Salvatore Boarding School Hallways

Hope's Diary Entry

Landon and I kissed last night and I couldn't be happier. Why didn't people kiss all the time? And why the hell did we wait for so long? Oh, right. I spent most of my time looking for reasons to send him away, but now that he was not here, I wanted him to come back so that I could kiss him like there was no tomorrow. All I could do was think about him now, his soft moist lips, his...

"That smile looks good on you," Emma commented from a table at a corner, a cup in hand, gaining my attention, and I couldn't help but smile even wider.

I was tired of just thinking about Landon, I wanted to talk about him and how he made me feel and how his voice - oh, his voice. I could listen to him speak all day and all night.

"May I sit with you?" I asked, just barely holding my excitement because she was the perfect person to share my happiness with.

"Of course," Emma replied, her curiosity as clear as the sun.

"Have you ever liked a boy?" I asked upon sitting down, but I didn't wait for her answer.

I needed to vocalize everything I was feeling and I couldn't hold it in anymore, so with the question, the flood gates of my happiness opened and words started coming out of my mouth faster than the speed of thought, and I relished sharing all the things I liked about Landon, from the texture of his hair to his hairste and from the color of his big beautiful eyes to the sound of his voice.

I already asked Vincent to call me when Landon arrived so that I could hear his low, smart sounding and strangely soothing voice just one last time. If it wasn't for Emma's phone rudely interrupting, I would have gone on and on and on and never got tired.

"As much as I've enjoyed the light one sided conversation," she said with a smile. "It's time for me to get to work, but since it looks like if you stop talking about Landon you'll burst out, go find a friend and talk their ears off. It's what friends are for, after all."

She patted my shoulder before picking up her cup and answering her phone, leaving me wondering who... Before I could complete the thought, I saw the one person that had to be missing Landon as much as I did coming my way with an open book in his face, and my body moved towards him on its own accord just as he walked past me and I reached for his shoulder.

"Ra-ouch!" I tried to gain his attention only to find myself pushed against a wall with a forearm on my throat, choking me, and yellow werewolf eyes glaring at me.

"Don't sneak up on me!" Rafael literally growled in my face menacingly, and for a moment, I truly feared him.

I could feel anger rolling off him in frightening waves.

"Or what?!" I heard Josie's voice ask before Rafael clutched his head in pain and fell to a knee with a pained groan.

In a second, it seemed as if werewolves appeared out of nowhere and they all moved to their kneeling Alpha's side and faced off with Josie, who held one hand out in Rafael's direction with a gesture that informed everyone that she was the cause of his pain and the other on a wall, siphoning, and Lizzie, their signature yellow eyes on full display, glaring at the twins.

Shockingly, although on shaky legs, Rafael rose to his feet without Josie releasing the pain inflicting spell, and when he raised his head, his jaw was clenched muscle bulge tight and facial blood vessels were more pronounced, face wrinkled to show strain and yellow eyes glared at Josie.

"Josie, stop!" Lizzie instructed, and reached for Josie's outstretched hand.

When my attention returned to Rafael, he was breathing heavily, but all the tension had left his body, although he was shaking and his yellow werewolf eyes were still glaring at Josie. I noticed a new development in the form of a nosebleed that reached Rafael's upper lip, and I wondered how powerful the spell Josie used was and how much of the nosebleed was caused by Rafael's strained defiance against the spell.

"I'll let this go because it's your birthday," Rafael said after a moment of total silence, breathing audibly hard. "But don't ever do that again. Both of you."

He added the last part with his eyes on me, although they were now brown.

Before I could say anything, sudden movement caught my eye and brought my attention to the side. It was Jed, and he moved to pick up a book two feet from his new Alpha's eleven o'clock, the book Rafael must have been reading.

"Don't, Jed," Rafael stopped him. "I'm your Alpha and you're my Beta, not my maid."

He then closed the two feet, bent and picked up the book himself. When he stood up, however, he stumbled and Jed caught him.

"Thanks," Rafael voiced his gratitude, embarrassed.

"Come on, Alpha," Jed said, placing Rafael's arm over his shoulder to balance him. "Let's go clean the blood off."

The other werewolves hurried to join them as they walked away, crowding around their new Alpha and shooting everyone warning looks and the other students made way for them to leave.

