Chapter Text
How had it all come to this?
That was the distant question in the back of Amity’s mind as she laid flat on her back atop the ugly, muddy green, and stain-spotted rug that covered the Owl House’s living room floor.
The rug's questionable state of cleanliness however was just as distant a thought in her head as the first while she stared up at a pair of wide, bright, brown eyes that were looking back down at her, appearing just as surprised as Amity felt. Though she was much too preoccupied to notice that, nor the dull pain in the back of her head where she had smacked against the floor on impact.
No, no, she was much too busy gearing up to pass out to worry about something as trivial as a minor concussion!
Her face was as red and glowing hot as molten oakstone as she stared up at Luz, hovering over her on her knees, both hands planted on either side of the witchling’s head and staring down at her. Her face was twisted up with worry while bedlam erupted all around them, but even that, she was deaf to in the moment.
"Spit them out, you half-witted cur!" Lilith shouted, making another grab for Hooty as he twisted and stretched around the living room, screeching. Brightly colored slips of paper sticking out of his beak as he stretched out of reach of all the hands making grabs for him.
“Ugh, Hooty!” Eda growled, swinging her staff at the house demon, who dipped out of the way, squealing. "Just grab him!"
"Get me down!" Gus screeched, hanging upside down from a section of the demon's body stretched over the couch.
"Hold on, Gus!" Willow yelled, chasing after the boy.
"Forget him, help me!" King squealed, claws clutched into the back of Gus's shirt and kicking his feet wildly.
"Hooty!” Eda snarled as he whipped by again, narrowly avoiding another smack of her staff and twisting around a lamp.
Luz shielded her from the slobbery little green and red plastic pieces that rained down on them as the infernal, bird-tube whizzed overhead making that skin-crawling choking noise as he tried to swallow another mouthful of game pieces.
That's right.
It was…
"Game night?" Amity cocked her head, looking at Gus and Willow as they stood on the front steps of Hexside that afternoon after classes. She had just been about to make her way home for a relaxing weekend when the two had flagged her down at the bottom of the steps.
“Yeah, human games!” Gus bounced on his toes excitedly, flicking at his own ears if for no other reason than to have something to do with his hands to help dissipate his excited energy. Willow rolled her eyes fondly at the younger witch before turning her attention back to Amity and nodding.
“Luz found a box filled with human games and we're going over tonight to play and have snacks. Just a fun game night… also, I think she needs a distraction.” Willow frowned and some of Gus' excited energy leaked out of him and he frowned, stopping his bouncing.
“A distraction?” Amity’s brows wrinkled between her eyes. What did Luz need to be distracted from? They were about to have two weeks off from classes before the beginning of the Autumn semester…
Oh.
Today was the last day of summer. Luz was supposed to go home today. Something that wouldn’t be happening now, not with the portal destroyed.
“Oh… right.” Amity frowned, clutching her textbooks closer to her chest. She couldn’t begin to imagine how Luz must be feeling right now. Trapped in the demon realm with no way to return home and not knowing even if she ever would ever be able to again.
“We figured we could all go over, play some games and cheer her up. What do you say?” Willow asked her and Amity chewed her bottom lip thoughtfully.
She wanted to go, of course, to make sure Luz was okay and help her, but at the same time, she wasn’t exactly having an easy time… functioning, around the human. It was embarrassing and infuriating all at the same time. She could know exactly what she wanted to do or say but the minute Luz turned those bright, shining eyes on her, or smiled in that way that made her stomach drop into her feet and her heart pick up tempo, it was like all thought vanished from her head.
She still cringed internally at the memory of: 'cute uniforms? Sweating?'
Then, of course, panicking and running off.
Her mind and her heart were at war. Her brain told her to save face and not go, lest she embarrass herself, not just in front of Luz, but their friends, not to mention Lilith and the Owl Lady.
Her heart said go, that Luz must be hurting and could use her friends to cheer her up.
Even though the word 'friend' stung her, just a little.
"I… I don't know," she finally mumbled, fingers digging into the cover of her book.
"You said she'd jump at the chance to go!" Gus turned to Willow.
Amity froze at that. There was no way Willow knew, it just wasn't possible!
She glanced up at the plant witch, who was looking at Gus, but she caught Amity's look from the corner of her eye and the edges of her mouth tugged upward in a smug, nearly imperceptible smile. Gus missed it, no doubt. Amity did not.
