Title: Only One
Author: Emily
Rating: PG 13.
Summary: It's the apocalypse but not everybody's gone.
Timeline/Spoilers: Pretty AU. Season three-ish I guess. Post the X/C break up.
Pairing: Xander/Cordy
Music: Lifehouse: Only One.

"Now I see this burden you gave me is too much to carry
Too much to bury inside
I guess you're the only one that nobody changes
I guess you're the only one left standing when everything else goes down
You're still the only one
You're still the only one"

I stand up amongst the dust and ignore the fact that I'm shaking. I run my hands through my hair and ignore the way I can't breathe. I'm Cordelia and I feel numb. I refuse to cry or to do any of the things that you're supposed to do when people die. I don't quite believe this is real, and I'd rather it wasn't. I want my car and my life and sun shining in California thank you very much. I don't want this and it obviously didn't want me because for some obscure reason I'm alive, and I'm standing here alone. Really, if this is how it's gonna be from now on then I'll pass. Yeah, I'll fucking pass. I'll pass on the death and the blood and the screaming and now, the silence. I'll pass.

What happens next though? Click my heels together. There's no place like home. Wake up, and everything is fine. It was all some horrible nightmare brought on by hanging too much with Buffy and all those freaks. That was it. And oh God, they're dead. Oh God.

" Cordy?" I hear and I think vaguely that whoever's talking to me should really use my full name. It's the end of the fucking world and there's no place for Cordy here. Cordelia...she was in Shakespeare wasn't she? King Lear? And did she die? I think she lived.

I look up and it's Xander. Out of all the people that could have lived, it's him and I think that this is some screw up on behalf of whoever's in charge up there. It should be someone who can actually do something, Buffy, Angel, not me. It shouldn't be me. It shouldn't be him. It shouldn't be us. What happened to us, I wonder suddenly. Whatever happened to us? Somewhere along the way something must have gone wrong if this is how it all ends.

" You weren't in Shakespeare." I say softly without meaning to.

" Shakespeare?" Xander asks, clearly confused. "Cordy we have to get out of here"

" Why? It's not as though there's anything left." I tell him and he stares at me for a second or two.

" We should go" He says again and I say " We should be gone."

He grabs my arm hard and looks at me hard and I want to cry. " Xander, why are we still here?" I ask, shaking my head.

His grip on my arm loosens and he's shrugging in that Xander way that makes me want to laugh. Because he's still the same even with everything. He's still the same. " Don't dwell on why, Cordy, please, let's just go."

I look at him for a second or two and then I nod. He wants to go, I don't know what in the world I want or ever wanted and so I go with him because there's nowhere else. Maybe he's right too, dwelling on the why isn't a good idea. Xander is even keeping his head and that's more than I can do. I follow him and we walk. Through rubble and bodies and I don't look down to see if I can recognise any of then. I walk through it all with my head held high like I own the fucking world. The thought's almost comical because who would want to own this world? And then I realise he's not walking with me. He lets out some strangled cry behind me and I don't want to turn around. Don't want to see. Whoever it is lying there, I can't look.

"Xander?" I ask softly. "Who..." My voice trails off and I don't want to ask.

There's a long pause and I guess he doesn't want to answer. The sun is barely visible behind ashy clouds and this place, this Hellmouth really is hell today. He doesn't answer and I hate him a little for that. Slowly I turn around and Buffy's small clenched hand with the silver glinting ring is next to a pile of dust and another silver ring and I want to cry again. The sheer poetry of it all makes me want to cry. That and the fact they're gone in the truest sense of the word. I guess it really is just us left and that's the worst part. Yeah, I think it's even worse than the fact that everyone's dead - and I think that thinking that makes me a bitch. I was always a bitch though. That's what Xander always thought. Him and the rest of the world. And me, I thought it too. I believed it and I acted it and I always wanted to be somehow a better person. Not just some mean beautiful bitch who never gave anything about anyone.

" C'mon." I tell him. "You were right, we should go." I say roughly and try to drag him along, my manicured nails digging into his arms.

He stares at me and he's so obviously falling apart. " Don't you even care?"

I stare back at him in this shock because I can't believe that he thinks this. " Of course I care." I tell him, outraged and somehow, deeply hurt. Back when I was with him I thought that maybe he could see right through me but now it's like my walls never even came down for him. If they did then he's forgotten.

He doesn't say anything and I don't have to scratch into his arms to make him follow me now. We walk in silence again and it's not as though there's anything we can talk about. What did we ever talk about? We were mean and cutting to each other and we made out in the back of my car. His opinion meant more to me than I let him know and now he thinks that I don't care.

" Why did you cheat on me?" I'm saying softly before I know what I'm doing.

He turns and stops and he has that anguished puppy dog look in his eyes that I never could resist. "Cor, it was just something....that happened, I didn't mean to I can't explain why." He says sadly not making any kind of excuse or giving me an explanation.

" But." I stop. " I just want to know, did what we had mean anything to you? Was I just some girl? Was it fun because I was popular and everyone said I was easy? Why..." My voice trails off as I ask him all these questions that have been at the back of my mind forever. I feel uneasy as I realise that once more my walls are falling down for him and I don't know if he even knows how big a deal that is.

He shakes his head. "No. Of course it did and you weren't and no." The way he babbles it would be funny if the anguish in his eyes hadn't transferred to his voice now. "Cordy, I loved you. I loved Willow because she was my friend and it was easy kissing her and knowing she wanted me back. But you, I loved you. You were just always so...unreachable."

" I...I wasn't." I protest. " I didn't mean to be unreachable." I say softly, horrified. He loved me? " I told Buffy once that I loved you." I say and speak my thoughts aloud.

He looks at me in equal horror because isn't this the right time for this? " You never told me that."

"I know." I say. " With you it was always Buffy or Willow or Faith or some girl who wasn't me. I didn't tell you. I'd never told anyone I loved them before, I wasn't gonna start with some guy who might not say it back." And there it is. That fear that he'd been hopelessly in love with Buffy or Willow all along and if he was then why did I have to love him.

" I would have said it back." He says and I start to cry. I'm horrified by this and he's horrified by this. So maybe I love him a little and maybe he loves me and it's only now when we're the only ones left that we finally find out. God. Talk about bad timing. I think this should be a good thing but I don't think it can be and I'm crying like I haven't cried since my dad left for five months when I was a kid. I was eight and I didn't think he was coming back and my mom drank and when he did come back it was like he was still gone. This is worse than that. It's worse because I'm curling up with my arms around my knees on the cool ground and Xander is holding me. He's kissing my forehead and holding me and murmuring my name. Nobody's ever done that before. I don't know if I want him to. I don't seem to have a choice though because he won't stop holding me and I can't stop crying.

Eventually I quieten and we're just there and now I don't want him to let go of me. He's stroking my hair and maybe letting your walls fall down can be a good thing. He says he loves me, really says the words and I press myself against him. I kiss him and it's not as though the blood, death, screaming, ashes and silence is gone but for a moment of two it's okay. I love him, however insane this may be, and...I'm not alone.

"I guess you're the only one that nobody changes
I guess you're the only one who will never change faces
I guess you're the only one"

Fin.