Another quick drive-by post. I'm on an unwanted writing hiatus, but I had a few spare minutes to polish this chapter a tad and post.
CHAPTER 28
Willow woke up slowly, strangely, finally realizing for the first time in a very long while she’d fallen asleep without wearing a tee shirt. Tara was tucked around her, her soft breath moving along the back of her neck, one arm slung around her stomach. As she’d done the past few mornings, Willow turned over slowly to look at Tara’s sleeping face. So many times before she’d overlaid it with memories of her other Tara’s face, now she overlaid it with memories of Tara still sleeping off the results of the rejoining conjure. Then as now, Tara had seemed to her younger, less wise to the ways of the world, and she loved that somewhere deep inside of her, somewhere when she was lost in dreams, that innocence still lived.
The innocence had also been present the previous night. They’d kissed again and again, Tara slowly, ever so slowly taking Willow into her hands, touching Willow’s breasts, finally kissing them. Before, it had been different. She’d been the one hesitant and unsure, more afraid then she’d cared to admit. All those years ago, Willow had acted cool, acted like she wasn’t terrified of making a mistake, of saying or doing something wrong, of embarrassing herself, as if there was some manual or check list she was supposed to follow. Her first Tara had been gentle with her, she who’d been the hesitant and unsure one until that moment when their so-called “friendship” kisses turned to something more, she who’d suddenly found some until then hidden reserve of confidence and sexiness. They’d both been with others, admittedly Willow only with the one (because the “fluke” didn’t really count) and Tara only with two (a late middle school romance and a “mistake” that happened during her “rebellious” period), but this Tara had not, and Willow was almost jealous. Not because she regretted Oz, or begrudged her Tara her past (although to say there hadn’t been a certain amount of jealousy would have been a not exactly gross exaggeration, but an exaggeration all the same), but because there was a small part of her that wished she wasn’t so knowing of things, wished her body was as mysterious to her as it had been when she was first coming into her own, when she could still sleep the night through and wake knowing she’d dreamed about sex, wake with the languor in her limbs, if not an actual memory of the dream.
Tara made a soft sound, and Willow leaned close, wanting to draw Tara awake with a kiss, first only the simplest of brushing of lips together, then an actual kiss as Willow felt Tara’s consciousness return, and then moving into each other’s arms, Willow coming to lie on top, a nest of arms and legs.
“It’s Friday,” Tara said, her voice sounding thick.
“No school. I don’t have to leave the house until late.”
“You’re going to work on your paper, right? The one for Professor Greenberg.”
Willow resisted making an unpleasant noise. “I’ve completed my outline, and so all I have left is to write the thing.”
“Your outline is almost the entire paper. It’s written in complete sentences.”
“It’s the only way to make sure I don’t skip a point or fall into some logic trap. Even if the class is just a basic science requirement, I still want to do well. And besides, researching the fault record was fun. I took Dawnie with me into the foothills and we took rock samples and photographs of the terrain.” This was not the conversation Willow wanted to have while she was half-naked and in Tara’s arms and so she stopped and offered Tara a wide-awake kiss. The kiss was returned, several more exchanged. Willow put her head down on Tara’s shoulder. “This is the best way to wake up, don’t you think?”
“Diego and Carl would sometimes wake me up by dumping water on my head. This is light-years away from that, and something more if there’s anything bigger than a light-year.”
Willow restrained herself from answering the implied question. “Are you going in to help Anya this morning?”
“From nine to noon. After that Giles has me on stake carving duty, and then I have practice with Buffy scheduled at three-thirty. Want to come and watch, the practice I mean?”
Willow had missed only two practice sessions since Buffy and Tara had begun training together, a habit Tara seemed to regard as entirely innocent while Xander and Buffy recognized was entirely indulgent.
“Dawnie and I have a dress fitting date at House of Style, so I might be a little late.”
“So has anyone . . .”
“Asked her to Homecoming? No. But after Janice pulled Dawnie off the dance floor last night, I saw the two of them talking. I suppose it’s a little intimidating. Asking Dawn out would be like running the gauntlet between Buffy and Xander. Plus there’s Anya and . . . well you can imagine. Marilyn from The Munsters had a better chance.”
“The Munsters was an old TV show, right?”
“From the 1960s.”
Noises were happening outside the door, soft conversations. Willow thought she heard Giles say something and then Buffy say something back. Any minute now there would be a knock on the door. Not happy about it, Willow sat up, accepting it was time to start the day and wondering who was next in the shower line. A soft gasp from Tara, however, yanked Willow back into the more immediate present.
The blush began somewhere high above her cheekbones and sped quickly downward, soon covering her upper chest, hiding all of her freckles, but not the state of her far more sensitive flesh. She wanted to say something spicy, even something saucy, but she knew whatever she said would sound more like a squeak, and so instead she simply watched as Tara’s gaze moved along her upper body. Blue eyes that felt like a touch were coupled with the most unaware smile Willow thought she’d ever seen. Finally, she just said, “Baby?” and watched Tara seemingly come back into herself.
“You, you’re even prettier by daylight.”
“Hey, I thought I was the breast girl,” Willow said, needing to make a joke before her hair actually started on fire, and then seeing something, an expression pass over Tara’s face. “Baby, what did you just think about?” Tara stumbled over the word “nothing,” which told Willow the thought had been definitely something. “Sit up with me a second?”
Tara sat up, crossing her legs under the sheet, her eyes cast down. Willow asked her question again, and this time Tara answered, and Willow felt her heart break in a way it had never broken before. “That’s just . . .” What? What could she say? “You’re right. My Tara didn’t have scars like yours. But that doesn’t mean—“
“The way you l-looked at her. I remember it. I remember your expression the first time you undressed her. You were n-nervous, but there was this expression in your eyes, like you couldn’t imagine anything more beautiful.”
