When Flora started working at Alfea as the caretaker of their new greenhouse a few years after she graduated, Palladium never expected that he would suddenly develop feelings for his past student. However, she was no longer a teenager and now a strong, intelligent, beautiful young woman with a very sweet disposition and, well, he was in love. Normally, such feelings would be manageable for him, though unpleasant, but, to his dismay, this bout of unrequited love morphed into a case of hanahaki, a potentially dangerous illness in which a person in his position would cough up flower petals until they either got over their feelings or confessed them. The one silver lining was that neither cure relied upon the feelings being reciprocated, so there was no version of this where the object of the afflicted person's feelings would feel obligated to return them.
However, left unresolved, the condition was dangerous and people had died from it before as, over time, the disease progresses and flowers begin to take over the whole body from the inside out. Basically, it was an illness of a magical nature in which a flower would root in the heart and grow into the lungs. First, the patient would simply cough up a few flower petals here and there, then buds, then whole blossoms, and then, in the final stage, the blossoms would come with bits of stems on them as stems would also start to poke through the ribs and even out through the skin. Left completely unresolved, this parasitic flower fed by blood and love would consume its host, completely filling their airway and poking holes in their lungs.
Palladium was certain he wouldn't die of this, though, since he was confident that these feelings would quit him soon enough. As such, the day after he coughed up the first petal, he went about his day as usual, just with the new addition of a handkerchief he would occasionally cough into the few times a petal came up. No one seemed to notice that anything was different at all, so he felt confident that he could keep this secret until he was cured of his feelings. For the first week, this was true but then, he had a day of classes that were all scheduled to take place in the greenhouse, as that would be important for the lessons. The more he was around Flora that whole day, the more he felt his feelings and the flowers bubble up inside him and, with the increased effort he put into squashing his feelings down and ignoring them, he was coughing up more petals and doing so more frequently.
"Are you alright?" she finally asked, voice full of concern at one of the longer coughing fits he had later in the day.
"Yes, perfectly fine," he replied dismissively, careful to keep all the flower petals in his handkerchief hidden from her and his students.
"Are you sure? If you need to go see Ofelia, I could take over the rest of class for you, especially since it's the last one," she offered.
"Nonsense, I'm fine," he insisted right before he started coughing again. She just gave him a sideways look and he caved. "Oh alright, I'll go to the infirmary if you would be so kind as to finish today's lesson with the students."
"I'd be happy to," she declared with a smile.
He could feel the flowers rising in his throat again at that smile so, instead of thanking her properly, he simply nodded and took his leave. Rather than visiting Ofelia, though, he just went back to his office, since he knew exactly what was wrong with him and what the only two cures were, making it pointless to seek medical help. The whole way back, he was cursing his illness, his inability to control it, and the fact that he knew it would only continue to get worse and more obvious over time. Even so, the one thing he could not bring himself to do was give up on the feelings going away and confess to Flora. Much as she was now a fellow faculty member and not a student anymore, there were still issues such as their age difference and how recently she was his student that made it feel so very wrong for him to have the feelings he was afflicted with, never mind share them with her.
So, since he couldn't cure his illness in such a quick manner, he settled on taking a potion he'd made that helped stall the growth a little and another that dampened the dull ache in his lungs. In truth, what the first potion did was stunt his emotions for a couple hours, which in turn slowed the flower's growth. Aside from curing the illness, it was the only way he could slow it down at all. Well, that and avoiding her entirely, which he intended to do starting immediately. However, she didn't get the memo about his intent to avoid her, so she poked her head into his office shortly after classes ended for the day.
"How are you feeling now? Was Ofelia able to help?" she asked as she stepped into the room.
The surge he felt inside was, thankfully, dulled by the medicine he'd taken, enough to prevent another coughing fit.
"Yes, she gave me some medicine that appears to have helped and sent me on my way," he lied.
"Oh good, I'm glad to hear that." Relief was evident in her voice at that sentiment. "Do you know what it is you have?"
"Just some seasonal cold," he told her dismissively. "It should get better with time and the medicine should help, too."
"Well, I hope you get better soon, but don't be afraid to call out sick if you need to — I'd be happy to help cover your classes again if you need it."
He cleared his throat and swallowed the petal that had just come up.
"I'll keep that in mind, thank you."
