Title: Beer Very Bad (originally titled "One Night Stand")
Author: Golden Waffles
Rating: PG-13. For now, at least. Mentions of sex.
Description: It's kind of an alternate ending to "Something Blue." That night Willow gets drunk at the Bronze, something a little different happens, involving a certain blonde girl.
Disclaimer: Of course I don't own the characters or settings of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Just the situations I put them in here.
A/N: Well, you are now experiencing the "long chapter once-a-week" style of updating rather than the "short chapter twice-a-week" style from before. I'm hoping I can keep it up. Next week is finals, though, so it might be rough. I promise, this is the LAST "Willow thinking to herself" chapter. There are other characters. Actually, I'm liking the next chapter (especially compared to this one and the last one). We'll see Tara again (sort of), and Willow and Buffy have some close call conversations. So don't worry- things will definitely pick up. We just need some context first.

Chapter 3:

Home

In Willow's experience, the walk from Erickson to Stevenson took between five and seven minutes, depending on her pace. In this case, it was just enough time for her to wonder whether she really wanted Buffy to be there or if she really, really didn't want Buffy to be there. On the one hand, talking through things was how she dealt with them- left unspoken, her thoughts just piled up until they threatened to make her brain explode. Usually, she talked things out with Buffy. But this… this was something unprecedented. Where would she even start? How could she admit what had happened, even to her best friend?

Besides, Buffy had been so preoccupied lately. Her budding relationship with Riley was keeping her pretty busy and distracted. They just weren't talking like they used to. Sometimes it was hard to believe they still lived together.

Well, she thought bitterly, at least Buffy will be happy that I won't be complaining about Oz as much.

She did feel considerably better now that she had made a decision about the whole Oz situation. She would still miss him. Maybe she would always miss him. But things had gone too wrong, too often. And he was gone now. It was time to move on. She had decided. And she was relieved.

Saturday mornings were not hotbeds of college activity. Willow easily avoided running into anyone as she navigated the deserted quad. It was a beautiful morning, actually, with a breathtaking sunrise behind her and happy birds twittering all over the place. It felt wrong. Her morning had been so indescribably weird, she felt like the sky should be green or upside-down or something. Nature disagreed. Apparently, the universe thought it was a great morning after all.

In the end, it didn't matter whether she wanted Buffy to be around or not- by the time she got to their room, it was empty, with both beds neatly made. Maybe Buffy had done a late patrol. Or maybe she was with Riley again.

Willow was happy for her best friend- mostly. It was good for her to have a nice, normal (albeit boring) guy for once, instead of a broody vampire like Angel or a humungous jerk like Parker. She deserved someone who wouldn't make her miserable, and Riley seemed pretty committed to that goal. Unfortunately, she wasn't sure Buffy could do "normal, healthy relationship," without all the fighting and demons and tortured souls. She supposed they would soon find out- either she and Riley would work or they wouldn't.

Either way, part of her hoped Buffy would find another conversation topic soon. She was about as tired of hearing about Riley as Buffy was of hearing about Oz. She imagined that half the reason they didn't talk as much these days was that their conversations had become so repetitive.

"Riley likes me."
"Oz left."
"I think I like Riley, too."
"I miss him."
"He's not Angel, though."
"It hurts."
"Angel made me sad, though."
"I feel like I've been torn in half."
"Riley's a good guy."
"I don't know what to do without him."

It wasn't a fun conversation to have over and over again. Still, she'd rather have that conversation another thousand times than the inevitable new one.

"So, Buffy, remember the other night at the Bronze? I got blackout drunk and had sex with a girl I've never seen before."

Usually, her conversations with Buffy were borderline redundant. They knew each other so well, she could predict what Buffy would say in almost any situation. It was still nice to say it all out loud. It was reassuring. But she didn't know what Buffy would say in the "I accidentally had drunk, anonymous gay sex" conversation. She wasn't even she what she would say in the "I accidentally had drunk, anonymous gay sex" conversation. How do you talk to someone about something like that?

Willow sank down on her bed and sighed, shaking her head to dispel the stray thoughts. Okay, so now what? Her eyes slowly swept the room before falling on a basket in her closet. She walked over and picked it up, along with a change of clothes. Hopefully, a long shower would help her clear her head. It certainly couldn't hurt anything.

She twisted the knobs on the shower until it ran warm and began stripping her clothes off. To her surprise, there was only one casualty of her hasty dressing: her inside-out socks. All things considered, it could have been much worse. She was also grateful for the steam; as it built up around the shower, it muffled some of the background noise in her head. After testing the water with her hand, she stepped into the warm stream. A small sigh escaped her as the water poured over her head. The aspirin had eased away the worst of her headache, but it still throbbed, especially given the heavy weight of her morning-long thought avalanche. The heat sank into her skull, soothing away the final dregs of pain and leaving her free to finish her ruminations.