“You think I got you the negligee to cover up the scars,” Willow said, the realization coming to her so fast, so strongly, it flew out of her mouth. The expression on Tara’s face confirmed it, and Willow felt her heart break further. But then another thought erupted in her too busy brain. “Baby, I got you the negligee because I thought it would look amazing on you. You see that’s the funny thing about lingerie. Even if you don’t intend to wear it, you always kind of buy it for yourself. Or, put another way, I bought the negligee thinking about how much fun it would be to take it off of you, kind of like the bra and panty set.”
“You’d want to . . .”
“Undress you,” Willow supplied. She waited for a small nod before continuing. “I’d kind of like to try it while you were actually conscious and when I might be able to sneak in a few kisses. And by the way, I’m still a breast girl, your breast girl, but I think I’m becoming a forearm girl and a few other body parts, all of which kind of get shown off while you practice drill.”
“Practice drill?”
“Tare, the reason I like watching you practice drill is because I’m usually spending most of the time imagining you . . .” Willow leaned closer and whispered the last word of her sentence into Tara’s ear.
Now they were both scarlet. “So, okay?” Tara managed a nod and started to move off the bed, but Willow caught her and pulled her close. “This is the kiss I’ve been holding back.”
All of the kisses before had been soft, dreamy, romantic. This wasn’t that kiss. It was hard and passionate and filled with longing and Willow was half worried Tara would panic and half worried she would lose all control, and when it was over, she heard Tara whisper, “okay.”
***
By 2:30 Willow was seriously wondering what she’d been thinking. All day, well ever since Tara had left that morning for the Magic Box Willow had been stewing over the kiss they’d exchanged just before getting out of bed. Except it hadn’t really been an exchange, and Willow was worried it had been too much.
The good thing about freaking out, however, was that her paper was complete, signed, sealed, and emailed to her professor with a full five weeks to spare. There was nothing like a good writing project for sublimating energy. But now the project was finished, as was all of her homework for the rest of the term except for reading the remaining novels for Professor Noxon’s class, Little Women and The Awakening, but she’d read the second in high school and the first in middle school and was pretty confident she could read them again in a snap. This meant the only distraction left was housework, and she’d already cleaned out the refrigerator, washed the upstairs bathroom floor, vacuumed the entire downstairs, and even managed to rinse out the fyarl demon blood from Buffy’s favorite hoodie. She checked the time again, it was now thirty-two minutes past the hour. If she walked to House of Style instead of taking her car it would kill at least twenty minutes, and she’d only be thirty minutes early, thirty minutes that could be wasted at The Coffee Grind, uptown Sunnydale’s answer to the Espresso Pump.
***
“I don’t know, Dawn. It seems a little—”
“Willow, I’ve seen pictures of the dress you wore to your prom, this isn’t all that different,” Dawn interjected quickly and softly, as if Mrs. Nguyen, who was at that moment pinning the hem, could not hear her.
“True, but I was older, and a senior. And you’re only a sophomore. Plus, don’t forget what happened. That was the dress that set in motion the fluke.”
Thinking Willow was about to nix the dress, Dawn argued, “Xander always says it was his tuxedo that did it.”
“It was both, and I’m not sure Xander’s tuxedo is relevant, here. We’re talking about a dress.”
“That’s supposed to make Kevin Berman want to ask me to dance.”
Mrs. Nguyen’s head bobbed at the mention of Kevin Berman’s name, and why wouldn’t it; who didn’t know Kevin Berman was the cutest boy at Sunnydale High given the number of Facebook testimonials, or more likely, the number of girls who’d passed through House of Style over the past weeks.
“So you know for sure he’s going stag.” Willow held back a smile over the word stag, which sounded like something her father would say.
“Kevin’s going with the rest of the wrestling team. So I’m going with Kit and Lisa.”
“Not Janice?”
“Janice has a real date with that boy Steven. I pointed him out to you when we were in Trader Joe’s.”
Willow remembered. He was cute, but blond, and Dawn was only enamored of boys with floppy brown hair, the Platonic ideal of which was Kevin Berman. She looked more carefully at the dress, or rather Dawn in the dress. The neckline was a little low, but acceptable. The fit though the bust and hips created a sense of feminine curves Dawn didn’t really have, but wasn’t that the function of this sort of dress. In a short flight of fancy Willow tried to imagine Tara in such a dress; she failed, not the Tara of before, not the Tara of now. A very subtle sniff from Mrs. Nguyen pulled Willow’s attention back into the here and now. A decision had to be made, or not.
“Tell me about the shoes. Two and a half inch heels are acceptable, anything higher and you’ll be seeing my resolve face.”
“Don’t worry about the shoes. I’m borrowing Buffy’s sling backs. They’re the same height as the ones I have on.”
Willow thought she recalled those had three inch heels, but for now she nodded her approval, a gesture also directed to Mrs. Nguyen, which caused Dawn to erupt in a sound pitched so high it was well above the hearing of all four legged creatures with the possible exception of hellhounds.
A few minutes later, back in her street clothes, Dawn was dragging Willow into Forbidden Sweets for a post-fitting celebratory cup cake, her treat. As usual, the place was a madhouse of soccer moms, middle schoolers, and sorority sisters, or in other words the double X crowd, and the two fell in line behind two women wearing Go Patriots sweatshirts (Benjamin Franklin Middle School pride) and a trio from Theta Delta Phi, one of whom Willow recognized from her intermediate geology class. Willow resisted asking her how her research paper was coming along since the response more than likely would involve “downloading nicely.”
“Have you tried the Nutella Dream cake, yet? It’s my new favorite after the Vanilla Coconut Effect.”
Willow had in fact tried both, Forbidden Sweets having been her Wednesday afternoon guilty pleasure since returning to Sunnydale. “I don’t know that Nutella anything would go wrong.”
“What about Nutella lasagna?”
“Okay, you got me there.” Willow craned her neck to see around an unusually large Theta Delta Phi to see a cupcake display that seemed near overwhelmingly extensive. “I’m not feeling the love for hazelnut, today. I’m thinking more along the carrot family of cakes.”
By the time they reached the counter, both had changed their minds, Dawn finding the Red Velvet Masterpiece irresistible and Willow seduced by the siren call of the English Toffee Fuddy-duddy. They took their cakes and Willow’s cup of lukewarm coffee (Forbidden Sweets yet to find counter help that could manage the cake racks and the coffee urns simultaneously) to one of the small tables that lined the side wall of the store.
