No replies as of yet ... I will get to them tonight - promise. Here, however, is part b of 'Drifting' ... sorry it took so long and that it's so short - I haven't had much writing time recently.
Lingering Darkness 3b - Drifting
"Many zoids will fall prey to your trapping skills," Tara agreed, nodding again, standing up and moving in front of Willow. Silently, she buttoned up Willow's shirt for her, patting the top button lightly when she was done. "There," she said. "All set?"
"Thanks," Willow said with a little smile, kissing Tara lightly and taking her hand, pulling her towards the door. "Come on," she said, as she dragged Tara along. "Pancakes won't make themselves."
"They won't?" Tara asked innocently, her eyes wide as Willow tugged her down the stairs. "But … but then … where do pancakes come from?" she spluttered, stopping short and clapping a hand over her own mouth when Willow turned into the living room.
"Well, you see," Willow said, her voice a whisper as she turned to Tara with twinkling eyes. "When two pancakes love each other very much …" she began, snickering quietly.
"Hush, you," Tara whispered back, squeezing Willow's hand. "Isn't that kind of … cute?" she asked, pointing into the room and grinning widely.
"Oh, yeah," Willow agreed with a nod, looking around the room. Dawn and Anya were asleep on the floor, their hair in partial braids, bringing to mind the conversation they had had the night before about human slumber party rituals. Xander was slumped in a chair, his neck at an obviously uncomfortable angle, a thin line of drool escaping his mouth and making Willow wrinkle her nose. Maybe that part wasn't so cute, she decided. But still, she figured Giles made up for the rest of it.
The older man was sprawled on the couch haphazardly, his limbs askew and his glasses barely sitting on his face, looking like they were about to fall. It was an extremely odd look for Giles, as he was always immaculately put together in Willow's experience, not counting band candy and other oddities.
Miss Kitty Fantastico was curled up on his chest, sleeping peacefully, her paws wrapped around his hand. Willow had no idea if Miss Kitty was protecting the hand, or had been attacking it earlier and thought it was dead, but it was cute nonetheless, and she stifled a giggle, lifting her eyes to Tara's face. Tara was clearly looking at Miss Kitty asleep on Giles, an expression of pure delight overtaking her features.
Willow watched Tara watching Miss Kitty for a few moments longer, a feeling of contentment settling inside of her, before tugging on Tara's hand again and pointing to the kitchen. Nodding, Tara started moving through the room quietly, Willow right behind her, their hands still intertwined.
"Where's Buffy?" Tara asked suddenly, her voice low so as not to wake the sleeping Scoobies. "And Mr. Angel, and the other two?"
"She probably patrolled, then went up to her bed," Willow said with a little shrug. "And Angel probably needed to head back to L - the guys left Cordelia and Fred alone at the hotel, and they were probably a little anxious to get back. Neither one of them is a fighter."
"Fred?" Tara asked absently, opening cupboards and pulling out the things she would need for the pancakes. She was pretty familiar with all of Willow's high school stories, and had kept up on who was who after several retellings.
"She's new," Willow said with a little shrug. "They picked her up in some kind of demon dimension she was lost in, or something like that. I met her briefly when I was in LA when …" she said, her voice trailing off and a little frown crossing her face, a pensive and sorrowful look taking over her eyes.
"When Buffy died?" Tara asked quietly, looking up at Willow, her attention pulled completely away from the pancakes and focused on the sadness emanating from Willow. "Sweetie," Tara said softly, taking the two steps that brought her up next to Willow and wrapping her arms around her. "Hey," she said, when Willow snuggled into her shoulder and wrapped her arms around Tara's waist. "I bet that was hard," she went on, feeling Willow's answering nod moving against her neck. "We never talked about it."
"Angel was so devastated," Willow said softly. "I mean, he always knew it was a possibility - we all always knew - but that … it didn't make it any easier."
"Of course it didn't," Tara said, nuzzling Willow's soft hair and placing a comforting kiss against her head. "You love her."
