|
Ch 18, Pt IV
The front door squeaked and Tara knew without looking that her brother had joined her. He closed the door softly behind him, standing at the edge of the porch steps for a moment, as caught in his own thoughts as she was in hers.
"Thought I was gonna have to drag your ass back here kicking an' screaming… Dad kept telling me that I had to do it, for your sake- that he didn't want to be the villain this time." His tone was mean, but the words still gave her a sort of comfort. "When we left, Dad said you'd be crawlin' back in no time."
Tara nodded. There was a clink of glass and Donny raised a couple of longnecks into sight. "Beer?"
She shook her head. The morals of underage drinking aside, she'd discovered early on that beer was nasty stuff. Everyone said it was an acquired taste, but why make the effort to acquire it? It was cheaper to get drunk on Two Buck Chuck, if that was the point.
"That's right. Not twenty-one yet, got to obey the rules or the boogeyman will get you." He crossed in front of her, slouching onto the other side of the swing as he used one beer to pop the cap of the other.
She didn't correct the assumption. If she'd stayed home, there is no question that would have been accurate. Her father would have been furious to hear that she'd ever been drunk, and probably suspicious of just how much alcohol that adventure had required. Now that she thought about it, her mother had seldom touched anything more than a glass of wine in a week. It might have been simple preference, but she had to wonder now if inebriation could affect her shifting. It would have been ample deterrent to excess if the demon within could be so easily revealed. She filed the idea away for later consideration.
"You don't look like a demon to me." Donny took a swig of his beer before letting it dangle from near-slack fingers. "But then, Mama didn't either."
"We can hide it," she almost whispered.
"But you're still you. I thought, I dunno, you'd go postal or some shit like that till Dad got you taken care of." He snorted. "Hard to imagine, but maybe you were like some kind of werewolf or something- like it wasn't all the time. He wouldn't say."
"It's… complicated." There were things that she was never, ever going to talk to Donny about. Suddenly her father's position was a little more understandable. Silence settled between them for a long minute.
"I don't think I've ever seen Dad as upset as that… barely said a word the whole drive back here. Wouldn't stop for nothing."
The grammar-Nazi in Tara's head was shaking it's fist, but this was nothing new. Her mother had never been happy with Donny's tendency to speak like the hoodlums he chose to hang out with, but had limited success trying to dissuade him. It was the one act of rebellion that he hadn't retreated from, though he was markedly less obnoxious in their father's presence. In spite of that concession, Tara had overheard more than once her father asking why her mother couldn't even keep her son civil. He'd tried to cut off Donny's contact with the kids, but since they rode the same bus to school it had been a losing battle.
After another long stretch of silence, there was a clink as Donny set his now empty bottle next to the unopened one on the ground. "Things were bad when you left, you know. He said I drove you off."
"No, Donny… no." She looked at him, slouched on the bench with an air of indifference, seeing his hurt for what it was. They'd never been close- Donny had tried to take out on her the frustrations that couldn't be expressed anywhere else, only to find her quietly resisting in the way that their father would never tolerate. He openly resented her closeness to their mother, repeatedly failing to try to garner the same affection. They had the shared burden of the demon and the shared guilt for the toll it took on the family. In some twisted way, Donny suffered from the lack of these, unable to relate. His was a more mundane weight of expectation and duty, but it was no less onerous for its simplicity.
Donny had to know, rationally, that his part in her decision to escape was relatively minor. But guilt, as she knew too well, didn't always pay attention to logic. Sometimes it clung as a residue from the constant flow that they moved in and around. His was the only voice in the house that ever raised in argument, his were the words that carried open threat, though he hadn't acted on them since he'd gotten out of junior high. The posturing was his defense against the world, as much as her silence had been. Still was.
"Before…" Her brother's voice broke the quiet again, the assumed backcountry accent falling away. "When Mama died, I was gonna leave, you know. I had it all set with Fernando's brother up in LA- he's got a brake shop…"
Tara waited for the rest of the story, but whatever had possessed her brother to that confession seemed unable to spur him further. He'd been as adamant as her father about how the family had to stick together, in her memory. Donny had been more clear in his resentment of having to care for the women of the family, but was no less steadfast in his intention to do what he could. That's what families do. Sacrifices must be made, but any decent person would do the same.
