"You're Bleeding."

“Haah.. haah..” looking down at the petal in her lap, breathing deep,  Kanade made the decision to head back to her room. “Should I look this up? This is a bit odd, but has it happened to someone before? Did Mochizuki make one of those salads with flowers again and I didn't notice them there? They weren’t that big, no? Should I look up what kind it might’ve been? What’s happening to me? What’s going on? Why? Can someone tell me?” All these thoughts and more raced through her mind while she tried to get up, leaning on her toilet then reaching for the counter and grabbing on with white knuckles, all accentuating her stress levels and in turn making them go haywire. 

Timeskip to later that night, it was about time for the nightly call with niigo. Mafuyu had only just finished her studies, albeit way later than normal with Mafuyu sitting in newfound dead silence, trying to figure out the reason why. It wasn’t until she got a notification from nightcord that she snapped out of her thoughts. The notification read that it was a DM, and that it was from Kanade. 

The DM read, “Hi Mafuyu, me and the others will be online and working today. Would you like to join us?”and for some strange reason, through her head the message sounded like Kanade herself was right there, speaking with her soft, calming voice.

 Mafuyu wondered why, but she shoved the thought aside and got on to replying to her, and Mafuyu’s own message reading, “of course I will be. Usual time?” but she got no reply. Mafuyu looked at the clock and in turn noticed that the time had already turned to 25:00, so she went to go and join the call. 

“Ah, there you are Mafuyu. Glad you’re here,” Kanade’s soft voice perturbed the silence plaguing Mafuyu’s ears.

“Mm.” Mafuyu replied with a hum, unsure if she should say anything. 

After a brief few seconds of uncomfortable silence, the sound of Mizuki and Ena joining the call filled Mafuyu and Kanade’s headphones. Ena was staying with Mizuki, so they both joined using just Mizuki’s computer. 

“Hello you two,” Kanade softly spoke. 

“Her voice is so.. What is it.. Calming.?” Mafuyu thought, blocking every other sound out. 

“Mafuuu~ yuu~,” Mizuki singsonged.

 “Anyone there?” Ena questioned. 

“Huh what? Of course.” Mafuyu replied, almost coldly. 

“Yeesh..” ena remarked under her breath, a small giggle emitting from Mizuki. 

“Come on Mafuyu,” kanade said calmly. “If something’s bothering you, we’re here to listen.” kanade said with a soft affirmation in her voice. 

“Okay,” Mafuyu said, her voice slightly wavering but she tried to not let it show. 

A little while later, all that could be heard was the soft clicking of keys on keyboard could be heard, and a small, almost unnoticeable cough, averaging every 2 minutes. 

As the minutes passed, the coughing got more frequent. Slowly, slowly they repeated quicker until- “sorry guys, just a second-” then Kanade muted herself. 

“So that coughing was her?”  ena questioned, rubbing her eye while looking up from her drawing tablet. 

“Kanade? Are you ok? Mafuyu asked, a tinge of worry in her words. 

Kanade unmuted. “Yes i’m fi-” another bout of coughing interrupted her words, but this time the mute button had slipped out of her reach. 

“K!” Ena and Mizuki simultaneously called out, worry encapsulating their tones. 

As soon as she had stopped coughing, “what was that K?!” ena said, bristling. “What’s going on?” she then asked in a quieter, more gentle tone. 

“Ah uhm- it’s nothing. Just a small sickness, I'm really sorry for worrying you guys.” Kanade answered quickly, avoiding suspicion from her other circlemates. 

“Well you say that but,” Mizuki paused, thinking of what words to use next. “That really doesn’t sound like something small.” Mizuki said, concern overflowing anything else that could be heard in their tone. 

“Me too,” Mafuyu said, stepping in. “If you need to tell us something, tell us something.”

“Okay, but,” kanade reluctantly agreed, pausing. “There’s nothing wrong, no cause for alarm. It’s okay everyone.'' Kanade said with a reassuring tone that the other members weren’t too sure as to whether she was lying or not. 

But still, the other members let it go, and kept working. 

“Hey guys~! I have an idea!” Mizuki called out abruptly during complete silence. 

Ena jumped, telling her to pipe down. 

“What is it, Amia?” Mafuyu asked, clearly unfazed. 

“I’m listening too,” Kanade said nonchalantly. 

“What if we all went out on a picnic together this weekend? The weather will be nice, I checked!” Mizuki exclaimed into the mic, clearly excited. 

