Time Heals All: a Willow/Tara fic with a terrible title

Author: Big_Pineapple

Feedback: Yes, including title suggestions, line edits, and general comments

Spoilers: vague reference to all seasons

Setting: Pre-season six and onward, AU.

Rating: PG-13, I think

Disclaimer: Copyright law. My girlfriend explained it to me once, but we were both falling asleep. Thank you, Mutant Enemy, for giving me Tara, but you jumped the shark.

Summary: Willow, age 36, does a good deed for the PtB, and she is rewarded with an opportunity to undo the canon.


Part I: The Wish

Willow’s bad knee popped when she bent it trying to sit up, and the light sent a spike of pain through her head. How did it get to be morning? And the baby. There was a baby. Was the baby okay?

There was nothing to lean on to help her stand, at least nothing she could see while squinting. She rolled over and pushed off from the ground with her hands. Her eyes began to adjust, and she blinked into a long white corridor.

“Oh crap,” she thought. “I’m dead.”

Then she heard a baby giggle. She spun and lost her balance, wavering idiotically and trying to force her eyes to focus. A man made of solid gold was sitting on the white steps in front of a white doorway, cradling an ordinary gurgling child. A golden woman stood over him, lifting her gaze from the child to Willow.

“We owe you a debt, Willow Rosenberg,” she murmured. “You have done a thing few mortals would even try to do.”

“Oh, good. Could ya maybe remind me what it was, exactly? ‘Cause, see, I think I hit my head, and I’m a little fuzzy on the details. And maybe you could turn the lights down in here? It’s kind of bright. Really clean, though…” Willow stared around at the blank white walls, jaw loose.

The golden man sneered. “She does not even know what she has done. Take her out of here, she stinks of death.”

Ignoring him, the woman stepped into the center of the room, drawing Willow’s attention to her face and the slight glimmer of golden cleavage. “We are the powers that be, and you have saved a life that is dear to us. What do you wish in return?”

Willow cocked her head. “Aren’t you supposed to know that already?”

“Few people ask for what they truly desire, but what is wanted must be asked for here.”

“Okey dokey,” Willow said. She shifted her weight and winced at the pain in her knee. She really should take the time to do her physical therapy. Maybe she could wish for more hours in the day. But that wasn’t what she really wanted.

She knew what she really wanted. She could see Tara’s crooked smile, her elegant awkwardness, the way things used to be when she was here.

“No,” Willow muttered out loud, “Selfish Willow. Focus. We played this game in middle school, the genie gives you three wishes. What was the best one? World peace?”

The golden woman chuckled. “You must wish for something that’s possible, I’m afraid.”

Willow kicked her leg to ease the ache, and the bad joint popped again. “What would Buffy wish for?”

“Is that a baby?” she had asked her friend last night, or at least Willow assumed it was last night. “I think I hear a baby crying.”

“It’s the apocalypse, Wil,” Buffy had snapped, “Everyone’s crying.”

Willow had stopped in her tracks. “Just trying to help,” she’d grumbled, and, hearing the noise again, had followed a different path than her friend. No, Buffy wouldn’t know what to do with a wish. But what about the old Buffy, the one who had died a hero?

“She just wanted to help.”

The golden man snorted. “Mortals always think they can.”

“We do!” Willow snarled, “All the time!”

“Oh yes, you’ve done so much good.”

Willow stared at him, warding off the memories that kept her awake at night. She wasn’t perfect. At thirty-six, she no longer expected herself to be. But the man was right. It could have been better.

“I want to make things right. The things I’ve done, I want to do them better. Or, not at all, I mean, the good stuff could be better, and the bad stuff could go away, and… Is that like world peace?”

There was something like pity in their eyes when the golden people stared at her. The man sighed.

“Go home,” the woman commanded. “Sleep. You will have twenty-four hours to find your way. You may speak of those things which were and are and must always be, but not of the future you seek to change.”

“Wait, what?”

Willow’s question echoed down the alley where she had found the baby and the massive cult of demons. Still no clue how she’d managed that one. Behind her, the sky was fading from black to gray in a sulky version of sunrise. It was half a mile to the closest bus stop, a thirty-minute bus ride to home.

Home was a cramped apartment where un-graded papers loomed in tottering stacks on the kitchen table, and she’d have to be quiet coming in to avoid waking Xander. He slept so lightly he could hear her breathe sometimes, but at least he slept. Willow eased herself into the least creaky kitchen chair and pulled her laptop toward her. Seven students had emailed her begging for their paper drafts. She’d have to push back the due date for revisions, again. The papers were from two separate classes, all close to the bottom of the stack. One cascaded onto the floor when she tried to move it, and only a subconsciously cast silencing spell allowed Xander to rest in peace.

“The Impact of Gender on Internet Participation,” Willow read at the top of the first paper. “This should be interesting.” Grading for proper formatting and citation took some of the fun out, but the kid had done original research. She sat in the front row, off to the left, if Willow was thinking of the right Sara. Neither of them in that class actually talked, so it was hard to tell. It was definitely the one who had written about gender pressure in the classroom earlier in the term. Would there be time to talk to her for a while, maybe give her some good old feminist empowerment so she’d speak up instead of just writing?

Drool from the pen dripped on Sara’s paper, and Willow set the chewed-up pen aside before it burst and covered her favorite pants in ink. That was the last thing she needed. The new pen didn’t work as well, and bearing down only made her handwriting more illegible.

Xander’s alarm blared at six o’clock. Willow could hear him thumping around in the bathroom upstairs, and it occurred to her that he hadn’t questioned the fact that she wasn’t home before he went to bed.

“Don’t worry about staying up for me,” she called up the stairs. “I’ll be fine!”

Electric shaver in hand, Xander shambled down the stairs. “I thought you were already back,” he said. “Didn’t want to wake you.”

Willow shrugged. “Coffee?”

“Expresso?”

“Is there any other kind?”

Exhaustion hit Willow in a wave when she opened the bag of coffee grounds. Triple shot for today, then. She rubbed her eyes and reached a shaking hand into the cabinet for two mugs. Her fingers spasmed, and one of the mugs smashed on the kitchen floor.

“Fiddle sticks!”

Xander raised an eyebrow. “We’re grown-ups now, Wil,” he said. “We can say bad words.”

“Fucking shit,” she spat, and Xander hugged her.

“When was the last time you slept?”

“Honestly?” Willow asked. “I can’t remember.”

Xander held her at arm’s length. “Shower. Sleep. It’s good for you.” His eyes searched her face for a sign she was still able to understand English. Willow covered her face with her twitching hands. Xander sighed.

“Take a pill,” he told her.

“I have a class at two,” she protested.

“Take half a pill.”

Willow shook her head, and she couldn’t stop the motion. Xander wrapped her arm around his shoulders and steered her to the stairs. She shook him off.

“You’re gonna be late for work.”

“I’ll clean up the mug. Go sleep.” Xander watched Willow bend her knee and wince, then sway on her good leg. “Are you okay?”

Willow nodded and leaned against the banister. “Fine,” she yawned. “Finey mcfine-fine.”

Xander ordered her to sleep again, then asked her where the broom was. Willow could hear the broken china scraping into the dust pan while she meandered into the bathroom to brush her teeth.

“These walls are thin,” she thought, as she did every morning.

She snapped a sleeping pill in half, swallowed one, then stared at the other half vaguely before deciding to slip it into her pocket. Her knee ached too much now to stand in the shower. She’d wash up when she woke up, if she had time before her class. If she slept.

Shoes and socks abandoned on the way to the bed, Willow burrowed into the covers and closed her eyes, wondering if she should take off her nice shirt before she got too drowsy.

When she stretched again and tried to roll over, she slipped and hit her elbow on pavement.

“I have got to stop waking up in weird places,” she grumbled, thinking she should tell her doctor about the somnambulism the sleeping pills caused. That sort of thing could be dangerous.

She sat up slowly, using the porch step she’d been sleeping on to help her. There was something familiar about this porch step.

Willow jumped back, her knee cracking painfully, and stared up at the Summers home in Sunnydale.

Ooh! Off to an interesting start. I loooooove time travel/do it over fics!

Willow's knee is both sad and hilarious. You know you're old when joints are a-creakin'! Keep it up, definitely wanna see where you take this.

This is interesting, I'd like to see where you go with it. You've already established some things that create more questions than answers. I hope you continue with it.


Heather

Time Heals All: a Willow/Tara fic with a terrible title

Author: Big_Pineapple

Feedback: Yes, including title suggestions, line edits, and general comments

Spoilers: vague reference to all seasons

Setting: Pre-season six and onward, AU.

Rating: PG-13, I think

Disclaimer: Copyright law. My girlfriend explained it to me once, but we were both falling asleep. Thank you, Mutant Enemy, for giving me Tara, but you jumped the shark.

Summary: Willow, age 36, does a good deed for the PtB, and she is rewarded with an opportunity to undo the canon.


Part II: Shadow

Fighting with Tara made Willow’s stomach all acidy, and she’d had nightmares about Glory showing up in their bedroom. She’d tried to use magic, but all she could manage was to throw a wet lasagna noodle at the God, and Tara was blathering in the background about horses, which only increased the tension. She’d soaked herself, the sheets, and Tara’s back where it had touched her with sweat. Tara’s back had been against her all night, and that was weird in and of itself.

Coffee and sassy eggs were served when Willow came out of the shower, and Tara called good morning without quite meeting her eye. Willow gulped the coffee and ignored the eggs. Miss Kitty Fantastico mewed at her, but she was headed out the door.

“No Kitty, don’t lick the eggs,” Tara said instead of goodbye.

Willow didn’t see herself scramble out of her way on the sidewalk, but the other Willow watched her go.

“I remember this day,” she had been thinking, watching the scene through a window. The flash of Tara’s hair, the way her arms moved when she reached up to drag Miss Kitty off the counter, had distracted her from the bulldozer exit her past self had made. If she had caught a glimpse of Tara’s face, she wasn’t sure she could have moved at all.

Whirling on herself, Willow ran down the sidewalk, yelling, “Hey you! Or, me. Hey!”

The girl acted like she was deaf. Willow charged forward, knee be damned, and grabbed at the back of the younger Willow’s shirt. Nothing happened. It didn’t feel like when she was a ghost, and her fingers simply slipped through, or the time when she was trapped in Buffy’s house and Halfreck’s barrier stopped her from reaching. Life simply skipped the moment when the two Willows touched.

Willow stopped and glared at the sky, where she assumed the powers that be were, watching, laughing. “How am I supposed to talk sense into myself if I don’t even know I’m here?”

The younger Willow was half a block ahead of her now, and Willow limped after, losing her around a corner. She knew where she was going, though, and she remembered how to get to the Magic Box.

No one looked up when the bell jingled, not even Anya. Willow knew she was substantial. The pavement had hurt when she fell on it, and the door had felt like a normal door when she pushed it. A man driving by in the street had even pulled over and asked if she needed a ride somewhere. She strode up to the counter and snapped her fingers in Giles’s face. He scratched his nose.

“Really?” Willow groaned.

She snatched a book from the table in the center of the shop, wondering what would happen if she threw it at him.

“Private collection,” Giles said from the counter, but he had only glanced up. “Books for sale are along the wall, here.”

Willow slumped. “Just looking.”

