Sheila pulled open the door, and her eyes widened in surprise.
“May I come in?” Xander asked. His tone was polite, but his eyes were angry. Sheila dreaded what was coming, but she supposed she should be grateful that he was alone, and not with that girl, Buffy. Realising that Xander was waiting for an answer, she nodded mutely and allowed him to enter.
“Would you like something to drink? Tea, perhaps?”
Xander shook his head, beginning to regret ever coming. Buffy had phoned him as soon as she’d returned from work, and he’d rushed straight over to talk to Sheila. It was time that someone was given a reason for her treatment of Willow, but was that someone supposed to be him? In all truth, it was probably Tara or Willow’s right. Only Willow needed Tara to be with her, and she needed him to do this for her.
“Biscuits?”
“Stop it,” he told her firmly, deciding that if he was going to do this, he was going to do it properly. “Just – just sit down.”
She was taken aback. This was not the immature boy that she’d known so long ago. This was a man, and one that she liked. Polite conversation was something that she endured, but not willingly. He had cut straight to the point, and that took guts, especially considering how scared he had been of her as a child.
“I need to talk to you,” Xander announced bluntly. “I don’t even know why I’m here and not Willow or Tara, but you need to give someone some answers. You don’t just march into someone’s home after ignoring them for twenty-two years and drop a bombshell like that. It’s not the neighbourly thing to do,” he added sarcastically, and hated himself for doing so. Sheila hadn’t always put Willow first, but, as Tara always said, he didn’t have the right to judge her. Even Willow didn’t have the right to judge her.
He sighed deeply. “I’m sorry. That wasn’t fair. I just need to know why. Willow needs to know why, but she’s not going to be coming here to get an answer. Just tell me why you treated her like you did; and I’ll tell her what she needs – what she deserves – to know.”
Sheila was silent for a long while, and when she raised a tired face to his, he was shocked at her expression. There was remorse in her eyes, and pain; but mostly there was that look of self-loathing. He should know. He’d seen it enough times in the mirror on his own face.
“What do you want?” she asked practically. “My entire life story? Everything after Willow was born? I’ll tell you all you need to know; but everything else stays private. I’m not the type of person that gives reasons for their actions, Xander.”
“Well, maybe you should be,” he informed her harshly. “I want to know why you treated Willow the way you did; and I want to know how you know all this about Willow and Tara. If you know Tara’s mother, fine. I don’t believe you, but Tara does.”
“She’s a wonderful woman,” Sheila agreed. “Willow’s a lucky girl.”
Xander’s expression tightened. “Funny, I would say that they’re both equally lucky.”
Sheila realised her faux pas, and her eyes widened. Wasn’t she supposed to believe that any woman or man dating her daughter was the luckiest in the world? Maybe she was; but that was hard when your daughter’s girlfriend was the replica of her mother, who you just happened to be in love with.
“I fell in love with Delyth Roberts the moment we met,” she informed Xander dreamily. “We were both seventeen, nearly eighteen, and almost as soon as we met we started casting spells together when she admitted to me that she was a witch. Long story made short, once we met we both started having the dreams – the gift that Willow and Tara now bear. I dreamt about things in the future; Delyth the past. They started to come true in my case, and Delyth began to understand and accept her past more because of her visions. We’d been together about three years - even started discussing having children - when I had the dream – the one about Willow and Tara.”
“Willow and Tara?” Xander blurted. “You had a dream about them?”
“Yes. If I had stayed with Delyth, we would have ended up bearing the mantle of the gift that Willow and Tara now bear. We would have had our children.”
“So that was it?” Xander asked bluntly. “You didn’t want the hassle of the gift and the duties of The Two Who Are Blessed, so you passed it on to Willow and Tara.”
“Are you kidding me?” Sheila asked incredulously. “Xander, the gift, the mantle – it’s such a beautiful blessing. They are pure, they are good, and they are true wiccans – that is why they carry the mantle. I didn’t want to give it up. I gave it up because, had I stayed, Willow and Tara would have been born as sisters. Does their love look as though they should be sisters, Xander? They would live in shame for the rest of their lives. I’m so sorry that I hurt Willow so badly – you can’t even imagine how sorry I am.”
“Yes, I can,” Xander told her, thinking of Anya. “I got a second chance, and so can you. I’m still noticing, though, that you haven’t answered my question. Why did you treat Willow the way you did?”
Looking ashamedly at her hands, Sheila admitted, “I was jealous. It’s a terrible thing for a mother to be jealous of her daughter, but I’d seen Tara in my dreams, and she was so much like Delyth… It hurt that Willow could be with Tara and I couldn’t be with Delyth. I’d given up the mantle so that she could have it, and I regretted it every day until they met and I dreamt about Willow’s happiness.”
“If you’d put the jealousy past you, you could have shared in it,” Xander retorted unforgivingly.
“I didn’t want to put it past me. So long as I was angry, I could think about Delyth and not leave Ira. If all I thought about were the good times, then I couldn’t have put up with the first man I loved, because my love for him was minuscule compared to my love for Delyth. I loved him, but I was still feeling Delyth’s hurt when I married him, and I suppose he was what you could call a substitute. Someone to marry so Willow could be born, and so I wouldn’t grow old alone. I didn’t want children with him, but I’d given up so much… Willow had to be born, or it all would have been for nothing.”
“Did you ever love her?” Willow’s best friend asked incredulously.
Sheila’s head shot up. “Of course I did!” she responded in shock. “I always loved Willow. She is my daughter, and I’m more proud of her than you can ever imagine. I just wasn’t ready to be a mother. If I’d waited, maybe I would have been a better parent. Maybe she would have been happier. Only it had to be then.”
Xander was shaking his head in disbelief as he stood up. “I was so jealous of Willow when I was younger. She never came to school with bruises, and she didn’t even know what it meant to be really yelled at until I got mad at her one time. Now I see I was the lucky one. At least my parents wanted me, and at least they paid attention to me, even if it was through punishment.”
“I came here for answers, Mrs Rosenberg, and I’ve certainly got them. As for making things up to Willow; making her feel loved by her own mother – you’re on your own.”
He slammed the door on his way out.