Reconciling with My Half-Sister.
By James Carmody.
Disclaimer: I do not own Buffy the Vampire Slayer/Angel the Series, Joss Whedon does, and I will not infringe on his copyright. This is just for fun. Please: Don't Pay Me Anything For This! I'm Begging You.
Characters: Cordelia Chase, Kennedy, Amy Madison, Willow Rosenberg, Oz Osborne, Xander Harris, Buffy Summers, Rupert Giles, Angel, Faith Lehane, Dawn Summers, First Evil. Others may come up as the story progresses.
Pairing: Oz/Willow, Kennedy/Cordelia, Cordelia/Xander Harris, Rupert Giles/Buffy Summers, Rupert Giles/Faith Lehane, Faith Lehane/Buffy Summers, Buffy Summers/Dawn Summers Kennedy/Willow Rosenberg,Faith Lehane/Dawn Summers,Joyce Summers/her children, Rupert Giles/Joyce Summers, Hank Summers/Buffy Summers/Dawn Summers, just to name a few.
Summary: This is a weird one, it's set in about twenty years after Season 3 of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Cordelia and Kennedy are half-sisters, and for the most part, they're reflecting on their younger years, and how often foolish they were as teenage adults. It's a bit of an AU, or Alternate Universe, in that Cordelia didn't die/ascend/whatever, she's still physically alive.
Setting: Kennedy's Mansion, namely the attic thereof. Set in about twenty years after Season 3, so about sixteen years after season 7, these women are roughly thirty-eight, and have become good friends now- not so in the beginning: they were one profoundly dysfunctional family!
Author's Story Notes: Italicized words will represent either thoughts, if they're in quotation marks, emphasis if they're separate from everything else, or, if they're in large sections, things are inverted: as that represents a flashback scene: these women are reminiscing of their younger years in school together, so if that happens: regular print will represent thoughts if within quotation marks, if not, emphasis, and this [text] means either telepathy (something I find fun to imagine as a Slayer Power), temptation, or prayer. Kennedy's watcher may also show up, hey, it's likely to be Giles.
Thank you for the inspiration, Kenn Faith Dawn, your idea of this has helped me to help you out with our mutual project of writing this universe- these girls are immense fun to write for!
I figure proper meditation and spiritual direction might help them with that ability- just a nifty idea for roleplaying games if you are into that kind of activity.
Please tell me what you think of my work.
Chapter 1.): "Remember When?"
Chapter 1 Author's Notes Beginning: This begins in a bright spring day, in Kennedy's mansion's attic, roughly some 20 years after they graduated High School.
Kennedy Giles, Rupert's adopted daughter and Cordelia Chase, half-sisters due to biology, sat in the former's attic, some sixteen years after 2003 AD. Kennedy picked up a book from their Senior year of High School: the Yearbook of one of them, and brought it to the couch where her sister was seated. The two thirty-eight year old women sat side by side, thumbing through the pages of the book, reminiscing of their school days.
Cordelia laughed lightly when they reached one of the pages "Hey; remember when we had to deal with how Catherine Madison had body-swapped with her daughter, Amy?" Cordelia asked her somewhat (by about a month) younger sister, Kennedy.
"Yeah" Kennedy laughed "that was quite an adventure...", then she thought about how she'd bullied Cordelia, and shivered a bit "I was quite a bully then.".
"Yes, you were at that." Cordelia remarked, then continued after a pause "but then so was I." she recalled her own bullying of the young woman they thought was Amy Madison, but it turned out it was her mother, Catherine. "As well as how I treated Willow; Wow! I was horrible to her... I hope sincerely that she'll forgive me for being such a literal bitch to her." Cordelia thought inside her head, then she recalled that her sister was Willow's girlfriend, and she wondered if Kenny would represent her to Willow and try to negotiate a peace between them, silently wondered, that is. Cordelia also remembered how Kennedy had bullied her, by threatening to throw her in the dumpster in back of the school and arrange for her to take a "field trip to the city dump" as Kenny would put it. It was then that Cordelia laughed, lightly, at how foolish they had been at teens and young adults.
Kennedy looked at her sister who was sitting next to her with a very high degree of devotion, and politely asked her "What's so funny, Darling?". She said this in a tone that indicated her concern for her stepsister and wanted into the joke going on in Cordelia's head.
Cordy was initially shocked that her sister had called her "Darling", a name that indicated a certain affection more common between close romantic friends or husband and wife than sisters; besides, Kenny was a homosexual, so was she coming on to her? Cordelia had to make sense of this. She didn't want her sister thinking of their relationship as anything that could evolve into something sexual or romantic- between sisters?! "YUCK!" Cordy thought. She was about to ask Kennedy what the younger woman meant when Kenny burst out laughing, still keeping her nearer arm wrapped around her back.
