Title: When You Win (22/?)
Author: Brooke
Email: absolutxandman@yahoo.com
Rating: R (for the next two parts)
Disclaimer: If I owned them Joyce wouldn't be dead, Spike would be getting his ass kicked more often, there would be, like, seven Xanders', people probably wouldn't watch, the show would be canceled…I digress and I don't own anything. Buffy and friends are owned by Joss, Mutant Enemy, 20th Century Fox, The UPN, and whoever else has rights to the show.
Summary: It might have a plot, read and find out. I do know that its kinda based on "What Dreams May Come", because that's what I was watching when I got the idea.
Spoilers: None that I can think of, it's an AU story so everyone should be safe.
Distribution: My fic is your fic. Just let me know.
Feedback: Definitely!! Tell me if it sucked or if you liked it. Whatever. Just write back!
Author's Notes: For the purpose of the story Dawn is 16, and Buffy is 24 almost 25, and Joyce is still alive.… indicate thoughts, "~~" are for phone convos, "**" indicates FLASHBACK. Happy reading all!
Author's Note 2: Character death warning.
P.S.- Thanks Melissa for beta reading this.
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"Hi Joyce," Willow greeted over the phone.
"Willow. Hello." Joyce said tiredly. She had just gotten through a hellish morning with Buffy, and was in the mist of fighting every motherly urge she had to rush over to her daughter's home and drag her out.
"Is everything alright?" Willow asked, concerned at Joyce's tone. The two had become closer after Xander's death mostly because they both needed somebody to talk to.
"No. But it hasn't been for a while now." Joyce breathed and Willow understood.
"Buffy'll be alright. She just needs some more time…"
"I don't think that she will." The older woman said so quietly that Willow almost didn't hear her, "I'm just so scared."
"I can talk to her if you want." Willow offered. She was in the same boat as everyone else in terms of conversations with Buffy, they just didn't happen.
"I know that she's kind of holed up in her own world." Joyce mentally debated whether or not to tell Buffy's best friend about that morning, but decided against it.
"Is she…at home?"
"Yes, she should be. I…tell her I'll come over tonight, Dawn and I, we'll fix dinner. You, Anya, and Giles should come too." Joyce tried to be cheery.
Willow silently pondered why Joyce couldn't tell her daughter that herself, but didn't ask, "Will do Joyce." She said instead, "I'll talk to you later."
Joyce hung up the phone Maybe Willow can get through to her, Buffy has known her as long as she knew Xander. She silently picked up her keys and walked out of the front door. She had to go to the market to get the ingredients for the dinner and she now had an excuse to get out of the empty house.
~8~8~8~8~8~8~8~8~
Willow pushed number 1 on the 'Magic Box' telephone speed dial. The slip next to the number read 'The Harris'', and she smiled as remembered making that slip the day after her best friends' wedding.
The phone rang four times before it was picked up by the answering machine.
"Hello."
Xander's voice rang through the store followed by a long pause.Willow's breath hitched in her chest as it sounded like her best friend had answered the phone, but then the message continued in Buffy's cheery voice, the one she didn't have anymore.
"We're not here…"
"Since when are we a 'we'?"
Xander questioned in the background."So leave a message."
She continued ignoring him, and then the high pitched beep that signaled the end of the tape-recorded flashback."Uh…" Willow started, still shaken by the message, "Hi Buffy. It's Willow. I, um, I'm at the shop if you…"
"Hello." Buffy said in a low voice as she picked up the phone.
"Oh, Buffy. You're home. That's good."
Buffy didn't say anything but Willow knew that she was still there from the steady breathing that she heard.
"I, um, I talked to your Mom, and she thought that I should call you…just to check up." Willow stammered.
"Yeah, she was pretty freaked after this morning." Buffy answered monosyllabically.
"This morning?"
"I got taken to the hospital, she had to pick me up." Buffy stated simply.
"Are you alright?"
"As I'll ever be."
"Want to tell me why?" Willow asked of the hospital trip.
