Rating: PG 13
Couples: W/T natch.
Spoilers: It’s set in its own separate little W/T universe, but references to Season 6.
Archiving: Course… just let me know, K?
Feedback: Yes please… self-confessed feedback whore here.
Disclaimer: Joss is God, Amber and Alyson are Goddesses, Mutant Enemy and UPN own all. I just play.
Notes: There is no plot to really speak of. I’m going down the Jossian road of ‘character development’ and seeing what happens. All set in Tara’s head.
The Dreamer – Part 1
‘Love is not a goal; it is only a travelling… There is a goal, but the goal is neither love nor death. It is a goal neither infinite nor eternal. It is the realm of calm delight, it is the other-kingdom of bliss. We are like a rose, which is a miracle of pure centrality pure absolved equilibrium.’
-D.H.Lawrence
My dream is about her. I’ve had it before, but she plays the starring role in most of my dreams. I feel sometimes that she is so much a part of me that I couldn’t subtract myself from her if I wanted to. She is in me, singing her songs in my head, the stream of Willowbabble running through me and in me and out of me. She holds part of me now and I hold part of her, and I do not know if those parts are retrievable, should I ever want it back. But I know that I never, ever will. Willow is my always, you see.
So my dream… She is walking towards me, and her eyes hold mine hypnotically. It’s like that. When she looks, I cannot look away. If she wants my attention she can hold it and I’m powerless in a way that I love. There are tears swimming in the green pools that I love to dive into, never reaching a bottom, playing in the flashes of gold that flicker there. My arm reaches out to touch her, wanting to stop the tears from falling before they even spill over her eyelashes. But my arm isn’t long enough; she’s beyond my reach, too far away and I cannot get to her. She cannot come to me and I cannot, or am not allowed, to get to her. As I watch helpless, she is pulled back from me, taken further away by forces I cannot see.
The separation and the tearing at my heart it causes send tears flooding down my cheeks. I cry silently, watching her drift further and further away. But her face is changing. Her face is calm and deadened now, the emotion gone, and all that is left is a shell. A thing that looks like Willow but that I know isn’t at all. There is nothing of my Willow left. The tears are gone from her eyes and she stares at me impassively as I cry and weep helplessly, and she fades into the mist, leaving me alone.
I wake slowly, feeling lost and emptied of everything in me. As my mind clears a little and I realise it was just the dream and that my Willow is not gone, some of the fog lifts. The light and the morning pull me towards consciousness. I lie drifting for a while, refusing to open my eyes, as my body becomes aware of its surroundings. Willow is still here. Of course she’s still here. It was only a dream. She is lying in her usual position. I have been rolled back towards the edge of the bed and am lying on my side facing her, whilst she is curled into the curve of my body, nestled in as close as she can get. Her face is buried in my neck and her breath eddies and flows across the downy skin behind my head. One of her arms is up on the pillow curled round my head, and the other hand is spread on the small of my back, pulling me closer to her. Her left leg is lying parallel to mine, touching all along the length, and her right leg is pulled up, resting on my thigh.
Her penchant for stealing all of the bed is not for the usual reason of wanting space. She’s not greedy. With Willow, it is simply that she wants to be as close to me as possible in sleep, and so I get pushed further and further towards my side and she creeps with me, like a tiny animal searching out warmth. But it is really she who is my warmth. She radiates heat, and her hot tight little body often feels like its burning up in my arms.
My closed eyes sense the light in the room, flooding in through the window that we never close at night so that we can see the stars as we explore and enter each other, or as we drift asleep and our whispered conversations trail off into soft breathing. It is light but it is not light enough to make me think the dawn is old yet. I know the morning is only just beginning. I know I am awake early as usual. Force of habit left over from a life spent getting up before the rest of the house woke to do my chores and cook breakfast. I always wake before Willow. This is my time, my silent time when nothing invades or interrupts my peace or my thoughts. The noises from outside are soft; there are one or two birds singing to each other a little way off and, in the distance, the faint sounds of a town waking up.
I open my eyes. A strand of Willow’s hair is lying across my cheek, tickling a little, and I move a hand to brush it away. I tuck it back behind her ear softly, revelling in the feeling of her hair as always. It’s silky soft and heavy and it always smells faintly of cinnamon. The first time I ever hugged Willow, saying goodnight after one of our first spell sessions, before she began staying over, I turned my face into her hair and breathed her in. The feel and smell of her hair steadied my heart and seemed to calm me, and balance out the head spinning dizziness I was feeling at being that close to her. I can lie for hours playing with her hair, running my fingers through it and kissing it. She loves brushing my hair in the mornings and when I return the favour, she sits very quietly on the bed and closes her eyes, loving the sensation of my careful fingers stroking and pulling.
I lie, stroking her hair, and stare at the ceiling. She smells of the lemon soap that I bought her, and of her shampoo and a faint trace of fresh perfume, and of sweat and the smell of our bedclothes… or maybe that’s just the smell of our bedclothes. She smells of Willow, and I lie and drink her in.
Miss Kitty is moving in the corner. She’s left her basket and I can hear her padding slowly across the carpet. She always slinks in the morning, her stomach stroking the floor, as she creeps like a predator towards her goal. Her goal is usually our bed, and she climbs up the duvet right about now. Her head appears by my foot and I smile at her. She always looks so proud of her achievement. She’s still only little and climbing the bed still seems to give her an enormous sense of achievement. Her claws are out, like mini crampons, and the duvet has suffered as a result of her morning expeditions. Willow tuts but I just smile. She’s only little and when you’re little the small things are still very big. Her pride always reminds me of climbing the elm. The first time I climbed the elm was one of the proudest days of my life. Is that sad? I don’t think so. Donnie had been swinging himself up it for years, and I’d always stood at the bottom and wished I could be up there, and be seeing what he was seeing. But Donnie’s reasons for climbing it were simply to show that he could. I climbed it to conquer my fears, and to look out over the place I grew up. When you were up the elm, you could see it all from a distance. And from a distance it didn’t look so bad. In fact, it even looked beautiful at times. And yes, a small part of me wanted to climb because Donnie had done it, and I wanted to too. But I don’t think there’s anything wrong with wanting to do what others have done. You just have to do it for the right reasons.
Miss Kitty suddenly launches herself onto Willow, like a big cat attacking it’s prey. She lands on her thigh, the one that is pulled up over mine, and Willow flinches silently at the sudden weight. I brush Miss Kitty off gently and she gives me a baleful look and hops off the bed to go give herself her morning bath. Willow is stirring though, and my moments of silence are over. I watch her face as she wakes. She is always so peaceful and childlike in sleep, but when she wakes, her face scrunches up into a comical protesting moan, and she always opens her eyes in the same way. With a very similar baleful look to the one Miss Kitty just gave me. I just smile and kiss her scrunched up nose. Her face relaxes and when she finally opens her eyes, there is a smile in them, as always.