Once she left, he let out a sigh. How could he have thought mere moments ago that he could avoid her? They were too close, too friendly with each other for her to just let him do that. No, the most he could do would be to try and minimize contact however much he could while continuing to take medicine as needed until winter break, which was coming in only a few weeks. Then, all he could do would be to hope that the month away from the school would be enough for this all to go away. That didn't seem too bad, he felt like he could manage that alright and, with something as close and tangible as winter break to look forward to, he felt a surge of hope and confidence.
. . .
Making it to the end of the semester was a lot harder than he had thought it would be, but he made it, if only by the skin of his teeth. In just that last couple of weeks, his disease had begun to progress and, now, even with the medicine, he was coughing up whole buds as well as petals and his coughing fits were getting both worse and more frequent. His one saving grace was that, as the semester drew to a close, it became much easier to avoid Flora without drawing suspicion, since he and all the other professors had so much grading to do as well as preparing final exams. As such, he was safe from any more well-meaning inquiries from his former student about the state of his health.
Yes, everything was relatively fine and manageable — as much as it could be, anyway — until the last day of school, when, as he was about to pop into Wizgiz's classroom to ask his colleague about something, Flora was already in there talking to the leprechaun. Not wanting to interrupt, Palladium hung by the doorway, which had the adverse effect of causing him to overhear them without meaning to eavesdrop. He just happened to be lucky enough to get there just in time to hear Wizgiz ask about what Flora would be doing for the break and her give an answer that included something about spending half of it with her boyfriend.
He was barely able to get out of earshot before he was doubled over, coughing up a garden on the floor. Unfortunately, he apparently hadn't removed himself far enough because who should then turn a corner and approach him but Flora herself before he had a chance to clean up the flowers. Worse yet was that seeing her again in such a context set him off into another coughing fit that he couldn't even try to hide from her. She rushed to his side, concerned, though she had no clue that her presence was actually making things worse.
"Palladium!" she called as she put a comforting hand on his back, sending a stab through his chest as the flower grew at the contact. "What's wr-"
Before she could finish her question, she saw a handful of petals and buds fall from his mouth and join the others piled on the floor and she knew exactly what was going on.
"Oh," was all she said at her revelation.
Mercifully, he then was able to stop coughing and actually say something.
"I will go home for break and then I'll be fine," he hoarsely assured her.
"So your person is back home and you decided to wait til break to tell them?" Flora asked, a curious note in her voice.
"Er, not exactly," he replied vaguely.
"Then what-"
"It doesn't matter," he insisted, cutting her off. "I appreciate your concern, but I'll be fine."
She didn't look convinced.
"Alright, but would you like me to at least try to use my magic to help before you leave?" she offered. "It's just another kind of magical plant, so I should be able to use my powers to slow its growth or perhaps even get rid of it."
That, he could actually accept.
"Yes, that actually could be very helpful, thank you."
With her magic, she felt around his chest to get a good sense of where the flower was and how big it was. Thanks to her studies both in magical plants and in healing, she knew about hanahaki and, more importantly, that the flower of that disease was called 'lenugia' and did not grow anywhere other than inside of people who were afflicted with the condition. Focusing her magic on the lenugia inside Palladium, she put a coating around the roots that should've cut them off from their supply of his blood without damaging his heart or interfering with his circulation.
"That should help," she told him as she dropped her hands and took a step back.
"Thank you, Flora."
She gave him a soft, encouraging smile.
"No problem."
. . .
Neither break nor Flora's magic helped Palladium as he'd hoped, and that largely could be attributed both to the persistence of the lenugia — which quickly broke free of its restraints — and just how much Palladium didn't know. For example, he'd been so focused on and affected by the words Flora had said about spending half her vacation with her boyfriend that he failed to notice the lack of excitement in her tone. Likewise, he hadn't the faintest clue of just how much his condition had wormed its way into her head and heart, how much and how frequently she worried about him, or how many times she caught herself almost hoping that she was the cause of it or, conversely, feeling a twinge of jealousy at the thought of it being someone else.
Most significantly, he had no idea that that was what led her to break up with the very boyfriend he spent his whole vacation being jealous of, with his head full of maladaptive daydreams about this unknown other man proposing to his love in the sparkling snow. While buds were becoming full blossoms and stems were wrapping around his ribs, he was completely unaware of the fact that she was falling for him, too. More accurately, she'd been attracted to him since she was a student but, as his student, had never really allowed herself to consider it in any capacity before she graduated and then just didn't really see him at all until she started working at Alfea, but now she was finally realizing and processing all of this while he had no idea.
