Feelings - A Hosie Story

Chapter 12 - "it's not your fault"

Three days. Three days since her disappearance. Three days of the entire school searching, performing spells, doing everything they can. Yet nobody has succeeded in find Josie. She's still missing and with each second that passes Hope's heart sinks even further and breaks even more. All Hope wants is to see her, but she can't.

Most of this time has been spent in the library or phone calls with family, in search of clues or even spells to locate Josie. Dozens of books and grimoires have have been read, none of which hold any sorts of answers. They are in exactly the same spot as they were at the start. The same questions play on their mind, and the same heartbreak follows.

Where is Josie?

Has somebody taken her?

And lastly, why?

Why, out of all the people in the school, in the town, why is Josie the one that's gone missing?

Alaric is hardly taking it well. He's fallen back into his drinking habits. He thinks nobody notices, but they do. Hope sees it, she smells it whenever she walks into his office. The mess on his desk says it all. And, they all try and help him, but he won't listen. Too swalled by his own grief to let others help. If he's not drinking his bourbon, then he's finding some other way to shut the world out. The man has already lost so much, so so many people, that this, losing Josie, never getting answers for her appearance, could completely break him. That's what everyone is terrified of.

And he's not the only one deeply feeling Josie's absence of course. Hope does too. She feels it when she's walking down the halls, or when she's getting food and sees the vegetarian options that remind her of Josje. She feels it when she lays in bed thinking of her. She feels it when she can only hear Lizzie's whispers from across the hall and not Josie's too.

It's hard, and she's trying to stay strong for everybody else, as they are for her, but it's not working. Josie has been such an integral part of everyone's life, she's been there from the start to the point that being without her has everyone feeling...lost.

Each time Hope catches her mind thinking of the worst, she tries to pull herself back. Yet it's hard when her life has been what it is.

Instead, Hope tells herself that they will find Josie.

One way or another, they are going to bring her home.

She lays on her bed, thinking of it all. Thinking of Josie and how her heart aches for the girl. Hope's arms want nothing more than to wrap around Josie's waist, to hold her close. She years for her touch. And she keeps hoping that Josie will barge into her room and be totally fine. She keeps hoping that Josie will walk into the school as if nothing had happened...

Except that's just it, something has happened and nobody knows what.

After staring at her bedroom ceiling for hours on end, she hears the door creak open. In walks Lizzie, who moves to sit near Hope on the bed. The blonde wears a frown, the one that has been permanently plastered on everybody's face since the second they realized something happened to Josie.

"Thinking?" She asks and Hope nods.

"About Josie...I just can't help but feel like it's my fault that she's missing." Hope admits. After all, she's been feeling an overwhelming sense of guilt.

"You can't blame yourself, Hope. None of us knew this was going to happen."

"But if I had just not stopped to talk to Landon...if I had just walked past him and gone straight to Josie, she'd be here right now." Her eyes tear up and she can't stop them.

"It's not your fault that thrift store hobbit showed up when he did. You were kind enough to even talk to him after he left like that." Lizzie explains. She rubs Hope's arm. It helps, though not nearly as much as when Josie does it. "What did you talk about with him anyway?" Anyone would know this is a form of distraction, a way to pull them away from the thoughts of Josie. It's been a method everybody has used recently when they haven't felt like talking about it.