Beyond
I
thought it would hurt more, Death, I mean. I thought there would be pain and
blood and fear and a culmination of all that is horrific and terrible. But I
guess I was wrong. I jumped into that vortex fully expecting the worst, my
heart hammering and my mind screaming. In those few seconds as I flew through
the air, those seconds that took an entire lifetime to pass, a million thoughts
clamoured for my attention //Dawnie…being
Called…"Is there a problem Ma'am?"…Mom's body lying cold and still…laughing so
hard at Xander's jokes cola comes out of my nose…cool lips on hot flesh…being
lifted high onto my father's shoulders and feeling like it's the safest place
in the world…"Close your eyes…"// and I prayed to a God that I don't even
believe in. Because it's better to cut your odds, right? If He's not there then
you lose less than if He is there and you don't pray.
Ironic that my last thoughts
weren't even panicked or desperate, they were just cool reasoning, a little
private joke to myself before… Before what, I don't know, even now that I'm
here. Before the sky swallowed me.
I looked down and I was falling.
Not me, though, my body. The physical manifestation of myself that I always
thought was so inseparable from the essence of Buffy. Well, excepting the
influences of evil magickal devices employed by psychotic sister Slayers. But
no magick here just a fragile corpse crashing down to earth, landing with a
silent jolt, arms and legs at impossible angles, blonde hair splayed out in a
fan behind its //my// head.
I winced when the body hit the
ground, expecting pain to flood through me, but it didn't, because that wasn't
me anymore //where am I? what happened?//. Instead I only watched, a
disinterested observer, as my friends gathered around the not-Buffy, the
atmosphere of grief and despair as palpable as the one of crackling, Hellmouth
energy Glory had created only a few minutes earlier.
Willow can't look and I don't
blame her. I wish I hadn't been able to look, that I could have turned away
from the scene, leaned on my lover's arm. But I couldn't. My gaze was
drawn helplessly towards the sight that befell me – Spike collapsing to his
knees and wailing hideously, a cry that reached up to me, surrounded me and
sent a chill through my very soul.
If I had eyes I would have cried
them out with tears for the plight of the people I loved.
I don't know how long they all
stood there for, time ceases to mean anything in my new state – seconds can
stretch into hours and days condense into minutes, all depending upon what
consumes them. But it seemed like an eternity that they stared at my body, like
if they looked at it long enough I would suddenly wake up and Buffy would be
okay and all this would have been a nightmare. But they stared and they stared
until they could no longer see through their own tears, and the body never once
moved.
I wanted to shout that it was
because I wasn't there any longer. I wasn't in that form anymore. I was above
them, in the air around them, my spirit scattered through the atmosphere. Now I
am nothing and I am everything. I am dead, but I'm still here, because I
couldn't leave. I'm not ready to go yet. There is too much life still in me
yet, too much love to leave it all behind.
Part of me was tempted to Pass
On, to head towards the light and Mommy and eternal respite from the weight of
the world's problems. But then I remembered why I died in the first place. Not
to save the world, but to save Dawnie, to protect my little sister. And I
couldn't leave her now could I? I couldn't abandon her without a family to
speak of in the midst of all her pain and loss. I promised her I'd always be
there to look after her and I intend to keep that promise.
There's something else as well.
Some other, more selfish, reason. I couldn't say goodbye. Not to Dawn or to my
friends – I left all them a final message, a 'just in case' or a 'be careful, I
love you' – but I couldn't say goodbye to you, to my Angel. The night before
the battle I picked up the phone, I even dialled your number several times, but
I slammed down the receiver before the connection could be made. I scrawled a
letter, more than one in fact, but not only did the word stick in my throat,
but it wouldn't flow from my pen either. I got to the 'g', even through the
double 'o', 'd', but when it came to it I always scribbled out the half formed
sentence before I ever got to its end, striking out the letters with thick
black marks and then burning the pages. I didn't want you to even find them
after I'd gone. I didn't want you to unfold the screwed up pieces of paper and
see where my tears had smudged the ink.
In the end I didn't even think
it. I'd given up trying to utter a sentiment I can never really mean. I
couldn't say goodbye, because it will never be over between us, even Death
can't separate us. I remember you telling me that once, in a dream after I sent
you to Hell. And I knew it was the truth. I woke up and I felt you all around
me, in the air like I am now and inside me, running through my veins. Then I
went to the mansion and you were there, waiting for me almost as if I'd willed
you to come, as if our love was stronger than life, than death, than good and
evil, than fate and destiny, than Hell itself. Perhaps it was and still is.