She thumbed through the book, fuming. It was one of the few that had survived the havoc she’d wreaked on the Magic Box, which was lucky. It had a little information on the Bringers, one of the only hints they’d had that next year. Maybe she could scan all the books they’d lost and save them to CDs, bring them back to the future with her. That would be helpful. She carried the book up the stairs with her and nestled into the shelves of long-lost information, ignoring Giles’s reminder that it was a private collection. She could mark the information about the First, the Bringers, the spell she’d used to raise Buffy, and hope it would help them find the answers faster. Xander would be here in an hour or two, and maybe he would see her.

When he came, he flopped down next to the younger Willow, his back to the balcony of books. Willow picked up a small crystal and tossed it at the table; when it hit, Xander looked straight up.

“You throw it, you buy it,” Anya snapped, glaring at a point that wasn’t quite Willow. “Store policy.”

“Sometimes I almost miss you,” Willow answered. Anya didn’t seem to hear.

“How’s it going, Wil?” Xander asked the younger Willow. She squirmed on the bench.

“I had a fight with Tara, and she’s all mad at me because she thought I was saying one thing, but I wasn’t, but she wouldn’t hear me out, and now I feel like there’s something really important I need her help with, but she won’t help me because she doesn’t get it, and I don’t get why she doesn’t get it and it’s just a great big don’t-get mess!” She glanced around the shop, almost making eye contact with the older Willow. “I got louder than I meant to.”

Xander squeezed her hand. “Fights are tough.”

“I just wish I could have a do-over, you know? Try it again, maybe get through to her.”

“Wouldn’t that be nice,” Xander chuckled.

From above, Willow watched the wheels turn. She kicked herself for not snatching the herb and flower directory off the table, but then, she would have found it anyway, the younger one. When the fight with Tara over resurrecting Buffy had started last night, it had only entrenched her more. Everything had, everything would. There was no talking to this girl.

Willow snapped the book in her hand shut in a rush of inspiration, catching and pulling her hair in the process.

“Ow,” she thought, then focused herself. “There’s no point talking to me, I won’t listen. Giles would try to talk to me, and that wouldn’t help either. Xander could make a difference, but not on his own. He tried, but I was pulling everyone’ else’s strings. Dawn doesn’t have the resources, and Anya doesn’t care about anything except Xander and the Magic Box. That only leaves…”

Willow buried her face in her hands and took a long, shuddering breath. The only one who could help her was Tara.

It wasn’t hard to remember exactly what Tara was doing that day; she’d spent most of her own day obsessing over it, calculating exactly how long she had to find the plant she needed, consecrate it, and cast the spell before Tara got home. When she had come home, she was radiant, and Dawn had dragged them off to dinner and a movie they couldn’t afford. But Dawn had passed her math final that week, so they had agreed she deserved a reward. Willow moaned in frustration. There would be no way to interrupt the day; Tara would be in public places, never alone, until after the spell was cast.

“But this is stupid!” she said, “Why would the Powers that be give me twenty-four hours, then make me just sit here until eleven at night?”

“Oh hey, look at the time! I forgot I have to, do the, thing. There’s a thing that… flowers! I um, flowers help with fights, right? I’m gonna go, get… flowers.” The younger Willow slipped the herb and flower directory into the pile of books on the table and scampered out of the Magic Box. The older Willow came slowly down the stairs and uncovered the book.

Mind control. She couldn’t stop and consider Tara’s feelings, or the consequences of her actions, oh no, she just wanted to go tearing off and do things. Stupid.

Tara would be terrified. Was there any reason for her to believe a thing Willow wanted to tell her?

Willow marked the page about mind control and returned to the balcony bookshelves. Tara would need this information, and other things, too. By the time Anya threw her out of the Magic Box at eight, she had arranged an entire shelf about the consequences of raising a person from the dead, along with the herb and flower directory and the drained book of Darkest Magicks. She found her way to the Espresso Pump and sat until ten thirty trying to figure out what she could say to Tara that would make any difference, or even any sense.


“Okay,” Tara said when she unlocked the front door. “It’s bedtime.”

“Why do we have bedtime in the summer?” Dawn whined.

Willow laughed. “Because if we didn’t, you’d be up all night. Besides, you wear us out.”

“At least we don’t make you get up,” Tara added, kissing Dawn on the forehead. “And you don’t really go to sleep, anyway. You sit on your bed and write in your journal with your headphones on.”

Dawn blushed. “How do you know that?”

“Because I tuck you in when you fall asleep with the batteries dead in your walkman and the lights still on.”

Willow sat in the sunroom at the back of the house, listening while the little family shuffled up the stairs. The younger Willow returned with an empty glass, the one she always filled and drained before she went to sleep. Even now that Willow didn’t sleep anymore, she still drank a glass of water. It had started when she was six, and she had been eating what her father called dehydrated apples with her lunch all school year. That summer at the beach, her mother had warned her to drink plenty of water or else she would get dehydrated, and little Willow had imagined herself shriveling up overnight.

As planned, Willow slipped into the kitchen, cautious even through she didn’t need to be, and pulled the second half of her sleeping pill out of her pocket. At her command, it crumbled into powder, and she dusted it into her younger self’s glass while it was filling at the faucet. The younger Willow made a face when she drank, but she cast and accusing glare at the tap, not her glass. She drained it and went upstairs. Willow lingered at the bottom of the stairs, bracing herself and listening to the murmur of conversation.

“All ready?”

“Almost,” Tara answered. “I just need to wash my face.”

“Okey dokey, see you in the sheets.”

Tara chuckled and kissed Willow gently. “See you there.”

Buzzing, Willow slipped into loose pajamas and climbed into bed, and when she closed her eyes, the sound of running water and the latching of the bathroom door faded into the white noise of sleep.

Hello faolan228 and Heather, and thank you for the encouragement. As you can see, it egged me on quite nicely. I look forward to hearing your thoughts on the next sections.

Thanks again for reading,
Kay

This is cool. And I think this is my first dibs. And even first comment on story.
Anyway, I love the extraordinary plot and I'm really curious about how you work things out.
And yeah, positive reinforcement is really good, so I'm giving it to you to increase the chance of next update coming in the short time. What a behaviorist am I.
Keep up the great work, because this is awesome idea.

S.

Time Heals All: a Willow/Tara fic with a terrible title

Author: Big_Pineapple

Feedback: Yes, including title suggestions, line edits, and general comments

Spoilers: vague reference to all seasons

Setting: Pre-season six and onward, AU.

Rating: PG-13, I think

Disclaimer: Copyright law. My girlfriend explained it to me once, but we were both falling asleep. Thank you, Mutant Enemy, for giving me Tara, but you jumped the shark.

Summary: Willow, age 36, does a good deed for the PtB, and she is rewarded with an opportunity to undo the canon.


Part III: Conversations with Dead People

Eyes closed, Tara fumbled for the hand towel and pressed it to her face. When she looked in the mirror, she saw Willow behind her. A sultry smile lit her face.

“What are you up to?” she crooned.

“Not what you’re thinking.”

Tara focused on the image in the mirror. The woman’s hair was past her shoulders. A jagged scar was faintly visible on her forehead, and she favored her left leg. Her energy flow was familiar, but jagged, and around it snaked a blackened coil of torment; it would take a lot of evil to integrate pain into the actual soul of a person. Tara whirled on the woman and blinded herself with a curtain of hair. Clawing it out of her eyes, she demanded, “Who are you? What are you doing here?”

Willow’s eyes widened, and she backed against the bathroom wall. “Shhh,” she pleaded, “you’ll wake up Dawn!”

“I’ll wake up the whole damn block,” Tara assured her, glancing at both bathroom doors.

“Tara, I could barely hear you upstairs when you called me. You can’t yell that loud.”

Tara stood straighter and tensed her muscles until they trembled. “Is that a threat or a dare?”

“I need to talk to you. How can I make you feel safer?”

For a moment, Tara didn’t move. Then she nodded to the door away from the bedroom. “Go out that door and down the hallway, last door on the right.” Her hand fluttered up and pointed an accusing finger. “And don’t touch anything.”

“Buffy’s room? Why?” Then it clicked, and Willow’s eyes lit up. “The BuffyBot! Baby, you’re brilliant.”

She slipped past Tara, who raised an eyebrow and inched away, then followed her out the door to Buffy’s bedroom.

“Do you mind if I sit down?” Willow asked, pointing to the desk chair. “I’m kinda gimpy, not used to this much walking.”

Tara nodded slightly, hands on either side of the doorway, eyes locked on her. Willow pulled out the chair and straddled it, a position she knew she would struggle to get out of, hoping the solid chance for a running head start would put Tara more at ease.

“How did you even get in here?”

“Spare key,” Willow answered, wincing at the pain in her knee when she stretched it out in front of her.

“Only people who’ve lived in this house can even touch that key. I placed the hex myself.”

“I have lived here,” Willow insisted, “and I’m not here on vacation. Last night I, the I you’re used to, tried to talk you into raising Buffy from the dead, and you have to make sure that doesn’t happen.”

Tara took a half step backward, into the light of the hallway. “You’re crazy.”

“No, I’m…”

“I would remember something like that.”

Willow turned away from her and watched the light blink on the BuffyBot’s power generator. “Not if I erased it.”

“That would be mind control, and Willow…”

“Willow will do anything she thinks she has to to keep you safe.” Willow took a breath and met Tara’s eyes.

“Willow loves me.”

“I do. So much, baby, it’s like this big black hole that…” Another breath. Tara stepped forward, but she didn’t cross the threshold. “I was there when Glory attacked you. There was nothing I could do to save you, and the next time something happens to you I’ll be just as helpless. It frightens me, how useless I am.”

“You think I don’t think about that?” Tara let go of the doorframe and entered the room. “God, every day, every minute that I can’t see you… her. Look, who are you?”

“I’m me, and I have until seven in the morning to explain to you that doofus down the hall has gone off the deep end. And you’re the only one who can even see me, which means you have to help, which is completely unfair… I do love you, Tara, but that’s not what I’m acting on right now, the me that’s actually acting in this time. I’m too scared.”

“I-I’m going to wake her up and find out about this.” Tara turned to leave.

“She’ll just erase it,” Willow warned. “She knows how, and she knows it works.”

Tara paused, staring at the floor like a nervous child at a spelling bee. “So, you’re saying you asked me to help you raise Buffy from the dead, and then you erased my memory of it?”

“You weren’t a big fan of the idea.”

“Because it’s completely unethical! You can’t disrupt the natural cycle.”

“But Buffy’s death wasn’t natural. Mystical forces were involved, so mystical forces might be okay. You said so.”

“I don’t think I’d s-s-say that,” Tara stuttered.

“You were kind of out of it. It was late.”

Tara looked up from the floor. “I really said that?”

“You’re not going to win an argument with her, Tara. She’s not playing fair.” Willow looked in the direction of her sleeping younger self, and growled, “She’s a rank, arrogant amateur.”

“Giles said that.”

Willow let out a humorless chuckle. “How could you tell?”

“Because it hurt your feelings.”

When Willow turned to Tara, the day smashed into her like the exhaustion that comes after five days of being awake. Her body shuddered from the impact of simply being understood, and understanding followed. This was real; she was home.