Part 2
‘Day by day
They travelled emptier of the things they knew.
They improvised new habits on the way,
But lost the occasions, and then lost them too’
-Thom Gunn, ‘The Discovery of The Pacific’
“Morning….” she mumbles, in a very quiet muffled voice, turning her head back again. Her mouth on my neck makes me shiver. I’m always like this is the morning. She doesn’t have to do anything and I’m hers, I want her. Last night we were awake until maybe three in the morning. She dragged me into bed at ten. I say dragged… I mean I willingly followed. She turned her ‘come to bed’ eyes on me and I fell over myself in my haste to be where she wanted me. Last night was one of those nights where we circled each other for hours, moving in curves and spirals, and every time we fell apart to lie exhausted and glistening, we were drawn back again. She’s like my magnet. I’m drawn and I love it. There’s something inevitable about me and her.
“Sleep well?” I don’t need to ask. She always sleeps well. Anya could scream in her ear and she wouldn’t wake from a deep sleep.
“Mmmm…” I just smile and let her lie there, slowly leaving her dream world. I know that Willow’s dream world is just as vivid, as beautiful, as real as mine. We grew up in the same place. We both escaped from places we didn’t want to be and we went to where they couldn’t touch us. We created worlds that were just ours. And in a way, I was way luckier than she. I had my mom, and I ran to her and escaped with her, but Willow just had her dreams. You can hate so much about your life, but if you can dream, you can make so much happen. Maybe the only bad thing about living where we live, in our dreams that feel so real, is that sometimes the badness manages to creep in and that feels real as well. My mind flickers back to the dream that I just had, but I don’t want to think about that just now and I push it away.
“Miss Kitty decided you ought to be awake…” I whisper in her ear.
“Miss Kitty only comes on the bed ‘cos you let her,” she says. She’s trying to tell me off but I can hear the smile in her voice. She turns her head and looks at me properly again. Her green eyes on mine, diving in, reading me, pulling me out of myself. The first time I told her she had beautiful eyes she blushed and looked away, not believing. But about three weeks after our first kiss, I took her to a mirror and made her look at them. They’re green, so amazingly green. Green is my favourite colour. I decided that the first time I saw her. They dance. And the tiny gold flecks in them move when she smiles. And when she smiles her whole eyes scrunch up and smile with her. She’ll never admit they’re beautiful. Her mom always told her green meant cats… and that was supposed to be a bad thing? But she’s happy that I think they’re beautiful.
She believes me now. It took a long time for her to believe me when I told her I loved her. Took even longer for me to believe she loved me. Two screwed up self-doubters end up together and find belief. There should be more newspaper headlines like that.
“She has a mind of her own. She won’t listen to me.”
Willow snorts a little disbelieving snort. “I’ve never ever heard you tell her off!” I haven’t. She just looks at me and wrinkles her little nose at me, and she’s so funny that I just crack up and can’t do anything but giggle. “She has you wrapped around her little finger…” Willow snuggles in closer, burying her head in my neck again.
“Cats don’t have fingers…” I murmur.
Willow licks my neck. It’s not a sexy lick; it’s a ‘stop being a smartypants lick’. Willow uses licks to convey all sorts of messages. I told her she was like a cat once, and she chased me round the room with a pillow and ended up tying me to the bed. I should do it again. She licks my neck when I’m trying to concentrate and do my work, just ‘cos she knows it’ll distract me. And she’ll lick me when we’re making tea or something at a Scooby meeting, just ‘cos she knows it’ll get me horny and I’ll have to sit there in agony until the meeting ends. Mostly she does it just to be annoying, when she’s feeling silly and playful, which is most of the time. And if I’m lucky, she’ll do it ‘cos she’s feeling sexy, but that doesn’t happen often enough for my liking. All of her licks have the same effect on me though. I end up dying to have her, needing skin, needing her, and she just bounces off, laughing. She’s wicked.
I can be wicked too though. In fact, I’m way worse. I just have the innocent act worked out way better than Will. She always looks like she’s trying to be innocent. I just look innocent.
“Miss Kitty does have fingers. She has delicate little fingers,” she breathes into my neck. I know she’s deliberately trying to turn me on, and it’s working, but I’m not going to let it show.
“She has paws, Will…”
“Why do they call it a ‘lazy finger’ then, the little one half way up her leg?” she crows triumphantly, sitting up a little and looking at me. I just smile and shrug. She grins. She’s won and she knows it, but it’s funnier seeing her win than winning myself sometimes. I pull her back down and direct her head down to rest on my breasts. It’s her favourite place to lie and she nestles in between them comfortably. Her right hand moves up and starts playing with my breast, stroking light circles round the nipple with a fingertip. She watches it stiffen and I watch her face. We never stop playing with each other and often its not really sexual, merely play. Willow treats it as a scientific experiment, seeing how many seconds it takes for my nipple to stand to attention. I can’t help but smile at the concentration in her eyes. When she’s really concentrating, the tip of her nose scrunches up, but right now, she’s just watching dedicatedly, her eyes totally focussed.
Suddenly she leans forward quickly and fastens her mouth on the nipple. She turns her head so that her eyes are on mine, and her look is one that oozes enjoyment. She’s teasing again. My body is going into Willow overload mode as it always does when she touches me. Electric sparks shooting through me and it’s all I can do not to tip my head back and moan. I’ve been lying here waiting for her to do this ever since I woke, and now she’s teasing me, and I can’t give in. She has no intention whatsoever of making good on her… sucking, and I have to pretend its not doing anything for me.
I stare her out, my face a blank, until she removes her mouth and pouts, humphing like a little kid. I can’t hold the blank face any longer and giggle. She realises my pretence and starts giggling with me.
“Meanie!” she laughs.
“You’re the meanie!” I protest.
I pull her up to me and she rests her forehead on mine, her body sliding on top of mine. My hands are holding her head, thumbs stroking her cheeks and fingers in her hair. She feels hot in my hands. She kisses me slowly and deeply, her tongue sliding in and finding mine. My fingers slide up further into her hair and her head feels so hot. She tastes of our sex the night before, mixed in with fuzzy morning mouth. Our mouths separate but our faces remain touching, foreheads and noses.
“Brain overheating again?” I ask with a smile, my fingertips laced in her hair.
“Your fault… I dreamt about you…” she says and kisses me again. Suddenly she rolls over, taking me with her and we’re kissing deeply, the heat rising. I’m on top, the way she likes me. I used to worry about squashing her, being too heavy for her, but she loves it. She likes the feeling of being dominated by my body, she says. All of her being covered by all of me.
When we draw apart and I settle by her side, she giggles and rolls away to check the clock. When she turns back she's wearing her outraged face.
“You let Miss Kitty wake me up before 7?! When you kept me up till all hours last night?” she lectures, the effect being spoilt by the smile playing at the corners of her mouth.