"That's what Angel said," Willow said her voice thoughtful and distant. "He said that he knew I loved her, and that if she could have possibly been saved, I would have done it."
"And you did," Tara pointed out, even as her mind started turning over this new information. "She's back, and she's going to be all right, Willow. I know it's been hard, but I really believe she's going to be all right." Had Angel's words unwittingly been the impetus behind Willow's frenetic research into resurrections, and her insistence that she had to try - that Buffy would do the same? That they couldn't leave her in some Hell dimension?
"Does it ever bother you?" Willow asked suddenly, losing Tara somewhere in the Willow Thought Process.
"Does what ever bother me?" Tara asked patiently. Willow, she knew, could make lightning-fast subject-changes, but it had always been an endearing quality, and Tara had learned fairly quickly early on that she just had to ask Willow to tell her what the new subject was, and they'd be fine.
"The me and Buffy thing," Willow clarified, lifting her head and looking at Tara seriously, a troubled look on her face.
"There's a thing?" Tara asked dryly, raising an eyebrow at Willow as she inwardly chuckled.
"What?" Willow asked her eyes widening and a look of Willow-Panic crossing her face. "Oh, no - no thing. No thing at all. Nothing, even, which would be 'no' plus 'thing' - as in, the absence of anything even vaguely resembling a thing. There's never been anything 'thingy' about the thing with me and Buffy, and oh God, I just said 'thing', but I didn't mean 'thing' in the
'thing' thing way, just as a sort of innocuous just friends, but very very good friends of the friendly non-kissy variety. Of course there's no thing - how can you even ask me that?"
"I know there's no thing," Tara said, her voice rich with affection for the girl in her arms and all her quirks. "You two are …" Tara said, composing her thoughts. It was hard to explain the dynamic between Buffy and Willow - hard to show that she completely understood why and how they needed each other, but it was important to her to let Willow know just how much she understood - to lay to rest any doubts Willow might have about how she felt about Willow's friendship with Buffy. "You two are devoted to each other," Tara finally said after a long moment. "Long before I ever showed up, you and Buffy were committed to a life together, no matter how long or short that ended up being."
"Tara, that's not," Willow said, her eyes widening further.
"Shh," Tara said, a soft half-smile crossing her face. "Yes, it is. You could have had any kind of life you wanted, gone off to any college, but you stayed right here. With Buffy."
"You make it sound so … subtexty," Willow said, pulling a face.
"That's not how I mean it," Tara said with a little shrug. "It's … it's hard to explain. But it's there, and I know it's a 'just friends' thing … it's always been and always will be a 'just friends' thing, but at the same time, it's so much more than being 'just friends', y'know? And I don't mean that in a 'not platonic' way … I just … I guess I'm just trying to say that you two have a very deep bond, and I know it. And I'd never do anything to come between you two."
"Tara," Willow said, her voice mildly protesting.
"I'm doing a lousy job of explaining this," Tara said with a sigh, and a pleading look on her face. "It's like … you two have all this history, and that's not a bad thing - it just means you have someone who you can always count on - who'll always be your friend and always love you, unconditionally. You two have had your rough spots, but you always find your way back to each other. It's beautiful - and it's what friendship is supposed to be like, and I'm glad you have it."
"She's my best friend," Willow said firmly, as if those words alone could encompass everything she and Buffy were to each other, and really, she decided, they did.
Tara nodded, her half-smile reappearing. "Exactly," she said with a little shrug. "In a way, knowing you had Buffy made it easier," she added quietly, her expression thoughtful.
"Made what easier?" Willow asked, her brow furrowing as she looked at Tara, wondering what she was referring to. Was that, Willow wondered, how people felt when she made some subject change connection in her head and forgot to explain it before jumping to the new subject?
"When I thought I was going to turn into a demon," Tara said with a light, casual shrug, even as a lost look entered her eyes and her gaze shifted downward. "When I thought I was going to have to leave you to keep you safe. I knew you had Buffy, and that she'd look after you, and do her best."