God, what happened? What don't I remember?

She poured some shampoo into her palm and began roughly massaging it into her hair. I remember going to the Bronze with Buffy and Xander. They wanted to cheer me up after Oz. But they were so on eggshells the whole time, I decided to wander off on my own. So I sat at the bar for a minute. And then Bartender Pete offered me a drink. I must have been looking sad.

She rinsed the shampoo out and tried to rub conditioner into the new tangles in her hair. She tried not to think about the reason her hair was so messy. For now, at least. For now, she appreciated the sweet, familiar scent her bath products gave the steam.

So I drank a beer. And I think it tasted pretty gross. But I felt just a little better afterwards. My head was quieter. So I drank another. And I felt a little better again. More relaxed. More detached. The music sounded a little better and the lights looked a little cooler. So I decided to have another. So I went back to the bar.

Willow froze with her hands still in her hair, halfway through combing out the tangles.

There. At the bar. There was someone there. I remember them. Blonde hair. Her. It was her. She looked lost, like she had never been somewhere like that before. But I just got another drink and left. And then… God, what then? More drinking? I think I went to the bathroom. I must have. But then what? Did I get another beer? Did I talk to her? Did she talk to me? Why did I have to drink that much? Why didn't I ask Buffy to take me home? Why was I so stupid? Why did I let myself get that upset?

She let her hands fall to her sides as the water rinsed everything from her hair and ran its course down her body to the drain. So that was something. She had met the girl at the Bronze bar. She might have been drinking, too. But how did they go from there to… where they ended up? What the frilly heck had happened in between? Besides the obvious. No, especially the obvious.

Had they talked first? What had they talked about? Did they dance? Kiss? Were they both drunk? Did the girl think she was flirting with her? Was she flirting with her?

There was only one person in the world who knew the answer to that question, and she wasn't in the shower. If Willow wanted to ask her, she would have to go back to The Room. Back to the mystery girl in Kresge on the east side of campus. Back to the cause of some of the most thorough and unshakable confusion she had ever felt in her life. She wasn't really in a hurry to do that.

She turned around so that the hot water rained against her shoulders. Leaving was bad. The water was good. Nice. Pleasant. Soothing. For the past several weeks, her whole body had been an overstressed network of muscle knots, caused by too much worrying and too little sleep. It felt better now. Much better. She just wasn't sure why.

As she closed her eyes and focused on the warmth pounding against her back, the tiniest, weakest dregs of a memory tickled the back of her mind. The stream of water condensed and transformed into a pair of hands. Soft, warm hands. Hands running over her body, over all the tense places. Hands that raised goosebumps over her entire body. It felt good. Really good. The memory was fleeting, though, and when she opened her eyes to check that she really was alone in the stall, the sensation faded. Frowning to herself, she twisted the faucets into the off position and exited, shivering.

The time to herself had helped. Her head was racing less, and she felt considerably calmer. The shower had made her feel better. Clean. As she got dressed in her new clothes and toweled off her drenched hair, the word struck her as odd. Did I feel... unclean before? She cocked her head to the side. No. Embarrassed? Definitely. Confused? Absolutely. Ashamed? Well, maybe a little. But unclean? Violated? No. Not that. Not really. Whoever that girl was, I'm pretty sure she wasn't evil. She wasn't a vampire. She wasn't Parker Abrams. She seemed kind of sweet. She wouldn't have done something like that. Whoever she was.

Willow returned to the room, depositing her clothes at the foot of her bed rather than in the hamper. She was tired. She reached under her bed and pulled out a large stuffed dog. He had kept her company in countless other moments of crisis, and he was always a good source of comfort and advice in the absence of her friends.

"So, boy, what do I do now?"

Before the toy could answer, she heard the rattling of a key in a stubborn lock. Buffy was home. She couldn't talk to Buffy. What would she even say? She hadn't come up with a good conversation starter yet! She hadn't rehearsed! Without thinking, she flung herself down on her side and closed her eyes, feigning sleep. She heard the door open and Buffy walk in. The footsteps paused in front of her bed for a few tense seconds before continuing to the far side of the room. Willow was unsure of how convincing her charade was, but she continued to hold perfectly still as Buffy buzzed around the room. Now I just wait for her to leave… or say something…

As she pretended to be asleep, she realized that her eyelids were actually pretty heavy and that they appreciated the rest. And that her bed was pretty comfy, especially now that her body wasn't so achy. And that she was really tired.

…And then she was back at the Bronze…