What their father actually did that kept the demon in check had been an unquestioned mystery, but Donny had his own share of duties. He had to be home to watch his sister so their mother could keep up her transcription schedule. He had to be there for the times when their mother began to loose her focus, to make her aware she was slipping, and if worst came to worst, call their father home. He had to maintain the computer system their father used for his business. Sometimes he had to go with their father, if the job needed another set of hands. Their father paid him for that work- direct to an account set up for his engineering degree. None of it was hard. Just constant, and tightly tied to the family. That was normal, though. A good family is close knit.
"W-why didn't you go?" If only he had. It would have given her the proof that leaving was possible, not just a daydream that would lead to a lifetime of insecurity and loneliness.
When she'd left, it was because she had given up. Like they said in Old Man River, she'd been "tired of livin' and afeared of dyin". If becoming a demon was inevitable, the burden on her family inescapable, then she had an end point- hoping that when she had to, she could conquer her fear for the brief time she had to. Her mother no longer needed her. She decided to give her family the freedom they couldn't ask for, planning her departure until the end of high school and then disappearing as completely as she was able. Only when Willow had become a fixture in her life had that plan been changed, hope kindling where she thought there was none and turning to desperation as the deadline drew nigh.
"Are you kidding? After the way you betrayed his trust, what was I supposed to do? Leave him too? You didn't see what he was like when you left-" Her brother switched abruptly to a vein more familiar to them both, crushing the ache in his voice with disparaging rectitude, "How could I let him try to keep this whole place up, inside and out? He can't even keep his business straight unless I update his database every month-" Donny cut off the short tirade. He'd made their father sound incapable, when they both knew he was anything but. He just made use of the resources he had, and that included his kids. It wasn't like he could let someone else keep his books, privy to information that could be misused in ruinous ways. Family could be trusted, family was available, and there was no reason to think they wouldn't always be there for him. Good people, after all, do not shirk their responsibilities.
"I can't stay here." She drew both feet up, arms clasped around her knees, the toes of her shoes just peeking out from under her skirt. The chill had started to creep in now, bringing the stars into sharper focus as the insulating cloud cover moved on.
"Oh? Then why'd you come back?" That was all the answer Donny needed, and if she'd never left, she would have seen it the same way. Tara had left, Tara was back, ergo Tara could not leave- not in any permanent way. She was proof of the inescapability that he'd accepted. She knew, because she had felt it too.
"I just need to know what Mama had to do to deal with being… this."
"What is "this", Tara? Why- I mean, he made it sound like he was the only thing that kept Mama safe. And she had to work at it- you know how she got. Why can you be so…" He waved a hand in her general direction, repeating what he'd already asked, "you?"
"Magic. Love. Friends." It had taken all three, and still had not been enough.
"Magic? Fight evil with a little more evil? God- I always wondered why Dad didn't keep mom from teaching you that crap."
"Magic isn't evil," she sighed, knowing that she'd conceded silently too many times over the years for Donny to believe her now.
"Not in itself, maybe. But if it's not the demon, how come you and Mama could do it so much easier than Gramps?" Unspoken was how Donny had abandoned the Craft that their mother had tried to teach him when he'd found his little sister's talents so far outstripped his own. His scorn of magic was largely defensive of his long-ago wounded pride, but it had also been a way he'd tried to gain the acceptance of their father. Magic was tied to demons, so he had solid reason to refuse any part of it, and he had happily ridiculed the hippie religion that espoused it. Somehow, for all her father's own belittling words on the same subject, Donny had never found solidarity- only receiving the demand that he respect his mother.
Being a demon probably did play a role in the relative ease that the Maclay women could manipulate magic, but that still didn't make it evil. She tried to come up with a good illustration, but settled for the only one that came to mind. "Just because a bee can fly doesn't mean that flying is caused by making honey. It's just something it can do, the same as a, um, bird or a butterfly."
A screech of a bat overhead reminded them of other things that flew. Tara allowed herself a grin. She and Mama used to root for the bats from this porch, exhorting their bug consumption like it was a team sport, if somewhat less loudly than most fans. Gramps had started it all, somewhere in her foggy recollection, responding to a child's fear of the odd sounds by suddenly cheering, "Go get'm boys!" before telling her and Donny gravely, "You've got a good set of bats here. Those mosquitos'll be droppin' like… well, droppin' like flies in no time.
