Another day, another situation that by now was quite familiar to Boscha. Having Willow sitting across from her, on an awkwardly small table, working on the more detailed parts of a group project.

She stopped counting how many times they'd had to work together. It seems word of their success spread and other professors got the same, unbelievably stupid idea of putting them together with the lamest projects each class could come up with.

Alright, they hadn't been that many, she just didn't care about counting them. She winged them as they came up and once they were over, out of sight out of mind.

It wasn't as bad as some weeks ago, but she still felt that floaty, vacuum-like feeling in her head every so often. Her memories had long since lost solidity, merging one with another, so she stopped trying to make much sense of them after a while. There were things she knew she once knew, but now they escaped her attempts at recalling them, as if the deeper she went the more diluted they became, until she couldn't distinguish them anymore.

Even what she remembered had an air of falsity, like that weird taste ready-made meals have that differentiate them from home-made no matter how good they look. What if what she thought she knew was real wasn't as she remembered? Who was to say she hadn't gotten all that wrong too?

Sometimes she wondered if she was even born. If she had ever lived at all. Sometimes, reality didn't feel real, and if someone told her it was all a dream she would have believed them. She opened up her eyes. When had she closed them?

It felt like she was looking at Willow for the first time. A part of her felt that ages-old familiarity; a feeling of novelty, that childish giddiness that comes with new experiences, engulfed a bigger one. Something this definitely wasn't.

She hadn't ever properly looked at Willow, had she? She always glared and scowled at her, most of the time at the back of her head, or from a distance. Now they were sitting opposite each other and so very close that if Boscha stared for a bit too long, no one would notice. Titan bless extra eyes.

Willow was too occupied with her own part of the activity to notice the lone eye boring into her. It seemed that subconsciously she perceived some of it though, and her ears wiggled a bit as if trying to shake the sensation off.

Boscha noticed alright. She had noticed all those little things before, and she saw some of them right now. Little green doodles decorating her notes, frayed loose threads on the hems of her sleeves, small, hardened spots on her hands, almost imperceptible, borne of her hands-on approach on plant magic...

As Willow concentrated deeper on her part of the work, she hunched over her paper and her glasses started sliding down her nose, nudging them back by scrunching it. Boscha would die before saying it out loud, but the sight was so… cute, it almost made her want to start wearing glasses herself. Then she noticed Willow peeking the tip of her tongue from between her lips, now truly deep in concentration at the more complicated exercises. It was the rosiest pink and seemed so soft but no softer than her lips and-

Boscha licked her own lips as images of taking them in her own and maybe, just maybe running her own tongue through them went through her mind.

Would they be as silky smooth as they looked? What would she taste like? Would she tangle her hands on Boscha's hair or would she grab onto her shoulders? Would she inhale sharply in surprise, or would she let out a shuddering gasp of relief? Lost in the visions, she forgot where she was, of whom she was thinking about.

Oh.

The throwback to reality hit her hard, as all of a sudden she finally, finally recognized that strange feeling she had been mistaking for nerves, or some sort of lung parasite.

Oh.

Wow, she was messed up alright. The first realization came up and ebbed away like nothing, a muted down echo. After a few seconds, she went back on it. Wait. Wait!

Wait a fucking minute!

Just for once, she was thankful for her demonic ancestry. Pink on pink doesn't really stand out. Her face felt like it was on fire though and it made her feel painfully exposed.

Panicking at the storm of feelings that now whirled inside her, Boscha got up from the table much faster than would be appropriate, and at the sound of the chair scraping the floor all eyes fell on her, which naturally did nothing to calm her nerves.

They saw, everyone could see me.

They know.

It made no sense at all, but at that moment she was beyond reason. So just like that, she took off without sparing a thought at the indignant teacher that started yammering about teenagers and in my times-.

Some minutes later, balled up under the bleachers, Boscha tried to keep her breath under control but it was a fruitless effort. Everything in her was going a mile a minute. Her heart rate, her breath, her thoughts. All sorts of things were going through her mind but she couldn't make sense of any of it.