The snake-like pain struck out at Tara as she watched the woman in front of her crumble. She was on her knees with her arms around Willow’s shaking shoulders before she realized she had moved. Willow pushed against her, sobbing, “I don’t deserve comfort,” but Tara held tighter, shushing her and running her fingers through her hair. The smell was familiar, the warmth of her, even the waves of grief.

“It’s alright, shh,” she whispered. “I’ll help you, it’ll be okay.”

A floorboard in the hallway creaked, and Tara jumped to her feet without losing contact with Willow, who was holding her breath. Dawn tiptoed to the doorway and started.

“Hey. Um.”

“H-hey,” Tara echoed. “Are you um, a-are you okay?”

Dawn retreated, saying, “Yeah, yeah, I just… thought I heard something or, um.”

“I-I was leaving. It’s okay.” Tara tugged at Willow’s sleeve in the dark, and Willow struggled to get out of the chair without making it obvious that there was a third person in the room. Her knee popped, and Tara flinched, but Dawn didn’t seem to hear. She was coming into the room with her eyes averted.

Tara released Willow, who limped into the hallway, and hugged Dawn. “I love you,” she whispered, and she kissed her head, slipped out, and shut the door.

Willow’s face was blotchy in the light from the hallway, but she had calmed herself enough to bear looking Tara in the eye. Tara gestured toward the stairs, and the two of them slipped into the kitchen.

“You recover fast,” Tara observed.

Willow shrugged. “Practice.”

“So, what is it you want me to do?” Tara asked, crossing her arms. “I mean, not resurrect Buffy, sure, but how can I prevent that if I can’t talk to Willow? Er, you.”

“Well, being informed is always a plus,” Willow started. “I looked up everything I could find for you and set it aside on the far right bottom shelf in the Magic Box. Also, you should talk to Angel. His number and address are in the back of the phone book. And, well, the first thing you should probably do is write all this down, in case it does get erased, and make sure someone else knows where to find it.”

“And big picture?”

Willow blinked. “What do you mean?”

“How do I help you? There’s obviously something wrong, I mean, there has been. You don’t deal with magic like I do, it’s… it’s like you’re addicted or something. Should I be staging an intervention?”

That hadn’t worked so well before. Willow wanted to say this, but it was against the rules, and she wasn’t sure what would happen if she broke them.

“It’s not,” she started, then paused. “It is an addiction, but it’s more than that. I can’t just stop and everything’ll be hunky dory again. It’s like I’m infected. Break the addiction, yeah, but the magic is inside me, too. I have to treat it, learn to live with it. Giles can help with that.”

Tara nodded. “So, research, talk to Angel, intervention. And when the apocalypse comes we throw the BuffyBot at it and hope for the best?”

Willow shook her head. “You can always talk to someone, they’ll help you. Angel, or…”

For a moment, Willow stared out the window over the sink, wondering how many epiphanies you could have in one day. “Faith.”

“Faith?” Tara tensed, suspicions aroused again. “Slut-bomb psycho-slayer Faith?”

Willow turned her gaze back to Tara. “Do you believe people can change?”

“Sort of. I mean, there’s an energy at the core of things that makes them what they are. That can’t change. But, behaviors, ways of thinking, sure.”

“Talk to Faith,” Willow said. “We have a lot in common.”

Tara opened her mouth to protest, then shut it and stood still for a while.

“How do I find her?” she asked.

“Angel will know where she is. He’s your new best friend, okay?”

Tara nodded, then she pulled the grocery list pad off the refrigerator and scribbled down Willow’s list of suggestions. “Anything else?”

“Yeah. If things get bad, leave me.”

“I don’t th-think I can d-do that,” Tara said.

“Believe me, you can,” Willow assured her. “You probably already thought about it.”

Heat spread across Tara’s face. She tore her notes off the pad, straightened, and attached the pad to the refrigerator door.

“This’ll help,” she said finally. “I mean, it makes sense, what you’re saying.”
“Spent all day working on it.”

Tara turned to face Willow. “I’m glad you came.”

“Me, too,” Willow replied. “I mean, not every day you get to go back in time and right the wrongs of your younger, stupid self.”

“You’re not stupid,” Tara blurted. She ducked her head and giggled at her outburst, then stepped forward and brushed Willow’s hair behind her ear. “You’re not stupid,” she repeated.

Willow trembled at her touch. She didn’t back away when Willow lifted her hands, didn’t stop her from running them along her bare arms, over her shoulders, and into her hair. “Oh baby,” Willow sobbed, “but I got so lost.”

Tara wiped the tears away as fast as they fell, then pressed both hands to Willow’s cheeks and kissed her. “I’ll find you,” she said when she pulled away. Willow felt her breath on her lips and shivered. Tara kissed her again, lingering. Her breath was speeding up.

Willow backed away, flushed and confused. “Is this appropriate?”

Tara smiled. She could feel Willow’s energy shifting, and her pain, so tightly wound around her soul, had loosened its grip.

“We’re saving the world,” she answered. “I think it calls for a celebration.”

Willow had forgotten the idea of release. She had believed her life would be the torrent of jagged torment she knew Tara could sense in her. But her knees, good and bad, buckled, and she collapsed in Tara’s warm, living embrace, and when the blessed remembrance of every part of her lover was made, she felt as though she had counted the beads of a rosary and been absolved. She fell limp on the living room floor, her head on Tara’s shoulder, and slept.

Tara watched her sleeping, felt the edges of her energy smooth over, and wondered still why she was so certain what this woman told her was true. There had been no reason, really, for her to trust her, even though her suggestions couldn’t hurt. Willow had seemed so far away from her since Buffy had died. Tara felt almost like she had lost her, along with her protector friend and nearly a month of her life. But this woman in her arms pulsated with dark energy as much as she seemed to tremble with love, and she spoke and moved like any other person. Except for the babble, and the vibrant energy, the smell of sage soap, and the crackling mind that was irrevocably Willow.

And the moments when she wavered. She hadn’t seen her face, but there was no hesitation when Willow had told her to leave. Her loss was a thing that was irrevocable, her regrets indelible. Tara watched her sleep, knowing that she hadn’t lived to see the future Willow had come from.

At six, for fear that the other Willow might wake up soon, she roused the one who was clinging to her. She rubbed sleep out of her eyes and examined it like it was gold.

“We should probably put clothes on,” Tara whispered.

“Do we have to?” Willow was allowing herself to pretend that the last fifteen years were a nightmare she was waking up from.

Tara kissed her and shoved her shirt in her face.

“Disappointing, I know.”

For a little while, the morning seemed normal. They dressed and sat on the couch, playing Miss Kitty and not talking about the future or the past. But they were running out of time.

“What happens,” Tara finally asked, “when you go back? I mean, have things already started changing?”

“I wish I knew. But hey, it can’t get any worse.”

Tara grinned. “That takes some of the pressure off, then.”

“I wish you didn’t have to do this,” Willow said. “It’s my fault. All of it.”

“Well, I’ll be sure to blame you when things start looking up.”

Willow laughed, and it hurt. She pulled Tara close, then looked into her eyes. “I love you so much. My always, my everything.”

Tara blinked, and she was alone.



---

Hello everybody. I'm really glad you're enjoying the story.
I should probably warn you now: after this weekend, rapid-fire updates like this probably won't happen again until almost July. I won't abandon it completely, but it'll be more of a weekly thing instead of twice a day. These are just really long days.

Thank you for your comments and readership,
Kay

Double Dibs!!

Great updates. Glad Willow was able to tell Tara to stop Willow. (That sentence only makes sense for this story. )

Will this continue on through Season Six or jump to the future where Willow sees the results?

Can't wait for more.

Time Heals All: a Willow/Tara fic with a terrible title

Author: Big_Pineapple

Feedback: Yes, including title suggestions, line edits, and general comments

Spoilers: vague reference to all seasons

Setting: Pre-season six and onward, AU.

Rating: PG-13, I think

Disclaimer: Copyright law. My girlfriend explained it to me once, but we were both falling asleep. Thank you, Mutant Enemy, for giving me Tara, but you jumped the shark.

Summary: Tara uses Willow's suggestions to try to make the future better.


Part IV: Consequences

“Whatcha doing?”

Tara jumped and scrambled to cover her notes, nearly dropping them on the floor at Willow’s feet. “Nothing! I-I mean, it’s just, I… God, you scared me to death.” She pressed a hand to her chest and prayed it was a good enough excuse.

“Jumpy?” Willow looked concerned, not suspicious.

“Didn’t get much sleep.”

“Poor baby,” Willow said, reaching for her. Tara stood up, leading her away from the roll-top desk and into the kitchen, muttering, “It’s okay. How’d you sleep?”

“Like a rock,” Willow told her. “And I had the weirdest dream.”

Making a show of digging through the refrigerator, Tara answered, “Oh?”

“There were these penguins, and I let them in the house ‘cause, hey, penguins!”

Tara relaxed and started pouring orange juice. Willow took a glass and kept going.

“But then they pointed a fish at me and said they wanted to steal all our blankets and take them next door, but there aren’t any penguins next door, they’re from the Antarctic!”

“Not all penguins,” Tara said. “There are lots of penguins who live on cliffs by the ocean. Hot penguins.”

Willow snickered. “Is that what turns you on?”

“I don’t think I can turn on when I’m this hungry.”

“Ooh,” Willow said. “Is it time for pancakes to go in bellies?”

When Tara turned to smile at her, she felt it, a faint black pulse in Willow’s energy. She shook her head and turned away. “I was thinking something faster? We have bagels.”

“We could fry some turkey slices and cheese!”

“Sure,” Tara said, glancing into the living room, where her notes sat exposed on the desk.

After breakfast, Tara left Willow with the dishes, mumbling something about errands and snatching her notes on her way upstairs. She changed into street clothes, stuffed the notes in a bag with a handful of quarters, and went out. There was a payphone around the corner from the Bronze; better to call Angel from there than to have Willow answer an unexpected call back on the house phone.


Cordelia chipped the fresh paint on her fingernails when she answered the phone. “Angel Investigations, we help the helpless,” she snarled.

“Um, h-hi, I um, c-c-could I, um…”

“Sorry, we don’t do speech therapy.” Cordelia started to hang up the phone, but the girl on the other end said, “You must be Cordelia.”

Pressing the phone to her ear with her shoulder, Cordelia started repainting her damaged nail. “Speak.”

“My name is T-tara Maclay, and I need to talk to Angel. I um, I’m a f-friend of Buffy’s?”

Cordelia sighed. “I’ll transfer you, hang on.” She thumped the phone on her desk and opened the door to Angel’s office. “T-tara Maclay on the t-telephone. Good luck getting a sentence out of her.”

Angel watched Cordelia slam the office door, then picked up the phone.

“Tara Maclay?”

“H-hi, um, M-mister Angel?”

Confused, Angel almost stuttered himself. “It’s just Angel. I don’t think I’ve been called Mister anything for a while.”

“Oh. Um.” Tara giggled faintly.

“Are you okay?” Angel asked her. “You sound nervous.”

“Yeah, I um, I d-don’t really t-t-t…” Tara slammed her hand against the siding of the phone booth, and Angel heard the impact through the phone. “Talk on the p-phone much. I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay,” Angel told her. “How can I help?”

