arsyadriani:haha yeah, Anya would flip out
I'm glad you're eager to read - hope you like the new one
Vamp_Willz: Anya is still in Sunnydale running the Magic Box, but she will make an appearance soon
I'm glad you're enjoying it! Thanks so much for commenting!
Mrs. Pineapple: Well, I'm glad you're liking it - I had a blast writing this one
I always loved the (tiny) bit of Buffy/Tara friendship we got to see during the crappy times of season six - so I love expanding it - they have a lot in common - their loves get turned into someone who is essentially unreachable - and they both lost their mothers...
Zampsa1975:
I'm glad you liked that - that scene wasn't in the first draft but I thought it was funny (and important) so I added it... Hope you like the new one
abarda:
I'm glad you liked it - that was a fun scene to write... Hope you enjoy the update!
Willowtree252: I'm glad you like the pace - we jump a little further ahead in this update, so I hope you don't think I'm rushing them... from here to the end is my favorite part
irishgrl3: I'm glad you like the pace - hope I don't screw it up
I'm glad everyone seems to like that part - I like it a lot too! Hope you enjoy the new one - thanks so much for reading and commenting!
AmberGoddess: Yeah, Tara's in a horrible place - I promise that it gets better! Thanks for reading and I hope you like the new one!
Early update because I'm going to be out of town this weekend and I'm not taking my computer
Chapter 6 of 11It was month before the coven decided that Willow was ready to start learning spells and gave Tara instructions where to begin. Tara thoughtfully led them outside to practice, knowing that Willow had been shaky her first time learning magic, spells sometimes going awry.
Buffy, Xander, and Giles were going to watch, along with the coven, but they didn't want to put any pressure on the witches so they were all staying at a distance.
Willow was practically skipping as they went down the hill, Tara following at a slower pace, though no less happy than her former girlfriend. "I'm so excited," Willow exclaimed, spinning in a circle happily.
Tara smiled, overjoyed to see her so enthusiastic. "I can tell," she stated, surprised when Willow spun her around excitedly, whirling them both in a circle. Willow seemed to realize what she was doing at the same time Tara did. However, Willow's arms moved to drop from around her at the same time that Tara's arms came around her.
Willow was surprised to realize that Tara was hugging her, and she relaxed into the hug without a conscious decision to do so. It took a moment before Tara recognized what was happening and she kept herself from jerking away, not wanting to scare Willow again. She gave the redhead one final squeeze, pulling back slowly and trying to forget how good it felt to hold Willow in her arms.
"Ready?" she asked softly, her fingers itching to trace over Willow's cheek.
The redhead was blushing but nodded, reluctantly stepping back out of Tara's arms. "I think so," she said, just as quiet and suddenly nervous. She was surprised to discover that she wasn't scared that she couldn't do the spell, but was nervous about disappointing Tara. The witch had been nothing but patient with her, fielding questions and providing suggestions and advice, and she didn't want to let Tara down if she couldn't get it right.
The others had told her that she would enjoy the studying, but she had still been surprised to discover they were right. Now that she had to put it to the test though, she was nervous that she would do something wrong, mess it up and disappoint Tara.
She wiped her hands anxiously on her skirt, swallowing nervously. Tara was giving her a reassuring smile. "You're going to be great, Willow. You can do this in your sleep," she assured the witch.
Willow nodded, still nervous. She murmured an explanation, and Tara cocked her head, not able to hear her. Willow swallowed again. "I don't want to do it wrong and disappoint you," she muttered, only barely audible.
Tara pulled her into another hug, one hand on the back of Willow's hair. "Honey, you could never disappoint me like that," she said earnestly. "We can wait, do this another time, if you're not sure."
Willow felt a thrill rush through her at the pet name, her doubts suddenly vanishing. "I can do it," she said, lingering in Tara's hug. "I can do it," she repeated, smiling.
Tara nodded, pulling back and taking a step back. "I know you can," the blonde stated, smiling confidently. "Ready?"
Willow nodded, taking a deep breath. "What do I need to do?"
Tara spent a few minutes explaining how to cast the spell, what she needed to say, how it would feel. Willow nodded in understanding, bouncing nervously on her toes. A second later she was jumping up and down in excitement as she murmured the spell, the effect immediate and powerful.
