(Completed) Bloody Petals {Miritama}

9

A few days after Tamaki and Mirio's trip to the abandoned movie theater, Tamaki went to school despite having woken up feeling nauseous and weak. His mom had to wake him up, and he pretended to have just slept through his alarm. The walk to school made it worse, but he was somehow able to make it to homeroom without passing out or having an attack.

Immediately, Nejire could tell that something was wrong. She jumped up from her chair and leaned down as if to try and help him sit down, but he shook her off. He sat down at his desk and laid his head down on the cool tabletop, allowing his eyes to fall shut.

"Tama-chan?" She asked, tapping him lightly on the back. "Tamaki, what's wrong? Do you feel okay?"

Tamaki swallowed, but it did nothing to get rid of the tightness in his throat. His chest ached. "I'm...fine."

She frowned. "Don't lie to me. Maybe you should go to Recovery Girl."

"N-No, I told you I'm fine." He raised his head so that he could look her in the eyes.

"You're not." She insisted and tried to stand up to get a teacher, but Tamaki grabbed her wrist. He shook his head and she sighed before sitting back down. "Fine, but the second it gets worse, you're going to Recovery Girl."

Tamaki agreed with a dejected nod, returning his head to the desk. He was just about to drift back to sleep when the door opened again and their homeroom teacher walked in. He had to lift his head and at least pretend to pay attention. But even pretending quickly became an impossible task.

His chest ached and his breathe was coming out in short pants. He kept looking at the clock, counting down the seconds until he could leave the classroom in order to run to the bathroom and hack up all the petals he could feel gathering at the back of his throat. He could only hold them back for so long. Twenty minutes into homeroom, he knew he wouldn't be able to hold it back much longer and raised a shaky hand.

"Yes, Amajiki-kun?" The teacher asked.

"U-Um, may I-I b-be excused?" His usual stutter was made even worse by the tightness of his throat. He could barely breathe through all the petals. They were there, crawling up his throat, threatening to block his airway if he didn't cough them up soon.

The teacher seemed to realize that there was something very wrong, nodding. Tamaki immediately hurried from his seat, but as it turned out he'd gotten up far too quickly. His legs turned to jelly and he fell over towards Nejire's desk. Luckily, she was able to catch him. A single petal landed on his tongue, and he quickly spat it into his hand while Nejire supported him. He vaguely registered her saying something to the teacher about taking him to the nurse before they were leaving.

As soon as they made it outside, Tamaki started coughing. He was somehow able to stay on his feet with Nejire supporting him. She helped him to the nearest bathroom, totally ignoring that it was the boys' bathroom, and let him go only when they reached one of the stalls. He collapsed to his knees the moment she let go, just barely avoiding hitting his head on the floor by gripping onto the edge of the toilet.

Nejire closed the door behind him, but it did nothing to mask the awful sound of him retching and coughing up petals. The attack lasted at least ten minutes, much longer than any attack he'd had previously. When it was finally over, he could do nothing but slump over and rest against the wall of the bathroom stall. He could taste blood in his mouth, and he knew there was probably blood on his face too. There was even blood on his hands, along with a few petals scattered around that had missed the toilet.

He was sitting there on the floor, panting and shivering when Nejire opened the door again. She had a damp paper towel in her hand, and she quickly knelt down and used it to clean away the blood on his face and hands. "I'm sorry," his voice sounded so frail and small, like a mouse squeaking.