The Hanahaki Club: Episode 14
Episode 14: Exposure Therapy, Part 3
So far…
After having hanahaki for Leon in high school, Hassie had the operation and lost all her memories of him. Now she is spitting up petals again for Leon, only months after after they were reunited through the Hickley University Theatre Society.
Episode 14: Exposure Therapy, Part 3
Hassie
The Work Room was Hassie’s favourite part of the library to study in, not because of its ergonomically-designed chairs and plush beanbags, nor because it was the only place in the building that was lit by natural light, courtesy of the floor to ceiling windows overlooking the courtyard between the library and Cowper House; but because it was the only space in the library which didn’t have ‘Study Zone! Quiet Please!’ signs plastered all over it in aggressive, red lettering. Designed specifically to allow group study sessions, the space was always abuzz with low chatter, punctuated by the occasional sounds of mirth or the raised pitch of an overheated debate. It was to this soundtrack that Hassie liked to work, keeping the corner of a group table to herself and half-listening to the conversations around her whilst she worked through a pile of reference-only books. It was nice to take a pause every once in a while from literary criticism on authors long-dead, and absorb the sometimes meaningful, often times shallow musings of the lifeforms around her. It didn’t really matter if the conversations were even interesting, or if she could make any sense of them, there was just something comforting in witnessing this moment of the journey—all these singular lives that happened to coincide in the same place at the same time, brought together by a single choice that landed them right here, right now. If any of these individuals had decided differently about their academic future, they would never have met, never have shared these ideas, never have grown in the way they were growing now—there would have been different spaces to occupy, different topics to discuss, different thoughts to articulate, different relationships to form, completely different feelings and memories to take with them through the rest of their lives. It was like watching a myriad of stories in progress—real tragedies and comedies and romances that existed, not between the pages of a book, but in this living, breathing, heart-thumpingly fragile, tangible world of a slow Monday afternoon.
Izaak thought she was crazy, of course. But then Izaak preferred to study in one of those dark, dusty booths on the top floor of the library, just about as far away from human contact as you could get—a place so quiet and neglected that it would be easy to lose track of time and then discover on leaving that a century had passed, life had moved on without you and there was no one alive who remembered your name.
“You’re lucky I have to love you,” Izaak had said when Hassie had expressed that specific thought to him.
Hassie smiled at the memory as she turned the page of her book. It was nice to have someone forced to care about you, despite their better judgement.
“Hey, Hassie! What are you working on?”
Hassie felt a flush instantly rise to her cheeks at the voice above her, a flush so intense that her reading glasses practically fogged up as she raised her head and stared directly into Leon’s smile.
“Hey!” she said, fumbling to remove her glasses. “Uh. Just some further reading for a module.”
She watched, as if in slow motion, as Leon reached out a hand to her book and flipped the cover to read the title.
“Discourses in the Sublime,” he read. “That sounds familiar.” He laughed at her confused expression. “The sublime,” he explained. “Think we did that at school for a poetry unit? Ms. Crocker’s class?” He dropped the book back in place and Hassie watched his hand travel back to his side with unnecessary attentiveness.
“Oh. Yeah.” Hassie did remember—they had been in Ms. Crocker’s class together for their GCSEs. Leon had sat in the row in front of her, two seats to the left. “Wordsworth.”
“That’s the one. What was the poem called?”
“It was an extract from The Prelude.”
“Are you studying Wordsworth now?” Leon asked as he dropped his bag to the floor and perched on the seat next to her. He smelled of the crisp January air and something else, sweet and zesty.
Hassie swallowed softly.
“Romantics,” she barely managed to reply. “The Romantics so, yes, Wordsworth, Shelley, Keats…” She shrugged, as if to apologise for her taste in literature. “Are you coming to the audition on Saturday?”