"Thanks," I voice gratitude of my own Josie's way, walking towards her and her sister.

"Yeah, thanks, Josie," Alyssa Chang followed my lead. "And you, Hope, for setting the stage for the new kid to solidify his place as the new Alpha and unite all the werewolves under him. Well done! You should be proud of yourselves."

"Back off, witch," Penelope entered the scene, addressing Alyssa. "And walk away."

"Oh, I will walk away, seeing as the better person walked away," Alyssa replied without missing a step. "But you can defend her all you want, Josie is never going to take you back."

With her shot fired, she turned around and walked away with her clique following behind her.

"Just so you know," Lizzie began, looking at Penelope. "She's not wrong."

"And I didn't do it for you, Hope," Josie added. "Not everything is about you."

Ouch. That actually hurt, but the birthday girls didn't get the chance to see because they were already walking away, like 'the better person', the crowd that had formed too.

"What the hell just happened?" I asked no one in particular, because a moment ago, I was happy and then suddenly found myself pushed against a wall, and the next thing I knew I was standing in the middle of a hallway trying to figure out what just happened and why Josie came to my rescue, even though I didn't really need her to, and hurt Rafael like she did.

"Don't know," Penelope said, probably wondering the same thing. "But see ya."

And I was left all alone, feeling alone. It was strange. Before, I didn't truly notice the loneliness being alone brought, but now, I realize just how lonely I was. I really missed Landon and wished I could hear his voice, but there was one other voice that could brighten my mood. I just had to find a phone and call its owner, my aunt Rebekah.

LDLDLDLD

Josie and Lizzie's POV

Lizzie's Diary Entry

"Why did you stop me from hurting him as much as he hurt us?" Josie questioned, pacing around the room while I sat on my bed, watching her. "He used you to hurt me, Lizzie!"

"You don't want to listen to me, Josie," I replied, because she didn't listen when I tried to explain. "You want to believe that Rafael took advantage of me and that he used me to get back at you for voting to send Landon away, but I'm no one's victim. Yes, I was vulnerable last night, but so was Raf, and he came to the gym to de-stress, like I did, and it just happened!

"There was no planning, no preparation. Just two vulnerable people finding comfort in each other so they could forget their problems for a few blissful moments so that they could feel less lonely. It wasn't about you, Jo. It was about us."

"So, there's an 'us' between you two?" Asked Josie, halting her pacing to look at me with crossed arms.

Beyond the anger and a hint of betrayal, I saw something in her eyes with the question: jealousy. I realized that she still liked Rafael despite everything, and this explained why she was extra furious. I could relate.

Even after Raf revealed that him and Josie kissed, I couldn't help but kiss him before I went to get the Moonlight Ring. I also wanted to kiss him goodnight when we parted for the night, but dad's arrival stopped me before I could make my move.

"I should have known when you stopped me," Josie took the delay of my answer as confirmation.

"There's no 'us' between me and Raf, Josie," this time, I didn't let my thoughts delay my response. "He's too damaged to think about having a relationship. Raf is still mourning his girlfriend's death, and he blames himself for it. You should have seen him on the edge of a breakdown while talking about how he was a killer and how he killed the love of his life and doesn't deserve a home.

"He was going to leave the school with Landon after our birthday party, and he might still leave to go look for Landon and never return. He doesn't have a reason to stay and I'm actually surprised that he's still here."

A myriad of emotions crossed Josie's face faster than I could identify one before she moved to sit down with her back against her bed, hugging her legs with her chin resting between her knees.

"I really hurt him," she said remorsefully.

I moved to sit beside her and hugged her and she leaned onto me.

I couldn't lie and say that she didn't hurt Rafael, there was blood and we all saw it. But I wasn't going to tell her that the damage she dealt could have been much worse if Rafael didn't have the Moonlight Ring on. Vengeful witches weren't known to go for minimum damage and Josie was more than vengeful, she was also using anger to compensate for her resilient feeling for Rafael and that made her even more lethal.

"He'll be alright," was my reply, instead.

I sure hoped that he would be alright and that his faltering was only because of a minor concussion and not something worse.

"I don't want him to leave," Josie whispered.

She wasn't the only one.