“I kept you up, huh?” I ask pointedly. She ignores my comment and carries on.
“Well, you definitely can’t have morning sex in that case! I need my beauty sleep…” And she turns her back to me, settles into the shape of my body and reaches for my hands. She pulls them around her. I let my fingers spread across her bare belly, relishing her soft curves, and pull her closer in to me.
Today is Saturday and for once, we have absolutely nothing planned. We have a whole day to lie in bed and tease if we want. We don’t get enough days like this. Much as I love the Scoobies and Dawn, a break from them is nice. Willow works too hard. It’s good for all of us to have a day off. I make a silent prayer to whichever gods are tuned in that the absence of all things undeadly will last the day. I hug her to me and watch her eyes as they close again and she settles and relaxes. Me and Willow alone time. This silence, this total peace, this is how it was before I met the Scoobies, back when it was just me and her. We discovered each other in peace, with no one else changing anything or influencing us. We were just us, ourselves, together. I don’t mean that we’re different now that others are involved in our relationship, but… well, maybe we are. Maybe others make us act in different ways; tiny ways, but still different. When I first met her, the thing between us was pure, unadulterated. And that’s why days like today are important, because Willow goes back to being Willow. She relaxes and I can see it visibly. She breathes out and it’s like all the stress is leaving her, and the time spent with me rejuvenates her.
I hold her tighter and bury my face in her neck, dropping little kisses there. She’s in my arms and we have a whole day to lie here like this if we want.
Part 3
‘There is always one moment in childhood when the door opens and lets the future in.’
-Graham Greene, from ‘The Power and the Glory’
Will is asleep again. Her closed eyes have begun to flutter lightly as she dreams and her breathing is the slow steady soundtrack that I fall asleep to every night. We’ve only had a few hours sleep. If she doesn’t get eight hours she’ll be cranky bear. And anyway, I love this. The first night Willow ever stayed over at mine, after a desperately embarrassing scene of ‘are you sure?’s and pyjama swapping, we lay in bed, no part of us touching, staring at the ceiling. As sleep overtook her she became more comfortable and she rolled nearer to me, seeking warmth as she does now. But I didn’t sleep all night. I just lay on my side, propped on pillows, with her head buried into my chest, watching her ribs rise and fall, and falling in love with the way her eyelids flickered and her face scrunched up in sleep. She was perfect. She was everything I’d ever dreamed about, and everything I knew I’d never have. Only now I have her. And I get to do this every night, lying here, watching her.
She never stops though, even in sleep. Her dreams often leave her crying or shaking, or mumbling quietly in dreamed conversations. Willow doesn’t know how to be lazy. She says I sleep peacefully, serenely. Willow doesn’t really do serene. She’s always got be active, busy, useful. She can’t even sleep quietly. It makes me giggle.
She lets out a little snort and twitches in my arms. I smile and wonder what crazy forests or fields she’s running through. I need to pee but it takes a few minutes to lever myself away from Will, as every time I inch away she instinctively moves with me. I detach a hand that was holding my wrist possessively, get up and wander through to the bathroom. Miss Kitty follows, skipping round my feet and miaowing. She’s never quite seemed to understand the concept of the toilet. She sits and watches us on it, looking at us with comical confusion. She’s doing it now and I have to laugh at her. I caught her crouched on the bowl once, looking as if she was ready to dive in and do battle with the toilet kitty.
“I’ll feed you in a minute…” I tell her as I wash my hands. I put some facial wash on and bend down to rinse. Miss Kitty’s now sitting on my feet, as if that’ll somehow speed me up. I stare at the wet face that looks out at me from the mirror for a few moments. It stares back impassively. It’s funny how I’m slowly coming to feel like I fit my skin better these days. You know how you hate how you look? I used to be disgusted with myself every time I looked in a mirror. Nowadays, though, it feels different. I look better. Or maybe Will’s taught me that I do have beauty. I have her, I think that’s my beauty. She says I’m beautiful but I can’t see that. But at least I kinda like the way I look these days.
I dry my face and then, very cruelly, drop the towel on Miss Kitty’s head. It takes her a while to scramble her way out and when her head emerges she indignantly looks up at my doubled up form.
“I’m sorry, Miss…” I bend down and scoop her up, still giggling. She’s still outraged and squirms in my hands. “You can have a big breakfast as an apology. It was awful of me…” I whisper in her ear. I carry her through to the bedroom, kissing and nuzzling her. Willow’s awake and as I come through she’s sitting up in bed, watching me. She has her most adoring look on, the one that makes me feel like melting on the spot.
“You are so mean!” she says with an impish grin. “I saw exactly what you did, you evil woman!”
“I know… I’m terrible. I don’t think she’ll ever forgive me… will you, Miss?” The kitten just looks at me.
“She’ll forgive you in about two seconds time when you feed her,” Will smiles. “I just had another dream,” she changes the subject as I put feed in the bowl.
“Tell me your dreams,” I smile, looking up at her. She holds my look for a moment, one of our silent connections.
“Well, the first one, the earlier one, had you in it. That was a nice dream.” She smiles again, remembering.
“Sexy dream?”
“I had you in black leather this time,” she says with a wicked look.
“Oh dear… My wardrobe just doesn’t satisfy you, does it, Will?” I grin and slide back into bed with her. She wriggles round and lays on my tummy again.
“Oh, it does. This is my favourite outfit, though,” she smiles and kisses my bare tummy.
“Birthday suit…”
“Birthday suit is best. You were very quickly into birthday suit in the dream, actually. And then you became Naughty Tara, and mucho fun was had by all.” We grin at each other like goofs. “But the second dream was just weird. I was running and I didn’t know what from. It kept gaining on me and… I think I was running through a forest… but I couldn’t get away or get out, and the thing was coming closer and closer. And then I fell over, and it was on me. And when I turned over, d’you know what it was?” I shake my head. “A rabbit! A huge bunny rabbit!” She says it with vehement disgust and I laugh helplessly at her face.
“You’ve been watching too much Life of Brian and spending too much time with Anya, baby!” I grin and play with the little stray locks of hair round her face.
“I know… it’s distressing…” she sighs melodramatically, and rests her head on my breasts again. I used to lie with my mom like this when I was tiny. When it was just me and her alone in the house, she’d break out the chocolate brownies and would lie on the sofa with me on top of her. We’d munch brownies and I’d chatter and drop crumbs down her top. The feeling of complete peace I used to have then is the same one I have with Willow now. I’ve been thinking about Mom a lot lately. Not sure why. Will was asking some questions the other day but she’s been hanging around in my head a lot before that. She’s always with me but I have phases when she shares my head as much as Willow does.
Willow suddenly lifts her head and looks up at me. “What are you thinking?”
“Just about Mom…” I say. She smiles and looks up at the space above my head.