Leon lent his elbow on the table and cupped his chin in his hand, which brought his green gaze suddenly much closer to Hassie—close enough that she could see the flecks of yellow at the edge of each iris. “Mmm,” he hummed in the affirmative, “Zeke is insisting I audition for the lead.”
“He told me you were his muse when he was writing the character.”
“I don’t know if I should be flattered or worried.”
“A bit of both,” Hassie recommended, deliberately dragging her gaze away from Leon’s green eyes to glance briefly around the room. “I hope we don’t get too many auditionees.”
She caught sight of a familiar figure passing the double doors of the Work Room. Was that Izaak? Had his seminar finished?
Leon laughed softly. “I don’t envy you. I wouldn’t want to spend my entire Saturday caught in the middle of Myra and Zeke.” He emphasised Myra and Zeke like they were a trademark or a comedy duo.
Hassie made a face, just as she recognised that it was Izaak lurking outside the Work Room doors, peering through the glass like a bad spy. What was he doing? “That is going to be a headache,” she agreed, turning her attention back to Leon. “But I really just don’t like disappointing people. There are only seven parts.”
Leon hummed again, thoughtfully. “Probably better to disappoint a lot of people than a few though?” he suggested. “That way the rejection won’t feel so personal.”
“Well, now I’m going to feel bad if we only get a few people on Saturday.”
Leon laughed again. He was always laughing. Which was awful, because he had a very nice laugh—warm, gentle, genuine—and the sound made Hassie’s stomach flip every single time she heard it. It was even worse when he was laughing because of her, because then a pleasant heat spread in her chest, triggering the desperate need to make him laugh again.
“Sorry,” he said. “I guess that backfired.” He raised his arm to check his watch. “I’d better get to my lecture.” He got to his feet and slung his bag back over his shoulder. “Hope your further reading continues to be sublime.”
You are sublime, Hassie wanted to reply, but didn’t because no way was she going to be a weirdo out loud.
“Don’t become a stand-up comic,” she said instead.
Leon looked offended. “What happened to not wanting to disappoint people?”
“Sometimes you have to do things you don’t like for the greater good of comedy.”
Leon poked his tongue out at her. “I hope your further reading sucks then.”
“Happy lecturing,” Hassie responded, watching him walk away, her stomach performing a triple aerial-cartwheel as that laugh sounded one more time—a soft chuckle accompanied by a quick wink over his shoulder before he slipped out of the Work Room.
About three seconds after he’d left, Izaak walked in and beelined straight for Hassie.
“So?” he said as he flopped into the seat Leon had just vacated.
“Hello to you too. Why were you lurking outside?”
“I didn’t want to interrupt.”
Hassie frowned at him and began packing up her things. “Interrupt what?”
“We don’t have to go right now if you’re not finished,” Izaak said, indicating the reference book. “How was your chat with Leon?”
“It’s okay, I’m done for today,” Hassie replied. “We should get back so you can rest before your shift.”
“What did you chat about with Leon?”
“Nothing really, he just popped over to say ‘hi’.” She finished packing her bag and looked up to see Izaak giving her one of his ‘you’re trying my patience’ stares. She sighed. “What?”
“Nothing.”
Hassie got to her feet, pulled on her coat, shouldered her bag and grabbed the reference book from the desk.
One, two…
Izaak stood up with her and followed her to the doors.
Three, four, five…
They went into the foyer of the library and Hassie headed towards the Reference Desk.
Six, sev—
“I’ve been thinking—” Izaak began.
There it is.
“Uh-oh,” Hassie said dryly, as she handed her book over to the clerk behind the reference desk.
She heard Izaak huff at her shoulder but he didn’t say anything else until she had checked the book back in at the desk and they were walking out of the library doors into the low, afternoon light.
“If nothing really is going to happen with Leon,” Izaak continued, linking his arm through hers so that she had no chance to escape hearing whatever this latest bright idea was, “You should try dating.”
“Huh?”
“Other guys,” Izaak clarified. “You’ve only ever had a crush on Leon and you’ve never dated anyone else. If you want to get over him, maybe you should see what else is out there.”
