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Becky smiles hesitantly as she ran into Alexa in the hallway. She sees the blonde looking at something on her phone with a smile, haven’t yet realized someone was watching her and it causes her stomach to swoop in an all too familiar way and she clears her throat as a tickle pushes in the back; that same tickle has been the bane of her existence for the last two months.
Becky knew Alexa was trying to prove to everyone why she drafted here, so she understood changes needed to be made, she just didn’t think those changes included ending their relationship, all for a stupid championship. But Becky, ever the optimistic, had hope that maybe they’d get back together one day.
But then the blonde starts getting meaner, calling her dumb for being nice, calling her a pathetic coward and so then Becky starts hating the way her breath catches when Alexa looks at her, like now when she has finally looked up from her phone. A scowl and an eye roll is all she gets from her and then she’s gone. She walks away and Becky watches her go.
Suddenly, the tickle becomes more prominent and the first flower comes up. She hears her name getting call in the background but she can’t take her eyes off the purple petal in her hand.
And that’s how she knows that Alexa doesn’t love her anymore.
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Becky wakes up the next day with an annoying cough and God is it painful. She looks down at the bottom of the trash can and she sees the Cyclamen petals laying there.
Rejection.
The petals then start making regular appearances if it’s during the night it’s great as she can get rid of them without anyone noticing, not to mention she can cough without people looking at her worriedly. And during the day it’s a bit harder, but the petals coming out are still a small amount, just enough that she can shove them in her pocket or a tissue and get rid of them later. There’s not blood, yet, and right now...that’s a good thing.
“Hey Becks”
She looks up from where she was eating her quinoa to see Bayley making her way to her table. “Hey Bay, what’s up?” She says with a smile.
“I was about to ask you that, we missed you last night for a movie night.” The brunette says sitting down. “Charlotte was excited you finally agreed to watch ‘Imagine Me and You’, the one with the florist and Piper Perabo remember?”
The florist...the last thing Becky wanted was to see, think or talk about flowers, she doesn’t need a reminder that the person she loves doesn’t love her anymore, nor does she want to subject herself to the burning of her lungs voluntarily.
“Yeah, I was just - ya know’ - feeling under the weather.” She says as she swallows down a petal that lingers annoyingly in the back of throat. “It’s just a bit of a cold.” She says with a fake smile. “I’m sure it will go away soon enough.”
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Except that it doesn’t because one day as she’s making her way back from the ring she feels the familiar tingling on her throat but it’s so much worse because she can’t breathe. God she can’t breathe, so she runs. She runs and she doesn’t stop until she reaches the bathroom and leans towards the sink filling it with rose petals and blood. It’s getting worse.
She’s in the middle of cleaning the blood stain sink, having already thrown away the flowers when she hears the door creak open. She looks up to see Alexa come in with a look of disgust and a hint of worry. And Becky’s knuckles go white from gripping the sink too hard.
“Do you have to spread your germs here?”
Becky clears her throat, trying with all her might to keep the petals down. “Last time I checked this is a public bathroom, I think my germs are the least of your worries.” She tells her letting her eyes dart across Alexa’s face, she has been avoiding her lately, going out of her way to not even run into her in the hallways and God it bothers her so much how Alexa doesn’t seem to notice and it hurts, it hurts knowing she just doesn’t care.
“You’re disgusting.” The blonde says glaring at her.
Once again, Becky clears her throat and she can practically taste the blood on her tongue and she wants to say something, anything, but she’s afraid that if she opens her mouth she’ll just empty a handful of flowers at the blonde’s feet . So instead she simply sighs and looks back to the sink re-opening the faucet.
The blonde only scuffs and walks out of the bathroom, and soon enough Becky’s back to emptying her stomach on the sink.
----
After the bathroom incident, Becky makes it her mission to find a confined space in every venue, one where she can just hide in. Only going out for interviews, matches and sometimes food though. She’s gotten pretty good at hiding from everyone.