Her cheeks flared and her shoulders bunched up around her ears, fingernails digging crescent shaded divots in the hard leather covers of her books.
She knew. Willow definitely knew!
"She didn't even invite me!" she managed to bark out, though she didn't look at either of them and clutched her books tighter to her chest.
"Well, technically she didn't invite any of us…," Willow hedged. "We got out of class before her and Eda was waiting to pick her up and invited us over to play, to take her mind off it.”
Amity had been over to the owl house enough times to know, that sounded like something the wild witch would do for her apprentice. She liked to play at aloofness, something Amity would recognize anywhere, but she obviously cared about Luz.
She could relate. So, shouldn’t she help, if she were able, to ease some of Luz’s pain?
“Alright…” She jerked her head in a sharp nod and the other two witchlings perked up, grinning.
“To the Owl house!” Gus cheered, turning and taking off down the path that led away from the school, leaving both girls to hurry along after him.
~ ~
Amity tapped quickly on her scroll as they walked, typing out a message to her sister about what day it was and the general situation. She got an affirmative that Emira would cover for her with their parents, though, whether or not she said anything to Edric was still up in the air.
She really, really hated having to ask Emira for a favor, knowing it would come with stipulations later on, but she needed someone to cover for her. She was supposed to go straight home after school, instead, she was making her way towards the owl house and she needed someone to explain her absence. Her siblings could be a lot, but they did come through when she really needed them.
A twirl of her finger spelled the device away as they approached the mishmashed shack of a house that Luz called home.
"Hoot, hoot, who goes there!?" Hooty's shrill voice was like nails on a chalkboard to the youngest Blight as they stopped outside the closed door
"We're here to see Luz," Willow grimaced as the house demon slithered out of the door to hover over them, beady eyes unblinking.
"Hmmm, I dunno!”
Amity growled, irritation rising rapidly for every second she had to look at him.
“Just let us in you stupid-!” She took a menacing step forward, fist raised, and Hooty shot back into the door.
“Alright, alright, Yeesh!” The door flung itself inward letting them in.
"Ah, you're here. Edalyn said you might be coming," Lilith greeted them from her place on the couch, teacup in hand.
Gus and Willow greeted the former coven leader cautiously, the memory of their fight with her in the emperor's castle still fresh in their minds. Amity pursed her lips, biting back any scathing words that threatened to slip out at the sight of her.
She already had some bad blood with the elder Clawthorne sister after Lilith had used her to cheat during her and Luz’s duel at the covention that had turned into the two sisters trying to one-up each other - using their apprentices as weapons. Add on everything that she had been told had transpired at the Emperor’s castle and the Conformitorium? Well, even the sight of the elder Clawthrone left a bad taste in her mouth. If Lilith noticed the sour look Amity was giving her, she made no motion to show it, nor did she say anything as she stood from the couch and retreated to the kitchen.
A moment later, the Owl Lady herself stuck her head out the doorway and grinned when her eyes fell on the three of them.
“The nerd brigade’s here, perfect!” She clapped her hands together. “Luz has been begging us to play these games with her lately and I figured today…” she stopped and glanced over at the stairs. “Well, she’d have more fun with you dorks, than with me and this nerd.” She jerked a thumb at Lilith, who scoffed at her. “Maybe… distract her today?” she asked them, cocky grin fading into something a little more subdued. Lilith too was frowning and not looking at anyone in particular.
The three witchlings nodded and Eda smiled at them before turning toward the stairs.
“Hey, Kid, get down here!” she hollered, making everyone else flinch at the sudden yell. The sound of the thumping of feet on the floor above them alerted them to the human’s approach long before they could see her.
“What is it Ed-” her voice trailed off as she thundered down the stairs, pausing when she saw her friends standing in the living room. “What are you guys doing here?” she asked, looking between them and Eda, who broke out into a wide grin as she hurried down the stairs to stand in front of them.
“You’ve been harping on at us to play those board games with you for a solid week now, but I figured, rather than playing with an old lady and me…,” she started, causing Lilith to scowl at her. “It would be more fun for you to invite the geek group to play.” She waved a hand at the other three teens.
“You guys came all this way to play games with us?” Luz cocked her head as she looked between the three of them.
“Absolutely,” Willow smiled at her, and Gus was once again bouncing on his toes as she turned to him.