"No." was the answer her best friend gave her. The refusal hurt Willow since they used to tell each other everything, but she kept talking to avoid the tears.
"Your mom said that she and Dawn are coming over to cook you dinner. The rest of us are coming too. She thinks it'll be good for you…"
"I don't really want any company." Buffy interrupted.
It surprised Willow how her friend could hold the same tone through the whole conversation, and more so the word 'conversation' was being used in the pretext of the phrase 'had with Buffy'.
The words left Willow's mouth before she knew what she was saying, "You need company. You need something."
"I have to go." Buffy stated.
"You have to go do what? Cry in a corner? Reinstate your vows as a hermit? Refill your Prozac prescription?" Willow cursed herself for saying that to her friend, but was astounded that Buffy didn't hang up.
"How could you say that? You're supposed to be my BEST friend. You have no idea what I'm going through."
"And as your best friend you'd think that you'd tell me. And that I'd tell you what I'm going through. You're not the only who's hurting…who lost someone they loved when Xander died. I tried to be there for you. We all did, but you didn't want any of us . Did it ever occur to you that I need my best friend to help me get through this too?"
"You lost your best friend that night." Buffy said in a low voice.
"Yeah. I did. I lost both of them." Willow stated truthfully, but Buffy ignored her.
"I lost my best friend. My husband. My child. My life. I lost everything, and I don't have anything left to offer you sympathy. I can't be sorry for that."
Willow was about to speak again but was cut off by the soft click of the other line disconnecting.
~8~8~8~8~8~8~8~8~
Buffy turned off the water and stepped out of the shower. The room was thick with steam as she had allowed the water to get as hot as she could stand it and then turned it up a little more.
She had grown to covet the time that she spent in the shower. It seemed to be the only time where she could completely let go without having to be sent to her shrink. The pelting stream drowned out her tears and helped her feel. The scalding hot water left her skin red and tender, but it seemed to be the only thing that she could feel anymore. It ended the numbness and reminded her that she was still alive.
Buffy moved across the room and grabbed her towel off of the rack, drying off absently while keeping her eyes focused on Xander's towels. They were arranged in the same haphazard way that he'd left them in before the fight. She sighed at the fact hat she couldn't bring herself to disturb anything that he had touched that night.
Buffy grasped the slippery doorknob and opened it allowing the steam to fall into the room and she sloshed her way over to the bed. She had forgotten to dry her feet, and still had water droplets streaming down her legs. She just didn't care. She, almost mechanically, began redressing in the pajamas that she had laid out before her shower.
They had been a present from her mother when she and Xander had returned from their honeymoon. The pajamas were powder blue and silky, and Xander had a matching pair that they'd hardly ever worn.
Buffy let her fingers trace over the initials embroidered on the left breast pocket, 'BAH'. Xander's just said 'AH', no 'L'. She had that pair laid out on the bed as well.
Buffy replayed her conversation with Willow in her head as she walked over to the vanity on her side of the room and sat down. Willow had lost her best friend, and Buffy realized that she hadn't even cared about what her friend was feeling. She doubted if she even cared now.
Willow's Xander wasn't dead. Willow's child wasn't dead. Willow wasn't dead inside.
Buffy's Xander was dead. Buffy's child. Buffy.
Her mother and sister were coming over to cook dinner in an hour, but she didn't plan on helping. If Joyce didn't have a key she wouldn't be getting into the house at all.
Buffy began brushing through her still wet hair while focusing on the pictures that she ad lined up in front of the mirror. They were all of her and Xander. All but one was just of the two of them, smiling, laughing, goofing around…the other was of the two of them and Dawn at her mother's house just over two years ago.
She remembered that day, Xander's building was being sprayed for potato bugs, whatever they were, and he had slept at Joyce's for a few days.
Buffy stopped brushing and picked up the picture, tracing her fingers over Xander's face. She stood up and walked over to the bed and then sat down, leaning against the still cracked headboard and bringing her knees to her chest, never taking her eyes from the picture.
