NCT Oneshots

The Flowers You Never Noticed - Yuta

Yuri had always been by Yuta's side.

She was there when he made the soccer team in tenth grade, when he scored his first goal, when he broke his ankle and couldn't play for months. She was the one who brought him tangerines during exams, stayed up late to quiz him, and cheered the loudest at every match.

She loved him quietly, gently, hopelessly.

And he never noticed.

To him, Yuri was his best friend. His comfort. His constant. She was someone he could laugh with, tease, lean on, and never once think of as more. She was safe. Familiar.

Until she started disappearing.

She missed his practices. She stopped responding to his messages. Her seat in class stayed empty. And when he finally found her sitting alone on the rooftop, her eyes were dull, her lips pale, and her voice was so quiet it barely sounded like hers.

"I'm fine," she said.

But there was blood on her sleeve and petals on the ground.

He didn't understand.

Not then.

The call came a few days later. She had collapsed. Her lungs filled with blossoms of love she never confessed. The doctors called it Hanahaki. Yuta had only heard about it in whispers, never thinking someone so close could suffer from something so cruel.

He ran to the hospital, but she was already gone.

Her sketchbook was left on the bedside table. Inside were pages of him. His smile. His eyes. His laugh. His name, written again and again in soft graphite.

He read the note she left for him.

"I loved you. I never told you, and maybe that's my fault. But I couldn't forget you. Not even when it started killing me."

Yuta didn't cry at first.

Not until days later, when he stepped onto the soccer field for the first time without her.

He doubled over during warm-ups, coughing.

A petal fell from his lips.

Cherry blossom pink.

And it was already too late.