“Why wouldn’t I want to play human games?!” He asked like he couldn't even believe that was a valid question. Luz chuckled at the illusion track student before her eyes fell on Amity, who froze solid under her warm and curious gaze.
The silence in the room was near deafening as they stood there looking at each other, Luz waiting for some kind of response and Amity seized with a case of sudden nerves, face shifting from pale to pink and pinker by the second.
Luz frowned as she watched.
“You okay, Amity?” Her question seemed to jerk the mint haired witch from her suspended state.
“Games!” she yelped, making everyone jerk in surprise. “I mean, yes. I’m fine, I came to play the games…,” she managed to spit out at last.
Somewhere behind her, she swore she heard Eda snort, but she ignored it, even as the tips of her ears burned red.
“That’s great, I’ll go get the box!” Luz’s smile was blinding as she turned and ran back up the stairs, feet pounding on the wood.
Eda watched her go with a smile.
“She certainly seems more cheery than she was this morning,” Lilith mused, standing at her sister’s side. Eda hummed in agreement before turning her attention back to the three younger witches.
“Well, throw down your junk and get comfortable. She should be back any minute and I’m gonna see what kind of snacks we got.” With that, she turned and walked back into the kitchen, Lilith trailing along behind her.
“Snacks?” King perked up from his place on the couch. “I demand snacks too!” He scuttled off the coach and followed after them.
The thumping upstairs continued in cacophonous booms before the noise finally died down, only for Luz to reappear on the stairs a moment later with a large, stained cardboard box held in both arms.
“I’m so glad you guys are here! I found these in one of the spare rooms last week and most of them still have all their pieces!” She said excitedly as she dropped the box onto the floor.
“Oh!” Gus wasted no time digging into the box, which rattled and shook as he dug around. “What’s this?” He held up a box with brightly colored little people on it.
“Candyland, that's a game for little kids though,” she explained and the boy’s ears dropped. “We can still play it sometime,” she assured him and set it on the floor, bending over to rummage through it herself. She leaned further and further over till she tumbled in with a squeal and a thump, landing on Gus who had also been buried up to his waist within.
“Luz!”
“Sorry!”
Willow and Amity shared a look as the two’s legs stuck out of the top of the box, kicking and wiggling, cardboard straining beneath their weight. Amity and Willow both rolled their eyes before Willow grabbed Gus’s legs and hauled him out while Amity wrapped her arms around the squirming human’s waist to yank her from her cardboard prison.
She sprang free, sending them both sprawling backward onto the carpet in a tangled heap of limbs. Amity grunted as Luz fell on top of her, knocking the wind out of her.
“Sorry, Amity!” She quickly scrambled off the witch, box clenched triumphantly in hand as she climbed to her feet.
“It’s fine…,” she grumbled, rubbing a hand over her stomach.
‘Let me help you.”
She looked up at Luz, who held out a hand. She only hesitated a moment before slipping hers into it, allowing Luz to pull her back to her feet.
“Whatcha got, Luz?” Gus asked as she held a box under her arm. The human grinned brightly and held it up for them to see.
“Monopoly!”
“What’s…'monopoly’?” Amity cocked a brow, testing the new word in her mouth.
“I am so glad you asked!” Luz grinned at her, holding the box up and giving it a shake. Whatever was inside jangled and rustled. The absolute look of glee on Luz’s face made her heart stutter in her chest and her ears twitch ever so slightly.
Luz paused, eyes drawn to the witch’s ears. Had they just… wiggled?
She opened her mouth to ask when Eda and King reappeared, with Lilith in tow and a tray of snacks in hand.
“So, what are you dorks playing?” she asked, sitting the tray on the table and King on the floor, where he sat, happily eating from his own bag of food.
“Monopoly! If that’s okay with you guys?” She turned to her friends. “It takes at least three people to play properly and back home it was only me and…,” she paused for a second and her unspoken words hung awkwardly in the air.
“Monopoly, yes!” Amity managed to spit out before anyone else and Luz’s eyes zeroed in on her. “Teach us how to play.” She nodded resolutely, even as her cheeks took on a slight rosy hue. Willow bit back a laugh in the form of a cough behind her hand and nodded.
“Sounds good to me.” She smiled and Gus nodded rapidly.
“Monopoly!” he shouted in agreement and Luz beamed at them.
“Great, so it’s pretty easy. You each get some money and you’re trying to take everyone else’s. The person with all the money at the end of the game wins,” she said, explaining the basics simply.