The spell Tara had chosen to have Willow practice was a derivative of the same spell she'd once practiced with the redhead, floating the rose in the darkness of her dorm room. Thankfully, the sunny daylight was helping to keep her memories at bay, keeping her from comparing the two.
In this environment, the effect was wildly different. There was no rose, but every stray leaf shot into the air, hovering at chest height and Tara looked down to discover that every blade of grass was standing straight up, almost as if they were struggling to fly, anxious to please Willow.
The blonde laughed, and Willow followed the path of her eyes, noticing the grass and faltering, the leaves dipping in the air. "Am I doing it wrong?" Willow asked nervously.
Tara shook her head, spying the coven on the hill and their friends watching. "No, you did a great job. It's just a bit…expansive," she explained, looking around at the ground.
"How do I fix it?" Willow asked, scowling in displeasure.
Tara saw the look and quickly put her hand on Willow's shoulder. "You did great Willow, really."
"Not good enough," Willow murmured, pouting.
Tara slung her arm around her shoulder, squeezing comfortingly. "You're too hard on yourself," she said. "I couldn't have done that my first try," Tara confided, smiling. "And you wouldn't have been able to do it when you first started." Willow arched an eyebrow, grinning suddenly. "The first time you started," Tara corrected herself, feeling her blood race at the sight of Willow's smile, the feel of Willow's magic buzzing in the air around her. "You're doing fine Willow," she said, taking a sudden step back and poking playfully at a leaf that was hovering near her nose.
She turned to face Willow again, smiling. "It's about control. You've definitely got power, you just need a focus," she explained, gesturing to the hundreds of leaves that floated around them. "Right now, the power is all you have. We can work on control, specific accuracy instead of it being so generalized like it is right now." Willow nodded, her face serious and studious, willing to obey Tara's instructions explicitly. "Let the leaves down, and we'll try again, focusing on only moving one leaf this time, okay?"
Willow did as she was asked, the leaves floating softly to the ground and they could both feel the grass relax beneath their feet. Tara just watched, letting Willow take her time, wanting her to feel comfortable. This time the result was slower, a single leaf floating up, spinning tranquilly. It came to a halt at eye level, wobbling only slightly before moving straight to Tara, bumping gently into her nose.
Tara laughed, pushing the leaf away with her finger, feeling the leaf push back. Willow's eyes opened as she heard Tara's laugh, a smiled blossoming on her own face. "How's that?" Willow asked, still concentrating on the spell.
"I knew you'd be fine," Tara said. "You may not remember, but you were born for this."
Willow grinned, a long blade of grass floating up and joining the leaf, almost seeming to dance together. "So I'm good at this?" she requested, watching her abilities on display.
Tara smiled wryly. "You're very good at this Willow." Green eyes found hers and she struggled to remember her own name, overwhelmed with feeling for the woman she'd fallen so deeply in love with years ago. The girl standing before her was an almost painful reminder of the way they'd been, before everything had fallen apart. "The best I've ever seen," she breathed, realizing what she'd said and the tone of her voice a second too late, a blush rising up her neck.
Willow bit her lip, thinking to herself that Tara blushing was the cutest thing she'd ever seen, momentarily forgetting that more than half of her memories were simply gone at the present. The blonde seemed flustered and Willow sent another leaf up to dance with the others. "I think I've got this," she commented.
Tara mentally thanked her for the moment to collect herself and she laughed quietly. "And you were nervous," she observed, a crooked half smile on her face.
Now it was Willow's turn to be knocked off her feet, feeling suddenly lightheaded and hearing the blood rushing through her own head. She'd thought that the magic was a good feeling, tingling through her veins, but this - this was
so much better than the magic. One smile from Tara and it felt like she was flying, could fly, even without the magic. "Not anymore," she breathed.
Tara blinked, suddenly realizing what the slack jawed look on Willow's face meant, and the discovery shocked her. Willow was attracted to her. Buffy was right, even without her memories, Willow liked her.