“How is that going to help?”
“Look, I know you’re so… enamoured… with Leon that you think he’s the best thing since bubble tea, but that’s just because you haven’t tried dating anyone else. If you, you know… shopped around… a bit, you might find something… better.”
Hassie cast Izaak a fond but sceptical look. This sort of conversation was so far out of his comfort zone, as evidenced from the way he’d just stumbled through that explanation, that she wouldn’t be surprised if he spontaneously combusted before they reached the car. Izaak didn’t do gossip, feelings, relationships—platonic or romantic—and he never gave explicit advice unless absolutely nagged for it. Blackmailing her into attending the hanahaki support group was the first time he’d ever directly interfered in her personal life. And now here he was telling her she ought to date around? Knowing him, he’d probably been thinking about this latest suggestion for weeks. He thought far too much about her situation, probably more than she even did, which was why Hassie couldn’t be mad at him. He was worried for her, and she hated that she had made him feel this helpless and desperate. Still, this dating idea was a bit much.
“You don’t think I’d just end up with hanahaki over someone else?” she asked.
“Well,” Izaak replied, typically blunt, “That is a risk. But I’m not saying you have to fall in love with someone else. I’m just saying that if you met some other guys… got to know them… you might realise Leon isn’t so special… you might, you know… fall out of love.”
Hassie didn’t say anything for a moment, as they crossed the road to the car park. It was true that she’d never dated anyone else, never even tried, never even had the chance. Leon was her first and only crush in high school, and at the time she’d never even considered looking at anyone else in the same way because she didn’t know the danger she was in. And then the hanahaki had happened and as soon as she’d had the operation, they’d moved to Hickley. Her sole focus since then had been on settling into her first year at university and not getting sick again—which meant avoiding falling for anyone. Much good that had done her, of course.
Izaak squeezed her arm gently—his way of asking for her thoughts.
“Don’t you think it’s unfair to date other people when I already have feelings for someone?” Hassie asked, as they reached the car and she handed the keys over.
“It’s just dating, Hass,” Izaak said, as he got into the driver’s seat. He turned to look at her as she slid into the passenger seat next to him. “Grabbing a coffee isn’t signing up for a mortgage, three kids and a retirement plan. Most people our age date several people at the same time, these days—apparently. So I’ve been told.” He shrugged. “It could be fun.”
“Did you just call dating ‘fun’?”
“Okay, so, it’s my personal idea of hell, but you’re not like me—you like people. You might enjoy it. At least think about it, yeah? For me?”
Hassie narrowed her gaze at him. “There’s a finite number of times you can use that on me, you know.”
Izaak didn’t look the slightest bit like he cared. “You will think about it though?” he insisted.
Wow, he was really pushing it today with the brotherly concern. Annoyingly, she couldn’t say she hated it, because it was so rare for Izaak to be this pushy, and she knew the past year and a half had been hard on him. The whole family had moved across the country because of her. Izaak had left his whole life behind—school friends, and neighbours, and the community they’d grown up in, all their childhood haunts and favourite places, just for her. Trying every option possible to cure her illness this time was the least she could do for him.
Rolling her eyes, Hassie buckled herself in with a displeased huff. “You’re very, very lucky I have to love you.”
Next time: Episode 15—Exposure Therapy, Part 4
Teaser:
Double dates? It was going to happen, wasn’t it? Even without him: Kai and Cheri were going to start hanging out with other couples every weekend and Taran was going to become the hopeless single friend no one knew what to do with because he ruined the nice even numbers on a table-booking. He could see it clearly: a long table set for five, with him sat at the end, an empty seat opposite, and used drinking glasses and plates piled up in the spare table-top space.
The Hanahaki Club Index
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Author’s Notes:
No, you guys are sublime.
Next time: Episode 15—Exposure Therapy, Part 4
PJ
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