“Hey, Tara’s Mom!” she says with a grin. I giggle. “I know you’re always watching your baby, and that means you’re watching me too, ‘cos I don’t very often let her out of my sight,” she says conversationally. “You don’t need to worry though. I take good care of her…” she looks down at me and strokes my cheek softly. “…don’t I, baby?”
“You do,” I whisper, and I’m blinking back tears for some reason. I love her. I love her so much I want to laugh and cry and sneeze and sing all at the same time. “I love you.”
“Ditto…” she says and she leans forward and kisses me, sucking softly on my bottom lip as she draws away. We lie and stare into each other’s eyes deeply for a long time, and silence fills us and surrounds us and enters us. Even Miss Kitty stops licking herself on the desk. I let myself drift in her again, and as she leans in kiss me again all I can think is she’s so beautiful, she’s so beautiful, she’s so beautiful…
Part 4
‘When we walk to the edge of all the light we have and take the step into the darkness of the unknown, we must believe that one of two things will happen. There will be something solid for us to stand on or we will be taught to fly.’
- Patrick Overton
Her tongue is dipping deeply into me, her fingertips touching my face with a feather lightness. She’s moving slowly and gently above me, her body melded to mine. Only our bodies could fit this well, I know that. I’ve kissed people before and wondered what the fuss was about; I’ve tried sex and found it jarring and awkward and painful. In the past, intimacy left me feeling dirty and angry with myself, angry that I let a boy do that to me. I should have been stronger, defended myself more, understood that sex meant more. Not that it was forced on me. I thought it was what I was supposed to be doing. Thought if I didn’t that made me odd, or frigid, or maybe I was just curious, like we all are. And by then, Mom was so different, was so changed by… everything… that I guess she just wasn’t there to tell me different. But it didn’t work and I hated it, and I never wanted it to happen again. The first, and only other, time I kissed a girl it was different; soft, gentle, it tasted different. It did something to me that I loved. But she wasn’t for me, I knew that and she wasn’t really interested anyway. She left me knowing more about myself though; I knew I would never let men touch me again and I knew that the feelings I had for women were important, that they would be important.
And the first time I kissed Willow, the first time she, or I, closed the gap (we can’t remember who it was)… that was… indescribable. That was the moment we both knew it was perfect. She was holding me and all the awkward, mumbling, blushing moments that had characterised ‘us’ up until that point were over. My arms wrapped themselves round her taut little body and we just found that we fitted, we were made for each other. We gravitate towards each other always; I won’t sit down on the opposite side of a room if there’s a space anywhere nearer to her. And we never just kiss with our lips. Everything else has to be involved as well; hands, faces, bodies, as much skin as we can get.
“Come…” she says, suddenly pulling away from me. I moan, almost inaudibly, at the loss of her lips on mine and she smiles. She’s levering herself off me and climbing off the bed, her hand gripping mine and pulling me with her. I get up and stand beside her next to the bed. She bends her head and kisses my shoulder, and raises her eyes to mine with an ‘I love you’ gaze for a split second. And then she’s pulling me towards the bathroom. She skips ahead and reaches into the shower cubicle to flip the switch. Bonus of dorm rooms: constant hot water.
“I thought I wasn’t getting morning sex?” I say, raising my eyebrows at her and grinning.
“Who says you are?”
“I’m getting hot steaminess anyway and that’s good enough for me…” I step into the shower and hold out my hand to her. I love that first second when you tip your head back and into the stream of water, soaking yourself completely and letting it drench you. Willow’s hands slip up, following the curves of my shoulder blades and clasping behind my neck. She joins me under the stream of water and her face nuzzles into my neck, tiny light kisses dousing me. Her hands move down and bring me closer, caressing my back and sliding down my spine. My eyes still closed, tilted up into the water, she is all I can feel.
My mind is falling into that place where I can’t form coherent thought. Willow’s hands and lips are everywhere, kissing, biting, slipping over wet skin. Her touches leave lines of fire all over me. I feel my desire rising and becoming frantic, and I can’t stop myself pushing her backwards, pushing myself onto her harder. Her thigh is between mine and is pushing hard up into me, leaving me breathless.
“Which shampoo shall I use?” she suddenly asks, inbetween kisses. This time I groan loudly.
“Willow! God, woman!” She pulls back and eyes me innocently, as if she doesn’t have a clue what I’m talking about. “You’re evil, d’you know that?!”
She blinks, playing dumb, and pulling an unbelievable cute face at me. There’s no point in even trying though. She’s already bending to pick up the shampoo. When she appears back in front of me again she’s grinning though. I pretend to slap her and she just pulls me in for another kiss, teasing this time, her tongue darting in and out, biting my lip. I end up laughing into her mouth and she joins me, giggling helplessly, until we’re standing with the water streaming over us, mouths and foreheads still together and my hands still cupping her cheeks, laughing like muppets. She starts tickling me and I squirm manically until she stops and pulls me into a hug. I can feel her hands moving behind my back and she soon reaches up and starts massaging shampoo into my hair. Her fingers move in slow circles on my scalp, rubbing the shampoo in and down the length of my hair. Smiling, she turns me round and her hands slip through my hair again and again. Her body is pressed up against my back, as close as she can get as always. Wet slick skin on wet slick skin. My favourite way to start the day.
“What d’you wanna do with our day off?” she asks. I tilt my head back into the curve of her neck and she slips an arm over my shoulder and pulls me close. She plants three little kisses on my neck.
“How about we go explore?” I say.
“Explore what?” she asks, in between kissing my shoulderblade.
“Somewhere we’ve never been before… what about Daniel’s Hill! We’ve always said it looks lovely up there and we’ve never gone...” Will reaches to the shelf before me for the shower gel and pours some into her cupped palm.
“Like an expedition?”
“An expedition, yeah…” I smile, and then smile some more as her hands begin sliding wetly over my breasts, cupping them carefully, rubbing and stroking.
“We could take a picnic! Sandwiches and gummy bears?” She’s obsessed with gummy bears. I faux-sigh, but it makes me giggle. Her fingers are playing with my nipples, twisting and squeezing them. They were already erect but she’s now teasing them wickedly.
“Yeah… gummy… oh, Will, don’t stop…” Her hands move further down my body, lathering me with soap everywhere.
“Not stopping. Merely making you clean for our big expedition.” Her hands are removed, and when I turn to face her she’s grinning and lathering her own body. She loves the feeling of when we’re both covered in lather and sliding everywhere. I pull her to me and kiss her again. I’m always amazed at how good my body is at achieving what I want it to even when my mind is lost in her. My hands are deftly tipping gel onto the curve of Willow’s ass and beginning to circle, covering her back in bubbles. I kiss my way down her neck slowly and lick a path between her breasts. Rose bud nipples, perfect in every way, and my mouth devours them. Her hands are everywhere and I take a moment to pause and marvel at the movement of the muscle in her upper arm. Skin, sinew, bone; she’s amazing. You always know the human body is incredible but you never KNOW it’s incredible until you get to know another body better than your own. And I still notice something new everyday, that's what I love most.