Her grandfather was living in Florida now, in a retirement home posing as a 'Community for Graceful Living'. He'd been an infrequent visitor, held by her father to be a shiftless hippie that was tolerated because the old man happened to be his wife's only living relative. That he wasn't related by blood and kept practicing his Wiccan ways without apology was ever a source of unvoiced friction.
"He talked about you all the time. Kept expecting you to show up on the doorstep, all weepy." Donny stood, the motion setting the swing into sudden motion. "Took a while, but I guess he was right."
Tara didn't respond and after a moment Donny brushed by, slipping back inside. It was a long time before she moved, her brother's final words hanging in her mind.
------------------
Willow wished Sunnydale General had HBO. Or the Discovery Channel. Even daytime PAX would be okay, but The Shopping Network was the hottest thing on at three in the morning and somehow she had trouble being fascinated by the latest miracle mop.
She'd woken two hours before and, despite wanting badly to rest up for her intended departure, was not even remotely tired. The nervous energy she'd started with hadn't been touched by the Benadryl her nurse had given her, and only dulled somewhat by the Restoril that followed an hour later. She tried to engage the kindly Filipina in conversation, but with the combination of a very heavy accent and a patient with hourly neurological checks that needed to be done it was a losing proposition.
The good news of the night was that she'd been able to get up and make her way to the bathroom with only the stabilization from her IV pole. Nurse Bonita had been very unhappy to find her half way across the room, convincing her legs that the crampy soreness was all in her head and not a legitimate reason to cease functioning, but other than hovering close enough to catch her if she fell, allowed her to do as she wished.
Internal celebration for the simple feat was silly, but it buoyed her enough for the ten foot trek back to bed. The ache that followed seemed unfair, but she had dropped off to sleep again not long after and was spared the worst of it.
There was no mystery as to the central place that peeing had taken in her current life. The IV was running constantly, soaking her in fluids that were supposed to wash the damaged muscle material out of her system without breaking her kidneys in the process. It was yet more proof that glomeruli were deserving of her undying antipathy. Or, not 'undying', because that had ominous implications, but at least 'persistent'.
Tomorrow's egress would be a question of balance- the earlier the better, in terms of how soon she'd be able to help Tara. The later the better, in terms of likelihood of success in actually getting out the door, back to her parents house, finding out where she was going, and driving there without doing something inconvenient like falling asleep at the wheel.
Willow closed her eyes, trying to make her body go limp one piece at a time, gradually trying to achieve the state of a well-cooked noodle. Like the Jello she'd gotten with her "just to be safe" soft-food-only dinner. Like the pizza they got from Luchetti's, that would dump all it's toppings in your lap if you weren't careful.
Great, now she was hungry and awake. Maybe they'd let her sneak one of the graham crackers that the med students always seemed to be snacking on.
--------------------------------
"-wer's free now."
Tara opened her eyes with a start, momentarily disoriented by the familiar-yet-not surroundings. She turned her head to see Beth peeking in the door with an insincere smile.
"Hnn- sorry?" She propped herself up on her elbows, trying to blink away the sandy feeling in her eyes and rally her mind to wakefulness.
"Oh, I'm so sorry. Your brother and dad are always up by six thirty, so I thought, it being seven and all…" Beth shrugged unapologetically opening the door the rest of the way and walking in, "I thought you'd like to know that the shower is free. I tried to be quick so there'd be enough hot water left-" She flicked open the curtains, letting the brilliant morning light stream in. Her eyes focused on Tara and widened, her face blanching, "God- it's true-"
Before Tara could do anything about the marks of the demon that had surfaced as she slept, her cousin disappeared. She let herself drop back to the pillow with a sigh, glad that at least her tail was still hidden under the rumpled covers.
Seven on a Sunday. If there were church to go to, or any reason at all, she'd accept it willingly. Religion was "a crutch for those whose character was too weak to give them a moral compass without it", but Daddy approved of church goers. They needed someone to tell them what to do, and it was to their credit that they recognized it.