“A… picnic.?” Kanade thought. “Can I really do that.? Wait, no. I have to. I’ve already convinced niigo i’m fine, so there should be no reason I can't go.” she nodded to herself. 

“Well, Mizuki’s already forced me so there’s no backing out for me either way. What about you guys?” ena inquired, all with a bored tone except for the question. 

“I’ll see if I'm free and mother will let me.” Mafuyu replied, surprisingly complying quickly. The truth being, she just wanted to see kanade. She had heard about what happened from Honami, and decided she needed to see how she was. 

And in any case, it had been a long time since the four of them had caught up. She hoped the sudden compliance wouldn’t scare Mizuki and Ena. 

Mafuyu thought. “Even if she needs to save me, so she says, I still need to make sure she’s not sacrificing everything cause then.. Then…..” but, Mafuyu stopped herself. She didn’t want to stop herself from almost having a ‘good time’. 

“Eeh~? What’s this? Yuki actually agrees without consideration~?” Mizuki teased, almost singsonging. 

“Yes,” Mafuyu agreed. “I don’t think I have any commitments this weekend.” 

“Alright!!” Mizuki exclaimed over excitedly. “Now , K, what about you?” Mizuki inquired, turning her attention to Kanade. 

“I should be good as well,” Kanade replied, stifling a cough and swallowing hard with a pang of metallic taste after. 

On the other end of the call, Mafuyu sighs out a slow, silent sigh of relief. She could see kanade, and make sure she wasn’t overworking herself. 

“Okay! That’s it settled. Let's meet at… What say 11:00?" Mizuki said happily. 

“That’s fine,” responded kanade, who was more concentrated on her music than anything else.  

“I’ll check.” Mafuyu said.

Come the day of the picnic, kanade was, well,  stressed to say the least.  She felt the carnation plant that had now lodged itself into kanade’s lungs tighten with unease. Its roots tried to deepen with every single thought of Mafuyu, making a solid foundation for itself in Kanade’s tiny lungs. 

As she got closer and closer to the meeting spot, she could feel a petal or two decide to come up and say hello, to lodge themselves into her throat, but of course she held them back. With each step, a new wave of petals came up her throat, the urge to cough growing ever stronger. 

Still, she pushed it down as her circlemates, Ena, Mizuki and Mafuyu came into view, and she quickened up her pace to not let them wait any longer. 

“Yaay~!” Mizuki exclaimed. “Now everyone’s here!” the blush-pink haired threw up their arms in excitement. 

“Mizuki, calm down! You’re gonna cause a scene already!” ena complained, albeit not as loudly as her partner. 

Mafuyu just nodded quietly with an “I agree,” while kanade laughed softly at their small bicker so as to not disturb the carnations crawling up her throat. 

“So,” Ena said, turning to Mizuki. “When're we gonna eat? You’re the one coordinating this whole thing right?” she inquired the Rosey haired overexcited individual sitting next to them with a slightly annoyed but bored expression on her face. 

“Ah, that sounds good! Great idea Ena~"Mizuki said happily, pecking a kiss onto Ena's cheek. 

“MIZU-” ena started screaming, but before that Mafuyu stopped her from alerting the whole park of their presence. 

“Can we please just concentrate on what we’re doing?” she asked the pair. “I would also like it if we didn’t garner attention.”

“Of course,” the two replied simultaneously, both feeling intimidated from the presence of Mafuyu’s stare, and after a couple seconds of weird silence, Mizuki started getting all the snacks out they brung. 

“Wow Mizuki,  you sure brought a lot,” kanade piped up, surprised.

“Yeah!  I thought why not, considering how long we haven’t been able to catch up as a group for!” Mizuki exclaimed happily, smiling sincerely. 

“Makes sense,”Kanade replied absentmindedly, checking her phone for the time and anything she’s missed. 

Mafuyu then turned to Kanade. She asked, “have you been alright lately?”

“Hm what? Of course,"Kanade replied, trying to reassure Mafuyu. “I should be the one asking that, shouldn’t i?”

“But your coughing on the call, It made me feel.. Worried, I think it is?” Mafuyu said, ignoring Kanade’s question and her own eyes dwelling holes into Kanade’s. 

“Ah, about that.. I didn’t mean to worry you at all, but it was just a small sickness. Please don’t worry at all.” kanade said with a smile, trying ever so hard to stifle a cough and keep the petals down. 