Tara finished her notes in the Magic Box, adding to it Angel’s description of the First and a bibliography of every page Willow had marked for her, in case the younger Willow found them and scattered them somehow. She tucked the completed account into the empty book of Darkest Magicks, even though it almost made her ill to touch it.

When she came home, Willow was sitting on the counter watching the BuffyBot make peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.

“Pretty cool, huh? It’ll come in handy when school starts back up.”

Tara nodded.

“You’re Tara,” the Bot announced. “You’re gay.”

“You can’t get a more sophisticated description than that?”

Willow hopped off the counter and pulled the BuffyBot open. “I can try,” she said, sliding her hand into the wires.

Tara shuddered. “Don’t do that.”

“Why?”

“Can’t you use a computer?”

Willow shrugged. “Sure, if I want it to take forever and not work until the fifth try. I haven’t even found all the horny-for-Spike bits yet.”

“It’s not important,” Tara said. “Fifth try would be fine. Just… It’s like you’re reaching into her brain and messing around in it. ”

The BuffyBot looked at both of them and asked, “Are you going to fight?”

“No!” Willow snapped. “Stop making sandwiches and tell us a joke or something.”

“Knock knock!”

Tara shook her head. “Not now.”

“Not now who?”

“Willow, I wanted to talk to you. About the spell you mentioned a couple nights ago.”

Willow almost choked on her sandwich.

“I looked into it, and there’s definitely a reason we took an oath not to raise the dead. A disruption of spiritual flow is costly, and that’s why most spells don’t bring people back whole; they pay with pieces of themselves. The ones that do work are…”

“This one will work.”

Tara nodded. “That’s worse. To resurrect a person requires giving life to the First Evil, with its strength equal to that of the person who’s being brought back. Buffy’s power is ancient, and it stretches into the future, too. The First would be so strong…”

“We fought the First before, Tara. Buffy kicked its ass, like she always does. We can handle the consequences.”

“Willow, it’s dangerous to…”

“I can deal with danger!” the BuffyBot volunteered.

Willow was trembling. “I’m not going to leave my best friend in some hell dimension just because we’re scared of a fight. I’m not leaving her there no matter what!”

“Why do you think she’s in a hell dimension?”

Willow froze.

“Everything else went back where it belonged when the portal closed,” Tara reminded her. “Why wouldn’t Buffy?”

Dawn walked into the silent kitchen and glanced from Willow to Tara. “What’s going on?”

“Nothing,” Willow growled. She stormed out of the kitchen, and Tara followed her until the bedroom door slammed in her face.

“Magic has consequences, Wil,” she called through the door. “You have to remember that.”


Warren woke up to the sound of his own laughter. He saw himself standing in the middle of the room.

“Mom!” he yelled, “Mom!”

“Oh shut up!” his double snapped. “Unless you want her to find out you sleep butt naked.”

Warren giggled in panic and pulled the covers tighter around him. His double wandered through the room, running his fingers along the shelves of collectible figurines and leafing through piles of notebooks.

“Home sweet home,” he crowed. “My friend, you have won front row tickets to the future, and we’re gonna make it mine! Ours! Yours! Whatever!”

Dibs

Great update. Loved Willow's dream about penguins. Although it just shows how unimportant she thinks her actions are and how little she is worried about them.

Loved Cordelia. Although I do think she had gotten better by the end of the second season of Angel (fifth of Buffy).

Hopefully Tara will be able to talk some sense into Willow.

Did not expect future Warren to show up. Is that a consequence of Future-Willow's actions? It shouldn't be because a) The PTB offered it as a reward and b) Warren was long dead when it was offered so he shouldn't have been affected unless it was deliberately against Willow which it should have been (reward). If it's not a consequence, why is he here?

You always seem to leave more questions than answers. Can't wait to read more.

You have my attention... please update soon.

Hey There!

I just caught up on this today and so far so good! I really hope Tara is able to keep her 'mission' a secret from the younger Willow, because if not, it could really screw up future events even more. I like the wisdom you gave to the older Willow, it seems like she's been through more than just Hellmouth stuff. I am curious to find out where the scar came from as well as the knee injury. I am a bit worried, now that there is an apparent 'future' Warren on the scene as well...boo!

I like it and hope to see lot's of updates! Keep writing!

Just got a chance to read you story and wow! I really love your ideas. Your taking something as basic as going back into the past and fixing previous transgressions and adding layers and demensions to it by showing Tara and Willow's relationship prior to raising Buffy. I think it's really important to show Tara's hesitation to go along with a plan that is so adverse to the way she was raised to think about magic. That has always been something that has bothered me from canon and you a doing a great job in addressing it. Thank you.

Looking forward to more!

Cool!
I'm a little lost on the motions of the story, which felt like it jumped around a bit.
maybe i missed a bit.

Was the time-travel the wish? or a run-up to the wish? if so when's the wish?

other than that slight niggle, it's beautifully written.
future Willow's terror is my own, i want to see her win.
it's up to Tara now.
I hope she can get through to past-Willow and help her gain a bit of maturity.

More please?

R

Sary-intriguing. Why is a future-Warren back? Do all such wishes come with a built-in hazard? (Magically & mythologically speaking, that makes sense, though.) I mean, I brought Warren back in my "World Beyond the Wall" fics, but he's not dangerous there. (He has four arms to make him more useful, one leg in the middle of his body so he can only jump to get around, and, while he retains his "latraballee" for sanitary reasons, he has no "latraballeros" -or, if you prefer, "tonestoniclones"- below it to provoke him to mischief. Plus he has to take orders from Katrina.)

Time Heals All: a Willow/Tara fic with a terrible title

Author: Big_Pineapple

Feedback: Yes, including title suggestions, line edits, and general comments

Spoilers: vague reference to all seasons

Setting: Pre-season six and onward, AU.

Rating: PG-13, I think

Disclaimer: Copyright law. My girlfriend explained it to me once, but we were both falling asleep. Thank you, Mutant Enemy, for giving me Tara, but you jumped the shark.

Summary: Tara uses Willow's suggestions to try to make the future better.



Part V: Bargaining

Cordelia groaned when Angel called her name.

“If Tara Maclay calls again, tell me right away,” he said, “and… try to be nice?”

Raising her head off her palms, Cordelia glared at him. “You’ve never had a migraine, have you?”

Angel dove toward her desk, hunching over as if he could see into her mind if he looked at her scalp closely enough. “You had a vision?”

“Yeah,” Cordelia sneered. “Right before Miss Tell-Me-Right-Away called. And this one was a doozy.”

“What was it?” Angel insisted.

Cordelia rolled her eyes and winced. “Nothing,” she said. “They didn’t show me anything.”


Tara huddled in a corner of the library balcony in the Magic Box, engrossed in chronicling the latest of her confrontations with Willow. She had come out of their room to recover her sandwich not long after she’d left, mumbling that she’d never quite mastered the art of storming off, trying to apologize.

“I don’t want apologies, Wil, I want you to let this go. The First caused a lot of trouble when it was here before, especially for Angel, and…”

Willow had looked at her sharply. “I never said anything about Angel.”

Tara had stared at the floor.

“You’ve been going behind my back! Who else have you talked to?”

“No one!” Tara had pleaded, “Just Angel and you, it’s… It’s complicated.”

“Make it simple,” Willow growled.

Simple. A thousand things ripped at Tara: the look in Willow’s eyes the night before, the fear that this Willow would take that all away from her, the fear Willow would become what the future said she would be, the premonition of her own death. This wasn’t simple.

“You’re using too much magic,” she said finally. It had gone over about as well as everything else had.


Giles came back from a lunch so late it was probably unhealthy to Anya’s shout of, “Welcome to the Magic Box, your one stop… Oh, it’s you.”

“No customers today?”

“One that won’t buy anything. You’d think with all the magic those two do, they’d have spent a fortune supporting their needy friends.” Anya glared up at the balcony library, where Tara was scribbling in a small notebook. It was unlike her not to greet him.

For a while, Giles went about his work, watching Tara’s hand move while the rest of her stayed still and poised. But her steadiness faltered in a shuddering sigh, not audible, but visible. She ripped pages out of her notebook, folded them gently with others, and tucked them away. He stopped her as she hurried past him toward the door.

“Tea?”

Tara stopped in her tracks and looked at him.

“I was going to brew some for myself, and I often find it… relaxing.” Giles gestured toward the table in the center of the room. “Would you join me?”

She sat down on a bench, making small, nervous gestures with her hands. “I um, I shouldn’t stay for long. Dawn needs dinner, and I can’t leave her to her own devices, or there um,” she giggled, and her hand jerked up to tuck a piece of hair behind her ear. “There might not be a house to come back to.”

“Willow cooks, doesn’t she?” Giles asked, filling the teapot with water.

Tara’s face darkened. “Willow. W-willow went out today.”

Giles settled the teapot on the hot plate and sat by Tara. “Is something wrong?”

He pulled the story out of her piece by piece.

“And where were you rushing off to?” he asked when she finished, pouring cups of tea from the overheated pot.

“To call Angel.”

Giles offered her the phone on his desk. Half-listening to her, he rubbed his glasses on a handkerchief.

“You want to know what I think?” Anya asked.

Giles barely heard her, barely answered, “No, not really.”

“I think Willow’s bizarre.”

“I keep saying everything wrong,” Tara whimpered into the phone.

At the other end of the line, Angel’s eyes were darting around his office in panic. He had never quite learned how to react to a girl who was crying; pats on the back were usually safe, tissues if any were available. But Tara sounded like she was about to break down on the phone, and there was no way for him to handle that, except to try to prevent it.

“You’re not saying anything wrong,” he said. “It’s frustrating.“

“I sh-shouldn’t have brought you into it. Angel, what am I supposed to do now? God, Willow could be sitting in the future just waiting for something to change, and I haven’t made a difference at all!”

Angel shifted in his chair. “Have you talked to Giles?” Crying girls were better handled by the English than the Irish, or at least that had been true in the seventeen hundreds. Thanks Willow, he thought.

Tara told him yes.

“Let me talk to him.”

There was a shuffle, and Giles came on the line.

“Is she okay?”


Tara stood beside the desk, fiddling with her fingertips, wishing she could hear the full conversation.

“No, I think she’s done all she can,” Giles said, then paused. “I think that would be wise. Should we involve the others?”

Others? Xander and Anya? Tara wasn’t sure she liked that idea. Really, she didn’t like involving Giles. This was her responsibility, not his, and frankly, she couldn’t imagine Willow listening to Giles any better than she listened to her. And future Willow had hesitated when she suggested an intervention. Tara considered saying something, but trying to organize her thoughts was tiring, and she hadn’t slept in… she glanced at the clock behind Anya. Thirty-two hours. Not that it was new. She’d pulled all-nighters with the Scoobies before.

Giles hung up the phone, and Tara snapped back to what was happening now.

“Who are you calling?” she asked, watching Giles turn the rotary dial.

“Xander,” he said. “It would be best to involve him as well. He may have an angle on Willow that we can’t exploit on our own.”

“E-exploit. That’s um, that’s not how I was thinking about…”

“Xander?” Giles said into the phone, “I want to discuss an important matter with you.”

Tara carried her cup into the bathroom and washed it, then placed it gently beside the pot. Giles covered the mouthpiece of the phone with his hand to say, “Thank you, dear,” then returned to his conversation. When Tara turned to tell Anya goodbye, she was counting money.

