the building next door. Now you waited for the images to be sent over and for him to give you the prognosis.

You look up as the door opens and see the doctor step in. He smiles, but it doesn’t quite reach his eyes. Instantly, your palms begin to sweat.

“Well,” he says on an exhale as he sits on his stool and rolls over to you. From the examination table you look down at him nervously. “I’ve taken a look at your images and, it’s as I thought. You have the Hanahaki Disease. Do you know what that is?”

You glance away, sadness squeezes at your heart. The now familiar tickle in your esophagus threatening to bring on a coughing fit. You clear your throat as you return your gaze to the doctor.

“Yes,” you whisper tightly.

“Then you know your options,” he straightens in his chair. “Find a way for your love to return your feelings or I can perform a procedure to remove the roots. But,” he shakes his head forlornly. “You will never have the capacity to feel romantic love again.”

What kind of options were these? you think desperately to yourself. If there was any chance that he could love you back, you did not want to take that choice away from yourself.

“I don’t want to have the surgery,” you tell him firmly.

He rolls over to the counter and scribbles onto a paper. Tearing it off he stands and hands it to you.

“Take this if you need help sleeping. The other will help mildly with the coughing during the day.”

I nod, accepting the paper.

“Thank you.”

“If you change your mind…”

“I won’t,” you give him a tight-lipped smile.

“Very well. Have a good day.”

────── 〔✿〕──────

As time passes, it only gets worse. Sometimes you retch up full blooms of blue anemone, the flowers beauty tainted with saliva and blood. The feeling of suffocating was the worst. There were so many times you wanted to give in and have the surgery, but knowing you could never love again frightened you more than anything. You told Sehun that you had been right. It was just a cold. You did not dare to tell him the truth for fear of losing his friendship.

Glancing into your mirror you see how much weight you’ve lost. Your eyes are sunken into your face, dark circles making them look even deeper and lost. Your cheeks are hollow, your hair thinning.

With glistening tears you apply makeup, bringing your face back to life. Sehun had invited you to have a picnic at the park. He said he had a surprise and you were excited. Perhaps he had finally decided to leave Destiny. Just maybe he had fallen in love with you instead.

You quickly dressed, then reached the park before him. There you laid out a blanket beneath the shade of a large tree. Opening the picnic basket, you begin to lay out some of the snacks when you happen to glance up and catch sight of Sehun.

You smile, but he hasn’t seen you yet. In a pair of dark blue jeans and a butter yellow t-shirt his skin seems to glow and your heart swells in your chest at how handsome he looks out of his barista uniform.

But then your eyes fall on the person beside him. You watch as he puts his arm across her shoulders and she puts one of her own across his lower back, hand resting on his hip. The sunlight glints off of an object on her finger and you know.

Instantly you know that his ‘surprise’ was that they had worked things out and he had proposed. They were engaged. Any chance you may have had...was lost forever.

You begin to cough, the sound harsh. A searing pain in your chest becomes unbearable and you look down to see something poking at your shirt. Through watery eyes you pull the collar of your shirt away from you and peer down. Eyes wide with terror, you see a stem growing out of the middle of your chest, a trickle of blood sliding down your skin.

Seeing him with her must have exacerbated the disease. Before you can grab your phone to call for help more stems break through your chest. You are screaming in agony, the sounds muted by the blooms forcing themselves up from your throat.

Writhing in pain, you fall back onto the blanket. Never had you ever felt anything as excruciating as what was happening to you now. Through the haze of pain you feel someone rush down beside you.

“Oh my God!”

It was Sehun. You turn tear filled eyes towards him and offer a crooked pain filled smile. He looks horrified and you wish you could reach out and smooth away the worried creases on his brow. His hands hover over you most likely unsure if he should touch you or not. Finally, he grasps the hand closest to him, his other hand brushing back your hair from your forehead.

The pain that wracks your body doesn’t seem so bad when he holds your hand so tenderly like that. You try to speak, but only gurgling sounds come forth.