Kenny had been laughing with her not at her right about then.
It took a while for Queen C to realize that Kennedy was laughing at her confusion and not her, and that she was laughing with her, not at her; initially she was angry at Kennedy for making fun of her, or so Queen C thought. Cordy thought that she was being made fun of so she was angry at her younger stepsister, but something in Kenny's facial expression that denoted seriousness and love told her "no, I'm not making fun of you, I'm laughing with you." so Cordy calmed down after about a minute.
"I can't believe we were so darn foolish, Kenny. We were such mean girls- why would anyone want to date us then?" Cordy asked her, relating what was so funny- how stupid they had been back then: being so mean to so many other students- they were both bullies, in fact, only major difference was that Kennedy was in fact the predator of her sister in this relationship between them; now it was a major relief that the two of them got along so incredibly well and seemed to have such a love of one-another, now that they were all grown up.
Kennedy's Slayer training and the theological stuff she had been compelled to study in that course, along with her Confirmation Classes in her teen years came back to her right about then. There was a little phrase that passed into Catholic theology from either Greek or Latin, she wasn't sure, but the phrase is "metanoia"- literally "New Mind" or more precisely "mind new", referring to embracing a new way of life, or something along that store. Now she more completely understood that: she had begun to embrace a new life with her stepsister, specifically by this playtime the two of them were engaging in right at this very moment: they were starting to act as sisters ought, and Wow! this was simply fun! She couldn't believe she hadn't engaged in it before with her.
Kennedy remembered then holding Cordelia against the wall of lockers, after slamming her into them frontally, threatening her from behind while holding her arm behind her back in a painful posture, telling her in no uncertain terms to "Shut up!", threatening her that if she even heard of her threatening another girl, even if the charges are false, she'd personally put her in the garbage right before the dump-truck comes by so that before Cordy could get out she'd be taken to the Sunnydale dump and would have to walk home. Kennedy shivered at her cruelty she'd shown that day to this other girl. The reason for this extreme dislike "Is it hatred?" Kennedy wondered; is because Cordelia's mother had carried on an affair with Kennedy's dad before his death "Do I hate my stepsister because of what her mom did to my biological family- by the way, isn't that incredibly unjust of me?" Kennedy had to question herself right now. So, in fact, Cordy and Kennedy were half-sisters, not just stepsisters!
"I like loving you as I ought... it's a lot more fun than fighting with you, Cor." Kennedy told her stepsister, happily.
"I like the fact we're finally getting along as well, Kenn, it's such a relief that we don't have to fight anymore; that always led to pain... mostly for me." Cordy said, rubbing her backside as her memories of all the fighting (and being bested time and again by her sister) came back to her "We had quite a messed up relationship, didn't we?" Queen C said, smiling at the relief that she wasn't going to be bent over her younger stepsister's knee and beaten again, or thrown in the garbage again, or sat on again, or touched without her permission any more.
"We sure did, Queen C" Kennedy said, using her sister's favorite nickname for a bit, to play with her, and hugging her fully she told her, they were now seated on the couch, with Kennedy's left arm wrapped around Cordelia's shoulders, and she pulled her into a hug saying right about then "I love you, and I'm so glad I do!"
To Be Continued...
End Chapter 1 Author's Notes: WOW did they have a dysfunctional family when they were teens! Future chapters will explore this relationship, as well as their other relationships; and we'll see the kind of actions hinted at in this peacemaking beginning.
Future chapters will be flashbacks, this one introduces us to them in their later thirties, and with much more mature minds. Now they're at peace, and this is the state they'll be in, but as we go deeper into the story, you'll see a lot of domestic fighting going on, as well as scoldings (usually from Rupert Giles to his daughter, Kennedy), as well as some degree of domestic violence from Kennedy towards Cordelia- who's a bit of a bully.
In context: Cordy's a bully towards many other students, but Kennedy is really bullying Cordelia; almost continually, both inside and outside their home-life, although they live in different homes!
If you think about it, and I mean REALLY think about it: Kennedy's Cordy's predator in their relationship. She's predating on her regularly, and quite often. This is one dysfunctional family!
The next chapter will likely deal with some of the High School Bullying that Cordy has had to endure at the hands of her stepsister, Kennedy.
Please, feel free to tell me what you think. I really want to know, but I also want to know why you think what you do about this story. Don't be shy.