It was good that Willow wasn't here. Waking her lady love before ten on a Sunday was asking for a long, crabby day unless you had something to convince her it was worth it. Tara caught herself before the thought of a few of those mornings could form in a goofy grin on her face. Goofy grins had no place at seven in the morning, and certainly not after as fitful a night as she'd had.
Sleep had claimed her quickly, when she'd finally crawled under fresh, tightly tucked sheets and a comforter that still held that indefinable scent of the home she'd grown up in. Residual of Beth's rosemary shampoo was a strong, acerbic scent that layered over rather than overwhelmed that essence that recalled her childhood so vividly. She'd dreamed mostly of her mother, though she wasn't sure of the details, waking with the sense of loss, later guilt, later shame, and once with such a soulless emptiness that she found her hands knotted painfully tight on her pillow.
There was no use in trying to reclaim sleep now. She wasn't the teenager that could just roll over and rejoin the world of oblivion anymore, even if she'd wanted to. Today, it was better to do what her father would want. "Butt out of bed, feet on the floor" was the cheerful phrase that had rung from her doorway on plenty of early mornings, followed by a conversation about what needed to be done while her mind emerged sluggishly from somnolence. She had to remember what was said- he'd always assume she was awake from the moment he opened the door, just lying in bed because she was too lazy to get up.
Beth had left the door wide open, also in the tradition of her father. Tara sat at the edge of the bed for a moment, dreading the day. Whether her father would part readily with the secrets he'd shared with her mother was only part of it. She didn't really want to know, given the nature of the problem at hand, the details of her parents' solution. If there had been some anonymous third party, it would still be embarrassing, but manageable.
Better that she be mortified for a day than making others suffer- it was something she knew logically and morally, but it still quailed under the gateless barrier of Things You Don't Ask Your Parents. Her mother had been open about the birds and the bees from as early as she could recall, but it was always something separate, removed from her parents. She'd been aware, abstractly, that her parents had to have been intimate at least twice to have had Donny and herself, but it had remained happily abstract even through sixth grade Heath Ed.
She found a mirror on the dresser that must be Beth's, critically examining the dark mask, horns, and ridges she saw. As best she could tell, they were unchanged over the last few days- hopefully indicative that they were in their stable, final forms. If that heralded the end of her quickening, it would be a huge boon- from what Jean had told her, the need to feed would drop significantly, and with it, the speed with which the Draw built around her.
She hoped to check if Jean had yet sent the login to the succubus network, but wasn't sure that her mentor would still be inclined to send it. If her connection to the Slayer, coupled with Willow's unveiled computer sleuthing, made her seem too much of a risk, she might never get the benefit of what others of her kind had learned.
Willow. She needed to call the hospital again. Tara had called around noon the prior day, first to the room, then to the nurse's station when her girlfriend failed to answer. It had been an enormous relief to hear that the redhead had woken, if briefly, to what appeared to be full consciousness, though disappointing that she couldn't speak with her directly. She couldn't risk Willow calling the house, so hadn't left any message, and to her chagrin, she'd forgotten her intent to call back until after it was too late to consider.
The markings faded readily when she told them to, but her tail decided to rebel with a twinge to one of the muscles she knew she hadn't had before. Keeping it hidden the entire day prior had been progressively more difficult, and by the time she'd gotten to the porch that night, it had been an enormous relief to let it simply curl loosely around her legs. Even the discomfort of sitting on it had been only a minor annoyance in comparison.
Somehow she could hide the tail that protruded from her tastefully altered Flying Toaster pajamas long enough to get to the shower. The water should pull her mind out of its sleepy fuzz, giving her at least a start point of calm in a day that was likely to be anything but.
"What'd you think, Beth, we just made all this shit up?" Her brother's voice was amused, though Tara could read no more into it from this distance. She made no particular effort to listen, but her bedroom was the closest to the front of the house and the words were clear enough.
"She has horns, Donny." Her cousin's voice was just shy of hysterical. "That doesn't worry you, even a bit? Did you miss genetics in high school or something? Half of you is-"
"Ever seen a woman who's colorblind, Beth?" Her brother's enjoyment had dimmed, but his tone was still that of casual conversation.
"No, it's X-linked."
"Same kind of thing- Mama was like Tara, but it doesn't pass to the men."
