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Feinberg figures out something's wrong by the third day.
Not the third message, because he tends to text Couriway random shit when he's bored, particularly if Couriway hasn't responded yet. It's a few days of YouTube links and memes and stupid animal pictures with is this your favorite Pokemon LMAO and when's your next stream??? later when it occurs to Feinberg that something might be up.
Strange, too, since Feinberg's usually the one getting sick and Couri's always the one worried about him. Feinberg's not used to being on this end of things. He tries not to worry, because Couriway's pretty good at taking care of himself, or at least hates being sick, so surely he'll be back bright and healthy enough to respond to Feinberg's messages.
He gives it a week, then starts looking up flights to Miami.
He doesn't tell Couriway, because he knows he'll just get be teased for being a spoiled little rich kid again, and then some ridiculous insistence that Couri doesn't need him to fly out for him anyway. But Feinberg wants to, and he has the resources, so he finds a flight that's definitely more expensive than it needs to be, wakes up early for the drive to O'Hare, and lands in the grand swamp of Florida by barely noon the next day.
It's sunny out, humid. Feinberg probably packed less t-shirts than he should've. He just kind of threw a few things into his suitcase this morning and booked it.
As he ponders in the cab line, he realizes he doesn't remember what Couriway's address is.
Well, there goes that surprise.
Feinberg starts the Discord call five times before Couri finally picks up. "Hello?" his voice says, then a cough. He sounds awful.
All of Feinberg's worry about clothes fly out his brain. "Couri! Dude, are you okay?"
Couriway coughs again. "Not really, but don't worry about it," he says, before, "Ah shit, that one hurt."
Feinberg feels bad for making him talk, but he's on a mission. "So hey, I'm in Miami," he says. "Can you give me your address? You don't have to tell it to me, just text it to me on Discord."
"What." Couri sounds panicked. He coughs again. "What do you mean you're in Miami--"
"I'm here to take care of you. Text me your address."
Feinberg hangs up before Couriway can properly protest. He keeps his gaze fixed on his phone until an address reluctantly pops up a few minutes later.
*
Couri looks pale when he opens up his front door, blinking at Feinberg through his glasses.
"You crazy motherfucker," is all he gets out.
Feinberg shoves his way in. "Nice to see you too, asshole," he says, with no heat. "I'll stay in the room I was in last time."
Couriway shrugs, trudging along behind him.
Feinberg hauls his suitcase into the spare bedroom, which looks like it was cleaned recently, and only just barely. There's a stray flower petal on the floor, though. Feinberg parks his bags and picks it up.
"What's this?" he teases, waving it in Couri's face. "Had a lady friend over recently?"
Couri glares, but doesn't answer. His face is pink. "If I had a lady friend over, she would've been in my room."
"Yeah, kind of a weird place for this to be, isn't it." Feinberg absently slips it into his pockets.
He turns back to Couri and looks him up and down. Despite the paleness, he seems fine, in a t-shirt and shorts, not shivering or anything.
Feinberg studies him, then presses the back of his hand to Couriway's forehead.
Couri startles. "What?"
"You don't have a fever." Feinberg frowns. "But you're definitely sick. What's up?"
Couriway glances away. "Nothing's up," he says evasively.
He clears his throat. Feinberg watches, but gets no further explanation. But Couri's clearly hiding something. And he was coughing earlier. So Couri can't fool him.
He clears his throat again. And again, until he starts coughing. He covers his mouth with his hands, but keeps coughing, and coughing, it sounds like hacking, and a chill runs up Feinberg's spine--
He pulls Couri's hands away from his face. Couri, too weak, doesn't stop him.
A pile of pink petals, matching the one in Feinberg's pocket, fall out of his hands.
"What," Feinberg says, "the fuck?"
*
They clean up the petals from the carpet, though as they toss them out, Feinberg remembers the one in his pocket. He decides to keep it; despite the disturbing nature of Couriway literally coughing up flower petals, they're surprisingly soft, comforting. They kind of remind Feinberg of Couri, but he doesn't dare say that out loud. Couri would hit him, and he's sick, so Feinberg has to go easy on him.
Couri coughs up a few more flower petals before he goes back to his room. Feinberg follows him. "Do you know what you have?" he asks, as Couri climbs back into bed.
Couri bunches himself up under his covers, snuggled up between some of his large Pokemon plushes. "No," he says, but his face is half-hidden under his blankets so Feinberg isn't sure if he believes him. "But it'll probably go away."
"You're drinking enough water though, right?" Feinberg knows staying hydrated is the bare minimum for anything.
