Title: To Fall Apart and Fall Back Together

Author: Lysa-uk

Rating: T

Feedback: As always, to Ask and it's yours.

Pairing: Willow/Xander

Summary: Xander's miserable, Willow's angry. How will it end?

Spoilers: Season 3

Disclaimer: I don't own these characters, but if I did… They belong to Joss Whedon/Mutant Enemy/UPN and everyone else. No copyright is intended.

Notes: This is kind of a long one, so I apologise now. It's set in the same time frame as 'The Wish', there are a few references to things that occurred in that episode, but if there are any mistakes…I don't really care. It's just something I've been wanting to write for a while, but it kind of took me a while. NC-17 version of this is available on request.

Dedication: To 'Locke', because you've helped me so much, not just with this fic, but my others, too. Plus, you kind of requested this, so I'm blaming you for everything. Sorry if it's not what you had in mind.


Xander Harris was in a bad mood.

He lay on his bed, his room darkened with the fading sunlight outside that was swiftly turning into night, his curtains closed to the outside world. One arm was folded behind his head, lending itself as a cushion, while the other bounced a tennis ball on the wall opposite from him. He wasn't sure whether it was helping him think more clearly, or if it was distracting him from his thoughts. Either way, it didn't matter. His head was a spinning. Not literally, though. No, he had seen it happening to some weird demon thing on patrol once, and it hadn't been fun. He meant figuratively, and he supposed that the repetitive motion wasn't really likely to help matters. But, he reasoned to himself, at least it couldn't make them worse. He hoped. Or maybe was just jinxing the hell out of himself. It wasn't like it would be the first time.

He knew it was his own fault, really. Everything was, if his father was to be believed, but this time it really was true. Okay, so maybe he hadn't been the only one to blame, but he should have seen something like this coming. But then, he never had been the sharpest stake in the weapons chest.

He shook his head to himself, a sigh of frustration escaping him and disappearing in the stagnant air of his room. He had been lying here for the past few hours, ever since he got home from school that day, looking thoughtful and trying to come up with some kind of ingenius solution to the problem. Of course, his mind didn't want to cooperate, not that it usually did anyway. He was just finding it even harder than usual to keep his mind from wandering into forbidden territory, and it just so happened that territory included his best friend and a few not-so-innocent moments from the past few weeks.

He felt like crap, and the country music playing from the stereo situated across the room from him was doing nothing to sooth and distract him. A part of him knew that nothing would do that, not even the dulcet tones from the music of pain that usually made him feel like his life was a peach compared to the traumas described by some of the singers he was used to listening to, but he figured it was worth a shot.

It had been just over a week since he and Willow had been caught red-handed - or, more appropriately, red-lipped - in the factory. He simply thought of it now as 'when my life went down the toilet', which was ironic because that was the only time in his entire life that he had felt absolutely certain about anything.

Xander decided that he hated irony.

No one would have thought that loyal and try-hard Xander Harris would cheat on his beautiful, popular girlfriend with someone else, especially not with good and innocent Willow Rosenberg. But he had.

And he couldn't help but be happy about that, in some strange and weird way, because in those few moments they had shared he had felt more than he ever had for anyone else.

Which brought up the pangs of guilt about Cordelia.

There was no denying that he had always been attracted to Cordelia, so he wouldn't even try. Cordelia was beautiful and confident and she was like a flame that he couldn't help but keep going back to, that kept drawing him in like a moth with no will of its own. Their encounters had begun on a purely physical level, even if they hadn't understood it at the time. It had been hot and new, and there was something between them that neither of them could have predicted. That first kiss between them was like a bolt out of the blue for the both of them. Twelve years of arguing, put-downs, snide comments and mutual dislike, and suddenly they found themselves kissing in Buffy's basement, and everywhere they could after then without being seen. It was like there were two different Cordelia's, the one she used as a façade in public, and the one she became when it was just the two of them, and he was glad that he was the one she chose to share that with. As time went on, their relationship progressed, and he was happy with that. He was happy with her. Why wouldn't he be?

Willow was why.

The first few days of the past week had been spent with trips to and from the hospital, even though Cordelia refused to see him. He'd sit in the hall, nurses looking at him inquisitively as he tried to catch a glimpse of his ex-girlfriend when people were coming and going from the room just opposite him. When she left the hospital, he hung around outside of her house, so much so that her parents had actually told him he had to let her recuperate, and that she'd call him when she was ready. He guessed they didn't know what he had done, mostly because his nose was left unbroken and his eye unblackened, and judging by the size of her father, that was definitely a good thing.

What he tried not to do was spend time with Willow, which was impossible when they had a sneaky mutual friend who was a vampire slayer and well-versed in acts of deception. She'd called and asked him to meet her, neglecting to mention that Willow would be there with her hair and her eyes and her lips, and he'd managed to fall for the same trick three times in the week, which he thought was maybe a personal best for him in the stupidity stakes. It wasn't that he didn't want to see Willow because, god, he really did. He just couldn't. If he saw her, there was the very real possibility that she would see the nervousness in his face, the way his hands shook and the way he felt about her in his eyes. He couldn't risk that, not ever.