**
"Xan?" Buffy called sleepily as she rolled over in her bed, her hand instinctively reaching into the space where he had been the night before. Finding it empty Buffy sat up, "Xander?" she murmured again while rubbing her hand over her eyes and yawning as she adjusted to the morning light.
Buffy pushed herself out of the bed and walked slowly to her door finding that it was already cracked open Xander must be downstairs already she thought as she stepped into the hall. She started towards the stairs, noticing that her mom's and Dawn's doors were already open, too.
She descended the steps and turned towards the living room when Dawn jumped out in front of her, camera in hand, and took a picture, the flash causing Buffy to take a step back and shield her eyes.
"Say Bed Hair!" Dawn exclaimed as Buffy tried to blink the spots out of her eyes and smooth out her hair as the same time.
"Only if you say Vamp Bait." She growled, making a slower than average grab for her teenage sister.
Dawn jumped back and snapped another picture, "Somebody's cranky in the morning."
"What's with the paparazzi routine?" Buffy asked grabbing the camera form Dawn quickly.
"Mom's taking film to the store so I get to finish that roll." She answered trying to grab the camera back, but failing.
"Take another picture and I break it." Buffy said handing the camera back to her, and another flash went off as soon as it was back in Dawn's hands.
The teenager smiled innocently, "Sorry. And anyway it might be too late. I don't think that Kodak has developed the technology capable of handling you in the morning yet." Dawn laughed and ran upstairs.
Buffy rolled her eyes and padded into the kitchen. She saw Xander standing at the kitchen island wearing only his pajama bottoms, in the mist of squeezing chocolate sauce into a glass of milk. "Hey Sleepy." he grinned without looking up.
Buffy scowled briefly as she remembered when he had came up with that nickname. She had fallen asleep on Giles' couch one day and Willow, in an attempt to make more space, accidentally knocked her on the floor, and she hadn't woken up. She had a justified reason, she was under the affects of a Dormatus demon's sleeping spell, but Xander conveniently forgot that information. Then he had pushed it one step further and said that Sleepy suited her because, in addition to sleeping like a coma victim, she was short like the dwarfs, at which point he got to sleep alone for a week. But now she'd gotten used to the name.
"Morning." she greeted, "Do you want some milk with that?" she asked as he was still squeezing chocolate into the glass.
"Just making chocolate milk Xander style." he smirked.
"They sell that in the store now, its called NesQuik Chocolate Syrup." Buffy laughed while hoisting herself onto the counter and Xander stirred his drink, ignoring her.
"Sleep good?" he changed the subject when he felt Buffy watching him, and she nodded. Xander smiled and turned to out the spoon in the sink and turned back around to grab his glass only to find it was gone. He turned his gaze to Buffy who was gulping down his milk with an innocent look in her eyes.
"Hey," he protested as he moved between her open legs to stand in front of her, "First you mock the milk, then you steal it. That's just wrong."
"I was wrong, this is the best chocolate milk ever."
"I know," Xander whined, "That's why I…" he was cut off when Buffy pressed her lips to his in a passionate kiss. Xander ran his hands up her thighs and to her lower back where he pulled her closer to himself as he deepened the kiss. He pulled away breathlessly, "You're right. That is the best chocolate milk I've ever made."
Buffy smiled and bit her lower lip as Xander leaned in for another kiss…and a camera flash went off.
"DAWN!" Buffy yelled. Snapping her head around to face her grinning sister and setting the glass down next to her.
"That was the last one!" Dawn exclaimed while backing out of the room, "Promise!"
Buffy jumped off the counter, forcing Xander to take a step back and Dawn let out an 'eek' before running into the living room. Buffy seemingly forgot about Xander and gave chase out of the kitchen.
Dawn tossed the camera onto the couch as she ran by it and crossed the room with her big sister behind her. "Buffy, it was only one picture." She laughed nervously while trying to put a chair between herself and the Slayer.
Buffy ignored her and leapt over the chair, smiling before she began tickling the screaming girl. Buffy laughed too as Dawn fought to stay on her feet, but then stopped her actions when she felt two arms wrap around her waist from behind and lift her off the ground.
Dawn stood up straight, smiling in front of her.
