Power is everything wrong with their family, twisting them into shadows of what they could be, and she sees the marks of it in Evi’s sharp words. She has no ability to heal them, or any light to shed upon the darkest spots. “Do you want me to blame you? Would that make this easier?” she asks, fighting back tears, her emotions always so quick to spike at the pain of others. Helpless, Jo watches Evi shoot up to her feet, the painting forming in Jo’s eyes breaking as she does so. This is, after all, not something she can fix by dumping different colors on it, no matter how much easier it would be. She doesn’t rise with her, head tilted back to look up at this older cousin of hers, cracking in front of her. They haven’t spoken of the drugs littering the pieces of Evi’s past, an unfortunate mess Jo had long thought she picked up on the run, but– “Evi–” No, she bites her lip hard, Evi still talking, and Jo feels as though she can no more interrupt them than she can halt the sun from rising in the window behind Evi, illuminating her in shades of red and orange. The sunrise feels like a wasted beauty on the ugliness of Evi’s words. Cas is dead, and Evi is the reason why, her thoughts summarize unhelpfully. “Is that all?” she states, purposely bland, swallowing back anything that might give her away. Control, she’s good at that, she’s always been polite. Polite. Good. That’s what Evi thinks of her, too. She grimaces. Evi deserves… something, but Jo doesn’t know what to give her or what to tell her. She promised a selfish acceptance for the only person she has left, but she isn’t sure how. Not yet. Still, Jo needs to speak and she looks up at Evi thoughtfully, trying to make her tone soothing in a way that the questions aren’t. “Did he try to hurt you? Did he threaten you? Could you have played along? Cas is… He could have played the hero like he always wanted and you could have come home.“ At what price? Jo doesn’t finish her sentence, a scowl on her face, unable to find a solution that doesn’t end with Evi hurt either way.
The first spark of anger isn’t from what Evi tells her. She can’t… She can’t find it in her to be angry at her cousin’s death. Not when there’s a distinct possibility that the alternative is Evi, trapped with their family, withering under their attention as Anton and Frederik did without anyone to care or notice. The anger comes from the idea that Jo will blame her. “Don’t tell me what to do,” she says, more snappish than she intends, defeating the purpose of her words. Her palm presses hard into her eyes once more, needing the near spark of pain to stabilize her thoughts. The vase shatters, and for half a heartbeat, wariness hits her. “I am not like them. I am not.” Her eyes land on the vase. Evi, or her? Which is worse, she wonders? Her fingers are clenched in her lap, tight enough for the knuckles to be white. “You can’t tell me someone hurt you - family or not - or threatened you and you, on a whim, decided to let them die. You aren’t a coward for saving yourself. What were you options? Truly, tell me, what could you have done? You said it yourself, he was a better witch than you both. And–” And. Jo fumbles, unsure, but fumbles on still. If anyone deserves a mess of an answer, but a genuine one, it’s Evi. “Are you upset that he died, or upset that you witnessed it?” This is where the territory is tricky, where she isn’t sure what to say or how to say it, and her anger is trickling away like a faucet turned off. She’s always run strong and then off. ”I promised honesty, didn’t I? I think… I think you were doomed from the start. A life spent running, or a life spent trapped.”
“Is that all?” It comes out as a guffaw and Evi blinks hard. Jo, of all people, should be shocked. Disgusted. After all, they’d lived a sheltered life, hadn’t they? Jo especially, it had always seemed. Jo, who Evi had been nearly crucified for almost hurting during their reckless teenaged days. “W-What does that mean, is it all?” Has Jo somehow seen worse? Did she expect worse? What is worse than fleeing the scene with bloodstained hands – the blood of your family, no less? “He was armed to the teeth with threats. Of course he was, it was Cas. He wouldn’t have just let me go, Jo. He would’ve made good on his word. Him playing the hero would’ve meant... nothing good for me. He grabbed me by the shirt and told me if I wasn’t a disgrace already, he was going to make me one, and I...” She’s not sure when her eyes closed, but they’re there now, fingers clenching and unclenching against the memory. “I panicked. I just... panicked.”
“No. No, you’re not.” Evi agrees, softer now, with a shake of her head. “That’s why I didn’t turn tail and run when I first saw you. I’ve always known that. You’re not like them at all.” Which means her version of justice is much more unpredictable. Better the devil you know, isn’t that what they say? Jo seems like a regular saint in her eyes, but Evi is also unaware of how she rights wrongs. The lecture seems to be the start of it, and so Evi takes it quietly, letting her gaze rest on the floor. Her head shakes at the repeated question, and she shrugs. There was only one option at the time. It feels hasty and foolish and, God, so selfish in hindsight. But did they have any other options, really? She doesn’t know. Doesn’t know the answer to the next question, either, and it takes her aback enough that she has to swallow hard. The question laid bare, in front of her gaze, anyway, seems to be hold an entirely different meaning. Not so much about if she’s upset, but something else. Is she a good person? Isn’t that what it comes down to? A good person would grieve their brother. A good person would repent. “I don’t know.” No, she does. Evi does know, she knows exactly how she feels, and it comes tumbling out like a confession. Of her emotions or her character itself, she can’t be sure. “That’s not true. I’ve never grieved him. Maybe because I never took the time to, but... that’s not it.” She exhales, gaze on the window, expression toeing the line at angry once more, but it’s not toward Jo. Not at all. “No, I’m not sorry he died. He was a bastard. I was sorry his death ruined my life. But I guess I did that myself.” Jo may have a point, that the life she’d led wasn’t one worth keeping. But escape had come at the expense of her brother. “Yeah. Yeah, maybe.” She murmurs, exhaling noisily after the fact and finally meeting her cousin’s eyes again. “I know you’re not like them. But still, if you’re angry, you’ve got every right to be. And I promise you, you won’t call me anything I haven’t already called myself. That’s all there is to know, though. Really. After that we just... ran.” Her grand confession seems almost small now, but that’s probably just because it’s had such time to fester in her mind. In its wake is a marked silence, heavy enough to leave Evi biting hard on the inside of her lip, wishing she could conjure up something to say to mend all this.