Tara walked home with her arms crossed over her stomach, flinching every time a car went past.


Willow was trying not to look like she was waiting for Tara to come home. She was praying Tara would come home, sane and in one piece. If it was going to cause this much trouble, she could do the spell without her; this fighting had to stop.

The door opened, and Willow tensed. Tara didn’t look at her.

“Hey.” Tara ignored her. “Giles called. He says he wants us to come to the Magic Box tomorrow afternoon, after closing.” Tara nodded, but she was halfway up the stairs. “Do you want dinner?”

“No thank you.”

Willow followed her into their bedroom. She was sitting on the edge of the bed, pulling off her shoes. “Baby, please.”

Tara sighed. “Can we not do this right now? I’m tired.”

“I just want you to know that I’m sorry. What I said, I…”

“That’s not good enough,” Tara cut her off.

“Well what do you want me to do, go back in time and take it back?” Willow grinned to herself. “Because I could probably…”

Tara was glaring at her.

“Kidding,” Willow whispered. “I probably couldn’t.”

Tara took a deep breath. I can’t do this, she thought.

“Believe me, you can.” Willow had told her that.

“I don’t think this is going to work,” Tara said.

Willow froze. “What? No, it’s, it’s working. We can work it out. We did last time.”

“We didn’t talk at all after last time. You are using too much magic.”

“But I just want to help people,” Willow protested.

Tara shook her head. “Maybe that’s how it started. But now you’re just shaping everything into what you want it to be. Including me.”

“No.” Willow scrambled around the bed and dropped to her knees at Tara’s feet. “Baby, listen to me. I don’t need magic, I need you. I can prove it! I’ll go a month, a whole month without magic. I promise!”

I can’t do this, Tara thought, then answered. “Go a week.”

“A week?” Willow exclaimed. “That’s easy!”

“A week. And then we’ll see.”

Tara stood abruptly, pulled the sheets down, and climbed into bed. She didn’t see the shadow that passed over Willow’s face.


-----

Hello everyone. Thank you again for your encouragement and comments. There are more questions in here, but I promise answers are coming.

Hope you enjoy this as much as I enjoy writing for you guys,
Kay

Dibs

Great chapter. I can't help but think of the saying "The more things change, the more they stay the same."

Luckily Tara has told enough people that if Willow uses forget spell on her, the others still know. In a way, I hope she does it on Tara now and make the others realize how dangerous she is rather than waiting to see what the meeting is about before making everyone forget at once.

Can't wait to see what happens next

Time Heals All: a Willow/Tara fic with a terrible title

Author: Big_Pineapple

Feedback: Yes, including title suggestions, line edits, and general comments

Spoilers: vague reference to all seasons

Setting: Pre-season six and onward, AU.

Rating: PG-13, I think

Disclaimer: Copyright law. My girlfriend explained it to me once, but we were both falling asleep. Thank you, Mutant Enemy, for giving me Tara, but you jumped the shark.

Summary: Tara uses Willow's suggestions to try to make the future better.



Part VI: Tabula Rasa, section I

“Willow!” Tara yelled up the stairs. “We’re going to be late!”

Willow appeared at the top of the stairs, making a show of dabbing at a spaghetti sauce stain. “I gotta get this out first. You guys can go ahead, I’ll catch up.”

That wasn’t exactly a safe plan, Tara thought, but maybe it would be better. The Scoobies would have a little time to talk before Willow arrived. She took Dawn’s hand.

“You have your tooth brush?”

“Yep,” Dawn said. “And floss and pajamas and everything. But I don’t get why I can’t help with research. I could totally read those books if I had the chance.”

“No.” Tara pulled on Dawn’s hand, dragging her out the door.

“Why not?”

Tara sighed. “I just don’t think you should be exposed to any more violence and bizarre demon rituals than you’ve already seen. And besides, isn’t it like some teenaged girl bonding experience, having sleep overs?”

“You really didn’t have a normal childhood.”

Tara shook her head.

“See? You turned out awesome!” Dawn declared.

Laughing, Tara kissed Dawn on the head and watched her climb the steps of her friend’s house and go inside. She continued to the Magic Box alone.

Willow waited at the top of the stairs until she was sure they were gone, then magicked the sauce off her shirt and ran to her stash of herbs in the bedroom closet. A sprig for Tara, and one for Angel. Giles, too? It would probably be best. As soon as this was behind them, things between her and Tara would be back to normal. She lit a fire, set a crystal in the flames, and burned the flowers, chanting.

“Tabula rasa, tabula rasa, tabula rasa.”


All eyes were on Willow when she walked through the door. It was like the time everyone thought she was dead, except there was no reason for them to think that now. She scanned her friends’ faces. Anya and Xander met her eyes, but Tara looked into her lap. Giles removed his glasses and rubbed them with a handkerchief.

“Willow, there’s something we’re all concerned about that we want to discuss with you.”

“Okay,” Willow said, scrutinizing him. He put his glasses back on as if they would protect him. “What’s up?”

“We think you’re going nuts,” Anya offered, leaning across the glass counter.

From her seat at the table, Tara shot Anya a withering glare, but the ex-demon shrugged it off. Tara’s gaze returned to her lap.

“Tara?” Willow called.

Her head raised, but her eyes didn’t. Xander stepped a little closer to her.

“I think you’ve heard all this from her already,” he said.

“And apparently you all have, too,” Willow snarled. She was backed into a corner, and the spell she’d cast wouldn’t cover Xander and Anya. If she didn’t think fast, she’d get caught.

“Now there’s no need to be hostile,” Giles said. “We’re all people who care about you, and I think we just need to sit down and talk for a while and…”

They slumped on the floor all at once, but they came to one by one.

Angel, in LA, was the first to recover. He bounded up the stairs, starving and bewildered after what must have been one heavy night of drinking. The brunette at the desk told him good morning, and he stopped to admire.

“I’ve got this serious craving for, I don’t know, a steak or something. Care to join me?”

The brunette looked up from the newspaper she had spread out on her desk.

“Are you okay, Angel?”

He laughed. “Angel? Is that your place downstairs?”

“No, it’s yours.” She raised an eyebrow. “Is this a prank?”

“Do you call every man you see ‘angel’?”

The brunette stood up. “Only when it’s their name. What is up with you?”

“Steak,” Angel answered. “Gotta have it.”

The brunette grabbed him when he headed for the door. “Are you crazy? You’ll burn up out there!”

Angel looked at the faint pattern of sunlight leaking in through the closed blinds, then at the pale skin of his hands. “Do you have any sunscreen?”

“None that’s SPF Vampire.”

Angel stared at her.

“It’s only an hour till sunset,” the brunette told him. “Can’t it wait?”

Angel watched the vein in her neck twitch.


When Tara came to, she nearly fell out of her chair. Why was she asleep in a chair? And when did it get to be night?

A pretty redhead was on the floor massaging her shoulder, and an older man was exploring a small lump on his head with his fingers. There was a boy draped across the table next to her, and a skinny blonde rubbing her eyes behind the counter. It must be a store.

She shook the boy.

“I’m awake!” he announced, sitting up, then he turned to her. “Hey.”

“Hey,” she told him. “Who are you?”

For a moment, the boy looked around the room, mouth agape, then he stared at her, eyes widening. “Not a clue. Do I know any of you?”

“What are you coming on to her for if you don’t who she is?” the redhead snapped.

“Well,” the boy blustered. “I figured she was a girl, and… I’d remember.”

“So I don’t know you?”

The boy looked back at her. “I don’t know any of you freaks. Is this a psych test? Am I getting paid for this?”

“It’s not just you,” the man groaned. “Does anyone remember anything?”

Slow head shakes all around.

“Well, perhaps we all got terribly drunk, and this is some sort of,” the man glanced vaguely around the shop. “Blackout?”

The little blonde shook her head. “I don’t see any booze. I don’t feel any head bumps. And I don’t see Alan Fondt.”

“Who?”

The boy lurched to his feet suddenly. “Okay, I’m not panicking. I’m not, I’m not. Stop looking at me like I’m panicking.”

“Look at the stuff on these shelves,” the redhead said. “Weird jars of weird stuff. Weird books with weird covers like… Magic for Beginners… Oh!”

Tara stood up and took a better look around. “This is a magic shop. A real magic shop!”

The man laughed. “Magic? Magic is all balderdash and chicanery. We don’t know a bloody thing. Except I seem to be British, don’t I?”

She glanced at the floor, embarrassed, and caught sight of a pentagram ring on her finger. She held it out. “Apparently I believe in it.”

“You!” the boy yelled. “You did this to us!”

“Hold on!” the redhead scolded, “Let’s not go all Salem Witch Trials here.”

The man nodded. “Yes, I quite agree. We should all just calm down. We’ll get our memory back and we’ll all be right as rain.”

Maybe the books have something, she thought, but the little blonde squealed.

“There’s a ring in my pocket!”

“Pockets,” Tara repeated, and she caught the pretty redhead’s eye. So pretty.

“Driver’s licenses!” the redhead exclaimed.

Everyone scrambled to check their pockets.

“It’s me,” the boy announced. “Alexander Harris. Hey, I exist!”

“Willow Rosenberg. Ha, Willow. That’s a funny name.”

“I think it’s pretty.”

The redhead smiled. “What do you got?”

“Um, Tara, and look. I go to UC Sunnydale?”

“Me, too!” the redhead said. “Maybe we’re… study buddies.”

Tara smiled. Study buddies, wouldn’t that be fun. God, I must be gay.

“I’m called Rupert Giles.”

The little blonde was fiddling with a key on a chain around her neck. “Hey, this key fits this lock!” she said, opening the cash register. “And these forms say that Rupert and Anya own the shop together. I must be Anya!”

“This is our magic shop? And I suppose I gave you that ring, as well,” Rupert offered. “Why on earth were you keeping it in your pocket?”

Anya shrugged. “Maybe you pissed me off.”

“Well, there’s very little evidence for that, now, is there?”

“Oh Rupie,” Anya crooned, tugging at Rupert’s suit jacket. “Why don’t we just put it behind us. It’ll be nice to wear such a gorgeous ring on my finger.”

“Okay,” the redhead said, “so we all have names. Are there any clues about what might have happened?”

“W-well I was thinking…” Tara began.

The phone rang, cutting her off. For a moment, everyone stared at it.

“Well,” Rupert said, “as the owner of this shop, I suppose I should answer that.”

“Co-owner,” Anya reminded him.

“Hello?”

“Giles? It’s Cordelia. Listen, I’ve got…”

“I’m dreadfully sorry,” Rupert interrupted. “I seem to be having a bit of a problem with memory. Who are you?”

Cordelia groaned. “You, too? Angel just came upstairs acting all weird, and then he attacked me. So I was wondering if…”

“Attacked? Good lord, are you alright, miss?”

“Um, yeah? I sprayed him with mace and locked him in the bathroom. He’s obsessing over his non-existent reflection.”

Giles was bewildered. “Non-existent? Is he that terribly thin?”

“No, he’s a vampire. You really don’t remember anything, do you?”

Rupert laughed and covered the mouthpiece of the phone. “This young woman believes she has a vampire locked in her bathroom!”

“So everyone’s going crazy?” Alexander asked.

“Maybe we have amnesia,” Willow said. “Do you think we should go to the hospital?”