Then, after a month, it was time to return to the school with Palladium still drowning in flowers, even more than he had been before. He more or less hid for a few days, going nowhere other than his classes but, then, Flora came to his office one afternoon. He might have noticed how tired she looked if it weren't for how his entire focus was taken by her sudden presence.
"I haven't had a chance to talk to you yet since we got back from break," she led off, a bit timidly. "I wanted to check in and see how you're doing."
Before he could answer, he started coughing so, rather than explain anything, he wordlessly handed her one of the full blooms that he'd just coughed up once he stopped. Her eyes widened, then narrowed in exceedingly rare anger.
"I thought you were supposed to deal with this over break," she pointed out accusingly. "So why are you… dying in front of me right now?"
"It was supposed to go away," he answered, his voice raspy from all the coughing. "Going home, taking some time — it should all be gone now, but it isn't."
"So you were counting on getting over your feelings over break?"
He nodded his confirmation.
"I couldn't — I can't — tell her, so it had to be that," he explained.
"So, what, you're going to die because that's better than telling someone how you feel? You'd throw away your life like that, just to avoid doing something you don't want to do?" She was raising her voice now, which was something he'd never witnessed before.
He shook his head.
"No, I-I'll tell her, but I have to think of how I want to do it first."
"No." Her voice was clear, crisp, and defiant. "You have to do it now. Some of the flowers you've coughed up have stems on them, and I'm sure the stems are starting to be visible under your skin, if they aren't already poking through. There's no time."
"But-"
He was cut off by another coughing jag and, this time, the flowers that came out were speckled with drops of blood, darker than well-oxygenated blood fresh from the lungs should be. With all the coughing came a surge of frustration at this disease and the unfairness of the whole situation.
"But how am I supposed to tell yo-" he barely managed to cut himself off before he completely slipped and blurted everything out.
However, she caught his slip and perked up at it.
"You just say it; there is no right or wrong way," she told him, her voice now gentle as any traces of her earlier anger melted away. "That's the whole point of hanahaki — that even if you didn't have flowers in your lungs, bottling all this up isn't healthy and you'd still be choking on your feelings. The only way you could be free of them would be to say how you feel."
"Fine." He raised his gaze to meet her bright green eyes. "I'm sorry, but I am in love with you, and I never would have told you but the last thing I want is to upset you, so I am, by your request." At his confession, he could feel the stems of the lenugia receding from his lungs and ribs. "I don't know where these feelings came from or why I have them but I genuinely thought that winter break would give me the space I needed to overcome them, but I was wrong. Now, I suggest you return to the greenhouse and forget any of this ever happened, but I understand if this affects how you see me."
And with that, he was fully cured of his hanahaki and both his lungs and heart were completely clear and back to normal. However, there was now a different kind of crushing, suffocating weight on his chest that still made it hard for him to breathe and he wasn't sure if this was any better than being suffocated by the lenugia. As for Flora, she was trying to decide whether the joy and relief she felt from receiving his confession outweighed her sadness and irritation at how he did it, leading off with an apology of all things, as though loving her was a sin for which he needed to atone.
"You don't need to apologize," she started with, choosing her words carefully as she went. "I know this has been difficult for you and I think I can understand why but please don't apologize. The truth is that I feel the same and it hurts to hear you talking about your own feelings as though they're this awful thing you want to throw away."
Tears started to well up in those beautiful green eyes he so loved and he couldn't stop himself from reaching out to wipe them away, struck by pain at the sight.
"I thought you… loved someone else," he admitted. "I didn't mean to eavesdrop, but I heard you talking about spending the vacation with your boyfriend."
She shook her head.
"We broke up. It was a long time coming and the two weeks we were supposed to spend on vacation together was just a way to try and save our relationship but, a few days in, I knew I couldn't keep pretending anymore, so I ended things."
He took a step closer to her, then another, until he was mere inches away.
"And now…"
"Now I know that you're the one I want, not him," she finished with complete conviction. "As long as you want me…" she added with some hesitation.
"Of course I want you," he told her like it was the most obvious thing in the world, like grass being green. "There is nothing and no one in the Magical Universe that I want more than you, and it feels as though it's always been that way even though I know it hasn't. But I'm so much older than you and you were my student only a couple years ago and-"
She cut him off with a kiss, not the slightest bit interested in any of the reasons why he hesitated. He immediately melted into her, the reservations he'd had only seconds ago now completely forgotten. In that moment, he couldn't fathom the idea that he never would have done this if not for a disease of flowers.