She giggles suddenly. I can feel her laugh reverberate inside her chest, below my lips. “Can we take Miss Kitty on the expedition too?” I smile and look up.
“She can find the North Pole for us…” I murmur. She wraps her arms round my neck and pulls me up to her again. Her eyes staring into mine, our silent connection that was there forever, and then her lips are on mine once more, entering and loving in that way that only Willow can. The water streams down over us and I think maybe the phone is ringing, but neither of us cares. This is us, Willow and I, doing what we do best; loving each other.
Part 5
‘When she lowers her eyes she seems to hold all the beauty in the world between her eyelids; when she raises them I see only myself in her gaze.’
- Natalie Clifford Barney
I step out of the shower after her. She wraps one of our huge white towels round herself and then, picking up the one beside it, turns to me and begins to gently towel the beads of water off my skin. She dries my neck and shoulders, kissing her way down the skin after the towel has dried it, then my arms, breasts, stomach. All the while I just stand and watch her face as it alternates between total concentration, as she wipes each droplet off in turn, and pure enjoyment, as she leans forward to kiss my skin.
When I’m dry to her satisfaction, she smiles and wraps the towel round me, slipping her arms beneath mine to tuck it in. She plants a quick kiss on my lips and then takes my hand and leads me back to the bedroom and sits me on the edge of the bed.
“Lean forward…” she commands. I do so with a smile. I like bossy Willow. She begins towelling my hair with another smaller blue towel. Her hands are always so gentle when she’s performing this little silent ritual. She touches me as if I might break at any moment; as if I’m the most precious thing she’s ever been allowed to hold. From inside my little blue world, my hands reach out for her sides and I tug on the towel, knowing she’ll tell me off. It falls into my hands but there’s no comment from Willow. I pull her further in towards me, between my legs, and slip my arms round her waist, hugging her close.
Suddenly the towel and soft massaging fingers are removed from my head and she’s smiling down at me.
“I can’t dry your hair if you’re going to squeeze me in half!” she grins. “You’re very unhelpful!”
“Ignore the hair…” I murmur into her breast. In response, she tosses the towel onto the bed and climbs onto my lap, straddling me, her knees either side of my thighs on the bed. She stares into my eyes, her fingers softly stroking the downy hair on the back of my neck. She runs a hand through the wet hair, pulling it forward and letting it fall across my face, only for her to tuck it back behind my ear.
“Did the phone ring earlier?” she places a tiny kiss on my temple. I shrug my shoulders.
“Not sure. Wasn’t really paying much attention.” She grins with me and we kiss. “And anyway,” I say as I pull apart from her, “I don’t want to know even if it did. Today is ‘Tara and Willow day’.”
“No one else allowed,” she agrees. “Except Miss Kitty,” she says over my shoulder to the kitten. I turn my head and as if on cue, Miss is clambering up the bed again. She reaches Willow’s pillow, and collapses there, panting a little at her exertions. “But it might have been important…” I turn back and give her a stare. “… like life and death important?” She’s hopeless. But she’s wonderful too though. I love that she gives that much to her friends, to total strangers, to the cause she believes in. She’s come from a place of such love and mutual commitment, and I love that she knows what that is, what people mean.
“Fine… go, check the phone!” I’m pulling an exasperated face, but I’m not annoyed really. Just secretly hoping it was a wrong number. She grins and hops off me athletically. I flop back on the bed and watch her walk across the room. I love watching her naked. She’s so unconscious of the fact when she’s with me. I still remember occasionally and find myself blushing or marvelling that someone could have brought shy, embarrassed, self-hating Tara to the point where I can be naked and not be excruciatingly self-aware constantly. Only Will could have done it, of that I’m sure. But she doesn’t care… maybe at first, but not much. She’s changed hugely since being with me, I know that. The rest of the world doesn’t matter quite so much anymore. She gets her love and affirmation from me, and she doesn’t have to be desperate to please everyone anymore. And I swear she gets sillier everyday. We were on a walk last week, a moonlit walk, outside of Sunnydale where it’s pretty much safe, and she had the urge to strip and run across this field starkers. And she did… running, looking like a nut with her boots still on and nothing else, and her boobs jogging up and down. And of course, then she persuades me to join her, which I kind of did. I stripped to my underwear anyway. Naked in front of Willow maybe. Not in front of potential strangers. And it did feel good, running around and then collapsing, laughing our heads off in the moonlight. Only Will…
She’s about to pick up the phone but suddenly stops, fingers on the handset, and looks back at me. She looks at me quizzically, weighing something up in her head, and then makes her decision, grins and hops back across the room towards me. She throws herself onto me with a giggle, knocking me backwards, and I envelop her in my arms and we roll, laughing, on the bed.
“It might be an apocalypse! And then I won’t be able to have my expedition, and Miss Kitty won’t get to go bug hunting…” she laughs breathlessly in my ear.
“You are bad…” I kiss her and then roll her onto her front and climb on top of her. Her shoulders are always so tense, so knotted. My fingers are good at this, massaging away her cares and worries. I love the little moans that she makes as I massage. I’m firm with her; if it hurts, it’s generally a sign that it needs attention. She worries about far too much and it shows in her back.
“There… it hurts there… ooooh!” I smile at her, as she tries to squirm. I’m hopelessly ticklish and she isn’t at all, but she seems to have a ‘ticklish mode’ that she only switches on when I’m massaging her. Miss Kitty has been watching with intense interest, looking baffled at our antics as usual, and she suddenly bores of watching and decides to join in. She hops onto Willow’s head, her claws carefully in, and Willow squeals as I just sit back and laugh.
“Miss!!!! Tara, get her off! Tar… her foot is in my ear!” Willow eventually manages to turn enough underneath me to reach up and grab the kitten. An indignant Miss Kitty hangs in midair as Willow turns onto her back. She glares up at both Miss Kitty and I. “You’re both horrible! I swear you work together… you plot this stuff!” I grin and bend down to kiss her. Miss Kitty bats at my ear as my lips are on Willow’s, and I turn to kiss her as well, before I climb off Will.
“I want you to wear that blue sleeveless top today,” I say as I head over to the wardrobe. Pulling it open, I rummage through our clothes. I’m fastidiously neat and Willow just chucks stuff everywhere so our wardrobe is always a curious mix of carefully folded and rumpled piles, no matter how often I tidy up. “You haven’t worn it for ages, and I was thinking about you in it in the shower.”
“I’m naked and horny in the shower with you, and all you’re thinking about is what you want to cover me up with?” she says, teasing, as her arms slide round my waist and her chin nestles into shoulder.