Tara shifted on her feet. “I have a weird dread thinking about psych wards. I um, I hope I don’t have a history.”

Alexander backed away from her. “I’m keeping my eye on you, lady.”

“Giles, are you there?” Cordelia yelled into the phone.

“Sorry,” Rupert answered. “We were discussing going to the hospital.”

“No!” Cordelia shouted. “Stay right where you are. It’s… You know what? I think you’re sick. You might be contagious, so you probably shouldn’t go out in public. I’ll call the hospital for you, just stay where you are.”

“Fair point,” Rupert said.

“Okay, now. Is there a girl named Tara Maclay with you?”

Rupert glanced up. “Yes, there is.”

“Tell her everything’s going to be okay, and she can call us if she needs help.”

“How do you know her?”

Cordelia sighed. “She’s a client. Private investigation.”

“Private investigation? Who is she investigating? Could that be the cause of all this trouble? Good lord, we could be being poisoned!”

A wave of panic swept over the magic shop.

“You’re not being poisoned!” Cordelia said. “I’ll look into it, just stay inside, alright? Jeez.”

She hung up, and Rupert stared at the handset for a moment before putting it down.

“The woman is a private investigator. She wants to tell you, Miss Maclay, that you’re perfectly safe, and you can call her for assistance if you need it. And she was strangely insistent that we stay indoors.”

Tara raised an eyebrow. What would she need a private investigator for?

“Maybe you’re paranoid,” Alexander offered, seeming to read her mind.

Rupert shrugged. “She said she’d send an ambulance for us. Until then I suppose we should just sit tight.”

“W-well, could we look at the books? The magic books?” Tara glanced up at everyone, then ducked her head. “I mean, it’s kind of weird, what’s happening. Maybe we shouldn’t rule anything out.”

“Oh sure, says the witch who’s afraid of psych wards.”

“Be nice,” Willow snapped. She scooped a stack of books off the counter and handed one to Anya. “I think it’s a good idea, Tara. If nothing else, it’ll pass the time.”

When she offered a book from the stack to Tara, their fingers brushed, and Willow felt a charge. Tara blushed.

“You okay, Willow?” Alexander asked when she sat down next to him.

Willow nodded. “Yeah. But I think I’m kind of gay.”


-----

Tabula Rasa got a bit long, so I've decided to post it in two parts. The next part will be along, probably sometime this weekend. Enjoy.

Dibs
Love this so far. I'm excited to see what happens next. BTW, there's no such thing as a chapter that is too long.

Can't wait til this weekend.

One quibble; didn't Angel, Cordelia, and presumably wElsey meet Tara back in the summer. even tho Buffy's death is a secret, I'm sure the gang had soem kind of ceremony the Fnagsters woudl've coem down for?

I'm really enjoying this. Espeically the last chapter, oh gosh haha. I really hope that everything will work out. So are they not bringing Buffy back or will that play off later in the story? Hm anyways I can't wait to see what happens. I love how you have twisted and turned the episodes

Ash

Wow, is Willow snappish today!
She's so annoying when she's like this, nothing is getting through to her.

It's good that the Scoobies have out side help, Cordelia to the rescue!
Uh, i can't believe i just said that.

Looking forward to more

Keep up the good work!

R

Hi There!

Tabula Rasa, although sad in the end, is one of my fav episodes. I mean, who's doesn't love Giles & Spike as father and son? And Willow and Tara inexplicably drawn to one another. So, I can't wait to see where you take this and the changes you make, since this is happening way earlier than it did in canon.

Looking forward to more!!

Time Heals All: a Willow/Tara fic with a terrible title

Author: Big_Pineapple

Feedback: Yes, including title suggestions, line edits, and general comments

Spoilers: vague reference to all seasons

Setting: Pre-season six and onward, AU.

Rating: PG-13, I think

Disclaimer: Copyright law. My girlfriend explained it to me once, but we were both falling asleep. Thank you, Mutant Enemy, for giving me Tara, but you jumped the shark.

Summary: Tara uses Willow's suggestions to try to make the future better.


Part VII: Tabula Rasa, section 2

Wesley arrived three verses into the rhyme Angel was chanting about how hungry he was. Cordelia was sitting on the floor in a heap of papers and books, turning pages with one hand and holding a crossbow up with the other.

“What on earth is happening here?”

“I’m so hungry I could eat the blood from children’s unwashed feet…”

Cordelia switched the crossbow into her other hand and rolled her eyes. “Angel’s crazy. I was going to ask Giles for the gypsy soul curse, but he’s crazy, too. I think there’s something weird going on, and until I figure out what it is, Angel is staying in the bathroom, so if you need to go, you’ll have to talk to the dentist next door or something.”

“He could break down the door,” Wesley observed.

“And if he does, I’ll kill him dead.”

“I’m so hungry I would drink the lifeblood of a mangled mink. I’m so hungry, oh…”

Wesley stared at the bathroom door. “Do you suppose there’s a way we could feed him? I’m finding this rather disturbing.”

Cordelia shrugged. “There might be some straws in the drawer by the coffee pot. Stick them together and feed them under the door or something. Just hurry up and help me; research is boring.”

Wesley brought a cup of blood from Angel’s apartment upstairs and tried to make a viable train of coffee stirrers. He spilled some blood, and Angel’s shoulder hit the door, making it splinter. Cordelia told Wesley to just pour the cup out and let him lick it off the floor. It didn’t seem the most sanitary solution, but it was the quickest and therefore safest for them.

“Do you know who the heck Tara Maclay is?” Cordelia asked.

“Ah yes,” Wesley replied, “the tall blonde girl who sang at the funeral. Lovely voice, impeccable pronunciation of the Latin.”

“I didn’t see her.”

Wesley scoffed. “Given the amount of makeup running down your face, I’d wager you didn’t see much at all.”

“I was thinking about Buffy,” Cordelia muttered, and Wesley regretted his harshness. Nerves, he was about to explain. Men in combat, you remember. But Cordelia continued. “And spiders. Why did they have to bury her in the woods, anyway? Wasn’t she surrounded by enough creepy stuff when she was alive?”

Sighing, Wesley descended into the pile of books Cordelia had amassed. “Why do you ask about her?”

“Angel got a call from her, said I should tell him right away if she called again. Didn’t make any notes about her, though. Maybe something’s after her, and it’s using this amnesia thing to make her more vulnerable. Like the band candy! Do you know a demon that does that?”

“That eats candy?”

Cordelia was disgusted. “No, amnesia? Jeez, Wesley, keep up.”

“Well, there are demons who can disorient their victims, but it typically relies on proximity. The Viledente demon, for example, can cause temporary madness by breathing in its enemy’s face, and the Ramjack must make physical contact… Perhaps we should check for stings? It would be a purplish color in a bull’s eye pattern, typically on a place that’s warm and soft, like the midriff or the buttocks.”

Cordelia handed him the crossbow. “Well, I’m not checking Angel. I’ll make Giles and the Scoobies strip. Keep researching.”


Anya answered the phone. “She says we have to examine each other’s warm, soft places for stings.”

Tara blushed. “F-for what?”

“Purple bull’s eye,” Anya answered, and she started to take off her shirt. “Alright, who’s gonna examine me?”

Alexander started to raise his hand, but Rupert jumped up and interrupted. “Dear, I believe there is a bathroom in this establishment. We can check ourselves in the mirror there.”

“Couldn’t hurt to be thorough,” Alexander offered, but Rupert just glared at him.

“I’ll go first,” Willow said, and she started opening doors. “Hey, a work-out room! And here’s basement storage. Bathroom bathroom… Here it is!” The redhead waved and disappeared. Tara giggled.

“We could check less personal places while we wait,” she suggested. “Arms and necks and stuff?”

Willow could barely turn around in the bathroom. She fell against the sink trying to pull her shoes and socks off. No marks on her legs; good. She pulled her shirt up over her head, and a black crystal clattered to the floor. Examination yielded nothing special. She shrugged and tucked it back into the half-hidden pocket at the hem of her shirt, thinking, “Maybe I’m a witch, too. Maybe Tara and I do spells together.” Her mind wandered off down a path of her and Tara spending quality time together, and she checked her back, stomach, and arms absent-mindedly before redressing and exiting the bathroom.

The others cycled through one by one. Alexander discovered a large purple spot on his thigh and ran out of the bathroom in nothing but boxers, shrieking, but it was only a bruise. No one else found anything.

When they called Cordelia back, she shrugged and told them she’d keep looking. It was getting late now, and she considered telling Wesley she’d get Chinese take-out for dinner, but she was afraid the word dinner would start Angel singing again. Stomach growling, she picked up the book that sounded least-likely to depict demons with erections and bloody fangs and started skimming the pages for words like “forgetting,” “amnesia,” and “bat-shit insane.”

“Hey, these are pretty,” she said, showing a picture to Wesley. “Forget-me-nots. Traditionally burned to ease grief, these plants have no magical potential.”

Wesley squinted at the page. “Magical potential? Ah yes, perhaps we should look into spells as well. Our assailant could easily be a magician of some kind.” He followed a cross-reference from forget-me-nots to mind control plants, then handed Cordelia a book of spells. “Tabula Rasa. It means ‘blank slate,’ more or less. See if you can find it.”

An hour later, the phone in the Magic Box rang again.

“The woman says we should look for a black crystal,” Rupert reported.

Alexander laughed. “Like that weird 80’s movie, with the puppets?”

“I um, I think it’s ‘The Dark Crystal,’” Tara said. “And I think I like that movie.”

“Why can you remember that, but not your own name?” Anya asked. Tara shrugged.

“She says,” Rupert continued, cutting off further digression, “that someone may have placed a spell on us, and in order to break…”

“You did this!” Alexander yelled. “I told you she did this! What did you do, witch?”

Tara backed away from him and started unloading her pockets: a billfold, two tissues, a crumpled piece of paper with a phone number scrawled across it, and twenty-one cents. She crossed her arms and glanced at Alexander. “That’s all I have.”

“So where did you hide it?” he shouted, advancing. Willow cut in front of him.

“She said that’s all she has. What do you want her to do, strip?” Her fury was hampered by a blush. Naked Tara. Not the appropriate thought to be having right now. And then she started to panic.

“Let’s see your pockets,” she demanded, trying to draw attention away from herself while she figured out what to do. The pocket was hidden. If she held her arm right, she could cover it, and then she could slip off and hide the crystal somewhere. Why did she have it in the first place?

Alexander dumped a large wallet, a cell phone, some candy bar wrappers, and a set of keys on the center table. Rupert added keys, a photocopy of his passport, and a handkerchief to the pile, and Anya, who had no pockets, dumped makeup, chicken feet, and a neatly clipped stack of twenty-dollar bills with everyone else’s stuff.

Willow dropped her wallet on the table and shrugged. “I don’t have pockets either.”

“Bad design,” Tara said, and Willow smiled at her. God, what a wonderful smile. There was something familiar in it, too, and in the way she moved, her lips parted, her foot twitching nervously while she put her weight on her other leg. She wanted to assure her somehow that things would work out by morning; she wanted to assure herself that she wouldn’t lose touch with this pretty girl, even if they had only been random customers in a magic shop. Why would Willow be in a magic shop? Tara scanned her clothes for pentagrams, tried to isolate some fiber of her that was magical, aside from the magical feeling of butterflies in her stomach. Sandals, long green skirt, no jewelry on her fingers or arms. Her shirt was black, which didn’t mean anything, clinging in places but looser around the waist, with what looked like a pocket stitched into the side furthest from her. But it couldn’t be a pocket.

