|
Hi. Those of you who've been following "Straight Through the Heart" know
I've reached a resting place, so I thought I'd take advantage of the
opportunity to post a few other things I've written. This one is my
first pov piece and also my first fic set outside of Season 3. Hope you
like it.
Title:
I Understand
We're hiding on the campus, in Tara's room. Me and Dawn and Willow and
Tara. Dawn brought sandwiches (salami and peanut butter? Ewww!).
Poor Tara. She's been through so much with her family and her mom
dying, and now that she's found a little happiness with Willow, Glory
comes along and runs her skanky god-hands through her brain. I thank
God that I can't really imagine what's happening in Tara's mind right
now, and I curse Him that Willow probably can.
Dawn's feeding her some applesauce, and Will's telling me about Tara's
care.
"What are you going to need?" I ask. She takes it to be a question
about medicine and supplies. Maybe it was.
"I don't know," she says. "They gave me a lot of stuff to keep her
calm. They said I might have to restrain her at night--" Poor Will.
I just hope she can't see the pain on my face the way I can see it on
hers.
"--but sometimes," she continues, "she's fine." (I can feel my throat
squeezing tight; I know I don't want to sob.) "She looks at me and
she's fine." That's right, I know Tara's fine; I would be.
"I'm sorry I couldn't--" I start to say, but Willow (of course) doesn't
blame me.
"That's okay," she says. "I can do this; I can take care of her, even
if she never--" That thought is too horrible to complete, and she
stops. Dawn looks up at her. But Will can do that, I know she would,
and whatever small sick part of me had hoped, just for a second, that
Tara would be shipped off to some rubber room and be forgotten, that
part dies a swifter death than it, or I, deserve.
"She's my girl," Willow says, and looks at Tara, full of love, and then
she looks back at me, a needless apology in her eyes.
It's my own fault, I know that now. I was her girl for all those years,
but I was too blind to see, and I can't blame her for moving on. I
thought that love had to be exciting and adventurous and mysterious and
strange--and I never knew what love was until Willow gave it to someone
else. I was the Slayer and I did amazing things and I fought against
creatures no mind should ever have to conceive of, and I won. And I was
a stupid, foolish girl who had love in her hands and in her arms and
resting its beautiful red head on her shoulder, and I didn't know what I
had, and I lost.
If only I hadn't been the Slayer--but I stop that thought right there.
If I hadn't been the Slayer, I wouldn't have had Dawn, my perfect lovely
little brat. I lived fourteen years never knowing that this piece of me
could be, and then I lived them over again, taking it for granted, and
resenting it, even. Sometimes I think that stupid Primeval Slayer
muffed her line, that she meant to say "Dawn is your gift," but I know
that isn't true; Death is what Slayers are all about, and that's why I
let Love slip away.
I stroke the hair of the one good thing I have done in this world, and I
look at the woman I hurt and I tell her, "I understand."
She pauses for a second and I start to worry: does she think that she
hurt me, that I need to forgive her? She did nothing but love me; I
was the one who shut her out and left her alone. Of course I understand
her choice; it's easy to do.
But she's smarter than that (I underestimated her again). She looks at
me with love and empathy and regret and says "I know you do." And I
know she does.
Of course she knows; she always did. Knew me better than I did myself.
We had a whole winter in that dorm room, just me and her, no parents or
Watchers to get in the way. Riley and me were going slow, Tara and her
were only talking about magic. So many perfect opportunities:
Christmas and New Year's, my birthday, Valentine's. (Is Chanukah a big
romantic thing? I don't know) And all I had to do was once, just
once, realize what God had given me, take her in my arms (she wasn't
going to push herself on me, I know that) and say "I love you, Will" and
leave no doubt.
I will always wonder what she would have said. "I love you, too" or
maybe just "Yes"? Or perhaps "Always"--that's what I like to think.
She says it now, but not to me; I had my chance.
"You hear that, baby? You're my Always," she says to Tara (lucky, lucky
Tara), and that's as it should be--I'm no one's Always, I'm the Slayer
and Slayers die. I probably don't even have a Now. All I want is for
Dawn to stay alive, for this little part of me to live and be the Buffy
that doesn't die, that doesn't desert her friends, that doesn't cause
them pain and agony and let them be dragged into hell after hell after
hell--be the Buffy that isn't too scared to take love when she has the
chance, to say the words she ought to say, to hold the person she was
meant to hold and never let her go. Please God, just let Dawn live and
all my loneliness and misery and stupidity will have been worth it.
What the fuck was that??
Glory just knocked down the wall; I'm almost relieved.
Just me and the hellbitch, one-on-one, the way it has to be.
I can do this. I'm the Slayer and this is what Slayers do; this is
what I'm good at, maybe the only thing.
I'll beat her and I'll save Dawn and everything will be all right.
Oh, God, I hope so.
|