“Call 911!” Sehun shouts to the woman. Within moments you can hear her responding to the operator and you tune her out, trying to focus on Sehun’s lips as he speaks to you. “What is happening to you?”

You are unable to answer as you begin to cough forcefully, sputtering as you try to catch your breath.

“An ambulance is on the way,” the woman comes to stand next to Sehun.

You both turn to look up at her. Her eyes are wide as she fixates on you, a hand coming up to cover her mouth.

“Thank you,” he tells her, before returning his attention to you.

“Please hang on. Stay with me,” he pleads. Some of the pressure alleviates and you inhale deeply. “God, this is not how I imagined this day to go.”

“I’m...sorry,” you croak, trying to breath through the torturous ache afflicting your body.

“No,” he chuckles humorlessly. “You don’t need to be sorry.” You tighten your grip on his hand as another stem pierces through your skin. “Jesus. Who did this to you?”

You shake your head desolately, squeezing your eyes shut in hopes he wouldn’t see. Tears flood down the sides of your face and when you open your eyes back up and your gaze locks on his countenance, you know he knows.

“No,” his lips turn down desperately. “No!”

Sirens wail in the distance. The woman squeezes his shoulder before rushing off to meet the ambulance.

“It’s not…your fault,” you try to assure him even as another burst of coughs plagues you.

“I didn’t know,” he whispers desperately. “I didn’t know.” He lifts your head up onto his lap in hopes of making you more comfortable. “I would have said something sooner. That’s why I invited you here. God, I’m too late. I’m sorry. I’m so so sor-.”

His words are cut off as you let out a muffled scream. His wide horrified eyes are the last thing you see before a bush of blue anemones bursts forth from your torso.

────── 〔✿〕──────

Thank you for reading. Please feel free to comment and reblog.

#EXO #EXO Fanfic #exo oneshot #EXO Oh Sehun #exo writing #EXO x Gender Neutral Reader #exo Sehun #EXO Hanahaki Disease au

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bigskydreaming · 4 years

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Sometimes I want to follow you but then I dee that you reblog from people who have terrible misinformed/ ignorant borderline xenophobic opinions about certain things I like and they enjoy dragging the things I like.. Then I end up not following you. Even if I block some of them they'll end up on my tl and who knows maybe you have the same/ similar opinions. So yes I love your metas, but sorry I can't bring myself to follow. This has nothing to do with your existing fandoms or "dark" fics.

Okay?

Sfjskgsgksjsi

Sorry I just really don’t know what to do with this? I’m not like, mad about it lol since this is how tumblr is supposed to work I’m pretty sure, like hey it’s cool you like my metas but that doesn’t necessarily mean you’re gonna like me The Person and if someone doesn’t like me then why the fuck would they follow me y’know?

In case this is about my posts yesterday about me being annoyed when people like block me but still wanna use my shit, it’s like....yeah that does legit annoy me because I think that’s dumb and I don’t get it. When I don’t like someone I don’t usually WANT to use or peruse content they create because it’s associated with them and I already decided they weren’t someone I care to associate with sooooo.....

But also, that was literally just me saying hey this annoys me. That’s it, that’s the whole scoop. Annoying things are annoying but expressing that isn’t like.....it doesn’t mean I’m going to DO anything about it or even that there’s anything TO do about it, it’s more just haha hey I too am a Person and I am disorderly and my fandom blog doubles as my main blog so here I am having Feelings, let me show you them, RAWR dinosaur emoji????

Idk maybe it’s that it’s 4 am and my brain hasn’t even rebooted enough for me to even figure out why the fuck I’m even awake, lol, but I guess what I’m saying is it sounds like you’ve made an A+ decision for yourself here? I have no idea what mutuals I reblog from that have views you see as xenophobic, without you, like, actually saying what views those are so I can confirm where I stand on them or sit or whatever. But I can tell you that I don’t follow a lot of people period and my mutuals list is pretty short and basically consists of individuals I’ve met on here that I would absolutely go the fuck to bat for, any time, any place, simply because I think they’re super cool people across the board and that’s what you do for super cool people: baseball as an analogy for friendship I guess? I never did get that particular analogy tbh. Or baseball.