"Tara," Willow said, her voice serious as she lifted Tara's chin to meet those eyes with her own. "If you had left me then, I'd have been shattered into so many pieces, not Buffy, and not all the king's horses and all the king's men could have put me back together again."
"I know that now," Tara said, biting her lip. "I didn't then, though. I thought … I thought you'd be okay. That it would be better for everyone if I just went."
"How would that have been better for you?" Willow asked, the old anger she had felt at Tara's family when they had tried to take her away rising up. "It would have been better for you to be with them?"
"It would have, if I had turned into a demon," Tara said firmly. "I … I had stopped …" she said, stopping her words, and a look of shame flitting across her face before disappearing.
"Stopped what?" Willow asked softly, her tone gentling. "What is it, baby?" she asked softly, moving her hands from Tara's back and sliding them to her waist, hooking her thumbs underneath the hem of her shirt and stroking the soft skin of her sides gently with her thumbs.
"I just … I stopped caring what happened to them," Tara said with another little shrug and a look of grief on her face, though whether it was because she had stopped caring and felt guilty, or because they had treated her so badly she could no longer be capable of caring and grieved the loss of family, Willow couldn't tell. Probably both, Willow decided. "If … if they had gotten hurt taking care of me, it would have hurt me a lot less than if it had happened to you - or to Dawn or Buffy, or Xander and Anya, or Mr. Giles," Tara said simply. "They stopped being my family when mama died."
"I'm sorry, baby," Willow said softly, pulling Tara into firm hug and holding her close, unsure of what to say.
"For what?" Tara asked softly, clearing her throat to remove the lump that had lodged there. She was tired of crying - had cried far too often in the past few weeks - and here, in Willow's arms, she just inwardly refused to cry anymore. She and Willow were together, and the rest of it could go jump in a lake.
"For everything," Willow said. "That those people hurt you," she went on, refusing to call them Tara's family, "that your mother died, that you were lied to all those years."
"I'm not," Tara said with a little sigh, her eyes dry as she let the comfort Willow was offering settle over her like a warm blanket, a sense of peace and purpose suffusing her.
"Um … huh?" Willow said, thoroughly confused.
"Would I have met you if any of that had been different?" Tara asked softly, raising her head from Willow shoulder and just barely touching Willow's cheek with her fingertips. "Would I be here right now?" she went on, her face so full of love and wonder it took Willow's breath away. "Because I wouldn't trade this for anything in the whole world."
"You … I …" Willow began, her mouth flapping open again and again as she searched for something to say, until finally she snapped her jaw shut with an audible 'click', finding she had no words as the multiple trains of thought running through her head had a huge collision, bringing her brain to a halt as crews were dispatched to look for survivors and to get the trains back on their proper tracks.
Tara just smiled and laughed lightly, realizing she had just rendered Willow completely speechless. That was certainly something new, she thought with an inward chuckle. The only other time Willow had been completely unable to say anything was the day they met, and that had had a demonic influence - she was very certain that Willow would have had a lot to say if she had been able to speak.
"Pancakes," Tara said, hoping the word would bring to Willow's mind the associating task, and that would jump-start her brain again.
"Pancakes," Willow repeated, as the efficient little crew in her head, who looked suspiciously like Disney's version of the Seven Dwarfs, got her pancake train back on track and moving. "Right," she said, and they moved to the counter to start making pancakes.
by SlayerTazz » Mon Jul 15, 2002 5:43 pm 
! Lastly, I get a sense with Willow admitting she doesn't like the idea of letting Tara out of her sight (ie evidenced by her lack of excitement in regards to going back to school), that they still need to sit down, and have open/honest talk about what they went through, in order to truly move-on/heal. Look forward to the next part! 
Heh ... people don't just walk through Hell and come out fine.
. 
I have always liked him, Plus it is so uncool to smack around the crippled.
at: 7/30/02 8:49:34 am
at: 7/30/02 8:47:21 am