Witches Aren't Supposed to be Flowery

Chapter 2: Conflicting Feelings

Things had been going a little more smoothly for Amity ever since that day at the library. With Willow on board, Amity was no longer alone in her endeavors, which was obviously good for many reasons. Not only was Willow a great person to talk to and get emotions out with, but she also would help when Amity was put on the spot about her well-being or her continuous leaving when she needed to cough. Amity was pretty smart, but she was not great under her friends' pressure, and she was definitely running out of excuses, so it was better to have two brains than one working on it.

Though while everyone else seemed fooled by the various lies, one person remained suspicious: Luz. The very last person Amity wanted to be worried about her was obviously not falling for Willow and Amity's tactics. She was too nice to confront them about it face to face, but it was only a matter of time before her care for her friends overpowered that initial politeness. Amity could only hope she could figure out a solution by then.

Nonetheless, Amity felt a lot less stressed to be continuing her regular routines with the knowledge that Willow had her back. And for that reason, she was able to pull herself out of bed and start getting ready for the school day.

It had been about a week since Amity had started experiencing symptoms, and she could tell that the disease was progressing. It was very slow and small changes that clued her in to this, but she would be coughing more often now, and her fits would sometimes yield two or three petals instead of just one. On the other hand, her leg was almost entirely healed, leaving her with a smaller brace instead of that clunky cast, and she could almost use it functionally again. It was strange how healing magic could fix broken bones but not a broken heart.

Amity's thoughts continued to wander as she finished pulling on the top piece of her uniform. She checked her pockets for tissues and stuffed a few more into them (in case of emergency) before finally heading out of her room and closing the door behind her. She walked over to the bathroom to brush her teeth and looked at herself in the mirror.

Lately, she hadn't been waking up as much because of stress, but she still was woken up once or twice a night by her coughing, which explained the dark circles under her eyes.

No wonder people are concerned about me, she thought, chuckling slightly under her breath.

Amity shook it off and focused on completing her morning activities. She pulled her hair up and left the room, walking downstairs to leave for school. Ed and Em met her by the door with a plain piece of toast for her breakfast.

Amity took hold of the toasted bread gingerly, eyeing it with caution. It really didn't sound good right then, and she could just tell that crumbs would aggravate her throat and send her into a bout of hacking. So she just held it in her hand as she and the twins began out the door and towards the school, planning to throw it away or give it to someone else when they arrived.

Amity was beginning to think she might get away with it, but after a few minutes, Edric spoke up.

"Yo, Mittens, are you gonna eat your breakfast? We worked so hard on it just for you," he grinned, his tone mocking.

Well, now she especially couldn't just not eat it without raising suspicion from her siblings.

So Amity took a small bite off the tip and grimaced as she felt her throat give the exact response to the swallow as she had previously anticipated. She halted her step and doubled over, dropping the toast as she brought her arm up to her mouth and wheezed into it, tears coming to her eyes. She quickly grabbed a tissue with her other hand and used it to replace her elbow, coughing into the tissue instead so that the twins wouldn't see whatever came up.

After a few minutes of Amity's painful coughs and Emira rubbing her back with concern, Amity finally felt what she could tell were more petals flutter up into her mouth. She shakily spit them out into the tissue, making sure to be as discreet as possible, and slowly straightened up as much as she could with her muscles still recovering from the spasms.