Willow shifted her weight to twitch the other foot, and Tara realized she had been staring. Her eyes flickered up to the other girl’s eyes, and something that was coiled inside the girl lashed out, like a snake striking at Tara’s face. She jumped.

“What’s wrong with you?” Anya asked.

Tara blinked. “Oh, I-I was um. I was thinking maybe, I mean, this is a m-magic shop, right?” She glanced again at Willow, who was nothing but a pretty girl holding her arm in a funny way. “Well, maybe none of us did the spell. Maybe someone else did, or tried to, and they left the crystal lying around somewhere. We could check, the um, the shop?”

Rupert nodded. “It’s certainly worth trying. With all the bloody nonsense going around today, I wouldn’t discard any idea out of hand.”

“Me and Anya could check the basement,” Alexander offered.

“Why don’t you check the workout room,” Rupert scowled. “Fewer things in there for you to break, I’d wager.”
“Willow and me could take the basement,” Tara said. “I mean, better for you guys to stay up here with the register and…”

“I agree. Keep them away from the money,” Anya insisted.

“Well, I should probably go down and make sure they don’t disturb…”

Tara interrupted. “But, I mean, you guys haven’t had any time to spend together, and that’s um, i-important. I mean, a store is, personal?”

Of everyone here, Willow would have the best chance at getting rid of the crystal down in the basement with Tara. “It sounds good to me. So, plan? Okay.” She grabbed Tara’s hand and fled toward the basement. The skin of her palm tingled.

Tara stayed behind her, down the stairs and into the cluttered storeroom, watching Willow move. The feeling of those eyes on her back made Willow shiver.

“It’s funny,” Tara said, “the things you do remember. Memories get stored in different places in the brain: faces, names, events, are separate from feelings, words. You can forget you ever knew a person and still remember what their voice sounded like. We don’t even know who we are, but we still have instincts, personality. Sexuality.”

Willow stopped digging through a box of rags and bones and looked at Tara, who was running her finger under the labels on the shelves.

“I don’t know why I remember that. About memory.” She gave Willow a crooked smile, and Willow’s knees started to fail her. She propped herself up against the side of a filing cabinet. Tara laughed. “You’d think I could remember something useful.”

“Well, we have feelings,” Willow gulped. “Those are pretty strong.”

For a moment, Tara hesitated, her fingers sticking to a place where tape had been peeled away. She hadn’t expected seduction to work, not really. Her second plan was to tell the pretty redhead she had a spider on her. That would have been more straight-forward. Why had she gone with seduction, anyway? She looked into Willow’s eyes and watched her chest rise and fall, the speed increasing as her gaze lingered.

Instinct, Tara decided, and she stepped forward.

“Something in your hair,” she murmured, plucking imaginary fuzz, smoothing the red hair around Willow’s reddening face. She leaned in a little more, a gesture she could excuse by saying the light was so low, and tilted her head. Willow closed the distance, kissing her frantically and running her hands along her shoulders.

Tara let her hand grab Willow’s side, then slid it down, escalating the kiss to a fever pitch to keep the redhead distracted. Her fingers slid into the secret pocket and wrapped around a sharp, hard object. Tara ripped away, knocking Willow off balance, and held the black crystal up in the dim light.

“Hey!” Willow shouted, and then she froze. Dread built in her gut as she watched Tara close her hand around the crystal and crush it.

When the memories returned, they were silent. Willow was simply aware, in the span of a heartbeat, of the look on Tara’s face, what the hardening in her eyes meant.

Shards of white crystal flickered to the floor when Tara lowered her opened hand to her side. They fell in a trail as she turned and climbed the stairs, leaving Willow shaking and alone.


Xander was wandering back from the training room when Tara strode out from the basement and started reloading her pockets from the pile on the table, shaking from the effort of holding back tears. She shot a glance at him that made him stop short.

“Can Willow stay with you for a couple days? She can live in the house while I’m away, but when I come back I want her gone. I don’t care where she goes.”

“What? Away, stay… what?” Xander spluttered.

Giles took her by the arm. “Tara, what happened?”

“Direct confrontation pisses her off. I could have told you that. Should have. God, why can I not stand up for myself?”

“I’m afraid I don’t understand…”

“I tried to guide her. That didn’t work. I tried talking, I tried threatening. Both ways, I got my ass kicked. So now, I’m leaving.”

“For where?” Anya asked.

“L.A. Angel’s going to teach me how to fight. I’m sick of this, I can’t…”

Giles held up his hands, trying to stop Tara’s momentum. “But you’re not thinking this through! How will you get there? How will you care for yourself? And what about Dawn?”

“Dawn’s coming with me,” Tara answered. “I know how to take care of myself, and her. I’ve done this before.” She took a breath and gazed around the shop, avoiding the questions in her friends’ eyes. “I can do this.”


The next morning, half-dead from lack of sleep, Tara clung to her scrap of self-confidence and rang the bell on Mr. Alvarez’s front desk. The mechanic appeared from the back, wiping his hands on a filthy red rag.

“Got another van to sell?” he laughed.

“I need a van,” Tara told him. “The camper you’ve had sitting in the lot for two years now.”

Mr. Alvarez looked at Dawn. “This gringa is crazy,” he told her. “That van is shit, taking up space. Better house than you showed up in, though, yeah?”

He pulled a set of keys off the panel of hooks on the wall and tossed them to Tara. She took Dawn by the hand and led her out to a dilapidated camper van parked in the middle of the used car lot. There was still a dent in the hood from when the last owners had hit a deer.

Tara unlocked the door and climbed the steep steps inside. Dawn followed, looking around and wrinkling her nose.

“What’s that smell?”

Tara inhaled deeply and sighed. “Venison. Deer jerky. Kerosene. Smells like home.”

Dawn laughed. “Your redneck is showing.”

“The last van I had smelled like cake. The one I sold to Mr. Alvarez? I told him I wished I’d had one like this, it would have been nice to cook.”

“When did you have a van?”

“High school,” Tara answered. “I bought it with the money my mom left me, fixed it up so I could live in the back all summer, until college. I couldn’t stay at home one minute past graduation, so I hid the van in the lot behind the football field. I left so fast my mortar board blew off on the highway.” She uncovered the gas stove and traced the burners lovingly. “I lived that way for two months, in the back of an old cake van, eating the food they throw out behind grocery stores. We’ll eat better than that in L.A., I promise.”

Dawn stared at her. “Why are you telling me this?”

Tara stared out the window above the tiny kitchen sink. “I-I don’t know. Trying to convince myself it’ll be good. To be free again? I was happy that summer.” She laughed. “But someone caught me brushing my teeth in the Wal-Mart bathroom and called the police. They figured out I was a student, called the administration, and they let me move in early. That’s how I ended up with a single my freshman year. I sold the van to Mr. Alvarez, told him I wished I’d had a camper like this.”

Tara sank down on the couch, and Dawn sat beside her.

Mr. Alvarez clambered into the van and grinned. “Nice, huh? Forget the mileage and the deer-sized dent in the hood. It runs.” He turned to Tara. “So crazy, you buying?”

“I’ll rent. I just need to get to Los Angeles. I can keep the sign in the window; maybe someone’ll buy it.”

“Who needs a camper in Los Angeles?” Mr. Alvarez laughed.

Tara gave him as much of a smile as she could muster. “Rich people live there, right? Rich people are crazy.”

“Rent it,” Mr. Alvarez muttered. He stomped down the steps, shaking his head and talking to himself in Spanish about paperwork. Through the camper window, Dawn watched him disappear into his office.

“Tara?” she asked when he was out of sight, “Why do you keep running away?”

Tara tucked a strand of hair behind Dawn’s ear, flashing a smile that might have been a wince.

“I don’t,” she said. “I came across the country to find a life that was my own. Now I have to learn how to protect it.”

Dibs!



This was spectacular!

I gotta say, i'm not liking Willow right now, i hope she comes right eventually.

But a Dawn/Tara cross country trip? That sounds like a blast!
I am totally looking forward to it!

Keep up the good work!

R

-----------------------------------------------
“All I feel is sunlight. All I hear is music.” - Willow
How i Met Your Mother - By Ariel

Amazing update! I can't wait for Tara to come back a major ass kicker! OOOOOO!

Please don't make us wait too horribly long for the next update.

Interesting; even with the amnesia Willow knew she had to protect the crystal.

Good plan for Tara; I'm hoping she'll be able to go into the details about the visit from FutureWillow with someone there, maybe find some outright help.

Time Heals All: a Willow/Tara fic with a terrible title

Author: Big_Pineapple

Feedback: Yes, including title suggestions, line edits, and general comments

Spoilers: vague reference to all seasons

Setting: Pre-season six and onward, AU.

Rating: PG-13, I think

Disclaimer: Copyright law. My girlfriend explained it to me once, but we were both falling asleep. Thank you, Mutant Enemy, for giving me Tara, but you jumped the shark.

Summary: Tara uses Willow's suggestions to try to make the future better.


Part VIII: Angel

It was hard to believe how many headlights swept past the windows, dragging long shadows through the camper: the spices in a little rack along the wall, the faucet, arching out, the stiff curtains over the squat windows. Tara had raided the pantry and fridge at the house, stashing as much food for the trip as she could, and she had filled a box with all her magic supplies, a duffel bag with clothes. Dawn had her backpack and two bags of her own, and pictures to tape along the walls of her little alcove above the cab of the van. It would have been better if Tara could have driven through the night; it was seven hours to Los Angeles, but they had pulled over after two, because it was late, and Tara was tired.

Now, she laid awake, counting the cars that pulled in and out of the Wal-Mart parking lot and wishing she’d brought more blankets. She was cold down to her bones, even rolled up like a burrito in her blankets on the fold-out couch. The camper had heat, but she didn’t dare turn it on. Even if the van didn’t burst into flame while they slept, it would waste gas.

Above her, Dawn made a tiny noise that might have been a sob. Tara made no move to check on her, for fear of getting yelled at or getting stuck up there. She rolled over and shivered. It wasn’t helping her exhaustion that she was keeping herself awake with worry, but she couldn’t banish the thought that she might never be warm in bed alone.

When she woke up, the aloneness was like a punch in the stomach. At least when she opened her eyes, she consoled herself, there would be nothing to remind her of Willow.

Dawn helped her scramble eggs on the gas stove in the van, and they put them on bread with ketchup like sandwiches. When Tara buckled herself into the driver’s seat, Dawn sat next to her.

“Can I keep the chair turned around backward?” she asked. “I like the mobile living room look.”

Tara shook her head. “No seatbelt that way.”

Dawn rode the seat as it slowly rotated. Tara waited for her to buckle up before pulling out of the lot.
“Do you want to play a game?” Tara offered. “We could try to get all the letters of the alphabet off the highway signs, see who gets the most.”

Dawn agreed, and Tara let her win. They played I Spy, and then they played music; Dawn kept flipping through the stations, creating a nonsensical mix of rock, pop and country that all somehow rhymed in Tara’s head.

“What’s for lunch?” Dawn asked about an hour outside of L.A.