I see everything more clearly
now. I have no haze of immediacy to look through anymore. In life there is
always something going on. I always had a place to be, an evil to conquer, a
world to protect, and in these times my thoughts were, without exception, a
confused cacophony. And buried amongst all the mundane stuff – like that
mid-term I had to study for, or my date Friday night, or the shopping trip to
grocery store that desperately needed doing – were my true feelings. The only
times I ever came close to realising them, though, was in the dark of night,
when all other sensory input was removed and my reflections turned inwards.
Lying in bed, you would come to me in forgotten dreams and memories of sweet
stolen kisses. My arms would ache for you, my eyes would sting with tears I
could no longer shed and my heart would break with endless pain. Then morning
would come, the whirlwind of my day began and all thoughts of you were lost in
constant hustle and bustle.
It's different now, though, it's
like my heart and my mind have been opened up to me, and everything inside them
put out on exhibit for me to see and analyse. In some ways it's painful,
because all the old slights and hurts and battles lost – the ones I had
deliberately pushed deep down in my unconscious – have come rushing back and
I've had to deal with them once more. Did you know that I never properly worked
through our break-up? I never went through that period of depression and
grieving that usually comes at the end of every long relationship. I just
picked myself up, dusted myself off and got on with life, bounced back with the
trademark Buffy spirit.
The night after we had that
gut-wrenching sewer talk, after you told me that you didn't want to spend your
life with me and shook the only certainty in my unstable, ever-changing world –
that our love would last forever – I went to see Willow and I cried my heart
out. I know it's perhaps a little unfair to mention these things now, to bring
up all the old pain and anger, but like I said, I've never yet got these things
out of my system, so now I am. Now I'm telling you how much it killed me to see
you just walk away like that – voluntarily walking away from our relationship
after all the hardship we went through to keep hold of it. It made me think
that it was our love that was at fault, our own emotions and personalities, not
the circumstances we were trapped in.
Okay, so I was wrong. Two years
later and our connection is still as deep as it has ever been. I felt it in the
crackling anger that stretched between us when I came to LA that time after
Faith, I felt it when you sat beside me at my mother's grave and we kissed so
tenderly. And I knew that two hundred years could pass and it would still be
there, we would still love one another. But I didn't say anything then, because
to just know it was enough. To love and be loved in return, even if the words
were neither spoken nor acted upon, was all the comfort I needed.
There is also a positive side to
this whole new insight into myself. I remember things that I'd thought forever
lost. And yes I do mean our Forgotten Day. Now that my existence is no longer
bound by the physical laws of the universe, those entire twenty-four hours came
rushing back to me like they had never left. And I can tell you this now –
those few memories have provided enough material for an entire lifetime of
psychotherapy. In fact I wish I were real so that I could kick your ass for
doing that to me then smother you with kisses for the wonderful sacrifice you
made and the depth of love it showed. I guess I'm just going to have to settle
on a few words, though.
The moment it all came flooding
back (like something I'd always known, but could only just understand) I was
angry. I hated you for what you took away from me – not only the chance to be
with you as I'd always dreamed, but also the memories of that day. Oh, that day
when everything was sweetness and light and each moment perfect and golden. I
thought my heart would burst with the happiness I felt then, my cheeks ached
with smiling and for once the future didn't scare me. Sometimes now, when I
think hard, I can still taste the sugary chocolate and ice cream in my mouth
and the saltiness of your flesh under my tongue. I can lose myself in the
feeling of your //hot// hands on my skin and you inside me, filling me
up with love like nobody else ever could.
Those memories (even coupled
with the heartbreak that followed them) would have helped me through so many
lonely nights, so many dark times. And I cursed you for taking them away from
me, without even giving me a choice in the matter.
But to live and know what we had
//what we could've had!// perhaps that would have been an equal torture,
one I'm not sure how you managed to live through. Once again I am struck by
your incredible strength, the burdens you take upon yourself in order to spare
the others around you. There is so much you hold inside yourself and never show
to the world, so much more of you even I never saw, that I want to see and
never will… I think that maybe there are bigger tragedies in life than just the
obvious ones – like chances that you never realised you had until they are lost
forever.
Of course, I couldn't stay angry
with you for long. I couldn't not forgive you for giving up your humanity for
me. It might have been in the right choice in the long run, or it might have
been the wrong one. Either way it was the one you made and we can't go back and
change it now, not with all the will in the world. And the important thing was,
you did it for the right reasons. I understood then and I understand now. Happy
doesn't exactly suit us, anyway, our place together is fighting side by side in
the night, not spending carefree days on the beach or at the movies. You wanted
me to find somebody normal, someone who could do those things with me, but the
problem was I could never do them myself.