And when she does encounter people she lies, she says she’s good, great even. Because she wants it to be true. She wants to feel strong and happy but instead she just feels stupid because here she is dying because she can’t seem to get out of love with the blonde.
Speaking of the blonde starts looking at her with worry and confusion whenever she does run into her, it’s a split of a second but it’s there. And she hates how that makes the cough even worse, so what does she do. Because it reminds her of how the blonde used to get annoyed at her when she got sick, because Becky was stubborn, one day the blonde had jokingly sat on Becky’s lap for a couple of hours because the redhead wanted to go for a run while having a cold.
And she wishes there could be a way to unpaint all of those pictures, but alas, there is no way to unremember...because the world is cruel that way.
So what does Becky do? She shows her face constantly for a few days, being her usual self until that slight worry in Alexa’s eyes is gone.
And God how she’d love to just unlove her.
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One day she wakes up with a fever that heats her skin that makes her feel like she’s on fire, and chills that rack through her body. And she. Can’t. Breathe. Becky rolls out of bed and barely makes it to the toilet and all that comes out from her mouth are white petals with thick layers of blood.
She is huddled by the side of the toilet after having called management to tell them she’d be missing a show, probably a few. So here she is an hour later still on the bathroom floor and she doesn’t know what to do because the petals just keep coming.
That’s how Sasha finds her. But it made sense that she was the first, Charlotte was in another brand now and Sasha was the second person she was closest to thanks to their NXT days. Made sense she’d notice she was avoiding her after the cough started.
When she comes into Becky’s room she sees the redhead with blood stained lips and she swears her chest in on fire. The second Sasha sees her she scoops her up and carefully places her on the bed and brings the trash can to her as soon as she does and thank God she does because it doesn’t take much time for Becky to start coughing purple hyacinth petals into it. She then brings a wet towel from the bathroom and start gently cleaning Becky’s face with it.
“Didn’t take you for a nurse, Sasha,” Becky says jokingly but it comes out weak and Sasha’s frown deepens. But she doesn’t ask for details because she knows. It’s pretty obvious anyways, it’s not like it’s a secret that she’s still madly in love with Alexa Bliss.
“How bad is it?” Sasha asks.
“As bad as it looks,” Becky answers honestly and weakly.
“Maybe the doc...”
“Won’t help. You and I both know what this is. And we both know there’s no cure for unrequited love.”
“Let’s just go, please. Maybe there’s something to slow it down or something.” Sasha pleads and the worried look coming from her usually stoic friend is enough to accept.
Sasha all but carries her to the doctor’s office, it wasn’t a company doctor as that would mean getting the word out to everyone and Becky refused to let everybody know about the level of stupidity and hurt she currently carries in her heart.
“You are in love.” The doctor says.
‘No shit.’ Becky things.
“It’s called Hanahaki Disease.” She knows that. Becky googled it the moment she coughed the first petal.
“We know, it’s cool though.” Becky tries to assure them with a bit of blood dribbling from her mouth. “I feel great.”
Sasha sighs and cleans the blood, thanking the doctor for the tissue he passed her. “Is there anything you can do?”
“We can give her something for her lungs but it’s not going make it go away.” He sighs. “You have two options… one you tell this person that yo...”
“Nope.” Becky rejects immediately. What would be the point? Alexa wouldn’t reciprocate, she had moved on, so what would be the point of doing that is Becky can’t move on anyway.
“Or there’s a surgery that involves removing all memories of this person.”
“Nope.” Becky answers again. She could feel a burning pain in her heart at the thought of that, why would she want to that? Because the surgery would not only take away her love but everything else, the memories of the blonde laughing at her silly puns, the tight hugs the blonde would give her after her matches, it’d take away everything to do with Alexa and she doesn’t want that.
“I urge you to reconsider…”
“Nope, I’m not doing it doc.”
“If you refuse to do anything you can…”
“We know.” Sasha snaps. “We know what can happen.” She says again with a sad tone.
And so from that point on Sasha travels with her, helps her stay away from people, stays awake while Becky coughs her heart out, makes sure Becky takes her prescription. And really it was just a matter of time before someone else find out.