Sooooooo tbh I’m like, not the guy to be all that mad that someone doesn’t like me, it’s kinda like lol this is a neat convo I’m just not sure why we’re having it, but what I’m far less keen on is like, just any kinda slight against my mutuals aka friends and friend type people at all.....especially when that doesn’t actually include what it is someone specifically has a problem with cuz Vague Wording is Vague, and when like I said, my inclination is to go to bat for my mutuals, I would kinda like to know what it is I should be swinging at in their defense. Just general FYI for anyone reading this or like future reference or whatever.

(Unless this is about Palestine again slash still, in which case I mean, I already said what I said there and what I said was What We’re Not Gonna Do is make this topic White Guy Sitting Ten Thousand Miles Away From the Gaza Strip Discourse Hour, and the one thing I always am is consistent aka stubborn aka....eh, you get it).

But anyway, my vaguely Point shaped thing here is just that, I am not a pod person or an invertebrate and my opinions are my own and I do not mindlessly agree with things others say even if it is a mutual or friend saying it, but that said, my mutuals are people I am more likely to agree with than not. So absent knowing specifically what posts of theirs concern you as to whether or not I agree with them, all I can really say is if you’re that bothered by some of their opinions in general then yeah, you’re probably best off avoiding me as well in order to keep your dash a place you’re comfortable with, regardless of how you feel about my fandom meta outside of those posts/opinions. Cuz there really is no outside as far as I see it; my fandom meta is me as is my decision as to who I reblog from and associate with as are my opinions and stances on non fandom matters. It’s all just the same me, one network, many shows, but if any of those shows are the equivalent of Fox News in your eyes, then yeah, for sure, screw that one show that has the one guy you really like and just change the channel and find one that’s a better match for you.

It’s allllllll good.

And for the record, if it’s ultimately more just that they bash things you like and seeing that randomly pop up on your dash might bum you out enough that it’s worth it not to follow me just to be safe there, like, that’s totally understandable and nothing to be sorry about. We all do it. There’s a metric fuckton of people in Batfandom that I probably WOULD follow or read or interact with if it weren’t for the fact that I see them talk and joke and reblog a lot with Big Name Batcest shippers and the like, and I mean, lol hey I’m an incest survivor who hates incest with a passion few will ever understand and seeing it pop up on my dash in posts that talk or laugh about it as something fluffy or sweet or harmless would bum me super hard. So it’s like welp, in every other respect it looks like me and this one person could sync up brainwaves and make like platonic soulmates through our next several lifetimes buuuuuuut they’ve got incest-fluff in their general sphere and that’s a dealbreaker for me so guess we’ll never know now cuz I’m gonna keep standing firmly over here. *shrugs* Does that kinda feel like a waste or a shame sometimes? Yeah, maybe, but like. Your priorities are what they are and if you’re happy with your priorities, sticking with them is the clear choice and not something anyone should kick themselves for.

I mean, I might happen to think someone’s priorities are wrong and bad but I’m allowed to just like you’re allowed to think the same about mine or my mutuals’? It’s just...when that’s the ultimate issue, people just having wildly in opposition priorities, there’s just like....not a whole lot to say there beyond ‘hey I think your priorities suck,’ ‘no, YOUR priorities suck,’ ‘well I think your FACE sucks,’ ‘how dare you, I got this face from my MOM, you giant bipedal pitstain, have you no shame’ etc etc ad nauseam.

Anyway, I’ve officially exhausted this topic so exhaustively I’ve now made myself exhausted enough to go back to sleep cuz it’s still not even 5 am lol, and this is all just brain vomit now anyway so in conclusion, it’s all whatever dude, you do you, I’ll do me, we’ll always have Paris, and that’s what you missed on Glee.

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