When I was younger I used to
wish to be anyone but the Slayer. I used to dream of just being an ordinary
teenager, whose thoughts were consumed with clothes and boys not demons and the
apocalypse. And after I met you my fantasies stretched to include us together
in this normal life. You would be human and we'd do all those mundane things,
like get a dog and a house together with a little sun porch where we'd sit out
in the evenings. Our wedding was beautiful, you know – we abandoned the
traditional church ceremony and got married barefoot on the beach at sunset.
Then we honeymooned in Barbados (boy, did I spend a lot of time imagining those
nights…) where our first daughter – India – was conceived. I even named our
children (two girls and a boy), that's how much time I spent thinking on these
things.
But I was just a silly teenager
then. I was just caught up in idle fantasy that I knew would never become
reality. That's what young girls do – they daydream of wedding bells and baby
carriages and deep, romantic love. Life hasn't hurt them yet, hasn't shown its
harsher side, so there are no limits on what they hope for, but also very
little hurt when those hopes aren't fulfilled. Only, you took those fantasies
seriously, because you wanted life to be perfect for me, you wanted me to have
everything I dreamed of. But those dreams – they always featured you, and when
you left they just stopped altogether.
I grew older and maybe a little
wiser and I learnt that just what you and I had was enough. Perhaps I didn't
appreciate it before, because I had nothing to compare it with. I hadn't met
other men and tried to love them. I hadn't yet found out that love is generally
something you work at, something you try your hardest to cultivate and
preserve, not a fire that suddenly ignites in your heart then blazes
ferociously until it has consumed your entire being. Love as a warm glow is better
than nothing, it beats being alone any day. In fact it even makes you feel
pretty good at times, like there's gonna be someone there when you come home at
night, someone to share your laughter and your tears with. But it still didn't prevent
me from missing the fire. That kind of inferno is dangerous and it burns you
sometimes, but the flames are still utterly mesmerising.
Moonlight kisses in the park or
the cemetery. A cool, bare sculpted chest to lay my head upon. Strong arms
holding me steady. A fierce presence protecting me at all costs. Your soft
voice whispering poetry and ancient languages into my ear. Someone to listen to
my endless babble – to really, truly understand how I feel and what I mean.
Those were the things we had. Those are what I miss, what I dream of having
once more. Maybe the old adage is true, you never appreciate what you have
until you lose it. I always knew I loved you. I knew I wanted the rest of my
life to be with you, but I never stopped to think about the little things I
would miss when we parted. I never imagined what it would be like to have a
story to tell you, about patrol or something funny Xander said, then remember
that you weren't there to tell. Or how I would feel when I had a problem that I
needed your advice with but I couldn't ask you. I never supposed my lips would
ache for yours or that my own bed would feel so foreign and so empty. And I
never thought that I would have to keep all these feelings so entirely to
myself, because the only person who would understand them wasn't there anymore.
I don't want to make you feel
guilty for anything you did, because God knows you have enough guilt plaguing
your soul already. And I know that you only ever had my best interests at
heart. But I'm just telling you what it was like for me to be without you in
the hopes that you'll finally come to realise how much of a privilege being with
you was. I fell in love with you when I was sixteen years old and from that
moment on you never left my heart even once. Even now, when all my other
connections to this world are virtually severed, there's still you that I cling
to, that I can never leave. I'm worried about you, you know. I'm frightened
that you'll do something stupid or that you'll lose your beautiful personality
in a haze of misplaced grief.
Because it is misplaced. I want
to shout to you, to yell that I'm still here, I'm still watching over you. I
was there when Willow first told you. I saw you collapse to the floor, your
eyes staring blankly out at nothing. You looked straight at me, straight through
me, seeing only empty air. Cordelia rushed to your side and you let her hold
you for a moment, whilst Willow just stood there, fresh tears coursing down her
cheeks, looking distinctly like a rabbit caught in the headlights of an
oncoming car, waiting to be hit by a new wave of pain.
"What happened?" Wesley asked in
a shaky voice. But Willow couldn't answer – she was sobbing too hard, and soon
Cordelia joined in, burying her face in your chest as she wept. And you just kept
staring, staring into space, your gaze so intense and piercing that for a
second I thought you could really see me. But then you shook your head firmly
and a single blood tear fell from your eye, leaving a red smear down your pale
cheek.
"What happened, Willow?" You
repeated Wesley's question in a soft and dangerously calm voice.
Willow turned to look at you and
met only your utterly vacant expression. Her weeping stopped immediately and
she backed away, frightened. The others looked confused, but I knew what had
scared her. Your eyes. She looked into your eyes and saw the emptiness there,
the extinction of the light that used to fill them. She saw Angelus.