Couri gives him a look over his blanket. "What, are you my mom now?"
"No, but you're sick and you live alone." Feinberg rolls his eyes. "Here, I'll get you some water."
He finds Couri's usual water bottle and rinses it before using the filter. When he comes back, Couri's in the same position before, one of his Pokemon plushes hiding half his face.
Not for the first time, Feinberg wonders what it would be like to be in the Pokemon's position. "Here," he says, and sets the bottle on the nightstand. "I got you water."
"Thanks," Couriway mumbles half-heartedly.
He sits up again to take a sip. Feinberg watches him carefully.
"I feel like it's kinda dangerous if you don't know what you have," he says. "Especially since you're, what. Coughing up flower petals? That's not normal."
"It's fine," Couri says, then coughs again. A petal falls into his lap. Feinberg picks it up without thinking. "It's just--something I'll get over, probably." He waves a hand. "You can stream on my setup if you want."
Feinberg brightens up. "Really?" Couri never lets anyone touch his setup. To be fair, Feinberg hasn't set up his stream anywhere but in his own home, but still, it's Couri. "Can I play on your account too?"
He wouldn't if Couri said no, even though he could probably get away with it as weak as Couri is. But Couri seems to think for a moment, before shrugging and burying his face back into his bed.
"Yeah, do whatever you want," says his voice, buried by blankets.
Feinberg races to Couriway's office, thinking up all the mayhem he can cause.
*
After a few hours of dicking around on Couriway's Minecraft account (while Couri commented on everything he did through chat, even though Feinberg was streaming from his account), Feinberg finds himself getting hungry. He decides to end stream so he can check up on Couri, too. "Bye everyone, bye chat," he says, before signing off.
Several piles of flower petals are strewn around the bed and floor when Feinberg returns to Couriway's room. As he picks them up, Feinberg asks, "You hungry?"
From his bed, Couriway shrugs. He's scrolling through something on his phone.
Feinberg hits his ankle. "Hey. You hungry?"
Couri sighs. "Yeah," he says. "But I haven't eaten. I don't know how it'll affect the--"
He coughs again, then flicks the flower petal that had landed on his phone screen to the side.
Feinberg picks it up, too. "You haven't eaten since all this started?" he says incredulously. "But--when did this even start--?"
He remembers how long his messages had gone unanswered as Couriway says, "A week ago."
"Couri!" Feinberg practically jumps on the bed. Couri looks thinner too, even though he's glaring at Feinberg. "Anthony! You haven't eaten in a week? C'mon, man, that's really not healthy--"
"I know it's not," Couriway says bitchily. "I'm not happy about it either. But with these flowers--or whatever--food might fuck up my digestive system, and I don't want that to happen."
Feinberg's at a loss, because he thought the crazy cough was bad, but not eating for a week is even worse. "We've got to get you better," he says, and pulls out his phone. "I'll eat something first so I can think better."
"That's sure to be an improvement," Couri snarks, and Feinberg lightly hits his foot in response.
*
Feinberg orders food, and tries to feed Couriway a french fry. Couri is stubborn and doesn't let him, but Feinberg can tell he's not happy about it.
"You didn't even have to come out here for me," Couri grumps. "I'll get better and start eating again like normal, I promise."
"A week without food, man," Feinberg says. He pokes at Couri's mouth with the fry again. "A week."
"I'll live."
"Will you, though? Will you really?"
Feinberg finishes his food and refills Couriway's water bottle when he goes to throw out his trash. Couri's eyes look soft when Feinberg comes back, though that might be a trick of the light.
"You're a pretty good friend, you know," Couriway says as Feinberg hands him his bottle back.
Feinberg scoffs, though the word friend hits him somewhere a little too close to the center of his chest. "Yeah, I know."
Couriway shakes his head, smiling. "And the most annoying thing that's probably ever happened to me," he says. "I can't believe you flew here when I didn't even tell you anything."
"I'm just that good," Feinberg says smugly.
"Yeah, yeah, don't get a big head about it."
Couriway goes back to his phone, though he nearly jumps out of his skin when Feinberg joins him on the bed. "Uh, Fein, what are you doing?"
"What does it look like?" Feinberg leans back against the giant Pokemon. Whatever it is. "I know you're sick, but what you have isn't actually contagious, right?"
"Um." Couri coughs again. Now used to it, Feinberg plucks the petal off his t-shirt. "I dunno?"
"Probably not," Feinberg says cheerfully, though he has no way of knowing. "So it's fine if we cuddle like this." He pulls out his own phone too.
Couri is silent for a long moment. "I guess," he says, finally. "We can cuddle."