Part of her was absolutely thrilled, while another part wept for the Willow she'd lost, the Willow she was trying to bring back. The realization reinforced in an instant her determination to keep her distance from this Willow, no matter how difficult it would prove to be. Willow needed to come back to herself before anything could happen between them again, if anything was ever going to happen between them again. Tara steeled herself as much as she could, determined to keep herself under control, not let herself slip.
Willow could see the change in her face, not sure what had caused it, but knowing instinctively what it meant. She sighed heavily, putting a pine cone into orbit around the other items.
It was nightfall before the witches stopped their practice, both silent throughout dinner, Buffy and Xander sensing the tension between them. Willow didn't linger after dinner, claiming tiredness and going to bed. Buffy and Xander followed Tara to the room she was staying in with Buffy, the pair trapping the witch, both looking for an explanation.
"What happened down there today?" Xander asked, resting a supportive hand on her shoulder.
Tara sighed, her shoulders slumping beneath his hand. "She likes me," she commented, not meeting her friends' eyes.
"That's great!" Xander enthused, grinning. Tara didn't respond as anticipated and he glanced at Buffy, obviously confused. "Isn't it?"
Tara gave him a small smile, shaking her head. "No, it is. I mean, I'm glad she still likes me, it's just that that's not Willow." His mouth opened to object and she put a restraining hand on his chest. "She's not
my Willow. I can't let myself forget that again. That's not the woman I love, she just looks like her."
"And acts like her," Xander reminded her, sobering as he realized what the problem was exactly.
Tara nodded, sitting on the edge of her bed. "Yeah, that doesn't help either," she sighed. Buffy and Xander took a seat on either side of her, knowing that their words wouldn't help. Tara dropped back on the bed, her arms crossing over her eyes.
Buffy and Xander glanced at each other before they leaned back, laying down on either side of Tara, their feet all still on the floor. Tara took a shuddering breath and Buffy sighed. "Willow will come back to you Tara."
One of the witch's arms moved slightly, her head turning enough to meet the Slayer's eyes. "I hope you're right," she breathed, her fear breaking though her determination momentarily.
*****
The coven slowly expanded their lessons with Willow, teaching her the basic tenets of their beliefs about magic and its uses, while the redhead soaked up every bit of knowledge she could. Tara and the others watched as her power and skill grew daily, the blonde witch following the coven's lead on what to teach Willow and how quickly they should proceed.
Tara was always careful about keeping space between them, and Buffy and Xander did their best to steer their conversations around any prickly subjects.
The two girls were always together, whether they were outside meditating, or in the library studying, or practicing spells with the coven. Buffy and Xander had to go back to Sunnydale for short trips a few times, checking on everything on the Hellmouth, and both Willow and Tara were relieved when they returned. They were unable to help with the magical training, but Willow appreciated having them around, enjoying hearing stories about their lives and loving getting to know her friends again. They seemed to be feeling more relaxed and happy, but she noticed the holes in their stories and wondered about it silently.
The mystery silences and significant glances between her friends was quickly growing to be too much for the redhead, but she knew that trying to force any of them to share would only result in the three closing ranks, becoming more impenetrable than ever.
Time passed quickly, and it was February before they knew it. The witches had just finished a session of mediation, the last exercise they did nightly before heading back inside to rejoin Buffy and Xander for dinner. It was the last time Willow would be alone with Tara that day and she deliberately lingered under the tree they preferred to meditate beside. She stretched widely as she watched Tara out of the corner of her eye.
Tara looked over at her quickly as Willow flopped back onto her back, the dead leaves covering the dry winter grass crunching under her. A laugh assured her that there was nothing wrong and she giggled herself as Willow's arms waved through the leaves.
"I'm an angel," Willow said enthusiastically, her head popping up to grin at Tara. The blonde bit back her automatic agreement, one hand covering her mouth at the sight of the leaves sticking wildly out of her lover's red hair. "What?" she asked, pouting as Tara giggled behind her hand.
The blonde didn't speak, just leaning forward to pluck one of the leaves out of her hair. She twirled it by the stem in front of Willow's eyes. The redhead took it from her, tucking it behind her ear and grinning.