Stuttering she repeated the
entire story, ending with the moment I hurled myself deliberately into the
vortex. And I listened intently to it all, more sure than ever that I made the
right decision – that death truly was my gift and I gave it well. You listened
too, quietly absorbing every word until Willow was done and crying once more.
Then you stood up slowly, shaking Cordelia off, and walked across the lobby of
the hotel to the reception desk. Still portraying an aura of utter calm and
control you picked up the computer monitor off the desk and hurled it across
the room. Six feet later it hit the wall, shattering into a million tiny
electrical components.
"This. Wasn't. Supposed. To.
Happen." You said in a low voice overflowing with suppressed rage and pain.
"Angel!" Cordelia called out, as
you stalked back towards the main exit of the building.
"Just leave me alone," you
growled.
"Perhaps that's not the wisest
idea at the moment," Wesley hurried after you. "You should really be amongst
friends right now – people who understand what you're going through."
You whirled around upon him,
seizing him by the shirtfront in a sudden fit of anger. "Don't ever say you
understand, because you don't," you spat out then dropped Wesley roughly to the
floor, before leaving, this time unchallenged.
I followed you around for a
while, saw you visit the Oracles, witnessed your rage vented against a pack of
demons roaming the sewers. Then you fell down and cried, like I have never seen
you cry before. It was the most painful, heartbreaking sound I have ever heard
and the time came when I couldn't bear to watch anymore.
So, I went away for a while. I
left to check on the others, to see how Dawn was holding up. She coped pretty
well for a girl her age, actually, for someone who has lost a mother and a
sister in quick succession. But then she's young and in the young grief hits
hard but lasts only a short time. Dad came back for my funeral (how weird does
that sound to say? – my funeral – but then I guess if anyone knew about
dying, it would be you). Fortunately he thought the death of his daughter a
more important matter than the passing of just his ex-wife.
At first Dawn was determined to
hate him. He had abandoned us and Mom and not even paid the remotest bit of
attention to our lives for the past five years. But, Dawn had been sheltered
from the worst of our parents arguing and the bitterest of Mom's feelings towards
him, so she soon came round. She let him into her little grief-enshrouded world
and they formed a new, closer, bond. Gradually I witnessed her depression begin
to lift. I saw her crack a smile or giggle at a joke on TV, then she would
remember and her face would set in a hard line once more. But each time reality
came flooding back, the cloud that covered her was a little less dark and the
burden upon her shoulders a little less heavy. Dad took her back with him to LA
and the change of scenery did her a world of good, so much so that every day
she seemed to get a bit brighter and not quite so crippled by pain and guilt.
I wish I could say the same for
you, however. If anything you only have only gotten worse as time passes. You have
estranged yourself from your friends, pushing them away time and time again.
You are withdrawn into yourself, and forget
to sleep, to eat, to even acknowledge the world around you. You spend hours
just standing at my grave, reading the inscription on the tombstone over and
over again, almost as if it would change if you willed it to hard enough.
Perhaps if you keep on wishing, keep on hoping then it won't say Buffy Summers,
it will read some other name, be somebody else's loved on rotting in the
ground, that this whole experience will just turn out to be some horrible
nightmare.
Well it is a nightmare, but it's
a real one. It's actually happening and there's nothing that either of us can
do to change it. I will just have to carry on with the only thing left to me –
watching you, being with you always. And I can hope that one day you will be
able to see past all the pain and the grief and the unfixable heartbreak and
feel me there, maybe even see my presence shimmering in the air.
Tonight you step away from my
grave, lovingly placing a final kiss on the cool, stone marker that is placed
there. You walk blindly home, staggering where once you used to walk tall,
finding your way through instinct alone. Then you collapse into bed from sheer exhaustion.
But you won't sleep – you never sleep anymore. You just stare up at the ceiling
as the day goes past until nightfall returns and you can resume your nightly
vigil at my grave. I don't really know why you go there – it's not like it's
actually me buried underneath all that earth. It's just the shell of who
I used to be, the final physical remains of my life. But maybe that's what you
need. You need some concrete reminder that I was actually here, that I loved
you once. And there's no way I could ever begrudge you that.
You switch off the light and let
the darkness envelop you, hiding the silent tears that fall down your cheeks. A
dull ache suffuses my whole being – your pain reflected on to me – and I lean
over to kiss you gently on the forehead, the cheeks, the lips, my energy
surrounding you.
You sit up abruptly, eyes
darting around the room, expression filled with childlike hope and anxiety. "Buffy?"
You whisper tentatively into the air, the first words I have heard you speak in
perhaps an entire week.
Concentrating with all my might,
I will for my voice to reach you.
"Yes, my love. I'm here. Even in
death…"
Fin
"Chi ama, crede"
~ who loves, believes.