“It shows off your arms. And I was thinking about how good your arms look…” I finally locate the top and pull it off the hanger triumphantly, and turn to present it to her. She grins and takes it. Just as she turns away to the underwear drawer, she tugs on my towel and it falls to the ground. She rummages in the drawer and as I’m looking through the wardrobe for something for me to wear, a pair of knickers and a bra hit me in the head. She sticks her tongue out at me as I bend to pick them up, and when I stand up again she’s got a pair of knickers pulled over her head. “I’m dating a five year old…” I mutter and cross the room to the chest of drawers.
I was going to wear my red skirt that she loves me in, but then I wonder if climbing hill in skirts is a good idea, and go for a pair of faded blue jeans. She goes ‘ass-crazy’ when I wear those anyway. I don’t wear jeans often. I can’t cope with the bottom-pinching and dry-humping frenzy that they send her into. At least today there won’t be other people around to catch us and I can enjoy over-sexed Willow without going redder than her hair.
“Ready?” she asks impatiently. I turn round from fastening my jeans up to find her fully-dressed and lowering a protesting Miss Kitty carefully into a rucksack. “Oooh, you put jeans on… goodie!”
“You’re hopeless,” I grin and pull coats off the door for both of us. She slips hers on and picks up our miaowing bag. “We’ll pick up lunch from the cafeteria, yeah, and then head out?” She nods and leans in to kiss me, her hand on the door handle.
“Not hopeless. Only hopelessly in love with you…” she smiles as she pulls away and turns to skip through the door. I stand for a second watching her go and smile. She’s crazy, but she’s mine and she’s just as in love with me as I am with her. Today will be fun. It already is fun. I smile, shake my head a little and, pulling the door to behind me, follow her down the hall.
Part 6
‘All times can be inhabited, all places be visited. In a single day the mind can make a millpond of the oceans.’
- Jeanette Winterson, from ‘Sexing the Cherry’
Tara carefully lets Miss Kitty out of the bag, unzipping it and letting her climb out. She’s bending down with her ass in the air as I follow her into the room, and I’m very tempted to be naughty and bite her ass again. I did it earlier when she was setting out lunch and she fell over into the sandwiches and gave me her best ‘Oh Willow’ look. I restrain myself this time. She just doesn’t understand though. Her ass looks SO good in jeans. I mean, it looks good in anything of course. Tara could wear a dress made of sackcloth and pour ashes over her head and she’d still look utterly shaggable. I think they did that a lot in the Bible, funny old men with beards sitting on the ground moaning. I’m not sure she’d look quite so good with a beard. Probably though.
“She’s exhausted…” she says, standing up and watching Miss Kitty wander across the room, a little wobbly. She flops into her basket and curls up, shutting her eyes immediately.
“She’s only little,” I say, slipping my fingers through Tara’s, “and she did spend all day hunting the prairies.” Tara turns to smile at me. She has her mothering face on that I love. She wears it when she’s looking after Dawn or worrying about me or Miss Kitty. She’s gonna be so good with our kids.
“Good day?” she asks, turning towards me and lifting a finger to stroke my cheek, her eyes latching onto mine. Her eyes are SO blue.
“Perfect day… even if we didn’t find the North Pole. I think Miss Kitty found enough bugs and twigs to make up for that though. She’s a very enterprising little kitty.” Tara smiles and her eyes crinkle up at the corners. I spent a whole hour this afternoon trying to stick my head up her top and giggling at the way her eyes just rolled and crinkled in despair. There wasn’t really room for my head and her boobs in the top but it was fun anyway. I mean, I don’t know many people who wouldn’t wanna spend a day with their head up Tara’s top. Buffy maybe. And I don’t think Dawn would, but even she likes Tara’s boobs. Not in a Tara and Willow cuddles kind of way. In a mothery cuddles kind of way.
“You hungry? I know we ate enough for all the combined Scoobies today but I just wondered…?” I groan and flop on the bed.
“My tummy feels like a drum. I think you fed me too much choc trifle,” I pout up at her and she grins and sits next to me.
“Want it rubbed better?” she offers, and I just moan and nod. I feel like being mothered tonight. She’s been telling me I’m a kid all day so I figure I’ll just be a kid a bit more and get the ‘being fussed over’ bits now. Tara TLC. She lays down on the pillows with her legs apart and I wriggle backwards into her lap. She pulls me close and I snuggle up with my head on her chest.
“You smell like grass and fresh air…” I murmur.
“And Willow drool probably,” she says as her fingers start rubbing my tummy. I would protest at the accusation but she’s so good at this and I could so fall asleep here, and I don’t have the energy to do anything other than murmur a reply.
“I didn’t lick you that much.”
“Willow, that’s just about all you did all day,” she smiles. I can’t see her smile but I can hear it in her voice. I love hearing her smile. Sometimes it’s almost better than seeing it. Only sometimes though.
“Yeah, well, what d’you expect when you wear jeans and that top?” I yawn.
“I expect to be bitten, licked and mawled all day, which is exactly what happened…” her words whisper down my neck and I shiver a little.
“And you loved every second of it!” I grin, nudging her a little with my elbow. She doesn’t reply but nibbles the top of my ear lobe gently. My grin widens. “Dirty ‘ho…” I murmur.
We lie in silence for a long while, her fingers gently rubbing me into sleepiness and my hands stroking the sides of her thighs. The clock ticking slowly away and Miss Kitty purring in her sleep are the only sounds that break the stillness. Tara’s breath wisping down my neck and her arms round me… who needs romantic films when you have this? The difference between the silences between me and Tara and the silences I have with other people is so cool. Tara doesn’t have to speak all the time, and when I’m with her, I don’t have to either. Willow Rosenberg doesn’t usually shut up in public, and she doesn't like silence, always feels she has to fill it. I think Buff and Xander would be a wee bit surprised if they knew sometimes me and Tara don’t speak for hours. We can just lie there and gaze at each other, and I find myself not needing to speak, or not even able to. She has this ability to project love, to make me feel like the brightest star in her sky, and she doesn’t even need words to do it.
And when we do talk I love the way it can be about just anything. She could tell stories forever, I’m convinced. She has this mind that’s like a pool of imagination, beauty, and pictures and she just pulls treasures out for me, one by one. I’m the only one who gets that; no one else gets bedtime story time, or the snippets of myth or truth or fantasy she throws around all day. And she daydreams. Anyone can dream, we all dream; it’s daydreams that open you up, lead you off into new places. My daydreams are kinda random and weird, but Tara’s are just beautiful.
“Tell me a story,” I say.
“A story…” she thinks for a few moments, and I lie patiently, for once, just happy to be still with her. “I won’t tell you a story,” she says eventually. “I’ll tell you about the Land of Silence.”
“Land of Silence?” I turn and look up into her eyes and receive a kiss on the nose. “What’s it like? What happens there?”