“So what about flowers? Do girls still wear flowers pinned to their dresses?”
Dawn made a not very quiet snort. “Willow, come on. You act like your last formal was centuries ago.”
“It was. My prom was in 1999.”
“Ha, ha. Generation X humor still all the rage, not. But about the flowers, we talked about doing a flower exchange, me buy flowers for Kit, Kit for Lisa, Lisa for me, but then it started to get too complicated, cause Kit only wears native plants and Lisa has allergies, and so we decided to buy our own.”
“Would it be too grandma-y if I bought you a corsage?”
A sentimental smile on her face, Dawn shook her head. “No, because it would be Willow-y perfect.”
The warm and fuzzy moment was not to last, however because coming through the door just then was a gaggle of the Daughters of Gaia. Willow noticed them immediately and sighed as she took another bite into her Fuddy-Duddy.
“Why with the look?” Dawn asked, and then followed Willow’s eyes towards a group of young women all dressed in multiple layers of shirts, vests, skirts, cloaks, woolen socks, and sandals. “I thought Ren Fair wasn’t until spring?”
“Remember a while back when I told you about the college Wicca group.”
“The ones who didn’t know anything about witchcraft and kind of thought you were a freak?” Off Willow’s nod, she added, “Oh,” and then, “Let’s just ignore them. They probably won’t even notice you.”
Dawn’s advice seemed excellent, and so Willow returned her attention to her cupcake, her now not even close to lukewarm coffee, and further discussion of all things Kevin Berman, but the strategy failed when minutes later, cake box in hand, Cheryl stopped by the table to spread her good cheer.
“Willow, didn’t I see you last week at the mall?”
Willow put down her coffee cup and took a deep cleansing breath. “Yes, you did. I guess we must be on a similar schedule or something.”
“Or something.” Cheryl turned to Dawn. “I’m the president of the local chapter of Daughters of Gaia. You look a little young, but are you attending UC Sunnydale. Our meetings are open to all students.”
“I’m in high school.”
“A townie, of course, like Willow, here.” Making it clear townies weren’t worth her time, Cheryl turned back to Willow, “So, how’s Tara. Now that you’re back together again, I’d expect to see her glued to your side as usual.”
Keep it simple, Rosenberg, Willow thought. “At work.”
“She’s not taking classes anymore? That’s too bad. We were in Greek History together and she was amazing. Her Greek was better than Professor Petrie’s.” Cheryl leaned closer and lowered her voice. “So what really happened to her face. I mean those scars are kind of intense. The one on her forehead isn’t so bad, but the one the side is—“
“So what made you into a total bee-otch.”
Cheryl looked aghast, Willow furious, and Dawn merely wore the self-satisfied expression of teen agers everywhere who shot and scored. Too hurt, too angry to do anything else, Willow made the noise adults were supposed to make when a young person said something out of turn, but let it be clear she agreed with Dawn’s assessment and not necessarily expressed in middle school speak.
“Oh, sorry. I didn’t realize. Are you a family member?”
“Willow and Tara are my family.”
“Like Heather Has Two Moms,” Cheryl said, eyes wide. “Wow, that is so cool. A little strange because Willow and Tara can’t be more than what eight or nine years older than you, but--“
“They’re not my moms. My sister’s is my . . .”
“Dawn, please stop explaining things,” Willow said, starting to worry she was about to cry, and because the last thing on Earth she wanted to do was cry, she let her temper go instead. “Cheryl, you know how you like to tell everyone I’m bad news. Well I haven’t been for a while, but for you, I might need to make an exception.”
Cheryl took a step back, then another, her lizard brain over riding all else, instinct overcoming the need to disparage. The rest of the Daughters of Gaia were watching from one of the far tables. Willow couldn’t decide if they were watching with fear or admiration.
“No need to get huffy, Willow. I’ll see you around on campus,” Cheryl said, before she rejoined her group, and they left en masse, a swirl of paisley skirts and a stomp of leather Birkenstocks.
Willow took another sip of less than ideal coffee, and Dawn continued to eat her cupcake. A minute passed, then another.
“I didn’t mean it.”
“I know.” Dawn gathered up their cupcake wrappers and Willow’s now empty coffee cup and took everything to the trash basket. When she came back she pressed a quick kiss on the side of Willow’s forehead. “But I meant it. That Cheryl makes Kristie Simpson look like an amateur.” Dawn cocked her head towards the door and put on her best Bogie accent. “Come on, Louis, let’s blow this cupcake stand.”
Two blocks later, the spin cycle of Willow’s stomach finally completed, she glanced at Dawn. “You know I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, you’re a pretty good kid.”
Dawn smirked. “I’m not a kid.”
Starting to laugh, Willow said, “So ‘two moms,’ Buffy’s going to love that.”
“Only if it means I join your cell phone plan, and by the way, congratulations on winning Tara over to yours.”
“Anya saw it coming.”
“She did.”
They walked another half-block. Again Willow broke the silence; this time because she knew Dawn wouldn’t.
“So, if you want to ask me stuff, you can? After all, I may be adopting you soon.”
Dawn waited until they reached the next corner, and then asked, “You and Tara, you’re kind of with the two again, but not. I mean. You haven’t . . .”
Willow knew she’d asked for it, asked for the implied question, still she blushed. “It’s not like before. I mean, when Tara came back to me last spring.”
Simply saying the words “last spring” put black spots in front of her eyes, and then Dawn caught hold of her hand, and the spots faded.
Dawn said, “Hey,” and Willow, after a while said it back, letting Dawn know she was okay. Still Dawn waited until they reached another intersection before starting, “I kind of get it. I mean she’s new. I see it, too. She’s not my Tara from before, but she’s . . . She’s still my Tara, just different. It’s like having her back but with this extra added Tara goodness. Like she still makes my pancakes, but now she’s also this serious kick-ass.” Dawn glanced at Willow, eyebrows raised with an apology for the term “kick-ass.”