Feinberg opens up 2048, pretending not to be distracted by the warmth of Couri's body under the blanket, next to his own. "You don't have to sound so enthusiastic about it," he mutters, but loud enough so Couri can hear.
*
They spend the rest of the day in Couri's room, because Feinberg doesn't want Couriway to strain himself and doesn't want to leave him alone either. At some point he figures he should get himself dinner, too, but Couriway's bed is so comfortable and smells so much like him that Feinberg thinks, I'll close my eyes just for a moment, and wakes up several hours later to a darkened room and Couriway snoring beside him.
It's a little terrifying, waking up curled around Couri like this, but at least it's late and Couri's asleep. Feinberg's stomach is growling, but he's still tired, too. Flying always takes a lot out of him, and the soft shelter of Couriway's bedroom amidst the Florida heat makes it that easy for Feinberg to drift back to sleep.
When he wakes up again, it's to the sounds of Couriway coughing. Feinberg sits up immediately.
"Morning sunshine," Couriway manages through the petals fluttering from his mouth.
Feinberg scrambles out of bed. "Let me get you water."
He grabs Couri's bottle and runs to the kitchen, then comes back and shoves it into Couri's hands. Couri drinks, then coughs once more. Feinberg catches the petal in midair.
Couri rolls his eyes. "Showoff."
Feinberg ignores him. "You sounded really bad just then," he says, because Couri did. "We should figure out what you have so you can get cured."
"I told you, I'll get over it." Couri doesn't meet his eyes as he puts his water bottle back down. "What's more important is that you slept in your dirty clothes in my bed."
Oh. Feinberg looks down at himself. Couriway is right. Feinberg is still wearing his clothes from yesterday, the t-shirt and sweatpants he flew in.
Even though he knows his suitcase is in the guest room, Feinberg says, "I don't think I packed enough Florida clothes, can I steal yours?"
Couriway splutters. "What?" he exclaims, but Feinberg is already going to his closet.
He browses through his options. Couriway is nimbler than him, and shorter, but half of his wardrobe is oversized so it's not as bad as it could be. Feinberg picks out a big t-shirt he's seen Couri wear on stream dozens of times and basketball shorts.
"Fein," Couriway whines.
Feinberg pretends not to hear him as he changes. "Better?" he asks, when he's done.
Couriway's mouth is slanted, but he doesn't look entirely unhappy. The soft color of the light is high in his cheeks. "You're so annoying."
Feinberg grins. "I've heard," he says, getting back on the bed. Now he's dressed for Florida, and he smells like Couriway all over. It's a small thrill, but Feinberg will take what he can get.
When Couriway looks at him again, he's smiling. Feinberg smiles back.
Then Couri starts coughing, sounding like something is lodged deep in his throat. The petals fall out of him fast and hard; Feinberg pats him on the back, and catches each one.
Once his coughing fit subsides, Couri says, "Thanks." He looks pale.
Worry seizes Feinberg's heart again.
"We've gotta find out what you have," he says, and opens his phone to do research.
*
It takes him a bit, because he starts by searching "freaky flower illness," which mostly just gives him results about flowers getting sick. Feinberg didn't even know that could happen. He reads a few articles out of curiosity before remembering what he was doing. He tries a few other search terms before he finds what he's looking for: a fictional condition called Hanahaki Disease.
"The flower vomiting disease! That's what you have, right?" Feinberg waves his phone in Couri's face. "It's gotta be, that's literally what you've been doing."
He starts reading without waiting for an answer.
"'Hanahaki disease--flower-vomiting disease--is a fictional disease characterized by the growth of flowers in the body as a result of unrequited--love...'"
He looks at Couri again. Couri looks embarrassed.
"You knew, didn't you?" Feinberg asks.
Couri's gaze drops down. "I didn't want it to be your problem." He coughs, but Feinberg's hands are too occupied, so the petal drifts into his lap. Couri allows it to land in his fingers and turns it over in his hands.
"What do you mean my problem?" Feinberg goes back to reading. "Blah blah blah, fanfiction, cosplay... 'The primary symptom is coughing or vomiting up flower petals, which progresses into full blooms as the condition worsens.'" His eyes widen. "'If untreated, the disease is usually portrayed as fatal, with death resulting from suffocation.' Dude!"
"Yeah, I know," Couri says. "But it's fine, that probably won't happen. It's fictional."
"That's literally what's happening to you!"
"Fein, I'll be okay, it's not--"
"Is this about your breakup?"
Couri blinks at him. "With who?"
Feinberg stares. "Your ex-girlfriend?"