“Peanut butter and jelly okay?”

“Can we stop somewhere?”

“Do you want to play the alphabet game again?”

Dawn slouched in her seat and stared out the window.

“We can take a stretch break and make sandwiches,” Tara said, hoping this would appease her.

“I’m bored,” Dawn said. “Can’t we do something?”

“We’re almost there, Dawnie.”

The thought of taking a detour made Tara’s shoulders tighten. She pulled off at the next rest stop and slapped sandwiches together while Dawn went into the welcome center to pee.

Relieved and stretched, Dawn began picking over the brochures in the shelves along the wall, glancing over her shoulder at times to see what the man at the counter was doing. Beside him was a turning rack of postcards and a tray of golden pins with the state bird and flower. The quail looked like it had been hiding in the bloom of the poppy, like the munchkin babies in the “The Wizard of Oz.” Dawn slipped up to the counter when an old man in a polo and flip-flops leaned over the counter and started asking directions. The attendant clumsily unfolded a map, and Dawn snatched a pin in the rustle. Both men glanced at her, but she was idly spinning the postcard rack with one finger.

When the sandwiches were finished and cut in neat diagonal halves, Tara climbed out of the van and wandered through the grass to the back of the welcome center. The air was clear and the sun was out and the heat was almost unbearable. The best shade was under a parched weeping willow growing by a man-made dribble of a stream. Were those poor things supposed to grow at all this far south? Sudden tears made Tara too blind to flee and lock herself in a bathroom stall; she slumped against a picnic table, standing at one end with her elbows on the warped boards. She cried for Willow, herself, Dawn and Buffy, and then because she was so tired. The first thing she was able to see was an older couple with a Chihuahua, staring at her. She wiped her face and waved to them. They picked up their dog and hurried away, and Tara laughed as they went.

Dawn was in the van, munching on a sandwich when Tara returned, her face clean and a little less red. She turned the radio on, spinning the dial until she found a song she recognized, then spread a napkin in her lap and ate while driving.


Tara followed directions Cordelia had given her, and after driving around the block twice and then five blocks down to find a parking spot, she and Dawn finally found Angel’s offices. The building was huge, but they could tell which one was his because of the commotion. Someone screamed, something fell, and Tara went running, motioning for Dawn to stay in the foyer. When she opened the door, a large orange demon was swiping randomly with massive claws. Tara grabbed the collar of the person closest to her and hauled them into the foyer and out of the demon’s reach. Using the door as a shield, she shot a fire spell into the room. A jet of flame hit the floor between the demon and Angel, causing them both to stagger back. Angel regained his focus and grabbed a sword off the floor. Tara shut the door on the demon, who had spotted her. She heard a hissing roar like the creature from a B alien film, then a thump.

“Are you okay?” she asked the person she’d grabbed.

“Normal day at the office. You almost ripped my shirt.”

Tara grinned. “Hi Cordelia.”

Cordelia walked around her and into the office. Tara waved to Dawn, then followed her.

Angel and Wesley were rescuing scattered paperwork from the smear of goo that had been the demon, Wesley chattering about the species and the toxicity of its remains. Cordelia volunteered to get a mop.

“H-hi,” Tara said when the two men looked up at her. She flashed a half-smile, then gestured at the small ashy crater where her fireball had landed. “Sorry about the floor.”

“Tara Maclay.” Angel smiled and stepped over the goo to shake her hand. “We appreciate your help.”

“Of course fire might not have been the best idea with a vampire in the room,” Dawn said.

Wesley straightened up and came to greet Tara. “Tactics aside, your control was impressive. Wesley Windham Price, we’ve met before. I…”

Cordelia, who had returned with the mop and a bucket, squealed and shoved them into Wesley’s arms before taking Dawn in hers. “Oh my god! You’re all grown up and even better dressed! Just look at how cute you are.”

Angel gestured toward his office, suggesting it might be quieter there. Tara followed him.

The door closed behind them, Angel leaned on his desk, offering Tara the chair in front of him. She sat, but not still.

“How are you?” he asked.

“I’ll live.”

Angel smiled as best he could. “How can I help? You didn’t really explain much on the phone before you came.”

“I want to learn how to defend myself.”

“Have you worked with weapons before?”

Tara looked surprised. “Of course not. I could hurt someone.”

Angel stared at her blankly for a moment, then burst out laughing. “What is it you want me to do?”

Tara stared into her lap and didn’t answer.

Sobered, Angel told her, “The first rule of self-defense is make lots of noise and run as fast as you can. Beyond that, it usually involves pain. If you’re in trouble, you can probably fight your way out with magic.”

“I don’t want to just use magic.” Tara took a breath and raised her eyes to meet his briefly before turning her gaze away. “I want options.”

“Why?”

“Because I’ve never had them before.”

She sat still, not looking at him, and Angel wasn’t sure where to look himself. He scrambled for something to say, something he could teach her.

“I guess it’s um, it’s kind of my fault no one asks me what I want. I don’t know. I’m going to be a junior in college, and I don’t know what I want to be. Never thought I’d get to choose. I-I don’t even know what I like, besides magic and girls.” Tara raised her head and looked Angel in the eye. “I just want to know something. I want to have a choice.”

Angel was stunned. There was no anger, no fear in her eyes, nothing but steadiness. Her breathing was even, her heart rate was slow. He stared for a moment, thinking of the way she sang and waiting for her to say the perfect thing one more time. But she was waiting for him.

“There’s an art form. It’s about balance and energy flows, more of a dance than a martial art. You can hurt someone with it, but you don’t have to. And you don’t have to be strong to do it.”

Tara waited. Angel shifted his weight. “I learned it from a vampire who was only five feet tall. It’s… I think you’d like it. We could try.”

“When?”

She was more agile than Angel expected, though self-conscious to the point of distraction, and she ran like lightening, but her energy flagged quickly. She hadn’t eaten well, and she had slept so poorly it looked like she’d been punched in the eyes. Angel took her down to his apartment to let her rest, but he told her it was to show her around. At his invitation, she sat at the kitchen table, and he poured her a large glass of water and watched her drink it.

“So um,” Tara started, “the demon today. Does that happen a lot?”

“Sometimes.” Angel opened the fridge, stared in, then closed the door again without taking anything out.

“W-what did it want?”

Angel shrugged, tapping a teaspoon on his palm.

“Angel,” Tara said, leaning across the table. “Is something wrong?”

“Cordelia,” Angel answered. He dropped his teaspoon in the sink and slumped into the chair across from Tara. “She’s my connection to the Powers that Be. She has visions, they tell us who’s in trouble, who is trouble. Without her, I’m shooting in the dark.”

“Why would you be without her? She’s not s-sick, is she?”

Angel shook his head. “I don’t think so. But she’s getting all the pain without the visions. It’s happened three times now in the past four days.” He started pacing across the kitchen floor. “I tried to get into their dimension, but they wouldn’t let me through.”

“I’m sorry.” Tara stared into her cup.

Angel didn’t answer. They sat in silence for a long time, and when Angel stood and returned to his offices, he didn’t seem to notice Tara following him.

Dawn called to her. She was sitting on Cordelia’s desk with a pad of eye shadow in her hand. A shock of purple covered her left eye lid, and Cordelia was hunting through her desk for cold cream pads to touch it up with.

“I can’t believe you never learned to do this,” she said over the rattle of drawers. “Looks like I’m out. I know I have some at home, though. Tara, you wouldn’t mind if I stole her for the night, would you?”

Dawn bounced on the desk. “Please, Tara?”

“Sure.”

Cordelia hugged Dawn. “You know what? We should go shopping tomorrow.”

“Oh,” Tara said. “You don’t have to work?”

“Like I can work with these headaches,” Cordelia groaned. “I mean, if it helps people, fine, whatever. But for nothing?”

Tara nodded. “A-angel told me about that.”

“Did he tell you to get some sleep? You look like hell.”

Tara shuffled her feet and stared at the floor. Cordelia picked up her purse and stood.

“You can get a decent shower at my place, if you’re not afraid of ghosts. He doesn’t creep, I promise. And hot Hamburger Helper for dinner.”

Tara looked up with a half smile tugging at the corner of her mouth. “You’re nicer than you sound.”

Cordelia shrugged. “Come on.”


The first day Willow came back to live in the house, she slept on the couch and ate nothing but the can of spaghetti-os that was all Tara had left behind. When Xander found out, he told her she could eat dinner and sleep at his and Anya’s apartment. Anya wasn’t fond of the idea, and she tried to convince Willow that she should do housework or cook while they were at work during the day. Instead, she wandered home in a daze to feed Amy and Miss Kitty Fantastico, and she spent her days snuggling Miss Kitty and weeping. She lived like this for a week before Anya called her a moocher, and then she got mad. Her stomping scared Miss Kitty, who hid under the couch and refused to come out, so Willow sat in the bedroom and played with Amy instead.

The rat was restless, squirming out of her fingers and skittering across the bedspread.

“What’s the matter, Amy?” Willow asked, wondering for the thousandth time if Amy could understand her at all. Buffy had said that all she thought about when she was a rat was cheese, but what if Amy was different? Or what if Willow wasn’t taking care of her right?

“You must be lonely,” she told her friend. “We should get you a friend, someone to love and play with and get attached to. Until they up and leave you for no good reason.”

Amy squeaked and tried to dive off the end of the bed. Willow caught her and held her to her chest.

“Don’t worry. I was just kidding,” Willow assured her, then she sighed. “Oh Amy, I wish I knew how to turn you back into a person…”

Suddenly, she jumped up and dropped the Amy rat onto the bed. “Reveal!” she commanded, looking up at the ceiling. A piece of parchment drifted down to her, and she read it quickly, without a single breath.

Amy’s scream rattled the windows.


--------

Hello everyone. Thank you for encouragement, and thank you so much for suggestions and questions. It's wonderful to hear from you all.

Kay

Dibs!

Angel: We help the helpless.

Gotta love the guy, especially when he's teaching Tara martial arts.
I would imagine he would want to teach Dawn fro the exact same reasons,
i mean nothing says 'i care' like keeping someone's loved-ones safe.
Imagine the look on the next badguy's face when he tries to grab Tara or Dawn and they just dance out of the way!

"I want options" Brilliant!

absolutely perfect!

more people should be this clear.

I get that poor Tara feels lost and alone, but this was totally the right thing to do.
She needs time away to get her boundaries rebuilt, and Willow needs time alone to get her head on straight.

I think it will be good for them.

keep up the good work sweetie

I'm looking forward to the next bit!

R

Kay,



That's really the heart of it isn't it? The only time she was asked what she wanted was when Willow asked her if she really wanted to leave with her father. We never knew exactly what she studying or what her major was (unless I missed that), we were much like Tara, and to quote you again sort of, we knew she liked magic and girls, or at least one girl, Willow. There was a lot of "grey area" with Tara that was sadly underdeveloped.



How much of the future has "Future Willow" done and changed simply by having Tara believe her?

*wiggles in my seat* So many possibilities.... you keep it interesting and use the basic structure w/o being clichéd. Good on you!

I also think it's interesting that w/o a thought she also took Dawn with her. She could have left Dawn with Giles, but I'm sure there's something you have planned there too - or at least I hope so.

I may not comment all the time, but I'm still here and tagging alone for your ride.


- Heather