It was time for some serious honesty, the kind Willow had missed sharing with Dawn. “I’ll always miss our Tara. We both will, because how couldn’t we? But I’m so happy she’s here.”
“Me, too.”
They reached the corner of Elm Street and turned onto University Blvd. Willow could feel Dawn cogitating on another question. She wasn’t surprised when Dawn finally asked it, using words so circumspect Willow thought only she could have figured out the meaning.
Willow took a series of deep breaths and wondered if there was a sequel to Heather has Two Moms, if maybe this was it, and then she smiled.
“Is it okay if I start by saying much as I hope someday soon you and Tara no longer hold this particular status in common, I am also super devoted to the idea that you keep this particular status a while longer, much-ly longer, in fact. Maybe until you’ve completed graduate school.”
“You’re not saying I should get married first?”
When did Dawn develop a dry sense of humor? “Just super independent, womanly wise, and, in the most ideal of all worlds, financially stable.”
“That’s not really a problem right now. Because I know I’m not ready, not now, probably not for a while.”
Dawn broke off and Willow waited several long moments hoping Dawn would continue without prompting. Her hope was not in vain.
“For me, it’s because I haven’t found the right person, plus the whole yours, Xander’s, and Buffy’s heads would explode and that is just way too much brain matter all over the living room carpet, cause that’s where I’d tell you guys, definitely.” Dawn stopped for a moment, an offer of mercy. “For Tara, I’m guessing part of it is the ‘how to.’ I mean I don’t think Tara’s figured out like eighty percent of the Internet is about sex. So no help there. And Anya doesn’t ‘grok’ the lesbian.”
Oh dear god. “Grok the lesbian?”
“Some word Xander uses. Anya thinks it means understand.”
“Anya, as in Anya and you have talked about . . .”
“Sex,” Dawn supplied, “not so much about you and Tara, because, again, not really grokking the lesbian sex. But, yeah, except Anya is mostly about the cautionary tales, and only a little about the mechanics. Okay, maybe fifteen percent about the mechanics and eighty-five about the vengeance.”
Willow took several deep breaths and realized she was less freaked out then she would have expected. Anya was blunt, but she was also precise, usually to a fault, and she did not know the meaning of embarrassment, which made her a near ideal instructor in at least the mechanics and consequences of sex. Any would leave no stone unturned. Willow knew there had to be an more appropriate metaphor, but at that moment her mind was drawing a complete blank.
“So besides the ‘how to’ and the body issues, there’s the other thing, I guess. I mean you and Tara, the two of you. I mean even Buffy was kind of in awe. It would be kind of hard to live up to, you know.”
“Body issues,” Willow repeated, then catching up, “What do you mean awe?”
“Body issues because of the scars, which anyone would have. And about the other, maybe you should ask Buffy about the awesomeness of Slayer sensitivities in a wood frame house. I mean I never heard a thing, but for Buffy, the whole world’s a sort of constant all quadraphonic, THK, the audience is listening, I feel the earth move under my feet experience. I’m just sayin’.” Dawn nudged Willow with her shoulder. “Okay, going to stop with the teasing. Except I’m also kind of serious.”
Again there were spots, white ones this time instead of black. Again, Dawn took her by the hand. Again Willow recovered after another block. They were halfway to the Magic Box, and at the rate they were going they’d be there just at dusk and well after every shred of Willow’s dignity was set to flames. Oh well.
“You think Tara’s worried about . . .”
“Willow, wouldn’t you be. Remember what she said, about the ‘intimate’ memory flashes.” Dawn gave Willow’s fingers a squeeze. “There’s nothing you can do about that, but there is something you could do about the ‘how to’ thing. And I know it’s kind of not you to explain that sort of stuff, but . . . Do you get it?”
She did. Willow pulled Dawn closer, letting go of her hand in favor of slinging her arm over her shoulder. “You know, Louis, this could be the start of a beautiful friendship.”
“Oh Jerry, don't let's ask for the moon. We have the stars,“ Dawn said, affecting a much better Bette Davis than Willow’s Humphrey Bogart.
They managed to exchange movie quotes for the next half block and the turn onto Magnolia when Willow felt it. A shift in the wind, a scent on the air, a sound tickling all of Willow’s senses, jumping them to high alert, Willow stopped in her tracks. Dawn started to say something and Willow used her hand to cover her mouth to silence her. So far as she could see there was no one the street behind or in front of them. But shrubs and tress lined this block of Magnolia, providing perfect places for persons human and not to hide, so did the five or six cars parallel parked on the street. “Dawnie, something’s wrong. Stay with me, but if I say run, we book. Got it?” Dawn made a squeak that Willow took as a yes, and they started walking.
She heard something, something thump-like, not the sound of a trunk closing, more like a . . . Willow whirled around just as the vampire landed on his feet less than a meter behind her. He was dressed in a suit, a tie, and his game face, and he was standing in the shadow of a magnolia tree. Willow didn’t need to glance at the sliver of sunlight left on the horizon to know he’d soon be able to step out of the shadow. She grabbed Dawn by the hand and took off at a dead run, Dawn trailing behind.
“You didn’t say run,” Dawn said, barely winded as they ran down the street.
“Dawnie . . .” Willow began, trailing off as three more vamps darted from behind a parked van to form a line on the sidewalk. “What the . . .” Footsteps sounded from the right. Willow didn’t need to look to know they were vamps. This was seriously not good.
***
Sweat beading on her forehead, Tara pivoted to her left. Buffy followed, moving around her to swing a punch from behind. Tara dropped, rolled along her shoulder, and came back on her feet, just in time to catch a roundhouse kick to the chest.
“Oh my god, Tara. Are you okay?” Buffy shouted as Giles came running from the rear of the practice room.
Tara was already moving onto her feet, winded and terrified. But not for having been kicked. “Something’s wrong,” she gasped, grabbing hold of Buffy’s forearm.
“Tara, are you saying you need to go to the hospital?” Giles said.
“Not with me, with Willow. Something’s wrong with Willow . . . and Dawn, I think. Willow’s panicking. We need to find them.”