She had grown so used to the nothingness that all these feelings popping up together were too much, and this was new and terrifying and-

Titan, what she wouldn't give to go back to being a spiteful little bitch. Her rage had always been too much, but it was a familiar kind of too much that she had learnt to exploit to her benefit. This was the opposite of that. It overwhelmed her and made her feel useless; she couldn't think of anything else, she couldn't even breathe properly, the air caught in her throat, choking on nothing.

Then she heard people coming closer to where she was. For a hot second she thought they were coming for her, to expose her to the world, but whoever they were seemed to be walking somewhat slowly and their voices appeared engrossed in friendly chatter. Then she recognized them. It was them.

Of course of all places they could go they chose the same place she was hiding in. Now only some wooden planks stood between Boscha and the quartet, and she wasn't in the mood of being kicked out, or doing the kicking-out. So she chose to keep quiet until they left to go on their merry way.

She wasn't really paying attention to whatever they were saying, but some minutes later her name was thrown around and her ears perked up. They better not be talking about-

"And then she just got up and left! I had to finish her part of the work!"

-Dammit!

Oh. Boscha hadn't thought about how her little scene would inconvenience the other girl. Once again, she had been too absorbed in her own feelings to weigh the consequences. A fuming Willow continued ranting about how weird Boscha had been lately and how she was sure she was planning something because nothing good ever came from her.

Boscha took offense to that. Her attitude had been almost exemplary as of lately, compared to what she was before that is, and sure, Willow had every right to be livid seeing as she was stuck with twice the work, but hadn't they been doing better these last few months?

A sharp pang bloomed within her chest at the hate dripping from the other girl's voice. She didn't know what Boscha was going through, it wasn't fair! She didn't mean to leave like that! Willow had to understand that-

A stomp on the bleachers, deafening from Boscha's hiding spot right under them, stopped her racing thoughts. Her chest twisted in anxiety at whatever words would come next.

"What's wrong with her?"

There wasn't worry in Worry's voice, as the words alone would imply. Rather, they were brimming with anger, with frustration. The feeling in her voice was so tangible, so compelling, Boscha felt the words as if they were her own, and asked herself the same question.

What's wrong with me?

Believe it or not, this was one battle Boscha wasn't willing to fight. She was just so tired of fighting through the days, through herself, through everything.

She had genuinely thought she had taken some steps forward with Willow, but it seems that she had hurt her so much the past years that not even these last months of incipient friendliness had had an effect on that.

It was the nicest Boscha had been in like, ever! If at her nicest she wasn't convincing Willow she wasn't a menace, she had no chance in hell to even get her to reciprocate her feelings. Anything nicer would be seen with suspicion, it was a lose-lose situation.

Sure, nothing's impossible and blah blah. But some impossibles are more impossible than others. Many such cases! This being one of them.

Ah, whatever. It hurt, yeah, and seeing as Boscha was just a young teen it was one of the worst things she had ever experienced in her short life, but she knew it would pass. Maybe it would take a long time before she got over these feelings, but she would survive. She would wing it as it came, as she did most things.

No one had ever died from a high school crush, and she doubted she would be the first one to do so.

That didn't mean there wouldn't be any of the longing, pining and yearning that came with the deal. Oh no, she was longing, pining and yearning plenty. Just, you know, in her very own Boscha way that no one had a way of recognizing as such because she had never really fallen for anyone before.

So for the next few weeks, she kept it down to side glances and innocuous creeping. Which was something she already tended to do, only now without any of the maliciousness, so nothing new, save for the new thoughts that went through her mind while on it.

She would make mental notes of all the little things that she would notice about the other girl, imaginary pages full of annotations as if preparing for an exam that would never come. Practical ideas that would never be of use. All sorts of 'what-ifs' paraded through her mind, and for the briefest of moments, if she concentrated on them just enough, they would feel like they were just around the corner, waiting for her to reach out and make them reality.

Ha! Like that was ever gonna happen. It was a lost battle from the beginning.

Boscha had never been one to deny her own feelings. She may have been closed off to other people, but she had never lied to herself in that way. The only person that had never judged Boscha was herself, so when the short-lived crisis died down she simply rolled with the rest. As soon as she calmed down from The Realization, she went through all 5 stages of the cycle of acceptance in like, 2 seconds flat.

