Title: Ankara

Author: TigerLilyFire

Summary: "Maybe I was wrong…maybe Istanbul is just too damn populous." AU if you follow the Season 8 comic books.

It had been exactly seven hundred and two days since the love of my existence was killed.

Seven hundred and two long, agony filled days.

Not one of these seven hundred and two days go by without the flashing image of her beautiful face enters my mind, and my heart wrenches within itself each time. Sharp, staggering pains that could last for eons.

Still, I had to continue, live each one of these days like I had pre-death, pre-pain…pre-Tara.

And it was hard, goddess was it hard. She was my light in the world of darkness, my candle – extra flame-y.

And Kennedy…well, Kennedy was too different. She was so unlike my sweet Tara….and I think…I think maybe that is what I needed then, to be away from any likeness to my light. I needed some darkness and some death to contrast my once bright life. Besides, when Kennedy and I started this thing, we both knew it wouldn't last. Just a fling, something new and exciting.

We are over now, just like we both knew would happen.

She is a slayer, and as she said, I am a goddess. Those two things don't make much with the mix-y.

So, here I am, in Turkey none the less. I have things to do here, saving the world related things. Buffy sent me here to recruit the Slayers here, and she acted very suspicious about it too, what with the shifty eyes and lookin' down a lot. I wonder what exactly that was about…oh well, too much thinking about Buffy-weirdness and not enough about Slayer-findyness.

I glanced at the instructions gripped tightly in my hand. The parchment was crinkled, wrinkled like the lines of apricot skin clinging to the pit, smooth and creased. I rubbed my thumb along the paper, feeling it…this...this should have been Tara's skin I was caressing. We should have grown old together…we were supposed to be forever.

I quickly shake my head, I shouldn't start. Once I started, the tears wouldn't stop for goddess knows how long.

I snapped my eyes back to the paper. Turn left at…Ege Sk. Follow the path if the road, turn right, right, left. Oh! Hello park! I smiled at the squeals of laughter peeling from the green and grassy area around me. Dogs ran about, barking, children played in the water fountain, and parent chattered about in Turkish, looking at their children with wary but amused expressions.

What difference would it make if I took a break? I stooped below the hanging branches of a Weeping Willow. Haha, Willow, that's my name! Um…yeah, that was a bit random…My thoughts however were interrupted by the sounds of a splash and a yelp. I looked up to see a little girl, maybe three or four crashing into the cold water of the fountain. Quickly I cast a quick charm,

"Dissipatus, almohadas!"

The cool, blue water in the fountain disappeared and the unforgiving concrete turned squashy and marshmallow like.

I stood up and ducked my head, they mustn't know I cast a spell. I ducked and weaved around the people peering over one another to see if the little girl was all right. Of course she was, but they didn't know that.

My footsteps were fast paced, but not oddly so, and I managed to round three corners before slowing. I entered a bazaar and glanced around at the goods offered. Three men stopped me, grabbing hold of my arms, trying to sell me something. I just shook my head no and sent a small, tiny shockwave down my arm to repel them. Not enough for them to notice anything off or strange, but enough to feel kind of static-y.

I glared down at my feet, damnit, why weren't they taking me to the Slayer? Maybe a quick locater spell, Slayer variety…

No, no, no time and no resources. Grumbling, I resumed my aimless walking. Sure, I had the directions, but I really didn't feel the urge to pull the paper out of my pocket. Too many thoughts from just the simple damn piece of paper.

You know, I made a pretty good investment in these boots. They are pretty, kind of shiny and a golden honey colored. Cute, and good for walking. I never even noticed the –

"Oof! Hey, watch where you're goin' pal!"

I continue my walk, just glancing back at the jerk to orate my feelings to him.

One glance and I'm shocked.

Oz.

"O-Oz?"

"Willow!"

I haven't truly thought of Oz in a long time. Fleeting mutters perhaps, but no real conscious though. Tara was all I needed.

We both are different people than we were back then, two different minds and souls. I have no expectations from this running in to him, because we are like...like jigsaw puzzle pieces. Taken out by grubby childish hands and played with. Before these hands came along and manipulated us, we fit together perfectly. But now that we have been…played with…for lack of better term, we just can't go back together. The once sharp edges are now smooth, and the smooth edges frayed and faded. Sure, the basic fit is still there, but…no longer are we made for each other.

I keep this thought to myself though, no need to spoil what can be a good thing.

He took a few strides toward me then enveloped me in a hug, eyebrows raised expectantly, he looked over my shoulder.

"Where is Tara?"

A deep, ripping sound wracked my body, and with eyes wide in alarm, Oz grabbed my arms, in an effort to keep me upright I realized.

Three simple words. Three simple words brought out the worst. The bad…the pain.

Rolling over me in shocks, I waited for the tide to ebb and subside.

Numerous gasps later, I managed to look at this long lost face and whisper,

"She's dead."

His eyes, always so expressive to his stoic face, if you knew how to read them that is, displayed pity, hope and…love? That was a foreign emotion to me. Something I hadn't known in almost two years.

Yeah…I think it was a love-look.

I smiled a weak half smile, good Willow, show him that you aren't a crazy girl who belongs in the loony-bin, even though you have lost the love of your existence.

"Maybe I was wrong…maybe Istanbul is just too damn populous."

He laughed, and I laughed along with him, one of the other emotions shined through even more brightly in his eyes.

Hope.

And I am pretty sure that the look he was radiating was glowing much more subtly right back at him, in my own.

A/N: I love both pairings Tara/Willow and Oz/Willow that is, and I wanted to convey just how much Willow truly did love Tara, and that she is incomplete without her, Tara's "hands" have remodeled her, and changed her. I believe that Tara and Willow had the love that comes once in a lifetime and they would have lasted if Tara hadn't been killed, but at the same time, I believe that Willow and Oz had a weaker, but just as consuming love that could be broken, yet just as easily repaired. So no flames on the pairing please!