“Tara, how can you know Willow’s in trouble?”
Tara looked at Giles, she saw the doubt in his eyes, the same in Buffy’s. She didn’t have time to convince them she was right. She needed to find Willow. And to find Willow she needed to focus, to bring herself to center, to quell the panic inside, to listen to her heart, her breath, to find the magicks and ask: " Aradia, Goddess of the lost, the path is murky, darkness pervades, I beseech thee, bring the light needed to find my Willow.”
Then the quiet that always comes first, a hush of forces natural and not, Tara listened to the hush and the underneath, listened for the faint buzz of coming energy. Listened, waited, until a small light came into being, hovering in front of her. “Let’s go,” Tara said, not waiting to see what the others would do.
***
Willow handed Dawn her cell phone. Dawn was the best high speed text messenger she knew, of course Dawn was the only high speed text messenger she knew, but that was beside the point. The vampires were keeping their distance for the moment, none of them speaking, all of them simply watching, like animals on point. All male, most died young, one she thought had been a boy who’d sat near the back of her psychology class, the one taught by the late and unlamented Maggie Walsh. Dawn handed back her cell, and Willow dropped it in her jacket pocket.
One of the vampires moved a step closer, than another, then they stopped. Willow heard Dawn say her name, softly, desperately, terrified. They didn’t have anything on them that would do as a weapon, no holy water, no crucifix. Willow had left all those things at home, stupid, stupid, stupid. She grew up in Sunnydale; it was autumn, when the night came quicker. What had she been thinking? Another of the vampires moved closer, two steps. The rest followed suit. It was like they were toying with their prey, seeing what their prey would do. She had to do something.
Something snapped, a fallen twig, the crack of dried wood. Willow looked into the darkness and saw three more figures closing in. Three more vampires. There was nothing left to do, and so first she apologized for breaking her word, and then she held out her hand and spoke a single word: incendrie.
The fireball danced atop of her fingers, casting off enough light for Willow to see they were surrounded by twenty or so vampires, more than she’d realized. She cast another spell, and the wall between hers and Dawn’s minds let down. Dawn’s thoughts were a spiral of panic. Willow cut through, pushing her words like slivers of ice into Dawn’s mind. Turning them into a singular focus. I’m going to open up a space between them, and we’re going to run. You need to keep going all the way to the Magic Box. Don’t stop, don’t look back, just run. Please Dawnie, I really need you to run ahead. You’re faster than me. Get Buffy. Get Tara. No looking back.
And Willow threw the first fire ball. It hit. One down, nineteen or more to go. She tossed out a second, a third, a forth that went wild, but a fifth that hit true, and then she screamed out loud and in Dawn’s thoughts: Go! They charged forward, slipping through a far too narrow hole in the gauntlet.
Willow hadn’t run full out for months, really not since those awful summer nights when she’d tried to lead the Scoobies while Buffy lay six feet under. They came to the end of the block, Willow keeping up, but Dawn starting to pull ahead. Her heart was beating too loudly to hear what the vampires were doing.
She’d tried to mix them up, taking out two ahead, then one to the side, the one to the other, but she missed the one on her right and hit a foxglove planting. Who’d have thought it would burn so prettily. She’d tossed one more ahead, and then she’d screamed go. Screamed like a little girl, her Willow voice sounding. Screamed because she was afraid, screamed because she’d done what she’d thought was unthinkable. Screamed because the magicks were all around her, just like the vampires. Screamed for Tara.
They rounded another corner, two more blocks to go. Something moved in her peripheral vision, tall, narrow, fast. No, not one thing, two things, two figures. Two more vampires dead ahead. “Dawnie, look out!”
Dawn went down, a tumble of arms, legs, knees, elbows, shoulders hitting the ground. Willow tripped over her, knees scraping on the rough concrete of Sunnydale’s forever broken sidewalks, broken because who bothered with well paved sidewalks when they lived on a hellmouth. And then something else, something likewise narrow, fast. A flash of blond hair. A billowing black coat.
Willow watched Spike swinging high and true, sheer momentum spinning the battle axe in his hands, a head severed, vampire dust blowing in the wind. She was still on the ground, tangled up with Dawn, Spike was standing above them. He said something, he said, “Red,” more vampires swarmed around them.
Willow rolled off of Dawn and back onto her feet. Her thoughts were spinning in her head like the flashing light off Spike’s battle axe. She reached down and helped Dawn off the pavement.
“Stay close, Red, you too, Little Bit.”
Spike spoke softly, and Willow could see what she thought was fear in his eyes. She’d never seen it before. Was this what it meant to have a soul? Not a good time for existential questions, or was the question metaphysical? Not a good time for metaphysical questions, either. An excellent time to concentrate, however. To calm, to focus, to speak.
Spike startled, but he didn’t move when the fire ball ignited. “Now that’s what I like to see.”
They both moved to flank Dawn, fire on the left, a sharp blade on the right. Still, it was pretty pointless. The vampires were gathered again, formed into a circle. Willow quickly counted them: thirteen, no one’s lucky number. And these were the smart ones, not the knuckle-heads she’d flattened before, the pack thinned, Darwin for the undead. Pretty pointless.
***
The tiny white light bobbed ahead as the three ran behind it. Buffy at point, Tara a length behind, Giles maintaining but breathing hard. Tara felt fear skittering along her skin, not her fear, Willow’s. Fear and something else. Fear of something more than whatever had Willow and Dawnie cornered. They rounded the corner onto Magnolia and saw a cadre of vampires surrounding something, someone, someones. Tara pulled ahead, her battle axe rising up in the air, and then a burst of energy, Buffy as if on wings. Buffy reaching them first. Then Tara.
Ignited. She swung high and severed the head of a vampire dressed in what had once been a Sunday suit. The years of training on her own, with her cadre, with Sam, all of it coalescing inside of her, her body mastered, her thinking silenced, Tara becoming her weapon. Another swing, another cloud of dust.