“Money, you say?” Eda hummed, leaning over her apprentice, a certain gleam in her dual-colored eyes.
~ ~
“Okay, we’re all set up and everyone knows the rules?” Luz asked, looking around at her friends, as well as Eda and Lilith. The latter looked quite indifferent from her place across from Luz on the coach and the former eyed the board hungrily from her place next to Luz.
“I’m ready!” Gus smiled at her, King having taken up a new place on the illusion track student’s shoulders and Willow nodded in agreement.
Amity hummed as she read over the rule pamphlet, determined to learn the ins and outs of this game before it even started. Most of it was understandable enough, though there were some terms she didn’t exactly understand. What was an electric company?
The front door swung inwards and Hooty saw them gathered around the coffee table and stretched his head inside to hover over them.
“Hoot, can I play!?” He asked, body undulating with excitement.
“Sorry, Hooty. We have all the players we need, maybe next time.” Luz cringed as the house demon turned to her, but only for a moment as she dumped the bag of pieces onto the board in a clatter of metal and plastic.
“Oooh… shiny…” He hovered closer to the board, mouth watering, only for Eda to smack him with the back of her hand, sending him coiling back with a hiss.
“Get out of here, Hooty!” the Owl Lady warned with a frown.
“Sheesh, fine!” He huffed, sulking back into the door, though it remained open as he watched them from across the room.
Amity glanced over the top of the paper to glare at the infernal house demon that was watching them with beady eyes.
“Amity?”
“Huh?” She jerked, turning towards the call of her name. Luz was looking at her curiously. “S-sorry, what?” she asked, but Luz only smiled, because that was Luz. At the other end of the table, Willow was giving her a knowing look that made her face flush. Gus sat at her side as oblivious to what was happening as Luz herself.
“I asked if you were ready to start?” She asked again and Amity nodded, ignoring Willow’s look. “Okay, you first.” she handed the dice over to her, fingers grazing her palm as she did and sending a shiver up the witch’s spine.
Thirty minutes.
That was how long it took for everything to go wrong.
Honestly, Amity thought it would have taken far less time than that, but it seemed to be a good day for the residents of the owl house.
The game was fairly simple and, to the surprise of no one, Eda picked it up very quickly. She went after everyone but seemed to have a special place for Lilith in her pillaging heart.
The two sisters were glaring at each other over the board as Eda shook the dice.
“I’m going to make you beg me for it.” The Owl Lady smirked and Lilith scowled back. She needed a five or higher to skip over the whole row of Lilith’s hotel covered properties. This would allow her to buy the final unmanned property on the board; the one Lilith needed to complete her last property set.
“I’d rather choke,” she sneered, eyes narrowing in defiance.
The four teens sitting around the table glanced between them and each other nervously, waiting for the roll of the dice. Things had started fairly peacefully too. That was until the sisters had gotten into an argument over the tax on a property, setting a chain of events in motion that no one was yet sure where they led. Like Lilith buying enough hotels to cover every square inch of her property on one-fourth of the board with the sole intention of trapping Eda in it. Instead, the witch had managed to ensnare Gus and Willow, bleeding them dry and ejecting them from the game in one shebang. They retired to the couch to watch the impending disaster.
Luz glanced down at the one property card she had left after having to mortgage the rest due to falling on a row of Eda’s properties. She was not very good at this game, but she had at least been having fun; she glanced at Amity from the corner of her eye.
The mint-haired witch had really seemed to be getting into it too, with that giddy little smile pulling at her lips when she landed on an unclaimed space to make her own and her own natural competitiveness shining through, though not nearly on the same level as the Clawthorne sisters. It made Luz grin too. She wasn’t fairing all that much better than Luz at the moment; waiting to see who was going to win the Clawthorne showdown.
Luz could tell though, no matter which sister came out on top in the next few moments, things were going to get ugly. Now she understood all those memes about monopoly being a friendship ender. Though, if the sisters could get over the curse thing, then surely monopoly wouldn’t put an end to their relationship.
She glanced between them as they glared and scowled at each other and frowned to herself. She was not as sure of that as she had been at the start of the game. Especially not as feathers began to sprout across the two’s arms.
No one noticed Hooty hovering nearby, watching the glinting plastic and metal game pieces with rapt attention.
It had not taken long to realize that while sharing the curse made it so Eda no longer turned full-on ‘owl beast’ when the two of them got worked up, symptoms started to crop up Like now.