"Oh." Couri bites his bottom lip red. "I forgot. That was months ago."
"Is it? We gotta call her up--"
"It's not," Couri rushes, before Feinberg can locate his phone. "It's. It's really not--" He bites his lip again. "I broke up with her. I don't have unrequited feelings for her."
"Oh." Feinberg has never asked Couriway much about his personal life, and Couri usually isn't want to divulge. It feels important, suddenly, that Couri is sharing this. "Okay, then who?"
Couriway laughs. "You think I'm just gonna tell you? That's none of your business."
"But you could die." Feinberg watches as Couriway coughs again from his laughter. Three more pink flower petals fall from his mouth. "Look at you. I'm not just gonna let you suffer like this."
"Believe me," Couriway says. "The unrequited love is much worse."
"Couri, you've gotta tell me who it is. Maybe we can make them fall in love with you." Feinberg races through all the possibilities in his head. Mostly other Minecraft speedrunners and content creators, but who knows. Couri has always had a way of surprising him. "It can't be that hard."
"What, you're saying it's easy to fall in love with me?" Couriway teases.
"Well, yeah." Feinberg's mouth moves faster than his brain. "At least for me."
Couriway freezes.
Feinberg does, too.
Couri says, "What."
"I mean, uh," Feinberg says, but then Couriway starts coughing again, harder than before, an ocean of flower petals falling onto his bed.
Neither of them try to clean them up this time. "What the fuck is happening," says Couri, through his coughing. "This shouldn't--"
With his confession out there, Feinberg doesn't feel as weird anymore as he comes around to pat Couri on the back, then rub circles soothingly, hoping it'll make him feel better. Couriway isn't pushing him away, which is a good sign. If Feinberg's stupid mouth is going to ruin things for them, he'll deal with the consequences later.
Couriway won't stop coughing. "This doesn't make any sense," he says. "It's not--" He looks up, and to Feinberg's surprise, his eyes are shiny and wet. Possibly from the coughing. Probably. Feinberg can't handle the idea of making Couriway look like this.
Couri says, "It said unrequited, this isn't unrequited--"
Everything clicks into place in Feinberg's head.
"Oh," he says, then takes Couriway by the chin and kisses him.
One more petal slips out between his lips, and then Couri's kissing back, eagerly, clutching at Feinberg's shoulders. Feinberg expected him to taste like plants or something herbal or weird and gross, but instead Couri tastes clean and fresh with a hint of sweetness on his lips. He shudders into Feinberg's mouth as Feinberg kisses him deeper, clutching him close and tight, putting a year's worth of dreaming and joking and wishing and pining into the kiss. Couri clings to him, lets Feinberg push him back against the headboard, making soft sounds into his mouth as Feinberg presses closer, trying to feel every inch of Couri's body against his own, hot spots along his skin and electric down his spine.
They break apart for air, panting. Couri's eyes are glassy.
Feinberg can't believe they did that. He laughs.
"Better?" he asks.
Couri taps for his chin for a moment, then coughs. A petal falls out from between his lips.
Disappointed, Feinberg watches it drift down between them.
But Couri doesn't look too surprised. "Matthew Feinberg," he says plainly. "I'm in love with you."
Feinberg's ears rattle. "I." He hasn't thought about it in so many terms, though he supposes if he was being honest, with how long, how much he's thought of Couriway, in all the ways that used to make him feel mad at himself, then slightly guilty--in so many ways, and then when he heard the news of Couri's breakup, the euphoria, and then the shame--
Couri touches Feinberg's cheek with his knuckles, breaking him out of his thoughts. "You don't have to say it back yet," he says, smiling.
Feinberg leans in to his touch. He pouts. "I want to."
"You can take your time. I've known for a few years now." Couriway sighs. "That's probably why I had this disease. Whatever it is. I didn't want to say it. I couldn't."
"Oh." Feinberg blinks. "Then--?"
Couriway takes a drink of his water, swallows. He waits for a moment, then coughs.
Nothing comes out of his mouth this time.
Feinberg whoops. "We did it! You're not gonna die of flowers filling you from the inside out!"
"I'm not." Couriway beams. His hand finds Feinberg's waist, slipping under his shirt. "But if you take my clothes off, we can talk about something else filling me up."
Scandalized, Feinberg playfully smacks him. "You're gross," he says, but wriggles against the warmth of Couri's palm. "You like it when I wear your clothes, I just know it."
Couriway hums. "I'd like it better if you took them off," he says, looking up from under his eyelashes.
Feinberg laughs and kisses him again. They spend the day in bed, petals falling with every shake.