Buffy leaping into the air and scissor kicking two vamps to the ground. A stake in one hand, another cloud of dust. Tara aware and not, seeing from the corners of her eyes the vampires regrouping, moving into another formation, searching for red hair, a narrow silhouette. Seeing something else, someone else with a weapon. Vampires didn’t use weapons. A flash of light on steel, a blade singing through the air. Someone else. A ball of fire sailing through the night air.
And then it was over. A cloud of dust rising on the wind, blowing towards the downtown. Tara dropped her weapon. Willow was glassy-eyed, standing on the green strip between the street and the sidewalk, her hair hanging about her face, her shirt pulled from her skirt, her knees bloodied.
“Willow,” she said, her voice still rough with fear, and Willow made some sound, some odd sound, not a cry, not a shout, the noise of the most aching pain, and Tara moved, unaware, on instinct, on a need too deep to register.
Arms holding, lungs breathing, pulling in, inhaling, needing to surround, encompass, protect, because she could have lost her, lost everything.
“Willow, it’s okay. I’m here. I’m not going to let go.”
“Tara?” And then racking sobs, a pain so deep it could have cracked the earth, Willow letting go to it, trying to breathe it out.
“Baby, I’m here. I’m here.”
Tara registered the others in some far corner of her brain. The vampire she knew was named Spike was standing next to Buffy, the two of them scanning the area, on guard and looking for trouble. Dawn was cuddled inside Giles arms, sobbing. Something else, something on the air, a scent so familiar, a scent of magicks, of Willow’s magicks.
“Baby, we need to go. We need to get out of here.”
***
They were back in the practice room, the two of them alone, one of them crying, the other offering comfort, but this time it was Willow in tears.
“I kind of like this,” Tara said, very softly.
Willow reached for another tissue to wipe her eyes, and then one more to blow her nose. “Well, that’s just wrong.” A faint grin offered counterpoint to her words.
“It’s nice. You and me, cuddling together on the not so very pleasant smelling practice m-mats. And by the way, when I thought that in my head, I didn’t slip on the ‘m’ sound.”
“I hate it when I act like a baby.”
“No one thinks you’re acting like a baby. You’re just crying for the both of us.”
“Doing double-duty? More than my share?”
Tara answered by pressing yet another kiss to Willow’s hair. She was sitting with her back braced against a stack of floor mats; Willow was lying against her chest, straddled between her arms and legs, her head tucked under Tara’s chin.
“How did you know we were in trouble?”
“I felt something. I can’t describe it. A feeling just hit me all of a sudden. So suddenly that I managed to forget to dodge and took one of Buffy’s round-house kicks to the chest.” Tara felt Willow begin to stir, and she tightened her arms to hold Willow still. “I’m okay. Really. What I really need is for you not to move.”
“You used a spell?”
“I called on Aradia to find you, and then I started running. I don’t even remember picking up my weapon. Buffy and Mr. Giles followed me, followed Aradia’s token.” Tara kissed Willow’s temple. “I’ve been scared before, but this time . . . I’ve never been scared like that. I thought my heart was going to break out of my chest.”
“I didn’t realize it was so late.”
“Baby, it wasn’t late. It was barely sunset. Those vamps were early and organized.”
Something scary to think about, Sunnydale’s vampires didn’t organize, that wasn’t there way. And something scarier.
“Tara, I had to use magicks.”
“I know.” Tara spoke at just above a whisper. “Baby, I know.”
“I didn’t want to, but I didn’t know what else to do.”
“Willow, it’s okay. What you did was right.”
“I broke my promise to you.”
“Not to m-me. You never made that promise to me. This is the promise you keep to me. You don’t die.” Tara clutched Willow tighter. “My Willow doesn’t die, because that’s the one thing I really couldn’t take.”
***
Almost an hour passed before they came out of the practice room. Buffy, Giles, and Spike were where they’d left them, at the research table. Dawn was there, too. Anya and Xander were at the counter.
“Xander ordered Chinese delivery,” Dawn said, coming off her chair and going to Willow. “Hug, please.” And to Tara, “You, too.”
Tara drew Dawn close and noticed she could smell vampire dust in the girl’s hair. It was probably all over all of them. Her eyes caught with Willow’s; we’re safe she tried to say.
“I ordered your favorite, the five-spice tofu,” Xander said, also going to Willow and Tara. “Group hug.” He wrapped his arms around all three. “You know next time Dawn sends out an all points Scooby 911, don’t forget to also send out the all clear.”
“Xander exceeded the posted speed limit driving to the location of the attack. He could have gotten a speeding ticket,” Anya said, still standing at the counter.
“Well, then it’s a lucky thing the Sunnydale police were elsewhere as always.”
The group hug broke apart with Dawn pulling Willow and Tara to the table, where now everyone sat down, Tara between Willow and Spike. She made a sideways glance at the vampire, and noticed he was doing the same to her.
“So what exactly happened, I mean we’ve heard Dawn’s version and where Spike came in, but . . .”
Willow put her hands on the edge of the table, as if bracing against it. “Dawn and I were walking back to the Magic Box when I guess I heard something, maybe felt something. The next thing I remember a vamp was standing about three feet behind us. We started to run, but then there were more of them in front of us.” She stopped for several moments, seeming to debate what to say next. “I didn’t know what else to do, we didn’t have any weapons, and so I started casting fireballs.”
Giles spoke first, then Xander, then Buffy, all three saying roughly the same thing, saying roughly the same thing as Tara had been saying the past hour, but Willow still couldn’t seem to hear it.
Buffy reached across the table and curled her fingers over Willow’s. “Will, look at me. Just look at me. I get it. I get the whole recriminations thing.”
“Do you? Buffy, I promised myself, I promised you—“
“What? To let yourself die, to let Dawn be killed?”
“Willow,” Giles interjected, his tone soft, gentle, “you’ve been through a horrendous ordeal and you came through it. You saved Dawn and you saved yourself.”
“Spike saved . . .”
“We don’t need to start arguing over who saved who, Red. You know perfectly well I couldn’t have held all of them off on my own. It was your little fire balls kept us in the fight. What we should be hashing out is when was the last time any of us saw a cadre of vamps organized and ready at bleedin’ dusk, let alone ready to start a feedin’ frenzy in downtown SunnyD.”
