Not A Joke

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TRIGGER WARNING⚠️:
~blood
~fictional illness
~*mentions* of death & surgery
~panic attacks
~fear of hospitals (not as extreme as a phobia)
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This oneshot is about the (fictional) Hanahaki Disease. If you aren't already aware of what it is, you should probably look it up before reading or you're going to be super confused lol. Anyway! Enjoy, or if it's too much you can skip this one I understand, that's what the trigger warning is for. This is probably the only fic I'll ever write with blood in it. And before anyone asks, YES, there is a happy ending. There always will be.

•••

Cyrus was sitting at the table eating dinner with his parents when it first happened.

His mother was chatting away with his stepfather, Todd, about some political event Cyrus didn't care to know about. He was about to shove another piece of lasagna into his mouth, but then he heard his phone chime.

He knew he shouldn't check it at the table, but he was expecting a text from his best friend, TJ. So he set down his fork and took his phone out of his pocket, seeing that TJ had sent him a funny cat video. TJ also had messaged him a bunch of hyper-excited smiley emojis, which made him smile, his heart swelling with warmth.

After texting back a laughing emoji, and reacting to the original message with a thumbs up, he locked his phone and shoved it back in his pocket. Once he had picked up his fork again, he went to take another bite of his favourite meal, and suddenly felt a sharp pain in his chest. He gasped and dropped his fork out of shock, standing up out of the chair.

This alerted his mother, and she turned to him, concerned. "What's wrong, Cyrus?"

Not wanting to worry his parents, he choked out, "may I go to the bathroom?"

He hoped they didn't notice his struggle of speaking.

"Of course, go ahead. You know you don't need to ask us that," Todd spoke.

Cyrus then proceeded to speed walk through the house to his bedroom, and into the washroom connected to it. He wanted to run, but that would cause suspicion, so he didn't.

The moment he got there, he yanked up the toilet seat and began coughing and throwing up blood into the water below. It hurt so badly, and he didn't know what was happening to him. This — having blood come out of your mouth — was clearly not normal.

When he was done, he started to become immensely scared. Which was understandable, because coughing up blood was obviously a cause for concern. But he also knew that if he told his parents, they would take him to the hospital, and he hated hospitals. He also really hated being smothered, which he would get a lot of from his four parents if they found out.

Soon, Cyrus felt the room start to spin and he felt like he was going to pass out. He started panting heavily and tears were silently streaming from his eyes. Backing against a wall, he sat down and brought his knees up to his chest, trying to control his breathing.

Then, he remembered what his therapist had said to him a few months ago: if you have another panic attack, try to remember your senses. Find one thing you can see, one thing you can hear, one thing you can smell, and one thing you can feel.

Cyrus looked around the room and fixed his eyes on an object, whispering, "s-soap."

Still breathing fast, he focused in on the sound of the air conditioning in the room that he hadn't noticed before. "F-f-fan."

He breathed in deeply through his nose and mumbled, "pasta."

Lastly, he reached his shaking hand out to touch something. Anything. He had to move a bit away from the wall but then his hand found the edge of something.

Tyrus Oneshots || Andi MackWhere stories live. Discover now