"I got her Dawnie." Xander said.
"Operation Payback!" Dawn yelled happily as she set her hands in a tickling position and advanced on her trapped sister.
"Nonononononono!!!!" Buffy begged as Dawn started tickling her sides, while she struggled against Xander's hold…and another flash went off.
"MOM!" Buffy yelled…
**
Buffy sat the picture down next to her on top of her husband's pajamas and reached over to her nightstand. She couldn't live like she was and she knew it. She didn't want to live like she was now. Her hand searched the surface of the small table and shut her eyes as her hand found the object and she picked it up.
Buffy's breath came slow and steady, knowing what she was about to do.
The razor. It'd been sitting there for the last two days, just waiting…
For the first time Buffy couldn't feel any tears coming and she opened her eyes to look at the room. To look at what she and Xander had created together and brought the blade to her wrist.
Buffy was shaking despite the calm she was feeling and she bit her lip to try to steady herself as she drew the blade down vertically once, and then a second time on the same wrist before she switched hands. On her left wrist the blade was unsteady because of the blood loss from her other arm where the liquid flowed freely, but she repeated the process.
Buffy's eyes stung as the dark crimson liquid soaked through her pajamas and then the comforter she sat on. She couldn't tell if she lay down under her own power or if she was just unable to sit up any longer, but she found herself on her side. Buffy tried to concentrate on her movements as she forced her arm to stretch across the bed and drape over the picture before she shut her eyes.
~8~8~8~8~8~8~8~8~
Xander walked around the living room, acknowledging each picture as it clarified before his eyes. Jenny seemed to finally be happy with his progress. She said it meant he was accepting things. But Xander didn't really see that he had a choice in the matter.
He stopped in front of one picture, in particular. It was of himself, Buffy, and Dawn. He smiled at the memory, the same picture was in his home…back on Earth, he supposed was the term that described his past.
He studied it, his eyes focused on his wife. She looked so happy…
But then something drew his eyes away from her face. A dark red droplet coursed from the frame and down the glass before falling to the floor below and then being followed by two others.
"Who's that?" Jenny asked from behind him.
"Dawn. Buffy and Dawn." He answered absently, watching the liquid stream down the glass. Jenny walked up to him and followed his line of vision, gasping in shock at what she was looking at.
"What's happening?" Xander asked as he reached out catching some of the liquid on his fingertips and smearing it around, "I think its blood."
"Are you doing that?" Jenny asked urgently.
"Yeah. You got me." Xander answered sarcastically, "I was just thinking that some blood would really brighten up the white carpet. No, I'm not doing this."
"That's not possible." Jenny said, reaching out and removing the picture from the wall. She ran to the bathroom with Xander in tow and held the framed photo under running water, "Do you have this picture?"
"Yeah, it's right there."
"At home," Jenny amended, "With Buffy. Is it in your home?"
"Yeah, it was in the living room."
"Oh my God," Jenny breathed as she removed the picture from the running water and held it up, watching more blood flow, "Soulmates."
"Huh?" Xander asked confused.
"You and Buffy. You were…are Soulmates." Jenny said is disbelief, "I've never seen a case like this. It's so rare…"
Xander stopped listening and smiled to himself. He was Buffy's Soulmate according to the laws of Heaven. He wished he could but his way back for just one minute so that he could scream that fact in Angel's ear, that he, Xander Harris, was Buffy's Soulmate.
"Why is that picture going all 'Exorcist' though?" he asked instead of singing his happy song.
"I don't know to much about it, but it's coming through from the mortal realm. It's very unusual. It's Soulmate material, the ability to reach each other even through death." Jenny re-emptied the frame into the sink.
"But it is blood." Xander insisted, "Can't you call somebody and see what's going on. If it's some type of connection that's coming through the picture something could be wrong."
Jenny set the picture down and looked at Xander, "I'm going." was all she said before she hurried out of the bathroom.
Xander's eyes locked on the picture, the frame now refilled with blood, and he was only vaguely aware of the sound of the front door closing.
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End Part 22