"I'm a leaf angel then," she amended her statement, and Tara bit her lip to keep herself from saying anything. Willow shook the leaves out of her hair after a moment, still grinning impishly. "So what are we working on tomorrow?" she asked, sensing one of Tara's quiet moments looming if she didn't change the subject.
Tara blinked, her eyes moving off of Willow with supreme effort. "Oh, well the coven was going to…"
She was interrupted by Willow, the redhead lying back in the leaves again. "What's your favorite color?" The question came suddenly and Tara blinked again, stuttering as she tried to think of the answer.
"B-b-blue," she said, hearing Willow's sigh as she stammered.
"Sorry," the other witch apologized, hating when she made Tara stutter.
The blonde shook her head. "It's not your fault. W-w-why did you ask about my favorite color?"
She could hear Willow's shoulders move through the leaves. "I just wanted to know. You know all this stuff about me, and I don't remember yours. It doesn't seem fair. When's your birthday?" she asked suddenly.
"October sixteenth," Tara said, not stuttering this time. "Xander's is coming up soon," she said, reminding herself as much as Willow.
"So close to Valentine's Day? That sucks!" Willow sat up in a rush, leaves again stuck in her hair. "We should have a party!"
Tara smiled crookedly, nodding. "Yeah, pretty much all of his birthday presents from Anya are really for her…" Tara sympathized. Honestly, she couldn't have felt less like celebrating, but she had seen that look in Willow's eyes before and she knew what was coming. It wasn't that she didn't want to celebrate Xander's birthday with him, they were just so busy that she doubted he even remembered it was coming up
Willow saw the doubtful look on Tara's face and pouted. "What? Don't you want to have a birthday party for Xander? What did we do last year?" she asked. She hadn't been able to figure out how they'd met, but she'd managed to put together that she'd known Tara for at least two years.
"For Xander's birthday? Well, you tried to bake him a cake, but it sort of slanted and fell apart," Tara said, smiling at the memory. Willow was pouting at the ground and Tara leaned forward, ducking her head to look her in the eyes. "You're good at many things, but baking is not one of them," she stated.
"So I gave him a wrecked cake?" Willow asked, frowning.
Tara laughed, shaking her head. "No sweetie. You didn't give your best friend a bad cake. I made another one and we gave him that one."
Willow seemed so excited by her birthday party idea that she seemed to miss the familiar pet name, or she had gotten much better at controlling her reaction, Tara mused to herself as she watched for the aftermath of her slip up. She'd gotten better at moderating her words, but Willow made it difficult when she was disappointed, the blonde's instinctual reaction being to comfort her.
"Well, you can help me and I'll do better this year!" Willow decided. Tara bit her lip, but nodded. "Hey, what did we do for your birthday?" she asked.
There was a split second of panic in Tara's eyes before she blinked, her face passive again. "Um, this year, not much. A few people came over for dinner," she hedged, knowing that Willow knew she was hiding something, but not knowing what else to do. The truth was that she and Willow had spent the day alone together, having their own party and only joining their friends for a small dinner of take out at the house. It had been before their disastrous Halloween, but even then, on her birthday, things hadn't been right between them.
"What about last year?" Willow asked, frowning. Surely they had had a party for Tara at some point. She was too amazing not to be celebrated, much less only once a year. The redhead stopped that train of thought quickly, not letting herself indulge in thoughts of how she would treat the beautiful blonde if she were free to show her how much she thought of her.
Tara smiled, the expression softening on her face. "We went dancing at the Bronze," she said simply, unwilling to think about the rest of her birthday, only wanting to focus on the good parts of that day.
Willow nodded before frowning. "What's the Bronze again? I know you've told me before, but I've gotten a lot of new information in the last few months and I can't keep it all straight."
Tara laughed. "It's the club in Sunnydale. You used to go there after school with Buffy and Xander. They have a dance floor, and pool tables, and stuff like that. It's fun."
"And we went there for your birthday?" Willow questioned, seeing the happy smile on Tara's face and hoping that she'd had something to do with putting that look on her face, either in the past or the present.