“Not that I’m ready to start agreeing with Spike, but he’s right. What the hell was that?” Xander reached over and dropped his arm around the back of Anya’s chair. “Besides organized.”
Tara wanted the subject to change, but she didn’t like the way Willow was retreating into herself. Conscious of Buffy’s more than interested gaze, she leaned over and brushed a kiss along Willow’s temple, and then whispered near her ear, “You need to stop f-freaking out, because for the first time in my life I’m sitting at a table next to vampire.” More than the kiss, this caught Willow’s attention.
“Organized and stealthy,” Willow interjected, her voice sill sounding rough, but her tone steady.
“Vamps don’t do stealthy. Vamps barely do socialization, especially the newly risen, so are we thinking this is another one of those portents?”
“I’ve little doubt of that, Buffy. Albert and Tara have both seen portents revealing this new evil’s influence. As the apprentice draws closer, more and more of the dark world will be drawn here to meet him.” Giles took of his glasses, inspected the lenses, and then returned them to his face. “Horrific as tonight’s attack was, I confess I am less worried about the denizens of this reality on their way to Sunnydale than what might be coming from the other. Tara’s provided me with profiles of some of the more treacherous demons who may soon breach this world, and Buffy has adjusted her training accordingly; nevertheless, these demons will remain far less predictable in their habits and strategies. As we’ve learned from Tara, among other things, in their native reality they are not adverse to attacking during daylight, more they do not shy from populated areas.”
“Is there any way we could set up some . . . I don’t know, early warning system?” Xander said while looking at Tara.
“Anya and I were doing some research the other day, and we think we can create a s-spectral rod tuned for dimensional incursions. It’s called a vresh.”
“It wouldn’t keep anything out,” Anya said, “but it would give the witchy among us a kind of sixth sense for things going wrong.”
“Witchy among us, so spell-casters like you, Giles, Tara . . .” Buffy hesitated, but then added, “and Willow, but not me.”
“You and Xander haven’t accumulated enough t-time with the magicks to be able to tune it, so it could only be the four of us,” Tara said.
“Could I be excluded?” The tension in Willow’s voice was palpable. Anya chewed on her upper lip, and said nothing, leaving it to Tara to explain.
“Will, it’s a four-hand spell. And there’s s-something else, once the vresh is created and operational, there’s no way to dampen its effects for one without dampening its effects for everyone.”
Tara understood. She understood Willow’s reluctance to help, but she could protect her, and given what was coming to Sunnydale, she could think of no alternatives. Her thoughts spinning, she was grateful when Giles finally spoke up and said, “Perhaps we might think more about this tomorrow, or at least once we’ve all had dinner.”
***
Tara closed the bedroom door behind her and glanced at the clock. It was only midnight, but it felt later. Following dinner, they’d all headed for Buffy’s house, even Spike, and afterwards, Tara joined Buffy, Giles, Spike, and Xander on patrol. She’d been unhappy to leave Willow alone, but she needed to see for herself if there were any further evidence of vampires forming cadres, because when she stopped thinking of what could have happened to Willow and Dawn, what scared her most was seeing this reality’s vampires taking on the characteristics of her reality’s vamps.
While they were patrolling, Spike had confirmed more or less what Tara had been thinking, Spike noting the only time he’d ever seen vampires act in concert was when one of them was making a play to be the next big bad, and so far as he knew no local vampire was planning to become the next master. She’d paired off with him to take on the east cemeteries, leaving Buffy, Giles, and Xander to patrol the south cemeteries, before all of them met to make a sweep of the downtown.
They rousted out a few vampires at Evergreen cemetery, but none at Parkview. Downtown, they found a trio smoking cigarettes in the alley behind Forbidden Sweets. But they didn’t seem to be part of any larger organization, and now were only dust in the wind. And then everyone split up, Buffy and she heading back to the house, Xander home to his apartment, Giles to his hotel room (he’d moved a third time and was now staying at the downtown Sunnydale Arms, and was still neglecting to explain what he was keeping in the trailer parked in Buffy’s driveway), and Spike to his crypt.
Tara had already come into the room once before to collect her sleep clothes before washing up in the bathroom, and she noticed Willow had moved in her sleep, she’d been lying on her stomach and now she was curled up on her side, hair spilled across the pillow, one hand drawn close to her face. Tara moved on near silent feet to the bed and slipped under the covers, ready to sleep as well.
“Tare,” Willow said, softly, sleepily.
“It’s okay, just sleep.”
Eyelids fluttered open and green found blue. “Hey.”
Willow touched Tara’s face, just a fingertip running along the cheek. “How was the slaying?”
“The vamps were disorganized, a good thing. I paired off with Spike, which was weird.” Willow’s expression showed she understood the weird part. “Are you okay?”
“My brain shut off for a little while, but my stomach’s still acidy over the fireballs.”
“And Anya’s and my idea,” Tara said, because she knew Willow couldn’t.
“I know you think I’m being too big with the worry.”
“No, no I don’t think that. I get it, Will. I realize what I’m asking you to do. You’ve worked hard—“
“At something you don’t think is necessary, baby. The problem is I don’t know what’s right anymore. I love knowing I’m part of this line, me, Willow, part of the Revane family line. I love that, I love saying it. But I also can’t forget what I did.”
“Willow, last spring—“
“As awful as it was, last spring I can sort of get my mind around. I hate what I did, what I became, how I hurt people, that I killed. But what scares me most is what I did to Tara before all of that, the spells I put on her. I wasn’t crazy with grief and anger and everything. I was just me, being selfish, misusing magicks.” Tara started to speak, but Willow spoke over her, “I used magicks to mess with the person I loved most, and I used magicks to mess with people who were at worst annoying, but mostly just bystanders. I’m talking about things Amy and I did at the Bronze.”
“Will, you didn’t have someone to teach you—“
“Not to be a jerk? No one needs to learn that, they should just know it.”