Feathers were sprouting along their arms as they glared at each other and finally Eda released the dice.
They might as well have rolled across the table in slow motion for how long it felt like it took before they slowly spun to a stop atop the board.
A six and a five.
"Ha!” Eda jumped up, arms thrust overhead. “How d’ya like that, sister?” she laughed obnoxiously as Lilith scowled at her, feathers ruffling before she looked back down at the board, eyes widening before a smirk pulled at her lips.
“Try counting that again, sister.” Lilith smirked up at her, cutting Eda’s celebration short. She frowned and leaned over the board, counting the spaces.
“Nine, ten, elev…” she stopped, finger hovering over the dreaded blue corner space.
“Go to jail, Edalyn.” Lilith’s smirk was downright wicked at this point.
Eda scoffed, planting a hand on her hip.
“Nice try, Lily, but I have this!” She reached into her hair and pulled out a little orange Chance card.
“Get out of jail free!” she declared, wiping the smug look off her sister’s face.
Luz frowned, eyebrows scrunching between her eyes as she glanced down at Amity’s pile of cards and money. An orange ‘get out of jail free’ card, was sitting in plain view of the table.
“But Amity has the only get out of jail free Chance card…” Luz reached over and held it up, drawing everyone's eyes to her.
A heart beat later.
“You cheated!” Lilith snarled, swiftly rising to her feet to point an accusatory finger at Eda, her feathers fluffing in irritation.
“You can’t prove anything.” She scowled and Lilith sneered, lunging over the table and digging her hands into Eda’s mane of hair; the witchlings jumped to their feet and out of the line of fire. As the two snarled and struggled, hotels and game money fluttered out of gray locks onto the floor.
“I knew it!” The elder Clawthorne growled as they pulled at each other's hair.
“Guys, stop, it’s just a game!” Luz moved to stop the fight when someone gave a particularly hard shove and the table jumped, sending pieces rattling rolling across the board.
Triggering Hooty.
“Prey! Hoot Hoot!” The house demon dove down and skimmed across the table, scooping up a mouthful of game pieces.
“Hooty, no!” Luz shouted, lunging for him, but he slithered away, stretching out of her reach.
“It's okay, Luz, I got him!” Gus yelled, shooting past her.
“Wait, what?!” King squeaked from his place still clinging to Gus’s shoulders as the witch ran forward and jumped, wrapping his arm around his tubular body. He yelped as he slipped around Hooty’s slippery form to hang upside down, King dangling from his shirt.
“Mayday!” King squealed.
Hooty squawked as the sisters finally separated and made a grab for him, sending feathers, both theirs and his, flying into the air as they tried to wrangle the house demon.
“Spit them out, Hooty!” Eda snapped at him as he slipped out of her grip. She growled and held out a hand. Things banged and clattered as her staff came flying into the room and into her open hand. She took a swing and smacked the house demon, who squawked again, dropping a few pieces as he flailed about. He zipped around the room and wrapped himself around all the furniture while the sisters yelled and shouted at him. Eda smacked him with the staff again and he made an abrupt turn shooting straight at Amity.
“Watch out!” That was the last thing she heard before all the wind was knocked out of her and the back of her head slammed onto the wooden floor, the threadbare rug doing nothing to soften the blow.
She hissed between clenched teeth, eyes squeezed tight against the sharp pain in the back of her head that was quickly fading.
It almost vanished completely when she opened her eyes and found Luz hovering over her worriedly.
She could feel her face start to burn as she stared up into the human’s deep brown eyes.
That was how they had gotten to be here.
"Are you okay?!" Luz asked, eyes trailing over her, as if searching for injury, which only made Amity's pink face burn all the darker as slobber covered game pieces dropped and clattered to the floor around them.
Luz made a face when a few hit her in the back of the head as she continued to look down at Amity questioningly, while everyone else screamed and shouted.
"Fine! I'm fine!" she insisted, looking anywhere but at Luz. Her ears were pinned tight to the side of her head, no doubt as red as the rest of her face.
Despite the deafening noise going on all around them, she was hyper aware of every sound and move Luz made.
So, when Luz sniffled, Amity heard it immediately and her head whipped to look up at the human still leaning over her, eyes slowly glazed over with unshed tears as she looked over at the chaotic scene unfolding around them. She bit her lip, as though it would hold the tears at bay.
She turned back to Amity, desperately trying to keep a straight face in front of the witch.
