I walk over to her carefully.

"How are the herbs coming?"

She doesn't respond and actually she acts like I am not even there.

Uh ouch.

"Okay so Hope actually killed me, I blocked it out from trauma and now I am a ghost, or you're giving me the silent treatment for some unknown reason."

I receive Josie's side eye.

"You know maybe we could work this out if you would tell me what's bothering you."

An eye roll this time.

"So are you going to choose to keep mysteriously ignoring me or are you going to talk to me before you go to face Hope alone?"

"How could you say that to her?"

There it is.

"Josie, I needed to try to get an emotion out of her, if that meant I had to say something no one else would, I did."

She scoffs and goes quiet again. I stop her from doing what she's doing and pull her up from her squatting position. Hopefully now that she's looking at me she can see how sincere I am when I say this.

"Listen to me, Josie please."

She finally lifts her eyes to mine, and I continue while maintaining eye contact.

"I don't ever want to hurt Hope, trust me when I say I would have much rather have gone the safe and cuddly way everyone else did if I thought that would work. It's the same great length you're about to make just in a different way. But I was breaking through and I realize I might have taken it too far, but I was getting somewhere. The anger was written all over her face."

"Yeah and what if she actually killed you huh, what would have happened then."

"But she couldn't, and I wouldn't say I am in the clear but I am aware of that. I put my life on the line in an effort to save the person who has saved this whole school more times than I can count, in the same way that you're risking your life for the same reason."

She takes a deep breath knowing I was making a good point.

"You didn't have to be cruel about it."

"You're right I was cruel, but that's what got the biggest reaction, and I am not going to apologize for that."

"Not the right one, Cypress. She's going to hunt you down, you know that right."

"It was an emotion, one is better than none, simple math."

I try to crack a joke to evaluate the emotions of the witch in front of me. I am met with a glare showing me that my joke was not as funny as I thought it was.

"Do you have a death wish or something, do you not value your life Cypress?"

Okay serious responses only.

"Not as much as I value yours, which is why I came here, I need a favor."

"It better be a protection spell with how reckless you're being right now."

"No, you think that I am Pen's best friend and don't have a constant form of protect, come on. But I cant do that for you because I am not a witch so I need you to drink this as a backup plan." I say handing her the vial of Hope's blood.

"Please." I am prepared to beg.

"Yeah, no. Hope wont hurt me."

"And I want to believe you, I do, but I just provoked her and I wish I knew what she would do next."

"No."

Okay I really didn't want it to come to this but I will do it if I have to.

I slowly sink to my knees in front of her, keeping eye contact with her the whole way down till I am kneeling in front of her.

"Cypress, what are you doing?" She asks, sounding a little unamused.

"I'm begging."

"Why?"

"Because I want Lizzie to come out of that therapy box to a sister, and selfishly, I want you to meet my parents like you said you wanted to last night. I want you to experience all the things you want in your life, and that's not going to happen if Hope doesn't act like we expect her to. But if you really don't want to take it and you have fully accepted the fact that you could die today, I will back off."

"One condition."

I nod knowing that whatever she asks I will do, if it means there's a guarantee on her life.

She extends her hand out for me to grab. I grab it and she pulls me back up to my feet.

"You have to take half of this vial with me, you're not in the clear and probably have higher chances than me of dying tonight, I can't have you dying on me yet."

"You, Josie Saltzman, make a compelling point. Deal."

Now when I said that I believed in Josie, I meant it.

I trust her and I wont ruin any plans that she has been forming the whole day, but I am still worried, so I get away from the school so I don't stupidly intervene. 

I am down in town walking around the square, pacing is actually more of an accurate description.

It's getting dark now and I am thinking I should start walking back to the school when I see a gray car pass my peripheral vision. It parks in the parking lot and I hear the door open, and a whoosh of air.

I can smell her before I see her. 

Fuck.

"You know, I was rooting for you Cy, badass redheads are a personal favorite trope." She says as she flips a piece of her hair behind her shoulder.

"Let me guess the next line, something about my story coming to an end?"

"Whitty till the end huh?"

"What, did you kill Josie, like you're about to kill me?"

"Nope, I wouldn't hurt Jo, you on the other hand I don't have the same regards for."

"Then do it."

"As you wish."

That's the last thing I hear before a snap of the bones in my neck.

The world around me goes black.