“Nothing happens there; everything is still and sweet. People may go and sit there, and contemplate the world peacefully. You can be still there and see the world laid out before you, in all it’s brightness and shade, and colour and darkness. Your life will flow before you, your thoughts will not be intruded upon and your soul will be cherished by all.”
“Sounds wonderful… Would I get in?” She tightens her arms round my waist, hugging me close, and smiles into my neck.
“Anyone can go there, but you must agree that silence has an importance. No one ages there, and there is no time there, only your own. When you want it to be morning, sharp and crisp and clear, it’s morning. When you want the hot still quiet of the afternoon, the afternoon arrives. If you want to see the stars and lie in velvet darkness, night is there.”
I sigh, loving her words and the way her voice caresses them as she says them. “Beautiful…” I murmur. “I want to go…”
“You can go. You simply close your eyes and you’re there. The Land of Silence is the place you go when you dream, when you’re still, by yourself. It’s with you all the time.”
I reach for her hand and link my fingers through it. Bringing it up to my mouth, I kiss the back of it. She has such slim hands, pale and delicate and so so soft. I kiss the skin again and again, exploring the tendons and knuckles with my lips. She lies and watches me, her other hand stilled on my stomach. I slip my mouth around her index finger, sucking and licking. When there isn’t an millimetre of finger I haven’t kissed, I go back to tracing the lines of her palm, over and over, loving every bit of skin, every bit of her. The silence of this moment is one you can’t break with words, or even thought.
Part 7
‘Whereso’er I am, below, or else above you,
Whereso’er you are, my heart shall truly love you.’
- J. Sylvester, ‘Love’s Omnipresence’
I think I drifted off. I think we maybe both did. She’s breathing lightly but steadily in my ear. A couple of strands of hair have fallen down over my face and I take them and play with them gently. She has silk for hair. So soft.
Her arms are still tight around me, hugging my waist. I love the fact that she never lets go, even in sleep. Oz used to move in his sleep and even if we went to sleep spooned round each other, I’d wake up on the opposite side with an acre of cold sheets in between us. The thing I love most about mornings now is slowly drifting into consciousness and having her arms around me and her breath gentle on my skin. I know then she’ll never leave. The mornings are when I’m most certain, when we wake together and she’s so there and so warm and so completely Tara, with mussy hair and a rumpled face. The Tara that no one else gets to see.
Everyone gets doubts about their relationships; well, I assume they do, I don’t think I’m odd. My doubts are fears really. Tara is so much more than I ever deserved and she just happened, and happened so perfectly. She fell into my life right just when I needed her, and I guess the old Willow can’t ever believe she’s really here for good, forever. She’s my dream but dreams fade and you wake from them. What if I wake from her one day and find she was just borrowed, just mine for a while? I know in my head that she’ll never leave, that she’s my always, but the little, self-hating, geeky old Willow won’t go completely away and won’t stop whispering that I don’t deserve her. I don’t deserve her. She’s the most light-filled person I ever met. And she has stripped away so much of geeky Willow and banished so much of her. Almost. She’s almost gone. I know one day she’ll be completely gone and new Willow, Tara’s Willow, will be all that’s left. It only takes a whisper though. For now the whispers are still there.
But in the mornings I can’t hear them. In the mornings, and when I wake like this in her arms, I’m certain. I wake in her arms like I’m doing now, and I know then for sure that she’s not going anywhere. She’ll always be here, she’ll always be mine. We’re each other’s always, aren’t we? Tara’s Willow. Willow’s Tara. That stays.
My toes are cold. I need toe cosies… or I could turn the heating up. Or maybe try socks. A glance up to the window tells me night has fallen. The clock reads a quarter past eight. We’ve dozed for a couple of hours. Infinitely carefully, I take Tara’s arms from round my waist, first one then the other, and then inch my way out from between her legs and off the bed. She’s fast asleep, lying propped up on the pillows, her head leaning to the side and her eyelids fluttering as she dreams.
I walk to the window. The stars are out tonight in a crisp clear sky, thousands upon thousands twinkling at me. And the moon, big and swollen, nearly full, looks friendly tonight. Funny how the night sky can be fierce and frightening one night, and contented and safe the next. I’m tempted to wake Tara and take her out to go lie on our backs and watch them. It’s one of my favourite things to do. It’s a Tara thing to do; she loves the night sky, fierce or friendly. I never thought a whole lot about it except in a sciency kinda way until she showed me the Big Pineapple and Lil’ Pile O’ Crackers and all the others. Much more fun than the real names. I glance over at her but she looks so peaceful I know I can’t disturb that, and I pull the curtains together, closing us off into our little world and leaving the night locked outside.
The room’s kinda dark except for Tara’s fairy lights which are always on, so I wander, lighting candles everywhere and switching the globe on. I love this room. It’s so… us. The first room we’ve had that is a complete mix of both of us. We both bought our favourite things to it and I love the way our personalities mix and flow and complement within it. Candles, crystals, our favourite pictures, strings of shells and collections of weird stones and sticks. It has lots of plants, which we haven’t had before. That was me. I had a gardening moment a while ago and went a little plant mad. One corner looks like a mini jungle, Tara says, but I like it. She just smiled and looked on amused as I dug into gardening and botany and plant breeding books in the library, and then smiled some more when I got a tiny bit bored as I always do. I never do things by halves, she says. It has to be all or nothing. It’s usually all and then nothing with my crazes. Still, the plants have stayed. They add something.
I love this room just because Tara is here, I guess. She always creates a feeling of safety and peace wherever she goes, makes me feel nothing can get in and disturb us. This is our place. The excitement that I felt in handing over our first joint rent cheque was kinda excessive. Tara teased me when I hopped up and down in the accommodation office. She said I was probably the happiest a student has ever been to pay their rent. I don’t care. It was a joint cheque! Me and Tara paying rent on OUR room, not mine or hers, OUR room! And the stuff in it we chose and bought together. Our things in our room. Silly, I know, but I guess it’s another finger in the eye of old whispering Willow and her doubt demons.
I wander aimlessly for a little, picking things up and putting them down again. Our extra flamey candle that neither of us want to burn anymore so it just sits on the window sill. We’ll keep that till we’re old and blue-haired, just to remind us that we always choose each other, that there is no other choice. I pick through our jewellery box and pull out a necklace I haven’t worn for ages. Buffy gave it to me a few years ago. It makes me feel a little guilty. Once I would have treasured that and worn it constantly, just ‘cos Buffy gave it to me. I guess the most important people in your life will always change. I guess it’s a matter of accepting that and making sure you don’t lose the others at the same time. The Scoobies are OK; we’re just different now. Not worse, or separate, or divided; just different. And part of me can’t help thinking it’s good. Willow Rosenberg doesn’t rely totally on Xander and Buffy anymore; she has self-confidence and belief and she has Tara, and she can be her own woman, maybe for the first time. Definitely for the first time. Tara makes people feel they can be themselves. She teaches self-belief without even knowing she’s doing it. She makes me feel so loved I know that what the rest of the world thinks doesn’t matter. She loves me and does anything else really come before that? I don’t think so.