“Okay, you were a jerk. And you did stuff you’re not h-happy about. Sometimes you resented Tara, Willow those things happen. People resent one another and they do things they end up not liking.”
“You don’t. I mean you don’t resent people.”
“I’ve done that. Some of the foster families I lived with, I hated their kids. I hated that they had parents and I didn’t. I resented my brother, both versions of him.”
“Versions?”
“One of my not so nice words. Before I was born my parents had a baby boy my father named Donny, but he died. Then after I was born they had another baby boy, and my father named him Donny, too. Donald was my grandfather’s first name. Anyway, I resented the way it seemed like I was just this misstep in between. Willow, I’ve m-made mistakes, everyone has. I get that you’re scared. I wish I wasn’t asking, but I need you. I need you . . .” Tara touched Willow’s face. “I need you by me. Not just to help with the magicks, I need you.”
Tara at first didn’t even realize she was starting to cry, and then the tears started to come forward in an unexpected rush. Eyes blinded, she folded herself into Willow’s arms.
“I got so scared, Will. I could feel you in trouble, and I got so scared like my insides were going to twist right out of me.”
Willow’s arms closed tight and Tara felt ashamed for wanting comfort when it was Willow who’d been in danger, Willow and Dawn. She calmed down slowly, soothed by Willow’s stroking along her back, her hair and turned so she could see Willow’s face again.
“Better?”
“Better,” Tara confirmed, feeling more and more embarrassed. “I’m sorry. I made things about me when we were talking about you.”
“Hey, first of all I think we can talk about both of us at the same time, and second, I think I get it. It’s scarier now because for one you feel responsible, like it’s your fault the vamps are organizing, which is silly, and two, because I’m not the only one who is different, so are you.” Willow brought Tara’s fingers to her lips and kissed them. “Before you were fighting side by side with your friends, and dear as they were to you they weren’t—“
“My family,” Tara said softly.
“Protecting Dawnie isn’t the same thing.”
“Neither is protecting you.”
“And that makes things scarier, riskier, and you’re not used to it. Not that you really get used to it, but it gets better.” Willow put another kiss on Tara’s fingertips. “It won’t get easier, but it won’t always hit you so hard. When Tara first started going out on patrol, I was a mess. Up until then I’d never really understood how Buffy felt when Xander or I would get into trouble.”
“You and Xander got into trouble?” Tara asked, feigning surprise.
“Some other time ask me about Malcolm, my one and only online boyfriend who turned out to be a demon named Moloch. Or about how Xander almost got it on with a giant praying mantis.” Tara smiled the smile Willow had been seeking, but to be sure, Willow asked, “Are you better?”
“Better. What about you? Is your stomach still acidy?”
Willow considered and rejected lying. “A little. Less now that you’re here. Can I put my head on your shoulder?” Tara answered by rolling onto her back and drawing Willow closer and Willow started moving her hand over Tara’s stomach, liking the clean cottony feeling of Tara’s tee shirt, one of hers that featured a scene of kittens playing with a ball of string. “Have I mentioned that I like it that you wear my tee shirts to bed.”
“A couple of times.”
“It always feels so nice and homey.” A memory of their morning floated up into Willow’s thoughts. “Which isn’t to say I wouldn’t mind seeing you in one of the pressies I bought for you.”
Willow thought she could hear Tara bite her lip, but Tara said nothing, and Willow continued moving her hand over Tara’s stomach, now liking the warmth of Tara’s body heat. She didn’t want sex, not yet, she wanted something else, something there didn’t seem to be a word to describe, or at least she could think of and she wasn’t really thinking when her hand slipped under the fabric and started to move over skin soft and scared and so very warm. “Is this okay?”
Tara waited a while to answer, but finally there came a soft, “yes.”
Willow raised her head to see Tara’s eyes just as Tara was moving to kiss her. Their lips met softly, and their bodies shifted again, now lying face to face. They continued to kiss, slowly, softly, sometimes their lips barely brushing. Willow was surprised when one of Tara’s hands moved onto her breast. Less surprising was Tara’s uncertainty, the tentativeness of her touch.
Willow sat up, letting the covers pool at her waist, and she looked at Tara lying their in her uncertainty, her tentativeness. “Both of us had scares tonight,” she said as she swept her tee shirt over her head. “I need to feel you next to me.” And she reached for the hem of Tara’s tee shirt.
Tara sat up, and her eyes showed many things, need, desire, shyness, fear. She let Willow take off her shirt, and then they lay back onto the bed, Willow’s head on Tara’s shoulder, Willow’s hand moving on Tara’s stomach. Before they fell asleep, they kissed several more times.
***
Tara crept through the underbrush until she could see them. They lay curled into each other, the one she now knew was called Willow held the other, the girl who looked like her reflection in her arms. She’d heard them first, soft voices speaking murmured words, soft cries of what Tara thought was pleasure, and she’d hesitated getting too close to them. She didn’t want to spook them, not when they’d given her so much. So she crept towards them quietly until she found this small pocket next to a fallen tree where she could see unobserved. Tara felt protective of them, even though she understood they’d been protecting her, also. It felt nice to be a protector, she thought, cuddling White Leg in her lap.
Above her she could see a star filled night sky through a circle of trees. She wondered if the moon had already set or if it was the new moon. Not knowing the moon’s phase bothered her, it was something she usually knew with certainty, at least since she’d quickened all those years ago. Still there was comfort in seeing the familiar star patterns, as they reminded her of the stories her mother had told her. Stories of gods and goddesses and heroes. She hoped someday she might be a hero.
A bird’s call to another pulled her eyes east and it was then she saw it, coursing through the wind swept sky, a trace of light. She wondered if White Leg saw it, too. An exclamation from Willow told her the girls definitely saw it, and in the back of Tara’s mind a thought tickled, one she couldn’t bring forward, but which sent her spiraling into another dream, the dream within the dream where sometimes bodies hung from lampposts, and other times walls of flame swept the land, and more times there were lessons to be learned and cookies to eat.
Last edited by Tecnopagan on Sun Mar 05, 2017 8:10 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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