Go nuts with your Hanahaki AUs. There are surprisingly few in the fandom, let's correct that!

From Fanlore: 

Hanahaki Disease (花吐き病 (Japanese); 하나하키병 (Korean); 花吐病 (Chinese)) is a fictional disease in which the victim coughs up flower petals when they suffer from one-sided love. It ends when the beloved returns their feelings (romantic love only; strong friendship is not enough), or when the victim dies. It can be cured through surgical removal, but when the infection is removed, the victim's romantic feelings for their love also disappear.

The term hanahaki comes from the Japanese words hana (花), which means "flower", and hakimasu (吐きます), which means "to throw up". 

The symptoms of the disease are summarized to strong pain, having flowers blooming in the heart and lungs, and then throwing them up.

This trope has several variations, and is used in both happy and tragic stories. It often develops over months or even years, beginning with coughing up a few petals and growing in intensity (and pain) until the victim is vomiting entire flowers, by which point the disease has entered its final stages.

The happy ending version is when the object of the victim's love returns their affections, thus making the love no longer unrequited. The victim is then cured of the disease. This may happen spontaneously when the object of affections realizes his (it's usually a him) love, or the disease may require the object to persuade the victim that their love is mutual. If the victim cannot believe that his beloved returns his love, he will die.

Another popular version is when the victim's lungs get filled with the flowers and roots grow in their respiratory system. They choke on their own blood and petals, and die. It is popular due to the angst that comes with character death.

There are also works where the flowers are surgically removed, as are the victim's feelings of love, meaning they can no longer love the person they once loved. Sometimes this also removes their memories of the former beloved, or the victim's ability to ever love again. Often, the one suffering the disease will refuse the surgery, preferring to die rather than losing their feelings.

Many artists and authors tend to use cherry blossoms as the flower of the petals that characters cough up, although it's not uncommon for the flower to be something significant to the characters. Flower symbolism is also popular in western fandom, for example to represent the victim's affections or personality, or that of their loved one.


Please, go nuts! Make it angst, humour, hurt/comfort, hurt/no comfort, fluff, whatever your heart desires! Make it as canon compliant or divergent as ya like. Set it wherever and whenever you wanna! It's just gotta be Spuffy and it's gotta involve hanahaki somehow. Heck, non-Spuffy is fine too, just in that case post it to ao3 or your other platform of choice but link it to me as I'd love to see!

My only preferences (though they are not requirements) are: No character bashing. Friendly/familial Spike+Angel would be nice but really you can do whatever you like! 💗