[August 1] [Super Junior] rhododendron
Title: rhododendron
Day/Theme: August 1 / healed by wind and sun
Series: Super Junior
Character/Pairing: Sungmin/Ryeowook
Rating: T
When Ryeowook woke up that morning and saw a rhododendron sprouting out of his shoulder, he knew he was going to die.
The disease started simply enough. First, he would grow a couple of flower in different places of his body -- the small of his back, the inside of his wrist. Then, leaves. They were easy to pluck out, easy to cover up. Denying it was the hardest part, in the first seven days. Afterwards, there was only resignation to look forward to, or desperation, if it fit the moment.
Ryeowook was never a desperate man, no. Not so much, not even after he'd started living with Sungmin.
"If you didn't want them to grow back, you shouldn't drink any water, or even take a bath," Sungmin told him, narrating the morning's news report with some seriousness in spite of how comically he looked in his nightgown, the one he’d gotten from his cousin as a joke but took to with surprising ease, much to Ryeowook’s mortification, "if you drank anyway, they'd multiply so quickly you'd get crushed under their weight."
Here Sungmin paused to take a bite out of his pancakes, a little burnt from Ryeowook's incapacity to watch the show without forgetting about breakfast. Ryeowook's fingers tightened around his glass of orange juice, before he set it back down on the table, as if considering something. When it became apparent that Ryeowook wasn't going to answer, Sungmin continued to speak. "Either way, you'd die. The only cure you'd even have would be to ingest the last flower that comes out of an infected person, and what are the odds of that, right?"
“That’s gross,” Ryeowook said, touching the rim of his glass, absent of the desire to drink, “you mean you’d have to eat a dead person’s flower?”
“When you put it like that,” Sungmin said, laughing, “I wouldn’t mind it so much, if it were yours.” His eyes brightened with barely concealed suggestiveness. It made Ryeowook’s mind hurt.
You’re a pervert, what will your mother say, Ryeowook meant to ask, but instead he pushed his glass towards Sungmin, shaking his head. "I'm glad it hasn't infected us," Ryeowook said, the words sounding hollow and tasteless in his ears, "I wouldn't know what to do if it happened to you."
Ryeowook pressed shaking fingers to Sungmin's cheek, and kissed the top of his forehead as he cleared the table. Sungmin looked at him, curiously.
"I'd smell nice, wouldn't I?" Sungmin said, smiling widely, and Ryeowook swallowed the nervousness in his throat, the desperation in blossoming in his chest. He wanted to get out, to feel the sun on his skin, the wind in his hair, anywhere else where he wouldn't have to hide from Sungmin's smile. Smaller scars healed for much longer, and smaller plants thrived under less significant warmth. That was just the way things worked in Ryeowook's life; quietly, and without so much importance.
"You already do," Ryeowook said, and pretended everything was still fine.
Day/Theme: August 1 / healed by wind and sun
Series: Super Junior
Character/Pairing: Sungmin/Ryeowook
Rating: T
When Ryeowook woke up that morning and saw a rhododendron sprouting out of his shoulder, he knew he was going to die.
The disease started simply enough. First, he would grow a couple of flower in different places of his body -- the small of his back, the inside of his wrist. Then, leaves. They were easy to pluck out, easy to cover up. Denying it was the hardest part, in the first seven days. Afterwards, there was only resignation to look forward to, or desperation, if it fit the moment.
Ryeowook was never a desperate man, no. Not so much, not even after he'd started living with Sungmin.
"If you didn't want them to grow back, you shouldn't drink any water, or even take a bath," Sungmin told him, narrating the morning's news report with some seriousness in spite of how comically he looked in his nightgown, the one he’d gotten from his cousin as a joke but took to with surprising ease, much to Ryeowook’s mortification, "if you drank anyway, they'd multiply so quickly you'd get crushed under their weight."
Here Sungmin paused to take a bite out of his pancakes, a little burnt from Ryeowook's incapacity to watch the show without forgetting about breakfast. Ryeowook's fingers tightened around his glass of orange juice, before he set it back down on the table, as if considering something. When it became apparent that Ryeowook wasn't going to answer, Sungmin continued to speak. "Either way, you'd die. The only cure you'd even have would be to ingest the last flower that comes out of an infected person, and what are the odds of that, right?"
“That’s gross,” Ryeowook said, touching the rim of his glass, absent of the desire to drink, “you mean you’d have to eat a dead person’s flower?”
“When you put it like that,” Sungmin said, laughing, “I wouldn’t mind it so much, if it were yours.” His eyes brightened with barely concealed suggestiveness. It made Ryeowook’s mind hurt.
You’re a pervert, what will your mother say, Ryeowook meant to ask, but instead he pushed his glass towards Sungmin, shaking his head. "I'm glad it hasn't infected us," Ryeowook said, the words sounding hollow and tasteless in his ears, "I wouldn't know what to do if it happened to you."
Ryeowook pressed shaking fingers to Sungmin's cheek, and kissed the top of his forehead as he cleared the table. Sungmin looked at him, curiously.
"I'd smell nice, wouldn't I?" Sungmin said, smiling widely, and Ryeowook swallowed the nervousness in his throat, the desperation in blossoming in his chest. He wanted to get out, to feel the sun on his skin, the wind in his hair, anywhere else where he wouldn't have to hide from Sungmin's smile. Smaller scars healed for much longer, and smaller plants thrived under less significant warmth. That was just the way things worked in Ryeowook's life; quietly, and without so much importance.
"You already do," Ryeowook said, and pretended everything was still fine.