“I’m sorry, Amity… I just wanted to play with you guys… and not think about…,” she stopped herself and sniffled again, which dug painfully at Amity’s heart. “I didn’t mean for everything to spiral out of control like this…” Her lip trembled and Amity’s fingers twitched at her sides. She wanted to reach up and wipe away the tears that had begun to gather in Luz’s eyes. If ever there was anyone who didn’t deserve anything but the best, it was Luz.
She couldn’t make her hands reach up, she couldn’t bring herself to do it.
She could still do something though.
She frowned, face setting hard as stone as she pushed herself up, forcing Luz off her and she climbed to her feet, lips pulled back over her teeth as she stood, a single spot of calm in the eye of the storm while everyone else continued to scream and flail around the room. Her hand shot up, bright magenta spell circle blazing to life.
Before anyone could blink, an abomination hand shot out of the floor and seized Hooty's body stretched across the living room in it's grip.
The house demon choked as Amity clinched her fist, the abomination hand mimicked her, squeezing the demon like a tube of toothpaste.
He hacked and choked, game pieces dropping to the floor in a symphony of quiet chimes and clack's as metal and plastic bits hit the floor. Gus slid off the house demon, dropping to the floor bonelessly as Willow rushed to his side.
The sisters were panting, bent over and catching their breath as Hooty wiggled and squeaked in the fist’s iron grip.
~ ~ ~
It took another half hour to get the living room back in a somewhat clean state, after which Eda boxed up Monopoly and stood in front of the witchlings, looking very serious. As she held the box, Lilith stood beside her, arms crossed over her chest.
“Never again.”
That was all that needed to be said as the box was tossed into the larger one housing all the other games, to be forgotten.
They ate the snacks that had somehow managed to survive the battle and not long after, Gus and Willow had to leave. They both hugged Luz tightly before they left, leaving only Amity.
Lilith had wandered away and King was lying curled up on the couch while Eda did something in the kitchen. The distant sounds of things being moved around echoed out into the living room.
Amity ran a finger nervously over the rim of her cup, Appleblood sloshing around the bottom as she glanced over at Luz from the corner of her eye. She seemed much happier now than when she had been hovering over her on the floor.
She was no longer on the verge of tears and looked quite content, but one look at her scroll told Amity that she needed to go. Emira wouldn’t be able to cover for her much longer.
Much as she hated to go.
She stood, drawing Luz’s attention as she set her cup down on the, now clean, coffee table. She finally turned to Luz, who looked up at her, already frowning, knowing what was coming.
“I need to head home,” she said and Luz nodded, already knowing.
She picked up her bag and slung it over her shoulder as Luz walked her to the front door.
Hooty was still passed out from when Amity had squeezed him into unconsciousness. He snored quietly to himself as Luz opened the door for her and they stepped outside into the waning orange and violet hues of twilight, leaving them alone for all intents and purposes as Luz closed the door behind them.
They were quiet for a long moment before Amity finally took a breath and turned to Luz only to squeak as a pair of arms wrapped around her shoulders and Luz’s chin came to rest on her shoulder.
“Thank you…,” she mumbled quietly, giving a brief but tight squeeze.
“I… you don’t…” Suddenly, Amity’s tongue was a mass of tight little knots that blocked her words from passing between her lips at every turn.
“I know why you guys came over today…,” her breath hitched and Amity blinked before reaching up and tentatively wrapped her arms around Luz’s waist, squeezing her back.
She was warm and smelled like the grass and something else, warm and earthy. Amity couldn’t help but bury her nose into the human’s hair as she hugged her back. Her face was hot and her skin tingled everywhere Luz was pressed against her, but she couldn’t find it in her to care at this very moment.
“Thank you for coming, it… It means a lot to me.” She heard Luz mumble thickly into her ear.
'Anything for you.' That was what Amity wanted to say.
She'd never be able to though, she knew that much. She'd never have the courage to risk Luz's friendship, even for the possibility of something more.
The idea of being rejected by the only person she'd ever felt this way about and to possibly lose her closest friend all at the same time was too much.
She would have to be happy with what she had. So, she would. She would be there for Luz, whenever and however she needed her.
"You're welcome," she whispered instead before Luz finally released her and with a final wave, Amity hurried off into the woods that surrounded the owl house.
She smiled to herself as she walked through the woods; only the barest hint of melancholy painted across her face.