"How do you know that? I remember Aunt Judy was adopted, so how-"
"She and Dad learned about it somehow. I don't know." The edge of annoyance that was surfacing evidenced her brother's discomfort with not having a full answer more than any confusion would have.
Beth's words were cautious when she spoke again. "Men might get colorblindness, but women are carriers- you still have the genes."
"It's part of that whole magic thing." Donny dismissed. "It's not supposed to make sense."
"But if you have kids, don't you need to know-"
"I am never havin' kids." His vehemence was unchanged from when Tara had last heard him make the assertion years before.
Tara realized she had been standing and eavesdropping for far longer than she'd realized, quickly gathering her things. The bathroom was just across the hall, so a quick peek to see if the coast was clear was all she needed to make the trip without showing off her tail.
-------------------------------------------------
"Sign each one, then date."
Willow gave Dr. Tautashep a look of annoyance before signing away all her rights in a quick shuffle of unread pages. The first time she'd left Against Medical Advice, she'd taken the time to read them all- after all, one should know what one is signing. It seemed odd that there was paperwork even for this. Couldn't she just walk out the door and ignore all this?
Yes, but it would feel wrong.
"This seems to be a habit of yours." Dr. Tautashep thumbed through the pages while Willow shifted impatiently in her seat. "When I looked at your old chart on the computer… have you ever actually stayed till we said you were good to go?"
"Look- I have somewhere I need to be. I know you want to make sure nothing will happen to me, but hey-" She pointed at the pile of paper. "That pretty much says it's all on my head if I fall over dead as soon as I step out the door. Which I won't. I feel fine. Peppy even." Willow gave him her best perky smile, which was marred only by how hard she was trying.
"You've recovered remarkably fast…" The doctor's grin was wry and he kept his eyes glued to the paperwork that he was now writing on. "Almost like magic."
"Um- yea. Eheh. Almost!" Willow kept her words cheerfully noncommittal as she watched for a reaction. She would look into whether Dr. Tautashep was going to be the future Sunnydale General contact for all things mystical, something that would be incredibly handy to be aware of, but that could wait till she got back.
"Right-o. Here's the copy for you and we're all set." Dr. Tautashep passed over a page full of eight point font. He didn't get up immediately, but seemed to be having some sort of internal debate. Willow began to wonder if she should just leave, but he finally spoke.
"Your girlfriend- the lady that was here… be careful, okay. She'd not what you think."
"I know what she is." The concern was nice, but everyone assuming that Willow was ignorant was getting on her nerves. She had her answer about the doctor being clued in, though, on the plus side. She gave him what she hoped was a confident smile. "We're going to figure this out."
"She might not mean to have hurt you, but… Miss Rosenberg, messing with demons is bad business." The doctor read something in her face that made him sigh. "Look, just be careful. I don't want to see you back in here, and I really don't want to be the one that has to declare you DOA downstairs."
"I'll do my best. Anything else?"
"No driving till you're seizure-free for six months, or your neurologist says otherwise. And you should make an appointment with Dr. Ellis, if he's on your insurance plan for outpatient- he's the one who saw you here, so he'd know your case. We can't really schedule the follow-ups for you since you're leaving AMA, but go through your primary care and they'll get you set up. I'm going to dictate a discharge summary in a minute." He lifted the papers in his hand. "You already signed the record release, so the information should be in their hands by Tuesday. Any questions?"
"Um… no?" It wasn't like they were actually going to be able to notify the DMV about the driving thing before she'd gotten where she needed to be. No need to question it.
"Anybody picking you up?" Dr. Tautashep stood by as Willow levered herself out of her chair.
"A classmate- she's meeting me in the lobby." The redhead started toward the elevators, pleased to find that she was even less unsteady than she'd hoped. This spell of Tara's seriously rocked. Day one, coma. Day two, sleep. Day three, recovery. Day four, hasta la vista. Not a Slayer-fast rebound, but not too shabby. While still stiff and sore, the exhaustion was gone, replaced by a jittery energy that had moved up her departure plans when she decided she'd go crazy without something meaningful to do to keep her mind off where she wanted to be.