Tara nodded. Willow's brain was working rapidly and Tara could see the plans forming in her mind. She didn't have the heart to tell her that the only reason she'd had the party the year before was at Willow's insistence. After her mother had died, her father and brother had never given her a birthday party and she had been so shy in school, it wasn't until she had been accepted into Willow's family that she'd felt comfortable enough around people to even consider having a birthday party. The party had all the result of Willow's planning though.
Tara couldn't imagine who Willow would convince to come this time, but she knew her lover wouldn't fail to find people to attend Xander's party. The blonde witch realized that they had all been so entirely focused on Willow and her training that she hadn't really gotten to know any of the coven witches, despite having lived with them for almost three months. She also knew that that wouldn't stop them from coming to anything Willow planned, they were all too kind to refuse.
Willow was grinning at her, obviously already planning in her busy brain. Tara shook her head with a wry smile, pushing herself up onto her feet. The redhead grinned, knowing instinctually that she had won. Willow jumped to her feet excitedly, throwing her arms around Tara's neck happily.
"Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!" she chattered and Tara nodded.
"Shouldn't Xander be thanking you? You're throwing him a party," she reminded her.
Willow jumped back, taking Tara's hand to pull her back up the hill towards the giant stone house. "Come on, we need to talk to Buffy and Xander. We've got a lot of work to do," she said, excited to have something to do that would hopefully bring her back close to her friends and wasn't related to magic in the slightest.
Tara let herself be dragged along, noticing as they moved quickly up the hill that there were still several stubborn leaves in Willow's hair. They stopped suddenly next to the table they ate dinner at routinely, Buffy and Xander looking up at them in surprise. They gave Tara a questioning glance, but the blonde witch shrugged, gesturing to Willow.
"What did I get you for your birthday last year?" Willow questioned Xander, the young man pausing with a bite halfway to his mouth.
"My birthday?" he asked, confused. Tara was smiling behind Willow's back and she nodded encouragingly to him. "Um, well you all chipped in and got me a new recliner."
Willow wrinkled her nose, glancing at the two blondes. "We did? That sounds boring."
Xander shook his head quickly. "No way Will! It was exactly what I wanted!" he insisted sincerely. "What's this about?" he asked, directing the question to Tara.
"Your birthday is next week," she said as she sat down. Xander's eyes widened and he laughed.
"It is, isn't it? I had completely forgotten," he said.
Willow was grinning like a maniac and she nodded. "Well, we're going to throw you a party!"
Buffy looked between the two witches, unsure how this topic could have possibly come up. Tara didn't look upset so the Slayer decide to wait on questioning her about it. "We are?" she asked, raising an eyebrow.
Willow nodded excited, sliding onto the bench next to Tara. "Yeah, Tara is going to help me make a cake, and Buffy, you can help make decorations, and Giles and the coven can come!" she planned, sounding so excited that none of them had any desire to rain on her parade.
Xander grinned at her, reaching across the table to put a hand over hers on the table. "Thanks Will. It sounds great," he said sincerely, giving her a smile and finding himself choking up. Seeing her like this, happy and hyper and so
Willow was almost physically painful for him, an undeniable reminder of what they were all doing here.
He coughed roughly, dropping her hand after a moment and blinking down at his food. Buffy's hand found his knee under the table, his leg bouncing unconsciously as he struggled with his emotions and her hand rubbed over his knee soothingly, giving him a tight smile as he looked sideways at her.
His feelings were mirrored in the Slayer's eyes and she leaned her head against his shoulder, listening to Willow's comfortingly familiar babble as she started working out plans.
*****
Tara closed the door behind her after dinner, unsurprised to find Xander sitting on her bed, waiting for her. Buffy was on her own bed, leaning on one side, her head resting on her hand.
"She sprung it on me," she apologized, sitting on the bed next to the carpenter. "I'm sorry Xander."
He sighed, nodding. "It's okay Tara. I don't mind, really."
She smiled encouragingly. "She's really excited about it. I'm going to help her make a cake and I'm sure she'll find lots of people to come."
Xander put his hand on her knee to stop her words, shaking his head. "It's really fine Tara. I'm not just going along with it. It's my birthday and my best friend is throwing me a party. This has happened before in my life, and it will happen again," he said sincerely, smiling.
Buffy sat up from her relaxed position on the bed. "We'll have a great time Tara. I'm sure of it." She met her friend's eyes seriously. "How are you doing though?"
