“Are you kidding me?”

Lilith looked up as Luz and Amity walked down from Luz’s closet. The two had been coming together every Saturday morning for about three weeks now to check out some Azura weekly column thing that had started coming out. She was all for it of course because it meant the two curled up in a blanket and talked about their favorite character all day long. Such closeness would have to lead somewhere eventually after all and any passive progression they could manage was perfect.

They weren’t quite so content this morning though as Amity crossed her arms in frustration. “I doubt it. The writer seems to think they can keep this stuff with Honey Cauliflower going forever. I personally give them about two more articles before I have one of my abominations eat every future installment of it.”

Lilith tilted her head to the side before getting up. “Um, what seems to be the problem little ones?”

Luz threw her arms back and inadvertently smacked the wall behind her because of it. Her fury was far too great though for bruised knuckles to stop. “Ugh. Sarafune seems to think he can just have Azura and Honey run circles around the fact that they obviously like each other. I mean, Honey almost confessed last week and Azura is acting like she didn’t say a word.”

Amity shook her head before adding, “It gets worse. Azura went so far as to pledge she’d be by Honey’s side no matter what. That no harm would come to her so long as she lived and that even if it meant facing her greatest fears, she would never abandon her.”

Lilith’s mouth slowly opened up as Eda walked in from the kitchen in her slippers. “I’m sorry, but are we talking about Grom?”

Amity turned slightly red for a second while Luz looked back at Eda and said, “No! I mean, sure, Azura has thrown herself under the claws of a Gothrogian Mawkbeast that sent her into madness for Honey, but that’s nothing like what I did.”

Amity smacked her forehead before saying, “Oh, don’t remind me about that. The two ended up falling on top of each other afterwards. Their faces were barely apart and they were so tired they couldn’t even get up at first. It would have taken them, like, a tenth of a second to kiss but no, that’s too much. They’re just going to get flustered and act like there’s nothing between them.”

Eda’s cup of blood slipped out of her hand as an audible creaking came from Lilith’s neck as she tilted her head. Luz only turned back to Amity though as she said, “And they’ll be going to some sort of spring festival soon. I totally don’t expect them to get stuck on a tunnel of love or anything.” Luz’s voice was thick with sarcasm as she waved the very notion away with her injured hand.

Amity noticed the red on Luz’s knuckles this time though and reached over to grab her hand. “Hey, did you do this when you hit the wall? What have I told you about being careful?”

Luz glanced away as her face became flushed with heat. “Oh, well, I mean, I was just getting excited like you were.”

Amity squeezed Luz’s knuckles as she glared at the idiot. “Yeah, but what if you actually got hurt?”

Luz would have debated that with how much the tight squeeze hurt that she had been, but she couldn’t help but just giggle and shoot back with, “Then I’d just have to hope you brought bandaids with you when you came to help me, wouldn’t I?”

Amity’s face turned bright red before she turned her back to Luz. “D-Don’t act like I’ll always be there…” She then lowered her voice to accidentally add, “Even if I want to.”

Luz tilted her head before cupping her ear and asking, “What?”

Amity leapt at the question before saying, “N-Nothing! Um, weren’t we talking about Azura?”

Luz rolled her eyes as she was reminded of this morning’s aggravation right before Hooty opened the door and squawked out, “We could talk about me!”

Lilith looked over and shouted, “Yes,” while Eda followed up with “Just anything less annoying than watching this.”

Amity and Luz frowned as they looked at the two older witches before the more energetic of the two asked, “What do you think that was about?”

Amity shrugged before sighing. “No, but, um, we do have the rest of our Saturday free now. Do you want to go do something maybe?”

Luz tapped her chin before smacking a fist into her other hand’s palm. “How about the beach? Eda checked for trash slugs yesterday so there shouldn’t be any ruining the view.”

Amity’s pupils became the size of pin heads as she whispered, “You. Me. Swimsuits. Water. Heat. Sand. Slipping. Games.”

“Yeah, exactly! And we can see if Gus and Willow want to join too.”

Amity blinked a few times as Luz walked past. For about a solid minute, she stared into space while the energetic girl rambled everything they could do at the beach. Everything they could have done. Just the two of them. Alone. In swimsuits. The mention of Luz only having enough money for one milkshake was the last straw to cause Amity to finally keel over as her brain turned to mush.

It was about another minute later when Luz ran out of the house. “Eda, Lilith, help! Amity passed out and her face is warm enough that she’s singing the floor!”

The two older witches slowly turned to look at the idiot before Eda said, “Oh no. Not today. She’s your problem.”

Lilith nodded before almost literally spitting venom with, “She’s your friend after all.”

Luz glared at the two of them for a moment, entirely missing the fact that the emphasis had been on ‘friend’ rather than ‘your’. But that would not stop her! She would help Amity with or without their help. She just needed to put Amity on the couch to help her rest, make the famous Noceda Chicken Cure Stock with extra love like mom made it, and then…

And then spend the next half hour reminding herself that you didn’t put in ‘extra love’ for your friends.