Imelda was waiting in one of the lobby chairs, gazing disinterestedly at CNN. The girl had shared two classes with Willow the prior year, and she'd had the dubious honor of being the only non-Scooby person that Willow knew the number of and was picking up the phone. She felt a bit guilty asking for a ride from someone she wasn't really on a trading-favors basis with, but her conscience was salved by knowing that she'd been the primary reason that Imelda had passed freshman Chemistry. It wasn't that the girl wasn't smart or working hard enough, but the foundations that high school should have given her were utterly lacking.
They exchanged brief greetings, Willow giving thanks for the ride, apologies for the wait, and vague excuses for why she'd been hospitalized. She had collapsed and she was anemic, but nobody needed to hear about things like seizures, comas, and massive epistaxis.
She went back to campus with Imelda for just long enough to throw some things in a bag on top of her laptop, then imposed on the tolerant girl for one last ride to the elder Rosenberg abode. She was finally alone there at just short of noon, impatiently booting up her computer while she worked her way through a bag of cinnamon pita chips. Hospitals needed to learn the healing power of pita chips- it could spark a health care revolution.
It took precisely twelve minutes to get the information she'd spent the last day agonizing over, another two to get the route Google-mapped, and five more to determine that there was a Dairy Queen en route- because a road trip without Dairy Queen is like Cracker Jacks without a prize, even in extenuating circumstances. They would need a good place to celebrate their return on the way back, too.
Willow wondered briefly whether she should bring either a shovel, or at least some kind of magic component-type contingency plan. The shovel seemed the better plan. It was big, obvious, and unambiguous. Magic was still in the 'wishful thinking' category, as another quick telekinetic attempt produced only a twinge deep in her sinuses. Maybe the butter knife had shifted a bit at her push, but that wasn't going to impress anyone the way shooting it into a wall would.
Actually, Tara might not be happy if I messed up the walls. Maybe I could just smack Donny with the spoon.
It wasn't like the Maclays were strangers to magic. From what Tara had said about her mother, there had been some serious power residing in that house. It was conceivable that they'd seen anything Willow could do and more, even if she hadn't been running on empty.
Glancing at the clock again, the redhead chewed on one last potential delay. She'd done a couple of meditative things in the hospital in an effort to both relieve her ansy nerves and encourage any magic recovery that she could. It turned out that hospitals were really poor for gathering ambient energy. It made some sense that all the bodies attempting to heal would suck it out naturally, but that didn't keep it from being frustrating.
With another glance at the clock she decided against another crack at refueling the mana tank. If she didn't hit any traffic, it would still take over four hours to get where she needed to be and who knows what Tara was going through. She shut down her computer and looted her parents' cabinets for portable food. Tara's letter had warned her about possible hunger, but it hadn't really hit before. Now? Munchies Gone Wild, the unrated edition.
Through all of this she had been tidying. Her clothes had been tossed together in a pile, which she pitched straight in the laundry, followed by the stinky sheets from upstairs. Tara's clothes were noticeably absent, which had concerned her until she recalled that only she herself had left the house naked as a jaybird that night. That had frozen her in horror for a full minute, before post-traumatic amnesia obligingly kicked in, allowing her to keep straightening the pillows on the couch and replacing ornaments that had been knocked to the floor.
By one-thirty she was ready, striding toward the front door armed with her raided supplies and backpack. The doorbell rang just as she reached for the front doorknob, giving her a heart attack and sending her snack sack flying. Mini-Musketeers from her mother's 'secret' stash skittered across the entryway like little silver roaches.
Tasty roaches, but… OK, that train of thought was just gross.
She yanked open the door, determined that band was not going to get a buck from her to support their next trip, the Girl Scouts were not going to sell her more than a dozen boxes, and the Mormons were not going to get her to call them "LDS", because that sounded a little too close to a psychedelic drug and they should really go for "Ecstasy" or "Dom" if they were going to go that route.
Instead, she just blinked stupidly for a moment before her face drew into a fierce scowl.
"Xander."
------------------TBC in Ch 19... because for Ch 18 to have 5 parts would be gratuitous.
|
Login
FAQ
Search
... or least have them figure out a way to find out what they need to know from Mr. Maclay... which I'm sure you're not going to make easy for them...
some sense into Xander before going after Tara... I truly hope that Willow & Tara get the information from Tara's dad without paying too heavy price...
... I truly hope that Willow finds Tara before Tara does something "stupid" in trying to control the Draw...