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It happens one morning when they are out running. Bayley, Sasha and Becky always go out running in the morning before going to the gym. One moment she was happily running with them and the next she’s on her hands and knees heaving out petals. And once again she cannot stop.
“What is going on?” Bayley asked panicked. “Are those flowers?”
“Shit! Becky!” She hears another voice exclaim but she can’t fully focus on it because her body seem intent of having her puke out her entire being in the form of flowers.
She feels a pair of arms helping her up once her body decides to give her a break.
“What’s wrong with her?” She hears a voice ask.
“She being stubborn idiot.” The second voice sighs and then keeps talking. “She has the hanahaki disease.”
“The unrequited love disease?”
“Mhmm… guess I don’t have to tell you who she loves?”
“That was a good nap.” Becky says as she wakes up. She looks around to see she’s back at the hotel room.
“Not funny.”
“Becky, there must be something we can do…”
“There’s nothing to do, Bay.” She says as she sits up on the bed.
“I’m not accepting that.”
“Well I have. I’m not afraid of the outcome. The story that I’ve lived, the chances, the what ifs...it is what it is.” She says shrugging.
“You mean something that could actually kill you?” The brunette demands “Becky, I was so scared. God! How can you be okay with this?!”
“Bay…” Sasha tried to intervene.
“It’s not fair.” The brunette says quietly.
And so she gains another roommate and bodyguard it seems. Either Bayley or Sasha or sometimes both are with her every minute of every day. if she was a 100% she’d hate it, she’d be annoyed already but she has been to busy puking her guts out to think about it.
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So it happens that the one moment Bayley and Sasha are out in the ring together she finds herself extremely hungry so she ventures out to catering to get some food she runs into Alexa. Because of course she does.
Her hair is up in a half ponytail and her eyes are looking straight into Becky’s, she sees her hand fidgeting with the paper cup in her hands and she’s biting her lip a tell tale sign that she’s nervous about something.
“Just came for some tea.” Becky says casually signaling to the tea bag on her hand. She looks back to it as staring at the blonde’s eyes makes her chest hurt, she think she’s sees worry on those eyes, but she refuses to believe it. Must be an effect of the fever she thinks.
Becky is about to walk out into the hallway when she hears her name being called softly.
“Becky.”
The redhead closes her eyes and takes a deep breath praying to everyone up in the sky that she doesn’t cough up any petals. She slowly turns around and looks at the blonde hoping she looks fine and not sick at all.
“Is everything okay? Are you...okay?” She asks.
And Becky can feel anger starting to burn in her stomach, and it isn’t fucking fair. Because how dare she ask her that. How dare she act like she cares after treating her like shit. How dare she stand there looking beautiful, in her black blazer and thigh high boots. How dare she move on while Becky was left counting days since her love gave up and got lost on her.
She feels angry because who the fuck decided that humans growing fucking flowers in their fucking heart because the person they love doesn’t love them back was a good fucking idea?
And for the first time in month Becky asks to whoever is up there what the fuck was their problem? Why was life not fucking fair? Why couldn’t she just fucking move on so she could keep going, so she can continue living her life. But of fucking course is not that simple.
Because she’s not fucking fine and there is nothing she can fucking do to stop it. And because she can’t just say. Tell me you love me. And as much as she wants to hate the blonde there is no way she’s going to burden her with this.
“I’m fine. Alexa” She says seriously and coldy. “You can stop pretending to care.”
And with that she walks out of the room. Sometimes bridges burn with no tunnels to get to the other side.
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“How is she?” Bayley asks once she’s back from her match. Honestly the fact that Becky has been able to work at all in her condition is a miracle in itself.
“The flowers haven’t stopped, and is getting worse the episodes are happening with very little time in between.” Sasha says as she passes a wet towel to Becky who is once again kneeled on the floor next to the toilet. “I think...it’s time to reconsider not telling her.”
“You need to get a hold of this, Lynch.” She says as soon as she watched Becky open her mouth to reject the idea once again.