But he knew that she wanted to know why their fluke had happened, and he wished he could talk to her and get it over with, just so he could lie his way out of it and put a stop to it all. He could see it in the way she'd stare at him, expectantly and curiously, but she had left him in no doubt at the Bronze when she'd told him that all of her parts were for Oz, so he wasn't going to fool himself there was any chance at all and therefore didn't see the point in confessing anything that could strain their relationship further.

But he was left wondering about that night in the hospital and what he'd told her when she was in the coma. He had never said those words aloud to anyone and actually meant it as much as he had right then. But still, when she had woken up and asked for Oz, he felt grateful more than anything else. One second of hurt, sure, when he realised that it wasn't him that she was asking for, but mostly thankful. He was grateful that he could go back to being his normal self, that his life wouldn't change forever if she had known what he had said, but mostly just happy that she was alive and kicking, because that made everything else alright. The words he had said to her that night were something he always told himself was fear. His fear of losing her that made him say anything that might keep her with him for just a little while longer. He told himself that he would have done anything to save her, but when she had woken up he didn't fool himself it was because of his words or what he felt.

No, that would be down to Oz. She woke up because she thought he was the one sitting by her bed and holding her hand and spilling his heart all over the pale blue hospital bedspread, turning it blood-red with his words. Even if it wasn't medically possible, he still believed that had a major part in her recovery. Not that he was bitter about that. Really.

He had absolutely no right to be jealous of Oz, he knew that. But he was. He had been ever since the werewolf had first started paying attention to his best friend. He'd never admit it to anyone, but he was afraid that Oz was taking her away from him. She had been the one who was there through everything while he had been growing up. She was the only one he knew he could count on. She was the only person he trusted absolutely and completely. He wanted her to be happy, but did it really have to be with Oz?

Okay. So maybe he was a little bitter.

It was the little things that got to Xander at first. The way she'd smile at Oz the way she used to smile at him. The way he was suddenly all she could talk about. How he was the guy who she told everything to. But then he'd find his eyes fixed on the way they'd hold hands underneath the table in the library so no one else could see. The way she'd blush under his utterly besotted gaze. The way her lips crinkled when he kissed them. Whenever he felt that envy turning his face green, he fought it by reaching over and taking his girlfriend's hand if she was there, or by making his excuses and leaving so he could call her and let her rant to him about some new store that had just opened up in the mall, or about how Harmony had made an idiot of herself in front of some hot guy on the football team, just so he could fool himself that he wasn't the worst boyfriend in the whole world, even if the pangs of guilt in his stomach told him otherwise.

So he pushed that night away, left it behind when he left the hospital that night because Willow was okay and that was the only thing that mattered. He carried on with life as normal, missing Cordelia when she was on vacation and hanging out with Oz and Willow who tried not to be too coupley around him, just to be polite. He told himself that he was okay with that, really, and he'd lived in that deluded state for a good few months.

But then there had been that 'wow' moment when he'd looked at her that night, bathed in light and life. He was sure she thought he was just being his usual, hormonal self when he'd seen her in that dress looking completely different, but it wasn't…just that. It played a big part, and he was ready to admit that, but it wasn't everything. He knew that if she'd stepped out from behind that screen in her overalls and a fuzzy sweater, he would have felt exactly the same.

Was it possible that you could know someone for all of your life, see them everyday and talk to them every night, but just look at them for one second and feel your life change because of it?

The answer was apparently yes.

He had never wanted or expected to cheat on Cordelia. That was forever the last thing on his mind, because who would want to? He knew that half the guys at school would have killed to be dating Cordelia Chase, some of them literally, so why wasn't that enough to stop him from kissing Willow that night in her room?

After that first kiss he had told himself that it didn't mean anything, that curiosity got the better of him and he gave in and that any guy would have done the same in his position. But then he had seen her again the next day at school, and it was an entirely different matter. When he was with Willow, he felt his heart race and his mind go blank and his palms getting sweaty and his stomach flip, and he knew there was no way he could stop it. The fact was, he hadn't wanted it to stop. Not then, and not now.

Memories of that night at the hospital had kept creeping up on him since then. It was something that he always found himself thinking of at the most inappropriate times, like when Cordelia was curled up in his arms when they were watching a movie, or when he was supposed to be taking a pop quiz in one of his lessons. He had forced himself into believing those feelings weren't real for so long, but what he hadn't expected was his feelings to grow and develop since he had experienced what it was like to kiss her.

He certainly didn't expect to be lying on his bed one day, listening to country music because he realised he was in love with his best friend.

Oh, no. His life wasn't complicated. Not at all.