I get a can of cat food from the fridge and fill Miss Kitty’s bowl for her. She’s purring in her sleep, lying curled up in front of some dream fire somewhere, or stalking more bugs on her little prairie. She was so funny today, her tummy stroking the ground as she stalked bugs through the grass. And she would creep so brilliantly, and then suddenly pounce and the poor bugs didn’t stand a chance. Me and Tara were copying at one point, until she looked up at us and gave us such a scathing look we felt quite embarrassed.
I give her a little stroke and then cross to the bed. Tara’s still fast asleep. She looks as exhausted as the kitten. I love the way she manages to look SO peaceful even in this funny position. I kneel on the bed and scooch up into the space between her legs again, so I’m kneeling before her. Some of her hair has fallen in front of her face in a silky blonde curtain and I gently tuck it back behind her ear. She stirs a little but doesn’t wake. She’s making tiny moans in her sleep, and I wonder what the dream is. I hope it’s a happy place she’s in. I hate it when she has nightmares. She does, kinda frequently, and I wake to her shaking, sweating and crying in her sleep. I have to gently wake her and hug her till she quiets. We talk about them sometimes but mostly she doesn’t want to do anything but lie and cuddle. She says they’re about her family, her dad and brother mostly, and part of me doesn’t want to know anymore than that. That’s horrible of me, I know. I know that one day we’ll talk about it. One day she’ll tell me everything, all her horrible childhood stories, but I have a feeling it will come a little bit at a time over a long space of time. That’s what we do now; it comes out a tiny bit at a time, and that I can deal with. That’s what Tara can deal with, which is more important.
She stirs suddenly and groans. I smile watching her wake. She looks funny, her mouth falling into a tiny adorable pout. She opens her eyes and blinks blearily at me, and then rubs her nose and yawns.
“How long have I slept?” she mumbles.
“Too long,” I whisper, and lean forward and kiss her softly. “I missed you.”
She smiles a sleepy smile at me and I lean in and kiss her again. She slips her arms up to hold my face and run her fingers through my hair, the way she loves to. I slip my tongue in to meet hers and she moans, a tiny moan that feels so good inside my mouth. Willow’s Tara. Tara’s Willow. That stays.
Part 8
You hold me in your hands
You won’t let me fall
You still my heart
And you take my breath away
- Jason Wade, Lifehouse, ‘Everything’
Her mouth on mine, her teeth nipping my lower lip, tasting me, possessing me. Why do I never get tired of this? Shouldn’t it get boring after a while? How does she manage to make it better every single time?
Her hand traces a feather-light line down my neck, across my shoulder, down my side and settles on my hip. She pulls me closer in to her, moulding her body to mine, till I’m lying on top of her. She wriggles and slides her thigh up inbetween mine, and then pulls away for a second to watch my face as I moan. She’s grinning and I love the way she always wants to watch, wants to see me at my happiest. She says my face tells her everything Willowbabble never manages to put into words. Or at least, manages to put into lots of words but not quite the most appropriate ones.
“That’s my favourite way to wake up...” she murmurs. I smile and slide down the bed a little until my face is level with hers. She moves too until we’re lying side by side, facing each other. Our foreheads are pressed together, and her legs are still entangled with mine. Her breath on my cheek makes me shiver a little and she smiles gently and moves her hand up to caress the skin, running the pad of her thumb over my cheekbone.
“It’s kind of even better than in the morning. In the morning we’re both still half asleep and we have morning breath and everything. That was just… perfect.”
I smile and nod, agreeing. “Mmmm…" We lie in silence for a few minutes. She’s right. That was perfect; all of it is. But can you sustain perfection? Perfection, by its very nature, surely has to be corrupted or spoilt or stained over the course of time. Nothing can stay pure, can it?
“Tari, d’you ever wonder if this isn’t… forever?” She’s giving me her best ‘stop it now Willow’ look, but I carry on. I’ve started now. “It’s just… do you ever worry about it?” She moves both hands to cup my cheeks and moves in a little closer still, till our lips are virtually touching and her breath wisps across my skin when she talks.
“Do I worry about losing you? Nothing worries me more. I can’t even start to imagine life without you, baby. But you know what, Will?” She stops and gives me a cutest half-smile, one side of her mouth curling up, and her eyes shining with happiness and sureness.
“What?”
“I’m not going anywhere, Willow Rosenberg, and you know that. This is where I fit. This… you and me, being silly all day and talking about our fantasies and playing and loving. This is my world and everything else can come and go… but you know as well as I do that this is forever.”
I lean back a little and just gaze into her eyes, transfixed, falling into the blueness of them, the peace and calm that radiates from them.
“You’re so sure. I love how you’re so sure…” I whisper.
“Will, we all get scared about the future, worrying that something as perfect as this might disappear from our grasp. And of course I worry… I wouldn’t be Tara if I didn’t. I dreamt last night that you were standing in front of me, and you were crying. I wanted to go to you and wipe the tears away, kiss them away. But I couldn’t reach you and you drifted off, you vanished into the mist, and I couldn’t stop you from going.” There is such sadness in her eyes as she remembers and tells me this, and I cannot speak. Instead I touch her face, hoping my fingertips will tell her what my mouth cannot. She smiles, shaking her head a little and carries on. “But Will, d’you know what? I woke up, and the fears and pain all evaporated when I saw you curled up asleep on the pillow next to me. And that’s how it will always be. We can both worry and dread losing each other, but we will always be there to let each other know that we don’t have to worry. I’m not going anywhere…”
“Neither am I…” my voice comes out a croak. I love her. I love her so much more now than I ever did when we met, and I’d never have thought that was possible. She was everything. She kindled this burning realisation in me, starting from that first second our eyes met, and I fell so quickly. The surge as our fingers linked in the laundry room would have knocked me over, had I been standing. It was like life suddenly stopped or disappeared; yeah, it disappeared. No sound, no fear, no nothing. Just her, and her blue eyes burning into mine and her fingers sending electricity like I’d never felt before shooting through my body. All panic, fear, adrenalin, all fell away, and it was just the two of us. And yeah, moving that drinks machine was amazing, but what was a hundred times more amazing was the feel of her skin on mine and her eyes on mine and me suddenly feeling like I’d just found something I’d been looking for for a long, long time. And I could tell she was feeling the same things; I think that’s what was most amazing. We were looking at each other and I was wondering where she’d come from and I knew she was smiling inside.
She’s smiling inside now. Her mouth is sightly open, her breath coming a little irregularly, and her eyes are boring into me like she’s trying to read my soul. But she’s smiling; not her face but the whole of her. I make her smile. She looks at me and smiles inside. That’s maybe the single coolest thing about our relationship. OK, so there are some other VERY co