Tara shrugged. "I already spend all day with her. A few extra nights doing party things won't kill me." She let out a deep breath. "And I think I'm getting better at not swooning when she smiles at me, and I only think about kissing her about twenty times a day, so I think I'm doing alright," she commented, smiling bitterly.
"How's the magic stuff going?" Xander asked curiously. They had been around the pair of witches when they'd been practicing, but the other Scoobies' grasp of magic was as tenuous as it had ever been.
Tara leaned back against the wall, curling one leg under her as she relaxed on the end of her bed. "She's amazing," the blonde said, an unconscious smile appearing on her face. Buffy and Xander exchanged grins and Tara blushed, ducking her chin to her chest. "But you already know that," she added. "It's going great. She's doing so well. The coven thinks she'll be finished in a few more months."
"That's great," Xander said. "Then everything will go back to the way it was."
Tara's smile slipped, her eyes dropping to her hands in her lap. "Yeah…" Her voice trailed off and Xander grimaced.
"I didn't mean it…Tara, that's not what I meant," he said firmly, moving to face her, his larger hands dropping over her knees. "She loves you Tara."
Tara's head shook back and forth slowly, tears welling up in her eyes. "She doesn't know me. She doesn't remember what she did to me."
Xander's shoulders slumped and he leaned forward to look her in the eyes. "I'm not talking about how she is now. I mean before. Before everything got so screwed up." Tara glanced up at him, her broken heart clear on her face. "I know that she did it to herself, but Tara, you know that she loves you."
"I love her too Xander, more than anything in the world, but it's not that simple. Even once she gets the magic under control, gets her memories back, we'll be back where we were…broken up and I don't know if I can trust her again."
Xander snorted in disbelief. "You know she'll have her memories back for
maybe ten seconds before she'll be begging you to take her back."
Tara's lips curled minutely at the corners and she let out a deep breath. "It's not that simple," she repeated.
Xander frowned. "You don't want her back?" he asked doubtfully, glancing over his shoulder to where Buffy was watching in silence.
"Of course I do!" Tara said sharply. "It's going to take time though."
Xander sighed. "I get that," he said. "Just do me one favor, okay?" Tara nodded, looking up at him. "Please don't forget how much she loves you. She messed up big time. But I've known Willow since kindergarten, and I've never seen her so happy in our whole lives as when you smile at her."
Tara's tears escaped as she took a shuddering breath and Xander opened his arms to her, letting her lean against his chest.
"Nothing could make me forget that Xander," she breathed into his shirt, hiccupping back tears and she felt Buffy join them on the bed, the Slayer's forehead leaning against the witch's shaking back.
As her crying eased, her friends stayed close. Buffy pushed hair back from Tara's face with a sigh, seeing that her eyes were red. "Everything will be okay Tara. Willow loves you, but she made a mistake. She let the magic get out of control." Buffy sighed heavily. "She absolutely did it the wrong way, but she only did what she did because she didn't want to lose you."
Tara wiped her tears away with one hand. "Ironic, isn't it…?" she mumbled, her bitterness obvious. "She lost me anyway." The old friends exchanged glances and Tara groaned, her head dropping. "I know she was addicted to the magic and she's getting better, but I'm still scared about how far she let it go. She couldn't go a week without magic, one week!"
"She's doing better though Tara," Xander said.
"She didn't choose this though Xander! She wanted to die!" Tara's tears were back with a vengeance and she collapsed forward against his chest. "She was ready to leave us, leave me…"
Xander soothed her without thinking about it, rocking them back and forth as Buffy's hands rubbed Tara's back gently.
"Willow would never want to leave you Tara," she murmured quietly, leaning over to speak into the witch's ear. "She didn't want to die, she was just struggling." The Slayer swallowed thickly. "Willow would do anything to be right with you again."
Tara didn't respond, just leaned on Xander and tried to choke back her despair, the suddenly fresh pain of her love's betrayal, wondering what it would take to move past it, to really let everything go back to the way it was before. They had been happy once, even in the midst of everything that they had been going through. She would do whatever it took to get back to that place with Willow.