“I’m trying…”
“No, you are not. Stop fighting this. I get that you don’t want to burden her or whatever but you cannot just literally choke on your feelings and then carry them to your grave.”
“Whoa, Sash…”
“No. She needs to do this Bayley. As much as I hate Alexa she at least deserves to know what’s going on.”
And so Becky finds herself walking around the venue looking for the blonde. After a while she finally finds her in sitting on a storage box playing with her phone. Becky looks at her for a few seconds before taking a few deep breaths and nodding.
“This is the right to do.” She mumbles and walks towards her.
“Hey, Lexi” She says cautiously. “You uh... have a minute?”
Alexa looks up, a frown forming as soon as she sees who is calling her. “Whatever it is, I don’t have time.”
“It’s about what happened at catering a few days ago” She tries as she walks closer.
At this the blonde looks back up from her phone and stares at the redhead for a few seconds, noticing how tired she looks. And although she’s worries her pride wins, because she tried being nice and she got rejected. Well fuck that. “Your chance has passed. You are right I don’t really care.” She says and she goes back to her phone.
Becky sighs and nods dejectedly. “Right. Of course.” At least no one can say she didn’t try. Could she try harder? Maybe… but honestly she’s too tired to do so.
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She was in the middle of a match, and she remembers being suplexed into a pile of chairs. She didn’t get to see what happens next.
She didn’t get to hear the way the audience gasp at the sight of blood and petals coming out of Becky’s mouth.
She didn’t get to see the way the medical team charges into the ring to place her on her side to keep her from choking.
She didn’t get to see how her two friends rush to the ramp to see her.
She didn’t see the way the way Alexa’s face fell and a horrified expression appeared.
She was being carried of the ring and she showed no signs of responsiveness. The medical team hovering over her, shouting out instructions.
When she comes to, she finds that she was no longer in the last place she remembered. An arena filled with people and her body on top of chairs. Of course, that was the last thing she remembered.
Blinking rapidly, she found something else entirely. She was in a hospital bed and more surprisingly by her bedside, holding her hand, was Alexa, who’d immediately noticed her stirring and was already reaching for the water by the bed.
Becky’s mind feels hazy, confused and her body felt limp. She downed the water, coughing a bit and she founds a trash can placed on her lap as someone holds her hair back while she gets rid of even more flowers. And God does her chest feels like she’s on fire. And then she finally wakes up fully, wiping her mouth and recognizing Alexa for the first time.
Her eyes widened, and the blonde’s heart fluttered.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” She asks desperately, her voice cracking with her eyes full of tears.
“I didn’t tell anyone.” She answers weekly.
“Sasha and Bayley knew…”
“They found out on their own...I didn’t want to say anything,” She sighs. “You were right after all, I am a pathetic coward.” She says out of breath and slowly.
“No...no.” The blonde says between tears holding on to one of Becky’s hands and bringing it to her lips. “It’s okay. You’re going to be okay, Becky. I promise.” The blonde whispers as she smooths her free hand over the redhead’s hair.
Becky wants to say something, she wants to push Alexa away but instead she says nothing and holds on to her hand tighter than before. She feels her throat burning and her lungs feels like they are drowning. She is dry heaving into the trashcan but nothing’s coming out and that’s who she knows. This it. She’s dying and so she looks at Alexa because she wants the last thing she sees to be her eyes.
“Please, don’t leave me,” Alexa whispers, looking straight into Becky’s eyes. “You don’t get to leave me, you hear me.” Her voice cracking and she’s two seconds away from breaking.
“I love you so much. God Becky, I never stopped. Please don’t go.” She says desperately and for the first time in months Becky swears she could feel air coming to her lungs with no obstructions, with no pain. Just pure fresh air.
Becky chuckles weakly “I love you more.” Uttering the same response she used to tell the blonde back when they were dating.
“I don’t think so.” Alexa scoffs as she places Becky’s hand on her heart. “ This heart, my heart, it’s yours. Forever.” She says softly honestly.
“Same.” She says tiredly yet happily.