Fighting it was pointless, so as long as these feelings lasted she would them be, and bask in the strangely good hurt it brought. It was bittersweet, but she chose to concentrate on the sweet part of it. When the bitter end is assured, as was her case, the best choice one can make is to make the best of the sweeter parts.

So where's the damage in engaging in a little peeping? No one would ever know. She wasn't hurting Willow, or anyone else, save Boscha's own image maybe. Or her heart.

Nothing that wasn't already in shambles before.

Weeks turn into months, and it was only after that time that Boscha realized the longer she indulged in Willow's existence, the stronger the feelings would grow and root themselves in her heart.

She fucked up. No one had ever told her that acceptance could be that counterproductive! Wasn't it supposed to help her move on quicker? The fuck?

Now the other girl was so ever-present in her mind she might as well start charging her rent. Boscha had taken what she thought was the most straightforward route out of her situation, and instead it snowballed right into an even deeper end.

And that wasn't the worst part, the worst was that she had become a huge fucking sap while at it. We're talking giving-Amity-a-run-for-her-money levels. Yes, that bad.

She could even recognize her by the sound of her step. For a moment, Boscha wondered if it was the same the other way around, if the sound of her steps generated as much dread in Willow as Willow's own called her out of her mind, like music.

The fields green with life, the dark woods behind her mansion, they meant nothing to Boscha, they were of no use to her. But Willow's eyes were the color of those hills, and her hair was inky black deepness just like those wild woods, and the sight of them, that used to mean nothing, now brought Boscha the thought of the girl.

Sometimes it felt nice, like sinking her face in an incredibly soft pillow after a long day, sometimes it was bitter, acrid medicine that made her feel healed but made her question whether the after effects were worth it.

Once again Boscha fell into a routine, new familiarity bringing her comfort in the wilderness that was teenage life. At school none was the wiser about what changed inside her, and she would rather it stayed that way. Things had been strange lately, so she didn't want to stick out any more than she already did.

If someone ever caught her gazing at the imposing Hexside greenhouse, longing in her eyes, they never mentioned it.

After a few weeks of moping around waiting for the feelings to wash away, the pins in her chest didn't give any sign of waning. If anything, they became more erratic, making her almost dread having to go to school.

For a couple weeks now her chest started feeling somewhat tight, and a tickle had settled deep within her throat. It felt like when one's just about to get some lung infection, and she braced herself for it, but it never came to be.

It didn't get any better either, somehow.

Sometimes her chest would make a low rattling sound when she breathed. It was nothing at all like a purr. It wasn't soft and comforting, but dry, hollow, like she had something stuck in there that wouldn't unstick no matter how much she tried to hack it up. It felt wrong.

She noticed it would sometimes become a bit worse when she passed by the greenhouse. That made her think it must have been some sort of allergy to whatever they kept in there, and that must have been the reason it simply wouldn't go away. If it were something that could stay up in the air, like pollen, then there wouldn't be a single space safe from it at school.

Ugghhh, since when did she get allergies? That was something nerds and literal mouth breathers got. She was way above such weaknesses, thought Boscha as she rolled her eyes almost by instinct. At that moment the tickling became almost unbearable, and she broke out in a dry cough.

The feeling of having something stuck became stronger, but the thing also felt looser, so she forced herself to hack harder in a try to get whatever was in there unstuck. Taking a deep breath, she prepared herself, and coughed her little witch guts out.

With that last cough she felt something dislodge from her throat and splat on her hand. Disgusting. When she moved it away from her mouth to look at whatever it was she had just given lungal birth to, her blood froze.

A single, pink petal. Tinier than her pinky nail.

She knew what it meant. Any witch with a brain knew what it meant.

Whelp. Turns out she would die from a high school crush after all.

"Fuck."

Boscha felt something stuck on her lip, and picked it off. Oh, there was the rest of the flower.

Once again, all 5 steps, 2 seconds flat-

"Fuck!"

Alright, maybe it would take a little bit longer this time.