Even as Mafuyu was boring holes into her eyes, Kanade couldn’t help but do the same. Her beautiful eyes which faded from a sky blue to a breathtaking purple, she couldn’t stop. But as soon as she realised what she was doing, she looked away with a red face in shame. 

After a couple seconds of uncomfortable silence (and some giggling from Mizuki,), “Shall we?” Mafuyu asked kanade, cocking her head towards the middle of the blanket they were sitting on, and smiling the tiniest bit. 

Kanade smiled back, happy that she could see a change with Mafuyu and that her music may actually be managing to do something. 

“Yes,” kanade replied, giving a nod of affirmation.

“Itadakimasu!” everyone all said simultaneously, then everyone grabbed something to munch on. 

(side note: ‘Itadakimasu’ means ‘Let’s dig in’ in Japanese and is said before eating a meal.)

Kanade thought something light would be best, so she just picked up a biscuit. But when she tried to swallow, her throat just wouldn’t have it. 

“Excuse me-” cough “let me just-” kanade mumbled, coughing as she got up quickly and ran to the public toilet close by. 

And of course, it had to be one of the ones that have an automatic door, which has to be the slowest closing thing in existence. 

The door barely closed in time before she felt the rush of blood and flowers surging up her throat, and she barely made it to the toilet, but she ended up just flailing over it, hacking as hard as was possible for her. 

Then at that moment, her phone fell out of her pocket and it glowed with a fierce white light, then a hologram popped up, it was Len. It looked like he was about to say something but when kanade just couldn’t stop coughing, all he could do was wait, worried. 

In the end, kanade was just throwing up flowers at that point, and when they’d decided to stop, a slow but sure stream of blood made its way up her throat, trickling out onto the toilet seat. She slumped, albeit almost lifelessly against it, until she saw her phone, and realised Len was there. 

“Kanade-Chan…” Len said worriedly, looking up at her with his big blue eyes full of concern. “What was that? Are you okay.? I sensed something was wrong..” he started mumbling, fumbling with his fingers. 

“Ah Len.. Yes, everything’s okay. I think the worst has come and gone.” kanade sighed.  “I just need to clean up an..” Kanade's now-husky voice trailed off as she blinked the last cloudy tears out of her eyes and realised just how much had actually come up. 

It looked almost like a full garden, both bloody and perfectly clean flowers swirling around in a pooled mixture of blood, bile, saliva, tears and water in the toilet bowl. 

The single sight of it was enough to almost will her to throw up even more, it would make anyone, though that would be just nothing, as Kanade hadn’t eaten much recently.

Kanade didn’t want to look at it any more, so she got up using the toilet and the adjacent disabled grab bars and wetted a tissue. 

“Hold on a minute Len,” she said quickly to the virtual singer who still had a worried expression plastered all over his face, and She then started to wipe the toilet seat down, albeit very weakly, but the tissue and her managed to get the job done. 

And just in time too, because these toilets have a time limit of about 10 minutes, then the door unlocks. She quickly picked up her phone with Len still there, and then she flushed the toilet and exited, making her way back over to niigo as quickly as she could. 

“I’m having a picnic with the rest of the group, would you like to stay and join us?” She asked the yellow haired boy, looking down at him with sincere and saddened eyes as she walked over, and he nodded in response, smiling a little. 

“Sorry for making you guys wait so long..!” kanade called out to the rest of the group, quickening her pace.  

As she got closer, the other members could see her face more clearly, and something was definitely wrong.  

“Yeah.. sorry I took so long, I didn’t mean it I.. Oh also Len is here..!” she brandished her phone out and put it on the blanket, and Len looked up with a solemn expression at the rest of the circle.

But before any of that, Mafuyu cupped Kanade’s face with her hand, pulling it towards her. 

“You look terrible.” she simply said. 

Kanade, on the other hand, had not heard what Mafuyu said and was instead getting flustered over Mafuyu. Her hand on her face, her face only a couple centimetres away from hers, her warm breath, her beautiful eyes, her-

 kanade then snapped out of it, embarrassed by what she’d done. But at the same time, Mizuki and Ena both looked over, concerned about kanade as well from mafuyu’s remark. 

“You know, she’s right..” ena added, worry colouring her face. 

“Yeah.. what’s going o-" Mizuki started to ask. But she got cut off by Mafuyu.

“Blood.” Mafuyu said

“Eh?” kanade stuttered. “What do you mean?

“Blood.” Mafuyu said again, this time only louder, and she rubbed at the corner of Kanade's lips with her hand still on Kanade’s face, and it rubbed off into a large droplet onto her thumb.